February 2024 – What are you reading?

Enter your current reads here :)

Have recently read:

Turn of the Table by Jonathan Stagge 4*s
Water Weed by Alice Campbell
Death of an Author by E.C.R. Lorac
The Last Word by Elly Griffiths 4*s
I Know What I Saw by Imran Mahmood
The Weekend Retreat by Tara Laskowski - got halfway through, then couldn't be bothered finishing it - unusual for me...

Just started Then She Was Gone by Lisa Jewell - good so far...

I started the Sean Duffy series, The Cold, Cold Ground, and can't wait to read the next ones.
I also have been reading the Linda Burkholder series about an ex-Amish police chief, and found an audio with 3 novellas, Linda Burkholder by Linda Castillo.
Years ago, like 20 years, I was reading the Elizabeth George's Inspector Lynley series, but stalled out at With No One as a Witness and I still have the paper book here. They always took so long to read but were very good. My Libby had the next book, What Came Before He Shot Her in an abridged form, about 10 hours, so I listened to it. The next books aren't abridged so I might get back into those books, when I can budget a 20 hour book in my week!

I also listened to Counterfeit by Kristen Chen which was a mystery but not part of a series.

>3 raidergirl3: I liked the Lynley series too. I had to stop, though, when one book (#13?) saw poor kids as crap because they were poor. (Yeah, no; EG clearly knows no poor people or even not-quite-poor people.) Also, so many problems with Havers. I dunno, too many issues. Fortunately, the world still has thousands of other books that I haven't read yet.

Started Kate Atkinson's latest, Shrines of gaiety, but had to return it to the library before I finished. Will definitely get back to that one.

I recently finished The Ploughmen by Kim Zupan. It's a combination crime novel and psychological character study that takes place in modern day Montana. Dark but effective.

I finished Guilt by Jonathan Kellerman. It was a good story. I enjoyed Dr. Delaware's psychoanalyses but the intrigue was plodding: I definitely was not sitting on the edge of my seat since I figured out the denouement fairly easily.

Am listening to a series of radio dramas originally aired on the BBC called The Sensitive: Eleven BBC Radio Crime Dramas (had to use the big long title to get it to come up) which feature a psychic who helps with crime investigation. Unlike most stories like this, the psychic doesn't always work with a particular police department or get roped in officially, but sometimes runs into crimes just as his life goes. Non-psychics aren't usually aware of the underbelly, but he is. None of the scenarios are intense or drawn-out and are more vehicles to tell Thomas's story so they all interconnect in that way. I'm enjoying it.

Finished Then She Was Gone by Lisa Jewell - 4 stars

Just started The Lantern's Dance by Laurie R. King - love this series...

>8 mvo62: I'm a couple of Mary Russell's behind. Island of the Mad didn't trip my trigger, so I wasn't in hot pursuit of the next titles. Interested to hear if this one holds up.

I was so pleased to find a Peter Robinson Inspector Banks novel that I'd somehow skipped over. I enjoyed Not Dark Yet, but it's a bittersweet feeling.

I'm reading my first Jason Bourne with The Bourne Treachery by Brian Freeman and I'm loving it. Then again, I'm always a sucker for a good espionage novel.

I'm in the middle of The whispering dead by Darcy Coates, which also has ghosts. It's the first in a series, so I hope to find out more about the world and not just the murder and other mysteries that may be specific to this book.

About to start In the Woods > a Tana French I’ve been waiting to get to for a while.

Oooh that's a good one. Difficult, but good and you really have to like hanging questions that go unanswered. If not, well you can move on to the second in the series which is more concrete. I wish French would go back to the Dublin Murder squad.

I just started How Can I Help You by Laura Sims - a murderous former nurse lands in a library under a new name. So far, so good.

>14 Bookmarque: That looks promising. There’s something creepy about nurses in crime novels.

>15 kjuliff: Borrowed it from the library, so if it isn't great, no harm done. Not super creepy yet, but it has some tendrils.

I have recently read:

Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo
Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarros
Iron Flame by Rebecca Yarros
Thunder by Erin Hunter
Robin Hood (I forget who wrote this one)
The Traitor by Richard Paul Evans
The first 4 book of the Brotherband Chronicles by John Flanaghan
The first 7 book of Ranger's Apprentice by John Flanaghan
And I am currently reading Murtagh by Christopher Paoloni

>9 gmathis: I finished The Lantern's Dance by Laurie R. King this morning - 3.75 stars :) Most in the series have rated 4 stars for me - Island of the Mad got a 3.5.

Good writing, as usual, but I lost track of the characters/family tree a little, and while enjoyable, it was "put-downable" - I usually finish a book in less than a week.
Hope that helps :)

>3 raidergirl3: love, love, love Elizabeth George.

I'm reading the second Marlow Murder Club Death Comes to Marlow by Robert Thorogood the creator of Death in Paradise. Always enjoy a locked room mystery, and this has the bonus that I know the area a bit.
Characters are fun too.

I'm really enjoying the Thursday Murder Club mystery series by Richard Osman. Nice, light, humorous with a bit of mystery, is what I need right now. Just finished The Man Who Died Twice.

I just finished Before the Fall and really liked it. I reviewed it in my thread in CR HERE

>21 ted74ca: It's such a great series. It took me a bit to find the tone as it felt at the first like a cozy mystery, but there is so much more going on.

>18 mvo62: Thanks for the follow-up! It's been a while since I read Island of the Mad, but my chief frustration was the maddening absence of Sherlock in a great deal of it. (I know, I know, it's the Mary Russell story, but...)

Will keep an eye out for this one!

I've finished A Banquet of Consequences by Elizabeth George, long but rewarding. It's my first George novel and I'll be happy to ready more.