Reviews: Three Tana French Novels

The Witch Elm

The Witch Elm by Tana French, October 9, 2018, Viking
Genre: psychological thriller
Source: library book
Comments:

A little different from her Dublin mysteries, The Witch Elm features the upper or upper middle classes, those with privileges in looks and heritage. What happens when looks are taken away, however, and the advantages of birth and privilege no longer seem to count? This seems to be the theme of the new book by Tana French, in addition to a suspenseful mystery plot. A novel that is compelling yet disturbing, all at once. I also finished: The Trespasser The Trespasser by Tana French, October 2016, Hodder and Stoughton Genre: police procedural, thriller Source: library book Comments:This is the sixth in the Dublin Murder Squad Series, a book I gave five stars. The main characters Antoinette and Stephen are detectives on the Dublin murder squad and are portrayed as many-faceted and complex characters, which gives the crime novel an added advantage. Antoinette is fairly new on the squad and has had to put up with taunts and pranks from her fellow detectives that were meant to deride and harass her as not only a newbie but as female. Her instincts propel her forward in spite of everything and in the end, change her mind about leaving the force. Faithful Place Faithful Place by Tana French, July 2010, Penguin Viking AdultGenre: police procedural, thriller Source: library book Comments: Frank Mackey, a detective, returns to his home, Faithful Place, to try to solve the mystery of the disappearance of his girlfriend Rosie Daly twenty-five years before. Had Rosy changed her mind about running away to London with him or had she been prevented from meeting him that fateful night when they were supposed to leave together but never showed up? The last time anyone ever saw her? Suspenseful plot, disarming detective, and plot twists that kept me reading. I have read Broken Harbor and The Secret Place, both equally good books in the Dublin series, and have two others to read - The Listeners and Into the Woods.  I must say I'm a fan!

Visit the Saturday Review of Books

The Birdwatcher by William Shaw, and Other Books

New books on the shelves.
Memes:  
The Sunday Post  hosted by The Caffeinated Bookreviewer,
It's Monday, What Are You Reading? by Book Date.
Mailbox Monday. 

Forever and a Day

Forever and a Day by Anthony Horowitz, November 6, 2018, Harper
JAMES BOND: The story of the birth of a legend, in the brutal underworld of the French Riviera.

Kill for Me

Kill for Me by Tom Wood, November 6, 2018, Berkley Books
A patron of Guatemala's largest cartel is ready and willing to pay Victor to eliminate the competition--her sister. 

Finished reading a library book:

The Birdwatcher

Review of The Birdwatcher by William Shaw, June 2017, Mulholland Books

Justice and delayed justice are the themes of this unusual crime novel set near Kent, England. A policeman on the force is asked to help with a murder investigation as he knew the victim, a fellow bird watcher. The policeman digs deeper than the murder task force wants to go, to find the true killer, and runs the risk of their discovering his own past crime.  Interesting twists in the  plot. 

What books will you be reading this week?

Review: Occupational Hazard by Alex S. Avitabile

Occupational Hazard by Alex S. Avitabile

Published: July 27, 2018

Genre: mystery

My take on the book: Al, an attorney in Brooklyn, and his ex-mafioso cousin Mick, cross swords with deputy mayor Gordon Gilbert when they represent Mary Woodley, who is suing Gilbert for child support. This is a fairly light-hearted mystery which pits two relatively unknowns against a powerful lawyer, now deputy mayor, in a domestic issue lawsuit. 

How Al and Mick outwit Gilbert is the story in this easy-to-read and delightful mystery.

Book beginning:

"You're out!" Gordon Gilbert bellows as I sit down. 

I'm out? What is this asshole talking about? Could he be referring to that play at the firm's picnic when he pretended that he hadn't dropped the ball while trying to tag me. One of the other partners had to mediate the call, and I was declared safe at third, having legged out a nifty triple. 

But he couldn't, he wouldn't, be referring to that play.

Page 56:

"You need to know what you're up against by going after Gilbert."

Memes: The Friday 56. Grab a book, turn to page 56 or 56% of your eReader. Find any sentence that grabs you. Post it, and add your URL post in Linky at Freda's Voice. Also visit Book Beginning at Rose City Reader

Thanks to the Cadence Group for a review copy of this book. 

It's Monday: What Are You Reading?

Vancouver Noir

A Risky Undertaking

Come With Me

Tony's Wife

New books on the shelves.
What books will you be reading this week?
Memes:  
The Sunday Post  hosted by The Caffeinated Bookreviewer,
It's Monday, What Are You Reading? by Book Date.
Mailbox Monday. 

Sunday Salon: Must Reads from the TBR Pile

These are a few of the books I have on my desk that are waiting patiently to be read.

Don't Eat Me 

Don't Eat Me by Colin Cotterill is the most unusual mystery series set in Laos and featuring the fictional Dr. Siri Paiboon, former national coroner of Laos, The books reflect the country's people, their beliefs, superstitions, and interesting cultural slants and is written tongue in cheek, with a great deal of irony and humor.

The Labyrinth of the Spirits

The Labyrinth of the Spirits by Carlos Ruiz Zafon, September 18, 2018.  The final book in the cycle of novels that began with The Shadow of the Wind.

The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock

The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock by Imogen Hermes Gowar, September 11, 2018, Harper
One September evening in 1785, the merchant Jonah Hancock hears urgent knocking on his front door. One of his captains is waiting eagerly on the step. He has sold Jonah’s ship for what appears to be a mermaid.

My newest read, from Harper:

Unsheltered by Barbara Kingsolver, publication October 16, 2018, Harper
Genre: literary fiction

Bum Deal

Bum Deal by Paul Levine, Jake Lassiter #12, published June 12, 2018 by Thomas and Mercer
Genre: legal thriller, featuring "Second-string linebacker turned disillusioned defense attorney Jake Lassiter ." 

What books will you be reading this week?
Memes:  
The Sunday Post  hosted by The Caffeinated Bookreviewer,
It's Monday, What Are You Reading? by Book Date.

Sunday Post: A Knife in the Fog by Bradley Harper

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I have a review copy of A Knife in the Fog by Bradley Harper, thanks to Seventh Street Books.
Published October 2, 2018, the book is set in September 1888, London. 

A twenty-nine-year-old Arthur Conan Doyle practices medicine by day and writes at night. He agrees to help authorities find Jack the Ripper, with the help of Dr. Watson, and soon discovers the body of a fifth victim. Wonder who the culprit turns out to be?

In gardening news,
we have brought in the potted plants as nights are beginning to get cold! My potted plants include the three poinsettias from last Christmas which not only survived the year but thrived outdoors this summer. I hope they will begin to turn red as another Christmas gets near.

For autumn, we bought Chinese moon cakes, those sweet round pastries packed with lotus seed filling or red bean paste, eaten to celebrate the Mid-Autumn Festival or Moon Festival or Harvest Festival. I had to go easy on it as the cakes are very sweet, but delicious with hot tea!

Last week was taken up with TV news and the Kavanaugh-Ford testimonies. We are all eagerly waiting to see what happens next. This beat out watching Netflix movies by a long shot. Serious and real.

What are you doing, reading this week?
 The Sunday Post  hosted by The Caffeinated Bookreviewer,

Book Review: Darkness Falls by Kyle Mills

This review was one of my first when I started blogging in 2007. It was posted in 2008. I thought the environmental topic is relevant today, though it's fiction and a good thriller, and I'm reposting it here.

Darkness Falls, book review

Now that the environment, global warming, and especially fossil fuel (oil) are foremost on our minds and in the news, and especially the new focus on Alaskan oilfields, I thought posting this review of the novel Darkness Falls would be timely. I reviewed the book several months ago for New Mystery Reader and have to admit that I was surprised that I enjoyed the unusual plot once I had read it.

In Darkness Falls, published October 23, 2007, an environmental thriller by Kyle Mills, one of the main characters, Jenna Kahlin, makes the mistake of her life when she helps a rogue environmentalist carry out his extreme solution to global warming, global pollution, and the slow destruction of the environment.

She helps him by taking the bluprint of another biologist, Erin Neal, and using that research to create a voracious oil-eating bacteria that could spread unchecked through oilpipes and underground oilfields, literally destroying them and drying up major oil reserves. The bacteria, however, would be contained, as it would be harmful only to oil and would die quickly on contact with oxygen and the air. She does this only to preserve the Alaskan environment and to stop oil drilling in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

Little does she realize that her partner in that successful venture, Michael Teague, had plans for "preserving" not just Alaska, but the environment of the entire world. When the same bacteria shows up thousands of miles away in Saudi Arabia, destroying major oilfields and oil reservoirs there and threatening major supplies to the United States, Erin Neal is forced out of his self-imposed exile and hermit's existence to find a way to stop the advance of the bacteria.

The author paints a convincing picture of doom if major oil sources were to suddenly dry up. Our dependence on oil for housing, food, and our basic daily needs is brought home in the course of the book. How Jenna and Erin, together with Homeland Security manager, Mark Beamon, race against time and pit their wits against mastermind Teague, is the basis of this novel.