Audible Plus – Page 4 – Carol's Notebook

The Hour of Death by Jane Willan

December 2, 2020December 3, 2020 by Carol2 Comments

I picked up The Hour of Death because of its Christmas-time setting. It's the second in the series, but the first I've read and it worked fine. I felt like I got to know the characters well. I got enough background but not too much. I enjoyed Sister Agatha for the most part. She's smart and tenacious, if a bit overly suspicious. Amateur sleuths pretty much have to be though. I could have done without her constant reference to other fictional detectives. Don't get me wrong, I adore Gamache and Jessica Fletcher, but she referred to them way too often. She stands on her own well, she doesn't constantly need to refer to other detectives. The nuns are an interesting group of women. While they do pray and sing and worship, they also make cheese and text each other and have an artist as a tenant. I think the Advent touches were some of my favorites: the hymns, the idea...

The Man in the Brown Suit by Agatha Christie

November 22, 2020December 18, 2020 by CarolNo Comments

The Man in the Brown Suit has been on my list to read for a while. I've read a lot of Agatha Christie's, but this is a Colonel Race book, and he has never been my favorite of her characters. Honestly, I should have read it earlier. Anne Beddingfield, our amateur sleuth, is awesome. She's practical, but full of grit and she doesn't frighten easily. She's also a hopeless romantic. Anne was raised by her anthropologist father, a well-known academic but a poor man more wrapped up in the dead than the living. After he dies, Anne refuses a more "suitable" arrangement and determines to find adventure. Then it happens - a man on the train platform near her falls to his death after seeing something that frightens him. The doctor who tends to the man wears a brown suit, and after he leaves hurriedly, Anne has her suspicions as to whether or not he is actually a doctor. She...

Miss Frost Solves a Cold Case by Kristen Painter

October 31, 2020October 30, 2020 by CarolNo Comments

I'm not quite ready for winter/Christmas reads yet, but maybe I am. Miss Frost Solves a Cold Case hit just the right note for this time of year for me. Jayne Frost, winter elf and niece of Santa Claus, is sent from the North Pole to Nocturne Falls, where supernaturals can live as they are because Halloween is celebrated every day of the year. She is there to investigate a series of disappearances in one of the Santa's toy stores. Several elf employees have left, supposedly quit, but with no trace of them afterward. A little bit of Halloween, a little bit of Christmas, some magic a good mystery - it's a cute book. The mystery is not terrible complicated but the clues are well-done and there are a couple possible suspects. The characters are fun. Jayne loved Dr. Pepper and all things sweet, which I can definitely relate to. She's nice and friendly and determined. She makes a few...

Lady Audley’s Secret by Mary Elizabeth Braddon

October 27, 2020October 29, 2020 by Carol2 Comments

Told by an unknown narrator, the story is focused on a "secret" of a woman named Lady Audley and the ultimate revelation of what that secret is. While you may think relatively soon into the book that you know Lady Audley's Secret, that the author has told us, you'd be wrong. The secret remains closely guarded right u to the time it is confessed by Lady Audley. I will be honest, though, the secret is not the strong part of the book. She lays down clues and throws hints here and there without giving way too much and keeping the secret well-guarded until the time is right for a confession by Lady Audley. I enjoyed the writing. The descriptions of the settings and characters put you there with them. I listened to Lady Audley's Secret just after The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins. They were written around the same time and both "sensational" novels, but this one felt tighter to...

A Conspiracy in Belgravia by Sherry Thomas

September 18, 2020September 18, 2020 by Carol2 Comments

This is the second Lady Sherlock book, and Miss Charlotte Holmes has set herself up as the supposed sister of an invalid brother, Sherlock, who is brilliant at solving baffling mysteries. Charlotte is still living with Mrs. Watson, who I just adore, and they really have the whole thing set up well. Only a few people know that Sherlock does not exist, including Charlotte’s sister Livia, Inspector Treadles, and Lord Ingram Ashburton, Ash, Charlotte’s closest friend since childhood. This book takes over just after the first, and really, although it could be read as a stand-alone, I would encourage you to read A Study in Scarlet Women first. Charlotte receives a note requesting an appointment from a Mrs. Finch, but Charlotte immediately recognizes the notepaper and realizes that the letter comes from Lady Ingram Ashburton. The situation is rather tricky, as Ash and his wife are not a happy couple. Moreover, Ash and Charlotte are secretly in love with one...

A Study in Scarlet Women by Sherry Thomas

September 16, 2020September 18, 2020 by Carol4 Comments

I have a tendency to read most Holmes knock-offs I come across. A Study in Scarlet Women was free with Audible's new Plus program. Sherlock is actually Charlotte Holmes. Charlotte is socially awkward, but , of course, incredibly observant and intelligent. She creates Sherlock so she is allowed to solve mysteries and problems. Women at the time are not expected to be able to manage on their own, let alone to be smarted than the police. I like that Charlotte makes her own choices and is trying to live life on her own terms. She teams up with Mrs. Watson, a widow who used to be on stage, to set up the whole "consulting detective" business/Sherlock deception. I do love both of these women, tough, independent, but also vulnerable in their own ways. This time, the main mystery centers on three deaths, supposedly natural connections, but Charlotte knows they are related murders. And proving who the killer was matters, if only...