Cook the Books by Jessica Conant-Park and Susan Conant

The mother-daughter team of Conant-Park and Conant have an imaginative series going with the "Gourmet Girl Mystery" series set in Boston.  "Cook the Books" is the 5th in the series featuring not so aspiring social worker, Chloe Carter.

Carter is a somewhat typical 20-something.  She has over-spent her credit limit doting on her best friend's baby.  She hasn't really found her calling in life, but thinks she should at least give a try to finish a master's in social work (or at least that is what will qualify her to get access to a trust fund from a dead relative). She prides herself on being independent, and it is that stubborn independence that makes her stay in Boston when her boyfriend accepts a job as a personal cook in Hawaii and invites her to come along.  She is so hurt that he made this plan without her participation she cuts him off totally, and makes herself miserable in the process.

Now Chloe desperately needs a part time job, and she responds to an ad to assist a cook book editor with the editing of a new cook book. The son of a famous chef is supposed to be working on the book and is making a mess of it. Chloe saves him organizationally and in terms of the recipes he is planning for the book. She proposes that they meet up with a friend of her former boyfriend, Digger, a chef who is about to open a new high profile restaurant in Boston.  The night before the arranged meeting Digger is killed in a fire that sweeps through his apartment.  Chloe has to discover who killed Digger and why while she juggles her work schedule, her school and clinical internship schedule, and resolving her feelings for the former boyfriend, Josh, who has returned to Boston for the opening of Digger's new restaurant.

The authors manage to keep the reader's interest throughout the book.  Both authors are social workers, and Conant-Park is married to a Boston chef, so they write about things they know.  They are able to legitimately endow their character with the kinds of skills and perception that make for good storytelling and great powers of observation for solving crimes.

I'm surprised I've missed the earlier books in this series and will make up for that by reading some of the previous books in the series.

Conant also has a well know series of mysteries for dog lovers, and I am familiar with some of the books in that series.

Liz Nichols

Heat Wave by Richard Castle

Since "Castle" is one of my favorite shows on TV I was pleased to see the book we've been hearing about on the show all year, "Heat Wave."  Boy, was I disappointed.

Even when I don't like a book I can usually persevere through the first few chapters.  Not this time.  I could only get a few pages in before I put it down.

I have never seen a more poorly written book to get published.  It is obvious that some non-English speaking hack was hired to ghostwrite the book from some screenwriter's outline.  American idoms are absolutely killed. Sentences are awkward and without any nuance.  Some phrases are laughable. At one point a bruised rib injury is called an "intercoastal" injury.  What's that?

All I can say is ABC and the producers of "Castle" blew it big time.  They've damaged the reputation of the show by putting out an almost illiterate piece of drivel.

Liz Nichols

Sand Sharks by Margaret Maron

This is another series I have not read before, and I am very pleased to have found it.  It is the Deborah Knott Mystery series by Margaret Maron, the latest of which is "Sand Sharks."

Knott is a district court judge in Colleton, North Carolina, who experiences more excitement than she bargained for when she goes to a conference for state judges in Wrightsville, NC, near Wilmington.  She discovers the body of a judge colleague near the restaurant where she eats for dinner the night before the conference starts and is caught up in helping the detective assigned to the case to determine who killed the judge.  Of course, there is some collateral damage and more dead bodies along the way to the truth about Judge Jeffrey's murder.  Did another judge kill him off?  Was it the friend of Deborah's cousin, who's son was victimized by a criminal the judge let loose?  Was it someone completely unassociated with the judge or his cases?

This is a profession I know little about, so watching the politics that goes on to get judges elected and kept in office is interesting.  What I liked best about the book is that all of the characters are given very human feelings and reactions.  Reading the book is like taking a page out of the lives of ordinary people and weaving a tale around them.  There are personalities you like and others you hate, and some that are just interesting or different.  All are described, warts and all, including the main character, Judge Knott.

This was a fast read.  I didn't want to put the book down and spent a large part of two days finishing it.  That is one of the tests of a good book for me.  If I am so involved that I can't put it down, it rates highly with me.  It means that the characters speak to me, the plot is absorbing and paced right, and the transitions are skillfully written so that you want to keep going on from one chapter to the next.  That is a skill that is accomplished by only the best and most experienced authors, usually, and Maron is experienced.  She has about 15 books in the Knott series, 8 books in the Sigrid Harald series, and 4 other novels.

Maron grew up near Raleigh, NC, lived in Brooklyn for many years, and has returned to her native North Carolina.  She has won awards for many of her mysteries. You can learn more about her at her website, www.MargaretMaron.com.

Liz Nichols
lizdnichols at gmail.com

Dead Man's Puzzle by Parnell Hall

This is the first time I've run in to Hall's Puzzle Lady Mystery series.  I have mixed feelings about it.

This is one mystery where it was not that easy to decipher the killer half way through the book, and I appreciate the complexity of the process that went in to constructing the book.  I don't happen to be a puzzle addict, so I did not take the time to try to solve the puzzles myself.  If I had the book would have taken me a lot longer.  I'm also not that familiar with Soduku, which I realize is very popular right now.  Soduku lovers will love this book.

What bothered me was the disjointedness of the dialogue.  The sleuth, Cora Felton, a puzzle creator who can't solve her own puzzles to save her life, has a thought process that is akin to someone who is ADHD or possibly bipolar, and that makes her dialogue and her thoughts difficult to follow.  It all hangs together in the end, but it is easy to get tangled up in the process.  The short, choppy dialogue makes the book at the same time a fast read, and a confusing one.

The other thing that bothered me about the book is the book's design.  I usually don't complain about this.  I appreciate the work that publishers do to create the finished product.  This time, the changes in typeface between headings, pagination and the body of the page make the work hard to read and detract from it to some extent.  Perhaps this contributes to the sense of disjointedness in the work.

I can't say that I got involved with the main character the way I do with my favorite mystery writers, and so I will probably not go out of my way to read another or to go back in the series to read some of the earlier books in the series. 

However, the subject and the writing style will appeal to many readers. I can understand why Parnell Hall has a following.

Liz Nichols

Cat Playing Cupid by Shirley Rousseau Murphy

I am really not a fan of books with talking animals.  I just have a lot of trouble with anthropomorthizing animals-- and that is the whole premise of Murphy's Joe Grey Mystery Series.

Joe Grey is a "speaking cat" who lives with several other like-gifted cats in the small town of Molena Point in coastal northern California.  Only a few people in this community know about this cat family's rare gift, and they are dedicated to keep the cats' secret. 

The secret is threatened by the discovery of a book about speaking cats buried with a dead body in the ancestral home of the family that first brought this cat family line from Wales.  The cats with their current people have to come up with a plan to get the body discovered after they have dragged away the offensive volume and without revealing the unusual talents of this family of cats.  Since no one in the police department is privy to the secret about the cats it is a matter of getting the police to find the body without becoming suspicious about the cats.

The other thread is the "love" story between a feral "speaking cat," Sage, and his half-feral litter mate, Kit.  Kit ultimately decides to stay with her people rather than to go back to the hard life of a wild cat.  I find this relationship too filled with sentimentality and anthropomorphic for my tastes.

There are sections of the book that are exciting and attention-grabbing, in particular the chase of the suspect (there's no surprise about who that is) and the clever way the animals and their people use to get the police to find the dead body in the Pamillion ruins.

This book will appeal to mystery lovers who enjoy animal characters and can suspend disbelief a bit in terms of what the animals think, say and do.

Liz Nichols

Fatally Flaky by Diane Mott Davidson

Whenever I see a new Diane Mott Davidson Goldy Schultz mystery I grab it, and I find it difficult to get anything else done until I've finished it! They always leave me wanting the next one right away.

This is one of those rare series where the characters are so compelling that it is as if they become part of your family. You care what happens to them and how they get out of the next mess. You watch as their kids grow up. Every nine months or year when the next installment comes out it's just like you've come for your next year's visit to a favorite cousin or best friend. When you finish, it's like wrapping up the visit until the next year.

"Fatally Flaky" does not disappoint. Goldy gets involved in catering a couple of weddings and it sets the scene for relationships that become important later in solving the mystery. The second wedding is for a ridiculously self-involved bride and her overly indulgent mother who is going out with Goldy's godfather, Jack, who recently moved to Aspen Meadows from New Jersey. Jack has his flaws, but he also has a heart of gold.

When Jack's friend, Doc Finn, is murdered it sets Jack and Goldy investigating. As usual in a Davidson novel, there are so many suspects each with a plausible motive, that it took me until shortly before Goldy breaks the case to figure it out myself.

This is classic Davidson and her fans will love this book.

Liz Nichols

Finger Lickin' Fifteen by Janet Evanovich

Stephanie Plum is at her prime in this zany installment about the attractive bail bond enforcer and her memorable entourage of family, friends, co-workers, and boyfriends. There are more blow ups and burned out cars and apartments in this book than in any previous one that I can recall, for those who like this type of pyrotechnics.

Stephanie has her usual collection of bond violations to enforce-- a flasher, an octogenarian with a beef against his dentist, a pyro-maniac, and a career criminal who will kill if given the chance. Mixed in are a couple of major plots-- Lulu is in danger of being whacked literally by a mob enforcer who cuts off his victims' heads. Lulu witnessed a gruesome beheading and is now in grave peril of the same fate. The other major plot line has to do with Ranger, Stephanie's sometime boss and love interest, who needs her help to solve who is breaking in to the buildings his security company has set up on alarm systems. The burglaries seem to be happening right under the noses of Rangeman employees.

As usual, Stephanie has a hard time deciding whether she likes Ranger or police detective, Joe Morelli better. In this round Ranger seems to be winning.

As always, a fast and entertaining read.

Liz Nichols

In a Guilded Cage by Rhys Bowen

Bowen has brought the story about Molly Murphy, transplant to New York City from Ireland in the beginning of the 20th century to new heights. She helps to discover whether young women friends of hers are dying of influenza or they're being poisoned. She is also deeply involved in an investigation about what happened to the parents of one of these friends, Emily, while they were supposedly missionaries in China 20 years earlier.

Meanwhile, the information she comes up with helps her beau, Police Captain Daniel Sullivan to solve some crimes having to do with the opium trade and smuggling in drugs from China.

It appears that in one of the upcoming Bowen books about Murphy he will marry her off to the dashing police captain. When she does, will he lock her into the "guilded cage" and away from her detective work? One of the main themes in the book is about how women in the 19th and early 20th centuries were almost prohibited from working outside the home once they married. Ambitious women had a real dilemma whether to follow affairs of the heart or the mind.

Good read, as usual, from Bowen.

Liz Nichols

Living the Vida Lola by Misa Ramirez

"Living the Vida Lola" is a first novel by Latina-by-marriage author, Misa Ramirez. Ramirez is a native Californian transplant to Dallas, Texas. This novel inaugurates the Lola Cruz Mystery Series.

Dolores Cruz is a 20-something PI working for the Camacho agency in Sacramento, California. She's a bit of a Stephanie Plum knock-off. The fact that Lola mentions Plum at one point makes it clear that the author has this Evanovich character in mind to some extent. They are similar in age, profession, and similar in the close ethnic family ties that they have. Cruz's 'hood is an older area of Sacramento where she grew up with her Mexican-American family and friends-- and a crush on a non-Latino guy from high school, Jack Callaghan, who is now a Sacramento Bee reporter.

Part of the plot line is the budding romance with Callaghan, and part getting ready for Lola's niece's quinceanera, and the business part is to solve the disappearance and murder of a local woman-- which she does with the help of Jack and a rival PI from her office, Sadie Metcalf.

The character of Lola grew on me, and by the end of the book I was looking forward to the next installment of this mystery series. I like the feisty-ness of this character, and her somewhat unusual value system for a PI. (She does not believe in carrying a gun.)

I did find the book was a little slow to get in to action and the characters got a little confusing at first so it was hard to concentrate on moving quickly from chapter to chapter. The text does not flow as smoothly as the works of more experienced mystery authors, but then, this is a first novel.

There is plenty here to like and to look forward to in future installments.

Liz Nichols

Look Again by Lisa Scottoline

As those who have been reading this blog for awhile know, I am a fan of Lisa Scottoline. Her work is refreshing because her plots are anything but formulaic. Her characters tend to grab you and hold on. You care about what happens to them.

I certainly enjoyed "Look Again" for all those reasons. I relate to protagonist, Ellen Gleeson, perhaps because of her journalistic career and mindset, but even more so because she is an adoptive mother. We have twins we adopted at 15 months and went through some of the same angst in getting to finalization of the adoption, that Ellen has after the fact-- I can relate well to her feelings of helplessness and uncertainty when she finds out that, if the real parents' rights have not been legally severed, then the adoption is illegal and she has absolutely no rights.

The description of the difference between how custody battles are plaid out in court versus parental rights was a blast from my own past, and the explanation is right on the money. It's a hard distinction for adoptive parents to fathom or accept.

Anyway, fans of Scottoline will love this well written and nail-biting story of a missing child case gone wrong and how that impacts Ellen Gleeson and her son forever.

Liz Nichols

Can't Never Tell by Cathy Pickens

This is a little different take on a Southern U.S. cozy mystery. It is set in a small town in northern South Carolina and is infused with the flavor of the rural, deep south. The heroine is a small town lawyer who had worked for a time as a law professor and is just getting used to small town politics and people again.

She gets embroiled in two potential murders when she finds a skeleton at a fun house at a county fair and then witnesses another victim falling off a cliff at a local falls on a family picnic. Both mysteries are woven effectively into the plot lines of the book. It is fun to get to know this character, Avery Andrews, and I'll enjoy getting to know her better in more editions of A Southern Fried Mystery series.

The author, Cathy Pickens, is an attorney and university professor in the law school at Queens University of Charlotte. She grew up in South Carolina, so she is very familiar with the territory.

Liz Nichols

Oolong Dead by Laura Childs

This is the tenth in the Tea Shop Mysteries series. Childs is also the author of the Scrapbooking Mysteries and the new Cackleberry Club Mysteries. I've read samplings of the Scrapbooking series, set in New Orleans, but this is the first time I've picked up one of Childs' Tea Shop Mysteries. I've been missing out.

For one the setting for this charming series is Charleston, SC, one of the world's most beautiful and atmospheric cities. Childs does a terrific job of weaving in Charleston locations and lore in this novel, and I'm sure the same is true of the earlier ones. Secondly, her characters are as likable and interesting as the setting. Third, I happen to be a tea lover, so I can relate to issues of running the Indigo Tea Shop and making the tea, scones and tea sandwiches featured in the book. The main character, Theodosia Browning, is likable and interesting.

I can't say that the plot is all that original or believable. In fact, it is quite contrived. But the characters and description of the location make up for it in a way and I was compelled to read the book in only a couple of sittings.

I plan on checking out more in the Tea Shop series and drinking in a little more Charleston atmosphere.

Liz Nichols

Doggie Day Care Murder by Laurien Berenson

I seem to be on a dog story kick these days, having recently completed "The Art of Racing in the Rain" and "The Story of Edgar Sawtelle" in the not too distant past. I have to admit, I'm a sucker for books that have animals among the cast of characters. Animals have such distinctive personalities that can be exploited under the power of the pen as easily as those of humans.

At any rate, the is the first Laurien Berenson mystery I've read and I'll probably go back and read others in her "Melanie Travis Mystery" series. The heroine is a teacher who is on leave after giving birth to her second son. Juggling a young family is part of the story line in this book, although Melanie does manage to get herself in the deepest do-do while her spouse is minding the kids.

In this book Melanie is kajoled into helping the owner of a doggie day care discover who killed her brother and partner in the day care business. There are the usual cast of suspects-- the maintenance guy, the sister/partner, the silent partner, and a variety of jealous husbands from the dead guy's amourous misadventures.

I can't say this is the most amusing or the best written mystery of all time, but it is amusing enough to keep me reading and wanting to read more of Melanie Travis' sleuth stories.

Liz Nichols