BOOK REVIEW

Author: George, Elizabeth

Title: Careless in red

In ten words or less: Lynley finds a body; reluctantly joins investigation

Review: Grieving over his pregnant wife's violent and senseless death. Thomas Lynley takes a solitary walk along the Cornish coast and discovers a body. When he approaches a nearby cottage to use a phone he meets Daidre Trahair, a local vet. When she lies to local police about not knowing the identity of the victim, Lynley wonders what she is hiding. And Lynley is looked upon with suspicion by the local cops--he is unshaven, unwashed, and without identification.

The local detective drafts Lynley to help with inquiries, and Barbara Havers is sent from New Scotland Yard to assist, and to see how Lynley is holding up.

Nicely complicated characters keep the reader interested, although here's hoping for more Lynley/Havers interaction in the next book in the series. And please let there be a next one. Author George has not run out of steam yet.

Why bother? For readers of the series--Lynley and Havers come together again to solve the mysterious death of a young man. It's a welcome return. Readers looking for a gritty story, with plot twists and turns, and well-developed characters need look no further. If you like Colin Dexter's Inspector Morse series, try these.

BOOK REVIEW

Author: Bond, Stephanie

Title: Body movers

In ten words or less: Shallow store clerk and petty criminal brother miss their fugitive parents.

Review: Carlotta and Wesley Wren were abandoned by their parents when their father was accused of embezzlement and jumped bail, leaving with their mother. Carlotta was 18 and Wesley 9 when they left, leaving their children to fend for themselves.
Carlotta overspends her credit cards on designer clothes, steals from her employer, and crashes parties. Wesley doesn't work, hacks into the city computer system, and is in debt to loan sharks for compulsive gambling. They are supposed to be charming and lovable, but they are self-centered and spend money they don't have as if there were no consequences. You want to slap them and tell them to grow up.
They get involved in the murder investigation of Carlotta's former finace's wife. Carlotta is pursued by a hunky detective, a medical examiner with a shady past, and her enormously rich ex-fiance, now a widower. This author is no Janet Evanovich.
Why bother? Don't.

BOOK REVIEW

Author: Barnard, Robert

Title: Last post

In ten words or less: Daughter investigates her dead mother's mysterious past

Review: Eve McNabb returned to her mother's house to put affairs in order upon her mother's death. May McNabb was a well respected school administrator who had raised Eve by herself after the death of her husband. But while Eve was reading condolence letters, she discovers a note that implies a lesbian affair in her mother's past. And, as she hunts down the letter's author, she discovers the truth about her father, also.

Why bother? Barnard, a Diamond Dagger Award winner and author of more than 2 dozen mysteries, does not disappoint.

BOOK REVIEW

Author: Preston, Douglas

Title: Blasphemy: a novel

In 10 words or less: Scientists proving Big Bang theory torn between science and religion.

Review: The world's biggest supercollider, brainchild of Novel laureate Gregory Hazelius, is the most expensive machine ever built. The project is supposed to explore the Big Bang theory--will it explain the mysteries of the universe or will it suck the earth into a black hole?
Reverand Don T. Spates accuses Hazelius of heading a Satanic attempt to disproved the existence of God. Spates recruits right wing evangelicals to confront the scientists in the Arizona desert. The U.S. government calls in CIA operative Wyman Ford to convince the scientist to shut down the experiment.
Preston's other books include "Jennie" and "Tyrannosaurus Canyon." He is also the author, with Lincoln child, of the Special Agent Pendergast mystery series.

Why bother? A science vs. religion thriller--if you liked HAL in Arthur C. Clarke's "2001: A space odyssey" be prepared to meet Isabella.

BOOK REVIEW

Author: Crusie, Jennifer

Title: Getting rid of Bradley

In 10 words or less: Teacher dumps cheating husband; was he a secret criminal?

Review: High school science teacher Lucy Savage divorced her cold-fish husband Bradley when she caught him cheating with a blonde. When Bradley didn't bother to show up at the courthouse, Lucy and her sister went across the street for lunch at a diner. Over her salad, Lucy noticed an unshave, shaggy haired man in a leather jacket. She couldn't help herself--he was disreputable, she was sure. And when he attacked her in the parking lot later....

Why bother? Crusie has written a dozen books, and her light romantic comedies sparkle.

BOOK REVIEW

Author: Kristen Laine

Title: American Band: music, dreams, and coming of age in the Heartland

In ten words or less: Spend a year with a high school marching band.

Review: Laine tells the story of a year in the life of a high school marching band at Concord High School in Elkhart, Indiana. Over 240 students are preparing to defend their state title. It's a remarkable insight into the world of competitive high school marching. Max Jones is the band director, and it is his final year at Concord before he takes a prestigious job at Purdue. The story follows several students--one whose mother has terminal cancer, another who hopes to attend West Point, a young woman who is interested in Israel and Judaism, though there are no Jews attending the school. It is a sampling of life in small town middle America.

The author tries to show how the group grapples with African American music and struggles to play their instruments like black jazz players. There is no sex and no swearing--is this typical of a high school these days?

Why bother? An intimate but selective look at teenagers involved in a competitive music program. Contrast these teens to the ones in William Gilder's "Where the game matters most: a last championship season in Indiana high school basketball," or Ben Joravsky's "Hoop dreams: a true story of hardship and triumph."

April’s Books

One of the best books of the month was Susan Wicklund's "This common secret: my journey as an abortion doctor." Wicklund became an abortion provider when she graduated from medical school. She writes of how she had to sneak into clinics, sometimes in disguise, the death threats, the toll her profession took on her family and marriage. Sometimes the protesters who reviled her sought treatment from her. She spent 20 years making sure women had access to safe and legal abortions. It is the story of a caring and courageous woman.

Max, Gerry. Horizon chasers: the lives and adventures of Richard Halliburton and Paul Mooney
Barnes, Gregory. Biography of Lillian and George Willoughby: twentieth-century Quaker peace activists
Wicklund, Susan. This common secret: my journey as an abortion doctor
Levine, Laura. Killer blonde
Monette, Sarah. The mirador
Kercheval, Jesse Lee. The Alice stories
Rabe, Jean. Fenzig’s forture
Combes. Mark. Running wrecked: a Phil Riley novel
Coben, Harlan. Gone for good
Scahill, Jeremy. Blackwater: the rise of the world’s most powerful mercenary army
Apps, Jerold W. In a pickle: a family farm story
Rock, Rose. Mama Rock’s rules: ten lessons for raising a houseful of successful children
Gasperetti, J.A. Landon’s odyssey
Berghaus, Bob. Black and blue: a smash-mouth history of the NFL’s roughest division
Heth, Edward Harris. My life on earth
Stoob, W. Nervous systems
Koethe, John. The constructor: poems
Standiford, Les. Meet you in hell: Andrew Carnegie, Henry Clay Frick, and the bitter partnership that transformed America

WHAT'S IN THE SUMMER BOOK BAG

These are a few of the titles I'm looking forward to reading this summer--some of these books have yet to be published. The month in parentheses is when they are due out.

Block, Lawrence. Hit and run (June)
One of my favorite authors. This one is about hit man Keller who is looking to retire, after finishing one last job.

Crosley, Sloane. I was told there’d be cake (April)
A book of essays. Tales of a New Yorker in her mid 20s. Reviews have compared her to David Sedaris and Sarah Vowell.

Schilling, Peter. The end of baseball (April)
A novel set in 1944. What if Bill Veeck (former owner of the Cleveland Indians)—he signed the first American League black player, Larry Doby—purchases a major league team and recruited an entire roster of Negro League stars?

George, Elizabeth. Careless in red (May)
A favorite series of mine. Detective Superintendent Thomas Lynley spends 6 weeks alone after the murder of his wife. He then discovers the body of a man who appears to have fallen to his death from a cliff. I especially enjoy the pairing of Lynley and his partner Barbara Havers.

Gillette, Kathy. Firefighterette Gillette (September 2007)
A woman who has been a firefighter for 22 years tells her story. I enjoy biographies of woman in nontraditional careers.

Feldman, Ellen. Scottsboro (April)
A novelization of the infamous Scottsboro case. In 1931, 9 black youths were arrested in Alabama by an irate white mob, accused of raping 2 white girls. They were repeatedly tried and found guilty, although eventually all the men were found innocent and freed—in one case after he had been in prison for 20 years.

Coben, Harlan. Hold tight (April)
A thriller/mystery about parents concerned for their teenage son, after his friend has committed suicide. Plus there is a killer on the loose in the area. Coben is known for his plot twists and turns.

Matloff, Judith. Home girl: building a dream house on a lawless block (June)
A foreign correspondent and her husband buy a fixer-upper brownstone in a rough New York City neighborhood.

Thompson, Christina. Come on shore and we will kill and eat you all: a New Zealand story (July)
An American woman married a Maori man. He was a tradesman from rural poverty; she was a graduate student from the middle class.

Barnard, Robert. Last post (May)
A top British mystery writer’s new novel unravels the secret of a woman’s recently deceased mother.