Book #158, The Professional by Robert B. Parker. What I love about the Spenser series is that everything is a shade of gray. Although occasionally the bad guys are really bad, most of the time there is something about them that humanizes them. Spenser doesn't just do the job assigned to him. He always has to do a little more. When he's hired to ( Read more... )

157 books in total. Not bad. I wish I could read faster. Too many books, too little time.

#148, Bed of Roses (Bride Quartet #2) by Nora Roberts. The second book, Emma and Jack's story, was slow to start and a little too quick to end, though we'll be planning their wedding through at least the next book. Emma is the Centerpiece of Vows, the ( Read more... )

#138, The Knife of Never Letting Go (Chaos Walking, #1), by Patrick Ness. This book was brilliant. What prevented it from getting 5 stars (and if they ever introduce 1/2 stars, this will be upgraded) is that that the cliffhanger ending is sad. I'm rushing to get the sequel, because I need to know more. The voice, that ethereal, mystical part of the ( Read more... )

#127, Skinned by Robin Wasserman. A modern Frankenstein story. In this very post-apocalyptic world, if your body is broken beyond repair, there are alternatives. Lia Kahn finds this out first hand. Lia was the queen bee of her high school. She set the fashion, she set the vids, if you were anyone, you followed her. But when a tragic accident ( Read more... )

#112, Nightwalker by Heather Graham. The story had a clever premise. A shootout in a town called Indigo long before it was a ghost-town has set the stage for the act to be repeated in modern times. Jessie Sparhawk didn't know she was a Nightwalker - someone who sees ghosts - until a murdered man dies on top of her and his ghost starts following her ( Read more... )

#101, Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane. This book was a 3 star book until the last 50 pages where it went totally wow. Completely unexpected and practically brilliant. Marshall Teddy Daniels and his partner Chuck Aule arrive on Shutter Island, an island of the Massachusetts coast that houses a prison for the criminally insane. They're there because ( Read more... )

From my Goodreads library. The most recent reads in August.

#90, Reader's Advisory: An Unshelved Collection by Gene Ambaum and Bill Barnes. You don't have to be a librarian to appreciate this humor but you do have to like books. The latest adventures of Dewey and the Mallville Public library are hilarious. It's almost enough to make me want back ( Read more... )

#83, My Favorite Thief by Karen Monk. Charlotte Kent comes from very rough beginnings but has put all that behind her and now runs a home for thieves and prostitutes looking to change their lives. But she learns that she can't run from her past. Meanwhile, Lord Bryden is learning the same thing. When Charlotte stumbles upon a masked Bryden ( Read more... )

The weekend turned out to be a good one. It felt long, which is always nice. I mostly focused on my to-dos. I deliberately put items like read and stitch on the list so I could do them and not feel guilty. There were definitely projects I put off. But overall, I was pleased ( Read more... )

#68, Fatally Flaky by Diane Mott Davidson. When Goldy's godfather and his best friend die suddenly, it's pretty clear it was murder. Unfortunately, I was sadly bored by this story which told rather than showed most of the time. Maybe Goldy's godfather had been mentioned in earlier books but considering he was the focal point, and she was so totally ( Read more... )