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| Hosted by The Book Date |
Life
After an exciting week with our son's wedding and a short trip to the beach, my life came to a screeching halt last week, as my chronic immune disease flared up again, with flu-like aches and a sore throat. My best guess is that I was exposed to something on our trip, since we ate a few meals in restaurants (something I normally avoid). I spent most of the week lying on the couch, resting as much as possible, though I managed to record one video. I did enjoy nice weather, even when I couldn't leave the house, and the beginning of some fall color.
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| Some brown-eyed Susans still in bloom! |
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| Fall has come to our back deck! |
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| Enjoying our screened porch in the evening |
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| Weekend relaxation: coffee & paper on the porch |
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| Dogwood adds some fall color! |
Friday, our son and his wife (that sounds so strange!) came for dinner, with their puppy, Chester. It was great to see them, catch up, and hear about their honeymoon. Chester was not impressed with our Halloween decorations! Our clock that moans and screeches on the hour freaked him out, and when he saw this witch, he backed away 😂
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| Not sure why, but Chester does NOT like our witch! |
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The [Insert Genre Here] Book Tag - this is a really fun, unique combination of Mad Libs and a book tag, with a series of questions about different genres, chosen randomly. It was a lot of fun, and I included a lot of great book recommendations!
September Reading Wrap-Up - What a great reading month! I finished 9 books and really enjoyed all the fun reading events: RIP XXI (Readers Imbibing Peril), Shorty September, Series September, and Sci Fi September.
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I'm enjoying fall reading, with the annual RIP XXI event (Readers Imbibing Peril - my 11th year!) for reading darker books in September and October.
I am almost finished reading The River We Remember by William Kent Krueger, one of his stand-alone historical mysteries. Set in 1958 in a small rural town in Minnesota, a local man named Jimmy Quinn is found dead in the river, catfish having chewed his face and body. Sheriff Brody Dern has quite a challenge here, since Jimmy was a mean, violent man who lots of people wanted dead. It's been outstanding so far, as are all of Kent's novels, with an intriguing mystery, in-depth character development, interesting historical details, and gorgeous nature writing. Surprising (because it's rare for me), I guessed who was behind the murder (and the circumstances) very early on, but that hasn't dampened my enjoyment of the novel. There were still plenty of surprising plot twists, and Krueger writes so beautifully, about nature and human nature, delving deep into each character's secrets and emotions. I'm loving it.
On audio, the mystery bonanza continues! I finished listening to The Rivals by Jane Pek, the sequel to The Verifiers (my review at the link). Claudia returns as a mystery-novel-loving employee at Veracity, a small company people hire to look into their online dating match, to find out if they are telling the truth about themselves. Here, Claudia and her two coworkers continue to investigate "the synths," AI bots that the big dating app companies use, pretending to be real people. A new client, Pradeep, comes in and claims that an ex-boyfriend has created a "clone" dating profile for Pradeep, and other various clients also keep the small team busy. When a client turns up dead, the team dig further into the mysteries of the dating apps to find out what happened. Meanwhile, Claudia continues to juggle her dysfunctional family relationships with her siblings (one of whom might be unwittingly mixed up in the synth business) and her demanding and never-satisfied mother. I met Jane at Booktopia in 2022 (she was great at book trivia!) and love her writing style, combining mystery and thriller with a hefty dose of humor and here, a touch of romance, too.
Now, I am listening to another mystery, but this one is a departure for me, a mystery set in Victorian England, Down a Dark River by Karen Odden. I don't usually read many novels set in Victorian times, but this one is special: the author was my classmate from 1st through 12th grades! When I heard at our 40th reunion that she was a best-selling novelist, I had to try one of her novels. In 1878 London, a wealthy young woman is found dead in a small boat floating down the Thames. She is soon identified as the daughter of a prominent judge, so Scotland Yard assigns the case to senior Inspector Michael Coravan (who the author says is based partly on our beloved 12th grade AP English teacher!). I'm only on chapter 5 so far, but it's already excellent, and I am fully hooked. Karen Odden has written six novels so far, including her recent release, An Artful Dodge, which is garnering rave reviews and a lot of buzz. I decided to start with this one since it is the first Inspector Coravan novel.
My husband, Ken, finished reading Hi Five by Joe Ide, book 4 in his IQ series of thrillers set in L.A., a Father's Day gift from me. He loves this series! He is now reading Past Crimes by Glen Erik Hamilton, a thriller I gave him for his birthday last week. This is the first book in the Van Shaw series, and the author's been compared to Lee Child, Ken's favorite novelist,
Our son, 32, finished reading The Bladed Faith by David Dalglish (book 1 of the Vagrant Gods series), a birthday gift from us this summer. He previously enjoyed The Keepers series by this author, and he said this new novel was great, and he's definitely going to continue with the series.
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