How am I already at the first Saturday in December?
It’s that point in the year when GoodReads wants to show me what my reading year looked like and I’m seeing ‘Best Books of 2024’ posts and my reaction is “WAIT! I’m not finished yet. I have some great books that I want to get to before the year ends.”
I still have twenty-four reading days left. I’m hoping that mean another ten to twelve books in 2024.
This week, I’ve had a mixed reading week, a good book buying week and I’m excited about my upcoming reads.
I’ve felt a little like Scrooge in my reaction to books this week. I’ve set aside two light novels that were meant to be ‘read-myself-into-the-spirit-of-Christmas’ books but which ended up boring or irritating me and had me muttering “Bah humbug”.
Fortunately, my other books have been very entertaing. I’m having fun reading an Advent Calendar horror novel called ’25 Days’ at a chaprter a day. I’ve posted the first seven days HERE. I’ve also read a good urban fantasy book and an excellent spy thriller.
I was two hours into this ten-hour audiobook when I decided to set it aside. I was listening to a description of Miss Beeton preparing Christmas lunch for her execrable brother and his family at the country pile she, the eldest, did not inherit but is secretly keeping afloat and I realised I was bored.
I knew from the blurb that I was still days away from a dead body being discovered, most of the characters were unpleasant but not unpleasant enough for me to enjoy hating them. I felt as if I was wading through all the small slights and casual abuses that can take the shine off a family Christmas without being engaged by the story or the people.
My full review is HERE
This is my third DI Adams book and they’ve all been fun. Her world is becoming more and more complicated as she encounters different kinds of Folk and magic users. This series isn’t a cozy mystery here’s too much violence for that, but it is an original and fascinating Urban Fantasy. I love that it’s set in Yorkshire, in plaes that I know and that the people, even the non-human people, feel real.
‘Vital LIes‘, turned out to be an even better book than I’d expected at the halfway mark. It has everything I want from a spy thriller; intrigue, betrayal, plot twists, dark histories and lots of edge-of-the-seat action. On top of that it has a fascinating main character. I met Sentro, a private security specialist with memory problems caused by repeated concussions, when she was caught up with pirates on container ship in ‘Water Memory‘.
In ‘Vital Lies’, she’s retired is trying to build a life with her daughter on a New Mexico ranch when her past catches up with her and endagers both of them. This was a well-told story that suceeded in making the mother-daughter relationship as central and as compelling as the complicated spy plot.
‘Happy Bloody Christmas‘ was my second attempt at a Christmas read. It was even more unsuccessful than reading ‘Miss Beeton’s Murder Agency‘. I only made it through 12% of the book before I was certain that it wasn’t for me and set it aside. The main character was hard to believe in. Some of her observations were astute and her humour was clever but most of the time she seemed to think and speak like a child. The humour was too laboured. The plot was too silly. The people were too hard to like.
For the second week running, i’ve added five books to my TBR. In my defence, one of them was almost free and one of them was a book my wife chose. That being said, I’m pleased with my purchases.
Suspicious deaths on the Skipton city council don’t sound as though they should have anything at all to do with the Toot Hansell Women’s Institute, and DI Adams would rather like to keep it that way. But when the councillor for Toot Hansell becomes the latest victim, Alice Martin, chair of the W.I. and RAF Wing Commander (ret.), steps straight in to take his place.
Before DI Adams can so much as say lemon drizzle cake the ladies of the Women’s Institute are lurking around farmyards in the company of dragons, farmers are vanishing, the invisible dog’s developed a caffeine dependence, and Alice is already in as deep as she can get. In deep, and facing a killer that seems to know far too much about her. Enough, perhaps, to turn the tables….
‘Game Of Scones’ (2020) is the fourth Beaufort Scales book about the Clovely Dragons, the Toot Hansell WI and DI Adams, following ‘Baking Bad‘, ‘Yule Be Sorry‘ and ‘Manor Of Life And Death‘. I’m expecting another gentle, mildly amusing cosy mystery with dragons.
Gourmet cook Manako Kajii sits in Tokyo Detention Centre convicted of the serial murders of lonely businessmen, who she is said to have seduced with her delicious home cooking. The case has captured the nation’s imagination but Kajii refuses to speak with the press, entertaining no visitors. That is, until journalist Rika Machida writes a letter asking for her recipe for beef stew and Kajii can’t resist writing back.
Rika, the only woman in her news office, works late each night, rarely cooking more than ramen. As the visits unfold between her and the steely Kajii, they are closer to a masterclass in food than journalistic research. Rika hopes this gastronomic exchange will help her soften Kajii but it seems that she might be the one changing. With each meal she eats, something is awakening in her body, might she and Kaji have more in common than she once thought?
Inspired by the real case of the convicted con woman and serial killer, “The Konkatsu Killer”, Asako Yuzuki’s Butter is a vivid, unsettling exploration of misogyny, obsession, romance and the transgressive pleasures of food in Japan.
‘Butter’ (2024) won the 2024 Waterstones Book Of The Year. It was my wife’s choice. I find the premise intriguing but I’m a bit intimidated by the length of the novel (the audiobook runs for over seventeen hours).
Sisters Nadia and Cass Brenner are heirs to Ocean House, a decades-old empire that builds superyachts for the rich and powerful: emirs, oligarchs, and titans of industry throughout America and Europe. They’re a next-generation success with the design of their soon-to-be-commissioned megayacht for a Chinese billionaire. But the sisters’ entrée into the coveted Asian market is tragically cut short when Cass falls from a fortieth-floor hotel balcony.
A Singapore detective rules suicide. Nadia’s been in the yacht business too long not to be suspicious. Especially when she discovers Cass’s involvement in dangerously illicit activities. Pulled into the same web of betrayal, lies, and secrets that trapped her sister, Nadia is on the most perilous mission of her life. Because uncovering the truth behind her sister’s death could tear the Brenner family apart—and it just might get her killed.
From Seattle to Austria to the South China Sea, Nadia must hold on to the one thing that can keep her safe. It’s the Brenner family motto: Trust no one.
‘The Drowning Game‘ (2024) is an Amazon ‘First Reads’ book, scheduled for release in January but available this month from Amazon for £0.99. I picked it up because I’ve enjoyed two other series by Barbara Nickless, ‘Blood On The Tracks‘ featuring railway investigator Sydney Rose Parnell and ‘At First LIght‘ featuring Dr Evan Wilding, forensic semiotician. I’m hoping ‘The Drowning Game‘ will be another well-researched, engaging thriller.
WSome said it was tragic, what happened to the Van Laars.
Some said the family deserved it. That they never even thanked the searchers who stayed out for five nights in the freezing forest trying to help find their missing son.
Some said there was a reason it took the family so long to call for help. That they knew what happened to the boy.
Now, fifteen years later, the Van Laars’ teenage daughter has gone missing in the same wilderness as her brother. Some say the two disappearances aren’t connected.
Some say they are.
I picked up ‘God Of The Woods’ (2024) because I’d enjoyed two of Liz Moore’s previous books ‘Heft‘ and ‘The Unseen World‘. They were both original and beautifully written but had nothing else in common. Shortly after I bought it, ‘God Of The Woods‘ won the GoodReads Readers’ Favorite Mystery & Thriller (2024) so I’m hoping it will be another stand-out book.
CIA assassin Fortune Redding is about to undertake her most difficult mission ever – in Sinful, Louisiana. With a leak at the CIA and a price placed on her head by one of the world’s largest arms dealers, Fortune has to go off-grid, but she never expected to be this far out of her element. Posing as a former beauty queen turned librarian in a small bayou town seems worse than death to Fortune, but she’s determined to fly below the radar until her boss finds the leak and puts the arms dealer out of play.
Unfortunately, she hasn’t even unpacked a suitcase before her newly inherited dog digs up a human bone in her backyard. Thrust into the middle of a bayou murder mystery, Fortune teams up with a couple of seemingly sweet old ladies whose looks completely belie their hold on the little town. To top things off, the handsome local deputy is asking her too many questions. If she’s not careful, this investigation might blow her cover and get her killed. Armed with her considerable skills and a group of elderly ladies the locals dub the Geritol Mafia, Fortune has no choice but to solve the murder before it’s too late.
‘Louisiana Longshot‘ (2012) is a roll of the dice for me. It’s a comedy with a quirky premise and lots of old people. If I like it, then there are another twenty-seven books in the series that might entertain me.
Next week’s reading has two more books with Christmas settings. Both involve murders. The third book is a cozy mystery with two amateur sleuths, one of whom is dead.
In the picturesque village of Kibblesworth, DI Tom Stonem is dreaming of a quiet Christmas alone.
But in the shadow of the Angel of the North, a body lies waiting. The dead man is posed with a child’s Christmas list in his pocket, and the first mysterious item – 1. No angel – is crossed off.
When a second body is found – a woman, stabbed in the abdomen after her work Christmas do – Stonem is convinced there’s a grim connection between the crime scenes and the seemingly innocent list. 2. Red partee dress. Could this be a murderer’s twisted code?
As a blizzard rages in the Tyne & Wear countryside, the body count is snowballing. Can Stonem stop the killer before they get everyone on their Christmas list?
‘The Killer’s Christmas List‘ (2024) was promoted as an ‘anti-cosy’ Christmas story. I’m looking forward to finding out what that means. Although this is the first book by Chris Frost, it’s not a debut novel as, writing as Chris McDonald, the author has already published ten crime novels.
Ruby Young’s new Boston apartment comes with all the usual perks. Windows facing the brick wall of the next-door building. Heat that barely works. A malfunctioning buzzer. Noisy neighbors. A dead body on the sidewalk outside. And of course, a ghost.
Since Cordelia Graves died in her apartment a few months ago, she’s kept up her residency, despite being bored out of her (non-tangible) skull and frustrated by her new roommate. When her across-the-hall neighbor, Jake Macintyre, is shot and killed in an apparent mugging gone wrong outside their building, Cordelia is convinced there’s more to it and is determined to bring his killer to justice.
Unfortunately, Cordelia, being dead herself, can’t solve the mystery alone. She has to enlist the help of the obnoxiously perky, living tenant of her apartment. Ruby is twenty, annoying, and has never met a houseplant she couldn’t kill. But she also can do everything Cordelia can’t, from interviewing suspects to researching Jake on the library computers that go up in a puff of smoke if Cordelia gets too close. As the roommates form an unlikely friendship and get closer to the truth about Jake’s death, they also start to uncover other dangerous secrets.
‘A New Lease On Death‘ (2024) is a new release kicking off a supernatural mystery series. This is a roll of the dice. I’m hoping that it won’t be too cute, that the humour will work and that the mystery will have legs.
On a freezing Christmas Eve in 1879, a forensic psychic reader is summoned from her Baker Street lodgings to the scene of a questionable death. Alexandrina Victoria Pendlebury (named after her godmother, the current Queen of England) is adamant that the death in question is a magically compromised murder and not a suicide, as the police had assumed, after the shocking revelation contained by the body in question, Alex must put her personal loss aside to uncover the deeper issues at stake, before more bodies turn up.
Turning to some choice allies—the handsome, prescient Lieutenant Brooks, the brilliant, enigmatic Lord Desmond, and her rapscallion cousin James—Alex will have to marshal all of her magical and mental acumen to save Queen and Country from a shadowy threat. Our singular heroine is caught up in this rousing gaslamp adventure of cloaked assassins, meddlesome family, and dark magic.
I’ve had ‘The Hanged Man‘ (2015) in my TBR pile since 2018. As it’s set at Christmas (albeit in an alternative Victorian London) now seems like the perfect time to dust it off. It’s listed as the first book in the Her Majesty’s Psychic Service series but I haven’t been able to find any further books in the series. Most of the author’s books have vampires as their heroes so it sounds like this was a departure for her. I’m hoping it will be a seasonal smile,
Mike Finn's Fiction 