63. Angel's Tip by Alafair Burke

Ellie Hatcher #2
listened on Audible
2008, Harper
352 pgs.
Adult Murder Mystery/Police Procecural
Finished 10/22/17
Goodreads rating:  3.76 * 2459 ratings
My rating:  4
Setting: Contemporary NYC

First line/s:  "The man leaned forward on his stool to make room for a big-boned redhead who was reaching for the two glasses of pinot grigio she'd ordered."

My comments:  Once again, Ellie Hatcher, NYPD cop, is after a serial killer - this one targeting young party girls with long blonde hair.  In the first book in the series we're given a glimpse into the world of online dating, this time we're given a glimpse of the late night NYC club scene.  Every once in awhile we're allowed to get into the head of the serial killer without any kind of identification, which makes it really interesting.  I'm not sure why I'm drawn to these gory murder mysteries, but Ellie Hatcher is really smart and astute, her new partner is almost too good to be true - and very likable - and the endless careening around New York City (for this NYC lover) is a really nice plus.  It was read really well, too.

Goodreads synopsis: Acclaimed thriller writer Alafair Burke delves into the underworld of the Manhattan nightclub scene in Angel’s Tip. Burke is the daughter of crime fiction superstar James Lee Burke, creator of Cajun detective Dave Robicheaux, prompting the Fort Worth Star-Telegram to proclaim that “this fast-paced-but-human thriller proves that writing talent is genetic.” A superb crime novel featuring NYPD Detective Ellie Hatcher (“a strong female protagonist in the tradition of Sara Paretsky’s V.I. Warshawski and Marcia Muller’s Sharon McCone” —Boston Globe), Angel’s Tip follows Ellie’s investigation into the murder of a young college student, quite possibly by a member of New York’s young moneyed elite, and fans of Lisa Gardner, Karin Slaughter, Harlan Coben, and Sue Grafton will most definitely want to trail along.

PICTURE BOOK - A Very Improbable Story by Edward Einhorn

Illustrated by Adam Gustavson

2008, Charlesbridge

HC $16.95

32 pgs.

Goodreads rating:  3.99 - 94 ratings

My rating:  4

Endpapers: Dark blue

Illustrations on much or most of page, text is on white

1^st line/s:  "one morning Ethan woke up with a cat on his head."

My comments:   Oh my gosh, what a great picture book to introduce probability to older kids!  It's cute and fun and gives wonderful mathematical information in a straight-forward, interesting way.  It gets a little convoluted at the end, but if it's being used as a read aloud, stress and pausing  can be used  effectively, and then play a probability game similar to one described in the book and VOILA!!

Goodreads:  Ethan wakes up one morning with a talking cat on his head. The cat refuses to budge until Ethan wins a game of probability. Without looking, Ethan must pick out a dime from his coin collection, or two matching socks from his dresser, or do something else improbable. Avery improbable story about a challenging math concept. Author: Edward Einhorn Format: 32 pages, paperback Ages: 7-10

60. Blackman's Coffin by Mark de Castrique

read on my Kindle and listened to using Whisper-Sync on Audible
2008 Poisoned Pen Press
255 pgs.
Adult Murder Mystery
Finished 11/2/16
Goodreads rating:  3.94 - 545 ratings
My rating: 4 - I liked it a whole lot
Setting: Contemporary Asheville, North Carolina (with forays back to 1919 via a journal)

First line/s:  "I felt a hand on my shoulder, shaking me awake.   'Now you can pass as a local.  They've all got one leg shorter than the other.  Comes from being raised on the side of a mountain.'"

My comments:  This was one of the first purchases I made when I started using Bookbub, which has introduced me to all sorts of authors that I've never heard of before.  I definitely liked Sam Blackman and his investigative prowess.  He has lost much of a leg serving in Iraq, and we meet him while he is ending his rehabilitation in Asheville, North Carolina.  I've been to Asheville several times and have extremely fond memories - of traversing onto and off the Blue Ridge Parkway, of visiting the Biltmore Estate, and of poking around.  I got to do more poking around while reading this book - the setting of Asheville takes a front seat, as does the writing of Thomas Wolfe and great history of the early 20th century including geology and gem-mining.  Excellent mystery.  I'm hoping the setting stays in Asheville, I look forward to more books in the series.

Goodreads synopsis:  What's really hidden beneath Asheville's rich history? Sam Blackman is an angry man. (NOTE from Muddy Puddle:  I didn't consider Sam Blackman an angry man at all...) A Chief Warrant Officer in the Criminal Investigation Detachment of the U.S. military, he lost a leg in Iraq. His outspoken criticism of his medical treatment resulted in his transfer to the Veteran's Hospital in Asheville, NC. Then an ex-marine and fellow amputee named Tikima Robertson walks into his hospital room.Tikima hints that she has an opportunity for Sam to use his investigative skills--if he can stop feeling sorry for himself. But before she can return, Tikima is murdered, her body found floating in the river. Tikima's sister, Nakayla, brings Sam a journal she finds in Tikima's apartment. The volume dates to 1919 and contains the entries of a twelve-year-old boy who accompanies his father, a white funeral director, as they help a black man, Elijah Robertson, transport his deceased relative to a small family plot in Georgia. Nearly ninety years ago, Elijah's body was found in the French Broad River, a crime foreshadowing the death of his great-great granddaughter--Tikima's.Sam and Nakayla must devle into Asheville's rich history, the legacy of the Vanderbilts at the Biltmore estate and of author Tom Wolfe, to uncover the murderous truth. Blackman's Coffin starts a new series by Mark de Castrique, author of the critically-acclaimed Buryin' Barry Mysteries. 

32. Dead Time - Stephen White

Alan Gregory #16
audio read by Dick Hill
11 unabridged cds...13 hrs....on the road from Tucson to PA
2008, Dutton Adult
397 pgs.
Contemporary Mystery
Finished 5/31/16
Goodreads rating: 3.82 (1503 ratings)
My rating:  4
Setting: Grand Canyon bottom and Colorado

First line/s:  "She disappeared into a crack in the earth."

My comments:  This was my first foray into this series, and I was told that I'd be okay if I didn't start with the first.  I liked it.  It was written from three points-of-view... Alan Gregory (a psychologist and the protagonist of the series); his ex-wife, Merideth; and a third person voice that describes a happening at the Grand Canyon's Phantom Ranch a few years previously that becomes the crux of the story.  Each of the numerous characters have backstories and difficulties they're coping with along with the current mystery, and I love the way it was all woven together.  I liked some of the characters, rolled my eyes at others, and laughed at and with some of them.  Great characterization and consuming storyline.  So why not a five?  A little too much conversation and rehashing - the book could have edited out some of the redundancy and extra long-winded-ness.  It was fine for a long cross-country drive, however.

Goodreads synopsis:  After the shocking developments in Dry Ice, Colorado psychologist Alan Gregory is struggling to deal with his newly adopted son and repair his shaky, though generally improving, marriage. But then Alan’s ex-wife, Merideth, reappears, seeking help she feels only Alan can give. Suddenly Alan is pulled into a mystery that reaches back years to a camping trip at the Grand Canyon involving Merideth’s fiancé and five friends whose lives were changed forever when a young woman mysteriously vanished from the Canyon floor. 
          Enlisting the help of friend and detective Sam Purdy, Alan finds himself pitted against new demons and unseen enemies as he tries to uncover the connection between the unexplained disappearance at the Grand Canyon and Merideth’s missing surrogate. The clock is ticking, and as Alan’s and Sam’s investigations take them from New York City to Los Angeles to the cavernous reaches of the Canyon itself, Alan unearths a series of secrets and deceptions that someone wishes to keep buried at all costs.

59. The Knife of Never Letting Go - Patrick Ness

Chaos Walking #1
listened to audio cd.
2008 Candlewick
479 pgs.
YA SciFi/Dystopia
Finished 9-7-15
Goodreads rating:  3.95
My rating:  Really didn't like it at all - too upper-level stressful, no down time....
Setting: a small planet similar to earth in a faraway place

First line/s:  "The first thing you find out when yer dog learns to talk is that dogs don't go nothing much to say.  About anything."

My comments:  I've waited a few days to see if my original opinion abated a bit - but it's only grown stronger.  I love the premise of this book, but I was put off by the stress-level and ugliness.  I listened to it - and the narrator did a wonderful job of depicting what Todd felt, saw, heard -- but it was incredibly overwhelming to me, my stomach and jaws were clenched, I dreaded returning to it and almost didn't finish it.  I didn't realize it was the first in a series, so was utterly disappointed at the so-called end.  So-- Mr. Ness did a grand job in eliciting feeling and emotion, but reading for me is pleasure and I found not even the tiniest pleasure in the reading of this book.  I've read others' reviews and I'm really glad that it's been enjoyed by so many!

Goodreads Summary:  Prentisstown isn't like other towns. Everyone can hear everyone else's thoughts in an overwhelming, never-ending stream of Noise. Just a month away from the birthday that will make him a man, Todd and his dog, Manchee -- whose thoughts Todd can hear too, whether he wants to or not -- stumble upon an area of complete silence. They find that in a town where privacy is impossible, something terrible has been hidden -- a secret so awful that Todd and Manchee must run for their lives.

But how do you escape when your pursuers can hear your every thought? 

72. The Girl Who Stopped Swimming - Joshilyn Jackson

Audio read by the author

Unabridged cds (9:24)

2008

311 pgs.

Adult CRF/Mystery

Finished 11/30/2014

Goodreads rating: 3.43

My rating:   3.5 Liked it a lot

Contemporary Florida

1st sentence/s: "Until the drowned girl came to Laurel's bedroom, ghosts had never walked in Victoriana.  The houses were only twenty years old with no accumulated history to put creaks in the hardwood floors or rattle at the pipes."

My comments:  I really love Joshilyn Jackson's writing.  Her descriptions are .... elegant.
The way she writes her characters make it seem as if you know them, or someone like them.  Her plots are always interesting, woven in fascinating ways.  This one had an element of "ghosts" that were not real, just in the protagonist's head, much like they could be in anyone's head, whether we'd like to admit it or not.  But the icing on the cake?  Jackson, herself, was the reader of this audio book.  And she was just plain terrific.  She has become one of my very favorite writers.

Goodreads book summary:  Laurel Gray Hawthorne needs to make things pretty. Coming from a family with a literal skeleton in their closet, she's developed this talent all her life, whether helping her willful mother to smooth over the reality of her family's ugly past, or elevating humble scraps of unwanted fabric into nationally acclaimed art quilts. 
          Her sister Thalia, an impoverished "Actress" with a capital A, is her opposite, and prides herself in exposing the lurid truth lurking behind life's everyday niceties. And while Laurel's life was neatly on track, a passionate marriage, a treasured daughter, and a lovely home in lovely suburban Victorianna, everything she holds dear is thrown into question the night she is visited by an apparition in her bedroom. The ghost appears to be her 14-year-old neighbor Molly Dufresne, and when Laurel follows this ghost , she finds the real Molly floating lifeless in her swimming pool. While the community writes the tragedy off as a suicide, Laurel can't. Reluctantly enlisting Thalia's aid, Laurel sets out on a life-altering investigation that triggers startling revelations about her own guarded past, the truth about her marriage, and the girl who stopped swimming.

18. Chasing Darkness - Robert Crais

#12 Elvis Cole/Joe Pike

audio read by James Daniels

8 unabridged discs, 7 hours

2008, Brilliance Audio

288 pgs.

Adult Murder Mystery

Finished 3/27/14

Goodreads Rating: 4.14

My Rating: 4.5 (Loved it)

PBS - now it's my turn to send it off into the great unknown -

Setting:  LA (or course!)

My comments:   I really enjoy Robert Crais' writing.  A lot.  He writes believable mysteries that keep me guessing. I love Elvis Cole. He's fun and funny.  I want to learn more about Joe Pike, but I like that he's kept a bit mysterious.   You can read this series in any order - I have and it works just fine. Bring 'em on!

Goodreads Review  It's fire season, and the hills of Los Angeles are burning. When police and fire department personnel rush door to door in a frenzied evacuation effort, they discover the week-old corpse of an apparent suicide. But the gunshot victim is less gruesome than what they find in his lap: a photo album of seven brutally murdered young women -- one per year, for seven years. And when the suicide victim is identified as a former suspect in one of the murders, the news turns Elvis Cole's world upside down.
          Three years earlier Lionel Byrd was brought to trial for the murder of a female prostitute named Yvonne Bennett. A taped confession coerced by the police inspired a prominent defense attorney to take Byrd's case, and Elvis Cole was hired to investigate. It was Cole's eleventh-hour discovery of an exculpatory videotape that allowed Lionel Byrd to walk free. Elvis was hailed as a hero.
          But the discovery of the death album in Byrd's lap now brands Elvis as an unwitting accomplice to murder. Captured in photographs that could only have been taken by the murderer, Yvonne Bennett was the fifth of the seven victims -- two more young women were murdered after Lionel Byrd walked free. So Elvis can't help but wonder -- did he, Elvis Cole, cost two more young women their lives?
Shut out of the investigation by a special LAPD task force determined to close the case, Elvis Cole and Joe Pike desperately fight to uncover the truth about Lionel Byrd and his nightmare album of death -- a truth hidden by lies, politics, and corruption in a world where nothing is what it seems to be.:

Sepulchre - Kate Mosse

Audio read by Donada Peters

16 discs - I made it through 6 of them

2008 Penguin Audio

560 pgs. - I read 205

Adult - Switched back and forth between 1891 and the present

Historical Fiction & CRF

Goodreads Rating: 3.68

My Rating: 1 (Didn't like it)

Acquired through PBS

Set in France - Paris and the countryside

My comments: I listened attentively to the first six cds.  Since it takes place in France, the reader did a wonderful job using French accents, and I enjoyed her reading.  But the story dragged.  Switching back and forth in time, there are two protagonists.  The 1891 protagonist, Leonie - is a spoiled idiot.  The 2000 protagonist isn't too irritating (yet), but her primary interest - Claude Debussy - is of no interest to me. Ten more discs to go?  Sorry, life's not long enough.....

Goodreads:  In 1891, young Léonie Vernier and her brother Anatole arrive in the beautiful town of Rennes-les-Bains, in southwest France. They've come at the invitation of their widowed aunt, whose mountain estate, Domain de la Cade, is famous in the region. But it soon becomes clear that their aunt Isolde-and the Domain-are not what Léonie had imagined. The villagers claim that Isolde's late husband died after summoning a demon from the old Visigoth sepulchre high on the mountainside. A book from the Domain's cavernous library describes the strange tarot pack that mysteriously disappeared following the uncle's death. But while Léonie delves deeper into the ancient mysteries of the Domain, a different evil stalks her family-one which may explain why Léonie and Anatole were invited to the sinister Domain in the first place.
          More than a century later, Meredith Martin, an American graduate student, arrives in France to study the life of Claude Debussy, the nineteenth century French composer. In Rennesles- Bains, Meredith checks into a grand old hotel-the Domain de la Cade. Something about the hotel feels eerily familiar, and strange dreams and visions begin to haunt Meredith's waking hours. A chance encounter leads her to a pack of tarot cards painted by Léonie Vernier, which may hold the key to this twenty-first century American's fate . . . just as they did to the fate of Léonie Vernier more than a century earlier.

7. Deadly Harvest - Heather Graham

There are supposedly three books, each about a different PI brother....This is Flynn Brothers #2

Audio read by Phil Gigante

9 unabridged discs/ 10:28

2008, Brilliance Audio

385 pgs.

Finished 1/28/2014

Adult Murder Mystery

Goodreads Rating: 3.96 (Whaaaaa?)

My Rating:  1/Didn't like it at all -  actually, it was painful .....

TPPL

Setting: Contemporary Salem, Massachusetts

My comments:  Yuck.  I always hate writing a negative review, it makes me feel so badly for the author.  But this book really stunk.  Predictable, repetitious, boring dialogue, stereotypical relationships, characters that could be interchangeable, a head-scratching inclusion of the sort-of-supernatural....and a depiction of the city of contemporary Salem, Massachusetts that is completely misleading.  Top that off with an audio reading that gives the characters crazy southern accents and I'm left cringing.  I can't believe I finished it.  Yuck.  Again.  No more Heather Graham for me.  Just not my cuppa tea.

Goodreads:  When a young woman is found dead in a field, dressed up as a scarecrow with a slashed grin and a broken neck, the residents of Salem, Massachusetts, begin to fear that the infamous Harvest Man is more than just a rumor. But out-of-town cop Jeremy Flynn doesn't have time for ghost stories. He's in town on another investigation, looking for a friend's wife, who mysteriously vanished in a cemetery.  

     Complicating his efforts is local occult expert Rowenna Cavanaugh, who launches her own investigation, convinced that a horror from the past has crept into the present and is seducing women to their deaths. Jeremy uses logic and solid police work. Rowenna depends on intuition. But they both have the same goal: to stop the abductions and locate the missing women before Rowenna herself falls prey to the Harvest Man's dark seduction.

3. City of Ashes - Cassandra Clare

The Mortal Instruments #2

read on my phone through Kindle

2008, Margaret K. McElderry

453 pages (which includes the beginning of the next book)

Finished Sunday, 1/13/2014 (Have been reading this for awhile)

YA Dystopia/Paranormal

Goodreads Rating:  4.26 (270,000+ ratings!)

My Rating: 3/Liked it

Setting: NYC

1^st sentence/s: "The formidable glass-and-steel structure rose from its position on Front Street like a glittering needle threading the sky."

My comments:  Lots of battling, descriptions of demons and bad guys, people not telling each other the whole truth, which puts everyone in precarious positions...and quite a few hints of possibilities to come.  It kept me reading, and will continue to, I imagine, for the rest of the series....

Goodreads Review:  Clary Fray just wishes that her life would go back to normal. But what's normal when you're a demon-slaying Shadowhunter, your mother is in a magically induced coma, and you can suddenly see Downworlders like werewolves, vampires, and faeries? If Clary left the world of the Shadowhunters behind, it would mean more time with her best friend, Simon, who's becoming more than a friend. But the Shadowhunting world isn't ready to let her go — especially her handsome, infuriating, newfound brother, Jace. And Clary's only chance to help her mother is to track down rogue Shadowhunter Valentine, who is probably insane, certainly evil — and also her father.

     To complicate matters, someone in New York City is murdering Downworlder children. Is Valentine behind the killings — and if he is, what is he trying to do? When the second of the Mortal Instruments, the Soul-Sword, is stolen, the terrifying Inquisitor arrives to investigate and zooms right in on Jace. How can Clary stop Valentine if Jace is willing to betray everything he believes in to help their father?
     In this breathtaking sequel to City of Bones, Cassandra Clare lures her readers back into the dark grip of New York City's Downworld, where love is never safe and power becomes the deadliest temptation.

27. Fearless Fourteen - Janet Evanovich

#14 Stephanie Plum
Audio read by Lorelei King

7 unabridged cds

Macmillan Audio, 2008

310 pgs.

Goodreads rating: 3.98

My rating: 4/Really good - very, very funny

Adult "murder" mystery

Setting: contemporary Trenton, NJ

1st line/s:

My comments:  Okay, this one was funny (yes, ridiculous.....) but funny!  I've found that you have to read these with tongue-in-cheek.  Stephanie's antics seem to be calming down quite a bit, but Lula's are still going strong, and the variety of odd characters that Stephanie acquires - and accepts - without questions is wonderfully fun.  And Grandma Mazer.....I want to meet her...or BE her...in another 25 years!

Goodreads summary:  Personal vendettas, hidden treasure, and a monkey named Carl will send bounty hunter Stephanie Plum on her most explosive adventure yet.

The Crime:  Armed robbery to the tune of nine million dollars.  Dom Rizzi robbed a bank, stashed the money, and did the time. His family couldn’t be more proud. He always was the smart one. The Cousin:  Joe Morelli.  Joe Morelli, Dom Rizzi, and Dom’s sister, Loretta, are cousins. Morelli is a cop, Rizzi robs banks, and Loretta is a single mother waiting tables at the firehouse. The all-American family.
The Complications:  Murder, kidnapping, destruction of personal property, and acid reflux. Less than a week after Dom’s release from prison, Joe Morelli has shadowy figures breaking into his house and dying in his basement. He’s getting threatening messages, Loretta is kidnapped, and Dom is missing.  The Catastrophe:  Moonman.   Morelli hires Walter “Mooner” Dunphy, stoner and “inventor” turned crime fighter, to protect his house. Morelli can’t afford a lot on a cop’s salary, and Mooner will work for potatoes.  The Cupcake:  Stephanie Plum.  Stephanie and Morelli have a long-standing relationship that involves sex, affection, and driving each other nuts. She’s a bond enforcement agent with more luck than talent, and she’s involved in this bank-robbery-gone-bad disaster from day one.  The Crisis:  A favor for Ranger.  Security expert Carlos Manoso, street name Ranger, has a job for Stephanie that will involve night work. Morelli has his own ideas regarding Stephanie’s evening activities.  The Conclusion:  Only the fearless should read Fourteen.

National Geographic Countries of the World SERIES

After hunting and hunting, reading through many different series of books about different world countries in the libraries and bookstores, I've decided that this series is the most accessible to my fourth graders.  Many are daunted by too much text - I think that is why I still dislike/d reading nonfiction.  This series is full of photos and maps (it IS by National Geographic!) and there's not one single page that is only text.  It's extremely readable and the information is interesting and seems current and well-researched.  I plan to use them in my classroom as literature circles, each group focusing on a different country and becoming an "expert" by reading this nonfiction book along with some fiction.
And in my reading from other sources, I've discovered that Afghanistan's largest income from agriculture is ..... opium!

Afghanistan
Susan Whitfield
2008, 64 pages


Population:  almost 32 million
Official languages: Dari (Afghan Persian) and Pashtu
Capital: Kabul

9. Heat Lightning - John Sandford

#2 Virgil Flowers

audio read by Eric Conger

unabridged cd: (9:59)

Putnam Adult, 2008

400 pgs.

Written for adults

Genre: Mystery/ Murder Mystery

Goodreads Rating: 4.06

My Rating:  4/Liked it a lot

Awesome (5) Loved it (4) Liked it (3) It was okay (2) Didn’t like it (1) (WORDS AND NUMBER)

Acquired TPPL

Setting: contemporary Minnesota

 My comments:  I read them out of order, this was the third one I read but the second one in the series. Easy to listen to, quite a bit of humor, I really like the personality of Virgil Flowers. The long hair, the band T shirts, even the womanizing all appeal to me and make his character seem real. This particular mystery was interesting but forgettable, it's the little details about the personalities that I remember most.

Goodreads Review: Flowers is only in his late thirties, but he's been around the block a few times, and he doesn't think much can surprise him anymore. He's wrong.

It's a hot, humid summer night in Minnesota, and Flowers is in bed with one of his ex-wives (the second one, if you're keeping count), when the phone rings. It's Lucas Davenport. There's a body in Stillwater, two shots to the head, found near a veterans' memorial. And the victim has a lemon in his mouth.

Exactly like the body they found last week.

The more Flowers works the murders, the more convinced he is that someone's keeping a list, and that the list could have a lot more names on it. If he could only find out what connects them all . . . and then he does, and he's almost sorry he did. Because if it's true, then this whole thing leads down a lot more trails than he thought and every one of them is booby-trapped.

South - Patrick McDonnell

(creator of the comic strip "Mutts")
2008, Little Brown & Co.
$14.99 HC
www.muttscomics.com
Goodreads: 4.43
my rating:  Liked it a lot (4.5)
40 pgs. & endpapers
Endpapers (& all pages) recycled beige

This simple, wordless picture book is super -- sweet and quite a lovely story.  It is autumn.  A flock of songbirds takes off for the south and forgets one of their own, who is asleep on the ground under a tree.  Along comes a cat who helps him through all sorts of strange,foreign terrain...pages and pages of a journey....until they come upon the bird's flock, resting on a telephone wire.  By now the bird and cat are close friends and their parting is a meaningful one.

Yes, my fourth graders could write a lovely story to go with this.  The simple beige/brown/pale yellow pages could easily be photocopied for students to use -- and even water color in the pale blues and greens that appear here and there.

(Note to self:  Check out other books by this author.  Are they wordless?  (The Gift of Nothing, Art, Just Like Heaven, Hug Time.)  "Sometimes it takes a friend to help you find your way."

46. Graceling - Kristin Cashore

audio read by a full cast
Graceling Realm Book #1
11 unabridged cds (12:30)
Full Cast Audio, 2009
Graceling copyright 2008
471 pages
There's a map of the seven kingdoms on the enpapers
Goodreads rated 4.13
I rated this 4 stars, I liked it a lot.
for: YA (there is a very small amount of older-kid antics which would make me a tiny bit reluctant to give to anyone younger than middle school)

I listened to this, it was a "full cast" recording, and very good. Kristin Cashore has a new one out that is supposed to be excellent, and it was strongly suggested to read this one first. I'm glad I did, am on the waiting list for Bitterblue, which takes place 8 years later.

Katsa, the protagonist, wasn't one of my favorite characters.  She's pretty self-absorbed, headstrong, and has little care for those she doesn't like or agree with.  She's smart and brave, but extremely cocky.  Her "love interest," Po, and the 10 year -old girl they save, Bitterblue, are much more likable.

When someone in the Seven Kingdoms is born with two different-colored eyes, that means they are born with some kind of "grace," something they can do remarkably well.  Katsa's grace is as a killer, although the actual more accurate title she discovers later in the book.  Po has to hide his grace (SPOILER: he can read the minds of or sense the thoughts and feelings of anyone that's thinking of him)  by calling himself a great fighter.  People with grace's are given wide berth.

Katsa has always been used by her uncle, King Randa, to punish his enemies.  She hates this.  But she must to what he bids to survive.  She and a few loyal friends create a "counsel," and they try to right some of the Seven Kingdoms' wrongs.  That is how she first meets Po, from the Island Kingdom of Leonid.

This was a good adventure, had a little ya boy-girl you-know-what going on, though nothing graphic.  She is indeed a feisty, strong female role-model and i will encourage middle schoolers to try this one out.

Notes to remember before reading a sequel:  King Randa, her uncle, is not a really nice guy.  However, his son Prince Raffin, is 3 years older than Katsa and her best friend.  He is a scientist/chemist who makes all the helpful drugs the council needs in its good-doings.  Oll is Randa's underlord, a spymaster (a "graying captain") and helped raise Katsa.  Giddon, another sidekick, has been very protective and asked her to marry him.  So he's now a bit jealous.

kristincashore.blogspot.com
www.gracelingrealm.com

Sunday Shorts

Goodreads has a meme called Sunday Shorts - you read short stories (from anywhere --books, magazines, internet site, free Kindle downloads), then write a little about them.  Short stories have never been my forte, so I'm going to try to read a few, at least for the summer.....

So I've started with Ghosts of Chicago by John McNally, written in 2008. 

The first story is titled "Return Policy," and it was really offbeat and I liked it a lot.  After being married for 18 years, Mark Timber's wife has left him.  So he decides it's only right to return every single wedding gift they received.  There's an element of loneliness ... aloneness .... that really struck a chord with me.  Everyone treats grief and sadness differently, and the things Mark chooses to do come from a deep place in himself.  I'm looking forward to more!

9. The White Mary - Kira Salak

audio read by Joyce Bean
2008, Brilliance Audio
10 cds, 12 hours
$36.95
368 pgs.
Written for adults
Rating:  4/Liked it a lot

Setting:  Contemporary Boston and Papua New Guinea
OSS:  A young, female journalist risks her life tramping through the tropical rainforest of Papua New Guinea following a tenuous clue about her dead hero.
1st Sentence:  "The black waters of Elobi Creek show no sign of a current  It is another dead waterway, Marika tells herself, one that will breed only mosquitoes and crocodiles.  Another waterway that somehow reflects -- in the darkness of the water, in its stillness -- all of her failings."

I certainly had no idea the direction of the plot when I began this book. Marika Vecera, a talented 33-year old journalist who has seen horrible things - genocide, torture, rape, unbelievable despair -  in all sorts of countries around the world, lives, herself, in despair, never allowing herself any happiness.  When she becomes involved in writing a biography of journalist Robert Lewis, whom she has idolized her whole adult life,  she begins a journey through the incredible, dense jungles of Papua New Guinea....a journey that helps her emerge from her despair to begin to understand and appreciate her own life.

63. The Dark Tide - Andrew Gross

Audio read by Melissa Leo
Harper Audio, 2008
9 unabridged cds
11.5 hours
434 pages
Rating:  5 at the beginning, 1 after about the halfway point,  so.....2.5 I guess.....
Setting:  Contemporary Old Greenwich, Connecticut
OSS:  When Karen Friedman's husband is killed in a terrorist train bombing, she meets Greenwich Investigator Ty Hauck, and together they try to unravel a mystery that ties Charlie Friendman's death and another death in the area.

First line:  As the morning sun canted sharply through the bedroom window, Charles Friedman dropped the baton.

This is a very good story, which starts out tight and clear.  But once the mystery begins full throttle and Ty and Karen begin to "like" each other, it slows down....a lot.  But the really, really irritating thing for me is the way that whenever the characters have a dialogue with one another, they say each other's same repeatedly....over.....and over....and over again. Blech.

The bad guys are very bad.  The good guys have flaws.  The rich don't know how good they have it, or want more.  High finances, hedge funds....if you're not on top of that sort of thing, you're more or less along for the ride, because the details went right over my head.  I was excited about this author when I began reading, but don't think I'll be reading another of his for awhile, unless I forget.

46. The Beach House - Jane Green

Audio read by Cassandra Campbell
Penguin Audio, 2008
9 unabridged cds
11 hours
352 pgs.
Rating:  4

Setting:  Nantucket

One-sentence summary:  A small cast of characters rent rooms in Nan Powell's "Windemere" one summer, creating a family of sorts:  Daniel, newly divorced and just out-of-the-closet; Daff and her13-year-old daughter, Jess, who is trying to deal with her parents' divorce; Michael, Nan's son, home to Nantucket from NYC and a troublesome affair with his boss.

This is a feel-good book with a happy ending.  Everyone needs one of these once in awhile, and it was read so beautifully that I looked forward to just listening to the words wrapping around me.  Cassandra Campbell has a lovely voice and puts just enough special inflection and personality into the voice of each character that you can tell them apart instantly.

You really get to know the characters, including the exes and dead .  Green makes sure we get a sampling of every part of life and death, joy and sadness, euphoria and misery, uncertainty and despair.  Yup, she's wrapped it all up in this one story.  It was a good "listen."

26. Stranger in Paradise - Robert B. Parker

Audio read by James Naughton
Random House Audio, 2008
$14.99
5 discs, 5 hrs.
Rating: 3.5

I'm writing this many months after I listened to it......This is not a Spenser, it's a Jesse Stone, who is the police chief of Paradise, Massachusetts, a town on or near the Cape, if I remember right. He is visited by someone that Jesse knows is wanted, an Apache hitman named "Crow." And although Crow is the "bad guy," it seems that Jesse has some respect for him. Crow's looking for a young girl who grew up in the area and is now hanging with gangs. He is working for her father, who wants her brought to him in Florida. And Jesse's ex-wife is investigating gang violence for the TV station she works for. The story winds around itself and is solved in Parker's ever-clever, no-holes-barred way.