Cynthia's bookshelf: all en-US Thu, 01 May 2025 19:08:57 -0700 60 Cynthia's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg the gatekeeper 40784720 December 1920.
Hours after his sister’s wedding, late at night, a restless Ian Rutledge drives down a country road somewhere en route to Ipswich. Haunted by the past, he narrowly misses a motorcar stopped in the middle of a desolate road. Standing beside the vehicle is a frightened young woman in party dress—and blood on her hands, a dead man at her feet.

She swears she didn’t kill Stephen Wentworth. A stranger was standing in the middle of the road, so they had to stop. Wentworth got out to ask if the stranger needed help, and without warning, he shot Wentworth straight through the heart, then vanished into the night. The shaken woman insists it all happened so quickly, she never saw the man’s face. There is no trace, other than the tiny carved wolf left as a calling card.

Although he is a witness after the fact, Rutledge persuades the Yard to give him the inquiry, since he’s on the scene. But is he seeking justice—or fleeing painful memories in London?

Wentworth was well-liked, yet his family paints a malevolent portrait, calling him a murderer. But who did Wentworth kill? Is his death retribution? Or has his companion lied?

Wolfpit, his village, has a notorious history: in medieval times, the last wolf in England was allegedly trapped and killed there.

When a second suspicious death occurs, then a third, the evidence suggests that a dangerous predator is on the loose, and that death is closer than Rutledge knows.]]> Charles Todd Cynthia 3 english-mysteries 3.86 2018 the gatekeeper
author: Charles Todd
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2018
rating: 3
read at: 2025/05/01
date added: 2025/05/01
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
Not their best effort. These books are always good but this is one of the ones that falls into the pattern of the inspector in his car and endlessly driving around and asking the same people new questions. The resolution of the mystery is frankly unworthy of all the driving around we had to do.
]]> <![CDATA[The Black Ascot (Inspector Ian Rutledge, #21)]]> 40133569 Scotland Yard’s Ian Rutledge seeks a killer who has eluded Scotland Yard for years in this next installment of the acclaimed New York Times bestselling series.

An astonishing tip from a grateful ex-convict seems implausible—but Inspector Ian Rutledge is intrigued and brings it to his superior at Scotland Yard. Alan Barrington, who has evaded capture for ten years, is the suspect in an appalling murder during Black Ascot, the famous 1910 royal horserace honoring the late King Edward VII. His disappearance began a manhunt that consumed Britain for a decade. Now it appears that Barrington has returned to England, giving the Yard a last chance to retrieve its reputation and see justice done. Rutledge is put in charge of a quiet search under cover of a routine review of a cold case.

Meticulously retracing the original inquiry, Rutledge begins to know Alan Barrington well, delving into relationships and secrets that hadn’t surfaced in 1910. But is he too close to finding his man? His sanity is suddenly brought into question by a shocking turn of events. His sister Frances, Melinda Crawford, and Dr. Fleming stand by him, but there is no greater shame than shell shock. Questioning himself, he realizes that he cannot look back. The only way to save his career—much less his sanity—is to find Alan Barrington and bring him to justice. But is this elusive murderer still in England?

]]> 365 Charles Todd 0062678779 Cynthia 4 english-mysteries It was good, I enjoyed it.]]> 4.21 2019 The Black Ascot (Inspector Ian Rutledge, #21)
author: Charles Todd
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2019
rating: 4
read at: 2025/05/01
date added: 2025/05/01
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
I had started to read a Charles Finch mystery and it was so boring that it made me nostalgic for Charles Todd, so I chose this book from my library's list of audio books. It's very good. I can't remember what the plot was but ... it's enjoyable and doesn't fall into the trap of some of these books, which is to just have the inspector driving around in his car from one place to another and then interviewing and re interviewing the same people, and then having social engagements with his sister and Melinda Crawford.
It was good, I enjoyed it.
]]> <![CDATA[Adventures in the Louvre: How to Fall in Love with the World's Greatest Museum]]> 213395444 A former New York Times Paris bureau chief explores the Louvre, offering an intimate journey of discovery and revelation.


The Louvre is the most famous museum in the world, attracting millions of visitors every year with its masterpieces. In Adventures in the Louvre, Elaine Sciolino immerses herself in this magical space and helps us fall in love with what was once a forbidding fortress.


Exploring galleries, basements, rooftops, and gardens, Sciolino demystifies the Louvre, introducing us to her favorite artworks, both legendary and overlooked, and to the people who are the museum’s the curators, the artisans producing frames and engravings, the builders overseeing restorations, the firefighters protecting the aging structure.


Blending investigative journalism, travelogue, history, and memoir, Sciolino walks her readers through the museum’s front gates and immerses them in its irresistible, engrossing world of beauty and culture. Adventures in the Louvre reveals the secrets of this grand monument of Paris and basks in its timeless, seductive power.]]> 384 Elaine Sciolino 1324021403 Cynthia 4 4.37 Adventures in the Louvre: How to Fall in Love with the World's Greatest Museum
author: Elaine Sciolino
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.37
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2025/05/01
date added: 2025/05/01
shelves:
review:
The beginning and end of this book are 5 stars; the middle is ... 3.5. The beginning and end are fun and original and lively. The middle part of the book is exactly what Sciolino accuses the Louvre of being: an obligation. Every chapter is dedicated to an ethnic group or gender choice that feels unheard; everyone should have a voice, I'm not objecting to that. But as she points out herself, this is a museum dedicated to Western culture and its origins up to 1848, and it's tedious to have her dedicate chapter after chapter to proving that there is artwork at the museum celebrating trans love, and gay love, and women as leaders and not sexual objects. Even she seems bored with herself in these chapters, which feel like lists. But when this book is good, it's REALLY good. And of course it's important to show the place of underappreciated and underrepresented peoples but ... if you're going to do so, maybe do it in a fashion that is as lively as the rest of this book.
]]> Lock 14 44149 154 Georges Simenon 0143037277 Cynthia 3 3.59 1931 Lock 14
author: Georges Simenon
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.59
book published: 1931
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2025/04/28
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Rising Man (Sam Wyndham, #1)]]> 25686321 B019CGXRZM

The winner of the Harvill Secker/Daily Telegraph crime writing competition

Captain Sam Wyndham, former Scotland Yard detective, is a new arrival to Calcutta. Desperately seeking a fresh start after his experiences during the Great War, Wyndham has been recruited to head up a new post in the police force. But with barely a moment to acclimatise to his new life or to deal with the ghosts which still haunt him, Wyndham is caught up in a murder investigation that will take him into the dark underbelly of the British Raj.

A senior British official has been murdered, and a note left in his mouth warns the British to quit India: or else. With rising political dissent and the stability of the Raj under threat, Wyndham and his two new colleagues–arrogant Inspector Digby, who can barely conceal his contempt for the natives and British-educated, but Indian-born Sargeant Banerjee, one of the few Indians to be recruited into the new CID–embark on an investigation that will take them from the luxurious parlours of wealthy British traders to the seedy opium dens of the city.

The start of an atmospheric and enticing new historical crime series.]]> 400 Abir Mukherjee Cynthia 0 3.87 2016 A Rising Man (Sam Wyndham, #1)
author: Abir Mukherjee
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/24
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Salvation of a Saint (Detective Galileo, #2)]]> 13506866 330 Keigo Higashino 0312600682 Cynthia 0 to-read 4.01 2008 Salvation of a Saint (Detective Galileo, #2)
author: Keigo Higashino
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2008
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/24
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[F*ck You, I'm Irish: Why We Irish Are Awesome]]> 22541949 AN IN-YOUR-FACE COLLECTION OF TRIVIA THAT'S SURE TO INSPIRE CHEST-THUMPING PRIDE IN EVERYONE OF IRISH DESCENT

From battling oppression and famine in Ireland to overcoming poverty and discrimination in America, we Irish gained our fightin� moniker by standing up for our rights and earning the respect we deserve. Now, the amazing feats, astounding people and incredible facts in this fascinating book of Irish trivia will make you proudly say, “F*ck you, I’m Irish� because we’re...
�SMART
(from ancient monks to James Joyce)
�TOUGH
(from boxing champs to Liam Neeson)
�SEXY
(from redheaded lasses to Colin Farrell)
�TALENTED
(from step-dancing troupes to Bono)
�INVENTIVE
(from tech companies to the Model T)
�FUN
(from raucous wakes to St. Patrick’s Day)
and sometimes. . .
�BANJAXED
(thanks to great whiskey and Guinness)
]]> 192 Rashers Tierney 1612434061 Cynthia 0 to-read 3.94 2015 F*ck You, I'm Irish: Why We Irish Are Awesome
author: Rashers Tierney
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/24
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Book of the Crime (Henry Gamadge #16)]]> 32799704 81 Elizabeth Daly 1631940945 Cynthia 0 to-read 4.46 1951 The Book of the Crime (Henry Gamadge #16)
author: Elizabeth Daly
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.46
book published: 1951
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/24
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Book of the Dead (Henry Gamadge #8)]]> 19294329 227 Elizabeth Daly 1937384233 Cynthia 0 to-read 4.20 1944 The Book of the Dead (Henry Gamadge #8)
author: Elizabeth Daly
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.20
book published: 1944
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/24
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Red Queen (Antonia Scott, #1) 60784568
Red Queen is the first book in a trilogy that has sold over 2 million copies in Spain, sold to seventeen countries, and is the basis of an Amazon streaming series to debut in 2023.

Antonia Scott—the daughter of a British diplomat and a Spanish mother—has a gifted forensic mind, whose ability to reconstruct crimes and solve baffling murders is legendary. But after a personal trauma, she's refused to continue her work or even leave her apartment.

Jon Gutierrez, a police officer in Bilbao—disgraced, suspended, and about to face criminal charges—is offered a chance to salvage his career by a secretive organization that works in the shadows to direct criminal investigations of a highly sensitive nature. All he has to do is succeed where many others have failed: Convince a recalcitrant Antonia to come out of her self-imposed retirement, protecting her and helping her investigate a new, terrifying case.

The case is a macabre, ritualistic murder—a teen-aged boy from a wealthy family whose body was found without a drop of blood left in it. But the murder is just the start. A high-ranking executive and daughter of one of the richest men in Spain is kidnapped, a crime which is tied to the previous murder. Behind them both is a hidden mastermind with even more sinister plans. And the only person with a chance to see the connections, solve the crimes and successfully match wits with the killer before tragedy strikes again...is Antonia Scott.]]> 384 Juan Gómez-Jurado 1250853672 Cynthia 3 3.96 2018 Red Queen (Antonia Scott, #1)
author: Juan GĂłmez-Jurado
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2018
rating: 3
read at: 2025/04/14
date added: 2025/04/14
shelves:
review:
I found this book in a list of best French romans policiers and it got like 4,000 very positive reviews. Since it's actually a Spanish book, I ordered the English translation, which seemed to be very good. I didn't really enjoy the book, but I can see how other readers might. The parts where it's the kind of autistic detective is in conversation with the disgraced policeman are fun and funny and interesting; but those chapters are interspersed with a lot of cruel killing and torture. There's enough of that in real life, I don't really enjoy reading made up incidents of it in fiction. So, I put it down. But I think other people might enjoy this book.
]]> <![CDATA[La Jeune Fille et la nuit de Guillaume Musso (Analyse de l'oeuvre): Analyse complète et résumé détaillé de l'oeuvre (Fiche de lecture) (French Edition)]]> 54740401
Que faut-il retenir de  La Jeune Fille et la nuit , ce thriller haletant ? Retrouvez tout ce que vous devez savoir sur cette œuvre dans une analyse complète et détaillée.

Vous trouverez notamment dans cette fiche :
� Un résumé complet
� Une présentation des personnages principaux tels que Thomas Degalais, Vinca Rockwell ou Maxime Biancardini
� Une analyse des spécificités de l’œuvre : le genre du thriller, la double chronologie narrative, le thème de la relation amoureuse

Une analyse de référence pour comprendre  rapidement  le sens de l’œuvre.

À propos de la collection LePetitLitteraire.fr :
Plébiscité tant par les passionnés de littérature que par les lycéens, LePetitLittéraire.fr est considéré comme une référence en matière d’analyse d’œuvres classiques et contemporaines. Nos analyses, disponibles au format papier et numérique, ont été conçues pour guider les lecteurs à travers la littérature. Nos auteurs combinent théories, citations, anecdotes et commentaires pour vous faire découvrir et redécouvrir les plus grandes œuvres littéraires. 

LePetitLittéraire.fr est reconnu d’intérêt pédagogique par le ministère de l’Éducation. Plus d’informations sur lepetitlitteraire.fr]]> 29 lePetitLitteraire 2808014309 Cynthia 5 french-mysteries Interestingly, this book came out a few years after the Joel Dicker book The Harry Quebert affair, and they are VERY similar. I think this one is actually a better version of the story, it's a little tighter and there aren't as many weird anachronisms, and I say that as a big fan of Joel Dicker.
This book definitely made me want to read more Musso books. I've read I think three or four of them, and they were all good but I think this might be the best one.]]> 4.12 La Jeune Fille et la nuit de Guillaume Musso (Analyse de l'oeuvre): Analyse complète et résumé détaillé de l'oeuvre (Fiche de lecture) (French Edition)
author: lePetitLitteraire
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.12
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2025/04/14
date added: 2025/04/14
shelves: french-mysteries
review:
Really very good and I enjoyed it all the way through and there were no weird sidetrips into strange things that made me wonder if I wasn't translating correctly.
Interestingly, this book came out a few years after the Joel Dicker book The Harry Quebert affair, and they are VERY similar. I think this one is actually a better version of the story, it's a little tighter and there aren't as many weird anachronisms, and I say that as a big fan of Joel Dicker.
This book definitely made me want to read more Musso books. I've read I think three or four of them, and they were all good but I think this might be the best one.
]]> <![CDATA[Agatha Christie: Murder in the Making: More Stories and Secrets from Her Notebooks]]> 10771134
Starting his investigation in the 1920s, John Curran examines the conventions of detective fiction as it existed then and reveals how Agatha Christie's publisher talked her into changing the ending of her very first book, 'The Mysterious Affair at Styles', a move that almost certainly changed the fortunes of not only her career but also the future of the detective novel. For the very first time, this book prints Agatha's original ending, painstakingly transcribed from the hand-written draft in one of her earliest notebooks.

Every decade saw Agatha Christie's success grow to new heights. The emergence of the world-famous Collins Crime Club in 1930 brought with it the very first Miss Marple novel; the austerity of the 1940s had Agatha Christie preparing to kill off Hercule Poirot; and the 1950s saw her experiment increasingly with stories influenced by more modern thrillers. Focusing on more than 20 Christie novels as detailed evidence, John Curran demonstrates the evolution of Agatha's writing through the decades, including her perseverance through the Swinging Sixties and Seventies into old age, concluding with a look at Agatha's last notebook and her ideas for an unwritten final book.

As well as revealing more than a dozen unpublished book ideas, 'Agatha Christie's Murder in the Making' contains two new short stories from her archives - 'The Man Who Knew' and an early Miss Marple draft, 'The Case of the Caretaker's Wife'.

NB: The first edition, first printing, has the ISBN on the reverse of the title page as in this record of the book but the back of the dust wrapper carries a different ISBN - 9780007908561! In addition there seems to be a variant title in that in some editions the last word of the sub-title is 'Notebooks' as opposed to 'Archive'.]]> 432 John Curran 1620904098 Cynthia 5 english-mysteries I think I kind of expected there to be more evidence of Christie's notebooks, with her own notes to herself and scratches out etc, but as it turns out her notebooks are pretty much illegible, and are organized in a higgledy piggledy manner. They are numbered at random, and Christie would just pick up any notebook that was handy and scrawl notes and then put it down and later pick up another notebook and continue her thoughts about whatever story she was working on. John Curran deserves a knighthood or something for figuring out how to read the scrawl and for his super human efforts to make sense of and seize order from the anarchy of these notes.

It was really interesting to realize that Christie would come up with an idea first and then try all sorts of different ways of making a mystery and a story work, even to the point of constantly changing characters' names. It was affirming to realize that some of her stories ARE essentially the same story, with slightly different characters. It was interesting to realize that some of her stories were published first in the US and THEN in Britain, and sometimes with different titles and EVEN with different endings.

It was interesting in both books to get a better sense of the chronology of the stories and to realize that some of the books about Marple or Poirot or Tommy/Tuppence had many years between the publication of/writing of stories.

It was interesting to see where certain stories fall in the arc of her life and her storytelling. I think I'm unique in really loving the book Nemesis, which is not her strongest plot but which reveals a lot about what a stone cold killer Miss Marple is when she's on the hunt for the truth. Logically, many of the Miss Marple books were written later in Christie's life, when she too was an elderly woman.

And I didn't realize how MANY plays Christie had written, to great acclaim.

And it was interesting to realize that when I read Passenger to Frankfurt, it seemed weirdly bad ... and in fact it was one of her last novels and WAS really bad.

I do find the text in these books is a little confusing. You REALLY have to remember what the stories are, because Curran doesn't really ever give you straight exposition on them. He kind of gives you her notes and says "It COULD have been written like this, and she played with these ideas for this story." If you don't remember the stories (and there are a LOT of them...) it can be a little like reading code or... someone's notes. I'm not even THAT much of a Christie fan (although I DO love the BBC shows, which are often slightly different than the original text versions), but I really enjoyed these two books and I recommend them.]]> 4.37 2011 Agatha Christie: Murder in the Making: More Stories and Secrets from Her Notebooks
author: John Curran
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2011
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/24
date added: 2025/03/24
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
This book should not have been fun and interesting to read, and yet it was. I don't think the intention was (as with a cookbook) for anyone to read it word for word and cover to cover, and yet I did. And I followed it up by reading his second volume about the notebooks.
I think I kind of expected there to be more evidence of Christie's notebooks, with her own notes to herself and scratches out etc, but as it turns out her notebooks are pretty much illegible, and are organized in a higgledy piggledy manner. They are numbered at random, and Christie would just pick up any notebook that was handy and scrawl notes and then put it down and later pick up another notebook and continue her thoughts about whatever story she was working on. John Curran deserves a knighthood or something for figuring out how to read the scrawl and for his super human efforts to make sense of and seize order from the anarchy of these notes.

It was really interesting to realize that Christie would come up with an idea first and then try all sorts of different ways of making a mystery and a story work, even to the point of constantly changing characters' names. It was affirming to realize that some of her stories ARE essentially the same story, with slightly different characters. It was interesting to realize that some of her stories were published first in the US and THEN in Britain, and sometimes with different titles and EVEN with different endings.

It was interesting in both books to get a better sense of the chronology of the stories and to realize that some of the books about Marple or Poirot or Tommy/Tuppence had many years between the publication of/writing of stories.

It was interesting to see where certain stories fall in the arc of her life and her storytelling. I think I'm unique in really loving the book Nemesis, which is not her strongest plot but which reveals a lot about what a stone cold killer Miss Marple is when she's on the hunt for the truth. Logically, many of the Miss Marple books were written later in Christie's life, when she too was an elderly woman.

And I didn't realize how MANY plays Christie had written, to great acclaim.

And it was interesting to realize that when I read Passenger to Frankfurt, it seemed weirdly bad ... and in fact it was one of her last novels and WAS really bad.

I do find the text in these books is a little confusing. You REALLY have to remember what the stories are, because Curran doesn't really ever give you straight exposition on them. He kind of gives you her notes and says "It COULD have been written like this, and she played with these ideas for this story." If you don't remember the stories (and there are a LOT of them...) it can be a little like reading code or... someone's notes. I'm not even THAT much of a Christie fan (although I DO love the BBC shows, which are often slightly different than the original text versions), but I really enjoyed these two books and I recommend them.
]]> <![CDATA[Agatha Christie's Secret Notebooks: Fifty Years of Mysteries in the Making]]> 20658052
When Agatha Christie died in 1976, at age eighty-five, she had become the world's most popular author. With sales of more than two billion copies worldwide, in more than one hundred countries, she had achieved the impossible—more than one book every year since the 1920s, every one a bestseller.

So prolific was Agatha Christie's output—sixty-six crime novels, twenty plays, six romance novels under a pseudonym and more than one hundred and fifty short stories—it was often claimed that she had a photographic memory. Was this true? Or did she resort over those fifty-five years to more mundane methods of working out her ingenious crimes?

Following the death of Agatha's daughter, Rosalind, at the end of 2004, a remarkable legacy was revealed. Unearthed among her affairs at the family home of Greenway were Agatha Christie's private notebooks, seventy-three handwritten volumes of notes, lists and drafts outlining all her plans for her many books, plays and stories. Buried in this treasure trove, all in her unmistakable handwriting, are revelations about her famous books that will fascinate anyone who has ever read or watched an Agatha Christie story.

How did the infamous twist in The Murder of Roger Ackroyd really come about? Which very famous Poirot novel started life as an adventure for Miss Marple? Which books were designed to have completely differ-ent endings, and what were they? What were the plot ideas that she considered but rejected?

Full of details she was too modest to reveal in her own autobiography, this remarkable new book includes a wealth of excerpts and pages reproduced directly from the notebooks and her letters, plus, for the first time, two newly discovered complete Hercule Poirot short stories never before published.]]> 499 John Curran Cynthia 5 english-mysteries I think I kind of expected there to be more evidence of Christie's notebooks, with her own notes to herself and scratches out etc, but as it turns out her notebooks are pretty much illegible, and are organized in a higgledy piggledy manner. They are numbered at random, and Christie would just pick up any notebook that was handy and scrawl notes and then put it down and later pick up another notebook and continue her thoughts about whatever story she was working on. John Curran deserves a knighthood or something for figuring out how to read the scrawl and for his super human efforts to make sense of and seize order from the anarchy of these notes.

It was really interesting to realize that Christie would come up with an idea first and then try all sorts of different ways of making a mystery and a story work, even to the point of constantly changing characters' names. It was affirming to realize that some of her stories ARE essentially the same story, with slightly different characters. It was interesting to realize that some of her stories were published first in the US and THEN in Britain, and sometimes with different titles and EVEN with different endings.

It was interesting in both books to get a better sense of the chronology of the stories and to realize that some of the books about Marple or Poirot or Tommy/Tuppence had many years between the publication of/writing of stories.

It was interesting to see where certain stories fall in the arc of her life and her storytelling. I think I'm unique in really loving the book Nemesis, which is not her strongest plot but which reveals a lot about what a stone cold killer Miss Marple is when she's on the hunt for the truth. Logically, many of the Miss Marple books were written later in Christie's life, when she too was an elderly woman.

And I didn't realize how MANY plays Christie had written, to great acclaim.

And it was interesting to realize that when I read Passenger to Frankfurt, it seemed weirdly bad ... and in fact it was one of her last novels and WAS really bad.

I do find the text in these books is a little confusing. You REALLY have to remember what the stories are, because Curran doesn't really ever give you straight exposition on them. He kind of gives you her notes and says "It COULD have been written like this, and she played with these ideas for this story." If you don't remember the stories (and there are a LOT of them...) it can be a little like reading code or... someone's notes. I'm not even THAT much of a Christie fan (although I DO love the BBC shows, which are often slightly different than the original text versions), but I really enjoyed these two books and I recommend them.

]]> 4.01 2009 Agatha Christie's Secret Notebooks: Fifty Years of Mysteries in the Making
author: John Curran
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2009
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2025/03/24
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
This book should not have been fun and interesting to read, and yet it was. I don't think the intention was (as with a cookbook) for anyone to read it word for word and cover to cover, and yet I did. And I followed it up by reading his second volume about the notebooks.
I think I kind of expected there to be more evidence of Christie's notebooks, with her own notes to herself and scratches out etc, but as it turns out her notebooks are pretty much illegible, and are organized in a higgledy piggledy manner. They are numbered at random, and Christie would just pick up any notebook that was handy and scrawl notes and then put it down and later pick up another notebook and continue her thoughts about whatever story she was working on. John Curran deserves a knighthood or something for figuring out how to read the scrawl and for his super human efforts to make sense of and seize order from the anarchy of these notes.

It was really interesting to realize that Christie would come up with an idea first and then try all sorts of different ways of making a mystery and a story work, even to the point of constantly changing characters' names. It was affirming to realize that some of her stories ARE essentially the same story, with slightly different characters. It was interesting to realize that some of her stories were published first in the US and THEN in Britain, and sometimes with different titles and EVEN with different endings.

It was interesting in both books to get a better sense of the chronology of the stories and to realize that some of the books about Marple or Poirot or Tommy/Tuppence had many years between the publication of/writing of stories.

It was interesting to see where certain stories fall in the arc of her life and her storytelling. I think I'm unique in really loving the book Nemesis, which is not her strongest plot but which reveals a lot about what a stone cold killer Miss Marple is when she's on the hunt for the truth. Logically, many of the Miss Marple books were written later in Christie's life, when she too was an elderly woman.

And I didn't realize how MANY plays Christie had written, to great acclaim.

And it was interesting to realize that when I read Passenger to Frankfurt, it seemed weirdly bad ... and in fact it was one of her last novels and WAS really bad.

I do find the text in these books is a little confusing. You REALLY have to remember what the stories are, because Curran doesn't really ever give you straight exposition on them. He kind of gives you her notes and says "It COULD have been written like this, and she played with these ideas for this story." If you don't remember the stories (and there are a LOT of them...) it can be a little like reading code or... someone's notes. I'm not even THAT much of a Christie fan (although I DO love the BBC shows, which are often slightly different than the original text versions), but I really enjoyed these two books and I recommend them.


]]> <![CDATA[Agatha Christie's Secret Notebooks]]> 6533532 492 John Curran 0007310560 Cynthia 5 english-mysteries 4.22 2009 Agatha Christie's Secret Notebooks
author: John Curran
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2009
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/16
date added: 2025/03/24
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
SO great. It's unexpectedly a really compelling page turner, or it at least it was for me. Like the notebooks themselves, there is no consistent throughline of the narrative, just little intriguing bits and pieces (and occasional images of Christie's completely illegible notebook pages). Each chapter warns of which stories there will be spoilers; I didn't really think anything was spoiled. There are so many Christie stories and I've read probably all of them and have watched all the tv and movie versions, usually more than once. For the most part I can't quite remember which stories are which and how they end; there are just too many of them. So as this book is describing in quick shorthand notes a story and how it came about, it was less spoiling and more appetizing and made me want to go back and re watch or re read. As a writer, I found the process of how she came up with her stories really interesting (even though, again, you have to kind of put together the story yourself, there isn't a lot of narrative throughline). I have the sequel to this; I'm looking forward to reading it. I did note that there is a lot more attention paid to Poirot than to Marple. I've been listening to a lot of Marple books on audio lately and I feel that really the Marple books are under appreciated. I'm hoping there will be more Marple in the sequel.
]]> Raising Hare: A Memoir 214269337 A moving and fascinating meditation on freedom, trust, loss, and our relationship with the natural world, explored through the story of one woman’s unlikely friendship with a wild hare.

Imagine you could hold a baby hare and bottle-feed it. Imagine that it lived under your roof and lolloped around your bedroom at night, drumming on the duvet cover when it wanted your attention. Imagine that, over two years later, it still ran in from the fields when you called it and slept in your house for hours on end and gave birth to leverets in your study. For political advisor and speechwriter Chloe Dalton, who spent lockdown deep in the English countryside, far away from her usual busy London life, this became her unexpected reality.

In February 2021, Dalton stumbles upon a newborn hare—a leveret—that had been chased by a dog. Fearing for its life, she brings it home, only to discover how impossible it is to rear a wild hare, most of whom perish in captivity from either shock or starvation. Through trial and error, she learns to feed and care for the leveret with every intention of returning it to the wilderness. Instead, it becomes her constant companion, wandering the fields and woods at night and returning to Dalton’s house by day. Though Dalton feared that the hare would be preyed upon by foxes, stoats, feral cats, raptors, and even people, she never tried to restrict it to the house. Each time the hare leaves, Chloe knows she may never see it again. Yet she also understands that to confine it would be its own kind of death.

Raising Hare chronicles their journey together, while also taking a deep dive into the lives and nature of hares, and the way they have been viewed historically in art, literature, and folklore. We witness first-hand the joy at this extraordinary relationship between human and animal, which serves as a reminder that the best things, and most beautiful experiences, arise when we least expect them.]]> 285 Chloe Dalton 0593701844 Cynthia 3 4.42 2025 Raising Hare: A Memoir
author: Chloe Dalton
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/16
date added: 2025/03/16
shelves:
review:
It's very sweet. I think for a certain kind of hard-charging urban person who has lost his or her understanding of the natural world, this is a really good reminder to stop and literally smell the roses and pick the wildflowers etc. It's a little bit preachy, in the way that when someone stops smoking they suddenly become evangelical about how bad smoking is, for the smoker and everyone else on the planet. But it's largely a nice literary walk through a country field, with lots of cute rabbits and hares doing binkies and zoomies on every page.
]]> <![CDATA[Colour Scheme (Roderick Alleyn, #12)]]> 280989 320 Ngaio Marsh 0006512380 Cynthia 4 english-mysteries
This is a super long book, or at least felt that way. I particularly enjoyed it because a close friend is a kiwi and she's down under all through the Northern Hemisphere winter, so it was fun to read about her homeland while she's there.

The characters are interesting and the story is enjoyable but it takes a long time to get where it's going. It is more like a novel in the sense that this is a book primarily about the relationships of a small group of people in a confined community. It's less like an actual mystery story. The murder doesn't happen until fairly late in the narrative; and I wont spoil anything here but ... let's just say the ball gets rolling very slowly.

I listened to this on audio; I think that if I'd been reading it in print, I might have put it down before getting halfway.]]> 3.79 1943 Colour Scheme (Roderick Alleyn, #12)
author: Ngaio Marsh
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.79
book published: 1943
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/16
date added: 2025/03/16
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
I find the summary of this book to be kind of deceiving; I don't really see how this could be her best written book, and I think the summary implies that there's more action than there actually is.

This is a super long book, or at least felt that way. I particularly enjoyed it because a close friend is a kiwi and she's down under all through the Northern Hemisphere winter, so it was fun to read about her homeland while she's there.

The characters are interesting and the story is enjoyable but it takes a long time to get where it's going. It is more like a novel in the sense that this is a book primarily about the relationships of a small group of people in a confined community. It's less like an actual mystery story. The murder doesn't happen until fairly late in the narrative; and I wont spoil anything here but ... let's just say the ball gets rolling very slowly.

I listened to this on audio; I think that if I'd been reading it in print, I might have put it down before getting halfway.
]]> <![CDATA[Tied Up In Tinsel (Roderick Alleyn, #27)]]> 280995
Holed up at Hilary Bill-Tasman's manor estate for Christmas, Troy Alleyn is to paint the man's portrait and, while she's there, view the Druid Christmas pageant. Along with a pack of eccentric guests, Troy enjoys the festivities-- until one of the pageant's players mysteriously disappears into the snowy night. Did the hired help-- each a paroled murderer from the nearby prison-- have a deadly hand in this Christmas conundrum? Inspector Roderick Alleyn arrives to join his wife in finding the lost man-- and unraveling the glaring truth from the glittering tinsel.
]]> Ngaio Marsh Cynthia 5 english-mysteries 3.79 1972 Tied Up In Tinsel (Roderick Alleyn, #27)
author: Ngaio Marsh
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.79
book published: 1972
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/26
date added: 2025/03/16
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
I listened to this on audio and really enjoyed it. I definitely missed parts as my attention turned to the road while driving, but I'll be happy at some point to listen to it again, or to read it.
]]> <![CDATA[The Vicomte de Bragelonne (Trilogie des Mousquetaires #3.1)]]> 369042 The Vicomte de Bragelonne opens an epic adventure which continues with Louise de La Valliere and reaches its climax in The Man in the Iron Mask. This new edition of the classic translation presents a key episode in the Musketeers saga, fully annotated and with an introduction by a leading Dumas scholar.]]> 768 Alexandre Dumas 0192834630 Cynthia 5 3.97 The Vicomte de Bragelonne (Trilogie des Mousquetaires #3.1)
author: Alexandre Dumas
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.97
book published:
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2025/03/06
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Smoke and Ashes (Sam Wyndham, #3)]]> 36203372 India, 1921. Haunted by his memories of the Great War, Captain Sam Wyndham is battling a serious addiction to opium that he must keep secret from his superiors in the Calcutta police force.

When Sam is summoned to investigate a grisly murder, he is stunned at the sight of the body: he’s seen this before. Last night, in a drug addled haze, he stumbled across a corpse with the same ritualistic injuries. It seems like there’s a deranged killer on the loose. Unfortunately for Sam, the corpse was in an opium den and revealing his presence there could cost him his career.

With the aid of his quick-witted Indian Sergeant, Surrender-not Banerjee, Sam must try to solve the two murders, all the while keeping his personal demons secret, before somebody else turns up dead.]]> 352 Abir Mukherjee 1911215140 Cynthia 5 What really puts this one above the average is the very interesting description of the anti British movement at this time when Gandhi and Das and Bose are whipping up the huge population of India into the state of resistance that will lead to the end of occupation.
All in all, it holds together well, never gets silly and is a fast, enjoyable, and informative read.]]> 4.09 2018 Smoke and Ashes (Sam Wyndham, #3)
author: Abir Mukherjee
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2018
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/26
date added: 2025/02/26
shelves:
review:
I'd had this on my To Read list for years, never found it at a bookstore, not sure it was even on Amazon, and ended up ordering it from the excellent Abe Books. Got a nice pristine copy and tore through it, so glad to have found it. The plot is kind of the standard template for a murder mystery, but it's handled well. The story moves pretty quickly, doesn't get stuck with its wheels in the mud too often (although... it does sometimes). The characters are interesting but a little bit amorphous. The love interest, Annie, is very Lauren Bacall and when he's with her, the detective Sam feels like Bogart; but when he's not with her, he doesn't seem so much like Bogart.
What really puts this one above the average is the very interesting description of the anti British movement at this time when Gandhi and Das and Bose are whipping up the huge population of India into the state of resistance that will lead to the end of occupation.
All in all, it holds together well, never gets silly and is a fast, enjoyable, and informative read.
]]> Yellowface 62047984
So what if June edits Athena’s novel and sends it to her agent as her own work? So what if she lets her new publisher rebrand her as Juniper Song—complete with an ambiguously ethnic author photo? This piece of history deserve to be told, whoever the teller. That is what June believes, and The New York Times bestseller list agrees.

But June cannot escape Athena’s shadow, and emerging evidence threatens her stolen success. As she races to protect her secret she discovers exactly how far she will go to keep what she thinks she deserves.]]> 319 R.F. Kuang 000853277X Cynthia 3 I skimmed too much of the book to tell you whether she pulls it together by the end, but really by the time I hit the middle of this book I couldn't care less about what happened to the protagonist, and I had no faith that the author would land the plane in an interesting way.
And of course ... now I'm one of the people the protagonist complains about, who criticize Their Art on Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ. Sorry not sorry.]]> 3.69 2023 Yellowface
author: R.F. Kuang
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.69
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/20
date added: 2025/02/20
shelves:
review:
Very disappointing, because it starts off GREAT and I thought it would get past its hackneyed plot (she stole someone else's manuscript and passed it off as her own! That's only been the plot of ... a dozen books?). But instead of doing something more interesting, she turns the last two thirds of the book into a whining wallowfest about how hard it is to be a published author, when the publishing house ignores you, and people troll you online, and anonymous strangers try to take you down and EVEN HAVE THE NERVE TO SAY YOU STOLE THE STORY (which she did) and that she's A WHITE WOMAN WRITING ABOUT A CULTURE SHE KNOWS NOTHING ABOUT (which she freely admits is 100% correct). She as a character doesn't do anything interesting with these truisms about the publishing industry, except to take petty delight in getting people fired if they're mean to her and to form a catty support group with two other successful older female writers (who just encourage her narcissism and whinging).
I skimmed too much of the book to tell you whether she pulls it together by the end, but really by the time I hit the middle of this book I couldn't care less about what happened to the protagonist, and I had no faith that the author would land the plane in an interesting way.
And of course ... now I'm one of the people the protagonist complains about, who criticize Their Art on Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ. Sorry not sorry.
]]> Perspective(s) 134115463 La situation exige discrétion, loyauté, sensibilité artistique et sens politique. L’Europe est une poudrière. Cosimo de Médicis doit faire face aux convoitises de sa cousine Catherine, reine de France, alliée à son vieil ennemi, le républicain Piero Strozzi. Les couvents de la ville pullulent de nostalgiques de Savonarole tandis qu'à Rome, le pape condamne les nudités de le chapelle Sixtine.
Perspective(s) est un polar historique Ă©pistolaire. Du broyeur de couleurs Ă  la reine de France en passant par les meilleurs peintres, sculpteurs et architectes, chacun des correspondants joue sa carte. Tout le monde est suspect.]]> 304 Laurent Binet 2246829356 Cynthia 5 I had worried this book would be too intellectual and academic and hard to get interested in but it's the opposite; it's completely entertaining and I was wonderfully immersed in the story.]]> 3.71 2023 Perspective(s)
author: Laurent Binet
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/18
date added: 2025/02/18
shelves:
review:
This is a five-star rating because five is the max number of stars but ... I'd have given it more. I LOVED this book. Normally I hate epistolary novels, they seem tedious and endless, but this book races along; and the plot is so complex ... it's impossible to imagine how the story could have been told any other way than as letters flying back and forth across 16th century Italy.
I had worried this book would be too intellectual and academic and hard to get interested in but it's the opposite; it's completely entertaining and I was wonderfully immersed in the story.
]]> <![CDATA[The Goldenacre (Shona Sandison Mystery, #1)]]> 60431250
Thomas Tallis, inspector of provenance, has just arrived in Edinburgh, Scotland, to authenticate The Goldenacre, a masterpiece by iconic Scottish architect and painter Charles Rennie Mackintosh. Still dealing with a miserable divorce and the fallout from a disastrous job in London, Tallis is eager to sign off on the painting and leave. It should be simple, as the painting has been owned by one noble family since the �20s. But then a horrifying parcel arrives on Tallis’s desk, and the threatening message is clear: someone doesn’t want him inspecting the painting. Now that Tallis sees lives are in danger, he has no choice but to stay until the investigation is complete.

Meanwhile, gruesome murders are plaguing Edinburgh. First, a Scottish painter of great renown. Next, an Edinburgh City Counsellor. Battle-hardened newspaper reporter Shona Sandison is on the case, even as her beloved industry shrinks around her. Shona doesn’t care who she steps on to get the best story, and she soon uncovers a link between The Goldenacre and the murders. As Tallis’s personal crises reach a fever pitch, Shona struggles to enlist his help in understanding how the painting is mixed up in all this violence before either one of them becomes the next victim.

Pensive, lush, and tragic, The Goldenacre is a heartbroken love letter to Edinburgh, and an unpredictable, gorgeously plotted mystery to savor.]]> 336 Philip Miller 1641294272 Cynthia 3 Miller threw in a couple stupid attacks on some of the characters that were notably unexciting and did nothing to further the story line. It's like it was written by a primitive version of Chat GPT.
I didn't like any of the main characters, except Shona's dad, a retired reporter. Actually the best parts of the book are the ones where Miller talks about the death of journalism, which he perfectly describes. THAT's the actual only interesting murder mystery in this book.]]> 3.44 2022 The Goldenacre (Shona Sandison Mystery, #1)
author: Philip Miller
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.44
book published: 2022
rating: 3
read at: 2025/01/14
date added: 2025/01/14
shelves:
review:
This has the potential to be an interesting story, but at the hands of Philip Miller it's just a plodding mess with no center. It was interesting enough that I finished reading it. It foreshadowed a lot of stuff but it never followed through; even at the end I was waiting to find out what had happened and why. The things that seemed intriguing at the beginning of the book never really turned into actual plot points.
Miller threw in a couple stupid attacks on some of the characters that were notably unexciting and did nothing to further the story line. It's like it was written by a primitive version of Chat GPT.
I didn't like any of the main characters, except Shona's dad, a retired reporter. Actually the best parts of the book are the ones where Miller talks about the death of journalism, which he perfectly describes. THAT's the actual only interesting murder mystery in this book.
]]> <![CDATA[Prisoners of the Castle: An Epic Story of Survival and Escape from Colditz, the Nazis' Fortress Prison]]> 59883560 The definitive and surprising true story of one of history’s most notorious prisons—and the remarkable cast of POWs who tried relentlessly to escape their captors, from the New York Times bestselling author of The Spy and the Traitor

In this gripping narrative, Ben Macintyre tackles one of the most famous prison stories in history and makes it utterly his own. During World War II, the German army used the towering Colditz Castle to hold the most defiant Allied prisoners. For four years, these prisoners of the castle tested its walls and its guards with ingenious escape attempts that would become legend.

But as Macintyre shows, the story of Colditz was about much more than escape. Its population represented a society in miniature, full of heroes and traitors, class conflicts and secret alliances, and the full range of human joy and despair. In Macintyre’s telling, Colditz’s most famous names—like the indomitable Pat Reid—share glory with lesser known but equally remarkable characters like Indian doctor Birendranath Mazumdar whose ill treatment, hunger strike, and eventual escape read like fiction; Florimond Duke, America’s oldest paratrooper and least successful secret agent; and Christopher Clayton Hutton, the brilliant inventor employed by British intelligence to manufacture covert escape aids for POWs.

Prisoners of the Castle traces the war’s arc from within Colditz’s stone walls, where the stakes rose as Hitler’s war machine faltered and the men feared that liberation would not come soon enough to spare them a grisly fate at the hands of the Nazis. Bringing together the wartime intrigue of his acclaimed Operation Mincemeat and keen psychological portraits of his bestselling true-life spy stories, Macintyre has breathed new life into one of the greatest war stories ever told.]]> 368 Ben Macintyre 0593136330 Cynthia 5 I'm not a huge WW2 buff, and I am very squeamish about reading about torture and horror and I found this an easy and wonderful book to read. ]]> 4.20 2022 Prisoners of the Castle: An Epic Story of Survival and Escape from Colditz, the Nazis' Fortress Prison
author: Ben Macintyre
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2022
rating: 5
read at: 2025/01/08
date added: 2025/01/08
shelves:
review:
Actually a six-star book or maybe 10. Such a great book. At first I was worried it would just be a list of "then they tried to break out this way, then they tried to break out that way," but it ended up being a real page turner that gets you deeply into the minds of the men in this prison. I was intrigued and I have to say glad that Macintyre distinguishes between the german guards and security officer, who followed the maxim of "This is a prison for gentlemen, run by gentlemen." It was interesting toward the end of the war that the prisoners AND the german army were all scared of what the crazier SS and Gestapo and Hitler inner circle were going to do. Im glad to know that most of the German soldiers were not automatically horrible and cruel.
I'm not a huge WW2 buff, and I am very squeamish about reading about torture and horror and I found this an easy and wonderful book to read.
]]> <![CDATA[The Man in the Brown Suit (Colonel Race, #1)]]> 209194 Pretty, young Anne came to London looking for adventure. In fact, adventure comes looking for her—and finds her immediately at Hyde Park Corner tube station. Anne is present on the platform when a thin man, reeking of mothballs, loses his balance and is electrocuted on the rails.


The Scotland Yard verdict is accidental death. But Anne is not satisfied. After all, who was the man in the brown suit who examined the body? And why did he race off, leaving a cryptic message behind: "17-122 Kilmorden Castle"?


Twisty, clever, and intriguing, The Man in the Brown Suit showcases Agatha Christie once again at her very best.

]]> 381 Agatha Christie 0007151667 Cynthia 3 english-mysteries 3.97 1924 The Man in the Brown Suit (Colonel Race, #1)
author: Agatha Christie
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1924
rating: 3
read at: 2024/12/29
date added: 2024/12/29
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
Im listening to this on an audiobook and it's only a semi decent version, punctuated awkwardly with cheap ads that roar in at weird moments at high volume, which is distracting. But in spite of these impediments I feel anyway that this is a nice story to pass time with but is not really worthy of Agatha Christie. It feels like an early story, and feels like she's experimenting a little with a different style of tale. It's kind of like reading a John Buchan, but with a heroine instead of a hero. I wouldn't run out to the store to buy a copy of it but it's an enjoyable story to listen to while baking.
]]> <![CDATA[The Secret of Chimneys (Superintendent Battle, #1)]]> 16361 400 Agatha Christie 0007122586 Cynthia 4 english-mysteries Nov. 2022
I just listened to an audio version of this book and really liked it, enough that I'm going to read a DIFFERENT audio version. It definitely is completely different from the BBC version and it's kind of got elements of a romance that are not very Christie, but it has a lot of her interesting smart observations about people, and I kind of liked the dumb romantic ending.
I didn't realize until I logged on to Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ that this is considered a Superintendent Battle story, or that there were other Battle stories. He was definitely not the star of this story, but ... I'll be curious to read other Supt Battle books now that I'm aware they're A Thing.
Dec. 2024]]> 3.85 1925 The Secret of Chimneys (Superintendent Battle, #1)
author: Agatha Christie
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.85
book published: 1925
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2024/12/29
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
To be honest, I mostly watch the BBC Agatha Christie stories. I read them all when I was a teenager but in recent years I've watched more than read. I picked up a copy at our swap shop of The Secret of Chimneys in French. It was a fun read, but completely and utterly different from the BBC Chimneys, which featured Miss Marple (the book does not) and which has almost no plot points in common with the TV show, which is more fanciful and romantic. I like them both. Theyre just ... really really different.
Nov. 2022
I just listened to an audio version of this book and really liked it, enough that I'm going to read a DIFFERENT audio version. It definitely is completely different from the BBC version and it's kind of got elements of a romance that are not very Christie, but it has a lot of her interesting smart observations about people, and I kind of liked the dumb romantic ending.
I didn't realize until I logged on to Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ that this is considered a Superintendent Battle story, or that there were other Battle stories. He was definitely not the star of this story, but ... I'll be curious to read other Supt Battle books now that I'm aware they're A Thing.
Dec. 2024
]]> <![CDATA[Death at the Sign of the Rook (Jackson Brodie, #6)]]> 203164357 The stage is set. Marooned overnight by a snowstorm in a grand country house are a cast of characters and a setting that even Agatha Christie might recognize â€� a vicar, an Army major, a Dowager, a sleuth and his sidekick - except that the sleuth is Jackson Brodie, and the â€sidekickâ€� is DC Reggie Chase.

The crumbling house - Burton Makepeace and its chatelaine the Dowager Lady Milton - suffered the loss of their last remaining painting of any value, a Turner, some years ago. The housekeeper, Sophie, who disappeared the same night, is suspected of stealing it.

Jackson, a reluctant hostage to the snowstorm, has been investigating the theft of another The Woman with a Weasel, a portrait, taken from the house of an elderly widow, on the morning she died. The suspect this time is the widow’s carer, Melanie. Is this a coincidence or is there a connection? And what secrets does The Woman with a Weasel hold? The puzzle is Jackson’s to solve. And let’s not forget that a convicted murderer is on the run on the moors around Burton Makepeace.

All the while, in a bid to make money, Burton Makepeace is determined to keep hosting a shambolic Murder Mystery that acts as a backdrop while the real drama is being played out in the house.

A brilliantly plotted, supremely entertaining, and utterly compulsive tour de force from a great writer at the height of her powers.]]> 320 Kate Atkinson 0385547994 Cynthia 4 3.69 2024 Death at the Sign of the Rook (Jackson Brodie, #6)
author: Kate Atkinson
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.69
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/12/29
date added: 2024/12/29
shelves: art-history-art-fraud, english-mysteries
review:
It's fun and I enjoyed reading it, but it falls apart at the end. There are a lot of different strands, and instead of pulling them together in a way that's surprising and delightful, it just kind of trails off. She introduces a farcical murder mystery theater troupe at the end and everyone interesting just becomes kind of a superficial character. It's disappointing, but still was an enjoyable read. I expected a little more complexity from her; this is just ... anyone reasonably talented could have written this.
]]> Beautyland 127282939 From the acclaimed author of Parakeet, Marie-Helene Bertino’s Beautyland is a wise, tender novel about a woman who doesn't feel at home on Earth.

At the moment when Voyager 1 is launched into space carrying its famous golden record, a baby of unusual perception is born to a single mother in Philadelphia. Adina Giorno is tiny and jaundiced, but she reaches for warmth and light. As a child, she recognizes that she is different: She possesses knowledge of a faraway planet. The arrival of a fax machine enables her to contact her extraterrestrial relatives, beings who have sent her to report on the oddities of Earthlings.

For years, as she moves through the world and makes a life for herself among humans, she dispatches transmissions on the terrors and surprising joys of their existence. Then, at a precarious moment, a beloved friend urges Adina to share her messages with the world. Is there a chance she is not alone?

Marie-Helene Bertino’s Beautyland is a novel of startling originality about the fragility and resilience of life on our Earth and in our universe. It is a remarkable evocation of the feeling of being in exile at home, and it introduces a gentle, unforgettable alien for our times.]]> 327 Marie-Helene Bertino 0374109281 Cynthia 3 couldn-t-finish 4.08 2024 Beautyland
author: Marie-Helene Bertino
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2024/12/15
shelves: couldn-t-finish
review:
As I go back and read the descriptions of this book again, I realize that I have no reason to be disappointed; I was warned. But there is so much enthusiasm for this book, which is lovely but in my opinion extremely boring and obvious. Ive given up after just a few chapters and perhaps something really interesting is about to happen but ... as I go back and read the descriptions of this book again, it seems that ... this is all there is, nothing else is going to happen. The basic concept is that a little girl is born and think she's a space alien sent to Earth to report on humans and all their funny little quirks, to help the powers that be on her own dying planet decide if they want to do some kind of merger with Earth. Her somewhat negligent parents stick an old fax machine in her bedroom and she uses this to communicate with her contacts on her own planet. This is less interesting than you might hope. Mostly what this book seems to be is an author trying to be innocent and original in her observations of humanity, with the device of creating a character who is a space alien. I'd say stick to Mork and Mindy if that's what you're looking for. If I have missed something by not finishing this book, I would be happy to hear from other readers.
]]> <![CDATA[The Granite Coast Murders (Commissaire Dupin, #6)]]> 53137968 In the sixth installment of Jean-Luc Bannalec's bestselling mystery series, Commissaire Dupin returns to investigate a murder at a gorgeous Brittany beach resort.

Inspector Dupin and Claire are on a two-week vacation, but while Claire seems to enjoy the quiet of the beach, Commissaire Dupin takes every opportunity to leave the beach towel. The fabulous dinners on the hotel patio and the rumors about a stolen statue of a saint are the few interesting moments of his days on vacation. But then a tourist vanishes without trace and there's an attack on a deputy to the local assembly, who is involved in confrontations with local farmers. Shortly after that, the Britanny beach resort is shocked by the discovery of a corpse.



Dupin clandestinely begins to investigate with the help of the local villagers, something he must keep a secret from Claire and his colleagues in Concarneau. Between bewitched valleys and beautiful beaches, an unfathomable case develops.]]> 304 Jean-Luc Bannalec 1250753066 Cynthia 4 couldn-t-finish 3.71 2017 The Granite Coast Murders (Commissaire Dupin, #6)
author: Jean-Luc Bannalec
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2017
rating: 4
read at: 2024/10/07
date added: 2024/10/07
shelves: couldn-t-finish
review:
I think if I'd read this while on vacation in Brittany, I would have LOVED it, but at home with a pile of things to do and books to read it seemed a little too frivolous to devote time to. But it's well written, nice characters, a solid genre mystery.
]]> Agent in Place 550739 320 Helen MacInnes 0449208591 Cynthia 2 couldn-t-finish But the essential action of the story is about spy activity involved NATO and the Warsaw Pact and ... I couldn't get excited about the outcome. I guess that's why we all love World War 2 stories, we know what's at stake and we know how it ended. A spy novel about Nato and the warsaw pact is only interesting if the human participants are so compelling that we care what happens to them. In this story, by the third or fourth chapter I felt the characters were fairly cardboard cutout.]]> 3.96 1976 Agent in Place
author: Helen MacInnes
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.96
book published: 1976
rating: 2
read at: 2024/09/30
date added: 2024/09/30
shelves: couldn-t-finish
review:
It's not that this book wasn't well-written and interesting; it was, actually. I especially loved the descriptions of 1970s Manhattan.
But the essential action of the story is about spy activity involved NATO and the Warsaw Pact and ... I couldn't get excited about the outcome. I guess that's why we all love World War 2 stories, we know what's at stake and we know how it ended. A spy novel about Nato and the warsaw pact is only interesting if the human participants are so compelling that we care what happens to them. In this story, by the third or fourth chapter I felt the characters were fairly cardboard cutout.
]]> <![CDATA[Close to Death (Hawthorne & Horowitz, #5)]]> 179311283 In New York Times–bestselling author Anthony Horowitz’s ingenious fifth literary whodunit in the Hawthorne and Horowitz series, Detective Hawthorne is once again called upon to solve an unsolvable case—a gruesome murder in an idyllic gated community in which suspects abound

Riverside Close is a picture-perfect community. The six exclusive and attractive houses are tucked far away from the noise and grime of city life, allowing the residents to enjoy beautiful gardens, pleasant birdsong and tranquility from behind the security of a locked gate.

It is the perfect idyll until the Kentworthy family arrives, with their four giant, gas-guzzling cars, a gaggle of shrieking children and plans for a garish swimming pool in the backyard. Obvious outsiders, the Kentworthys do not belong in Riverside Close, and they quickly offend every last one of their neighbours.

When Giles Kentworthy is found dead on his own doorstep, a crossbow bolt sticking out of his chest, Detective Hawthorne is the only investigator that can be called on to solve the case.

Because how do you solve a murder when everyone is a suspect?]]> 432 Anthony Horowitz 006330564X Cynthia 5 4.06 2024 Close to Death (Hawthorne & Horowitz, #5)
author: Anthony Horowitz
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2024/09/29
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A False Mirror (Inspector Ian Rutledge Mysteries) by Todd, Charles(January 9, 2007) Hardcover]]> 152150035 Excellent Book 0 Charles Todd Cynthia 4 4.50 2007 A False Mirror (Inspector Ian Rutledge Mysteries) by Todd, Charles(January 9, 2007) Hardcover
author: Charles Todd
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.50
book published: 2007
rating: 4
read at: 2023/10/14
date added: 2024/09/21
shelves:
review:
These books are formulaic but well done and enjoyable. Thus one was pleasantly like a 1940s black and white, set in an old spooky mansion by the seaside. the plot is intricate and mostly very tight, with only a small point or two that seemed not to make sense.
]]> The Rose Code 53914938 The New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of The Huntress and The Alice Network returns with another heart-stopping World War II story of three female code breakers at Bletchley Park and the spy they must root out after the war is over.

1940. As England prepares to fight the Nazis, three very different women answer the call to mysterious country estate Bletchley Park, where the best minds in Britain train to break German military codes. Vivacious debutante Osla is the girl who has everything—beauty, wealth, and the dashing Prince Philip of Greece sending her roses—but she burns to prove herself as more than a society girl, and puts her fluent German to use as a translator of decoded enemy secrets. Imperious self-made Mab, product of East-End London poverty, works the legendary code-breaking machines as she conceals old wounds and looks for a socially advantageous husband. Both Osla and Mab are quick to see the potential in local village spinster Beth, whose shyness conceals a brilliant facility with puzzles, and soon Beth spreads her wings as one of the Park’s few female cryptanalysts. But war, loss, and the impossible pressure of secrecy will tear the three apart.

1947. As the royal wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip whips post-war Britain into a fever, three friends-turned-enemies are reunited by a mysterious encrypted letter—the key to which lies buried in the long-ago betrayal that destroyed their friendship and left one of them confined to an asylum. A mysterious traitor has emerged from the shadows of their Bletchley Park past, and now Osla, Mab, and Beth must resurrect their old alliance and crack one last code together. But each petal they remove from the rose code brings danger—and their true enemy...]]> 624 Kate Quinn 0062943472 Cynthia 5 4.42 2021 The Rose Code
author: Kate Quinn
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2021
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2024/09/16
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Lord Edgware Dies (Hercule Poirot Mysteries)]]> 30400002 1 Agatha Christie 1504763491 Cynthia 4 english-mysteries But as always there are things to learn.
Early in the story, someone refers to Poirot as a detective and he says, "Non. I study the psychology of the criminal mind." And in fact, that I think is what makes Agatha's books so compelling and so interesting .... and what, actually, makes this one story one of her less successful outings. There are mostly a lot of strange incomprehensible people running around doing things that make no sense from an ordinary human point of view. One of the characters does something and Agatha explains that he's just mad because he's handsome and a movie star and no one says no to him. REALLY?? But the weaknesses of this story do make it more clear why her best stories work so well. The characters do the kinds of things that humans do, perhaps on a grander scale but, like Tragedy, still comprehensible and compelling.]]> 3.93 1933 Lord Edgware Dies (Hercule Poirot Mysteries)
author: Agatha Christie
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1933
rating: 4
read at: 2024/09/15
date added: 2024/09/15
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
I listened to this on Spotify, with Hugh Fraser as the reader. He's great. This is not one of the best Agatha's. It's a bit gothic and overwrought. It was actually better as a BBC production, which kind of edited it down and brought out the essential elements.
But as always there are things to learn.
Early in the story, someone refers to Poirot as a detective and he says, "Non. I study the psychology of the criminal mind." And in fact, that I think is what makes Agatha's books so compelling and so interesting .... and what, actually, makes this one story one of her less successful outings. There are mostly a lot of strange incomprehensible people running around doing things that make no sense from an ordinary human point of view. One of the characters does something and Agatha explains that he's just mad because he's handsome and a movie star and no one says no to him. REALLY?? But the weaknesses of this story do make it more clear why her best stories work so well. The characters do the kinds of things that humans do, perhaps on a grander scale but, like Tragedy, still comprehensible and compelling.
]]> Les Caprices d'un astre 60151620 Deux cent cinquante ans plus tôt, Guillaume Le Gentil de la Galaisière, astronome de Louis XV - personnage qui a réellement existé -, partait vers les Indes pour observer l'exceptionnel passage de Vénus devant le Soleil. Il revint onze ans plus tard, déclaré mort et sans avoir pu observer l'éclipse. "Tu ne cherches pas une étoile, tu cherches l'amour, tu le trouveras à la fin du voyage", lui dit un vieux sage durant son étonnant périple dans les mers de l'Inde.
Du XXI� au XVIII� siècle, les trajectoires de ces deux hommes romantiques s'entrecroisent et se répondent. Entre le récit d'aventures et le conte philosophique sur la quête de soi, Antoine Laurain signe un roman qui répond au besoin d'évasion et de merveilleux qui sommeille en chacun de nous.]]> 288 Antoine Laurain 2080206168 Cynthia 4 3.83 2022 Les Caprices d'un astre
author: Antoine Laurain
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2024/09/01
date added: 2024/09/15
shelves:
review:
Very sweet. Enjoyable and predictable.
]]> <![CDATA[A Death in Cornwall (Gabriel Allon, #24)]]> 199981527 Un asesinato brutal, una obra maestra desaparecida, un misterio que solo Gabriel Allon puede resolver.

Gabriel Allon, restaurador de arte y leyenda del espionaje, llega de incĂłgnito a Londres para asistir a un acto oficial en la GalerĂ­a Courtauld con motivo de la recuperaciĂłn de un autorretrato robado de Vincent van Gogh. Pero, cuando un viejo amigo de la PolicĂ­a de Devon y Cornualles le pide ayuda para resolver un desconcertante caso de asesinato, se descubre persiguiendo a un poderosĂ­simo y peligroso adversario.

La víctima es Charlotte Blake, una afamada profesora de Historia del Arte de Oxford que pasa fines de semana en el mismo pueblo costero donde Gabriel vivió bajo una identidad falsa. La muerte de la profesora Blake parece obra del diabólico asesino en serie que desde hace un tiempo tiene aterrorizada a la campiña de Cornualles. Hay, no obstante, ciertas incoherencias en el caso, como la desaparición de un teléfono móvil y una misteriosa anotación de tres letras que ella dejó en un cuaderno, en su despacho.

Llena de suspense y exquisita elegancia, Muerte en Cornualles es de lo mejor que ha escrito Daniel una historia deslumbrante de asesinatos, poder y codicia insaciable que mantiene cautivado al lector hasta la última página.




«EL MEJOR REPRESENTANTE A NIVEL MUNDIAL DE LA NOVELA DE ESPÍAS». THE WASHINGTON POST

«Daniel Silva ha vuelto a escribir una novela absorbente, llena de suspense y giros inesperados, a la vez didáctica y satisfactoria. Escrita con belleza y sencillez, con personajes memorables y diálogos convincentes (...). Las peripecias de Gabriel Allon siguen siendo tan cautivadoras como siempre». The Cipher Brief]]> 480 Daniel Silva 0063384248 Cynthia 4 And yet... I finished it.
Also, the only reason I picked this up was because I thought it was set in Cornwall. I think theyre in Cornwall for about 6 pages total. And there's some mystery about a missing Picasso that needs to be returned to the Jewish family that lost it during WW2, but... it just gets the most cursory notice.
And yet... ]]> 4.34 2024 A Death in Cornwall (Gabriel Allon, #24)
author: Daniel Silva
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.34
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/09/15
date added: 2024/09/15
shelves:
review:
I gave it four stars because for some reason I found it compulsively readable but really, I hated this book. It didn't really even have a plot that made sense. It was like an AI wrote it, and threw in a recipe of world-shaking financial misdeeds, a bunch of torture and fights, a glamorous and beautiful ex thief, a weird amalgam main character (he's Israeli, does he speak with an accent? what does he look like...? I guess he gets described in the first books maybe but ... still how hard is it to throw in some descriptors? We do know his wife is SUPER HOT, of course, because the AI knows we like that. And there are endless references to ultra high luxury items, because the AI thinks it will impress us. And there were a bunch of financial terms and calculations and some world politics things thrown around... I had no idea what they were talking about.
And yet... I finished it.
Also, the only reason I picked this up was because I thought it was set in Cornwall. I think theyre in Cornwall for about 6 pages total. And there's some mystery about a missing Picasso that needs to be returned to the Jewish family that lost it during WW2, but... it just gets the most cursory notice.
And yet...
]]> <![CDATA[A Caribbean Mystery (Miss Marple, #9)]]> 31300
Nephew Raymond West has given his favourite aunt a vacation at a beautiful resort in the Caribbean. While there she encounters an old wind-bag. One of his stories is about meeting a murderer. He has a snapshot. Suddenly he hesitates, and gets flustered. By the next morning he is dead, seemingly of natural causes. Miss Marple has doubts.

And well she should.

Librarian's note: this entry is for the novel, "A Caribbean Mystery." Collections and other Miss Marple stories are located elsewhere on Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ. The series includes 12 novels and 20 short stories. Entries for the short stories can be found by searching Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ for: "a Miss Marple Short Story."]]> 224 Agatha Christie 0451199928 Cynthia 5 english-mysteries ]]> 3.83 1964 A Caribbean Mystery (Miss Marple, #9)
author: Agatha Christie
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.83
book published: 1964
rating: 5
read at: 2024/09/10
date added: 2024/09/10
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
This book and its partner, "Nemesis," are two of my favorite Christie books. I've enjoyed all the BBC productions, which are not completely faithful to the original text. And i loved listening to both on audiobook, read by the incredible Joan Hickson (who starred in the early BBC versions as fluffy, pink, elderly Miss Marple). The original text is very good, and I find myself quoting from it a bit this week. And I think part of what makes it so interesting to me is the contrast between Miss M and the elderly, overly blunt Mr. Rafiel. They're such an interesting team, and it's interesting to observe Miss Marple through his eyes. They both appear to be old and kind of useless creatures but they're both so smart and sharp. Two of my favorite sections are where Miss Marple expounds on the idea that no one really knows who we are; people only know what we tell them about ourselves, true or not true. And I love the part where Rafiel asks if he's a suspect and when Miss M says no, he says, "of course. i'm too disabled to murder someone." And she says, "actually, youre smart enough to figure out how to do it, in spite of your disability. No, I think you're not guilty of murder because you're smart enough to figure out how to get what you want without resorting to murder. Murder is for stupid people."

]]> <![CDATA[Crook Manifesto (Ray Carney, #2)]]> 61812836 Colson Whitehead continues his Harlem saga in a novel that summons 1970s New York in all its seedy glory.

It's 1971. Trash piles up on the streets, crime is at an all-time high, the city is careening towards bankruptcy, and a shooting war has broken out between the NYPD and the Black Liberation Army. Amidst this collective nervous breakdown furniture store owner and ex-fence Ray Carney tries to keep his head down and his business thriving. His days moving stolen goods around the city are over. It's strictly the straight-and-narrow for him -- until he needs Jackson 5 tickets for his daughter May and he decides to hit up his old police contact Munson, fixer extraordinaire. But Munson has his own favors to ask of Carney and staying out of the game gets a lot more complicated - and deadly.

1973. The counter-culture has created a new generation, the old ways are being overthrown, but there is one constant, Pepper, Carney's endearingly violent partner in crime. It's getting harder to put together a reliable crew for hijackings, heists, and assorted felonies, so Pepper takes on a side gig doing security on a Blaxploitation shoot in Harlem. He finds himself in a freaky world of Hollywood stars, up-and-coming comedians, and celebrity drug dealers, in addition to the usual cast of hustlers, mobsters, and hit men. These adversaries underestimate the seasoned crook - to their regret.

1976. Harlem is burning, block by block, while the whole country is gearing up for Bicentennial celebrations. Carney is trying to come up with a July 4th ad he can live with. ("Two Hundred Years of Getting Away with It!"), while his wife Elizabeth is campaigning for her childhood friend, the former assistant D.A and rising politician Alexander Oakes. When a fire severely injures one of Carney's tenants, he enlists Pepper to look into who may be behind it. Our crooked duo have to battle their way through a crumbling metropolis run by the shady, the violent, and the utterly corrupted.]]> 336 Colson Whitehead 0385545150 Cynthia 4 3.82 2023 Crook Manifesto (Ray Carney, #2)
author: Colson Whitehead
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2024/09/05
date added: 2024/09/10
shelves:
review:
He's obviously an amazing writer, and I enjoyed that this is Literature but it felt a little funkier, not pretentious, not Literary. But like so much literature, it felt like it wasn't going anywhere. It was kind of a picaresque tale of wandering around Harlem in the 1970s. I can't imagine he was alive in that era but he seems to have perfectly captured Manhattan in that rough era. But in the end I found myself kind of speed reading through it ... and getting to the end and not feeling like I'd missed any plot points. I feel about this book the way I'd felt about Table for Two by Amor Towles: That somehow he was rushing to finish this, perhaps because he was bored with it or perhaps because a publisher was pushing him to keep to a schedule?
]]> Le Tour du monde en 80 jours 1452956 Le Tour du monde en 80 jours notamment, sont conçus comme des machines théâtrales. Tout y est calibré, ajusté pour tenir le lecteur en haleine, l'étonner, le distraire ou le prendre à contre-pied. On est en pleine esthétique romantique, celle de Dumas en particulier, avec qui Verne collabora un temps. Mais le Tour du monde c'est aussi l'avènement du monde industriel, le culte de la machine, de l'efficacité, le pointage horaire étendu à une échelle universelle. Culte porté jusqu'à l'outrance, avec un humour féroce, une ironie mordante : Verne n'est pas dupe. Et s'il agite ses personnages comme des marionnettes prises de frénésie, c'est pour, en sourdine, articuler un discours de révolte : Philéas Fogg n'est pas si loin de Némo l'anarchiste, nouveau Faust moderne, et ce texte éblouissant cache bien des profondeurs. --Scarbo]]> 331 Jules Verne 2253012696 Cynthia 5 3.81 1872 Le Tour du monde en 80 jours
author: Jules Verne
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.81
book published: 1872
rating: 5
read at: 2022/05/30
date added: 2024/08/31
shelves:
review:
I read this many years ago, and have seen the older movie and the more recent BBC version with David Tennant, who's so great. But the new version has almost nothing to do with the original book. However, I loved the book (again) and I loved the BBC film.
]]> <![CDATA[Hercule Poirot: The Complete Short Stories (Hercule Poirot Mysteries) by Charles Todd (Foreword), Agatha Christie (10-Sep-2013) Paperback]]> 126340820 Excellent Book 0 Agatha Christie Cynthia 5 Listening to David Suchet kind of makes your head explode because he's SO good and his voice can be so completely different depending on the character he plays.
I've listened to about half the stories in this collection so far, but theyre all good.]]> 4.60 1999 Hercule Poirot: The Complete Short Stories (Hercule Poirot Mysteries) by Charles Todd (Foreword), Agatha Christie (10-Sep-2013) Paperback
author: Agatha Christie
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.60
book published: 1999
rating: 5
read at: 2024/08/17
date added: 2024/08/23
shelves:
review:
Im listening to these on spotify. It's been a couple weeks, but I believe this is the collection that is ready by both Hugh Fraser and the amazing brilliant David Suchet. Hugh Fraser is actually a very good reader and does a lot of good accents, including a very good Belgian Poirot. He's not great with women though but he's still really.
Listening to David Suchet kind of makes your head explode because he's SO good and his voice can be so completely different depending on the character he plays.
I've listened to about half the stories in this collection so far, but theyre all good.
]]> <![CDATA[4:50 from Paddington (Miss Marple, #7)]]> 140278
Who, apart from Miss Marple, would take her story seriously? After all, there were no suspects, no other witnesses... and no corpse. Not the police.

Librarian's note: this entry is for the novel, "4:50 from Paddington." Collections and other Miss Marple stories are located elsewhere on Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ. The series includes 12 novels and 20 short stories. Entries for the short stories can be found by searching Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ for: "a Miss Marple Short Story."]]> 288 Agatha Christie 1579126936 Cynthia 5 Hickson was a wonderful fluffy old Miss Marple in a mid 1980sish BBC series; i feel like some of the other readers who do Miss Marple books try to copy her cadence and intonation, because she's so perfect. But when you listen to Hickson read one of these books ... she's AMAZING. She gets all the voices right and she is, as you listen to Christie's actual text, the perfect fluffy, wooly and piercing spinster lady. This is a story I've read and seen in various movie and tv versions. It's a great tale, and this reading is exceptionally good. ]]> 3.96 1957 4:50 from Paddington (Miss Marple, #7)
author: Agatha Christie
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.96
book published: 1957
rating: 5
read at: 2024/08/15
date added: 2024/08/23
shelves:
review:
I didn't read this one, I listened to it on Spotify, read by the amazing, inimitable Joan Hickson.
Hickson was a wonderful fluffy old Miss Marple in a mid 1980sish BBC series; i feel like some of the other readers who do Miss Marple books try to copy her cadence and intonation, because she's so perfect. But when you listen to Hickson read one of these books ... she's AMAZING. She gets all the voices right and she is, as you listen to Christie's actual text, the perfect fluffy, wooly and piercing spinster lady. This is a story I've read and seen in various movie and tv versions. It's a great tale, and this reading is exceptionally good.
]]> Murder in Vienna 53790505 194 E.C.R. Lorac Cynthia 4 english-mysteries 3.69 1956 Murder in Vienna
author: E.C.R. Lorac
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.69
book published: 1956
rating: 4
read at: 2024/08/23
date added: 2024/08/23
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
This was my first Lorac book, and I plan to /hope to read more. He's a very atmospheric and enjoyable writer. The mystery was mmmm not great but not so bad that I stopped reading. There were too many strands and not enough human drama. A book like this makes me appreciate Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers, who are really writing human dramas and are still able to compose a very neat and clean mystery; you learn more and care more about the people involved in the story than you do in the actual crime. In this story, it's a little bit of a French farce with too many characters running around, many of them with the same name. It all gets thrown at the wall at the end; there's even a strand where the detective says during the summing up "We'll never know what happened here." I mean, come on. Nevertheless I enjoyed this and will read more by this author.
]]> Table for Two 195474144 From the bestselling author of The Lincoln Highway, A Gentleman in Moscow, and Rules of Civility, a richly detailed and sharply drawn collection of stories set in New York and Los Angeles. The millions of readers of Amor Towles are in for a treat as he shares some of his shorter six stories set in New York City and a novella in Los Angeles. The New York stories, most of which are set around the turn of the millennium, take up everything from the death-defying acrobatics of the male ego, to the fateful consequences of brief encounters, and the delicate mechanics of compromise which operate at the heart of modern marriages. In Towles’s novel, Rules of Civility, the indomitable Evelyn Ross leaves New York City in September, 1938, with the intention of returning home to Indiana. But as her train pulls into Chicago, where her parents are waiting, she instead extends her ticket to Los Angeles. Told from seven points of view, “Eve in Hollywood� describes how Eve crafts a new future for herself—and others—in the midst of Hollywood’s golden age. Throughout the stories, two characters often find themselves sitting across a table for two where the direction of their futures may hinge upon what they say to each other next. Written with his signature wit, humor, and sophistication, Table for Two is another glittering addition to Towles’s canon of stylish and transporting historical fiction.]]> 451 Amor Towles 0593296370 Cynthia 3 4.15 2024 Table for Two
author: Amor Towles
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2024/08/23
date added: 2024/08/23
shelves:
review:
I like everything that he writes; i even liked Lincoln Highway though I'd thought I wasn't going to like it. I was very lukewarm about this collection. Some of them I just sped flipped through. The feeling this book mostly gave me was that he needed to turn something in to his publisher and he just went in his drawer of sketches and unfinished work and dug out these ones. Most of them are fine. I wouldn't recommend that you run out and buy it.
]]> <![CDATA[The da Vinci Code (Robert Langdon, #2)]]> 3406981
Situasi menjadi semakin menegangkan ketika Langdon menemukan sebuah kaitan mengejutkan: mendiang kurator itu terlibat dalam Biarawan Sion - sebuah kelompok persaudaraan rahasia yang nyata, yang beranggotakan antara lain Sir Isaac Newton, Batticelli, Victor Hugo dan Da Vinci. Landon curiga bahwa sebenarnya ia terkait dengan sebuah perburuan untuk memecahkan misteri besar. Sebuah misteri yang mencerahkan sekaligus berbahaya yang telah disembunyikan selama berabad-abad.

Landon dan Sophie menjadi buron internasional. Mereka harus memecahkan labirin teka-teki itu. Jika gagal, rahasia Biarawan - sebuah kebenaran kuno yang dapat mengguncang dunia - akan hilang selamanya.]]> 632 Dan Brown 9793335807 Cynthia 5 3.93 2003 The da Vinci Code (Robert Langdon, #2)
author: Dan Brown
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2003
rating: 5
read at: 2007/01/01
date added: 2024/08/18
shelves: american-mysteries, art-history-art-fraud
review:
i wanted not to like this book because it was so popular but i loved it. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out why people love this book so much and I think at least in part it's because Brown creates so many interesting puzzles and brain teasers for the reader to solve. A great plot too also great settings and characters.
]]> <![CDATA[Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer]]> 146274
The murder of Abraham Lincoln set off the greatest manhunt in American history -- the pursuit and capture of John Wilkes Booth. From April 14 to April 26, 1865, the assassin led Union cavalry and detectives on a wild twelve-day chase through the streets of Washington, D.C., across the swamps of Maryland, and into the forests of Virginia, while the nation, still reeling from the just-ended Civil War, watched in horror and sadness.

At the very center of this story is John Wilkes Booth, America's notorious villain. A Confederate sympathizer and a member of a celebrated acting family, Booth threw away his fame and wealth for a chance to avenge the South's defeat. For almost two weeks, he confounded the manhunters, slipping away from their every move and denying them the justice they sought.

Based on rare archival materials, obscure trial transcripts, and Lincoln's own blood relics, Manhunt is a fully documented work and a fascinating tale of murder, intrigue, and betrayal. A gripping hour-by-hour account told through the eyes of the hunted and the hunters, this is history as you've never read it before.]]> 444 James L. Swanson 0060518502 Cynthia 5 4.16 2006 Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer
author: James L. Swanson
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2006
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2024/08/14
shelves:
review:
i saw the television version of this book, which was great
]]> <![CDATA[Death on Gokumon Island (Detective Kosuke Kindaichi, #4)]]> 59112463
As Kosuke Kindaichi attempts to unravel the island’s secrets, a series of gruesome murders begins. He investigates, but soon finds himself in mortal danger from both the unknown killer and the clannish locals, who resent this outsider meddling in their affairs.

Loosely inspired by Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None, the fiendish Death on Gokumon Island is perhaps the most highly regarded of all the great Seishi Yokomizo’s classic Japanese mysteries.]]> 320 Seishi Yokomizo 1782277412 Cynthia 0 to-read 3.76 1947 Death on Gokumon Island (Detective Kosuke Kindaichi, #4)
author: Seishi Yokomizo
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.76
book published: 1947
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/08/08
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Twenty Years After (Trilogie des Mousquetaires #2)]]> 7184
Twenty Years After (1845), the sequel to The Three Musketeers, is a supreme creation of suspense and heroic adventure.

Two decades have passed since the musketeers triumphed over Cardinal Richelieu and Milady. Time has weakened their resolve, and dispersed their loyalties. But treasons and stratagems still cry out for justice: civil war endangers the throne of France, while in England Cromwell threatens to send Charles I to the scaffold. Dumas brings his immortal quartet out of retirement to cross swords with time, the malevolence of men, and the forces of history. But their greatest test is a titanic struggle with the son of Milady, who wears the face of Evil.]]> 845 Alexandre Dumas 0192838431 Cynthia 5 4.06 1845 Twenty Years After (Trilogie des Mousquetaires #2)
author: Alexandre Dumas
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.06
book published: 1845
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2024/08/07
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Blue Lightning (Shetland Island, #4)]]> 7157547
Shetland Detective Jimmy Perez knows it will be a difficult homecoming when he returns to the Fair Isles to introduce his fiancée, Fran, to his parents. It’s a community where everyone knows each other, and strangers, while welcomed, are still viewed with a degree of mistrust.

Challenging to live on at the best of times, with the autumn storms raging, the island feels cut off from the rest of the world. Trapped, tension is high and tempers become frayed. Enough to drive someone to murder...

When a woman’s body is discovered at the renowned Fair Isles bird observatory, with feathers threaded through her hair, the islanders react with fear and anger. With no support from the mainland and only Fran to help him, Jimmy has to investigate the old-fashioned way. He soon realizes that this is no crime of passion—but a murder of cold and calculated intention.

With no way off the island until the storms abate, Jimmy knows he has to work quickly. There’s a killer on the island just waiting for the opportunity to strike again.]]> 368 Ann Cleeves 0230746659 Cynthia 5 english-mysteries Great characters and setting. 4.03 2010 Blue Lightning (Shetland Island, #4)
author: Ann Cleeves
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at: 2016/04/01
date added: 2024/08/07
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
Great characters and setting.
]]> <![CDATA[Appointment with Death (Hercule Poirot, #19)]]> 16363
With only 24 hours available to solve the mystery, Hercule Poirot recalled a chance remark he’d overheard back in Jerusalem: â€You see, don’t you, that she’s got to be killed?â€� Mrs Boynton was, indeed, the most detestable woman he’d ever met.]]> 303 Agatha Christie 0007119356 Cynthia 5 This book is so confidently spun out. There isn't a murder for the first 15 chapters. The early parts of the book are a super creepy depiction of the emotional sadist who is mother and step mother to a group of young men and women. She gets off on controlling them and being cruel to them, and has been doing it for their whole lives. They're trapped and can't figure out how to escape.
So there's a murder. And I'll just say that you come to like the characters so much that when Poirot arrives and starts to figure out who did what to whom and when, you want all the family members to come out unscathed. No spoilers here. Read it yourself, and don't look for a fast thrilling mystery story; enjoy this as a profound psychological thriller.]]> 3.87 1938 Appointment with Death (Hercule Poirot, #19)
author: Agatha Christie
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1938
rating: 5
read at: 2024/07/23
date added: 2024/07/23
shelves:
review:
A masterpiece of Agatha Christie-ness. I listened to this on audiobook, narrated by the wonderful impeccable Hugh Fraser. I'd also seen the television version, with David Suchet, which is also really good. I'd seen it many years ago and forgot the ending, but remembered the cruelty of the horrible woman who's at the center of this plot.
This book is so confidently spun out. There isn't a murder for the first 15 chapters. The early parts of the book are a super creepy depiction of the emotional sadist who is mother and step mother to a group of young men and women. She gets off on controlling them and being cruel to them, and has been doing it for their whole lives. They're trapped and can't figure out how to escape.
So there's a murder. And I'll just say that you come to like the characters so much that when Poirot arrives and starts to figure out who did what to whom and when, you want all the family members to come out unscathed. No spoilers here. Read it yourself, and don't look for a fast thrilling mystery story; enjoy this as a profound psychological thriller.
]]> <![CDATA[Murder in Mesopotamia (Hercule Poirot, #14)]]> 16360
It was clear to nurse Amy Leatheran that something sinister was going on at the Hassanieh dig, something associated with the presence of â€Lovely Louiseâ€�, the wife of the celebrated archaeologist Dr. Leidner. But she couldn't pinpoint it.

In a few days� time Hercule Poirot was due to drop in at the excavation site. With Louise suffering terrifying hallucinations, and tension within the group becoming almost unbearable, Poirot might just be too late…]]> 264 Agatha Christie 0007113803 Cynthia 4 3.92 1936 Murder in Mesopotamia (Hercule Poirot, #14)
author: Agatha Christie
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1936
rating: 4
read at: 2024/07/21
date added: 2024/07/23
shelves:
review:
I started this as an audio book and just couldn't get used to the reader.
]]> <![CDATA[Midsummer Mysteries: Tales from the Queen of Mystery]]> 61980335 Agatha Christie's most famous characters--including Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple--solve even the most devilish of conundrums as the sun beats down in this all-new summer themed collection from the Queen of Mystery.

Summertime--as the temperature rises, so does the potential for evil. From Cornwall to the French Riviera, whether against a background of Delphic temples or English country houses, Agatha Christie's most famous characters solve complicated puzzles as the stakes heat up. Pull up a deckchair and enjoy plot twists and red herrings galore from the bestselling fiction writer of all time.

Includes the stories:

The Blood-Stained Pavement
The Double Clue
A Death on the Nile
Harlequin's Lane
The Adventure of the Italian Nobleman
Jane in Search of a Job
The Disappearance of Mr. Davenheim
The Idol House of Astarte
The Rajah's Emerald
The Oracle at Delphi
The Adventure of the Sinister Stranger
The Incredible Theft]]> 255 Agatha Christie 0063310953 Cynthia 5 Listening to them, while I garden and I cook and I drive around for work and on errands, I've come to have a new appreciation for Agatha Christie. I'd first read them all many years ago, when I was in junior high school. I was already an enormous fan of Dorothy Sayers, and I didn't enjoy the Agatha Christie books as much (although they were a fun fast read and the paperbacks were easy to find and cheap).
Now I'm older and I think I understand that what makes her stories so amazing is the way she describes people and manners and places. She's really like Jane Austen. The mysteries are kind of secondary; what makes them so interesting IMO is that we're fascinated by the people in them. Christie of course also seems to have been a student of famous real-life crimes; and she had some medical background from WW2. Many of her mysteries seem to revolve around medical expertise, particularly poisons.
Not to take anything away from her genius but when you listen to a whole collection of stories at one time, you also realize how many of her stories grow from the seed of a nursery rhyme, or a quote from a play or the Bible. It makes sense, when you think about how many stories and books she wrote. They were built on something; it's not like she was writing the Great Novel of Her Life. She was starting, like a professional, with a scrap of an idea and then building on top of it with all these interesting characters she brings together at a place and time where there are a lot of overlapping motives and skullduggery.
I am going to continue to listen to the Hugh Fraser audiobooks for the rest of the summer, and will probably just give them all five stars without writing up much additional explanation.
I still am not SUCH a fan of audiobooks that I want to listen to anyone other than Hugh Fraser, or David Suchet who also narrated some of the Christie books. I've heard a couple other readers and ... couldn't finish the whole book. They just weren't as good. ]]> 3.78 2021 Midsummer Mysteries: Tales from the Queen of Mystery
author: Agatha Christie
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2021
rating: 5
read at: 2024/07/23
date added: 2024/07/23
shelves:
review:
Im newly a fan of listening to audiobooks, specifically because I've discovered the actor Hugh Fraser reading the works of Agatha Christie. He was wonderful as Capt. Hastings in the series with David Suchet, and he reads the novels wonderfully.
Listening to them, while I garden and I cook and I drive around for work and on errands, I've come to have a new appreciation for Agatha Christie. I'd first read them all many years ago, when I was in junior high school. I was already an enormous fan of Dorothy Sayers, and I didn't enjoy the Agatha Christie books as much (although they were a fun fast read and the paperbacks were easy to find and cheap).
Now I'm older and I think I understand that what makes her stories so amazing is the way she describes people and manners and places. She's really like Jane Austen. The mysteries are kind of secondary; what makes them so interesting IMO is that we're fascinated by the people in them. Christie of course also seems to have been a student of famous real-life crimes; and she had some medical background from WW2. Many of her mysteries seem to revolve around medical expertise, particularly poisons.
Not to take anything away from her genius but when you listen to a whole collection of stories at one time, you also realize how many of her stories grow from the seed of a nursery rhyme, or a quote from a play or the Bible. It makes sense, when you think about how many stories and books she wrote. They were built on something; it's not like she was writing the Great Novel of Her Life. She was starting, like a professional, with a scrap of an idea and then building on top of it with all these interesting characters she brings together at a place and time where there are a lot of overlapping motives and skullduggery.
I am going to continue to listen to the Hugh Fraser audiobooks for the rest of the summer, and will probably just give them all five stars without writing up much additional explanation.
I still am not SUCH a fan of audiobooks that I want to listen to anyone other than Hugh Fraser, or David Suchet who also narrated some of the Christie books. I've heard a couple other readers and ... couldn't finish the whole book. They just weren't as good.
]]> <![CDATA[The Last Plantagenets (The Plantagenets, #4)]]> 235344 Vintage paperback 447 Thomas B. Costain 0445001038 Cynthia 5
update, August 2021: I should have noted that I was taught in high school that Richard III did not kill his nephews, so it's not like I'm disputing what Costain wrote, I just thought he got a little bit Fan Boy on that topic.

Meanwhile, I picked this book up again two years after my first read and read all the way through and didn't realize until I went to Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ that i had already read it ... two years ago. I still really enjoyed it (although this time, I read my Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ review just before getting to the third and final section, about Richard III, and put the book down at that point).

This is a good book.

July 9 2024
Wow good to see how consistent I am. I read this book AGAIN and did at least keep thinking that a lot of it was familiar... especially the final chapters with too much information on the murdered princes. It's still great. This time I was reading the entire series of four books on the Plantagenets. They're all so good, and really are like beach reads: they're hard to put down (if you love English history).

Let's hope I don't add in a new review in 2026...]]> 4.09 1962 The Last Plantagenets (The Plantagenets, #4)
author: Thomas B. Costain
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.09
book published: 1962
rating: 5
read at: 2024/07/09
date added: 2024/07/09
shelves:
review:
Great page-turning history but he loses it a little bit when he tries so desperately to prove Richard III didnt kill his nephews; instead of making a strong case, he loses his historian cred. but still a great book.

update, August 2021: I should have noted that I was taught in high school that Richard III did not kill his nephews, so it's not like I'm disputing what Costain wrote, I just thought he got a little bit Fan Boy on that topic.

Meanwhile, I picked this book up again two years after my first read and read all the way through and didn't realize until I went to Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ that i had already read it ... two years ago. I still really enjoyed it (although this time, I read my Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ review just before getting to the third and final section, about Richard III, and put the book down at that point).

This is a good book.

July 9 2024
Wow good to see how consistent I am. I read this book AGAIN and did at least keep thinking that a lot of it was familiar... especially the final chapters with too much information on the murdered princes. It's still great. This time I was reading the entire series of four books on the Plantagenets. They're all so good, and really are like beach reads: they're hard to put down (if you love English history).

Let's hope I don't add in a new review in 2026...
]]> <![CDATA[The Magnificent Century (The Plantagenets, #2)]]> 1193013 324 Thomas B. Costain 1568493711 Cynthia 5 4.12 1949 The Magnificent Century (The Plantagenets, #2)
author: Thomas B. Costain
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.12
book published: 1949
rating: 5
read at: 2024/06/30
date added: 2024/07/08
shelves:
review:
This whole series is so easy and delightful to read, and so interesting and informative.
]]> <![CDATA[The Labors of Hercules (Hercule Poirot, #27)]]> 538608 246 Agatha Christie 0425067858 Cynthia 5 english-mysteries They're all interesting little psychological investigations; and a couple of the short stories were actually used in the Suchet production. ]]> 3.70 1947 The Labors of Hercules (Hercule Poirot, #27)
author: Agatha Christie
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.70
book published: 1947
rating: 5
read at: 2024/06/23
date added: 2024/06/24
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
This was one of the David Suchet Poirot productions that I most enjoyed, and that I've seen several times. I listened to the actual book this week, while gardening, and though the book (really a collection of short stories) is very different from the tv production, it's very good. I'd say really that it's actually one of her best books. Poirot is at the end of his career and finds a dozen mysteries to solve that somehow have a (often very tenuous) link to the labors of Hercules in classical mythology.
They're all interesting little psychological investigations; and a couple of the short stories were actually used in the Suchet production.
]]> Now, Conjurers 201906753
Nesbit Nuñez discovers the partially devoured body of Bastion Attia: star quarterback, secret witch, and Nesbit’s even-more-secret boyfriend.
No one knew why brilliant, gentle Bastion lived his life by a seemingly arcane set of rules, including a strange manner of speech and an inability to say his own name.

Now the remaining members of North Coven—Nesbit, Dove, Drea, and Brandy—vow to get answers. Nothing can prepare them for what they uncover: Bastion had been locked in a terrifying battle of wits and wills with something living deep beneath an ancient mausoleum in the local
cemetery.

North Coven must confront the red-gloved monster that took piece after piece of Bastion, that he fought until his last breath. Not knowing that Bastion left behind the key to its destruction . . .

Now, Conjurers is a wildly original, spine-chilling YA debut about queer found family and a love that outlasts death.]]> 384 Freddie Kölsch 1454951591 Cynthia 5 It's kind of stunning that this is her first published book. It's exceptional and I recommend it. For a young writer, she has perfect command of the story and you know right from the beginning that she knows where she's going with the tale and that she'll "land it" with a perfect ending that gathers all the strands. I look forward eagerly to her next books.
]]> 4.14 2024 Now, Conjurers
author: Freddie Kölsch
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.14
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2024/06/15
date added: 2024/06/18
shelves:
review:
This would not normally be a genre I would read, but it was written by my daughter's wonderful friend. I started reading it to be polite and then couldn't put it down. The last 150 pages I ate in one sitting, and then I cried, and then I laughed at the next chapter and then I cried again at the end. This is an extraordinary book, with humor, sass, great characters, a nice creepy Y2K subplot, cemeteries, teenage trauma and drama and a very moving and realistic assessment of what it's like when someone you love, someone your age, suffers and then dies. And yet ... this is a very fun book. Kolsch is very talented at foreshadowing in a casual flip way; and she has a nice way of occasionally breaking through the fourth wall to say eg I told you we would come back to this later!
It's kind of stunning that this is her first published book. It's exceptional and I recommend it. For a young writer, she has perfect command of the story and you know right from the beginning that she knows where she's going with the tale and that she'll "land it" with a perfect ending that gathers all the strands. I look forward eagerly to her next books.

]]> The Postern of Fate 20765399
However, when she writes down the letters, they spell out a very disturbing message: "Mary Jordan did not die naturally." And sixty years after their first murder, Mary Jordan's enemies are still ready to kill. . . .]]> 276 Agatha Christie Cynthia 3 2.82 1973 The Postern of Fate
author: Agatha Christie
name: Cynthia
average rating: 2.82
book published: 1973
rating: 3
read at: 2024/06/17
date added: 2024/06/18
shelves:
review:
This is a later-in-life Tommy and Tupence story, which I listened to as an audio book read by the very talented Hugh Fraser (aka Captain Hastings). It starts slow and it picks up a bit but not so much that I was tempted to start it again after putting it down for the evening. It reminded me a little bit of the story where the mystery is actually related to a country house visit during the war, I think at Checkers. I think it was a Poirot. It was perfectly fine but ... not one of her best.
]]> Passenger to Frankfurt 310224
Sir Stafford Nye’s journey home from Malaya to London takes an unexpected twist in the passenger lounge at Frankfurt � a young woman confides in him that someone is trying to kill her.

Yet their paths are to cross again and again � and each time the mystery woman is introduced as a different person. Equally at home in any guise in any society she draws Sir Stafford into a game of political intrigue more dangerous than he could possibly imagine.

In an arena where no-one can be sure of anyone, Nye must do battle with a well-armed, well-financed, well-trained � and invisible � enemy…]]> 363 Agatha Christie 0007154925 Cynthia 2 ]]> 2.94 1970 Passenger to Frankfurt
author: Agatha Christie
name: Cynthia
average rating: 2.94
book published: 1970
rating: 2
read at: 2024/06/16
date added: 2024/06/18
shelves:
review:
I listened to this as an audiobook and at first I enjoyed it but after a while it became too much of a political rant with no plot. The political rant was definitely interesting but... i ended up switching to another story.

]]> <![CDATA[The Three Edwards (The Plantagenets, #3)]]> 401930
A History of the Plantagenets includes THE CONQUERING FAMILY, THE MAGNIFICENT CENTURY, THE THREE EDWARDS and THE LAST PLANTAGENETS.]]> 480 Thomas B. Costain 0445081864 Cynthia 5 He's a wonderful historian in that he refers a LOT to other historians and lets you know obliquely where he's getting his facts from; and that balances out what sometimes feel like moments where he shouldn't know as much as he knows (very detailed descriptions of some of the characters' clothing, for example). You feel like he isn't making it up.
And he makes the characters so alive that it's much easier to remember who they are, whereas I feel many other history books just rattle off names and titles and it becomes very confusing.
In sum, I feel Costain really deserves his reputation as an extraordinary historian. ]]> 4.09 1958 The Three Edwards (The Plantagenets, #3)
author: Thomas B. Costain
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.09
book published: 1958
rating: 5
read at: 2024/06/07
date added: 2024/06/07
shelves:
review:
Amazing. Each of the four books in this collection of the history of the Plantagenet rulers of England is about 400 pages and I'm racing through them. I just finished this, the third book, and can't wait to get to number 4 (although I'm forcing myself to take a break and read a couple other books that I very much want to get at).
He's a wonderful historian in that he refers a LOT to other historians and lets you know obliquely where he's getting his facts from; and that balances out what sometimes feel like moments where he shouldn't know as much as he knows (very detailed descriptions of some of the characters' clothing, for example). You feel like he isn't making it up.
And he makes the characters so alive that it's much easier to remember who they are, whereas I feel many other history books just rattle off names and titles and it becomes very confusing.
In sum, I feel Costain really deserves his reputation as an extraordinary historian.
]]> Un animal sauvage 203835346 398 Joël Dicker 2889730476 Cynthia 5 But THIS book:
O
M
G
It's like he went to fiction writer school and learned an eff-ton about plot and character, or like he now has an incredible editor who helped sand down the edges and keep all the plates spinning. This book is PERFECT, truly a great mystery story with fantastic characters, and a plot that I found completely unpredictable and, by the last page, completely satisfying. I won't say anything more for fear of spoiling it, and this is a book that should NOT be spoiled. Go read it, and Joel Dicker please write more like this one. This book really puts him up in the pantheon of the greats.]]> 4.08 2024 Un animal sauvage
author: Joël Dicker
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2024/05/15
date added: 2024/05/15
shelves:
review:
Holy smokes this was good. I like Dicker enough that I was looking forward to this newest title coming out, and bought it right away. But I've found his past books to be uneven and unpredictable. My favorite was the Harry Quebert Affair, which I really loved but which I found to be very imperfect (the Netflix tv version of it was actually slightly better than the book, because it smoothed out some of the problem sections). Other books of his I've read and pretty much enjoyed but � they never lived up to the promise of Harry Quebert, flawed as it is.
But THIS book:
O
M
G
It's like he went to fiction writer school and learned an eff-ton about plot and character, or like he now has an incredible editor who helped sand down the edges and keep all the plates spinning. This book is PERFECT, truly a great mystery story with fantastic characters, and a plot that I found completely unpredictable and, by the last page, completely satisfying. I won't say anything more for fear of spoiling it, and this is a book that should NOT be spoiled. Go read it, and Joel Dicker please write more like this one. This book really puts him up in the pantheon of the greats.
]]> <![CDATA[An Extravagant Death (Charles Lenox, #11)]]> 53138073 In what promises to be a breakout in Charles Finch's bestselling series, An Extravagant Death finds Sir Charles Lenox traveling to Gilded Age Newport and New York to investigate the death of a beautiful socialite.

London, 1878. With faith in Scotland Yard shattered after a damning corruption investigation, Charles Lenox's detective agency is rapidly expanding. The gentleman sleuth has all the work he can handle, two children, and an intriguing new murder case.

But when a letter arrives with an unexpected invitation, he's unable to resist the call of an old, unfulfilled yearning: to travel to America. Arriving in New York, he begins to receive introductions into both its old Knickerbocker society and its new robber baron splendor. Then, a shock: the suicide of the season's most beautiful debutante, who has thrown herself from a cliff. Or was it a suicide? Her closest friend doesn't think so, and Lenox, sacrificing his plans, travels to the family's magnificent Newport mansion in the guise of an idle English gentleman. What ensues is a fiendsh game of cat and mouse.

Witty, complex, and tender, An Extravagant Death is Charles Finch's triumphant return to the main storyline of his beloved Charles Lenox series--a devilish mystery, a social drama, and an unforgettable first trip for an Englishman coming to America.]]> 288 Charles Finch 125076713X Cynthia 4 4.09 2021 An Extravagant Death (Charles Lenox, #11)
author: Charles Finch
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2024/05/12
date added: 2024/05/15
shelves:
review:
Hmmm I guess I've read a lot of his books but I have no memory of any of them. That was kind of my experience with this book, too, although I listened to it on audio while taking a long car drive and I wasn't fully paying attention to it. As far as I can remember, it was fine but was a little heavy on description and repetition but a little light on plot development and character. I had downloaded this particular book because it was set in Newport RI and I was driving there for a weekend of visiting the great seashore cottages. There was some good history of Newport and that definitely added to my appreciation of the house tours I went on. In all, it was enjoyable and an excellent book for that moment, but not necessarily a book I'd rush to read again, or to recommend.
]]> <![CDATA[The Conquering Family (The Plantagenets, #1)]]> 1193015 The troubled period after the Norman Conquest, when the foundations of government were hammered out between monarch and people, comes to life through Costain's storytelling skill and historical imagination.

THE CONQUERING FAMILY is the first in A History of the Plantagenets, and is followed by THE MAGNIFICENT CENTURY.

]]> 291 Thomas B. Costain 156849372X Cynthia 5 This is a 400 page book of history of the 1100s in England and France it's a complete pageturner. I couldn't put it down and can't wait to read the next in the series. ]]> 4.08 1949 The Conquering Family (The Plantagenets, #1)
author: Thomas B. Costain
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1949
rating: 5
read at: 2024/05/05
date added: 2024/05/07
shelves:
review:
The version I read was online, from the copyeditors of Canada website, which is GREAT (it's called fadedpage.com. It was called The Conquerors but I think it's the same book.
This is a 400 page book of history of the 1100s in England and France it's a complete pageturner. I couldn't put it down and can't wait to read the next in the series.
]]> Saint in Europe 2269093 203 Leslie Charteris 0891903879 Cynthia 5 3.76 1953 Saint in Europe
author: Leslie Charteris
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.76
book published: 1953
rating: 5
read at: 2024/04/19
date added: 2024/04/30
shelves:
review:
The Saint books are always unexpectedly excellent, with good plots/characters and really nice writing. Even though this one feels more modern/1960s, it's STILL really good; many mystery writers cant make that leap from cozy charming pre-1950s to modern times, but Charteris does it well.
]]> Quelqu'un d'autre 203229603
CĂ´te d'Azur - Printemps 2023
Au large de Cannes, un yacht dérive entre les îles de Lérins. À son bord repose Oriana Di Pietro, éditrice italienne et héritière d'une célèbre famille milanaise. Agressée sauvagement, elle succombera après dix jours de coma. Qui a tué Oriana ? Un homme et trois femmes livrent leur version de l'histoire : Adrien, le mari de la victime, pianiste de jazz séduisant et mystérieux ; l'insaisissable Adèle, sa jeune maîtresse ; Justine, la policière locale chargée de l'enquête et Oriana enfin, à travers le récit bouleversant des dernières semaines de sa vie. Personne ne ment. Mais personne n'est d'accord sur la vérité...]]> 352 Guillaume Musso 2702183697 Cynthia 5 3.78 2024 Quelqu'un d'autre
author: Guillaume Musso
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2024/04/16
date added: 2024/04/17
shelves:
review:
I think this is my third Guillaume Musso and definitely my favorite. It isnt perfect but it doesn't bog down, it moves quickly, there was nothing that made me stop short and shake my head in disbelief. The end seems perplexing but... the book jacket copy does say you arent sure about who's guilty of the crime until the last line of the book so ... i guess the last line IS the solution. But if it is the solution, then it kind of makes me feel like the last ten chapters were kind of deceptive and a waste of time. But overall... good book, makes me want to read another by the same author.
]]> <![CDATA[Ruling Passion (Dalziel & Pascoe, #3)]]> 77190 320 Reginald Hill 0440168899 Cynthia 3 I feel like a good mystery does two things: It wraps you up in the lives of the characters; and it gives an interesting mystery/crime with a neat solution. This one is mostly about the lives of the characters. The crimes and solutions are kind of an afterthought. ]]> 3.91 1973 Ruling Passion (Dalziel & Pascoe, #3)
author: Reginald Hill
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.91
book published: 1973
rating: 3
read at: 2024/03/31
date added: 2024/03/31
shelves:
review:
It was fun, and I carried it around reading it while waiting for things to happen in my life; but honestly I have no idea what happened in this story. There were two parallel mysteries going on and the solution to both was completely random. However, the characters of Dalziel and Pascoe are lots of fun, and there was an additional police superintendent named Backouse who was also interesting and enjoyable. But Pascoe kept coming up with theories of the case that he would explain at great length to the reader; but since he was completely wrong most of the time, and Backouse was right, it felt like a waste of time to read Pascoe's (long) explanations of the case (which were wrong). Nonetheless it was fun, as all these books are, and I don't regret reading it.
I feel like a good mystery does two things: It wraps you up in the lives of the characters; and it gives an interesting mystery/crime with a neat solution. This one is mostly about the lives of the characters. The crimes and solutions are kind of an afterthought.
]]> <![CDATA[Wichita Lineman: Searching in the Sun for the World's Greatest Unfinished Song (Faber Social)]]> 43345903
'It's just another song to me. I've written 1,000 of them and it's really just another one.' Jimmy Webb

'When I heard it I cried. It made me cry because I was homesick. It's just a masterfully written song.' Glen Campbell

The sound of 'Wichita Lineman' was the sound of ecstatic solitude, but then its hero was the quintessential loner. What a great metaphor he was: a man who needed a woman more than he actually wanted her.

Written in 1968 by Jimmy Webb, 'Wichita Lineman' is the first philosophical country song: a heartbreaking torch ballad still celebrated for its mercurial songwriting genius fifty years later. It was recorded by Glen Campbell in LA with a legendary group of musicians known as 'the Wrecking Crew', and something about the song's enigmatic mood seemed to capture the tensions in America at a moment of crisis. Fusing a dribble of bass, searing strings, tremolo guitar and Campbell's plaintive vocals, Webb's paean to the American West describes a telephone lineman's longing for an absent lover, who he hears 'singing in the wire' - and like all good love songs, it's an SOS from the heart.

Mixing close-listening, interviews and travelogue, Dylan Jones explores the legacy of a record that has entertained and haunted millions for over half a century. What is it about this song that continues to seduce listeners, and how did the parallel stories of Campbell and Webb - songwriters and recording artists from different ends of the spectrum - unfold in the decades following? Part biography, part work of musicological archaeology, The Wichita Lineman opens a window on to America in the late-twentieth century through the prism of a song that has been covered by myriad artists in the intervening decades.

'Americana in the truest sense: evocative and real.' Bob Stanley]]> 288 Dylan Jones 0571353401 Cynthia 3 3.61 Wichita Lineman: Searching in the Sun for the World's Greatest Unfinished Song (Faber Social)
author: Dylan Jones
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.61
book published:
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2024/03/29
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Legacy of the Dead (Inspector Ian Rutledge, #4)]]> 20237 For in Scotland Rutledge will find that the young mother accused of killing Eleanor Gray is a woman to whom he owes a terrible debt. And his harrowing journey to find the truth will lead him back through the fires of his past, into secrets that still have the power to kill.]]> 356 Charles Todd 0553583158 Cynthia 4 4.10 2000 Legacy of the Dead (Inspector Ian Rutledge, #4)
author: Charles Todd
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2000
rating: 4
read at: 2024/03/23
date added: 2024/03/23
shelves:
review:
A very good Rutledge. This one involves Hamish's fiancee, Fiona, who is in jail and suspected of murder. She is trying to protect someone but would rather hang than give up her secret. This one moves along pretty swiftly, until about 3/4 way through, when it bogs down a little bit into procedure, and it seems like Rutledge is just driving around the countryside and interviewing the same people a few times. There are a few loose threads that never get resolved. BUT... the ending is very unusual and makes up for any other flaws in the telling of the story.
]]> The Hunter (Cal Hooper, #2) 174156145
Cal Hooper took early retirement from Chicago PD and moved to rural Ireland looking for peace. He’s found it, more or he’s built a relationship with a local woman, Lena, and he’s gradually turning Trey Reddy from a half-feral teenager into a good kid going good places. But then Trey’s long-absent father reappears, bringing along an English millionaire and a scheme to find gold in the townland, and suddenly everything the three of them have been building is under threat. Cal and Lena are both ready to do whatever it takes to protect Trey, but Trey doesn’t want protecting. What she wants is revenge.

A nuanced, atmospheric tale that explores what we’ll do for our loved ones, what we’ll do for revenge, and what we sacrifice when the two collide.]]> 467 Tana French 0593493435 Cynthia 5 3.95 2024 The Hunter (Cal Hooper, #2)
author: Tana French
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2024/03/19
date added: 2024/03/19
shelves:
review:
The definition of a page turner, a fantastic sequel to The Searchers. This is not only a fun and wonderful read from the start, it picks up steam and pretty soon you're rolling through the story like a snowball in an avalanche. The plot at the center of it all, the MacGuffin, is a little bit Snidely Whiplash old school, but she creates such amazing characters and funny, hilarious, vernacular dialogue, it carries you over any eyebrow lifts you might do about the fake goldrush story. And by the end, French has made even the tired gold story seem fresh and modern and compelling.
]]> <![CDATA[The Beckoning Lady (Albert Campion Mystery, #15)]]> 383199
Danger is hardly unknown in this idyllic Suffolk village, but it is a less romantic peril than on Mr Campion’s first visit, more than twenty years ago.

â€Margery Allingham has precious few peers and no superiors.â€� - The Sunday Times

â€Allingham’s work is always of the first rank.â€� â€� New York Times

â€Unforgettable.â€� â€� A.S. Byatt]]> 244 Margery Allingham 0099506084 Cynthia 3 3.87 1955 The Beckoning Lady (Albert Campion Mystery, #15)
author: Margery Allingham
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1955
rating: 3
read at: 2024/03/06
date added: 2024/03/06
shelves:
review:
This was a fun read, but not really a mystery. It was more like reading an Angela Thirkell novel, but with three dead bodies that show up. There isn't really an investigating, there's just a lot of prep for a party and some distracting information about a wonky marriage and even wonkier finances. There are so many red herrings in this story you could launch a fishing fleet. But it was fun in the way a Thirkell novel is fun. It just wasn't really what one expects from a Campion.
]]> The White Cottage Mystery 383197
NOTE: White Cottage Mystery was her first mystery, published as newspaper serial 1927; first published in book form 1975.]]> 139 Margery Allingham 088184666X Cynthia 4 3.49 1927 The White Cottage Mystery
author: Margery Allingham
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.49
book published: 1927
rating: 4
read at: 2024/02/25
date added: 2024/02/25
shelves:
review:
The very first Margery Allingham mystery. It's very good, but a little more conventional than some of her later work. Nonetheless, it moves along quickly and has a surprise ending. Im glad I read it.
]]> The Cheyne Mystery 59694879 287 Freeman Wills Crofts 1774643006 Cynthia 1 3.84 1926 The Cheyne Mystery
author: Freeman Wills Crofts
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.84
book published: 1926
rating: 1
read at: 2024/02/12
date added: 2024/02/19
shelves:
review:
So many mystery aficionados are fans of his work, and I found copies of a few of his books at a local book fair and bought them. I started this one shortly after having struggled through two mysteries where it was hard to tell what was going on and what the crime had been (Proof of Guilt and The Floating Admiral); and I just didn't feel up to embarking on another mystery where the mystery itself is actually what's going on in the mystery (too meta for me).
]]> The Loss of the Jane Vosper 1869318 200 Freeman Wills Crofts 1842324020 Cynthia 3
Then the story settles down to a hard slog of Detective French interviewing and re interviewing people involved with the ship and its cargo. This book made me realize that what I like best in detective fiction isn't a cleverly engineered plot (and there was in fact a lot of engineering in this mystery; the author was an engineer). It's the personalities of the suspects and the many different ways they're guilty of something, even if it's not the crime being investigated. In this book, we don't even learn anything about the detective. At the very end of the story, the backgrounds of the criminals are sketched out quickly. I think this book would have been more compelling if it had been written in a more modern style, with the antagonists and their personalities at play.

PS don't be misled by the cover art attached to this Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ volume. There are basically no women in this story, and the ship is a cargo ship, not a passenger liner.]]> 3.72 1936 The Loss of the Jane Vosper
author: Freeman Wills Crofts
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.72
book published: 1936
rating: 3
read at: 2024/02/17
date added: 2024/02/17
shelves:
review:
Certainly one of the most famous Golden Age detective fiction writers... I found three of his books at a swap and picked them up. The first two I dismissed immediately; but I enthusiastically dug into this one, which began with a gorgeous description of a ship at sea in a storm. There are four explosions and an exciting rescue. The inquest that follows is fascinating.

Then the story settles down to a hard slog of Detective French interviewing and re interviewing people involved with the ship and its cargo. This book made me realize that what I like best in detective fiction isn't a cleverly engineered plot (and there was in fact a lot of engineering in this mystery; the author was an engineer). It's the personalities of the suspects and the many different ways they're guilty of something, even if it's not the crime being investigated. In this book, we don't even learn anything about the detective. At the very end of the story, the backgrounds of the criminals are sketched out quickly. I think this book would have been more compelling if it had been written in a more modern style, with the antagonists and their personalities at play.

PS don't be misled by the cover art attached to this Ĺ·±¦ÓéŔÖ volume. There are basically no women in this story, and the ship is a cargo ship, not a passenger liner.
]]> The 12:30 from Croydon 31194746
We begin with a body. Andrew Crowther, a wealthy retired manufacturer, is found dead in his seat on the 12.30 flight from Croydon to Paris. Rather less orthodox is the ensuing flashback in which we live with the killer at every stage, from the first thoughts of murder to the strains and stresses of living with its execution. Seen from the criminal's perspective, a mild-mannered Inspector by the name of French is simply another character who needs to be dealt with. This is an unconventional yet gripping story of intrigue, betrayal, obsession, justification and self-delusion. And will the killer get away with it?]]> 359 Freeman Wills Crofts Cynthia 1 3.66 1934 The 12:30 from Croydon
author: Freeman Wills Crofts
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.66
book published: 1934
rating: 1
read at: 2024/02/12
date added: 2024/02/12
shelves:
review:
I began this as an audio book and found it so slow I couldn't go on. The first couple chapters are a detailed description of a 10-year-old girl's impressions of what it's like to fly over the English Channel from England to Paris in the early 1930s and ... it might have seemed charming to some but to me it felt kind of rambly and pointless and unbearable.
]]> Les Années 3079197
Tout révèle le désir de poser comme les stars dans Cinémonde ou la publicité d'Ambre solaire, d'échapper à son corps humiliant et sans importance de petite fille. Les cuisses plus claires, ainsi que le haut des bras, dessinent la forme d'une robe et indiquent le caractère exceptionnel, pour cette enfant, d'un séjour ou d'une sortie à la mer. La plage est déserte. Au dos : août 1949, Sotte ville-sur-Mer".

Au travers de photos et de souvenirs laissés par les événements, les mots et les choses, Annie Ernaux donne à ressentir le passage des années, de l'après-guerre à aujourd'hui. En même temps, elle inscrit l'existence dans une forme nouvelle d'autobiographie, impersonnelle et collective.]]> 256 Annie Ernaux Cynthia 3 However, this is a Nobel Prize winner and a work by a woman considered one of the best of all the modern French writers, so obviously there is more to this book than I was able to take from it.]]> 4.17 2008 Les Années
author: Annie Ernaux
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2008
rating: 3
read at: 2024/02/12
date added: 2024/02/12
shelves:
review:
A very beloved friend gave me The Years (en anglais) and then we decided to try and read it in the original French ... which turned out to be exceptionally difficult because the prose and the narrative are so fragmented. Then I read it in English, and honestly ... I don't love memoir, and I found this one to be very fragmented and sometimes kind of distasteful. There was a lot of self consciousness, a lot of masturbation and menstruation, and then an odd moment after the terror attacks of 9/11 when she insults the US president and then scorns a periodical that says, "We are all Americans," and she basically says not only, "Im not!" but also blames the US for betraying the trust of all the French people by not being invincible and not being able to foil an attack where the only weapons used were simple boxcutters. Im not THAT super rah rah Team America but I found that kind of distasteful —enough that I felt it excused me from having to finish the last 15 pages of the book.
However, this is a Nobel Prize winner and a work by a woman considered one of the best of all the modern French writers, so obviously there is more to this book than I was able to take from it.
]]> The Floating Admiral 719399
In 1931 Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, and 10 other crime writers from the newly formed Detection Club collaborated in publishing a unique crime novel. In a literary game of consequences, each author would write one chapter, leaving G.K. Chesterton to write a typically paradoxical prologue and Anthony Berkeley to tie up all the loose ends. In addition, all of the authors provided their own solutions in sealed envelopes, all of which appeared at the end of the book, with Agatha Christie's ingenious conclusion acknowledged at the time to be 'enough to make the book worth buying on its own'. The authors of this novel are G.K. Chesterton, Canon Victor Whitechurch, G.D.H. Cole and Margaret Cole, Henry Wade, Agatha Christie, John Rhode, Milward Kennedy, Dorothy L. Sayers, Ronald Knox, Freeman Wills Crofts, Edgar Jepson, Clemence Dane and Anthony Berkeley.

©1931, 2011 The Detection Club (P)2017 HarperCollins Publishers]]> 320 The Detection Club 051511023X Cynthia 3 Long story short, it all got very muddled, and many of the authors spent of their chapter explaining why things that had happened in previous chapters hadn't actually happened and it just went on and on and in the end I have no idea what actually happened or why.
A cool novelty but ...
I listened to this as an audio. I dont think I would have made it all the way through if I were reading it on paper.]]> 3.87 1931 The Floating Admiral
author: The Detection Club
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.87
book published: 1931
rating: 3
read at: 2024/02/09
date added: 2024/02/09
shelves:
review:
I love the concept of this book, but the execution pretty much showed why we love a tightly plotted mystery... because this one was really not plotted at all... I mean, obviously, since it was done like a progressive dinner, with each author picking up the story for one chapter only.
Long story short, it all got very muddled, and many of the authors spent of their chapter explaining why things that had happened in previous chapters hadn't actually happened and it just went on and on and in the end I have no idea what actually happened or why.
A cool novelty but ...
I listened to this as an audio. I dont think I would have made it all the way through if I were reading it on paper.
]]> <![CDATA[Proof of Guilt (Inspector Ian Rutledge, #15)]]> 15776723 Excellent Book 343 Charles Todd 0062015680 Cynthia 3
But by the middle of the book, I was feeling sort of bored and lost in a very muddled and complicated plot that began with a bunch of disappearances and possibly murdered men ... but the two men that Rutledge was exhaustively searching for the murderers of never showed up. We never even really knew if they'd died...

Then it seemed like a lot of people got involved in murders because of not inheriting estates that it wasn't their right to inherit, or for inheriting estates that they were supposed to inherit but didn't want. I never completely understood who was guilty, who got killed, what happened, what about the body in the rose garden...

Also, Hamish was largely silent in this story, which was disappointing. Usually Hamish offers some clues and some perspective; but in this one he just kept making noises and then being quiet, kind of like a puppy or a toddler.

I hope that the next book in this series is better but it's possible this series has jumped the shark. I hope not.]]> 3.77 Proof of Guilt (Inspector Ian Rutledge, #15)
author: Charles Todd
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.77
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2024/02/09
date added: 2024/02/09
shelves:
review:
I was enjoying the beginning and the way it was so pointlessly descriptive, sharing details of his tea and the view from a shop window. I was thinking, "This must be part of the reason I enjoy these books so much; they're very ... cozy."

But by the middle of the book, I was feeling sort of bored and lost in a very muddled and complicated plot that began with a bunch of disappearances and possibly murdered men ... but the two men that Rutledge was exhaustively searching for the murderers of never showed up. We never even really knew if they'd died...

Then it seemed like a lot of people got involved in murders because of not inheriting estates that it wasn't their right to inherit, or for inheriting estates that they were supposed to inherit but didn't want. I never completely understood who was guilty, who got killed, what happened, what about the body in the rose garden...

Also, Hamish was largely silent in this story, which was disappointing. Usually Hamish offers some clues and some perspective; but in this one he just kept making noises and then being quiet, kind of like a puppy or a toddler.

I hope that the next book in this series is better but it's possible this series has jumped the shark. I hope not.
]]> <![CDATA[Murder Your Employer (The McMasters Guide to Homicide, #1)]]> 61272658 The McMasters Conservatory for the Applied Arts - a luxurious, clandestine college dedicated to the fine art of murder where earnest students study how best to "delete" their most deserving victim.


Who hasn’t wondered for a split second what the world would be like if a person who is the object of your affliction ceased to exist? But then you’ve probably never heard of The McMasters Conservatory, dedicated to the consummate execution of the homicidal arts. To gain admission, a student must have an ethical reason for erasing someone who deeply deserves a fate no worse (nor better) than death. The campus of this “Poison Ivy League� college—its location unknown to even those who study there—is where you might find yourself the practice target of a classmate…and where one’s mandatory graduation thesis is getting away with the perfect murder of someone whose death will make the world a much better place to live.

Prepare for an education you’ll never forget. A “fiendishly funny� (Booklist) mix of witty wordplay, breathtaking twists and genuine intrigue, Murder Your Employer will gain you admission into a wholly original world, cocooned within the most entertaining book about well-intentioned would-be murderers you’ll ever read.]]> 400 Rupert Holmes 1451648219 Cynthia 5 3.79 2023 Murder Your Employer (The McMasters Guide to Homicide, #1)
author: Rupert Holmes
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at: 2024/02/01
date added: 2024/02/02
shelves:
review:
I thought when i began this book that it would be light, fluffy, superficial and fun, which would have been fine. But it was in fact REALLY good and a page turner, AND very inventive and fun and funny. Highly recommend.
]]> <![CDATA[The Times: How the Newspaper of Record Survived Scandal, Scorn, and the Transformation of Journalism]]> 75494577
“An often enthralling chronicle [that] delivers the gossipy goods . . . Like Robert Caro’s biographies, [ The Times ] should appeal to anyone interested in power.”� Los Angeles Times

For over a century, The New York Times has been an iconic institution in American journalism, one whose history is intertwined with the events that it chronicles—a newspaper read by millions of people every day to stay informed about events that have taken place across the globe.

In The Times, Adam Nagourney, who’s worked at The New York Times since 1996, examines four decades of the newspaper’s history, from the final years of Arthur “Punch� Sulzberger’s reign as publisher to the election of Donald Trump in November 2016. Nagourney recounts the paper’s triumphs—the coverage of September 11, the explosion of the U.S. Challenger , the scandal of a New York governor snared in a prostitution case—as well as failures that threatened the paper’s standing and reputation, including the discredited coverage of the war in Iraq, the resignation of Judith Miller, the plagiarism scandal of Jayson Blair, and the high-profile ouster of two of its executive editors.

Drawing on hundreds of interviews and thousands of documents and letters contained in the newspaper’s archives and the private papers of editors and reporters, The Times is an inside look at the essential years that shaped the newspaper. Nagourney paints a vivid picture of a divided newsroom, fraught with tension as it struggled to move into the digital age, while confronting its scandals, shortcomings, and swelling criticism from conservatives and many of its own readers alike. Along the way we meet the memorable personalities—including Abe Rosenthal, Max Frankel, Howell Raines, Joe Lelyveld, Bill Keller, Jill Abramson, Dean Baquet, Punch Sulzberger and Arthur Sulzberger Jr.—who shaped the paper as we know it today. We see the battles between the newsroom and the business operations side, the fight between old and new media, the tension between journalists who tried to hold on to the traditional model of a print newspaper and a new generation of reporters who are eager to embrace the new digital world.

Immersive, meticulously researched, and filled with powerful stories of the rise and fall of the men and women who ran the most important newspaper in the nation, The Times is a definitive account of the most pivotal years in New York Times history.]]> 592 Adam Nagourney 0451499360 Cynthia 5 4.13 The Times: How the Newspaper of Record Survived Scandal, Scorn, and the Transformation of Journalism
author: Adam Nagourney
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.13
book published:
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2024/01/29
shelves:
review:
AMAZING book. I think it was more interesting to me than it might be to sometime that isn't a journalist; my husband worked for the NYT and I worked for their magazines, and then worked for a small newspaper. A LOT of what got talked about was very relevant to my life. However, it's a fascinating look at the paper of record, and it explains a little bit why I find the Times hard to read these days. The book ends with the new generation of leadership coming up, under Arthur Gregg Sulzberger and it's optimistic about the future.
]]> Un Noël de Maigret 2503077 94 Georges Simenon 225311670X Cynthia 5 french-mysteries 3.62 Un Noël de Maigret
author: Georges Simenon
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.62
book published:
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2023/12/13
shelves: french-mysteries
review:
A collection of short holiday themed mysteries. They're all good in the Maigret way, with a lot of human psychology and a slow buildup to a resolution that's based on humanity. It's funny that Simenon sounds like he was such a monster and misogynist and yet when I read about his domestic life with Mme Maigret, I generally dont feel like it's cringeworthy. I wouldn't say he's immensely considerate of her but I also wouldn't say she seems abused or unhappy.
]]> <![CDATA[Horizon by Helen Macinnes (2013-12-17)]]> 46123965 x Helene G. Brown 0944235115 Cynthia 4 3.81 Horizon by Helen Macinnes (2013-12-17)
author: Helene G. Brown
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.81
book published:
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/12/06
shelves:
review:
Sometimes her books are a little tedious and dated and sometimes, for no apparent reason, they just fly along and you can't turn the pages fast enough. Nothing much happens in this World War II thriller but it's fascinating and I loved it.
]]> <![CDATA[Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon]]> 149105520 The Big Short and Flash Boys, the story of FTX’s spectacular collapse and the enigmatic founder at its center.

When Michael Lewis first met him, Sam Bankman-Fried was the world’s youngest billionaire and crypto’s Gatsby. CEOs, celebrities, and leaders of small countries all vied for his time and cash after he catapulted, practically overnight, onto the Forbes billionaire list. Who was this rumpled guy in cargo shorts and limp white socks, whose eyes twitched across Zoom meetings as he played video games on the side?

In Going Infinite Lewis sets out to answer this question, taking readers into the mind of Bankman-Fried, whose rise and fall offers an education in high-frequency trading, cryptocurrencies, philanthropy, bankruptcy, and the justice system. Both psychological portrait and financial roller-coaster ride, Going Infinite is Michael Lewis at the top of his game, tracing the mind-bending trajectory of a character who never liked the rules and was allowed to live by his own―until it all came undone.]]> 272 Michael Lewis 1324074337 Cynthia 5 3.72 2023 Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon
author: Michael Lewis
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at: 2023/11/24
date added: 2023/11/30
shelves:
review:
Fascinating and insightful. Michael Lewis at his best and with a compelling subject to write about and explore.
]]> <![CDATA[Commander in Cheat: How Golf Explains Trump]]> 41716956 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
"Reilly pokes more holes in Trump's claims than there are sand traps on all of his courses combined. It is by turns amusing and alarming." -- The New Yorker

 "Golf is the spine of this shocking, wildly humorous book, but humanity is its flesh and spirit." -- Chicago Sun-Times


"Every one of Trump's most disgusting qualities surfaces in golf." -- The Ringer


An outrageous indictment of Donald Trump's appalling behavior when it comes to golf -- on and off the green -- and what it reveals about his character.
Donald Trump loves golf. He loves to play it, buy it, build it, and operate it. He owns 14 courses around the world and runs another five, all of which he insists are the best on the planet. He also claims he's a 3 handicap, almost never loses, and has won an astonishing 18 club championships.


How much of all that is true? Almost none of it, acclaimed sportswriter Rick Reilly reveals in this unsparing look at Trump in the world of golf.



Based on Reilly's own experiences with Trump as well as interviews with over 100 golf pros, amateurs, developers, and caddies, Commander in Cheat is a startling and at times hilarious indictment of Trump and his golf game. You'll learn how Trump cheats (sometimes with the help of his caddies and Secret Service agents), lies about his scores (the "Trump Bump"), tells whoppers about the rank of his courses and their worth (declaring that every one of them is worth $50 million), and tramples the etiquette of the game (driving on greens doesn't help). Trump doesn't brag so much, though, about the golf contractors he stiffs, the course neighbors he intimidates, or the way his golf decisions wind up infecting his political ones.


For Trump, it's always about winning. To do it, he uses the tricks he picked up from the hustlers at the public course where he learned the game as a college kid, and then polished as one of the most bombastic businessmen of our time. As Reilly writes, "Golf is like bicycle shorts. It reveals a lot about a man." Commander in Cheat "paints a side-splitting portrait of a congenital cheater" (Esquire), revealing all kinds of unsightly truths Trump has been hiding.
]]> 256 Rick Reilly Cynthia 5 Hilarious and insightful. 4.11 2019 Commander in Cheat: How Golf Explains Trump
author: Rick Reilly
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2019
rating: 5
read at: 2023/10/20
date added: 2023/10/20
shelves:
review:
Hilarious and insightful.
]]> <![CDATA[The Nature of the Beast (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, #11)]]> 24586590
But when the boy disappears, the villagers are faced with the possibility that one of his tall tales might have been true.

And so begins a frantic search for the boy and the truth. What they uncover deep in the forest sets off a sequence of events that leads to murder, leads to an old crime, leads to an old betrayal. Leads right to the door of an old poet.

And now it is now, writes Ruth Zardo. And the dark thing is here.

A monster once visited Three Pines. And put down deep roots. And now, Ruth knows, it is back.

Armand Gamache, the former head of homicide for the Sûreté du Québec, must face the possibility that, in not believing the boy, he himself played a terrible part in what happens next.]]> 376 Louise Penny 1250022088 Cynthia 4 4.17 2015 The Nature of the Beast (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, #11)
author: Louise Penny
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.17
book published: 2015
rating: 4
read at: 2023/10/19
date added: 2023/10/19
shelves:
review:
I give it four stars instead of five because her books are so formulaic and im finding her formula a little ... predictable duh now that ive read about a half dozen of them. Having said that, her books are still very good, compelling, tightly plotted, often witty, and while you kind of know what's going to happen, the story still manages to be surprising. I think this is one of the better books in the series, although she does kind of make A Big Deal Out of Everything, and there are some questions that she never answers. But it's still very good.
]]> <![CDATA[The Thursday Murder Club (Thursday Murder Club, #1)]]> 46000520
But when a brutal killing takes place on their very doorstep, the Thursday Murder Club find themselves in the middle of their first live case. Elizabeth, Joyce, Ibrahim and Ron might be pushing eighty but they still have a few tricks up their sleeves.

Can our unorthodox but brilliant gang catch the killer before it's too late?

Alternate cover edition can be found here .]]> 382 Richard Osman Cynthia 5 3.87 2020 The Thursday Murder Club (Thursday Murder Club, #1)
author: Richard Osman
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at: 2023/10/18
date added: 2023/10/18
shelves:
review:
I LOVED this book. Super funny, great characters, tightly plotted. I had picked up the second book in this series a year or so ago and couldn't figure out what was going on; now that i have the background, i look forward to returning to Book 2 and the subsequent titles in the series. i highly recommend.
]]> <![CDATA[The Biggest Bluff: How I Learned to Pay Attention, Master Myself, and Win]]> 49814228
A New York Times Notable Book

“The tale of how Konnikova followed a story about poker players and wound up becoming a story herself will have you riveted, first as you learn about her big winnings, and then as she conveys the lessons she learned both about human nature and herself.” � The Washington Post

It's true that Maria Konnikova had never actually played poker before and didn't even know the rules when she approached Erik Seidel, Poker Hall of Fame inductee and winner of tens of millions of dollars in earnings, and convinced him to be her mentor. But she knew her a famously thoughtful and broad-minded player, he was intrigued by her pitch that she wasn't interested in making money so much as learning about life. She had faced a stretch of personal bad luck, and her reflections on the role of chance had led her to a giant of game theory, who pointed her to poker as the ultimate master class in learning to distinguish between what can be controlled and what can't. And she certainly brought something to the table, including a Ph.D. in psychology and an acclaimed and growing body of work on human behavior and how to hack it. So Seidel was in, and soon she was down the rabbit hole with him, into the wild, fiercely competitive, overwhelmingly masculine world of high-stakes Texas Hold'em, their initial end point the following year's World Series of Poker.

But then something extraordinary happened. Under Seidel's guidance, Konnikova did have many epiphanies about life that derived from her new pursuit, including how to better read, not just her opponents but far more importantly herself; how to identify what tilted her into an emotional state that got in the way of good decisions; and how to get to a place where she could accept luck for what it was, and what it wasn't. But she also began to win. And win. In a little over a year, she began making earnest money from tournaments, ultimately totaling hundreds of thousands of dollars.  She won a major title, got a sponsor, and got used to being on television, and to headlines like "How one writer's book deal turned her into a professional poker player." She even learned to like Las Vegas.

But in the end, Maria Konnikova is a writer and student of human behavior, and ultimately the point was to render her incredible journey into a container for its invaluable lessons. The biggest bluff of all, she learned, is that skill is enough. Bad cards will come our way, but keeping our focus on how we play them and not on the outcome will keep us moving through many a dark patch, until the luck once again breaks our way.]]> 368 Maria Konnikova 052552262X Cynthia 5 couldn-t-finish 4.03 2020 The Biggest Bluff: How I Learned to Pay Attention, Master Myself, and Win
author: Maria Konnikova
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at: 2023/10/16
date added: 2023/10/16
shelves: couldn-t-finish
review:
I gave it five stars even though i couldn't finish it because i LOVE her and ive loved listening to her talk about this book, in fact i love listening to her talk about everything. But for some reason i have trouble making it through her books, even though i love her explorations and i like her narrative voice. The story got bogged down for me; not to sound like an idiot but there was too much talk about poker... the most interesting parts for me were the psychology and the strategy but i had trouble plowing through all the poker parts.
]]> Eight Perfect Murders 52225186 A chilling tale of psychological suspense and an homage to the thriller genre tailor-made for fans: the story of a bookseller who finds himself at the center of an FBI investigation because a very clever killer has started using his list of fiction’s most ingenious murders.

Years ago, bookseller and mystery aficionado Malcolm Kershaw compiled a list of the genre’s most unsolvable murders, those that are almost impossible to crack—which he titled “Eight Perfect Murders”—chosen from among the best of the best including Agatha Christie’s A. B. C. Murders, Patricia Highsmith’s Strangers on a Train, Ira Levin’s Death Trap, A. A. Milne's Red House Mystery, Anthony Berkeley Cox's Malice Aforethought, James M. Cain's Double Indemnity, John D. Macdonald's The Drowner, and Donna Tartt's A Secret History.

But no one is more surprised than Mal, now the owner of the Old Devils Bookstore in Boston, when an FBI agent comes knocking on his door one snowy day in February. She’s looking for information about a series of unsolved murders that look eerily similar to the killings on Mal’s old list. And the FBI agent isn’t the only one interested in this bookseller who spends almost every night at home reading. The killer is out there, watching his every move—a diabolical threat who knows way too much about Mal’s personal history, especially the secrets he’s never told anyone, even his recently deceased wife.

To protect himself, Mal begins looking into possible suspects . . . and sees a killer in everyone around him. But Mal doesn’t count on the investigation leaving a trail of death in its wake. Suddenly, a series of shocking twists leaves more victims dead—and the noose around Mal’s neck grows so tight he might never escape.]]> 270 Peter Swanson 0062838202 Cynthia 3 couldn-t-finish
For that reason, i couldn't get past those first few chapters and i dont know if she actually WAS investigating for the FBI, but i lost faith in the narrator and the author over that question and it took away my suspension of disbelief... ]]> 3.61 2020 Eight Perfect Murders
author: Peter Swanson
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2023/10/16
date added: 2023/10/16
shelves: couldn-t-finish
review:
I made it through the first few chapters and it was fine and cute but a voice in the back of my head kept saying "She isn't actually investigating this for the FBI..."

For that reason, i couldn't get past those first few chapters and i dont know if she actually WAS investigating for the FBI, but i lost faith in the narrator and the author over that question and it took away my suspension of disbelief...
]]> <![CDATA[The Salaryman's Wife (Rei Shimura #1)]]> 412242
Rei is the first to find the beautiful wife of a high-powered businessman, dead in the snow. Taking charge, as usual, Rei searches for clues by crashing a funeral, posing as a bar-girl, and somehow ending up pursued by police and paparazzi alike. In the meantime, she manages to piece together a strange, ever-changing puzzle—one that is built on lies and held together by years of sex and deception.]]> 432 Sujata Massey 0061044431 Cynthia 4 3.60 1997 The Salaryman's Wife (Rei Shimura #1)
author: Sujata Massey
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.60
book published: 1997
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/10/16
shelves:
review:

]]> Old God's Time 61358640 From the two-time Booker Prize finalist author, a dazzlingly written novel exploring love, memory, grief, and long-buried secrets

Recently retired policeman Tom Kettle is settling into the quiet of his new home, a lean-to annexed to a Victorian castle overlooking the Irish Sea. For months he has barely seen a soul, catching only glimpses of his eccentric landlord and a nervous young mother who has moved in next door. Occasionally, fond memories return, of his family, his beloved wife June and their two children, Winnie and Joe.

But when two former colleagues turn up at his door with questions about a decades-old case, one which Tom never quite came to terms with, he finds himself pulled into the darkest currents of his past.

A beautiful, haunting novel, in which nothing is quite as it seems, Old God's Time is about what we live through, what we live with, and what may survive of us.]]> 261 Sebastian Barry 0593296109 Cynthia 2 3.76 2023 Old God's Time
author: Sebastian Barry
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2023
rating: 2
read at: 2023/10/13
date added: 2023/10/13
shelves:
review:
This seemed like it was going to be a mystery story of some kind but instead turned into an exploration of the abuse inflicted on young children by Catholic priests and nuns, described pretty graphically. I couldnt take it.
]]> <![CDATA[Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland]]> 40163119
Patrick Radden Keefe's mesmerizing book on the bitter conflict in Northern Ireland and its aftermath uses the McConville case as a starting point for the tale of a society wracked by a violent guerrilla war, a war whose consequences have never been reckoned with. The brutal violence seared not only people like the McConville children, but also I.R.A. members embittered by a peace that fell far short of the goal of a united Ireland, and left them wondering whether the killings they committed were not justified acts of war, but simple murders.

Patrick Radden Keefe writes an intricate narrative about a notorious killing in Northern Ireland and its devastating repercussions.]]> 441 Patrick Radden Keefe 0385521316 Cynthia 4 4.47 2018 Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland
author: Patrick Radden Keefe
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.47
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2023/10/13
date added: 2023/10/13
shelves:
review:
I expected to find this book disturbing, gruesome and violent but instead it was a very interesting journalistic effort to find out the truth about the Irish Troubles when that truth is unknowable... because from its earliest days, the rebels survived and succeeded based on how well they could say nothing. It seems that most of the people on all sides of this story will die without anyone ever knowing what actually happened... to the author's credit, he makes that ineffability a compelling part of the narrative.
]]> <![CDATA[A New History of the United States]]> 131490073 Maurois. Andre. Cynthia 4 4.00 1943 A New History of the United States
author: Maurois. Andre.
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1943
rating: 4
read at: 2023/10/10
date added: 2023/10/10
shelves:
review:
Maurois is thoughtful and interesting and the first half if the book flew by. The second half got bogged down in a lot of detailed description of elections and quarrels over how the nation should be governed...
]]> The Luminaries 17333230 The Luminaries is a brilliantly constructed, fiendishly clever ghost story and a gripping page-turner.]]> 848 Eleanor Catton 0316074314 Cynthia 4 Which is my one objection: I dont feel like the author tied up all the loose plot strands or explained all the characters and their motivations; and she certainly never explained all the astrological symbols and chapter titles (like, WTF?). Like many works of literature (versus page turners), I felt that she was rushing it toward the end.
Ultimately, though, this book was fun and interesting enough that I didn't really care; and i think is a book that would reward a second reading and maybe a little internet research.]]> 3.73 2013 The Luminaries
author: Eleanor Catton
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.73
book published: 2013
rating: 4
read at: 2023/10/08
date added: 2023/10/08
shelves:
review:
First let me say that I enjoyed this book very much. I dont think of Man Booker Prize winners as being "entertainment" but this book was definitely entertaining. It helped that I read it while on a long trip alone; this is not, I think, a book that you can read a few pages of every night before falling asleep. It is more than 800 pages if densely plotted adventure and it's easy to lose the thread.
Which is my one objection: I dont feel like the author tied up all the loose plot strands or explained all the characters and their motivations; and she certainly never explained all the astrological symbols and chapter titles (like, WTF?). Like many works of literature (versus page turners), I felt that she was rushing it toward the end.
Ultimately, though, this book was fun and interesting enough that I didn't really care; and i think is a book that would reward a second reading and maybe a little internet research.
]]> <![CDATA[Three complete novels P.D. James: Murder in Triplicate]]> 20768770 683 P.D. James Cynthia 4 english-mysteries 3.62 1980 Three complete novels P.D. James: Murder in Triplicate
author: P.D. James
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.62
book published: 1980
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2023/09/22
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
For some reason, I've never really gotten interested in PD James. But I picked up this omnibus at the transfer station Swap Shop and read it with great enjoyment. Then I was on Amazon Prime or some streaming channel and started watching an old PD James BBC production, eventually realizing that it's NOT an old production, it's brand new, starring Bertie Carvel. I liked it very much, and recommend it as well. I feel certain I'll read more James'. I did read Death at Pemberley several years ago and liked it -ish ... I don't think I kept my copy of it but maybe i'll find one at the library and go back and re read it, or watch the BBC version again.
]]> Back to the Garden 59900687 A fifty-year-old cold case involving California royalty comes back to life--with potentially fatal consequences--in this gripping standalone novel from the New York Times bestselling author of the Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes series.

A magnificent house, vast formal gardens, a golden family that shaped California, and a colorful past filled with now-famous artists: the Gardener Estate was a twentieth-century Eden.

And now, just as the Estate is preparing to move into a new future, restoration work on some of its art digs up a grim relic of the home's past: a human skull, hidden away for decades.

Inspector Raquel Laing has her work cut out for her. Fifty years ago, the Estate's young heir, Rob Gardener, turned his palatial home into a counterculture commune of peace, love, and equality. But that was also a time when serial killers preyed on innocents--monsters like The Highwayman, whose case has just surged back into the public eye.

Could the skull belong to one of his victims?

To Raquel--a woman who knows all about colorful pasts--the bones clearly seem linked to The Highwayman. But as she dives into the Estate's archives to look for signs of his presence, what she unearths begins to take on a dark reality all of its own.

Everything she finds keeps bringing her back to Rob Gardener himself. While he might be a gray-haired recluse now, back then he was a troubled young Vietnam vet whose girlfriend vanished after a midsummer festival at the Estate.

But a lot of people seem to have disappeared from the Gardener Estate that summer when the commune mysteriously fell apart: a young woman, her child, and Rob's brother, Fort.

The pressure is on, and Raquel needs to solve this case--before The Highwayman slips away, or another Gardener vanishes.]]> 322 Laurie R. King 0593496566 Cynthia 0 couldn-t-finish 3.73 2022 Back to the Garden
author: Laurie R. King
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.73
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/09/05
shelves: couldn-t-finish
review:
In general I love everything that Laurie King writes but ... I tried twice with this title and just couldn't get past the third chapter. I dont know why.
]]> <![CDATA[Le Livre des Baltimore (Marcus Goldman, #2)]]> 26836349
Les Goldman-de-Montclair, dont est issu Marcus Goldman, l’auteur de La Vérité sur l’Affaire Harry Quebert, sont une famille de la classe moyenne, habitant une petite maison à Montclair, dans le New Jersey.

Les Goldman-de-Baltimore sont une famille prospère à qui tout sourit, vivant dans une luxueuse maison d’une banlieue riche de Baltimore, à qui Marcus vouait une admiration sans borne.

Huit ans après le Drame, c’est l’histoire de sa famille que Marcus Goldman décide cette fois de raconter, lorsqu’en février 2012 il quitte l’hiver new-yorkais pour la chaleur tropicale de Boca Raton, en Floride, où il vient s’atteler à son prochain roman.

Au gré des souvenirs de sa jeunesse, Marcus revient sur la vie et le destin des Goldman-de-Baltimore et la fascination qu’il éprouva jadis pour cette famille de l’Amérique huppée, entre les vacances à Miami, la maison de vacances dans les Hamptons et les frasques dans les écoles privées. Mais les années passent et le vernis des Baltimore s’effrite à mesure que le Drame se profile. Jusqu’au jour où tout bascule. Et cette question qui hante Marcus depuis : qu’est-il vraiment arrivé aux Goldman-de-Baltimore ?]]> 476 Joël Dicker 2877069478 Cynthia 3
I know a lot of people love this the most of the Joel Dicker books but I found it really hard to get through. There isn't that much that happens. The beginning of the book promises some kind of interesting complex relationship between Marcus and Alexandra, which never really happens. It promises a Great Family Drama that tears everyone asunder, and you never really get that either. When what he describes as the Drama happens, it takes up about one page and is frankly kind of hard to believe. I didn't find any of the characters particularly compelling or consistent; even the venerated Uncle Saul who's presented as a paragon turns out to be disappointing, but not in a very interesting way, just kind of mundanely bad. When his bad side is exposed, it's not really built up to; it just kind of splutters out and makes you feel like his downfall was, really, kind of pathetic and well-deserved.]]> 4.12 2015 Le Livre des Baltimore (Marcus Goldman, #2)
author: Joël Dicker
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2015
rating: 3
read at: 2023/08/08
date added: 2023/08/08
shelves:
review:
**This review has spoilers.**

I know a lot of people love this the most of the Joel Dicker books but I found it really hard to get through. There isn't that much that happens. The beginning of the book promises some kind of interesting complex relationship between Marcus and Alexandra, which never really happens. It promises a Great Family Drama that tears everyone asunder, and you never really get that either. When what he describes as the Drama happens, it takes up about one page and is frankly kind of hard to believe. I didn't find any of the characters particularly compelling or consistent; even the venerated Uncle Saul who's presented as a paragon turns out to be disappointing, but not in a very interesting way, just kind of mundanely bad. When his bad side is exposed, it's not really built up to; it just kind of splutters out and makes you feel like his downfall was, really, kind of pathetic and well-deserved.
]]> The Cask 544251 400 Freeman Wills Crofts 1842323849 Cynthia 3 english-mysteries 3.54 1920 The Cask
author: Freeman Wills Crofts
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.54
book published: 1920
rating: 3
read at: 2019/02/21
date added: 2023/07/26
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
i understand that crofts was considered a pioneer in the murder mystery genre and it was interesting to read this book withthat understanding. It's very primitive, however, and really makes you appreciate what Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers did by introducing compelling characters and back stories. This is really a very lunky procedural, with no real central character. It's confusing and it's hard to care who did what to whom when. Having said that, I finished it and didn't find it a chore to get through.
]]> <![CDATA[Pearls Before Swine (Albert Campion Mystery, #12)]]> 76645
All the books from Albert Campion series are standalone titles and can be read in any order.]]> 224 Margery Allingham 0553245481 Cynthia 5 art-history-art-fraud There are also some extraordinary character sketches in this novel, especially the one of the Marquess of Carados' mother. It makes your hair stand on end in terror as he describes this lovely, slightly idiotic and yet incredibly willful and powerful elder woman of privilege who absolutely believes the rules don't apply to her and her type. The way Allingham describes her is .... so real and so frightening.
The mystery plot itself is so convoluted that you almost can't follow it but there is a lot of suspense and this book has so much to offer that the details of the mystery are secondary ...
]]> 3.97 1945 Pearls Before Swine (Albert Campion Mystery, #12)
author: Margery Allingham
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1945
rating: 5
read at: 2015/01/20
date added: 2023/07/22
shelves: art-history-art-fraud
review:
This is one of my favorites of the many Allinghams I've read this holiday season. Not only are the descriptions very good it's also a really interesting contemporary description of a topic I find endlessly interesting, which is the theft by the Nazis of many of Europe's great works of art, at the beginning of the war. Many were hidden away (as we know from Monuments Men) in caves in Germany. I won't give a spoiler but there are massive amounts of stolen works at the heart of this mystery, and it's so interesting to read about them in a book written in I think 1944.
There are also some extraordinary character sketches in this novel, especially the one of the Marquess of Carados' mother. It makes your hair stand on end in terror as he describes this lovely, slightly idiotic and yet incredibly willful and powerful elder woman of privilege who absolutely believes the rules don't apply to her and her type. The way Allingham describes her is .... so real and so frightening.
The mystery plot itself is so convoluted that you almost can't follow it but there is a lot of suspense and this book has so much to offer that the details of the mystery are secondary ...

]]> <![CDATA[The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle]]> 40914164
There are eight days, and eight witnesses for you to inhabit.

We will only let you escape once you tell us the name of the killer.

Understood? Then let's begin . . .

Evelyn Hardcastle will die. Every day until Aiden Bishop can identify her killer and break the cycle. But every time the day begins again, Aiden wakes up in the body of a different guest. And some of his hosts are more helpful than others . . .

The most inventive debut of the year twists together a mystery of such unexpected creativity it will leave listeners guessing until the very last second.]]> 458 Stuart Turton 149267012X Cynthia 4 english-mysteries 3.75 2018 The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle
author: Stuart Turton
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2022/07/10
date added: 2023/06/13
shelves: english-mysteries
review:
i wanted to like this book but it was sloppy in terms of dumb copy editing errors (smudged silver crockery?) that i lost faith quickly that hed be able to take me through a complicated plot. #disappointed
]]> The Devil and the Dark Water 51854625 A murder on the high seas. A detective duo. A demon who may or may not exist.

It's 1634 and Samuel Pipps, the world's greatest detective, is being transported to Amsterdam to be executed for a crime he may, or may not, have committed. Traveling with him is his loyal bodyguard, Arent Hayes, who is determined to prove his friend innocent.

But no sooner are they out to sea than devilry begins to blight the voyage. A twice-dead leper stalks the decks. Strange symbols appear on the sails. Livestock is slaughtered.

And then three passengers are marked for death, including Samuel.

Could a demon be responsible for their misfortunes?

With Pipps imprisoned, only Arent can solve a mystery that connects every passenger onboard. A mystery that stretches back into their past and now threatens to sink the ship, killing everybody on board.

The breathtaking new novel from Stuart Turton, author of the The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, winner of the Costa Best First Novel Award.]]> 463 Stuart Turton Cynthia 5 3.82 2020 The Devil and the Dark Water
author: Stuart Turton
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at: 2023/02/09
date added: 2023/05/26
shelves:
review:
It took me two tries to get into Turton's first book, the 7 1/2 deaths of Evelyn Harding, but once I finally got rolling I enjoyed it. But that reading experience didn't prepare me for this new book, which I found to be completely enthralling and in the literal sense, "amazing." It doesn't play games with the narrative in the same way as 7 1/2 deaths, it's more straightforward and yet up until the last sentence I had no idea what was going to happen. It ended abruptly, which was fine, but left me feeling a little unfinished... so I read the acknowledgments and even the Author Interview at the end of the book, which I rarely do, and even found those enjoyable and funny. This book is an interesting mix of Lord of the Flies and Sherlock Holmes. The hero we meet at first is Samuel Pipps, who is lauded as a great solver of mysteries and a genius ... and then we barely see him through the story, which ends up focusing more on his Boswell/Watson, a big strong soldier named Arent. It all comes together like a big swoosh of revelations as the story proceeds. I highly recommend it and I look forward to his next book.
]]> The Remains of the Day 274186 here.

The Remains of the Day is a profoundly compelling portrait of the perfect English butler and of his fading, insular world postwar England. At the end of his three decades of service at Darlington Hall, Stevens embarks on a country drive, during which he looks back over his career to reassure himself that he has served humanity by serving “a great gentleman.� But lurking in his memory are doubts about the true nature of Lord Darlington’s “greatness� and graver doubts about his own faith in the man he served.]]> 245 Kazuo Ishiguro 0679731725 Cynthia 3 4.17 1989 The Remains of the Day
author: Kazuo Ishiguro
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.17
book published: 1989
rating: 3
read at: 2002/01/01
date added: 2023/05/16
shelves:
review:
I think one thing people forget when they read this novel is that it isn't just another picture of English country house life in the years before the World Wars changed "everything." It's a picture of English country life by a Japanese man who lives in England. Ishiguro is of the generation of Japanese who also grew up in a very rigid class system that had incredibly complex and formal social rules � but in his lifetime the Japanese began to rebel against and leave behind that culture. Think of this not as a novel from the point of view of an English butler but as a novel from the point of a Japanese man trying to make sense of the parallel changes, decades later, in his own world and culture.
]]> <![CDATA[The Shadow of the Wind (The Cemetery of Forgotten Books, #1)]]> 1232 487 Carlos Ruiz ZafĂłn Cynthia 4 4.26 2001 The Shadow of the Wind (The Cemetery of Forgotten Books, #1)
author: Carlos Ruiz ZafĂłn
name: Cynthia
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2001
rating: 4
read at: 2023/04/02
date added: 2023/04/02
shelves:
review:
This book is like a mashup of Magical Realism and The 1001 Nights. There are stories within stories and stories that are parallel stories and tales of heartbreak and heartache and betrayal. There are really no good parents in this book and very few good men. I will not say more, because I don't want to spoil this interesting but often confusing tale. I think this is a book that benefits from being read quickly, in as few sittings as possible. And I suspect it is a book that is better (less confusing and more profound) the second time you read it. I liked it enough that maybe I will indeed read it a second time.
]]> Clara lit Proust 61200256
Clara est coiffeuse dans une petite ville de Saône-et-Loire. Son quotidien, c’est une patronne mélancolique, un copain beau comme un prince de Disney, un chat qui ne se laisse pas caresser. Le temps passe au rythme des histoires du salon et des tubes diffusés par Nostalgie, jusqu’au jour où Clara rencontre l’homme qui va changer sa vie : Marcel Proust.]]> 192 Stéphane Carlier 2072991307 Cynthia 4 A quick little book, very interesting and fun to read. It feels like it would be a terrific little independent film. ]]> 3.61 2022 Clara lit Proust
author: Stéphane Carlier
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2023/03/23
date added: 2023/03/23
shelves:
review:
I blew through the first section of the book, feeling like I wasn't that interested in the little portraits and vignettes. Then I got to the part where Clara reads and talks about Proust, which I was excited about. And as I went along, I realized her message was ... people read too fast and part of what we learn from Proust is to breathe, read, think, observe, enjoy.
A quick little book, very interesting and fun to read. It feels like it would be a terrific little independent film.
]]> L’Énigme de la chambre 622 51797899 Des années plus tard, au début de l’été 2018, lorsqu’un écrivain se rend dans ce même hôtel pour y passer des vacances, il est loin d’imaginer qu’il va se retrouver plongé dans cette affaire.
Que s’est-il passé dans la chambre 622 du Palace de Verbier?]]> 576 Joël Dicker Cynthia 3
This one has the same Dicker style of flashing back and forward with multiple intersecting plot lines but it's not apparent even halfway through WHO WAS MURDERED. I had hoped this one was kind of a snowy hotel in Switzerland fun story but it's not, and there's very little local color of Switzerland; most of the action takes place in an apartment; an office building; and a couple fancy hotels and restaurants, so much so that it almost feels like product placement.

The main characters are not particularly interesting, theyre kind of all rich but desperate. The one likable character is presented as lovely but unexpectedly dumb and ambitious. Dicker writes himself into the story, but we don't get the same sense of his urgent need to write, it's more like he pops in from time to time, with some girl he met somewhere. I think the plot is going to involve the fact that the story of these Swiss people is actually just the story Dicker is writing, as he is in the process of writing it, but ... he needs to like work harder even within the fictional confines of this story to make it more interesting. Even if the plot were "I'm typing and ... wait, suddenly the fourth wall breaks down and I'm explaining to you why that plot strand wasn't working," that would have been more intriguing.

By midway through the book, every subsection and chapter that began with "two months ago," or "15 years ago," I'd find myself groaning and thinking omg please not that story again.

So I give up. My next effort will be The Baltimores, which I couldn't WAIT to read after finishing Alaska Sanders (even though I guess the Baltimores came out before Alaska Sanders, he refers to it constantly in Alaska as "the book I'm going to write next.")
]]> 3.85 2020 L’Énigme de la chambre 622
author: Joël Dicker
name: Cynthia
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2023/03/17
date added: 2023/03/17
shelves: couldn-t-finish, french-mysteries
review:
Uncle, or oncle. I love joel dicker but I couldn't make it past the halfway point on this one. To contrast it with Alaska Sanders, which so far is the best of the three books I've read by him, in that book every chapter has a twist that makes you go, "WHAT?" and frantically turn the page to see what's happened.

This one has the same Dicker style of flashing back and forward with multiple intersecting plot lines but it's not apparent even halfway through WHO WAS MURDERED. I had hoped this one was kind of a snowy hotel in Switzerland fun story but it's not, and there's very little local color of Switzerland; most of the action takes place in an apartment; an office building; and a couple fancy hotels and restaurants, so much so that it almost feels like product placement.

The main characters are not particularly interesting, theyre kind of all rich but desperate. The one likable character is presented as lovely but unexpectedly dumb and ambitious. Dicker writes himself into the story, but we don't get the same sense of his urgent need to write, it's more like he pops in from time to time, with some girl he met somewhere. I think the plot is going to involve the fact that the story of these Swiss people is actually just the story Dicker is writing, as he is in the process of writing it, but ... he needs to like work harder even within the fictional confines of this story to make it more interesting. Even if the plot were "I'm typing and ... wait, suddenly the fourth wall breaks down and I'm explaining to you why that plot strand wasn't working," that would have been more intriguing.

By midway through the book, every subsection and chapter that began with "two months ago," or "15 years ago," I'd find myself groaning and thinking omg please not that story again.

So I give up. My next effort will be The Baltimores, which I couldn't WAIT to read after finishing Alaska Sanders (even though I guess the Baltimores came out before Alaska Sanders, he refers to it constantly in Alaska as "the book I'm going to write next.")

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