AAR

[Manda]

I finally read Tana French's IN THE WOODS over the weekend and most of THE LIKENESS had mixed feelings about both. Spoilers Ahoy!

Technically I thought it was quite well done, though I was annoyed about the lack of resolution for the disappearance of Rob's childhood friends. But what really annoyed me was the dissolution of Rob and Cassie's friendship. I picked up THE LIKENESS hoping that there would be some reconciliation but after I did something I almost never do (skipped to the end) I realized that not only is there no reconciliation but Cassie gets engaged to Sam. I dunno. I know some people weren't overly fond of Rob, and I can see why. But I would have felt much better about the whole thing if French had at least let us see him dating someone and slightly settled. As it was I just finished both of them feeling disjointed and unsatisfied.

Even so I'm going to be thinking about these books for a while to come. Not sure I'm ready to read the next two yet, though.
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Manda Collins

[maggie b.]

Still Life
Louise Penny

I had mixed feelings about this book. I was fascinated by the mystery but I really didn't fall in love with Gamache. The assistant whom he had to send home was almost frightening in her clueless-ness. I wondered if she would become a rival/villain at some point.

Still, I was interested enough that I got book two from the library.

maggie b.
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http://maggiebbooksandteas.blogspot.com
She is too fond of books and it has turned her brain. - Louisa May Alcott

[dick]

I've been reading Anne Perry's "Monk" novels, set in the Victorian era. I'm both intrigued and irritated by them. The mysteries strike me as problems to be solved rather than mysteries, although the last I read, "The Twisted Root," had a surprising, although horrifyingly Oedipal, conclusion. The romance in them is muted and requires a considerable amount of imagination to see as romance. The relationships though, especially that between the barrister and his father are insightfully delineated, as is the triangular relationship between him, the heroine (?), and the hero (?). I include the question marks because it's difficult to decide which of the two major male characters should be thus considered, and which of the possible heroines is the central one.

[Anne Louise]

[LinnieGayl]

[Anne Louise]

[Anne Louise]

[LinnieGayl]

[dick]

I recently read Marion Chesney's "Hasty Death," subtitled "An Edwardian Murder Mystery." It is part, I understand, of a series starring Captain Harry Cathcart as a peer who has opened a detective agency and is often "assisted" by Lady Rose Summer, daughter of the Earl of Hadshire. It was great fun. One example which made me laugh out loud: Lady Rose is lamenting having to accompany her mother to balls, soirees, etc., and lists all the rules she has to remember, including taking care not to sit on a seat which is still warm from a male's bottom.

[veasleyd1]

I'm a hobby genealogist, so I snapped up the five inexpensive e-books by G. G. Vandagriff (Poisoned Pedigree, etc.). The mystery series is set in 1993-1994, before major internet resources, when researchers still had to do genealogy "the hard way." I enjoyed the first one; I also enjoyed the title above, which is set in Barry Co., MO. As I worked through them, though, I became increasingly annoyed with the whiny insecurities of the heroine and the increasingly intrusive religious messages. Even for a genealogist, the series as a whole gets a C-.

[maggie b.]

[MrsFairfax]

[MrsFairfax]

[Manda]

[Minerva]

I just finished The Walnut Tree by Charles Todd. I'm not quite sure how to describe this book. It is not a mystery. It is not a romance. It has plenty of descriptions of WWI and battlefield medicine. Bess Crawford is a very minor character. I enjoyed this novelette (longer than a novella, but shorter than a novel??). I'm rewatching Downton Abbey, so it suits my mood. I don't know how I would feel if I wasn't on a DA kick.