Ruby in the Smoke

Phillip Pullman's Ruby in the Smoke is an exciting adventure and mystery story geared toward a young adult audience. Sally Lockhart has just lost her father at sea. But she recieves an unusual note and when she goes to his partners to ask about it, one of them drops dead, and she manages to set in motion a ripple in sea of conspiracy. Sally is not your average heroine, she has pluck and her father raised her more like a boy than girl. She starts to investigate these questions and accuires along the way some trustworthy friends and pals.

What really happened when her father died? Did it have anything to do with the nightmare she has been having since she was a little girl? How does the opium trade play a role in this? And who is the puppet master controlling things behind the scenes?

Pullman takes the reader on quite a roller coaster ride and provides a unique view of the grittier side of Victorian England. A fun thrilling mystery. I look forward to reading the sequels.

Papercrafts and Murder

One doesn't often think of home-made card making and murder. It is a rather odd combination. But Elizabeth Bright's mystery series featuring Jennifer Shane and her shop, Custom Card Creations, manages to combine the two rather well.

Jennifer is trying to make a go of her small business in a tourist town. She realizes it will be a struggle (thank goodness - a realistic craft mystery series!), since she has previously worked for her sister's scrapbook store. Rebel Forge, Virginia is a tiny town filled with family and friends. When a murder happens - it is usually someone Jennifer knows. Her brother, the sheriff, wants to keep her out of trouble, but her aunt, sister and her own curiosity keep dragging her in.

Jennifer is a humorous heroine and appealing character. I enjoyed her family - especially her frequently married and divorced aunt. We want her to succeed - in her shop and solving her mystery. I think the creepiest scenario was the one where she received a homemade card from her customer who had just died - telling Jennifer that she - the deceased - had been murdered.

There are only three books in the series so far, and maybe that is all there ever will be. I often wonder how appealing these craft centered stories are to people who are not interested in the craft! But this series is a good read for gloomy fall day. Enjoy.

The books are: Invitation to Murder, Deadly Greetings, Murder and Salutations.

The Irish Lass in New York City

Molly Murphy is inquisitive, eager to learn, smart, and doesn't take no for an answer. She also challenges the status quo. And she is a bit independent and stubborn. Sounds like a with-it kind of gal for today's society? She might fit right in. But she is a character in Rhys Bowen's historical mysteries set in 1900's New York City.

She was supposed to back on the farm in Ireland taking care of her brothers. But through a series of dramatic events, she finds herself trying to leave the country and does it with the help of a dying woman who wants to send her children to their father in America. But before she makes it into the country, a murder occurs that may revel her past. And that is where the series starts.

The books are: Murphy's Law, Death of Riley, For the Love of Mike, In Like Flynn, Oh Danny Boy, In Dublin’s Fair City, Tell Me Pretty Maiden.

Rhys Bowen has a winner in her hand with these tales. Bowen has them tightly plotted - each book follows directly after the next and she leaves you wondering just how Molly is going to solve her crime, pay her rent, and who she will run into next in the wilds of New York City's neighborhoods. Along the way she makes friends, enemies and glimpses some important historical figures of her day. Bowen gives a great look into the immigrant experience and the growth of the Irish in New York. I can't wait until the next one comes out. A very good read.

Murder Most Crafty

What can you say about a collection of mystery short stories that have titles like - "Collage to Kill For" (Susan Wittig Albert) or "Oh, What a Tangled Lanyard We Weave" (Parnell Hall)? Murder Most Crafty, edited by Maggie Bruce, is a fun, quirky book. I think you have to like crafts or be a crafter to understand some of the humor in this collection. And yes, crafting can be dangerous - there are dead bodies all over the place.

Some lines from one of my favorite stories - "Call it Macaroni" by Jan Burke

"I don't have anything against the Crafty Fox itself. I am not immune to its charms. When we walked in, I gazed about me in wonder: here were gimcracks and gewgaws out the yingyang.

I was in the modern equivalent of the medieval woman's witch hut: everything for anything, and the knowledge that men didn't really approve of it. For the modern woman, it was a combination toy store, hardware store, and magic shop."

"The spell? It makes this say this to yourself. "I have the time, patience and skill to complete any project. The process will be fun and frustration-free. Friends, neighbors and total strangers who encounter the discreetly placed finished masterpiece in our home will eye it covetously and ask "Where did you buy this?" They will be amazed when I answer, 'I made
it.' "

I nearly fell out of bed laughing at that one. Maybe you had to be there. Read the book. It is fun and frothy and maybe you will discover a new author to boot.

State of the Onion

State of the Onion by Julie Hyzy is the first book in her new series about a White House assistant chef named Olivia Paras. Our Olivia is a modern gal. She's just walking with her shopping on the White House lawn when there is an incident - a man is evading the Secret Service. As she takes cover, she is a bit disconcerted to realize that he is coming her way. And she tries to help out. She hits him with her shopping - which just happens to be a engraved frying pan for the head chef who is retiring. Well, that gets her into all sorts of trouble. The frying pan gets confiscated and she is warned that the guy she just pummeled is a known assassin. But he is trying to tell her something about someone shooting the president...

After being warned off the situation, it keeps festering in the back of her mind. She's no fool. She realizes it did not make the news the way it really happened. Who is this guy? And why does he know the agents personally? And in the meantime, she is trying to help prepare for various important state dinners, trying out for the job opening of head chef and dealing with her boyfriend who does not want to talk about the event. What's a smart gal going to do? Turn to the Internet! There she finds out more about what is going on...

Olivia is a great character - she's smart, personable and ambitious in her field. It is refreshing to have a lead character that is no simpering miss, and takes control of the investigation - at least the parts she can control. The level of detail that Hyzy provides about the White House kitchens is excellent and adds to the fun. No worry about partisanship here - her president is made up!
A wonderful debut. I am eagerly awaiting the next installment! A fun read.

Murder is Binding

As a bibliophile, wouldn't it be fun to go to a town that is full of bookstores? One book store has cookbooks? The other has mysteries, another is filled with tomes crammed with history. Welcome to Stoneham, New Hampshire! This imaginary town decided to revitalize it's old downtown, by inviting booksellers to come and help create a tourist attraction. So the town is filled with new folks, tourists, and long time residents. Not always a happy combination. But when the owner of the cook book store is found dead and her rarest cookbook is gone, and Tricia, the mystery store owner, is suspected... Tricia decides to get to the bottom of this.

Lorna Barrett's Murder is Binding is a great start for a mystery series. Barrett has constructed some welcoming characters and eccentric ones too. My particular favorite is the older gentleman customer who is there when the mystery store opens until it closes for the day. Tricia eventually ends up hiring him since he knows so much about the books in stock.

Tricia is a enjoyable character who deals with murder, running her store, and the invasion of her out of town , trying to be helpful sister, with class and style. A bit of wine at the end of the day helps, too. One can also learn a bit about antique books. A fun read. I'm looking forward to the sequel.

The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: Adventures in the World Of Chinese Food

The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: Adventures in the World Of Chinese Food by Jennifer 8. Lee is a whirlwind trip into Chinese American cuisine. The fortune cookie is an American made phenomena, but does it have an ancestry in the food culture it helped popularize? That is the start of Lee's quest and she takes the reader all over the world in search of answers.

As an American -born Chinese, she takes us in the history of the Chinese food in America and elsewhere. Chinese food is served in all seven continents - including Antarctica. (And she takes us to some of the most well known of the overseas restaurants. The irony is that most of them have"American style" food!) It is a story of Chinese immigration and adaptation.

Just who first made chop seuy anyway - and just who is this General Tso and his chicken? (This dish really sounds like just a variation of sesame chicken to me!) And what happens when hundreds of people use the same numbers from their fortune cookie to play the lottery? Read and find out.

Lee's book is well written and thoughtful. She provides us with a glimpse of the Chinese American experience. I'm just glad she let us all come along for the ride. A must read for anyone who loves their local Chinese takeout. Well written and a lot of fun. And yes, it will make you hungry.

My Gosh! Summer is Over! The Past 6 Months with Harry

Yes - August has zipped by us and I have read a bunch of stuff - but I am backed up on the posting! YIKES!

One thing I did these last six months and just finished in early August - was a re-read/re-listen project. I re-listened to ALL of the Harry Potter books on audio book. Yep. It took awhile - since I have an okay commute - but not a super long one (thank goodness!) But the experience was worth the time. And Jim Dale does a fantastic job with the many voices. I delved in to sections I did not remember with clarity. I discovered clues and foreshadowing that Rowling carefully plotted and planned. And discovered some red herrings along the way.

Was it worth it? Oh, yes! Will I do it again? Someday. But I got my self ready and raring to go to Terminus, a Harry Potter conference held in Chicago. It was great fun to talk about these great stories with a bunch of fellow fans. We put the fan in fanatic - don't ya know!

What's the next long term project? I'll let you know when I do - but on to more reviewing.

Forecast

If you have a talent such as being able to predict the weather, what do you do with it? Become a local "character" in your New York neighborhood? Or become a weather person on TV? Rowie Shakespeare isn't sure if she wants to continue in her family's New Age store called Second Sight. Being from a family of psychics has it's problems for time to time, but Rowie gets her chance on TV - when the regular weatherman Drew is sidelined with an injury.

Jane Tara's book Forecast is a frothy good time. With a family of psychics unsure of themselves, their squabbles and expectations, and with a new romance interest that just happens to be the man whose job she took, Rowie's not sure what to do. She can find lost children but can she find out what she wants to do in life? And is Drew a part of that life? A fun, frothy read.

The Art of the Re-Read part 1

I met a library land big-wig a few weeks ago. I had the pleasure of eating dinner with her. And I was thrilled to bits, when I heard her say she likes to re-read books! So do I!

Why you might ask?

Depends on the situation. Sometimes it is because there is nothing else around that suites your fancy. Maybe you are trying to remember a certain passage, plot line or fascinating character? Or perhaps they are your version of book "comfort food". They have a good story. You like the characters -they make you laugh. It is written well. And it reminds you as you read them, that in the chaos of a bad week in your own life, that it will be okay, and everything will be alright in the end.

More on this topic later...

The Blossom Street series

In this series of books, author Debbie Macomber manages to take simple stories about the intersecting lives of women and bring life, enthusiasm and warmth to some great characters. It sounds like it should be easy - but it is never easy creating characters that in the end the reader wants to chat and visit with -long after the story is over.

Her first book, The Shop on Blossom Street, starts with Lidia who is the owner of A Good Yarn knit shop. Lidia is trying to keep her newly opened store running. She is trying to set up a series of classes to bring more people into the store. Her students have had varied lives. Jacqueline is a bored older woman who is convinced her husband is cheating on her. Carol is happily married but is trying to start a family but with only painful results. And Alix is the younger one who has been reared by the school of hard knocks, and whose tough outer shell protects a creative woman inside.

The next book is entitled A Good Yarn. Lidia has started a relationship - but she is scared it will end like all the others. Her new batch of students are: Elise, an retired, older divorced woman who is not so pleased to have her ex-husband come into her ordered life; Bethanne is a mother with teenagers, who is going through the fallout of a divorce; and Courtney, a teenager, has just moved to the area to stay with her grandmother who has signed her up for the class.

Will Lidia make a success of the shop? Will the others meet their goals, and deal with the surprises - both good and bad - that happen in their lives? Macomber does deal with their disappointments and set backs. That is one of her talents in making these characters seems real. They could be the gal down the street or your mother's best friend. She also brings a nice inter generational theme to most of the stories. It continues to give you the feeling that you could be a part of this group of women. Macomber manages to combine their lives and twisting story lines to provide satisfying good reads. Try them. But I warn you - they might give you a craving to knit!

The Perfect Kiss

Characters either grab you or they don't. Plots either intrigue you or disappoint you. People may say that genre books are the same story again over and over. They aren't really. There are little differences in the writing, in the character, in the settings that blend together and make a book a bit more magical than you may have originally thought.

Anne Gracie's The Perfect Kiss is one of those books that surprises. Grace is set on having an adventure. She finally has inherited the money, worn down her relatives' objections and is planning to travel to Egypt. But first she is going to do a favor for a timid friend. Grace is going to help Melly on her journey to meet her fiance. Grace will be disguised as her chaperone and keep an eye on her. But Dominic Wolfe is not what he seems either. He may have inherited the title, but grew up overseas since his mother was separated from his father. He doesn't seem that interested in a previously arranged married. But he does notice the sassy chaperone who keeps trying to organize the disheveled household. Who is this woman who keeps trying to set things right? And why do the villagers think she is the harbinger of prosperity for the estate?

Grace is just trying to get things settled so she can leave on her trip, but Dominic keeps questioning her efforts and it is getting rather hard for her to keep from taking charge of the household. As she gets to know him, she realizes she needs to leave because she is in love with him. And she can't hurt Melly's chances for a marriage.

And that is where things get a little different. A bit of the Far East, a pinch of quirky characters, and a pair of lead characters that don't want to be ordinary. Come join in the experience. A fun and frothy read.

Death Dines In

Death Dines In, edited by Claudia Bishop and Dean James, is a collection of mystery short stories. Short stories are excellent for giving the reader a taste of an author's style or a glimpse of their latest main character. This anthology happens to focus on food. Each story takes that into consideration. And yes, there are a lot of people keeling over at the table - so this might not be the book that you read at lunch time.

Some highlights - Elixabeth Fowell's story of Alice Roosevelt Longworth's detecting and meddling at an elegant dinner party. (Too bad this is not a series.) Claudia Bishop's tale of a bad dinner at the Inn with the slightly eccentric Dr. and Mrs. Mackenzie. Carole Nelson Douglas' story of how Midnight Louie (the cat) dealt with a dangerous gourmet dinner. An introduction - (for me) of Rhys Bowen's Molly Murphy character, an Irish immigrant who hasn't been in America that long. And Parnell Hall's Puzzle Lady who really doesn't want to give a speech at the luncheon but combines it with solving a murder instead.

A great collection of stories - some a bit creepier than others. It makes one consider the phrase "watch what you eat" in a whole new way. A fun read.

Summer and the Reading is Easy - Part 1

He is a chef. She is a chef. He cooks Italian - continuing the family tradition. She trained in France and is ready to accomplish her dream of opening her own bistro. Anthony's restaurant is a staple of their Brooklyn neighborhood. Who is this French upstart anyway? Vivi thinks he's arrogant, and his flavors are off. Who is he to tell her how to cook? She's come to America to make a new life for herself. It may sound at first, like a superficial story, but Deirdre Martin's writing skill and style makes her book Just A Taste, go down nice and easy.

Anthony is pleased to have met a fellow chef who shares his passion for food. He's a widower and his large well meaning family is trying to get his life in order for him. He disagrees with Vivi on her recipes, but understands her drive to get her own place open. Vivi thinks he is handsome, but really has to concentrate on opening her restaurant and getting her chief investor - her half-sister to come through with the promised money. But when they get together - whether it be to complete in a cooking contest, or to compare contractors - sparks happen.

Martin does a great job making these characters seem as if they are part of your family. Her secondary characters grow and change in the story and the secondary storyline about teaching Anthony's little nephew how to cook is great. Vivi and Anthony are not "perfect" and that makes them and their situation more enjoyable and believable. Nice and frothy. A great summer read. Enjoy.