Day: September 16, 2019
Halloween Bingo 2019: The Second Week
A day late (though hopefully not a dollar short), here’s my “second bingo week” summary; and it’s a summary of a much better week than the first one turned out to be. (So, yey!) For one thing this is due to the books, all of which were either outright winners or at least enjoyable on […]
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Jim Butcher: The Aeronaut’s Windlass
The week’s longest read and, perhaps surprisingly, not its best one. To start with the plus side, this novel’s most interesting characters (and its single most outstanding feature) are the cats — not merely Rowl, the feline protagonist, but all of them; not least also Naun, the giant black tomcat leader of a tribe of […]
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Bingo Call: 9/16/19 – Psych
Reblogged from: Obsidian Blue Psych: Psychological thrillers, plot twists and suspense, unreliable narrators and other mind-fuckery. And, as an aside, any Halloween Bingo book that takes place within or related to an insane asylum, haunted or otherwise, would qualify! Original post: ThemisAthena.booklikes.com/post/1952654/bingo-call-9-16-19
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Anthony Rolls: Scarweather
Quite a change of pace compared to the author’s Family Matters, the first book by Rolls that I read — but if the two books have one thing in common, it’s a sense of the unusual and extraordinary, and an incurable urge to pour the acid of satire on experts (self-appointed and otherwise) and on […]
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Michael Gilbert: Smallbone Deceased
In my travels in the world of classic crime fiction, one of my truly overdue reads — a book rightly renowned for its dry sense of humor and truly unique way of disposing of a body. If you ever thought a crime novel set in a law office specializing on wills, trusts and property law […]
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Fredric Brown: The Dead Ringer
Brown’s second Ed & Am Hunter novel and the book that, thanks to Tigus’s generous gift of last year, has been pencilled in for precisely this square ever since. I truly enjoyed my return to the Chicago and Midwest of the Classic Noir era — Brown’s writing and plot construction easily stands up to that […]
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Bob Berman: Earth-Shattering
Neither as “epic” nor as “profound” as the blurb promises, and definitely higher on the “popular” than on the “science” part of “popular science writing”. Based on his style of writing, I can very well imagine Berman as a personable guide at his local observatory or as a host of popular radio science programs; the […]
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Patricia Wentworth: Eternity Ring
Another book off to a great start; if for no other reason than the fact that we get to meet Frank Abbott’s family and learn why he didn’t become a lawyer — as had initially been his chosen career path — but a policeman instead. (Wentworth takes us back to Frank’s family home in a […]
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Peter Ackroyd: Hawksmoor
The first book I read in the second week’s of September, and for the longest time it was on a solid track for a 4 1/2 or even 5-star rating. Tremendously atmospheric, with London (both 17th century and present day) not so much merely setting but additional character and two timelines tantalizingly mirroring and winding […]
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