Author – Carol's Notebook

The Tucson Valley Retirement Community Cozy Mystery Series #1-3 by Marcy Blesy

September 25, 2024September 25, 2024 by CarolNo Comments

Rosi is recently divorced and out of a job. She heads from her home in Illinois to Tucson to help out with her dad, who is having knee surgery, planning to stay for a couple of weeks. Her parents rent a house for the cooler months in the Tucson Valley Retirement Community. She meets a few of the locals, but of course it's not long until she finds a dead body, Salem Mansfield, the bookstore owner. Rosi doesn't think Police Officer Dan Daniel is up to the task of finding the killer, so does some investigating of her own. I like Rosi. She's funny and smart and the relationships between her and her mom and dad felt real. She also connects with the local landscaper, her potential love interest, and gets an adorable puppy. All the good ingredients in a cozy. I will say that even though the mystery was good, the characters stole the show. Rosi has, of course, decided...

The Mystery of Montague Morgan by Karen Baugh Menuhin

October 10, 2022October 10, 2022 by Carol2 Comments

I have been reading/listening to this series since the beginning and always enjoy them. Lennox, our sleuth, is a war hero who is now one of those gentlemen who have money but not a job, so of course, he solves mysteries. This time around he's helping his friend, retired Scotland Yard Detective Swift. Swift's family makes whiskey, but their broker has disappeared, with their money. The mystery leads the pair to an island where they get snowed in with a group of people - one of whom is a murderer. Oh, and they have to solve the case quickly so Lennox can make it to his Christmas Eve wedding. I enjoyed the story, but I'm already invested in Lennox and Swift. There are a lot of characters, from the friends staying at the house to the staff, and the plot was rather convoluted. We got love affairs and murder and smuggling and plenty of secrets. I guess there was maybe too...

99 Percent Kill by Doug Richardson

July 11, 2019July 11, 2019 by Carol2 Comments

In 99 Percent Kill, Lucky Dey has to find the missing/runaway daughter of a Wisconsin millionaire; a tough enough job in LA, where a pretty young girl is a target for all kind of nasty stuff, made even tougher by the father who insists on riding along. I liked Lucky a bit better this time around than I did in the first of the series, Blood Money. He's still tough, but he's not as mean. He's still single-minded, but this time it comes off as a good thing, an asset. He's also addicted to painkillers. He's one of those characters who has a chip on his shoulder and a black cloud over his head. I think I'd like to see him working as an actual cop one of these days. 99 Percent Kill is action-packed, not surprising when the author started as a screenwriter, but it gives us moments to breathe, essential when most of what we're reading is disturbing and violent....

The Case of the Cursed Dodo by Jake G. Panda

October 19, 2017October 23, 2017 by Carol4 Comments

I listened to the full cast audio of The Case of the Cursed Dodo. I am not used to listening to books with more than one, or at most two, narrators, so it did take me a chapter or two to get into the groove of it. It was an interesting set-up though. The book is written in kind of a screen play style, so on audio it felt like you were listening to an old-style radio show, which was pretty neat. I liked the characters, all endangered species, and the hotel that serves as the base of operations. Jake is a good semi-hard-boiled detective, gruff and tough, but also loyal. We've even got a dame, although condors are not really my idea of sexy birds. My one complaint is that there are a few too many bad guys, it got a bit confusing who was on which side and why. I also expected to learn a bit more about the...

“B” Is for Bad Girls by Rebecca Cantrell and Sean Black

May 6, 2016April 22, 2016 by Carol1 Comment

"B" Is for Bad Girls is #2 in the series, but can definitely be read as a stand-alone. It's short, funny and has a good mystery. Sofia is a great lead character. She's new to the detective business, although she played one on tv— literally, she quit acting to become a detective. The paparazzi is still happy to get pictures of her in awkward situations though, like peeing in public or coming out of a rehab facility for example. Part of what makes it fun is that her semi-celebrity status in Malibu lets us meet other celebrities, like the bad girls at the rehab center where she is undercover. Well, not really undercover, since she's still being herself, just pretending to be a drug addict, which she is not. It's neat to have the entertainment industry in the background of the series. Sofia is a riot she has a great sense of humor about herself and about life. Her friends and...

Real Elves: A Christmas Story by Helen Smith

October 13, 2014 by Carol1 Comment

Real Elves is my first Christmas read of the year and it was a cute little mystery, a little silly maybe, but it has a light-heartedness that fits Christmas. And I would love to visit the Magic Forest, pick a golden apple, and see Santa. It's a short story, only 35 pages or so, so I don't want to give away too much of the plot. I will say that there's no violence and it has a happy ending all around. I've read a couple other stories featuring Emily Castles. She's smart, funny and a bit quirky, but I don't think you actually get much of a feel for her characters here, it's more about the magic and mystery, not the recurring character. That does mean it works well as a stand-alone though. It'd be a nice gift to sneak into a stocking or a small gift exchange....