Category: Books

Very rarely does a title sum up a book perfectly, but in the case of The Return of Moriarty by John E. Gardner it does. Three years after the incident at Reichenbach Falls, not only is Sherlock Holmes back in London, but so is his nemesis Professor Moriarty. Obviously, this novel is really only for Holmes fans, since it assumes that you know something of the history of the two men. Moriarty's back and he needs to put his "family" in order, as Moran has been rather lax in his oversight during Moriarty's absense. Moran, you may remember, is the man who attempts to kill Holmes in "The Empty House," Moriarty's right hand man. Interestingly the events in that short story are retold here, but from Moran and Moriarty's points of view. The story is rather slow-moving and while a lot happens, nothing really happens. There are some fights with a rival organization, some planning for world chaos, a touch of romance between...

The Sandal Artist by Kathleen T. Pelley is a heart-warming book with a good Christian message. And it is a Christian book, even if it's not clear from the blurb on GoodReads or Amazon. Roberto is a young artist who makes just enough money to feed himself but is determined to become great. He only paints lovely, wonderful, graceful things, refusing to paint the village children, the local man and his donkey or the beggar woman when they ask. One day, though, when he takes his shoes to the cobbler to be repaired, the cobbler gives him a pair of sandals to wear for the day, warning him. "There are some who say that if you wear another man's shoes, you will see the world with his eyes and feel it with his heart. So keep your eyes and heart open wide, my boy. Who knows what secrets you may find?" Walking in the sandals, Roberto sees the beauty in all the people...

I wish I had read The Potter's Field by Andrea Camilleriin print, rather than listening to the audio. It's rare that I say that, most audiobooks I've listened to have been well dones, and in general I enjoy listening to mysteries; this one was just a little tough. I don't know why exactly, maybe there was just too much dialogue for an audio, a little too difficult to keep the speakers straight. Or maybe the voices of  Inspector Salvo Montalbano and the other characters were not how I heard them in my head when I read the first in the series, The Shape of Water. The Potter's Field is, at heart, a book about betrayal disguised as a mystery. An unidentified corpse is found in a clay field, the potters field. The body has been hacked into thirty pieces and placed in a black plastic bag. Salvo is reminded of the passage in Matthew 27. After Judas betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver...

I've taken to listening to audio books while I'm running, so I'm finishing them at a quicker rate than I used to. I'm still a pretty slow runner still, but I'm up to over 3 miles, 3 times a week, and I'm brave enough to run in the neighborhood and on main street, which means some ups and downs, not just the flat, smooth circle at the park. I've listened to several of the Commissario Guido Brunetti mysteries, although I'm not really following any order. Each stands on its own pretty well, but of course characters continue from one to the next. I've mentioned before that Brunetti's family is very present in the books, he's not a detective out there on his own, he has a lovely wife, Paola, and two teenage children, who he talks with, spends time with. They'll all be home for dinner, and what delicious dinners they have. In Fatal Remedies, Paola is even more of a focus...

I put a hold on this audiobook based on the author alone. Kate Wilhelm is an author whose mysteries and thrillers I tend to enjoy, but when I started to listen to Skeletons, I almost didn't get past the first bit which was basically the blurb from the back of the book. It mentioned a young man being killed, implying that it was the main character's fault and a possible connection to a family history of being involved with the Ku Klux Klan, and neither really struck me as something I wanted to listen to, but I kept going and was glad I did. Lee Donne has an eidetic memory that maintains a visual representation of everything she has ever seen, a gift she finds essentially useless. Lee has left college, without a degree, and has no job on the horizon, so she agrees to house-sit at her grandfather's isolated Oregon home. Her stay soon becomes a nightmare when she is tormented...