Recent reads

Homicide in Hardcover by Kate Carlisle.
This is the first book I purchased (and read) on my Sony Reader. (Yes, I have the elegant red one.)
Our heroine, Brooklyn Wainwright is an expert in rare books and their restoration. Although she'd been estranged from her mentor, Abraham Karastovsky, she is happy that they have reconciled. Until she finds him lying in a pool of blood in the midst of restoring an edition of Faust that is said to be cursed.
When Brooklyn is hired to complete the renovation of the Faust, she suddenly begins to have accidents, obviously caused by the person who killed Abraham.
Brooklyn is sure that Abraham was not killed by a curse, and she is determined to find the person responsible, although handsome security expert Derek Stone seems equally determined to keep her out of trouble, though she sees it as "getting in her way".
The bookbinding theme is not at all boring, as some might expect. Brooklyn is a vibrant, interesting protagonist and I look forward to further installments in the series.


Her Royal Spyness by Rhys Bowen.
In which we meet Lady Victoria Georgiana Charlotte Eugenie, known to her friends as "Georgie". Thirty-fourth in line to the throne, Georgie became virtually penniless when she turned 21, as her allowance was cut off. Frustrated living with her older half-brother "Binky" and his wife at the family's estate, Castle Rannoch, Georgie decides to strike out on her own, and removes herself to the family's London home, Rannoch House. After an unsuccessful few hours as a cosmetics salesgirl at Harrods, she decides to start her own housekeeping business. The only problem is that the only housekeeper she employs is herself.
Binky joins her at Rannoch House when an unscrupulous Frenchman claims to have proof that their father gambled away the family lands. But when Georgie returns home to find the Frenchman drowned in the bath, with Binky the obvious suspect, she is certain that Binky is not smart enough to have committed the crime and sets out to clear his name.
In the process, she encounters some hilarious and harrowing situations, including several attempts on her life.
The book is written as a series of Georgie's diary entries, seems to me to detail the life of a young woman in 1930s London quite well.
The sequel, A Royal Pain, is already available in paperback, and Royal Flush, the third in the series, has just been released in hardcover. They will be added to my toppling TBR pile soon!