All the Queen’s Men by S. J. Bennett

All the Queen’s Men by S. J. Bennett

by Carol2 Comments
The Queen is disconcerted to see one of her favorite paintings at an exhibition of maritime art in Portsmouth. The painting, given to her by the artist, is of the retired Britannia yacht and once hung outside her bedroom. She enlists Rozie to discover when it left her collection and why it has never been returned, a task that turns out to be not as easy as it sounds. Then, a housekeeper is found beside the Palace swimming pool and it turns out several of the staff, including the dead woman, had received nasty, threatening anonymous letters. The mystery is a bit convoluted. The clues and cases all tie together, but it meanders a bit getting to the conclusion. I do enjoy the characters though. They give the book its charm. The Queen is sharp and charming. Rozie is super competent and we get to see a bit more of the personal side of her life. Prince Philip steals every...
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In Cold Blood by Truman Capote

In Cold Blood by Truman Capote

by Carol6 Comments
In Cold Blood has been on my to-read list for a while. Honestly, I'm not sure why I put it off. I enjoy both true crime and crime novels and since this is one of the classics in the genre, chances were pretty good I'd enjoy it, which of course I did. Well, as much as you can "enjoy" the story of a horrible murder, of the men who committed it, and the law enforcement trying to track them down. On November 15, 1959, Richard "Dick" Hickock and Perry Smith, on a tip from another inmate, went to the Clutter household in Holcomb, Kansas expecting to find a safe or $10,000 cash in the home. There was neither money nor a safe, but they had agreed to leave no witnesses, so the four family members in the house were killed. Due to the relentless work of the Kansas Bureau of Investigations led by Alvin Dewey, Hickock and Smith were eventually...
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The Holdout by Graham Moore

The Holdout by Graham Moore

by CarolNo Comments
The Holdout is my first "summer book" this year - a paperback that I can read while floating in the pool or sitting in my hammock. Entertaining and fun, but not one I'd be afraid to get a little water on. Thankfully, cause half of it got dunked on accident. Ten years ago, Maya was the lone holdout on a jury and convinced her fellow jurors to acquit a black teacher accused of murdering his white teenage student. According to the press and most people, they got it wrong. One of the other jurors, Rick, thinks they let a guilty man go free and blames Maya. Ten years later, the jury is reassembled for a documentary. Rick claims to have new evidence but is killed before he can share it. Maya is the prime suspect and feels the only option for her is to prove who the killer really is. The story alternates between the still unsolved 10-year-old case to the...
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Movieland by Lee Goldberg

Movieland by Lee Goldberg

by Carol4 Comments
As series fans will know, Eve Ronin has been through a lot. She has struggled to defend her position in the LASD. Her workload has been tough, which isn't helped by her inability to occasionally leave work at the office. Movieland does work well as a stand-alone though. Goldberg gives us enough background to know where Eve stands and what led her there. This time around, Eve and her partner, Duncan Pavone, are investigating the shooting of two campers, one of whom was killed. It turns out that this was just the latest shooting in a string of them, some of which were reported to the police and some of which the park rangers kept to themselves. When another person is killed the question becomes are all seemingly random shootings related? Are there copycats taking advantage of the situation? Because there are so many incidents, we have multiple suspects and a variety of witnesses. Goldberg does a good job keeping all...
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Fevered Star by Rebecca Roanhorse

Fevered Star by Rebecca Roanhorse

by Carol2 Comments
I hate to tell you to go back and read Black Sun before starting Fevered Star, but you really should. And the good news is the "to be continued" ending won't bother you nearly as much as it did me if you can head straight into this one. Not that this one has a very satisfying ending either, but it's at least not quite as cliffhanger. As before, the world (a weaving of pre-Colombian influences) is strongly engaging and well developed, with fascinating characters and culture. We have several viewpoints in Fevered Star, some more compelling than others. We learn more about our avatar's powers and about their own interior struggles. We see the people that surround them, those who love them, hate them, or want to use them. Heroes and villains are very much a matter of perspective. There's a war coming and the book is all about forming alliances and putting people in the right places, which can...
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The Fields by Erin Young

The Fields by Erin Young

by Carol2 Comments
The Fields was a bit too much for me. Riley Fisher, with a new promotion under her belt, is in charge of the investigation of the gruesome death of a woman found in the middle of a corn field, a woman who was Riley's friend when they were teenagers. Too much: Backstory: Riley was friends with the woman, but there's also another more tenuous personal connection to the case. I'm not a fan of dwelling on backstories and if this is actually the first of the series and relied so heavily on Riley's past, I'm not sure I want to read the next.Gruesome details: I read a lot of mysteries. The details here made me flinch and were just gross. For me they were over the top, and not in an enjoyable way.Bad decisions: The detectives in books like this always make some questionable decisions, and Riley is no exception. There are also some decisions that put a child in danger,...
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