Category: Audiobooks

Title: The Black Country (Murder Squad #2) Author: Alex Grecian Read by: Toby Leonard Moore Category: Mystery Audio published: May 21, 2013 by Penguin Audio Rating: 3 out of 5 stars Add: Goodreads Purchase: Audible | Amazon | Book Depository The British Midlands. It's called the "Black Country" for a reason. Bad things happen there. When members of a prominent family disappear from a coal-mining village - and a human eyeball is discovered in a bird's nest - the local constable sends for help from Scotland Yard's new Murder Squad. Fresh off the grisly 1889 murders of The Yard, Inspector Walter Day and Sergeant Nevil Hammersmith respond, but they have no idea what they're about to get into. The villagers have intense, intertwined histories. Everybody bears a secret. Superstitions abound. And the village itself is slowly sinking into the mines beneath it. Not even the arrival of forensics pioneer Dr. Bernard Kingsley seems to help. In fact, the more the three of them investigate, the more they realize they may never...

On any good treasure map, X always marks the spot, whether it be a kids game or in a pirate book. The Treasure Hunt in Andrea Camilleri's book, is not a good hunt. Not only is there no X to mark the spot, but the "treasure" is gruesome. Title: Treasure Hunt (Inspector Montalbano #16) Author: Andrea Camilleri Translated by: Stephen Sartarelli Read by: Grover Gardner Category: Mystery Audio published: September 24, 2013 by Blackstone Audio (first published 2010) Rating: 3 out of 5 stars Add: Goodreads Purchase: Audible | Amazon | Book Depository A hail of bullets interrupts a period of dead calm. An elderly brother and sister open fire on the piazza below their apartment, punishing the people of Vigàta for their sins. Montalbano is hailed as a hero when news cameras film him scaling a building — gun in hand — to capture the ancient pair of unlikely snipers. Shortly after, the inspector begins to receive cryptic messages in verse from someone challenging him to go on a “treasure hunt.” Intrigued, he...

B is for Bat. I recently listened to The Bat by Jo Nesbø and a review follows. The story takes place in Australia, so first I thought I'd talke a bit about bats "down under," large fruit bats actually. In the sandstone caves of Northern Australia, Northern Territory and Queensland, there are numerous depictions of flying foxes, some dating back tens of thousands of years.  In The Bat, several Aboriginal stories are referenced but not the one about a confrontation between Tjinimin the Bat God and the Great Rainbow-Snake.  Tjinimin wanted to have sex with the Green Parrot-Girls that were the consorts of Great Rainbow-Snake and of course Great Rainbow-Snake objected to this.  At the end of the story Tjinimin hangs upside-down in a tree to admire the stars and decides never to try having sex with anyone again, whereupon his nose falls off.  Which is why bats have such short faces, apparantly. Flying foxes eat fruit and this has inevitably brought them into...

Title: The Lake Quilt Mystery Author: S. D. Brown Read by: Wendy Pitts Category: Middle school, Mystery Audio published: January 21, 2013 (first published 2009) Rating: 3 out of 5 stars Add: Goodreads Purchase: Audible | Amazon Freedom Lake Resort Gated. Fenced. Remote. Miles from home. Miles from friends. The moment twelve-year-old Kelsey and her mother arrive at Freedom Lake, it's obvious that this is not going to be the kind of resort experience Kelsey expected. Or hoped for. A nurse escorts a girl in a straight-jacket out the back door of their cabin and Kelsey's creeped out. The girl begs Kelsey for help. Mrs. A., the woman who runs the resort, apologizes and explains that the girl hasn't been taking her meds. That's when Kelsey learns there's a private school on the property for girls with "special needs." It's off-limits to resort guests, not that Kelsey would have a reason to go there. At first Kelsey believes Mrs. A. because she has other things to worry about. Like how she will fit...

Title: Moonlighting in Vermont (Bree MacGowan Mystery #1) Author: Kate George Read by: Sara Mackie Category: Mystery Audio published: January 21, 2013 (first published 2009) Rating: 2½ out of 5 stars Add: Goodreads Purchase: Audible | Amazon Rumor has it that nothing ever happens in small-town Vermont, but for Bella Bree MacGowan, there is no shortage of excitement. She becomes the prime suspect when she finds her boss dead in a pool of blood and can’t convince the officer in charge, hunky Lt. Miles Brooks, that she isn’t capable of murder. Lt. Brooks believes two things: The first is that everyone is capable of murder, and the second is that the simplest solution is usually correct. So when it appears that Bree MacGowan has both motive and opportunity, he’s confident he’s found his killer. Meg Maverick owns the local paper, and Bree’s been her paste-up tech and friend from the beginning. She has no doubt of Bree’s innocence, but she’s worried. If her husband Tom, the captain-in-chief at the local state...