Carol's Notebook

Literary Escapes Challenge 2026

January 6, 2026September 18, 2026 by Carol2 Comments

The Literary Escapes Challenge hosted at Escape With Dollycas Into A Good Book is one I don't do great at but have fun keeping track of. The goal is to read 1 book set in each of the 50 states + the District of Columbia. (51 Points). If you complete the challenge you earn 50 Bonus Points. You also can earn Bonus Points for books set in Countries around the world. 1 Bonus Point for each country – no repeats. Alabama Alaska - Murder and Mayheim by Ronica Black and Toni Logan Arizona Arkansas California - A Very Novel Murder by Ellie Alexander Colorado Connecticut Delaware District of Columbia Florida - Murder by Cheesecake by Rachel Ekstrom Courage Georgia - Murder with a Side of Shrimp and Grits by Skylar Warren Hawaii - Cruising Through Midlife by Addison Moore Idaho Illinois - Arsenic and Adobo by Mia P. Manansala Indiana Iowa Kansas Kentucky Louisiana - Claire DeWitt and the City of the Dead by Sara Gran Maine - Murder Will Out by Jennifer K. Breedlove Maryland - On the Hook by Rae Keech Massachusetts...

2026 Audiobook Challenge

January 6, 2026January 6, 2026 by CarolNo Comments

I’m signing up for the 2026 Audiobook Challenge, hosted by Caffeinated Reviewer and That’s What I’m Talking About. I might be a bit of an audiobook junkie. My goal for the year is 75+, which puts me at the Over-Achiever level. The hashtag is #2026AudiobookChallenge. Also, June is Audiobook Month, so there will be a special mini-challenge just for the month. Books read:...

The Sittaford Mystery by Agatha Christie

January 6, 2026January 6, 2026 by Carol4 Comments

The Sittaford Mystery is a stand alone that doesn't feature and of Christie's usual characters. The book starts off with a party held in a stately manor in the middle of nowhere during a snow storm. The guests are an interesting mix and they decide to try table-turning, a way of contacting the spirits based on the movements of the table they are all sitting around. The table soon announces that the owner of the house, Captain Trevelyan, who is not present, has been murdered. Everyone assumes it is a joke in very bad taste, but Trevelyan's friend, Major Burnaby, decides he need to walk six miles in the snow to the house Trevelyan is renting, to check on him. Trevelyan has, of course, been murdered. We get a nice mix of amateur and official investigation here. Our amateur sleuth is Emily Trefusis, the fiancée of the man being held for the murder. She is determined and clever. She teams...

January Cloak and Dagger Link-Up

January 1, 2026December 30, 2025 by Carol3 Comments

Happy New Year!! For those of you who are new to the challenge, welcome! To all the returning readers, I’m glad you’re joining in again. If you haven’t officially signed up for the challenge yet, head to the 2026 Cloak and Dagger Reading Challenge post. Does anyone have their first book of the year planned, cloak and dagger or otherwise? Let us know in the comments. Or have you already finished your first book? You are invited to the Inlinkz link party! Click here to enter...

The Christmas Tree Farm by Laurie Gilmore

December 30, 2025December 30, 2025 by CarolNo Comments

I thought a Christmas romance would be a fun read for December. This one was like a paperback version of a Hallmark movie with a bit more spice. It was good enough, but I'm not much of a romance reader and found it dragged a bit. I do appreciate that for the most part Kira and Ben actually did communicate decently. The reasons their romance didn't proceed as smoothly as it could have made sense and were minor in the grand scheme of things. And the happy ever after was cute enough....

The Dog Sitter Detective’s Christmas Tail by Antony Johnston

December 30, 2025December 30, 2025 by CarolNo Comments

The Dog Sitter Detective's Christmas Tail has lots of things I enjoy in a mystery - Christmas, dogs, a snowed-in house full of suspects, but I just didn't really enjoy it. Gwinny is an actress trying to revive her career and is dog-sitting for a bit of money or fostering a dog for no money in this case. She's dating Birch, a retired Detective Chief Inspector who has a black lab. You know from the blurb that the two of them end up snowed in in a house with 6 former spies. One of the spies, their host actually, ends up dead. Gwinny and Birch feel like it's up to them to discover who the killer is. I have not read the others in the series, but this one felt like it worked well enough as a standalone. We get some background on Gwinny and Birch and are told that she's solved a couple of cases in the past, but this...