Broken Promise – Linwood Barclay

Broken Promise – Linwood Barclay (Promise Falls #1)   In Broken Promise, the latest from Linwood Barclay, the author returns to the town of Promise Falls, New York and pens another terrific thriller. Promise Falls was the setting for two of Barclay’s previous books, Never Look Away and Too Close to Home. Many familiar character populate Broken Promise including: Police Detective Barry Duckworth, Landscaper Eddie Cutter and his son Derek and the main protagonist David Harwood. Harwood and his family wife Jan and son Ethan were the main characters in Never Look Away. Broken Promise picks up David’s life several…

Continue reading

The Shining Girls – Lauren Beukes

The Shining Girls Didn’t Shine for me! (Book 39 for 2015) So – have you ever zipped through a book, enjoyed it, and yet felt that you never really connected with the book? That may be the best way to describe how I feel about The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes. It obviously wasn’t how Tana French felt about the book, on the cover of the book French’s quote reads….. “Utterly original, beautifully written, and I  must say, it creeped the holy bejesus out of me. This is something special”  I originally discovered this book in a post titled 10 Novels…

Continue reading

Reading Challenges – Late September Update

 Reading Challenges Three Books Finished in September – Thirty-Eight for 2015! This afternoon I finished John Scalzi’s The Last Colony It is the third book that I have read in September and the 38th book finished in 2015. The other two books finished this month are Better Than Before from Gretchen Rubin and Robert Ludlum‘s The Matarese Circle. I had planned to read both The Last Colony and Better Than Before. The two other books that I had planned to read for my reading challenges were Mayhem a historical fiction read and The Lost Triumph a nonfiction read about the Battle of Gettysburg.  While…

Continue reading

The Matarese Countdown – Robert Ludlum

The Matarese Countdown a Return to the Works of Robert Ludlum   I finished The Matarese Countdown (Book Number 37 for 2015) yesterday and it was another good read from one of the masters of the thriller genre Robert Ludlum. The book was one of the last books written by Ludlum, before his death in 2001. Through the 1990s my reading changed from reading political thrillers to mostly mystery series, but  during the 1980s Robert Ludlum’s novels were mainstays of my reading. They were always were thrilling reads, as typically, either one person or a small group of people was out…

Continue reading

B.B. King – Blues Icon – Born September 16, 1925

B.B. King – Blues -Born near the town of Itta Bena, Mississippi (September 16, 1925 – May 14, 2015) Back in May of this year the music world lost the legendary blues boy Riley B.B. King at the age of 89. Today September 16th, B B King would have turned 90! An autopsy performed on the musician, because two of his daughters alleged that he had been poisoned, revealed that King had died of complications of Alzheimer’s disease and congestive heart failure, with no evidence of poisoning. The following was posted last year at Me, Myself, Music and Mysteries…..  …

Continue reading

Renaissance Granddad’s Favorite Books of the 70s!

An AARP Post leads to a list of My Favorite Books from the 1970s!   This morning my wife said “you’re old. please join AARP so we can at least derive some benefits from you ancientness!” Actually, she didn’t say that, but she did ask me to join AARP so that we can hopefully get a discount on our Ancestry.com renewal! While I was on the site registering and paying the whole $16.00 a year membership this post Readers’ Picks: 10 Books Boomers Love caught my attention.These are the books that the readers picked: 10 The World According to Garp – John Irving…

Continue reading

Badlands – C.J. Box

Badlands – C.J. Box – Cassie Dewell Book #2   After finishing Windigo Island, I read Badlands from C.J,Box. Box is the author of the Joe Pickett series, another of my favorite series.During his career Box has written several outstanding standalone thrillers A while back The Highway one of the standalones features Detectives Cody Hoyt and Cassie Dewell. and a terrific villain the Lizard King, A long-distance trucker who preys on the women who service long distance truckers a rest stops along the nation’s highway. The women are known as “lot lizards”. Badlands is book two in the Cassie Dewell…

Continue reading

Windigo Island – William Kent Krueger

Windigo Island-  William Kent Krueger – (Cork O’Connor # 14)   I started reading the Cork O’Connor series from William Kent Krueger back in 2003 when I picked up Purgatory Ridge, Book #3 in the series, at the library. After finishing the book I quickly sought out the first two books in the series and have not missed a book since!! Cork O’ Connor is the former sheriff of Tamarack County, Minnesota, he is part Ojibwe and Irish. He is also the father of Jennie, Annie and Stephen O’Connor and is constantly battling evil in the County and beyond. Cork…

Continue reading

Alex – Pierre Lemaitre – As good as it gets!

Alex – Pierre Lemaitre – Commandant Camille Verhoeven (Book # 2)         Several weeks ago, when I was in the library I saw an interesting book titled Camille, by a French author Pierre Lemaitre it is the third book in  a series that features Commandant Camille Verhoeven. At the time I didn’t know that, but I did see that the Camille was the sequel to Alex, so I requested  Alex thinking that I was starting at the beginning of the series. Wrong – Alex was actually the first of the three books to be translated and released in the US, but…

Continue reading

The Highway – C.J.Box Another Winner from Box!

C.J. Box – The Highway -Cody Hoyt #2 – Cassie Dewell #1   Last week I saw that C.J.Box would be releasing a new box on the 28th of this month titled Badlands. The book is the sequel to his release The Highway. Now I am a fan of C.J Box’s work and have read all but one of one of the Joe Pickett novels  and why I never finished Cold Wind, I really can’t say, but I have stayed away from The Highway. Why? Again, I can’t say, But with the second book of this Cassie Dewell series coming out,…

Continue reading