Book Review: Grave Apparel: A Crime of Fashion Mystery by Ellen Byerrum

Grave Apparel: A Crime of Fashion Mystery by 

Ellen Byerrum, July 3, 2007

Wearing colorful Christmas sweaters at this time of year seemed to be a bone of contention for an editorial writer in the new mystery, Grave Apparel by Ellen Byerrum. Someone disliked the writer's column dissing merry Christmas clothing so much, he clobbered her with a giant candycane just before an office holiday party, leaving her unconscious with a head injury and dressed in ...you guessed it, a jingling Christmas sweater!

Fashion writer Lacey Smithsonian tries to find out whodunnit in this Crime of Fashion "Sweatergate" mystery set in Washington D.C. Too humorous to be a traditional cozy, this mystery seems to be all about fashion Scrooges and fashion tastes.

Book Review: Meow is for Murder by Linda O. Johnston

Meow is for Murder, Petsitter Mystery by Linda O. Johnston, published 2007 by Berkley

Finished that cozy mystery, Meow is for Murder, and couldn't have guessed ahead of time the person who "dunnit" or how those two Bengal cats were used to find the murderer. Clever little plot, although the deal that petsitter and lawyer Kendra makes with a suspect is unusual and somewhat unrealistic, I thought.

The suspect, Amanda, is charged with the murder of man who has been stalking her. Amanda is the ex-wife of Kendra's current love, Jeff, and a bit of a stalker herself, always showing up at Jeff's door with various and sundry requests for help and assistance. She promises to stay out of Jeff's life for good if Kendra, an amateur sleuth on top of everything else, will find the real killer and get her off the murder hook.

Here's the weird part. Amanda signs a "legal" and "binding" document saying she will be out of Jeff's life forever if Kendra proves her innocent.

In the end, Kendra finds that Jeff may not have been worth all the trouble after all and accepts a date with, here it comes....., a vet that she meets on one of her other lawyerly cases. Now, like so many of the mystery heroines these days, such as Stephanie Plum in Janet Evanovich's books, this main characer has two love interests to add sauce to the mystery.

Catch Kendra in the next book in the series to see how the new guy works out. That's how the mystery series sometimes works - a thread of romantic intrigue leads you on to the next book. Curiousity doesn't always kill the cat, but it sure makes some writers Fat Cats.

Book Review: A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers. a novel by Xiaoulu Guo

A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers: A Novel by Xiaoulu Guo
Published 2008 by Vintage

A student from China arrives in London for a year's study of English so she can return home and help her parents with their expanding shoe factory business. Zhuang is 23 and a reluctant student, who nevertheless carries around a Concise Chinese-English Dictionary and looks up and writes down almost every new word she comes across for the entire year in London.

A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers, a new novel by Chinese writer Xiaoulu Guo, takes us in the heart and mind of a foreign student suddenly exposed to a strange culture. The student Zhuang tries to understand all the inconsistencies and contradictions of her new surroundings and the paradoxes of the English language as well.

She must also deal with her newfound sexual freedom and her relationship with an Englishman she meets and falls in love with but who is her opposite in many ways. Though they live together for almost the entire year, they remain very different. More Buddhist in his outlook on life, he finds her need for commitment and security too demanding and unnecessary. She, on the other hand, is frustrated by his apparent lack of concern for the future.

At the end of the year, Zhuang's student visa is not renewed, and she returns to China while her lover moves to Wales, a place he finds restful and peaceful but which she had found beautiful but cold, rainy, and gloomy.

I recommend the book for anyone interested in East versus West perspectives.

A poem by a young man who also values dictionaries with foreign words:
www.poetrymagazine.org/magazine/1207/poem_180287.html

Book Review: Hounded To Death by Laurien Berenson

I'm reading Meow Is for Murder, a pet sitter mystery with a ball python named Pythagoras and a dog called Stromboli, not to mention two Bengal cats cutely named Cherise and Carnie. I noticed that the author, Linda O. Johnston resembles another pet mystery writer, Laurien Berenson, whose latest mystery, Hounded to Death, I've just finished.

These two writers could be sisters or even twins, I thought. They both have the same kind of hair, same length, and style, and their features are similar. One parts her hair on the right, the other on the left, however. One wears glasses, the other doesn't. Well, I don't think they are the same person, writing under pseudonyms as some writers are wont to do.

Besides, one likes King Charles Spaniels and lives in California, and the other loves poodles and writes in Kentucky.

Their writing styles are also different.

Meow is for Murder is full of alliterative fun. Johnston loves to play with words, which she does all through her book. Berenson in Hounded to Death has amusing characters though she also has a pun in her book title. They write about different personalities altogether - a pet sitter cum lawyer versus a special needs tutor cum dog trainer. (Seems dealing with pets isn't nearly enough - main character must also have a respectable profession),

Both authors however have a great time creating zany or colorful characters to move their mystery plots along - one about pet sitting two Bengal cats, the other about dog show personalities and a dog show symposium.

Both involve murder, of course. And, naturally, the pets are not among the guilty parties.

Book Review: Death of a Maid by M.C. Beaton

Death of A Maid by M. C. Beaton, another in the Hamish McBeth "Cozy"series that features the adventures of a quirky Scottish policeman in a small Highland village. A light mystery novel? I recommend it.

The mystery of a maid "done in" is the latest that Hamish the policeman must solve, looking for anyone with "means, motive, and opportunity." And the motive for murder is a popular one in British cozies - blackmail. But which of the ones being blackmailed did the dirty deed. The popularity of the series lies as much in the plots, I think, as with the pictureque Highland setting and the character of the policeman himself.

In every book in the series, Hamish sidesteps being drawn into marriage by a girlfriend or pushed into the arms of someone by the villagers who want to see him happily married. He also avoids notoriety, letting his boss take the credit for all the crimes he solves, and avoiding promotion and being sent from the quiet of his beloved village.

Hamish's quirkiness endears him to his readers. He likes living alone with his wild lynx-like cat, his dog, and the sheep and hens he raises in his backyard. He has a perfect view of the ocean and the rough landscape from his living quarters in the police station. And he is known and liked by just about everyone in the village and the nearby towns. Thr maid in question is not missed by many, even by those she works for. But Hamish solves the crime, once again removes an offender from the village scene, and sends the perpetrator off to prison elsewhere. At the end of each novel, peace descends again on the village, thanks to Hamish. As it should, in a Cozy mystery.

Finished reading Beaton's Death of a Gentle Lady, again with Constable Hamish Macbeth of the Scottish highland village of Lochdubh (fictional). Hamish tries to help save his police station and a Russian maid by proposing marriage, with grave consequences. Marriage eludes the policeman once again, though he does solve two or three murders.

Book Review: Who's Kitten Who? by Cynthia Baxter

Who's Kitten Who?  (Reigning Dogs and Cats Mystery) by Cynthia Baxter,  December 2007.

Long Island veterinarian Jessica Popper is more than busy. Not only is she visiting clients in her mobile clinic, which she refers to as her "clinic-on-wheels," and hosting a segment of Pet People on local TV, but she has to fit in the plans of several other people.

Her friend and landlady, Betty Vandervoort, insists that Jessica try to solve the murder of actor and playwright Simon Wainwright, who is a member of an amateur theater group that
Betty has joined, and whose body was found stuffed in a trunk in a dressing room in the theater. When one of the actors decides to leave the play after the murder, Jessica is offered a small part. As a member of the group, she is now in a position to observe and interview all the cast members, the prime suspects in the murder. .

Jessica has other things to worry about as well. She is to be the maid of honor at Betty's wedding and also has to prepare for the visit of her fiance's parents. Nick's parents bring their pampered little dog Mitzi and stays with Jessica and Nick in their tiny cottage, already filled with Jessica's pets - two dogs, two cats, a talkative parrot, plus a Jackson's chameleon.

To make matters worse for Jessica, Nick objects to her detecting and her other activities, which he says take too much time away from him. Newsday reporter Forrester Sloan tries to step into Nick's shoes and into Jessica's love life while helping her in her detecting. Police lieutenant Anthony Falcone tries to discourage Jessica at every turn from interfering in the murder investigation.

In the end, after several scary moments and at least one attempt on her life, Jessica does find the killer and manages to also smooth out her personal life.

We learn a lot about theater production as well, as we follow Jessica through her rehearsals, her costume and make up sessions, and her observations on how complex lighting and scenery add to the success of a play.

Witty dialogue and interesting sub-plots make this an enjoyable, "cozy" read. This is the sixth book in the Reigning Cats and Dogs Mystery series by Cynthia Baxter.

Sudoku Mystery Novels, Anyone?

Shelley Freydont's hardcover, The Sudoku Murder is a novel for the general mystery buff.

Kaye Morgan's paperback, Death by Sudoku is a book for the mystery buff who is also a serious sudoku puzzle player. Morgan has also written another on the same theme, Murder by Numbers.

Take your pick.

Katie McDonald, in The Sudoku Murder, is a Ph.D math whiz who works for a hush-hush government think tank. She has a photographic memory, grew up learning to solve many different types of puzzles, and is loyal to her childhood mentor and friend, Prof. P.T. Avondale. She takes a long vacation and returns home to New Hampshire when the professor calls for her help to save his beloved puzzle museum from a bank foreclosure.

Certain parties, including the owner of the bank, would like to see the museum building razed and a more profitable shopping mall in its place. Soon after returning home, however, Katie finds herself solving a different kind of puzzle, the mystery of the professor's murder. The book is entertaining and doesn't require the reader to solve puzzles of any kind or even to think very hard.

Liza Kelly in Death by Sudoku, is a math whiz of a different sort - a former Hollywood publicist who is secretly a sudoku addict, and also part Asian. (Japanese, maybe?)

This protagonis also returns to her hometown, but to live a simpler life and write puzzles for a local newspaper, the Oregon Daily. Liza soon discovers that secret messages are being sent nationwide to followers of a group out to create mayhem and murder, and the messages are being sent via the Sudoku puzzles printed in a Seattle newspaper.

The plot and the solution are as elaborate as a very difficult Soduku puzzle and only the most serious of Sudoku fans can, or want to, follow it. Learn about Naked Pairs, Hidden Pairs, Swordfish, X-Wings, Nishio, and other chains of logic to help you solve the most daunting of puzzles. And at the very end of the book, as an added bonus, are.....Sudo-Cues!!

Sudo-Cues: Ten Things Not To Do At A Sudoku Tournament! Don't, for example, expect it to be easy, don't forget your brain, or your allergy pills, and don't forget you're in public! (Sudoku is, of course, normally a solitary kind of activity).

Kaye Morgan's next Sudoku mystery novel is scheduled for 2008. I only hope it'll be easier for the general mystery reader cum puzzle player to get through. Yes, I do plan to read it, even though I might have to face Sword fish, X-Wings, Nishio, or other unfathomable chains of logic.