November and December 2020 Reads

Nov	89	Hunted	Arne Dahl
	90	The Last Scoop	R. G. Belsky
	91	From the Ashes	Jesse Thistle
	92	The Kingdom	Jo Nesbo
	93	The Law of Innocence	Michael Connelly
	94	Winter Counts	David Heska Wanbli Weiden
Dec	95	Shuggie Bain	Douglas Stuart
	96	The Purity of Vengeance	Jussi Adler-Olsen
	97	The Marco Effect	Jussi Adler-Olsen
	98	Burnt Sugar	Avni Doshi
	99	Big Sky	Kate Atkinson
	100	The Heat Wave	Kate Riordan
	101	The Phone Booth at the Edge of the World	Laura Imai Messina
	102	Dogs of Winter	Kem Nunn

This miserable year ended great, reading-wise.  I found a "new to me" author, Jussi Adler-Olsen.  He writes a Danish detective series.  The two books I read were outstanding and I've ordered the rest of the series.  Expect to hear me rave about the series in 2021.  

Two of these books are must-reads, Shuggie Bain and The Phone Booth at the Edge of the World.  Be sure to put them on your reading list.  Suggie Bain won the Booker Prize.  Frequently I'm not impressed with the winners, but this time I whole-heartedly agree.

I also really enjoyed Winter Counts and Dogs of Winter.  Winter Counts is about modern Native American life and Dogs of Winter is about the California surf culture.  Both good reads.

What are you reading?

September and October 2020 Reads

More great books for these two months.  The best reads were by Nesbo, Le Carre, Enger, Penny, Backman, Donoghue, Butcher, and Dahl   They are great authors and never disappoint.

What are you reading?

July and August 2020 Reads

I've really fallen behind keeping up with this blog.  I've decided to do 2-month reports, in order to catch up.  June and July were great months for reading.  There's not one bad book on this list.  I started reading Ake Edwarson's Swedish police procedurals, and they're the best.  Also, you can never go wrong with Connelly, Winslow, Butcher, or Nesbo.

What are you reading?

June 2020 Reads

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June	42	Olive The Lionhearted	Brad Ricca
	43	Frozen Tracks	Ake Edwardson
	44	Bear Necessity	James Gould-Bourn
	45	Wanderers	Chuck Wendig
	46	Death Angels	Ake Edwardson
	47	Pretty Things	Janell Brown
	48	Even the Dogs	Jon McGregor
	49	Bikeman	Thomas F. Flynn

 

There are two books on this list that I don't recommend, Pretty Things and Even the Dogs.  The rest were great. 

Olive the Lionhearted is a great biography.   It reads like a novel, which makes it an easy read.

Two more Inspector Winter novels by Edwardson.  I've been sparsing them out because I don't want the series to end.  I think there's two or three more.

Bear Necessity is a delightful debut will be published in August, keep your eyes open for it. It's filled with delightful characters and it's heartwarming and uplifting - what we all need.

Wanderers is a humdinger of a book! Not my usual read, it's sci-fi, and at almost 800 pages, it was very long, plus there was a pandemic! The writing was sharp and the storytelling was tight. It was hard to put down

Bikeman ~ I read this epic poem in 2008, when it was first published. Then, I thought it was the best thing written about 9/11, and I still agree.  I intend to re-read it more often, even if my heart breaks every time. 

What are you reading?

May 2020 Reads

Another great month for reading.

May	34	Crazy Rich Asians	Kevin Kwan
	35	The Summer Book	Tove Jansson
	36	An American Spy	Olen Steinhauer
	37	Paris Never Leaves You	Ellen Feldman
	38	The Last Tourist	Olen Steinhauer
	39	Odd Partners	Anne Perry, editor
	40	Sun and Shadow	Ake Edwardson
	41	Never End	Ake Edwardson

Alright!  This month is different, I'm not going to do mini-reviews, I'm just going to tell you all these books were wonderful, except Crazy Rich Asians.  Read them all, with that one exception!

What are you reading?

April 2020 Reads

April	25	The Dreamers	Karen Thompson Walker
	26	Stateway's Garden	Jasmon Drain
	27	The Yellow Bird Sings	Jennifer Rosner
	28	The Tourist	Olen Steinhauer
	29	Poems To See By	Julian Peters
	30	Frying Plantain	Zalika Reid-Denta
	31	Nearest Exit	Olen Steinhauer
	32	Sing to It	Amy Hemple
	33	Savage Son	Jack Carr

The quarantine and "stay-at-home" orders didn't really affect me.  My reading didn't increase because I read at night and sew/quilt during the day.

Stateway's Garden by Jasmon Drain is brilliant.  It reads like a memoir; it's a series of stories telling about life for children in the projects in Chicago.  They deal with crushing poverty, violence, and crime.  This is their world and Drain is a great writer.

The Yellow Bird Sings is a fabulous debut novel about the unbreakable bond between a mother and a daughter.  They are hiding from the Nazis during WWII.  Read it!

This month I started a spy series.  The Tourist is the first of the Milo Weaver novels.  It was great and I'm going to read them all.  Olen Steinhauer has some stand-alone novels, and that's how I became hooked on his writing.  All the Old Knives was a favorite, and The Tourist is just as good.

Poetry isn't high on my list, but I did enjoy Poems To See By. Peters has illustrated classic poems, manga-style.  It's like reading a poem in the Sunday Funnies!

It's no secret that I really enjoy a good spy/thriller, and Savage Son fits the bill.  It's the 3rd in the Terminal List series.

What are you reading?

March 2020 Reads

16	When Will There Be Good News?	Kate Atkinson
17	One Minute Out	Mark Greaney
18	A Good Girl's Guide to Murder	Holly Jackson
19	The Field Guide to the North American Teenager	Ken Philippe
20	The Night Swimmers	Peter Rock
21	Bones Never Lie	Kathy Reichs
22	The Dime	Kathleen Kent
23	That Left Turn At Albuquerque	Scott Phillips
24	Europa Blues	Arne Dahl

Another good month for reading.  When I read anything by Kate Atkinson, Mark Greaney Kathy Reichs or Arne Dahl, and I'm a happy camper.

A Good Girl's Guide to Murder is a murder mystery full of twists and turns and with an ending you'll never expect.  I really enjoyed it.

The Field Guide to the North American Teenager, is a wonderful YA novel.

The Dime is a gritty crime novel.  It's also a debut novel.  I liked enough to order the 2nd in this series.

What are you reading?

February 2020 Reads

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7	Canyon Dreams	Micheal Powell
8	The Paris Library	Janet Skeslien Charles
9	When We Were Vikings	Andrew David MacDonald
10	Out of the Dark	Gregg Hurwitz
11	Murder in Saint-Germain	Cara Black
12	Into the Fire	Gregg Hurwitz
13	To The Top of The Mountain	Arne Dahl
14	The Blinded Man	Arne Dahl
15	Bad Blood	Arne Dahl

I loved reading Canyon Dreams!  It's a moving story about a basketball team on a Navajo reservation that shows how important sports can be to youths in struggling communities

The Paris Library is so good,  It's based on the true World War II story of the heroic librarians at the American Library in Paris.  It has everything, it'll make you both laugh and cry!  It'll be released in June.

When We Were Vikings is an uplifting debut about an unlikely heroine whose journey will leave you wanting to embark on a quest of your own, because after all...we are all legends of our own making.

To The Top of The Mountain, The Blinded Man, and Bad Blood are part of the Intercrime series.  These are translated from Swedish and well worth tracking down.

What are you reading?

January 2020 Reads

2020
Jan	1	Dear Edward	Ann Napolitano
	2	Hellbent	Gregg Hurwitz
	3	The Elephant's Journey	Jose Saramago
	4	Me & Mr. Cigar	Gibby Haynes
	5	Misterioso	Arne Dahl
	6	Rabbits for Food	Binnie Kirshenbaum

Another great month of reading.  My two favorites are Dear Edward and Misterioso, but they were all good.  Dear Edward is the perfect read for a book club and everyone else!   A 12-year-old boy is the sole survivor of a plane crash and he's now famous and all alone.  His life changes when he's a bit older and he reads the letters that strangers wrote him.  It's a meditation on survival and a tutorial on how a broken heart can mend.  I love this book so much that I sent it to 5 of my favorite readers;.

Misterioso is the first in a new Swedish crime series.  I read a lot of Scandinavian authors because I enjoy the change in world view.  This is a great series and has been turned into a TV series.  I don't watch TV, so I didn't base my reading on that.  I loved all the characters in this story and hope to follow them on more adventures.

Gregg Hurwitz is a must-read author for me, I've enjoyed each of his Orphan X novels and Hellbent is no exception.  If you haven't read Hurwitz, I suggest starting with the first in the series, Orphan X.

What are you reading?

December 2019 Reads

Dec	81	Water Dancer	Ta-Nehisi Coates
	82	Thirteen Doorways, Wolves Behind Them All	Laura Ruby
	83	Nowhere Man	Gregg Hurwitz
	84	Skipped Parts	Tim Sandlin
	85	County Line	Bill Cameron
	86	Carved In Bone	Jefferson Bass
	87	The Beautiful Ones	Prince
	88	Broken Ground	Val McDermid
	89	Ghost Story	Jim Butcher

Water Dancer is a must-read.  Every page is laced through with dense, gorgeously evocative descriptions of a vanished world and steeped in its own vivid vocabulary.

Nowhere Man is the 2nd installment of the Orphan X series, it's great.

Carved in Bone is a great debut mystery.  If you're a fan of CSI, NCIS, Patricia Cornwell, and Kathy Reichs this book is for you.

The Beautiful Ones is  Prince's brilliant coming-of-age-and-into-superstardom story of one of the greatest artists of all time  It features never-before-seen photos, original scrapbooks and lyric sheets, and the exquisite memoir he began writing before his tragic death.

Ghost Story is the 13th Harry Dresden novel.  Did you know that Harry is the only wizard listed in the Chicago phone book?  Usually, by the 13th in a series, I'm done!  Not with the Dresden stories, I'm hooked and Butcher manages to keep the stories fresh.

What are you reading?