Review: Permanently Deleted by Amy E Lilly

Phee Jefferson is a small town librarian and her friend Nellie's husband is drowned in his pickle factory.  Worried that Nellie will be arrested, she and her sister set out to solve the crime.  Then Nellie disappears and things become ever more urgent.

I like Phee a lot.  She has a soft spot for animals - adopting a stray dog early in the book.  She is smart and determined and standing her guns with deputy Clint who she is dating and refuses to make a commitment.  Her sister on the other hand, I found a bit annoying.  She was determined to get involved immediately and often pushed reckless behavior.  She was great comic relief but in a bit predictable way.  

It is hard in cozies to not be too formulaic.  I found it slipping into those a bit in this book and my biggest frustration was the attitude that the investigation was a fun game.  Murder is a serious business even in cozies - or it should be.

That said, this book was quite funny, though the colloquialisms were a bit heavy handed at times.  I read some reviews where that seemed to be a negative for some people, and I can see why as it seemed a bit too much.

I did however, really enjoy the ride and will read others in the series.

Terri

Blog: My favorite time of the year

Good Evening,
My favorite time of the year is here. I love fall, halloween, leaves that change but most of all I love the plethera of books that are released.

Here is a few book that I can't wait to read:
BRAIN DEAD by ELAINE VIETS
HAMMETT HEX by VICTORIA ABBOTT
DEATH by TIARA by LAURA LEVINE
CROWNED and DANGEROUS by RHYS BOWEN
AUNT DIMITY & the BURIED TREASURE by NANCY ATHERTON
The ART of MURDER by ELAINE VIETS
PUMPKIN PICKING WITH MURDER by AURALEE WALLACE

As you probably know I spent the month of September at my daughter's home. The Blue Springs South Library is really wonderful but I had to return the books I checked out and didn't get the chance to read the last little bit of two books.
When I came home I went to my library. They had one of the books and I checked it out yesterday.
The other one I didn't see however I am sure they have it. Will look for it in the next two week because as you can tell I have a lot of fun books to read.

Some are library books, a couple I won and a couple were ordered.

I finished The SKELETON HAUNTS A HOUSE by LEIGH PERRY
I am always impressed with this series. As usual I hate it when the books ends.
Also I almost finished with MURDER IN the SECRET GARDEN by ELLERY ADAMS.
Once again I am thrilled with this series and will hate the last page of this book.

I have some books on my kindle that need to be read.

Now you know why I love fall because nothing is better than a dark and stormy fall evening where the leaves fall and I can delve into a mystery and leave all of my stress behind as I listen to the howling wind.

Having said this I am praying for everyone in the line of "Hurricane Matt" because real life mother nature is more to fear than any horror story.

Pamela

Guest Blogger: Alice Duncan

Yay for October

The reason I’m yaying for October is ‘cause I get to visit California and see my friends and kids and one of my grandsons. In other to see the other grandson and his wife and children, I’ll have to go to North Carolina, which is considerably farther from Roswell, New Mexico, than California is. I aim to take a good picture of the house in which Daisy and her family live while I’m in Pasadena.

September was a pretty good month for yours truly, if you discount the fact that the physical therapist tried to kill me. With needles. Took me nearly a month to recover from his “dry needling” of my left glute, dang it, and he set my for-the-back-pain exercises back a long, dreary way. However, I can now walk the wieners and do exercises again (whoopee, but you gotta do what you gotta do).

I’ll get in touch with the folks who won copies of books in September in individual e-mails. If you’d like to enter October’s contest, I’ll be giving away audio copies of ANCIENT SPIRITS, in which Daisy Gumm Majesty and Harold Kincaid travel to Egypt and Turkey because everyone (except Daisy) thinks the trip will help heal her grief over losing her husband, Billy. Naturally, things go wrong, but Sam Rotondo rushes to Turkey and tries to save the day. He doesn’t quite succeed, but the day is saved anyway. Here’s the audio cover for ANCIENT SPIRITS, which is remarkably akin to the e-book and paperback cover for the same book. There’s even a link if you’re burning to hear it and don’t want to wait to see if you’ve won a copy. Denice Stradling, who’s narrated all of my Daisy books so far, does a terrific job, as usual, on this one:

 Ancient Spirits

Another good thing happened in September. My wonderful publisher, ePublishing Works, has begun selling hardback copies of some of their books. Included in this hardback experiment is my latest Daisy book, BRUISED SPIRITS. I’m particularly fond of BRUISED SPIRITS, because it’s based on a real, live woman’s story (her story is extremely grim, by the way). The book deals with spousal abuse and kidnapped-for-the-sex-trade children. I have absolutely no idea how I can write funny books about stuff like that. Guess it’s a gift, if an odd one. If you have a special need for hardback copies of my books, you might be interested in this one:

 Bruised Spirits

Naturally, since hardbacks are expensive, feel free to purchase the e-book or the paperback. I’m not greedy. Much.

Oh! And if you’ve ever wondered what the White side-treadle sewing machine on which Daisy makes all of her clothes looks like, here it is. This is my machine, and I actually used to sew clothes on it for my daughters and me:

In the meantime, I’ve been madly editing Frontier Fiction books for Five Star and been having a whale of a time doing it. I love editing. It’s ever so much easier than writing, although I wish I had more time to write. But one has to earn a living for oneself and one’s hounds, don’t you know. I’ve been able to edit for some wonderful western authors and consider myself privileged because of it.

One of these days, however, I must finish the next Daisy book, SPIRITS UNITED (in which I murder a librarian, but only because Lynne Welch, former RWA Librarian of the Year and overall librarian extraordinaire, asked me to). I will finish it. Promise.

If you’re interested in visiting my woefully out-of-date web site, please do so at: http://aliceduncan.net/ . And if you’d like to be Facebook buds, just go to my Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/alice.duncan.925

Thank you!

Review: Forensics by Val McDermid

This book was what is says and more.  It delves into various forensic disciplines in depth and explores the history and development of each.  It stresses what is true and not true about each area and relates historic and recent cases where it has been applied.  Entomology, Blood Spatter analysis, DNA, Forensic psychology and Fingerprinting are just some of the categories.  The research is excellent and her narrative is very engaging and easy to understand.

With all the tv shows, movies and documentary series regarding crime, I think this is a fantastic read to see what they are all talking about.

Terri

Guest Blogger - Elaine Viets -On Going Dark Again

Going Dark Again

By Elaine Viets

           After 15 years of writing cozy and traditional mysteries, I'm back writing hard-boiled, forensic novels. I'm writing the darker Angela Richman, death investigator mysteries. Brain Storm is the first mystery in this new series.

            A death investigator works for the medical examiner's office. At a murder, the DI is in charge of the body. The police handle the rest of the crime scene.

          Angela is a death investigator in mythical Chouteau Country, Missouri, stronghold of the overprivileged and the people who serve them.

          My death investigator mysteries aren't too gory – not like Patricia Cornwell's "I boiled my dead boyfriend's head." This series is more like the TV show Forensic Files, without the commercials.

          I've come home.

          My first series, the Francesca Vierling newspaper mysteries, was hardboiled.  Then, when the publishing division was wiped out, I switched to the traditional Dead-End Job mysteries, featuring Helen Hawthorne. The Art of Murder, the 15^th novel in the series is just out. I also wrote ten cozy Josie Marcus, Mystery Shopper mysteries.

         

          I love both series, but wanted to write dark mysteries again. But I didn't want to do another police procedural or a private eye with a dead wife or a drinking problem. Other writers had done those and done them well.

          But death investigators were a profession many readers didn't know about. Janet Rudolph, founder of Mystery ReadersInternational, agreed. She believes Angela Richman is the only death investigator series. Last January, I passed the Medicolegal Death Investigators Training Course for forensic professionals at St. Louis University. I wanted the training – and the contacts – to make the new series accurate.

          Now that I'm writing dark again, my writing has changed. Here's what happened when I jumped from cozies to hard-boiled

          My characters can cuss. Angela Richman's best friend and colleague is Katie, Chouteau County assistant medical examiner Dr. Katherine Kelly Stern. Pathologists tend to be eccentric, and Katie is based on a real pathologist who’d perfected the art of swearing. Her profanity was a mood indicator. I could tell how angry she was by whether she used "fricking," "freaking," or the ultimate F-bomb and how often she employed these and other cuss words. Oddly enough, when she swore, the words didn't sound offensive.

          Katie cusses with style and grace in Brain Storm. 

          Body counts.  In cozy and traditional mysteries, the murders take place offstage. In the new death investigator series, readers aren't forced to take a blood bath, but they will see crime scenes and forensic procedures. They'll get a firsthand look at the sights, sounds, even the smells of death.

          Real weapons. In cozy mysteries, when Josie Marcus battles killers, she resorts to “domestic violence," using kitchen tools, gardening equipment, and whatever she can grab for weapons.

          Helen Hawthorne in the Dead-End Job mysteries is a little bolder. She's armed with pepper spray to take down killers, though in Checked Out she did get sprayed

with her own weapon.

          In Brain Storm, when Angela confronted the killer, she was in an office, surrounded by the standard supplies: wastebaskets, chairs, coffee mugs, letter openers. I was prepared to have Angela grab one, when it dawned on me: Wait! This isn't a cozy.

         I can use firepower.

          So Angela shot the killer in the head. It felt so good.

          Brain Storm is on sale as a trade paperback, audio and e-book amzn.to/2awPsIe

           

                Win an autographed hardcover of Elaine’s seventh Dead-End Job mystery, Clubbed to Death. http://elaineviets.com/index.php?id=contests

Review: Need by Joelle Charbonneau

In Notttawa, High school students receive requests to join

NEED, a new social networking site.  They get to ask for something they need and then they are requested to complete a task and then what they asked for is provided (not always in the way they expect).  Soon all the students are participating and some are getting new iPods and other goodies.  Then the tasks they are asked to do become darker and some kids are dying.

The main character, Kaylee, asks for something that is truly a need (not a want) - a kidney for her sick brother.  What it will take for that to happen is worse than she could have imagined.

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This is a wonderful story told from the point-of-view of many of the teens.  It makes you think of the differences between wants and true needs and what people are willing to do under the cloak of anonymity.  I loved this book.  It made me think while enjoying the ride.

The big question of WHY?  who is behind it, is very unexpected.

Terri

Review: The Girl in the Ice by Robert Bryndza

Erika is at work again, in London after an investigation went very wrong in Manchester where her husband was killed.  A girl is found frozen under the ice who turns out to be a wealthy doctor of a powerful and rich family.  The family wants to control the investigation's direction and Erika is having none of it and as she digs deeper, she finds it isn't just the one murder she needs to worry about but several.

I liked both Erika and the supporting team members (Particularly Moss) and it was a solid read.  

Sometimes I didn't agree with her choices (like hijacking a press conference) but that is what makes intriguing characters.

Terri