The Books of March

Driving Mr. Albert: a trip across America with Einstein’s brain by Michael Paterniti

When pathologist Thomas Harvey performed the autopsy on Albert Einstein in 1955, he removed the brain and took it home. He same some pieces of the brain away to other scientists and kept the rest in a Tupperware container in his garage. Dr. Harvey eventually left Princeton, lost his medical license, and ending up working in a plastics factory in Kansas. The author tracks down Harvey, and plans a drive across the country to deliver the brain to Einstein’s granddaughter Evelyn in San Francisco. Along the way they stop at cheap motels, pancake houses, the home of William S, Burroughs, and visit Harvey’s ex-wife.

 


Broken Places by Sandra Parshall
Breeding Ground by Sally Wright
Death of a Policeman by M.C. Beaton
Driving Mr. Albert: a trip across America with Einstein's brain by Michael Paterniti
Full Dark House by Christopher Fowler
The Fourth Bear by Jasper Fforde
A Groom for Gwen by Jeanne Allan
Murder She Wrote: Dying to Retire by Jessica Fletcher and Donald Bain

Driving Mr. Albert

Driving Mr. Albert: a trip across America with Einstein’s brain by Michael Paterniti

When pathologist Thomas Harvey performed the autopsy on Albert Einstein in 1955, he removed the brain and took it home. He same some pieces of the brain away to other scientists and kept the rest in a Tupperware container in his garage. Dr. Harvey eventually left Princeton, lost his medical license, and ending up working in a plastics factory in Kansas. The author tracks down Harvey, and plans a drive across the country to deliver the brain to Einstein’s granddaughter Evelyn in San Francisco. Along the way they stop at cheap motels, pancake houses, the home of William S, Burroughs, and visit Harvey’s ex-wife.

February's Books

An ancient Cohen the Barbarian embarks on a quest to meet the gods of Discworld in The Last Hero: a Discworld Fable. Wonderfully illustrated by Paul Kidby.

Killing Time by Cindy Gerard
NYPD Puzzle by Parnell Hall
The Missing Dough by Chris Cavender
The Rosie Peoject by Graeme Simsion
Sucker's Portfolio by Kurt Vonnegut
Einstein by Walter Isaacson
Sourcery by Terry Pratchett
Crashed by Timothy Hallinan
Little Elvises by Timothy Hallinan
Invisible Code by Christopher Fowler
Murder at the P and Z by Dorothy Hayes
Garment of Shadows by Laurie King
Bryant and May off the Rails by Christopher Fowler
Ronnie by Ronnie Wood
The Last Hero by Terry Pratchett
Designer Dirty Laundry by Diane Vallere
Love Valentine Style by Various Authors
Three Seconds to Thunder by Linda Rigsbee
September Fair by Jess Lourey
The Particle at the End of the Universe by Sean Carroll
Wyrd Sisters by Terry Pratchett

Sendoff for a Snitch by KM Rockwood

Jesse Damon spent twenty years in prison—he went in at sixteen and is now on parole. He’s trying hard to keep on the straight and narrow, but trouble just seems to find him. It’s not that he makes bad decision—sometimes stuff happens.

Jesse’s got a job at a plating factory, has a little basement apartment, and a girlfriend of sorts. When a monster storm causes flooding and power outages in the city, Jesse panics. While trying to pack up his meager belongings to keep them from destruction, Jesse discovers the ten year old brother of a co-worker sitting on his steps. While trying to help the boy, he gets picked up by the police and fears he will be going back to prison on a parole violation. Unwittingly he’s a suspect in a murder and drug operation.

Working class heroes are hard to find—Jesse is no computer whiz, martial arts champion or master of disguise. The author does a masterful job of portraying Jesse as someone who tries to do right but can’t catch a break. Even the minor characters, like the owner of a head shop, are vivid and achingly real. Fourth in this compelling series.

Bryant and May off the Rails

When an elusive criminal known as Mr. Fox kills a police officer while escaping from a holding cell, the Peculiar Crimes Unit is outraged. As they attempt to track the murderer down, they discover Mr. Fox has been using different identities and altering his appearance.

Meanwhile, an attractive young woman in a polka dot dress dies from a fall in a London tube station. She was on her way home from her job at a department store cosmetics counter, and security camera footage shows that although she was wearing four inch high heels, she didn’t stumble. But detectives Arthur Bryant and John May dig deeper, and wonder if there is any significance to a sticker found on her coat. When a university student goes missing in a tube station, another sticker is found, and the detectives are sure there is a connection.

Bryant is a rumpled, aged detective, who pours over his books but is not opposed to using new technology, as long as he’s not the one tapping the keys. May is the silver haired ladies’ man, a stylish dresser, and smooths over the mussed feathers caused by his unorthodox partner. A thoroughly entertaining series, a police procedural uniquely British.

Gin and Daggers by Donald Bain

Can’t get enough of “Murder, She Wrote”? In the first of the book tie-ins with the television series, Jessica Fletcher leaver Cabot Cove for England to visit Marjorie Ainsworth, the world’s queen of mystery writers. Joining Jessica at the country house are Marjorie’s sullen niece Jane, her sister and her husband, a charming but penniless Italian count, a critic, two book publishers, a theatrical producer, and a handsome young protégé of Marjorie’s. The household staff is on hand too, but when Marjorie is murdered, no one present thinks that the butler did it. It’s a classic English country house murder, and Jessica is right in the middle of it. Fans of the television series will be pleased to follow Jessica through the streets of London and meet up with all sort of characters.