O Jerusalem

Author Laurie R. King sends Holmes and Russell to British controlled Palestine to work on a case for Mycroft.  During their sojurn they masquerade as an Arab man and boy traveling with two others through the countryside.  Their costumes bring them into some unusual situations as Russell proves to their two guides her ability with a knife and her willingness to kill if necessary.  The four of them uncover a plot to destroy British rule and of course triumph.  An exciting story.

The Klondike!

Having once visited Dawson City in the Yukon, I decided this book Gold Diggers: Striking It Rich in the Klondike would be an interesting read.  Author Charlotte Gray takes a look at the gold rush and its relationship to the development and decline of Dawson City through the stories of six different individuals.  We witness the tale through the eyes of writer Jack London, miner Bill Haskell, businesswoman Belinda Mulrooney, journalist Flora Shaw, mountie Sam Steele, and priest Fr. William Judge.  This was a fascinating account of the free-wheeling and often amazing story of the gold rush from the travels on the Chilcoot Pass tthrough the earliest gold strikes, the tent cities, and freezing conditions and starvation, to the eventual commercialization of the gold industry.  Gray writes a worthwhile tale.  It makes me want to go back to the Yukon to see the area through better informed eyes.

You've heard about it, now read it!

I have heard endlessly about The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson, and I bought it a year ago.  But it took me until last week to get around to reading it.  I hated putting it down!  It is worth reading. 

Disgraced financial investigative journalist Mikael Blomkvist is hired to research the decades old disappearance of 16 year old Harriet Vanger.  In turn, he hires the unorthodox Lisbeth Salander as his assistant.  Along the way, they discover the shady dealings of Hans-Erik Wennerström the financier who sent Blomkvist into his exile. 

Now that we have the facts of the story out of the way, I want to say that there is much suspense, horrific crime, computer hacking, and romance.  I cannot do the book justice.  Just read it.

Body Work

This latest work by Sara Paretsky featuring her detective, V. I. Warshawski, begins in the trendy Club Gouge.  Performance artist Karen Buckley, The Body Artist, allows bar patrons to paint on her naked body, at the club.  Warshawski attends a performance and witnesses the venom of one of the young club goers (Chad) toward Nadia, a woman who paints on the Artist.  At a later performance, Nadia is shot and Warshawski gets involved; hired to prove that Chad is not guilty of killing this woman he has had differences with.  The Body Artist, the bar owner, and all involved in the club are extremely uncooperative with the investigation, which leads to the disappearance of the Artist and the involvement of Ukranian thugs.  This latest offering in the V. I. Warshawski series is worth reading.

Face-blind!

You Don't Look Like Anyone I Know by Heather Sellers is the story of one woman's quest to understand a little known disability.  Sellers has prosopagnosia, or face-blindness, something that she only recently realized she suffered.  All her life she has had trouble recognizing people, but did not know that this was abnormal.  In her quest for knowledge about face-blindness, she explores her childhood to determine if her mentally-ill mother or her alcoholic father could be the source of her own problems. 

I found myself racing through the book to learn more about her childhood as well as her present day mistakes in introducing herself to long-known acquaintances.  Once she ran up and kissed the wrong man in the airport thinking it was her boyfriend. 

The book can seem disjointed at times, but is still an enjoyable and quick read worth considering for your own reading lists.

Books books books

Now that school is in session again, it is harder to get around to blogging about my reading. 

Here is what I read - as far as I can remember

The Lies of Fair Ladies - Jonathan Gash - Lovejoy book - loved it.
The Moor - Laurie R. King - a Sherlock Holmes, Mary Russell book - I listened to it and loved it.
Deep Shadow - Randy Wayne White - A Doc Ford mystery - probably his best yet.

If I think of anything else, I will write again.

A Real Slog through a Lovejoy Mystery

The Great California Game by Jonathan Gash was quite a slog.  This one takes place in the US, but the slang was so weird that you would never recognize it as anything American.  Lovejoy gets himself involved in some sort of country-wide gambling scheme aimed at control of the major markets of America.  You can tell from that last sentence that I never quite figured out what was going on.  Give this one a miss. 

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

Eleven-year-old Flavia finds a dying man in the family's cucumber patch.  She makes solving his murder - and his identity - her task.  Full of fun and quirky humor.

Alan Bradley's The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie was enjoyable to listen to.  I think it would make a great kid's movie.  I am not so sure about the appeal to adults.  I do not think I would have been able to enjoy this if I read it, but listening to it was fun.  The reader - Jayne Entwistle - did a great job of Flavia de Luce's voice.  She really sounded like a young genius.

A visit to Echo Park

The Madonnas of Echo Park by Brando Skyhorse is a fascinating look at the interlocking lives of an unlikely group of Mexican Americans in the Los Angeles area.  When Skyhorse was in the sixth grade, he insulted a classmate at a dance party by refusing to dance with her because she was a Mexican.  Later, Skyhorse learned that he, too, was a Mexican American.  He has been troubled by his behavior ever since and has speculated on the life Aurora Esperanza would have had after his beastly behavior.  This book is his tribute to his classmate.  I recommend spending some time with the inhabitants of Echo Park and taking a peek at their lives.

Dragongirl

Ever since Todd McCaffrey took over the writing of his mother's famous Dragonriders of Pern series, the books have gotten weaker and weaker.  This book seems to be more about multiple sexual relationships than about dragons and fighting thread.  I think Todd is planning to take the series more into the realm of people and how they interact and less into their relationships with their dragons.

In this book, young Fiona, queen rider, becomes the head of Telgar Weyr, at a time when the dragon numbers are at their lowest and the threat of thread at the highest.  It is up to her and her fellow weyrleaders to determine how they will manage to increase the dragon numbers in time to save the planet.  I think it is obvious that they will go back or forward into time to mature their young population to fighting age in the next book. 

I can't help it, I keep reading them even though they fail to satisfy.

Louisiana at its murderous best!

James Lee Burke is a superb writer of mystery set in his home state of Louisiana.  One really gets a flavor of the state.  In the newest entry, The Glass Rainbow, Burke's detective, Dave Robicheaux gets involved in investigating a series of murders of young women.  Of course, these murders are outside his jurisdiction and using his friend Clete Purcell to help him, is not working by the book. 

I got lost when he began to investigate the wealthy man his daughter was dating.  I probably just read too fast.  The book is a good one, maybe not the best in the Robicheaux series, but still a worthwhile entry.

A Monstrous Regiment of Women - Laurie R. King

I just realized that I had omitted writing anything about this book.  I finished listening to it several weeks ago.  The book involves a charismatic woman preacher who has drawn a large following of wealthy women.  Why have so many of these women died?  Is the minister to blame?  It certainly looks as though she would be guilty.  This book was a good entry in the Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes series and I recommend it highly.  One caveat, the series should be read in order.

Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes

I'm still listening to the series of Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes mysteries by Laurie R. King that I read already.  I just finished A Letter of Mary in which Dorothy Ruskin, an archaeologist, presents to Mary a parchment she has discovered which appears to be from the hand of Mary Magdalene.  While Russell is studying the letter, she and Holmes discover that Ruskin has been found dead.  Determining that she was murdered, they then begin to seek clues regarding the murderer. 

A Letter of Mary is fairly interesting in its study of early documents and the implications such a document as a letter from Mary Magdalene would have on society.  I did not find the conclusion of the mystery that satisfying.  Perhaps I missed a clue or two.  This would not surprise me as sometimes when I listen to a book, my attention wanders.

The Best Detective Books Anywhere!

I believe that Bill Pronzini is the best author of detective books anywhere.  His latest, Betrayers, does not disappoint.  Tamara is off sleuthing on her own case, Bill has a case that sounds like it will be a waste of time, and Jake is working a skip trace.  No major cases this time, but the same taut writing and ever-evolving characters.  Added to this book is a side story concerning Bill and Kerry's thirteen-year-old daughter who has found and brought home a box with cocaine inside.  Where did this come from and why does she have it?  Bill will figure this out as well. 


I recommend all of the books by Pronzini, especially his "Nameless Detective" series.  I would recommend you read an earlier book first so that you can get a better idea of who each character is, especially since Tamara and Jake are not in the earlier books. 

Caper!

Parnell Hall, the writer of both the Puzzle Lady and the Stanley Hastings series of mysteries, has released his latest in the Hastings series: Caper.   Stanley is a private detective whose only detecting ability is in his expertise with trip and fall cases in his work for an ambulance chasing, sleazeball lawyer.  In this newest book, Hastings is approached by a young woman looking to have him track down the movements of her teenage daughter, who she says is working after school as a prostitute.  She tells him that she wants her daughter followed and brought safely out of her situation.  What Hastings does not know, is that the "mother" is not the mother of the girl in question, and when the daughter's supposed John is found dead, who looks the guiltiest?  Stanley Hastings himself.  The bumbling private eye then spends his time working out how to clear his name without revealing his close involvement. 

I used to read these and thought it might be fun to read a new one.  But now I find that the detective's bumbling ways just annoy me.  Perhaps I have read one Stanley Hastings/Parnell Hall too many.

Isabel Allende's Latest Book

I finally read a book by Isabel Allende, Island Beneath the Sea.  It had marvelous reviews in all the sources I saw, so I thought I would give her a try.  The book was quite long and at times seemed to drag, but I would still recommend this story about Zarité, a slave woman on the island of Saint-Domingue.  Zarité is bought by a sugar cane plantation owner, Valmorain, to care for his house and family. 

The story follows Zarité as she becomes further intertwined in the lives of the Valmorain family.  Following the major slave rebellion on the island (and the subsequent renaming of the island to Haiti,) the family relocates to French owned New Orleans.  It is there that Zarité wins her freedom, but conditions continue to throw the fates of her family and the Valmorain's together. 

The conditions on the plantation are brutal and ugly; the mix of voodoo and Christian religion in the lives of the slaves fascinating.  Since I am not doing justice to the scope of this book, I can only ask you to please consider adding this book to your "to read" pile.

Girl in Translation

Jean Kwok's Girl in Translation is the story of eleven-year-old Kim Chang and her mother, who emigrate from Hong Kong to the United States hoping for a better life.  When they arrive, they find themselves indebted to Aunt Paula who is charging them for their air fare and controlling where they live by putting them in an unheated, broken windowed, unfurnished apartment and collecting their rent money besides.  The only work they can get is also controlled by Aunt Paula - backbreaking labor in her sweatshop in Chinatown.  Kim attends the local school and works to excel but finds it difficult, since she, too, must work in the factory. 

The sweatshop scenes are heartbreaking as Kim is not the youngest worker; many other children must work there to help their parents.  Despite her age, Kim assumes adult responsibilities - even filling out her mother's tax forms.  This is an interesting and worthwhile read about the tensions of being between two worlds.  The story rings true.  I recommend it highly.

"I need you to understand how ordinary it all was."

The year is 1963 and the place is small town Mississippi.  Eleven-year-old Florence Irene Forrest has an anything but ordinary life as the daughter of a mentally unstable mother and a father with dark secrets.  The first we realize that her father's night meetings are anything but benign occurs when immediately after he leaves, Florence's mother takes her on a trip to the bootlegger - not the white bootlegger, but the black bootlegger - and gives this man a warning to "get everybody inside, and the boys in the woods."

As Florence becomes more aware of the conditions of her life, the story grows ever darker.  The book is a look back at her life from the viewpoint of her adult life, and her dawning recognition of what she witnessed that year.  The Queen of Palmyra by Minrose Gwin reminded me of The Help but with a much harsher view of race relations in that violent time. 

The Very Last Gambado by Jonathan Gash

Antiques and women, being passion, are the only living things you can depend on.  Trouble is, they come with this other stuff called crime.    --Lovejoy

Thus begins the latest read in my quest to re-read all the Lovejoy books until I reach the ones I have not yet read. 

In this novel, a movie crew has come to town to film a story about the robbing of the British Museum and hired Lovejoy to be its antiques expert.  What's the problem?  Well, the museum has never been robbed and all possible plots can be foiled.  Can Lovejoy come up with a plan?  And why do they need him anyway?  Could this be the first successful robbery of the beloved institution, the "very last gambado?"  Join Lovejoy on his first adventure with Hollywood.

Rereading Laurie R. King

I have decided to reread Laurie R. King's Sherlock Holmes/Mary Russell books - but I am cheating!  I am listening to the books.  I just finished her first Holmes/Russell book - The Beekeeper's Apprentice. I recommend it highly.  Mary Russell is a teenager when she first meets her neighbor Sherlock Holmes.  When the two of them match wits, Holmes finds that this young woman is his intellectual match.  He soon begins teaching her the tricks of his trade and the two work together to solve their first case: who is trying to kill them and why?  I never read any of Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes books, yet I find this series to be a wonderful read.  You might also like to read The God of the Hive reviewed previously.

Caramelo by Sandra Cisneros

Caramelo is the story of three generations of a family told in truths, half-truths, and outright lies and seen through the eyes and ears of young Celaya or "Lala."  The book is Cisnero's first novel since The House on Mango Street, a book I found to be much more fun to read than this one.  The book has a lot of Spanish in it and I grew tired of looking up the words.  I do recommend the book, but not as highly as I recommended Mango Street.  If you are interested, I also read and reviewed Cisneros' Woman Hollering Creek in an earlier post.

Zozi contest

http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/zozi-trip-giveaway/

Lovejoy in Hong Kong

In Jade Woman by Jonathan Gash, a penniless Lovejoy is sent to Hong Kong to escape Big John Sheehan's thugs.  He is promptly robbed of the money he was given by Janie, the woman who is helping him, and all of his belongings.  How does one survive in a country where you do not speak the language, have no possessions, and know no one?  Well, in Lovejoy's case, you get yourself in more trouble than you started in.  Lovejoy becomes a gigolo for hire, manages to get involved in the local triad, and plans an antique scam.  All action, no thinking!  Love it!

The God of the Hive

This latest Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes mystery by Laurie R. King continues last year’s The Language of Bees. Russell and Holmes are separately trying to get back to London from northern Scotland. Russell has a small child with her and is dependent on an American pilot for help. Holmes is on the North Sea traveling with a young man with a gunshot wound and a woman doctor. It’s hard to say much about this book without spoiling its predecessor. I recommend this book, but if you have never read a Russell/Holmes book, please begin with the first book, The Beekeeper’s Apprentice.

I'm Going to be a Grandma

I'm going to be a Grandma.  I have fears and misgivings.  I am worrying about many things. 

Life Lessons from Regina Brett

When Regina Brett turned 45, she wrote a newspaper column of her 45 life lessons. When she was 50, she added five more. The result is God Never Blinks: 50 Lessons for Life’s Little Detours. In this book, Brett expanded her most popular newspaper column into a collection of insightful, entertaining, personal, and funny essays on life. A must read for anyone who ever enjoyed her columns in either the Beacon Journal or the Plain Dealer, or anyone who simply enjoys good writing.

Moonspender

Take murder, mayhem and antiques, add women, treasure hunters and a few witches and you have another fun Lovejoy mystery. This time, someone is unearthing and stealing national treasures and Lovejoy is determined to find out who it is. Enjoy Moonspender by Jonathan Gash for a good read.

Slaves in Ohio

Wench: A Novel by Dolen Perkins-Valdez is based on Tawawa House, a retreat in Ohio frequented by both Northerners and Southern slave owners in the 1850s.  It is the story of four slave women who meet at the house over several summers and learn each other’s secrets.  Each is tempted by the thought of freedom in free-state Ohio.  This book is heart rending in its depiction of the suffering of women subjected to cruelty endured at the hands of their masters.  This book is a wonderful read.

Another Reason Why I Don't Keep A Gun In The House, by Billy Collins

The neighbors' dog will not stop barking.
He is barking the same high, rhythmic bark
that he barks every time they leave the house.
They must switch him on on their way out.

The neighbors' dog will not stop barking.
I close all the windows in the house
and put on a Beethoven symphony full blast
but I can still hear him muffled under the music,
barking, barking, barking,

and now I can see him sitting in the orchestra,
his head raised confidently as if Beethoven
had included a part for barking dog.

When the record finally ends he is still barking,
sitting there in the oboe section barking,
his eyes fixed on the conductor who is
entreating him with his baton

while the other musicians listen in respectful
silence to the famous barking dog solo,
that endless coda that first established
Beethoven as an innovative genius.
 
I got this from my sister's facebook page

Claude Monet

I just finished reading Claude and Camille: a Novel of Monet by Stephanie Cowell.  I enjoyed this peek at the life of the Impressionists in Paris in the 19th century and the love story between Claude Monet and his lover, later wife, Camille Doncieux.  Now I have to look at some of his art just for fun.

Another book I re-read

Re-reading books for me has been very rewarding lately.  This morning I finished (I confess, this was an audio book) Barbara Kingsolver's The Bean Trees.  I love this story about Taylor Greer who leaves her home in Kentucky, travels west in her jalopy of a car, acquires a new name and a child along the way, and ends up living in Arizona.  The book covers the themes of child abuse, immigration, friendship, and honor quite nicely without ever taking you to a place that makes you feel you are being preached to.  Kingsolver's matter of fact writing style is truly enjoyable.  I also recommend her Poisonwood Bible, Lacuna, and the sequel to The Bean Trees, Pigs in Heaven. 

The A-Ha Moment

I have been struggling with the 19th annotation retreat since October, wondering what I was doing, and what I was supposed to be getting out of it.  This morning I had my a-ha moment.  I was reading a homework assignment on the graces of the Principle and Foundation, the First Week and the Second Week of the Exercises and realized with a start that indeed I have received those graces. 

The section I was reading came from "The Graces of the Third and Fourth Weeks" by Dominic Maruca as reprinted in Notes on the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola, edited by David L. Fleming (St.Louis: Review for Religious, 1983).  It read, in part:

     When considering the Principle and Foundation, the exercitant should have received a dual grace: (a) since God is the Lord of history it is His prerogative to demand that we serve Him at each specific moment of history, cooperating with Him in directing the course of history; (b) since we are dependent creatures, we are relieved of the oppressive burden of autonomous agents serving rather as instruments of the Source of all being and activity.  This balanced dual grace enables him to be both accountable and yet not overanxious.  Moreover, he has acknowledged the relativity of all things; no thing is made absolute: neither wealth nor penury; neither health nor distress; neither honors nor disapproval; neither longevity nor a short life-span.  He is truly free and fearless and yet conscious of his responsibility to utilize the means and opportunities which God provides.
        In dwelling upon the enigma of sin in history, he has been assured that the process of alienation from God began long before he came on the scene and that it will continue long after he has taken his leave.  He has considered how this outcast state was compounded by subsequent sins of man which have woven a tangled skein of sinful structures in which we all find ourselves enmeshed as part of the human race.  ... In accepting God's judgement upon this past personal sinfulness, however, he has experienced God's healing forgiveness and been freed from oppressive guilt and the frustration of sheer futility.
           With a sense of gratitude toward Jesus Christ, his liberator, he has felt the inspiration to enlist in a corporate enterprise, to enter into the mystery of how Christ is continuing his work of liberation through the joint efforts of many brothers.  This grace of the Call of the King has several dimensions: the earnest desire to promote the Kingdom on a grand scale is balanced by the realization that his own person - body and soul - must be the immediate focus of his zealous concern, since the roots of all evil are lodged within himself.  
            Next, by entering into the mystery of the Eternal Council of the Holy Trinity, he has felt a sharing of God's own concern and compassion for mankind, which he views as wandering about lost in its own blindness and powerlessness.  ...
...The graces of the 1st and 2nd weeks are not something which were communicated en bloque; rather, each exercitant has realized them to some extent, depending on the lived experiences of his relating to the living God and his involvement in the course of human events.  His actualization of these graces, however, will continue in a spiral-like fashion as he is progressively blessed and burdened with a new lived-experience of sin and redemption.  Grace is an evolving, relational organic reality which God is continually communicating to each person.


This means, in a nutshell, that this morning I realized that I have been called to follow and to ministry, that I must take compassion not only out into the world, but also into my own home.  That I am truly a graced, forgiven sinner and that Jesus is an intimate friend.  

These words are not easy for me to write in what may be a public forum, but I feel quite different today.  Renewed in spirit.  

Also, last night during the bereavement group I am co-facilitating, I realized that I truly am called to ministry.  I am a minister.

Meditation

A Meditation on Rembrandt's Head of Christ

What he sees he takes in.

Every human sorrow

        fuels the fire that burns

        low and steady

        in his open heart.

He looked at the leper like this,

        imagining the man's life

        before he changed it.

He looked at the centurion and saw 

        what it must be for a father 

        to watch his child die.

He looked at the woman by the well,

        and saw her five husbands, and sent her home

        with a promise; at the woman caught

        in adultery, and did not condemn her;

        at the woman weeping at his feet - knowing

        she knew him, who walked the dusty earth 

        unrecognized - and honored her extravagance.

One might live long

        just to be looked at once this way,

        judged, forgiven, and blessed,

        taken in, recognized - a prayer answered

        in eyes that meet longing and assuage it;

"Lord, remember me

        when you come into your kingdom."

--Marilyn Chandler McEntyre - Drawn to the Light: Poems on Rembrandt's Religious Paintings (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003)

We used this poem as an opening prayer for our class one week and I wanted to share it. 

Morning Prayer

Sitting in my chair this morning, I looked out the window.  The sky was gray dark with clouds, but the sun was peeking through, touching the treetops with gold. 

Lovejoy in Scotland

Another book in my quest to re-read all the Jonathan Gash Lovejoy series is The Tartan Sell. When a delivery of a priceless antique goes wrong, ending in murder, Lovejoy realizes that he is the next target. Lured by the promise of a hoard of antiques on an estate in northern Scotland, he uses the opportunity to leave his home in East Anglia. Of course, nothing is ever easy with Lovejoy. He escapes in a traveling circus heading north, but what he finds in Scotland is not what he expected at all. How will he make the best of his situation?

Women, scams, and danger follow Lovejoy wherever he goes.

Funeral In Blue

Tragedy has come to a friend of Hester Monk and Callandra Daviot.  Dr. Kristian Beck’s wife has been murdered along with artist’s model Sarah Mackeson.  When Dr. Beck is arrested for the murders, Monk steps in to find out who really killed the women.  Travel with Monk through the streets of Victorian England as well as Vienna, Austria as he searches for Elissa’s murderer. Glimpse the world of compulsive gambling and understand the uprisings in Europe against oppression.

Praying

Praying


It doesn’t have to be
the blue iris, it could be
weeds in a vacant lot, or a few
small stones; just
pay attention, then patch

a few words together and don’t try
to make them elaborate, this isn’t
a contest but the doorway

into thanks, and a silence in which
another voice may speak.
- Mary Oliver

The Purpose of a Blog??

I believe that the purpose of this blog should not be just to write book reviews.  However, I hesitate to write anything that could be too personal, or would reveal information that might hurt another, so I am struggling.  Please bear with me while I type and learn. 

A Novel of Intricately Woven Deceit

I just finished reading Bitter Sweets by Roopa Farooki.  The story follows the Pakistani/Bangladeshi family of Parvez and Shona Khan and their lives in England.  Shona learned the art of the lie from her mother at an early age; now as an adult with adult sons she is faced with the web of deceit that seems to have hopelessly entangled their lives.  Her father has two wives, she is having an affair, and one of her sons has a relationship that is dangerously close to revealing all.

I recommend this book.

The Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World

Esquire editor A.J. Jacobs, author of The Year of Living Biblically and The Guinea Pig Diaries began this series of quirky books about his obsessions with The Know-It-All: One Man's Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World.  His quest? to read the entire Encyclopaedia Britannica from beginning to end.  Sometimes informative, sometimes funny, always interesting, he takes us from a-ak to Zywiec with his self-effacing, humorous look at knowledge.  His search leads him to meeting Alex Trebek, an appearance on Crossfire, taking on a debate team, and finally to being a contestant on Who Wants to be a Millionaire?  Interwoven in his reading adventures is the more personal quest of achieving parenthood,and other stories of his family and friends.  I highly recommend any of his books.

The Highly Ineffective Mystery

I just quit on The Highly Effective Detective by Richard Yancey.  The main character is a bumbling fool, not funny like the reviews all say.  After about 100 pages, I could not take it anymore.  I am teaching myself to quit on books I don't like, so I quit on this one.

"Antiques are all we have" - Lovejoy

"Antiques are all we have.  They're all we can depend on and the only things mankind can look forward to.  They deserve protection."
              Lovejoy (Jonathan Gash)

Pearlhanger by Jonathan Gash begins with Lovejoy at a séance and ends up with him hunting for an almost mythical pearl antique.  Join him on a sweep of East Anglia looking for his precious antiques and secretly buying them.  Before too long Lovejoy is in trouble with several forgers, the police, and a dangerous collector of antiques. Of course, there is a woman involved who is forcing him to do her bidding; what would a Lovejoy mystery be without a woman? 

Disclaimer:  I know nothing about antiques at all.  I just love Lovejoy, the scoundrel! 

Mennonite in a Little Black Dress

For once I am reading something current, Mennonite in a Little Black Dress, a memoir by Rhoda Janzen.  When her husband leaves her for another man, Janzen goes home to reconnect with her family and her heritage.  This delightful and humorous book is the result.  Many times I found myself laughing out loud at her descriptions of her life, her marriage, or her childhood.  I highly recommend this book, after all, how can you go wrong when on the first page you read of a relative who named her withered arm "Stinky."

I Love Lovejoy

After the brutal murder of two of his acquaintances, Lovejoy is forced to submit to a plan to, of all things, steal Venice.  Once in Venice, Lovejoy skulks around the city trying to suss out the best way into the Palazzo Malcontento to learn where the forgeries are being produced and determine the principle players in this scam.  Once again, Lovejoy has too many women from which to choose, and one of those women may be a murderer.  Who can he trust?   In The Gondola Scam by Jonathan Gash, until the last pages, you will never know. 

A Cozy English Novel.

Helen Simonson’s Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand, is a nice relaxing read with a social conscience. Major Ernest Pettigrew begins a friendship with the local shopkeeper, Jasmina Ali, a woman of Pakistani heritage. Much to the dismay of his son and the people of his village of Edgecombe St. Mary, his friendship soon looks to be developing into something much stronger.

Meanwhile, there is the trouble between Abdul Wahid and Amina, Roger Pettigrew and everyone, the Major and his sister-in-law, a large building project that threatens village life, and a matched pair of prized shotguns. Join Major Pettigrew as he tries to come to terms with public opinion in Simonson’s first novel.

Slaves of Obsession

In Anne Perry's Slaves of Obsession, Monk is hired to discover who is blackmailing Daniel Alberton, a gun dealer. Meanwhile, both sides in the United States Civil War are trying to purchase guns from Alberton. When Merrit, Alberton's daughter; Lyman Breeland, the buyer for the North; and the guns all disappear at the same time that Alberton is found brutally murdered, Monk and Hester are sent to the United States to find Merrit and attempt to apprehend Breeland to stand trial for the murder.

When they return to London, Breeland and Merrit are both held for trial and Monk must determine if they are guilty. Does the blackmail attempt have anything to do with the murder? Did Breeland steal the guns or did he buy them, as he said he did? This exciting entry in the Monk series of mysteries includes scenes from both the US Civil War and underwater diving in the Thames.

Disappointment

I am very disappointed today.  We had a meeting that was to decide whether to allow a group to meet and when we arrived we found it was a done deal.  What is the point of a committee if all you do is say "yes?" I would have voted yes, I just wanted the opportunity.

The Candy Factory

Katharine Weber's True Confections is the story of one Alice Tatnall Ziplinsky's life in the world of Zip's Candies, a world she entered through her marriage.  Weber begins this novel with an affidavit by Alice that the following is "true and correct to the best of my knowledge."  Although we know fairly early on that Alice is known as an arsonist, we are teased with the details of that arson interspersed with life in a candy factory.  The teasing way she tells her story makes the reader yearn for more and read on. The story leaps from one event to another, skipping details, only to jump back to an earlier topic, thus tantalizing the reader the way a good chocolate bar might.

But all is not perfect about this book.  The author's detour into one character's escape from WWII Hungary to Madagascar is murky and confused at best.  The main character, who is narrating this escape admits to making things up, but that does not help.  

Sleepless goes to the Movies!

I go to the movies about twice a year; My spouse goes about 35 times a year.  Well today was the day for me.  We went to see Alice in Wonderland.  I'm not unhappy I saw it, but it was not that great.  Plus my hearing is such that I needed it to be closed captioned! ;-)  I liked the effects (other than the Mad Hatter's dancing - that was just stupid).  The cards were good as were the Jabberwock and the White Queen's chessmen soldiers.

As an aficionado of Lewis Carroll's books and Tenniel's illustrations, I'd say the fall down the rabbit hole and the Jabberwock were right on.

The Stupidity of Reading Crummy Books

I just finished slogging through Kelli Stanley's Nox Dormienda (A Long Night for Sleeping).  This is the first in her "Arcturus" murder mystery series - and as far as I am concerned, it may as well be her last. 

The book is supposed to be a noir mystery taking place in Roman Britain.  I could not figure out who was who many times in this book.  When I finished, I did not know how we got to the resolution of the mystery.  It was rough going as there are Latin words a-plenty in this murder mystery - fortunately it has a glossary. 

I kept asking myself why I was so determined to finish it.  What a waste of time.

And Another Book Goes into the Reject Pile

I was trying to read Tim Dorsey's Gator a-go-go and suddenly realized I have gotten old.  I just did not care about the Spring Break activities of what turned out to be the main characters.  The book kept jumping from one scene to another in Florida; and from Boston to Florida; and I could not keep track.

Woman Hollering Creek

I just finished reading Sandra Cisneros' collection of short stories Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories.  I really am not a fan of short story collections, but wanted to give this book a try.  I liked some, and found others dull.  I suppose that is a normal reaction to a collection of this sort.  I really liked "Woman Hollering Creek," "Bien Pretty," and "Little Miracles, Kept Promises."  It was difficult when it switched to Spanish; I only know a little Spanish.  I had to put some stuff into Google translate in order to read it, but not that much.  I liked The House on Mango Street much better.  I still have Caramelo to read. 

One Problem with Listening to Books

I was listening to Wife of the Gods by Kwei J. Quartey, a murder mystery set in Ghana.  I had to quit more than halfway through the book because of violence.  I find it much more difficult to listen to a violent scene than read it.  Now I will never know how Detective Inspector Darko Dawson solves the murder.  If I had been reading the book, I would have skimmed through that rather than be forced to visualize it.  No, fast forward was not an option since I had lost any sympathy for the main character.  It's probably a wonderful book.  Perhaps someone will be able to tell me.

Lovejoy

Spend Game 
          Lovejoy and his love of the moment witness the murder of an antique dealer.  Why murder Leckie?  What had he been involved in?  Of course, Lovejoy never dreams of telling the police what he saw and pursues the murderers himself.  As usual he ends up in a tight spot clamoring for an antique no one is really sure exists.

The Sleepers of Erin
          This one begins with Lovejoy in the hospital bleeding from a wound he acquired while trying to stop the robbery of a church's priceless antiques.  Before he is released, he finds that he is under arrest for the very robbery he tried to prevent.  How will he get out of this one?

I still have many Lovejoy books to re-read before I begin the new one.

Quote I read today

“Librarians, like ministers of religion, and poets, and people with serious mental health disorders, can make people nervous. Librarians possess a kind of occult power, an aura. They [can] silence people with just a glance.” Ian Sanson / THE BOOK STOPS HERE

Anne Perry

I have now completed 10 books in my effort to re-read all the Anne Perry "Inspector Monk" books.  The one I finished last night is The Silent Cry.   Hester is nursing a young man, Rhys Duff, who was badly beaten in the slums of London.  Rhys can no longer speak and his father was murdered in that same beating event.  What is going on here?  Why are these gentlemen hanging around the slums and who is responsible for the random beatings and rapes of women in these areas?  Will street justice be meted out, or will Monk find enough information to bring a case to court?  Did Rhys murder his own father?  What is the secret that is keeping Rhys from talking?

On the Lighter Side

I just took some time to read two books that came about as a result of the popularity of their blogs:  How to Take Over teh Wurld  and Cake Wrecks: When Professional Cakes Go Hilariously Wrong by Jen Yates.  The first book is based on the LOLCAT blog I Can Has Cheezburger (http://icanhascheezburger.com/) and the second is from the blog Cake Wrecks (http://cakewrecks.blogspot.com/)

How to Take Over teh Wurld is cute, but Cake Wrecks had me laughing so hard I was in tears.  Good choices for a few minutes of relaxation.

The Desert?

I remember back 11 or 12 years ago when I first returned to church.  Everything was so new and exciting.    Each religious event or prayer was such a spiritual high.

Now, I am dry and absent.  I still attend all the services, but I cannot recapture the feeling.  I know that is normal, but it is difficult.

I want that excitement again, that feeling of being close to God.

The Myers-Briggs test

When was the last time you did the Myers-Briggs test?  My results seem to change slightly when I take the test.  Partly I want to answer in ways that show me as an introvert, and yet I can be an extrovert if the situation warrants it.  I just took it again today and I am (today) ISFJ.  What are you? 

See the test and read your results here:  http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/JTypes2.asp

The Twisted Root

I just finished listening to The Twisted Root by Anne Perry.  It is another in the series of Detective William Monk mysteries.  Two women are accused of conspiracy and murder in the deaths of a coachman and the mother of the fiancé of one of the women.   Was the older woman being blackmailed for the theft of medicines from the hospital?  Was the younger one also being blackmailed?  What was the truth about the younger woman's mysterious past?  What happened to her baby and who was the father? 

This book has a wicked and unexpected twist to the tale.

A Departure from My Reading of Murder Mysteries

I just finished reading The Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible by A. J. Jacobs.  A. J. Jacobs made the decision in his self-admitted obsessive-compulsive way that he would follow all the rules of the Bible for one year.  It is a fascinating and humorous look at our beliefs.  Another fun aspect of the book is the way his long-suffering wife puts up with his antics.  It is interesting to watch an avowed agnostic discover a belief in God and return to his own religious roots.  I read The Guinea Pig Diaries: My Life as an Experiment by him last year and decided he was worth reading.

I just put his other book The Know It All on hold.  He's worth it!

Another Lovejoy Mystery

I just finished Firefly Gadroon.  Lovejoy is forced into finding and rescuing a cache of stolen antiques in the North Sea before they are shipped off to Europe.  Will he succeed?  Can he rescue these prizes?  Would he give them to their rightful owners?  Can he manage all this, save his skin, and avoid killing the bad guys? Oh, and what is a gadroon, anyway?

Sandra Cisneros

WOW!  I just read The House on Mango Street.  It is considered a teen book, but I would certainly not limit it to teens.  Sandra Cisneros tells a story in a series of vignettes of growing up Latina in Chicago.  I want to go and read everything she has written.  I will look into what the library owns and see what will be next.  I put a hold on Caramelo and on Woman Hollering Creek.  The other things she has are poetry and I do not know if I am ready for poetry at this time.

The Vatican Rip

I just finished The Vatican Rip by Jonathan Gash. Lovejoy is blackmailed into stealing a valuable antique from the Vatican museum. A good book, but a bit more confusing than his others. I am still waiting for a copy of his book The Spend Game to arrive. I skipped it for this title.

Now I have to work on homework. To begin with I have to compare the second week Ignatian Spiritual Exercise on The Kingdom, with the exercise The Two Standards. There is a whole bunch more, but I take it one piece at a time.

More Murder and Mayhem

I just finished reading The Merry Wives of Maggody by Joan Hess, an "Arly Hanks" mystery. These take place in the inbred town of Maggody, Arkansas. To get a true picture of the relationships among the characters you really have to start with Malice in Maggody. The cast of characters can get confusing when Mrs. Jim Bob Buchanon, aka Barbara Jean Buchanon Buchanon and others are interrelated.

Simon's Cat

One of my favorite internet videos is the cartoon "Cat Man Do." Now, Simon Tofield has his own website with several Simon's cat videos. Check it out. http://www.simonscat.com/index.html

Murder in the Highlands

If you feel like reading a cozy mystery, take a look at the Hamish Macbeth series by M. C. Beaton. The latest is Death of a Valentine. I finished this one the other day and it was just as lovely and mindless as all the rest. They are worth reading for your entertainment. The victim is never anyone you care about, the criminal is always an outsider or no one you have become familiar with in any other books in the series, there's never any blood and guts to wade through. If you feel like some fun, start with the first in the series Death of a Gossip.

I Love to Read

In case you hadn't noticed, I love to read. I just finished Weighed in the Balance by Anne Perry and Silencer by James W. Hall. The Anne Perry is another book in the Inspector Monk series of detective fiction. I still have quite a few to go before I re-read or listen to them all.

Silencer is a book in a series about a guy named Thorn. I used to read these and saw the new one and figured it was time to read another one. Now I am not so sure. It was much grittier than the reading I currently do. I was almost afraid of having nightmares because the bad guys were so evil.

Reading and Writing

I finished all my homework for next Wednesday - the paper is written and everything. Now I am free to go back to reading for pleasure. I have a mountain of books from the library and only can renew a couple of them, so it's speed reading or give up.

I finished listening to A Breach of Promise by Anne Perry. I am reading her book Weighed in the Balance.

My Busy Sunday and a Reading Update

Today I must begin work on my next class assignment. I am reading about and writing on the 2nd week of the Spiritual Exercises and the Prayer of the Senses. I have five topics to consider for my paper and have managed to get two of them into a rough draft. The next one is going to require a reread of the material - a short handout from Sandra Schneiders' The Revelatory Text.

I also finished yet another Jonathan Gash book, The Grail Tree. I have not mentioned what his books are about. They take place in a village in England. The main character, Lovejoy, is an antique dealer and a "divvie." A divvie is someone who can tell if something is an antique through his own internal senses: think of a water diviner for antiques. The books are murder mysteries with plenty of antiques information thrown in. I think any antique collector would enjoy them. I am not into antiques, but he talks about human greed frequently, and I confess that if I could make money off something priceless I just might.

The Grail Tree assumes that there has been a finding of the Holy Grail and the machinations of the various characters to acquire it and profit from it.

The Lovejoy books are irreverent, definitely chauvinistic and fun.

Ignatian studies

I began reading about the second week of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius today. This section includes the Prayer of the Senses. I have a report to write on this and several other topics. Slogging through the reading all day today with many unwanted, but not unexpected, naps.

Meanwhile, my own adventure with the Spiritual Exercises has me traveling through the first week, a week of contemplation of my sins and the sins of the world.

More reading

In my quest to re-read all of Jonathan Gash's books before I enjoy the newest one, I just finished Gold by Gemini.

There Is a God/There Is No God

This little book, There Is a God/There Is No God, by John Kirvan comes highly recommended to me. It is considered a companion book to the Cloud of Unknowing. Each meditation is preceded by a section from the Cloud and is followed by Kirvan's meditation on that piece. I just began reading it this morning. We'll see how it goes.

Another book finished

I just finished A Whisper to the Living by Stuart M. Kaminsky. I love two of the several series Kaminsky writes. This one was an Inspector Porfiry Rostnikov mystery. The other series he writes that I like is the detective Abe Lieberman books.

Comments

I realize that my blog does not have much in it. I'll get there. Meanwhile, I am trying to figure out the comments section. Let me know if you can comment. Thanks.

Reading Update

I just finished reading Saving CeeCee Honeycutt, by Beth Hoffman. It was a pretty good book, nothing heavy. See the reading list on the right side of the page.

Finished my paper - sort of

I have a paper due next Wednesday on An Adult Christ at Christmas. I just finished the rough draft of it. Now I have to edit it and probably pad it a bit to meet the specifications!

Weight Watchers

If their math were better the Weight Watchers folks would know that I MADE MY 10% GOAL TODAY!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm sure the fat will be in the fire with this one.

(Thanks to the website criggo.com)

The Fabulous Science & Technology Blog

We keep a blog at work, go visit for the latest and greatest in our department. http://ascplst.wordpress.com/

Reading update

I am trying to re-read all of the Inspector Monk books by Anne Perry - or listen to the books if I can easily get the tapes. I just finished reading Cain His Brother and am listening to A Breach of Promise.

I am also re-reading all of the Jonathan Gash books since it has been so long since I read any of his. I just finished The Judas Pair.

Finally, I just finished Retail Hell by Freeman Hall.

Last night I started on Acedia and Me by Kathleen Norris.

It amazes me how much reading I can get done when I am home sick!

See the reading list on the right side of the page.