Wild Ride by Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer

In ten words or less: Demons inhabit Ohio amusement park; everyone's family has dark secrets.

Review: Mary Alice Brannigan is restoring an amusement park in Ohio, but little does she know that it's a prison for the five most powerful demons in history. Strange things keep happening, though--the giant clown statue is found across the park, destroyed; furtive strangers appear at the ice cream parlor every day; and some of the park's old-time employees are discovered dead.

While there is the usual quotient of humor in this novel, the romance takes a back seat to the demon battling. And a dizzying cast of demons there is--big dragon demons, demons trapped in a fortune telling booth, and little demons that can be trapped in Tupperware containers.

Why bother? There's less romance here than we've come to expect from Jennifer Crusie, but there's plenty of fun, and mind-boggling demons of every size and shape. Readers who like a little romance with the supernatural will be please, but those with a phobia of giant, possessed clowns should take a pass.

The Gladstone bag: a Sarah Kelling mystery by Charlotte MacLeod

In ten words or less: Artists seek buried treasure on island; body found on shore.

Review: When Emma Kelling's friend asks her to play hostess to a group of guests at a summer home on remote Pocapuk Island, Emma hastily agrees. Her son Walter and his yodeling wife and children are planning to visit Emma, and there's only so much yodeling a doting mother can stand.

The artists and writers invited to the island are strangers to Emma, and evens turn even stranger when she is drugged on the ferry, and her bag of costume jewelry goes temporarily missing.

A light, fun, old-fashioned cozy, of the kind that is getting hard to find these days.

Why bother? It's not chick lit; it's not a thriller; just an entertaining mystery a la Agatha Christie.

Farm Fresh Murder by Paige Shelton

In ten words or less: Becca cans preserves and investigates murder at the farmers' market.

Review: After inheriting a farm from her aunt and uncle, thirty-something Becca grows fruit and sells preserves at the farmers' market her twin sister manages. When the body of crotchety fower seller Abner is discovered, the suspects are many. Was it over a land dispute or a long-ago teenage romance?

Why bother? Readers who enjoy cozies, like those of Claudia Bishop and Laura Childs, will like this mystery. First in a new series; recipes included, of course.

June's Books

In Richard Stark's "Ask the Parrot," Parker, scrabbling through rural Massachusetts after a botched robbery, has police and their dogs tracking him. Tom Lindahl, a local recluse who's been nursing a grudge, agrees to help Parker hide out, but only if he'll help him with a robbery he's been plotting.

Lindahl used to work at a racetrack, but lost his job when he blew the whistle on his employer's criminal activities. He's been plotting his revenge ever since, spurning his neighbors' company, with a sullen parrot as his only company.

Suspicious locals dog Parker's every move, while the reader wonders whether Lindahl will turn Parker in for the reward money. Or will Parker rob the racetrack, and doublecross Lindahl? Is there honor among thieves?

Stark, a pen name of mystery Grand Master Donald Westlake, keeps the suspense and action rolling along. It's only been six months since his death, but knowing there'll be no more Westlake/Stark mysteries to anticipate makes the world just a little less interesting.

Thunder keeper by Margaret Coel
Star spangled murder by Leslie Meier
Only the super-rich can save us by Ralph Nader
Ask the parrot by Richard Stark
Irreverent guide to Manhattan by Ethan Wolff
Farm fresh murder by Paige Shelton
Stranger in the country by Robert Barnard
The girl who kicked the hornet's nest by Stieg Larsson
Compromising positions by Susan Isaacs
Frommer's New York City by Brian Silverman
Let's go: New York City by Carl Hughes, ed.
Bodies left behind by Jeffrey Deaver
Something in the water by Charlotte MacLeod
Seven year switch by Claire Cook