I’ll start this installment with what I have already read (recently) and then share with you what I’m currently reading… all have been good reads.

I started with this book – it was a Friday Freebie (I think) on Barnes & Noble’s website (for Nook readers)

It’s a mystery – fairly light reading. The main character is an unemployed former journalist who makes her way through life rowing and doing odd jobs to make ends meet. She’s kind of headed nowhere and likes it that way.  She stumbles into a murder mystery when one of her rowing buddies is accused of murder, which she knows he couldn’t possibly have committed (could he?) and ends up being hired by his lawyer as a pseudo-investigator to help uncover facts which could lead to her friend’s case being dropped.

I have to admit, while I was often yawning and wishing the plot would move along more quickly, I still enjoyed the story.  The characters are well written and not boilerplate – they have sass and vitality.

I enjoyed it enough that I picked up the next one in the series immediately after finishing the first – that’s one of the nice things about an e-Reader – no waiting to go to the bookstore!

This one was good as well, although not as good as the first. I’m not sure if I was just getting tired of the type of writing, or what.  In this story, Tess, the main character, is still dabbling in maybe becoming a full-fledged investigator, although she is working full time now. 

This story involves her “uncle” who is badly beaten and for most of the book is in a coma, a greyhound who is “rescued” from the tracks, and another murder mystery Tess investigates.

The characters weren’t as well developed, but the story was pretty good. After finishing it, though, I decided to take break from the Tess stories and pick up some other things to read. I’m sure I’ll go back and read more of them, though. They are good, light reading and perfect when I don’t want to think too hard. 😉

Moving right along…

I am also reading through this book, although it’s not a constant thing, I am reading when I’m in the mood.  It’s a very interesting book and has given me some great perspective, given that I have a pre-teen daughter and I’m hoping that we’re doing the right things in terms of the building blocks in her life. 

The conversations revolve around the following:

1. You are more than the sum of your parts
2. Don’t be in such a hurry to grow up
3. Sex is great and worth the wait
4. It’s OK to dream about marriage and motherhood
5. Girls gone wild are a dime a dozen—dare to be virtuous

There are biblical references, but also plenty of practical advice.  I’m finding nuggets of wisdom throughout.

And then, finally, I’m reading this:

It was part of another promotion on B&N and I am hooked. It is so engrossing and the main character is mysterious, wounded, powerful and captivating.

She is an “informationist” – a mercenary of sorts, who is hired by various countries, organizations and wealthy individuals to acquire information. And she does, through whatever means necessary.

However, as you follow her on her various “missions” in the opener of the book, you begin to realize that she is a wounded soul, running from memories at the same time she is completing her assignments.

She is hired by a wealthy oil magnate to try to find information related to the disappearance of his daughter four years earlier.  Finding people is not what she normally does, but she takes the assignment, intrigued and challenged by the seeming dead-end trails.

She’s given one mandate from the magnate – a “keeper” of sorts who is tasked with traveling with her and keeping her safe (which she feels is unnecessary and insulting, yet unavoidable).

I’m about 150 pages in and I can’t wait to find some free time to sit down and keep reading. I want to know more about her, more about the missing girl, and see what happens with the two main characters’ relationship – how it develops and what becomes of it.

I’d strongly recommend it to anyone.

So, your turn… what are you reading these days?

I’ve been doing a lot of reading lately. I’ve pretty much given up on night time television.  There’s nothing on that I care about watching – not enough to give up sleep for, anyway!

So, instead of vegging in front of the TV, I’ve been reading. Once the monkeys go to bed, I snuggle up in my chair in our sitting room and read until I can’t focus anymore. Some nights, that’s five minutes, some it’s more.  It just depends.

I’ve been really lucky, too, in that I’ve found some really great books to read.

I think the last one I shared with you was Juliet or maybe it was Septimus Heap?

I thoroughly enjoyed Juliet. It was a really great book. One I would recommend to anyone.

I have taken a break from Septimus Heap because Big Girl is reading it, too, and she wanted to catch up to me in the story so we can talk about it. So, I’ve been reading other books while we get to the same point in the story.

Here are some of the books I’ve read in the past few weeks:

Prayers for Sale
by Sandra Dallas

This was a really, really good book. I gobbled it up in a matter of days, enjoying it like I would a delicious dessert for my mind.  The characters are really well-written and the story consists of an 80-something year old’s reminiscences of her youth in a gold mining camp in the mountains of Colorado and her current relationship with a young, newly-married girl.  I was hooked within the first few pages and couldn’t wait to sit down and read in the evenings. I was sad when the story was over, wishing I could spend more time with the characters (always a good sign, in my mind)

I would highly recommend it to you. Especially if you are in the mood for something a little bit different.

 

The Lace Makers of Glenmara
by Heather Barbieri

This one just captured me from the very beginning.  It is the story of a heartbroken young woman who is traveling through Ireland trying to recover from being jilted by her fiancé (for another woman, of course).

She ends up in a small village that has a lace making group – middle-aged women who each have stories of their own.  The book weaves their stories, and Kate’s (the main character) together beautifully, and the imagery is spectacular.

I finished this one last night and am hoping to find more stories by this author.

Another one I’d highly recommend.

 

Now, I’m starting The Map of True Places by Brunonia Barry.

It’s the story of a young psychotherapist, Zee Finch, who is thrown in a tailspin when one of her patients commits suicide.

She travels back to Salem, where she is from, and finds her father in poor health and needing care.

I’m not much further into the book than that, but I loved The Lace Reader, another book by Barry, so I am looking forward to reading this one.

I’ll let you know how it turns out.

 

 

 

And what about you?

What are you reading these days?  Any recommendations?

I’ve been tossing back and forth between books since finishing Juliet. It was such a good book and I was having trouble deciding what I wanted to read next. There were quite a few books I wanted to read, but my budget wasn’t allowing me to go nuts and buy them all right now. And they are on “wait” at the library, so I had to decide to either read a “real” book that I already had on the bookshelf at home, or an existing book already on Beatrice.

I got lucky and Barnes & Noble had a Free Friday book that looked promising. I’m hooked now. Big Girl is reading a library copy of the same book, which is fun because we can talk about the story as we go. 

There are six (or seven?) books in the series, so I am sure B&N will get their tithe at some point, unless we get lucky and find them either at a used bookstore or the library. I may just go ahead and purchase the “real” book so that Big Girl and I can share them more easily. She likes to take her books to school and read them when she has free time and I’m not too keen on letting Beatrice take a trip to school.

So, now I am reading Septimus Heap, Book One, Magyk which, although, I think, a children’s book, is really very entertaining.  It’s about a family of wizards who adopt what they think is an abandoned baby girl but who turns out to be a princess who was rescued just as her mother, the queen, was killed.  It’s all twists and turns and lots of fantasy and magic, but it’s a nice escape from reality right now.  The story is engaging and the characters are interesting, if not too deeply developed (so far).

Big Girl is really enjoying it, which I love, and hates to put it down at night when it is time for lights out. I think it will be fun to read together and have something to share, especially if she makes it past the first book and on into the others in the story.

 

Who knows, maybe some Harry Potter will be in our future one day?

What are you reading right now?