September ~ 2014

81. The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place: The Hidden Gallery...Maryrose Wood
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The Incorrigible children actually were.
 
Of especially naughty children it is sometimes said, "They must have been raised by wolves."
Thanks to the efforts of Miss Penelope Lumley, their plucky governess, Alexander, Beowulf, and Cassiopeia are much more like children than wolf pups now. They are accustomed to wearing clothes. They hardly ever howl at the moon. And for the most part, they resist the urge to chase squirrels up trees.
Despite Penelope's civilizing influence, the Incorrigibles still managed to ruin Lady Constance's Christmas ball, nearly destroying the grand house. So while Ashton Place is being restored, Penelope, the Ashtons, and the children take up residence in London. Penelope is thrilled, as London offers so many opportunities to further the education of her unique students. But the city presents challenges, too, in the form of the palace guards' bearskin hats, which drive the children wild—not to mention the abundance of pigeons the Incorrigibles love to hunt. As they explore London, however, they discover more about themselves as clues about the children's—and Penelope's—mysterious past crop up in the most unexpected ways. . . .

Second book in a cute little middle grades series. I'll probably try and pick up the rest eventually just to find out why they were abandoned in the first place and what relation Miss Lumley really has to them.



82. In the Shadow of Blackbirds...Cat Winters
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In 1918, the world seems on the verge of apocalypse. Americans roam the streets in gauze masks to ward off the deadly Spanish influenza, and the government ships young men to the front lines of a brutal war, creating an atmosphere of fear and confusion. Sixteen-year-old Mary Shelley Black watches as desperate mourners flock to seances and spirit photographers for comfort, but she herself has never believed in ghosts. During her bleakest moment, however, she is forced to rethink her entire way of looking at life and death, for her first love, a boy who died in battle, returns in spirit form. But what does he want from her? Featuring haunting archival early-twentieth-century photographs, this is a tense, romantic story set in a past that is eerily like our own time.

I really liked this one. The main character was great!


83. Curseworkers: White Cat...Holly Black
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Cassel, 17, is an anomaly as the only untalented one in a family of curse workers. While his mother, grandfather, and brothers make their living by illegally performing death curses, manipulating memories, and casting emotion charms, Cassel relies on his quick wit and con-artist skills to convince his private-school classmates that he's normal, despite bouts of sleepwalking and patchy memories of standing over a murdered friend named Lila. Nightmares about a white cat that resembles Lila, his family's ties to organized crime, and evidence of a mysterious plot against him threaten to pull Cassel into the world he's fought hard to resist.

 I've always loved Holly Black's books and this is no exception. I already have the sequel from the library.


84. Silo Saga: Wool 1-5...Hugh Howey
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This Omnibus Edition collects the five Wool books into a single volume. It is for those who arrived late to the party and who wish to save a dollar or two while picking up the same stories in a single package.

The first Wool story was released as a standalone short in July of 2011. Due to reviewer demand, the rest of the story was released over the next six months. My thanks go out to those reviewers who clamored for more. Without you, none of this would exist. Your demand created this as much as I did.

This is the story of mankind clawing for survival, of mankind on the edge. The world outside has grown unkind, the view of it limited, talk of it forbidden. But there are always those who hope, who dream. These are the dangerous people, the residents who infect others with their optimism. Their punishment is simple. They are given the very thing they profess to want: They are allowed outside.

It's hard to explain this one. Apparently, the author self published a bunch of short stories and then made them into one book for the kindle. It was really well done...the story was interesting and the editing was wonderful. It's about a group of people who live in a hundred+ level silo and are separated into different jobs (mechanical, farmer, supply, IT, etc.) The world outside is full of deadly gasses and they can only see outside through video feeds. The worst thing you can do is talk about going outside or wonder what else is out there and the punishment for that is to be sent "cleaning." They put you in a special suit and you are sent outside to clean the monitors for the video feed. It is basically a death sentence because the suits quickly break down and let in the gas. I can't say much more without giving a bunch of spoilers, but I definitely recommend checking out this book!



85. Lost Crafts... Una McGovern
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This charming book is an engaging introduction to a range of traditional crafts and activities. Almost one hundred skills are described and illustrated, from trout-guddling to lacemaking, beekeeping to drystone walling. Whether wanting to learn a new craft, explore social history, or reminisce about pastimes from a bygone age, readers of all ages will lose themselves in Lost Crafts. And with more of us choosing green and ethical lifestyles, there has never been a better time to rediscover these sustainable pursuits.

When I first ordered this book, I thought it would have actual instructions on doing the different activities. Instead, it just gave a little bit of information and then a list of books and websites where you can learn more. Not what I was looking for, but a good little introduction.


86. The Witch with No Name...Kim Harrison
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It’s Rachel Morgan’s ultimate adventure . . . and anything can happen in this final book in the New York Times bestselling Hollows series.
Rachel Morgan has come a long way from her early days as an inexperienced bounty hunter. She’s faced vampires and werewolves, banshees, witches, and soul-eating demons. She’s crossed worlds, channeled gods, and accepted her place as a day-walking demon. She’s lost friends and lovers and family, and an old enemy has unexpectedly become something much more.
But power demands responsibility, and world-changers must always pay a price. Rachel has known that this day would come—and now it is here.
To save Ivy’s soul and the rest of the living vampires, to keep the demonic ever after and our own world from destruction, Rachel Morgan will risk everything. . . .

The last book in a series I have been reading for years. Not the best book of the series, but I did like how she wrapped up the main storyline. There were a few things I think are still hanging, so I hope she writes a few more short stories to tie them up. Pretty sad to have this one ended.



87. Asylum...Madeleine Roux
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Madeleine Roux's New York Times bestselling Asylum is a thrilling and creepy photo-illustrated novel that Publishers Weekly called "a strong YA debut that reveals the enduring impact of buried trauma on a place." Featuring found photographs from real asylums and filled with chilling mystery and page-turning suspense, Asylum is a horror story that treads the line between genius and insanity, perfect for fans of Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children.
For sixteen-year-old Dan Crawford, the New Hampshire College Prep program is the chance of a lifetime. Except that when Dan arrives, he finds that the usual summer housing has been closed, forcing students to stay in the crumbling Brookline Dorm—formerly a psychiatric hospital. As Dan and his new friends Abby and Jordan start exploring Brookline's twisty halls and hidden basement, they uncover disturbing secrets about what really went on here . . . secrets that link Dan and his friends to the asylum's dark past. Because Brookline was no ordinary mental hospital, and there are some secrets that refuse to stay buried.

88. Sanctum...Madeleine Roux
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In this haunting, fast-paced sequel to the New York Times bestselling photo-illustrated novel Asylum, three teens must unlock some long-buried secrets from the past before the past comes back to get them first. Featuring found photographs, many from real vintage carnivals, Sanctum is a mind-bending reading experience that blurs the lines between past and present, genius and insanity, perfect for fans of the smash hit Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children.
Dan, Abby, and Jordan remain traumatized by the summer they shared in the Brookline asylum. Much as they'd love to move on, someone is determined to keep the terror alive, sending the teens photos of an old-timey carnival, with no note and no name. Forsaking their plan never to go back, the teens return to New Hampshire College under the guise of a weekend for prospective students, and there they realize that the carnival from the photos is not only real, it's here on campus, apparently for the first time in many years.
Sneaking away from sample classes and college parties, Dan and his friends lead a tour of their own—one through the abandoned houses and hidden places of the surrounding town. Camford is hiding a terrible past, and the influence of the asylum runs deeper than Dan ever imagined.

I love books set in asylums! These weren't as scary as they could have been, but I liked them.


89. Red Glove...Holly Black
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After rescuing his brothers from Zacharov’s retribution and finding out that Lila, the girl he has loved his whole life, will never, ever be his, Cassel is trying to reestablish some kind of normalcy in his life. That was never going to be easy for someone from a worker family that’s tied to one of the big crime families—and whose mother’s cons get more reckless by the day. But Cassel is coming to terms with what it means to be a transformation worker, and he’s figuring out how to have friends.

Except normal doesn’t last very long. Soon Cassel is being courted by both sides of the law and is forced to confront his past—a past he remembers only in scattered fragments, and one that could destroy his family and his future. Cassel will have to decide whose side he wants to be on, because neutrality is not an option. And then he will have to pull off his biggest con ever to survive…. 

 Sequel to White Cat. I really love the characters and storyline in this trilogy...can't wait until the library gets the last one in.



90. The Cavendish Home for Boys and Girls...Claire Legrand
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At the Cavendish Home for Boys and Girls, you will definitely learn your lesson. An atmospheric, heartfelt, and delightfully spooky novel for fans of Coraline, Splendors and Glooms, and The Mysterious Benedict Society.

Victoria hates nonsense. There is no need for it when your life is perfect. The only smudge on her pristine life is her best friend Lawrence. He is a disaster—lazy and dreamy, shirt always untucked, obsessed with his silly piano. Victoria often wonders why she ever bothered being his friend. (Lawrence does, too.)

But then Lawrence goes missing. And he’s not the only one. Victoria soon discovers that The Cavendish Home for Boys and Girls is not what it appears to be. Kids go in but come out…different. Or they don’t come out at all.

If anyone can sort this out, it’s Victoria—even if it means getting a little messy.

 Pretty creepy. I wish it had been longer.



91. The Iron Trial...Holly Black & Cassandra Clare
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From NEW YORK TIMES bestselling authors Holly Black and Cassandra Clare comes a riveting new series that defies what you think you know about the world of magic.

Most kids would do anything to pass the Iron Trial. Not Callum Hunt. He wants to fail. All his life, Call has been warned by his father to stay away from magic. If he succeeds at the Iron Trial and is admitted into the Magisterium, he is sure it can only mean bad things for him.

So he tries his best to do his worst - and fails at failing. Now the Magisterium awaits him. It's a place that's both sensational and sinister, with dark ties to his past and a twisty path to his future. The Iron Trial is just the beginning, for the biggest test is still to come . . .

I really liked it and I will read the rest in the series when they come out, but I kept thinking Harry Potter the whole time.



92. Code Name Verity...Elizabeth Wein
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Oct. 11th, 1943-A British spy plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France. Its pilot and passenger are best friends. One of the girls has a chance at survival. The other has lost the game before it's barely begun.

When "Verity" is arrested by the Gestapo, she's sure she doesn't stand a chance. As a secret agent captured in enemy territory, she's living a spy's worst nightmare. Her Nazi interrogators give her a simple choice: reveal her mission or face a grisly execution.

As she intricately weaves her confession, Verity uncovers her past, how she became friends with the pilot Maddie, and why she left Maddie in the wrecked fuselage of their plane. On each new scrap of paper, Verity battles for her life, confronting her views on courage, failure and her desperate hope to make it home. But will trading her secrets be enough to save her from the enemy?

A Michael L. Printz Award Honor book that was called "a fiendishly-plotted mind game of a novel" in The New York Times, Code Name Verity is a visceral read of danger, resolve, and survival that shows just how far true friends will go to save each other.

It made me cry and I didn't figure out the twist ahead of time. If you have girls, read this book with them...it is wonderful.


93. Top Secret Twenty-One...Janet Evanovich
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Trenton, New Jersey’s favorite used-car dealer, Jimmy Poletti, was caught selling a lot more than used cars out of his dealerships. Now he’s out on bail and has missed his date in court, and bounty hunter Stephanie Plum is looking to bring him in. Leads are quickly turning into dead ends, and all too frequently into dead bodies. Even Joe Morelli, the city’s hottest cop, is struggling to find a clue to the suspected killer’s whereabouts. These are desperate times, and they call for desperate measures. So Stephanie is going to have to do something she really doesn’t want to do: protect former hospital security guard and general pain in her behind Randy Briggs. Briggs was picking up quick cash as Poletti’s bookkeeper and knows all his boss’s dirty secrets. Now Briggs is next on Poletti’s list of people to put six feet under.

To top things off, Ranger—resident security expert and Stephanie’s greatest temptation—has been the target of an assassination plot. He’s dodged the bullet this time, but if Ranger wants to survive the next attempt on his life, he’ll have to enlist Stephanie’s help and reveal a bit more of his mysterious past.

Death threats, highly trained assassins, highly untrained assassins, and Stark Street being overrun by a pack of feral Chihuahuas are all in a day’s work for Stephanie Plum. The real challenge is dealing with her Grandma Mazur’s wild bucket list. A boob job and getting revenge on Joe Morelli’s Grandma Bella can barely hold a candle to what’s number one on the list—but that’s top secret.

 Great, as usual!



94. Anna Dressed in Blood...Kendare Blake
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Cas Lowood has inherited an unusual vocation: He kills the dead.
So did his father before him, until he was gruesomely murdered by a ghost he sought to kill. Now, armed with his father's mysterious and deadly athame, Cas travels the country with his kitchen-witch mother and their spirit-sniffing cat. Together they follow legends and local lore, trying to keep up with the murderous dead—keeping pesky things like the future and friends at bay.
When they arrive in a new town in search of a ghost the locals call Anna Dressed in Blood, Cas doesn't expect anything outside of the ordinary: track, hunt, kill. What he finds instead is a girl entangled in curses and rage, a ghost like he's never faced before. She still wears the dress she wore on the day of her brutal murder in 1958: once white, now stained red and dripping with blood. Since her death, Anna has killed any and every person who has dared to step into the deserted Victorian she used to call home.
But she, for whatever reason, spares Cas's life.

Really liked this one!

August ~ 2014

69. Ship Breaker...Paolo BacigalupiQuote

In America's Gulf Coast region, where grounded oil tankers are being broken down for parts, Nailer, a teenage boy, works the light crew, scavenging for copper wiring just to make quota--and hopefully live to see another day. But when, by luck or chance, he discovers an exquisite clipper ship beached during a recent hurricane, Nailer faces the most important decision of his life: Strip the ship for all it's worth or rescue its lone survivor, a beautiful and wealthy girl who could lead him to a better life. . . .

70. Drowned Cities...Paolo Bacigalupi
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In a dark future America where violence, terror, and grief touch everyone, young refugees Mahlia and Mouse have managed to leave behind the war-torn lands of the Drowned Cities by escaping into the jungle outskirts. But when they discover a wounded half-man--a bioengineered war beast named Tool--who is being hunted by a vengeful band of soldiers, their fragile existence quickly collapses. One is taken prisoner by merciless soldier boys, and the other is faced with an impossible decision: Risk everything to save a friend, or flee to a place where freedom might finally be possible.

This thrilling companion to Paolo Bacigalupi's highly acclaimed Ship Breaker is a haunting and powerful story of loyalty, survival, and heart-pounding adventure.

71. The Vindico...Wesley King
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X-Men meets The Breakfast Club in this darkly humorous adventure

The Vindico are a group of supervillains who have been fighting the League of Heroes for as long as anyone can remember. Realizing they're not as young as they used to be, they devise a plan to kidnap a group of teenagers to take over for them when they retire--after all, how hard can it be to teach a bunch of angsty teens to be evil?

Held captive in a remote mansion, five teens train with their mentors and receive superpowers beyond their wildest dreams. Struggling to uncover the motives of the Vindico, the teens have to trust each other to plot their escape. But they quickly learn that the differences between good and evil are not as black and white as they seem, and they are left wondering whose side they should be fighting on after all . . .

72. The Feros...Wesley King

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After using your newfound super powers to defeat the most evil villains on the planet, what could you possibly do for an encore?
James, Hayden, Sam, Emily and Lana are finally ready to join the League of Heroes. Their new powers have made them stronger than ever (Hayden has perfected some particularly useful tricks for doing housework from the sofa), and the friends even gave themselves a name: the Feros. But as their induction into the League approaches, they are ambushed and arrested by a group of rogue Heroes. The only one who can clear their name is the League’s leader, Thunderbolt—but he’s gone missing. The Feros manage to escape capture, but with Thunderbolt gone and several League members defecting, there is no one left to trust.
Confident they can overcome anything together, the group’s security is shaken when Emily is mysteriously abducted right out from under them. Have the Vindico somehow managed to escape the impenetrable Perch? Or are they fighting a new enemy that they can’t see? One thing they know for sure is that even Sam’s telepathic detection has proven useless against this unknown foe. Without their computer genius or their telepathic shield, how will the Feros ever find Emily and keep themselves—and their families—safe?

Sequel to Vindico. Not as good as the first one, but still fun.



73. Little Brother...Cory Doctorow

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Marcus, a.k.a “w1n5t0n,” is only seventeen years old, but he figures he already knows how the system works–and how to work the system. Smart, fast, and wise to the ways of the networked world, he has no trouble outwitting his high school’s intrusive but clumsy surveillance systems.

But his whole world changes when he and his friends find themselves caught in the aftermath of a major terrorist attack on San Francisco. In the wrong place at the wrong time, Marcus and his crew are apprehended by the Department of Homeland Security and whisked away to a secret prison where they’re mercilessly interrogated for days.

When the DHS finally releases them, Marcus discovers that his city has become a police state where every citizen is treated like a potential terrorist. He knows that no one will believe his story, which leaves him only one option: to take down the DHS himself.

All teens should read this book! Activism, politics, freedoms and rights, history...it has it all, plus all kinds of information on computers and technology.


74. Swim the Fly...Don Calame

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Fifteen-year-old Matt Gratton and his two best friends always set themselves a summertime goal. This year's? To see a real-live naked girl for the first time—quite a challenge, given that none of the guys has the nerve to even ask a girl on a date. But that goal starts to look easy compared to Matt's other aspiration: swimming the 100-yard butterfly (the hardest stroke known to God or man) to impress the sizzling new star of the swim team. In the spirit of Hollywood’s blockbuster comedies, screenwriter Don Calame unleashes a true ode to the adolescent male: side-splittingly funny, sometimes crude, yet always full of heart.

75. Altered...Jennifer Rush

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Everything about Anna's life is a secret. Her father works for the Branch, at the helm of its latest project: monitoring and administering treatments to the four genetically altered boys in the lab below their farmhouse. There's Nick, solemn and brooding; Cas, light-hearted and playful; Trev, smart and caring; and Sam . . . who's stolen Anna's heart.

When the Branch decides it's time to take the boys, Sam stages an escape. Anna's father pushes her to go with them, making Sam promise to keep her away from the Branch, at all costs.

On the run, with her father's warning in her head, Anna begins to doubt everything she thought she knew about herself. She soon discovers that she and Sam are connected in more ways than either of them expected. And if they're both going to survive, they must piece together the clues of their past before the Branch catches up to them and steals it all away.

76. Erased...Jennifer Rush

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After fleeing the Branch with Sam, Cas, and Nick, Anna is learning how to survive in hiding, following Sam's rules: Don't draw attention to yourself. Always carry a weapon. Know your surroundings. Watch your back.

When memories from Anna's old life begin to resurface--and a figure from her childhood reappears--Anna's loyalties are tested. Is it a Branch set-up, or could it be the reunion Anna has hoped for? Ultimately, the answers hinge on one question: What was the real reason her memories were erased in the first place?

77. A Shiver of Light...Laurell K. Hamilton

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I am Princess Meredith NicEssus. Legal name Meredith Gentry, because “Princess” looks so pretentious on a driver’s license. I was the first faerie princess born on American soil, but I wouldn’t be the only one for much longer...

Merry Gentry, ex–private detective, now full-time princess, knew she was descended from fertility goddesses, but when she learned she was about to have triplets, she began to understand what that might mean. Infertility has plagued the high ranks of faerie for centuries. Now nobles of both courts of faerie are coming to court Merry and her men, at their home in exile in the Western Lands of Los Angeles, because they will do anything to have babies of their own.

Taranis, King of Light and Illusion, is a more dangerous problem. He tried to seduce Merry and, failing that, raped her. He’s using the human courts to sue for visitation rights, claiming that one of the babies is his. And though Merry knows she was already pregnant when he took her, she can’t prove it.

To save herself and her babies from Taranis she will use the most dangerous powers in all of faerie: a god of death, a warrior known as the Darkness, the Killing Frost, and a king of nightmares. They are her lovers, and her dearest loves, and they will face down the might of the high courts of faerie—while trying to keep the war from spreading to innocent humans in Los Angeles, who are in danger of becoming collateral damage.

She finally wrote a new Merry book! I was happy with it and hope she's a little quicker with the next one.



78. Nicholas Dane...Melvin Burgess
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When fourteen-year-old Nicholas Dane’s mother dies, social services sends him to a home for boys where intimidation and violence keep order. After a number of fights and brutal punishments, Nick thinks that life can’t possibly get any worse . . . until he realizes that the home’s respected deputy head, who has been grooming him with sweets and solace, has something more frightening in mind.

This one is hard to review. It was a good book in the sense that it was well-written, I liked the characters, and I was into the story. However, the story was a sad, horrible tale with many disturbing ideas and scenes and no real happy ending. It was written for high school level teens, but I would allow my middle school son to read it...just be prepared for lots of uncomfortable discussions. WARNING - It has child rape, murder, pedophile behavior between teachers/counselors and students, lots of adult-on-child (as well as child-on-child) violence, and a pretty graphic child molestation scene.


79. The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place: The Mysterious Howling...Maryrose Wood
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Found running wild in the forest of Ashton Place, the Incorrigibles are no ordinary children: Alexander, age ten or thereabouts, keeps his siblings in line with gentle nips; Cassiopeia, perhaps four or five, has a bark that is (usually) worse than her bite; and Beowulf, age somewhere-in-the-middle, is alarmingly adept at chasing squirrels.
Luckily, Miss Penelope Lumley is no ordinary governess. Only fifteen years old and a recent graduate of the Swanburne Academy for Poor Bright Females, Penelope embraces the challenge of her new position. Though she is eager to instruct the children in Latin verbs and the proper use of globes, first she must help them overcome their canine tendencies.
But mysteries abound at Ashton Place: Who are these three wild creatures, and how did they come to live in the vast forests of the estate? Why does Old Timothy, the coachman, lurk around every corner? Will Penelope be able to teach the Incorrigibles table manners and socially useful phrases in time for Lady Constance's holiday ball? And what on earth is a schottische? 

Very cute middle grades book.


80. The Book Thief...Markus Zusak
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It is 1939. Nazi Germany. The country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier, and will become busier still.

Liesel Meminger is a foster girl living outside of Munich, who scratches out a meager existence for herself by stealing when she encounters something she can’t resist–books. With the help of her accordion-playing foster father, she learns to read and shares her stolen books with her neighbors during bombing raids as well as with the Jewish man hidden in her basement.

In superbly crafted writing that burns with intensity, award-winning author Markus Zusak, author of I Am the Messenger, has given us one of the most enduring stories of our time. 

I've had this book on my shelf for almost five years now, but have put off reading it. I'm glad I finally got around to it, but it did make me cry.

July ~ 2014

60. Inhuman...Kat Falls
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In the wake of a devastating biological disaster, the United States east of the Mississippi River has been abandoned. Now called the Feral Zone, a reference to the virus that turned millions of people into bloodthirsty savages, the entire area is off-limits. The punishment for violating the border is death.
Lane McEvoy can't imagine why anyone would risk it. She's grown up in the shadow of the great wall separating east from west, and she's naturally curious about what's on the other side - but she's not that curious. Life in the west is safe, comfortable . . . sterile. Which is just how she likes it.
But Lane gets the shock of her life when she learns that someone close to her has crossed into the Feral Zone. And she has little choice but to follow. Lane travels east, risking life and limb and her very DNA, completely unprepared for what she finds in the ruins of civilization . . . and afraid to learn whether her humanity will prove her greatest strength or a fatal weakness.

61. The Lost Sisterhood...Anne Fortier
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Oxford lecturer Diana Morgan is an expert on Greek mythology. Her obsession with the Amazons started in childhood when her eccentric grandmother claimed to be one herself—before vanishing without a trace. Diana’s colleagues shake their heads at her Amazon fixation. But then a mysterious, well-financed foundation makes Diana an offer she cannot refuse.

Traveling to North Africa, Diana teams up with Nick Barran, an enigmatic Middle Eastern guide, and begins deciphering an unusual inscription on the wall of a recently unearthed temple. There she discovers the name of the first Amazon queen, Myrina, who crossed the Mediterranean in a heroic attempt to liberate her kidnapped sisters from Greek pirates, only to become embroiled in the most famous conflict of the ancient world—the Trojan War. Taking their cue from the inscription, Diana and Nick set out to find the fabled treasure that Myrina and her Amazon sisters salvaged from the embattled city of Troy so long ago. Diana doesn’t know the nature of the treasure, but she does know that someone is shadowing her, and that Nick has a sinister agenda of his own. With danger lurking at every turn, and unsure of whom to trust, Diana finds herself on a daring and dangerous quest for truth that will forever change her world.

Sweeping from England to North Africa to Greece and the ruins of ancient Troy, and navigating between present and past, The Lost Sisterhood is a breathtaking, passionate adventure of two women on parallel journeys, separated by time, who must fight to keep the lives and legacy of the Amazons from being lost forever.

 


62. Dexter's Final Cut...Jeff Lindsay
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Hollywood gets more than it bargained for when television's hottest star arrives at the Miami Police Department and develops an intense, professional interest in a camera-shy blood spatter analyst named Dexter Morgan.

Mega-star Robert Chase is famous for losing himself in his characters. When he and a group of actors descend on the Miami Police Department for "research," Chase becomes fixated on Dexter Morgan, the blood spatter analyst with a sweet tooth for doughnuts and a seemingly average life. To perfect his role, Chase is obsessed with shadowing Dexter's every move and learning what really makes him tick. There is just one tiny problem . . . Dexter's favorite hobby involves hunting down the worst killers to escape legal justice, and introducing them to his special brand of playtime. It's a secret best kept out of the spotlight and away from the prying eyes of bloated Hollywood egos if Dexter wants to stay out of the electric chair. The last thing he needs is bright lights and the paparazzi. . . but even Dexter isn't immune to the call of fame.

 Not at all happy with the ending to this one. In fact, I was pretty disappointed with Dexter the whole novel. I hope the next one is more like the earlier books in the series.



63. Midnight Crossroad...Charlaine Harris
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Welcome to Midnight, Texas, a town with many boarded-up windows and few full-time inhabitants, located at the crossing of Witch Light Road and Davy Road. It’s a pretty standard dried-up western town.

There’s a pawnshop (someone lives in the basement and is seen only at night). There’s a diner (people who are just passing through tend not to linger). And there’s new resident Manfred Bernardo, who thinks he’s found the perfect place to work in private (and who has secrets of his own).

Stop at the one traffic light in town, and everything looks normal. Stay awhile, and learn the truth...

A new trilogy by Charlaine Harris, but very different from the Sookie books. I enjoyed it and am looking forward to the next one.



64. The Undead Pool...Kim Harrison
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Witch and day-walking demon Rachel Morgan has managed to save the demonic ever after from shrinking, but at a high cost. Now, strange magic is attacking Cincinnati and the Hollows, causing spells to backfire or go horribly wrong, and the truce between the races, between Inderlander and human, is shattering. Rachel must stop this dark necromancy before the undead vampire masters who keep the rest of the undead under control are lost and all-out supernatural war breaks out. Rachel knows of only weapon to ensure the peace: ancient elven wild magic, which carries its own perils. And no one know better than Rachel that no good deed goes unpunished . . . 

I love this series and am pretty bummed the last book comes out in September.



65. The Darkest Path...Jeff Hirsch
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A civil war rages between the Glorious Path--a militant religion based on the teachings of a former US soldier--and what's left of the US government. Fifteen-year-old Callum Roe and his younger brother, James, were captured and forced to convert six years ago. Cal has been working in the Path's dog kennels, and is very close to becoming one of the Path's deadliest secret agents. Then Cal befriends a stray dog named Bear and kills a commander who wants to train him to be a vicious attack dog. This sends Cal and Bear on the run, and sets in motion a series of incredible events that will test Cal's loyalties and end in a fierce battle that the fate of the entire country rests on.

66. Swipe...Evan Angler
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Set in a future North America that is struggling to recover after famine and global war, Swipe follows the lives of three kids caught in the middle of a conflict they didn’t even know existed. United under a charismatic leader, every citizen of the American Union is required to get the Mark on their 13th birthday in order to gain the benefits of citizenship.   The Mark is a tattoo that must be swiped by special scanners for everything from employment to transportation to shopping. It’s almost Logan Langly’s 13th birthday and he knows he should be excited about getting the Mark, but he hasn’t been able to shake the feeling he’s being watched. Not since his sister went to get her Mark five years ago . . . and never came back. 
When Logan and his friends discover the truth behind the Mark, will they ever be able to go back to being normal teenagers?

In case you didn't notice, there's a bunch of YA in the last couple of months. DS13 and I are having a read-off this summer.


67. Storm Front...Jim Butcher
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 For Harry Dresden, Chicago's only professional wizard, business, to put it mildly, stinks. So when the police bring him in to consult on a grisly double murder committed with black magic, Harry's seeing dollar signs. But where there's black magic, there's a black mage behind it. And now that mage knows Harry's name.

68. Fool Moon...Jim Butcher
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Meet Harry Dresden, Chicago's first (and only) Wizard P.I. Turns out the 'everyday' world is full of strange and magical things - and most of them don't play well with humans. That's where Harry comes in. Business has been slow lately for Harry Dresden. Okay, business has been dead. Not undead - just dead. You would think Chicago would have a little more action for the only professional wizard in the phone book. But lately, Harry hasn't been able to dredge up any kind of work - magical or mundane. But just when it looks like he can't afford his next meal, a murder comes along that requires his particular brand of supernatural expertise. A brutally mutilated corpse. Strange-looking paw prints. A full moon. Take three guesses. And the first two don't count ...Magic - it can get a guy killed.

I've been wanting to start this series for a while now. These weren't as great as I was expecting, but I'm hopeful that they get better.

June ~ 2014

53. Days in the Lives of Social Workers...Linda May Grobman
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This book is an essential guide for anyone who wants an inside look at the social work profession. Whether you are a social work graduate student or undergraduate student, an experienced professional wishing to make a change in career direction, or just thinking about going into the field, you will learn valuable lessons from the experiences described in DAYS IN THE LIVES OF SOCIAL WORKERS.

54. Mallory's Oracle...Carol O'Connell
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Serial killing, insider trading, the occult and the vices of wealthy Manhattan widows are the themes that collide in this heavy-handed first novel starring an unusual policewoman. Kathleen Mallory was an 11-year-old thief living on the streets of New York City when Detective Louis Markowitz rescued her and raised her in his home. The novel opens a decade later when Markowitz, a widower, is found dead beside the third in a series of Gramercy Park dowagers slashed and murdered in broad daylight. Mallory, whose early criminal instincts and keen intelligence have been loosely channeled into computer science, is forced to take a leave from the department and decides to seek vengeance on her own.

55. The Man Who Cast Two Shadows...Carol O'Connell
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O'Connell's second novel (after Mallory's Oracle) brings back NYPD Sergeant Kathy Mallory, plunging this tough-minded yet soulful heroine into another convoluted case. When a woman killed in Central Park is mistakenly identified as Mallory, the former street urchin and computer whiz sets herself up as bait by moving into the apartment building that houses her three main suspects. Using a computer and the building's electronic bulletin board to psych out the killer, she stirs up more than she bargained for, including someone who wants her dead. Other elements in the intelligent plot include a crime of passion, a suspenseful cat-and-mouse game and a boy who may be telekinetic and whose stepmothers keep dying.

56. Killing Critics...Carol O'Connell
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O'Connell's driven and sharp-edged NYPD detective Kathleen Mallory revisits a 12-year-old double murder case first investigated by her beloved adoptive father, whose death was central to her notable debut in Mallory's Oracle (1994). The murder of a second-rate performance artist in mid-performance has many associations to the earlier, grisly and still unsolved homicides, which also touched the art world. Many of the same characters are involved in both killings: J.L. Quinn, the elegantly icy critic whose niece was one of the first victims; Avril Koozeman, whose galleries were murder scenes then and now; and Emma Sue Halloran, once a critic, now a culturecrat who forces hideous art into new buildings. Mallory and her partner, Sergeant Riker, must find keys to the new killing by prying memories from these witnesses. Hampering their efforts is the desire of the police brass to keep the old case closed. O'Connell's narrative force and character development are irresistible. Although the intense and private Mallory offers little to love until late in the story, her fierce determination draws the reader into her quest. Wacky artsy types and a flawed but sympathetic Riker leaven the heavy dose of misanthropy.

57. Stone Angel...Carol O'Connell
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Much darker than the previous three novels starring Mallory, Stone Angel examines the shadows that haunt this unique detective, bringing to light the horrors that drive her. Here she is seeking retribution with single-minded obsession for her mother's grisly death by stoning. The small Louisiana town she fled as a child and to which she now returns is polluted with enough moral corruption to make Faulkner proud. Fans of the earlier books will be gratified to know that old friends have followed Mallory to Louisiana. Charles has spent months tracking her, dogging her steps with a fiercely loyal determination. Detective Riker has found her as well, and the relationship among these three continues to develop as the men try to keep her from destroying herself while seeking revenge. O'Connell is at her best when she is characterizing the almost animalistic Mallory, and she has outdone herself here, deftly weaving together threads of character and subplots from all four novels to reveal Mallory's true motives.

 Great new author (to me...she's been out for a while.)



58. Judas Child...Carol O'Connell
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In a departure from her popular Kathleen Mallory suspense series (most recently Stone Angel), O'Connell's chilling tale of a murderer who preys on children compensates for a muddled plot with its clear-eyed look at the heights and depths of human behavior. When two remarkable fifth-grade girls, Gwen Hubble, the beautiful daughter of the lieutenant governor, and Sadie Green, an imaginative and plucky child obsessed with horror comics and movies, are kidnapped from the St. Ursula's Academy, two adults afflicted by their own tragedies are drawn into the investigation. Forensic psychologist Ali Cray draws stares both for her slit skirts and for a disfiguring facial scar, the result of a secret childhood trauma. Policeman Rouge Kendall is haunted by the memory of his twin sister's murder 15 years earlier. The killer was supposedly caught, but similarities between the old murder and the current case make Cray begin to doubt. In the earlier case, the killer used a note from one captured child (the Judas child) to lure a friend; the reader knows that this is again the pattern, just as we know, or think we know, where the girls are being held. As the investigation continues and the girls attempt to escape, O'Connell introduces vivid minor characters, including a 10-year-old boy almost too shy to speak and one of Cray's ex-lovers, a cop who expresses his thwarted yearning for her through insult contests.

Really enjoyed this one! It is a stand-alone from the same author as the Mallory series, so it has a very similar writing style. Great twist at the end...did not see it coming!

May ~ 2014

47. This Dark Road to Mercy...Wiley Cash
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The critically acclaimed author of the New York Times bestseller A Land More Kind Than Home—hailed as "a powerfully moving debut that reads as if Cormac McCarthy decided to rewrite Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird" (Richmond Times Dispatch)—returns with a resonant novel of love and atonement, blood and vengeance, set in western North Carolina, involving two young sisters, a wayward father, and an enemy determined to see him pay for his sins. After their mother's unexpected death, twelve-year-old Easter and her six-year-old sister Ruby are adjusting to life in foster care when their errant father, Wade, suddenly appears. Since Wade signed away his legal rights, the only way he can get his daughters back is to steal them away in the night.
Brady Weller, the girls' court-appointed guardian, begins looking for Wade, and he quickly turns up unsettling information linking Wade to a recent armored car heist, one with a whopping $14.5 million missing. But Brady Weller isn't the only one hunting the desperate father. Robert Pruitt, a shady and mercurial man nursing a years-old vendetta, is also determined to find Wade and claim his due.
Narrated by a trio of alternating voices, This Dark Road to Mercy is a story about the indelible power of family and the primal desire to outrun a past that refuses to let go.

 Not quite as good as his first book, but I still really enjoyed it.


48. After Dead: What Came Next in the World of Sookie Stackhouse...Charlaine Harris
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Dead Ever After marked the end of the Sookie Stackhouse novels—a series that garnered millions of fans and spawned the hit HBO television show True Blood. It also stoked a hunger that will never die…a hunger to know what happened next.

With characters arranged alphabetically—from the Ancient Pythoness to Bethany Zanelli—bestselling author Charlaine Harris takes fans into the future of their favorite residents of Bon Temps and environs. You’ll learn how Michele and Jason’s marriage fared, what happened to Sookie’s cousin Hunter, and whether Tara and JB’s twins grew up to be solid citizens.

This coda provides the answers to your lingering questions—including details of Sookie’s own happily-ever-after…

Cute little book. Kind of an epilogue that tells what happened in the future to all the characters in the series.



49. Havana Real: One Woman Fights to Tell the Truth About Cuba Today...Yoani Sanchez
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Yoani Sánchez is an unusual dissident: no street protests, no attacks on big politicos, no calls for revolution. Rather, she produces a simple diary about what it means to live under the Castro regime: the chronic hunger and the difficulty of shopping; the art of repairing ancient appliances; and the struggles of living under a propaganda machine that pushes deep into public and private life.

For these simple acts of truth-telling her life is one of constant threat. But she continues on, refusing to be silenced—a living response to all who have ceased to believe in a future for Cuba.

I've read her blog for a few years now, so most of this book wasn't new to me. I would definitely recommend it to others who aren't familiar with her.



50. The Last Witchfinder...James Morrow
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Jennet Stearne's father hangs witches for a living in Restoration England. But when she witnesses the unjust and horrifying execution of her beloved aunt Isobel, the precocious child decides to make it her life's mission to bring down the Parliamentary Witchcraft Act. Armed with little save the power of reason, and determined to see justice prevail, Jennet hurls herself into a series of picaresque adventures—traveling from King William's Britain to the fledgling American Colonies to an uncharted island in the Caribbean, braving West Indies pirates, Algonquin Indian captors, the machinations of the Salem Witch Court, and the sensuous love of a young Ben Franklin. For Jennet cannot and must not rest until she has put the last witchfinder out of business.

Wow...very disappointing. This is normally a topic I love, but I slogged through this book from the very start (actually the second start...I tried reading this a couple of months ago and couldn't get past the first couple of chapters.) I felt nothing for the characters and the plot was a little far-fetched at times. I have to admit to skimming through most of the last half of it.



51. Archetype...M.D. Waters
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Emma wakes in a hospital, with no memory of what came before. Her husband, Declan, a powerful, seductive man, provides her with new memories, but her dreams contradict his stories, showing her a past life she can’t believe possible: memories of war, of a camp where girls are trained to be wives, of love for another man. Something inside her tells her not to speak of this, but she does not know why. She only knows she is at war with herself.

Suppressing those dreams during daylight hours, Emma lets Declan mold her into a happily married woman and begins to fall in love with him. But the day Noah stands before her, the line between her reality and dreams shatters.

In a future where women are a rare commodity, Emma fights for freedom but is held captive by the love of two men—one her husband, the other her worst enemy. If only she could remember which is which. . .

52. Prototype...M.D. Waters
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Emma looks forward to the day when she can let go of her past—both of them. After more than a year on the run, with clues to her parents’ whereabouts within her grasp, she may finally find a place to settle down. Start a new life. Maybe even create new memories with a new family.

But the past rises to haunt her and to make sure there’s nowhere on the planet she can hide. Declan Burke wants his wife back, and with a little manipulation and a lot of reward money, he’s got the entire world on his side. Except for the one man she dreads confronting the most: Noah Tucker.

Emma returns to face what she’s done but finds that the past isn’t the problem. It’s the present—and the future it represents. Noah has moved on and another woman is raising their daughter.

In the shocking conclusion to M.D. Waters’s spectacular debut, Emma battles for her life and her freedom, tearing down walls and ripping off masks to reveal the truth. She’s decided to play their game and prove she isn’t the woman they thought she was. Even if it means she winds up dead. Or worse, reborn.

These two were great. I loved the first book, so I checked out her author page and she was running a trivia contest. I ended up winning it and I received an ARC (advanced reader copy) of Prototype. It doesn't come out until July 24, 2014, so I was happy to be able to read it early. If anyone wants to read these, I would suggest waiting until July, so you can read them back-to-back.

April ~ 2014

40. Bloody Twist...Carolina Garcia-Aguilera
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Bloody Twist is the seventh novel in the Bloody Series (three murders per book or your money is refunded) featuring Lupe Solano, the Cuban-American private investigator who lives and works in Miami.
Two years after having been shot, (Bitter Sugar), Lupe is back on the job, helping Tommy MacDonald, Miami’s premiere criminal defense attorney and sometime lover, with a case involving his new client, the mysterious Madeline Marie Meadows. Twenty-two year old Ms. Meadows is Miami’s highest paid call girl (her rate: $5,000. per hour), expensive, to be sure, especially in light of the fact that she is a virgin. Although Ms. Meadows has not been charged with any crime, she has taken the precaution of retaining Mr. MacDonald because she feels that it is highly likely that she will be. Ms. Meadows reports that she has been interviewed by Miami Homicide Detective Maxwell Anderson in relation to the murders of two men she knows well: Dr. Steinberg, the ob-gyn who verifies that she is a virgin and Mr. Robinson, a wealthy developer who is her steady client. Although Tommy is drawn to his newest client- originally from Dubuque, Iowa, Ms. Meadows is gorgeous, with a natural blond beauty not often seen in Miami’s plastic surgery happy town- he is skeptical of her story, and asks Lupe to begin an investigation.

In a race against time, Lupe finds herself conducting in effect, two investigations: the first, finding out who murdered three men; and the second, discovering who the ‘real’ Madeline Marie Meadows really is. Along the way, Lupe has to deal with such diverse elements as Napoleon and Josephine, Ms. Meadow’s killer Chihuahuas, as well as the Loredo twins, Ms. Meadows’ pimps, marketing geniuses who thought up the hook of labeling her as ‘Miami’s highest paid call girl who is a virgin’. Lupe enlists the help of her friend, Sweet Suzanne, the well-known Miami madam, and Nestor, the crack investigator to achieve that goal.

41. Bloody Shame...Carolina Garcia-Aguilera
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With her acclaimed debut mystery Bloody Waters, Carolina Garcia-Aguilera introduced Cuban-born PI Lupe Solano, "a woman to be reckoned with on the mystery scene" (New York Newsday). Now the sexy Miami sleuth returns, with a case that strikes dangerously close to home: the investigation of a suspicious car accident that killed her closest childhood friend.

 Finished up the last of this series. I really hope she writes more...these are fun books.



42. One Hot Summer...Carolina Garcia-Aguilera
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A sizzling summer of sexy fun in Miami Beach, where anything can happen . . . and does. Margarita Maria Santos Silva is a woman adamant about making her own decisions in a family that seems to have the future, as well as the rules, neatly laid out for her. After the birth of her son, Margarita is at the end of taking a year off from her stressful legal career and trying to decide whether she should go back to work or stay home and raise her son—the latter being the choice both her overachieving husband, Ariel, and old-fashioned family desperately want her to make.
But when her old law school boyfriend-the handsome Luther Simmonds—shows; up out of nowhere, all hell breaks loose . . . Now she has more than one critical decision to makeand only one hot summer to do it in.

 Although this is by the same author as the Lupe Solano series, this book was horrible! I couldn't stand the main character and didn't really like any of the others. I don't think I will read any more of her stand-alone novels.



43. The Deadhouse...Linda Fairstein
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One of the most haunting buildings in New York City, and perhaps the most dramatically beautiful, the Deadhouse sits on a small island in the middle of the East River. The abandoned structure, like the ghostly remains of a castle, plays in the imagination as a site of mystery and intrigue...a likely place for murder.
Following on the bestselling success of Cold Hit, Likely to Die, and Final Jeopardy, top Manhattan sex crimes DA Linda Fairstein brings her unique blend of authenticity and style to a mesmerizing tale of murder and deceit.
It's the holiday season but there's little reason for cheer at one of New York's most elite colleges. A respected professor is dead; strangled and dumped in an elevator shaft. Lola Dakota's lifeless fingers clutch a few strands of hair, and a piece of paper in her pocket reads "The Deadhouse."
What brought a distinguished academic to such a tragic end? Opportunistic murder seems unlikely as assistant DA Alexandra Cooper, working with detectives Mike Chapman and Mercer Wallace, uncovers a distressing pattern of betrayal and terror.
There's proof that Lola's husband, Ivan, wanted her dead. He has an alibi, but could he have hired a killer? Or could one of Lola's colleagues have erupted into unexpected violence? Some of their stories don't quite ring true. And why did Lola have a photograph of twenty-year-old Charlotte Voight pinned to her office bulletin board? Charlotte left her dorm room eight months ago and vanished into the night. Is she dead? Could she and Lola have become victims of the same predator?
Perhaps most puzzling of all are the words "The Deadhouse." What was Lola's connection to this desolate place where people once endured slow and agonizing deaths? And what danger awaits Alex there or on the streets of Manhattan as she targets Lola's killer?

 I'm not sure if I like this author or not. Her books start off slowly dragging and I almost quit reading them, but then towards the middle they finally start picking up and turn out really well. Then they end pretty abruptly. I feel like she has potential, so I will try one more of hers.



44. A Land More Kind Than Home...Wiley Cash
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For a curious boy like Jess Hall, growing up in Marshall means trouble when you get caught spying on grown-ups. Adventurous and precocious, Jess is protective of his older brother, Christopher, a mute whom everyone calls Stump. Though their mother has warned them not to snoop, Stump can't help sneaking a look at something he's not supposed to—an act that will have repercussions. It's a wrenching event that thrusts Jess into an adulthood for which he's not prepared. He now knows that a new understanding can bring not only danger and evil—but also the possibility of freedom and deliverance. Told by resonant and evocative characters, A Land More Kind Than Home is a haunting tale of courage in the face of cruelty and the power of love to overcome the darkness that lives in us all.

 This was a wonderful, sad story. I would definitely recommend this book. It is set in North Carolina and the author was able to perfectly capture the characters and setting.



45. The Calligrapher's Daughter...Eugenia Kim
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In early-twentieth-century Korea, Najin Han, the privileged daughter of a calligrapher, longs to choose her own destiny, though her country—newly occupied by Japan—is crumbling, and her family, led by her stern father, is facing difficulties that seem insurmountable. Narrowly escaping an arranged marriage, Najin takes up a new role as a companion to a young princess. But the king is soon assassinated, and the centuries-old dynastic culture comes to its end. Najin pursues a coveted education and is surprised to find love. After one day of marriage a denied passport separates her from her new husband, who continues alone to America. As a decade passes and the world descends into war, Najin loses touch with her husband. Will the love they share be enough to sustain her through the deprivation her country continues to endure? The Calligrapher's Daughter is a richly drawn novel about a nation torn between ancient customs and modern possibilities, and is a "vivid, heartfelt portrait of faith, love and life for one family during a pivotal time in history."

 Another sad, but well-told story. This poor girl was on a roller coaster of ups and downs.



46. Escape from Mr. Lemoncello's Library...Chris Grabenstien
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Kyle Keeley is the class clown, popular with most kids, (if not the teachers), and an ardent fan of all games: board games, word games, and particularly video games. His hero, Luigi Lemoncello, the most notorious and creative gamemaker in the world, just so happens to be the genius behind the building of the new town library.

Lucky Kyle wins a coveted spot to be one of the first 12 kids in the library for an overnight of fun, food, and lots and lots of games. But when morning comes, the doors remain locked. Kyle and the other winners must solve every clue and every secret puzzle to find the hidden escape route. And the stakes are very high.

In this cross between Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and A Night in the Museum, Agatha Award winner Chris Grabenstein uses rib-tickling humor to create the perfect tale for his quirky characters. Old fans and new readers will become enthralled with the crafty twists and turns of this ultimate library experience.

 Oh, I absolutely loved this one...it was so much fun! It was full of puzzles, riddles, and tons of allusions to other children's books. And it was set in the coolest library to ever exist...what's not to love?!

March ~ 2014

22. Bad Monkey...Carl HiassenQuote

Andrew Yancy—late of the Miami Police and soon-to-be-late of the Monroe County sheriff’s office—has a human arm in his freezer. There’s a logical (Hiaasenian) explanation for that, but not for how and why it parted from its shadowy owner. Yancy thinks the boating-accident/shark-luncheon explanation is full of holes, and if he can prove murder, the sheriff might rescue him from his grisly Health Inspector gig (it’s not called the roach patrol for nothing). But first—this being Hiaasen country—Yancy must negotiate an obstacle course of wildly unpredictable events with a crew of even more wildly unpredictable characters, including his just-ex lover, a hot-blooded fugitive from Kansas; the twitchy widow of the frozen arm; two avariciously optimistic real-estate speculators; the Bahamian voodoo witch known as the Dragon Queen, whose suitors are blinded unto death by her peculiar charms; Yancy’s new true love, a kinky coroner; and the eponymous bad monkey, who with hilarious aplomb earns his place among Carl Hiaasen’s greatest characters.

Here is Hiaasen doing what he does better than anyone else: spinning a tale at once fiercely pointed and wickedly funny in which the greedy, the corrupt, and the degraders of what’s left of pristine Florida—now, of the Bahamas as well—get their comeuppance in mordantly ingenious, diabolically entertaining fashion.

Love, love, love this author!! This one was awesome, as usual!




23. Takedown Twenty...Janet Evanovich
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New Jersey bounty hunter Stephanie Plum knows better than to mess with family. But when powerful mobster Salvatore “Uncle Sunny” Sunucchi goes on the lam in Trenton, it’s up to Stephanie to find him. Uncle Sunny is charged with murder for running over a guy (twice), and nobody wants to turn him in—not his poker buddies, not his bimbo girlfriend, not his two right-hand men, Shorty and Moe. Even Trenton’s hottest cop, Joe Morelli, has skin in the game, because—just Stephanie’s luck—the godfather is his actual godfather. And while Morelli understands that the law is the law, his old-world grandmother, Bella, is doing everything she can to throw Stephanie off the trail.

It’s not just Uncle Sunny giving Stephanie the run-around. Security specialist Ranger needs her help to solve the bizarre death of a top client’s mother, a woman who happened to play bingo with Stephanie’s Grandma Mazur. Before Stephanie knows it, she’s working side by side with Ranger and Grandma at the senior center, trying to catch a killer on the loose—and the bingo balls are not rolling in their favor.

With bullet holes in her car, henchmen on her tail, and a giraffe named Kevin running wild in the streets of Trenton, Stephanie will have to up her game for the ultimate takedown.

Yay...She has finally gotten back into her writing groove! She was stuck in a rut there for a few books, but this one and the last one were great again!



24. Final Jeopardy...Linda Fairstein
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This critically acclaimed, explosive thriller is a book only prosecutor Linda Fairstein could write. Patricia Cornwall knows the morgue; John Grisham knows the courtroom; but no one knows the inner workings of the D.A.'s office like Linda Fairstein, renowned for two decades as head of Manhattan Sex Crimes Unit. Now that world comes vividly to life in a brilliant debut novel of shocking realism, powerful insight, and searing suspense.

Alexandra Cooper, Manhattan's top sex crimes prosecutor, awakens one morning to shoking news: a tabloid headline announcing her own brutal murder. But the actual victim was Isabella Lascar, the Hollywood film star who sought refuge at Alex's Martha's Vineyard retreat. Was Isabella targeted by a stalker or -- mistaken for Alex -- was she in the wrong place at the wrong time? In an investigation that twists from the back alleys of lower Manhattan to the chic salons of the Upper East Side. Alex knows she'sin final jeopardy...and time is running out. She has to get into the killer's head before the killer gets to her. 

Meh. I have a couple more of her books, but am in no hurry to read them. The book wasn't bad, per se, but I have too many other (more interesting) books to get to right now.



25. Strong Curves...Bret Contreras
26. Lacrosse for Dummies...James Hinkson


27. Grits and Grunts: Folkloric Key West...Stetson Kennedy
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Many a book has been written about Key West, but there has never been anything like Stetson Kennedy’s Grits & Grunts, a portrait of the Key West that was. Neither a history (though you will learn a lot about Key West’s unique past) nor a guidebook (though you will learn more about Key West than any guides offer), Grits & Grunts is a treasure trove gleaned from the rich multiculture that came to full-flower on “The Rock” during the first half of the twentieth century, “when Key West was Key West.”

You’ll find an abundant sampling of the inimitable art of Mario Sanchez, whose carved bas-relief paintings of Key West street scenes are in great demand around the world, as well as many never-before-published photographs. The overflowing Key West songbag is also here in all its abundance, from lullabies to traditional ballads, as well as games and folktales.

 I love all the old stories about Key West, plus we collect Mario Sanchez prints, so this book was a fun read for me.

28. An Appetite for Murder...Lucy Burdette
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Hayley Snow's life always revolved around food. But when she applies to be a food critic for a Key West style magazine, she discovers that her new boss would be Kristen Faulkner-the woman Hayley caught in bed with her boyfriend! Hayley thinks things are as bad as they can get-until the police pull her in as a suspect in Kristen's murder. Kristen was killed by a poisoned key lime pie. Now Hayley must find out who used meringue to murder before she takes all the blame.

29. Death in Four Courses...Lucy Burdette
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The annual Key West Loves Literature seminar is drawing the biggest names in food writing from all over the country, and Haley Snow is there to catch a few fresh morsels of insider gossip. Superstar restaurant critic Jonah Barrows has already ruffled a few foodie
feathers with his recent tell-all memoir, and as keynote speaker, he promises more of the same jaw-dropping honesty.

But when Hayley discovers Jonah's body in a nearby dipping pool, the cocktail hour buzz takes a sour turn, and Hayley finds herself at the
center of attention--especially with the police. Now it's up to her to catch the killer before she comes to her own bitter finish.

These were cute and I'll read the next two in the series whenever the library gets them in. The author is also really nice...I met her at an outdoor market here in Key West a couple of weeks ago.



30. Bloody Waters...Carolina Garcia-Aguilera
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Although Garcia-Aguilera, like her sleuth, Guadalupe ("Lupe") Solano, has worked as a Miami PI, her first effort has more melodrama than mystery. Lucia and Jose Moreno were happy when their high-society lawyer arranged a no-questions-asked adoption; but now that their daughter's life depends on a bone-marrow transplant from her birth mother, he's no help. So they've come to Lupe, a Mercedes-driving, Beretta-toting daughter of Miami's Cuban American elite, who taps a wide network of friends and lovers in her effort to find the child's biological mother. She succeeds, but at a price. Not long after Lupe realizes that she's being tailed, a man is killed. Then luck delivers Barbara Perez, a link in the illegal-adoption chain, and Lupe must overcome the woman's hostility and persuade her to undertake a dangerous journey. Lupe and her eccentric family (a bodybuilding cousin; a dad who keeps a boat provisioned for the day when Castro falls; a sister who's a nun) have a charm that bodes well for future outings.

31. Bloody Secrets...Carolina Garcia-Aguilera
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Miami P.I. Lupe Solano has been called "funny, sexy, and Miami-smart" by Nelson DeMille, and "an absolute joy" by The Miami Herald. Now the celebrated sleuth returns. In a sweeping story that takes readers from the last days of Batista's Havana, to the Guantanamo Bay refugee camp, to Miami's high society, Lupe takes the case of a balsero-a refugee who escaped Cuba by raft. Luis is a drifter living in a flophouse, but he claims Miami's most prominent Cuban couple has robbed his family and arranged for his murder. Lupe is instantly drawn to Luis, and his sense of honor. But the case becomes troubling when innocent people are killed and when her feelings for her client become more than professional. A page-turning mystery, a remarkable glimpse into the lives of all strata of Cuban-American society, and a fascinating look into the moral quandaries an investigator faces, Bloody Secrets is Garcia-Aguilera's boldest achievement yet.

32. A Miracle in Paradise...Carolina Garcia-Aguilera
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Smart, savvy Lupe Solano returns for murder, romance and another cafe con leche in the fourth installment of Garc!a-Agu!lera's Miami-based series (Bloody Secrets, etc.). This time it's Lupe's sister Lourdes, who's a nun at the Order of the Holy Rosary, who presents the PI with a troubling mystery. Lourdes's Mother Superior hires Lupe to look into claims that on October 10, Cuban Independence Day, a miracle will take place when the holy statute of the Virgen de la Caridad del Cobre will cry tears over the separation of her people in Cuba and the U.S. Lupe has less than a month to find out who or what is behind this miracle, and if it will indeed take place. Her trusty sidekicks Nestor and Marisol, at first wary of the very notion of questioning the Catholic Church, assist Lupe in the investigation, digging into the suspicious activities of a group of Yugoslavian nuns who are undoubtedly tied into to the miracle. When corpses start turning up, Lupe knows she's involved in dangerous business, but her curiosity impels her to seek the truth. A memorable tale of Cuban-American life, this novel boasts an engaging plot and a fiery heroine armed with sharp insights into Cuban and Catholic ways that will lead readers happily into the sultry heat of Little Havana.

33. Havana Heat...Carolina Garcia-Aguilera
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Lupe Solano is a sexy, scrappy Miami PI whose social status as a daughter of the Cuban-exile aristocracy opens a lot of doors in South Florida. What's behind those doors in Havana Heat include family secrets, tangled political alliances, and the rumored (but undiscovered) final tapestry in the Unicorn series, the Flemish masterpieces bought from a French aristocrat by John D. Rockefeller and given by him to New York's Cloisters Museum, where they draw thousands of admirers annually.
A lavish wedding uniting two members of Cuban-American royalty sets the scene for the secret assignment pressed on Lupe by Lucia Miranda, whose ancestor sailed with Christopher Columbus, got off the boat in Cuba after the last voyage, and supposedly kept his captain's gift from Queen Isabella--the eighth Unicorn tapestry. Lucia wants Lupe to retrieve the tapestry from its hiding place in Havana and smuggle it back to Miami. Since Lupe's already made a specialty of reuniting the stolen or confiscated work of Cuban artists with the rightful owners, and the Unicorn tapestries have a special place in her heart, she agrees to the proposition--much to the dismay of her boyfriend, a sexy Cuban activist lawyer. But there's a backup boy toy waiting in the wings who offers Lupe another job that dovetails neatly with the Unicorn hunt and points her to Havana in her father's luxurious Hatteras yacht.

Love this series! I still have a couple to go and I'm going to check out some of her stand-alones, too.




34. Libriomancer...Jim C. Hines
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Isaac Vainio is a Libriomancer, a member of the secret organization founded five centuries ago by Johannes Gutenberg. Libriomancers are gifted with the ability to magically reach into books and draw forth objects. When Isaac is attacked by vampires that leaked from the pages of books into our world, he barely manages to escape. To his horror he discovers that vampires have been attacking other magic-users as well, and Gutenberg has been kidnapped.

With the help of a motorcycle-riding dryad who packs a pair of oak cudgels, Isaac finds himself hunting the unknown dark power that has been manipulating humans and vampires alike. And his search will uncover dangerous secrets about Libriomancy, Gutenberg, and the history of magic. . . .

This book was great...probably the best I've read in a while! I absolutely loved the ideas and can't wait for the rest of the series.

35. Key West: History of an Island of Dreams...Maureen Ogle
36. A Key West Companion...Christopher Cox

37. 1000 Indian Recipes...Neelam Batra
38. Digestive Health with Real Food...Aglaee Jacob

39. Bitter Sugar...Carolina Garcia-Aguilera
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The dearest friend of Lupe Solana's beloved "Papi," Ramón Suarez was the owner of a prosperous sugar mill back in Cuba until Castro forced him into exile. Now an unnamed Spanish source wants to purchase the confiscated property at a fraction of its true value. Suarez wants the sexy, smart, hot-tempered South Florida P.I. to find out why, but Ramon's lazy, no-good nephew Alexander just wants to take the money and run. Then Alexander is found brutally slain in a sleazy Miami hotel -- his last known visitor, Tío Ramón, accused of murder. Lupe's routine journey down a paper trail now turns into something darker and more twisted, entangling her in a mysterious web of spun sugar and blood that will bring bullets smashing through her window and death to her door.