Hey!! Let's get some action going! What are we reading?

[Luffy]

Originally Posted by CRussel

IMHO, reading Phryne Fisher books are best done at least roughly in sequence, since characters develop over time. But you're right, probably not for everyone. They are witty, fun, are set in a time and place that I know nothing about, and have strong female characters. So a very good fit for me. But no book is a good fit for everyone.

Don't mind the message I sent you with the Karma. I made a mistake.

[Gazella]

Originally Posted by Gazella

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon

Finished it yesterday night. Didn't like the fact that it contains a lot of obscene language; felt it was more than necessary and was quite annoying at times. Other than that, a unique, interesting, and easy read. Surprised that it's a children's book. However I read that there are two editions; one for children and an edition for adult.

[Gazella]

Still haven't decided whether to read Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin or The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams.

Can THGTTG be read as a stand-alone?

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by Gazella

...Can THGTTG be read as a stand-alone?

Absolutely.

[Gazella]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

Absolutely.

So you get a sense of closure? In other words, the ending doesn't leave you hanging?

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by Gazella

So you get a sense of closure? In other words, the ending doesn't leave you hanging?

Not unless you consider the last line of the book in which an invitation is extended to Authur Dent to have a quick bite at the Restaurant at the End of the Universe a cliffhanger.

[MickeyC]

Originally Posted by Gazella

So you get a sense of closure? In other words, the ending doesn't leave you hanging?

But don't forget your towel.

[Hampshire Nanny]

Originally Posted by Dazrin

Next up is a complete change of scenery from the American southwest to the extreme north of Canada, Arctic Wargame by Ethan Jones the first in his Justin Hall series. I picked this up as a freebie almost 2 years ago during my "get anything that looks remotely interesting and is free" phase, my TBR list still hasn't recovered but I am working on it slowly, and it has been near the top of my TBR pile waiting for me to be in the right mood ever since.

I'm still in that phase. I have a TON of unread freebies in my Amazon account. I had so many of them on my Kindle that it was bogging down, so I finally deleted most of them from the device.

Originally Posted by CRussel

IMHO, reading Phryne Fisher books are best done at least roughly in sequence, since characters develop over time. But you're right, probably not for everyone. They are witty, fun, are set in a time and place that I know nothing about, and have strong female characters. So a very good fit for me. But no book is a good fit for everyone.

I really liked the Phryne Fisher novels -- reading through them at a rapid pace, particularly after I discovered that the first 19 books were available through the library's Freading service. I received #20 as a gift, and then borrowed the book of short stories (A Question of Death) from the library shortly afterward. One thing that I think helped me enjoy the books so much was that I had seen the first 6 or so episodes of the TV series and so I visualized the main characters as they had been cast.

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by Hampshire Nanny

I really liked the Phryne Fisher novels -- reading through them at a rapid pace, particularly after I discovered that the first 19 books were available through the library's Freading service. I received #20 as a gift, and then borrowed the book of short stories (A Question of Death) from the library shortly afterward. One thing that I think helped me enjoy the books so much was that I had seen the first 6 or so episodes of the TV series and so I visualized the main characters as they had been cast.

Yes, the TV series is superb. Essie Davis owns Phryne and really gives you a perfect sense of the character and the time. I first encountered Phryne in the series, and then went to read the books. The series and the books complement each other, and the series is a fairly accurate representation of the books, though I admit to missing Mrs. Butler. OTOH, I know the limitations of budgets and TV.

[Gazella]

Originally Posted by MickeyC

But don't forget your towel.

Towel?

[Gazella]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

Not unless you consider the last line of the book in which an invitation is extended to Authur Dent to have a quick bite at the Restaurant at the End of the Universe a cliffhanger.

Okay thanks for the info.

[ATDrake]

Originally Posted by Loosheesh

Speaking of Georgette Heyer, I found most of her mysteries to have male victims whose heirs are almost always their nephews; what was up with that?

Well, from a Watsonian perspective, childless uncles are probably the best victims for providing an easy-but-probably-wrong suspect pool, since parents and grandparents are a little too personal (and you'd be eventually getting that money anyway, unless they cut you out of the will for other reasons that murder probably wouldn't help with and you'd be better off eliminating your prospective co-heirs instead), cousins are a bit distant because unless they're total anti-social recluses they've usually got their own lives/immediate next-of-kin issues going on, and childless aunts old enough to have grown nephews are unlikely to suddenly marry and produce kids to displace one from the inheritance hierarchy.

While there's a risk that they might acquire a new husband and leave all the money to him, there's also the chance that he could be proved to be an unfaithful fortune-hunting cad (or the murder pinned on him) and gotten rid of that way. Whereas rich uncles, on the other hand, could marry some sweet young thing at any time and even if the new wife did turn out to have mercenary motives for that, she could still pop out cousins that uncle would feel obliged to provide for, even if their mother later runs off with someone younger and richer.

So, they're kind of mystery's natural victim.

Doylistically speaking, who knows what Heyer might have had against uncles (or nephews)?

Anyway, finished Jo Nesbø's Nemesis and Devil's Star, 4th & 5th books in the Harry Hole, Dysfunctional Yet Brilliant Norwegian Inspector series, in what the omnibus edition calls "The Oslo Trilogy".

I'll have to say that Nemesis was actually really surprisingly good. While it did have some of what I'm coming to think of as the Nesbø quirks which I'm not sure I really like (interspersed stream-of-consciousness monologues from the killer's point of view, which don't really serve to provide Clues so much as let you wallow in how clever the killer thinks they are; yes this totally guilty person is totally guilty, did I not point out to you the many ways in which they are totally guilty, only not of this particular crime and you've just gotten them accidentally killed while the real killer is pointing and laughing at you; oops you arrested the wrong person for the wrong reasons which I have been wrongly leading you to reason, three times!; etc.), it also had a very clever setup and resolution for the intersecting crimes involved.

If the previous book, The Redbreast in "The Oslo Trilogy" seemed to have something of a theme of judgment, in terms of who could sit and judge (the cops, the killer), who had sat and judged (the Norwegian authorities immediately post-WWII when dealing with the collaborators, modern society looking back on a-bad-idea-in-retrospect political affiliations), and what the effects of judgment and the carrying out of it were, then Nemesis had a definite theme of vengeance.

The entire book seemed to be an extended meditation on revenge, bringing forth examples of one-time strikebacks, escalating cycles of such, limited retaliation, occasional atonement and forgiveness, and the ultimate effect of all of these on the persons affected both initially and in the aftermath.

And in-between this all were a few very well-laid-out intersecting crimes which used police procedural methods to solve them (there were some really interesting bits on bank robberies, and the use of body language and lip reading to help identify masked suspects, and the hiring standards for anonymous contract killers in overseas vacation countries), and this time there were actual it-makes-total-sense-in-story reasons for the world seeming to be out to get Harry specifically, and all the red herrings planted which made certain people look suspiciously suspect, and seemingly throwaway mentions of stuff actually turning out to be key to the assorted resolutions.

I like it when there's an actual mystery that is actually solvable given the materials given (and has a pretty clever solution, to boot), and not just a glorified lets-follow-the-killer-and-hope-we-get-there-first kind of thing that many crime thrillers seem to resort on.

After that, The Devil's Star was kind of a step down. Still fairly good, and with a reasonable who-ultimately-dunnit and why this herring was of a particularly rufous colour, but this time it's back to more outracing the serial killer stuff which somehow doesn't really compel me as much as the more standard forms of crime. I guess I'm just kind of jaded after watching all those seasons of Dexter (especially the last few utterly terribad seasons which should be taught in writing classes as an example of How Not To Do It, Ever).

Also, it's starting to get absurd how many serial killers seem to be popping up in Oslo in such a short time, especially the ones who seem to have a sadistic psycho-sexual motivation for it, and especially after they make a point of how prior to this serial killers were practically unknown in Norway, and that's why Harry Hole had to get special training from the FBI and go to Australia to actually catch his first one. #3 technically had a serial killer with a political/revenge plan, #5 is another serial killer for personal reasons, #7 was a sadistic psycho-sexual one, and #8 The Leopard, which I started on this morning, is shaping up to be another potentially psycho-sexual one.

For perspective, the entire population of Norway is pretty much at the same numbers and urban density of BC, and in the past 40 years or so, we've only had about maybe 3-4 serial killers in the Greater Vancouver Regional District (admittedly, that we know of, since there's a fair chance that a number of others have been operating and didn't ever get noticed/caught). And I think we technically have a higher crime rate (still one of the lowest in the world, though).

High recommend for Nemesis, which IMHO is the best Nesbø I've read thus far, and good enough to standalone among general police procedurals on its own merits. Moderate recommend for The Devil's Star if you've been following the series as it has a fairly good case, and does follow-up on Harry's prior personal and professional issues in a decent fashion, though frankly, I'd have preferred it if one particular resolution ended differently, which I think would have been more interesting to see than what actually happened, because of the potential effects on the public's trust and the paranoia that someone like that could still have a reach through the bars of the law, as has been demonstrated by others in a similar situation recently.

[alansplace]

Originally Posted by alansplace

I just finished reading The Thousand-Dollar Tan Line. It was highly enjoyable, with a compelling and well told story and of course with the expected nostalgia. I've read that Rob Thomas has a contract with Vintage Books for a second Veronica Mars Novel. I'm looking forward to its release with high anticipation and hope that there will be many more after that one.

Now on to Dead Game (Ed Noon #3) by Michael Avallone.

This morning I completed reading Dead Game. Like the two previous Ed Noon mysteries that I've recently read this was a quick and enjoyable noir detective novel that I'd chosen as my September Amazon Prime lending library selection.

Now on to read my freebie for September in the:

program. The one I've chosen for September is the mystery novel, Tunnel Vision by Aric Davis.

[MickeyC]

Originally Posted by Gazella

Towel?

Read the book and you'll understand. And don't get me started on Forty Two!

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Now for Citadel by John Ringo. I bought this in July from Kobo using a good discount code. The second in his "Troy Rising" series, about a hostile alien invasion of the Solar System. I seem to have liked the first, although it is four and a half years since I read it so I don't remember much about it. But it looks like the second eases us into the situation.

That was fun. Lots of massive engineering, space battles and some AI speculation. I'll be reading the third one shortly.

But first it's the latest Asimov's SF magazine, edited by Shiela Williams.