Just finished reading...

It's hard to believe that this is already the TENTH of Laura Childs' Tea Shop mysteries. This "episode" begins with Theodosia filling in for a friend who is unable to ride in a steeplechase. Her horse balks at a jump because of a dead body lying beside it. The body turns out to belong to a local television anchor, who happened to be the sister of an ex-beau of Theo's, with whom she's recently had a public disagreement.
Luckily, Theodosia is well enough known by local law enforcement officials that she is not a suspect, but her friend/nemesis Detective Burt Tidwell asks her for her (informal) assistance, which of course she would have given anyway. When Jory, the victim's brother also asks Theo to look into the matter, she feels doubly justified. Although Theo seems to be a sensible woman, and vows not to walk into dangerous situations, she manages to do so anyway. Fortunately, she usually remembers to keep her cell phone handy.
It's wonderful to read about the day-to-day operations of her tea shoppe, and the glamorous affairs she often attends. But I am getting tired of her fancy duds getting ruined in every book!


Meredith Cole's first novel won the 2007 St. Martin’s Minotaur/Malice Domestic Best First Traditional Mystery Novel Competition, and it's easy to see why. Lydia McKenzie, a fine art photographer, is in the midst of her first gallery showing: a series of photographs based on a book about past murders that occurred in New York City. But the evening of the opening, a pair of detectives arrive to tell her that one of the models has been found dead, posed the same way as in Lydia's photo. Of course Lydia (whose day job is secretary of a PI agency) is upset by this, and as well as doing all she can to aid the police, she does a little digging on her own. When another, and then another of her friends/models is killed.
Cole's narrative is very matter-of-fact, which lessens the shock-value of the crimes to some extent, and perhaps helps the reader empathize with a young woman experiencing monstrous incidents in her life, and is shocked and stunned as she tries to make sense of them.

Just finished reading...

In the third volume of the Spellmans series, our intrepid heronine Isabel is in court-ordered therapy after ignoring a restraining order filed by her neighbour. Isabel is also taking a self-inflicted break from the family detective agency and working in her friend Milo's bar.
Her brother David asks her to house-sit for him, and she discovers that he has an empty apartment in his basement, which comes in handy when she loses her job at the bar. She secretly moves into the apartment, whilst working on a case for a friend of Milo's, attending therapy sessions, and trying to decide what she wants to do with her life.
The Spellmans are an interesting, if unusual family. Isabel's generation all grew up in the family firm, and while her older brother David decided not to continue in the business, Isabel did. However, she has a great deal of difficulty differentiating the business of a private detective from regular life, and treats most of her daily activities and contacts as if they were investigations.
I loved this book, but I do have a problem with the footnotes, which I find terribly distracting.

Recent reads

Not my usual type of book but I did enjoy this medical thriller by one of the authors who attended LCC. Former NYC medical examiner Dr. Edward Jenner is asked by a friend to look into the case of his daughter's murder, which turns out to be one of a string of serial killings. The young woman's roommate turns up at his home, asking for shelter, and a relationship develops between them as they search for the madman together.

Claudia Bishop was on the panel I moderated at Left Coast Crime.As well as this series, she writes the Hemlock Falls mysteries. This is the second in the series about Dr. Austin McKenzie, who practices veterinary medicine in rural upstate New York. In this outing, Dr. McKenzie must solve the mystery of who killed a most unpleasant turkey farmer, in order to absolve the young man who sells him turkey feed.

Josephine Tey's The Daughter of Time was the March read of the DorothyL Book Discussion group. I hadn't read this book for years, but remembered it fondly. Sadly, it wasn't as absorbing as I remembered. Although I did love the story of Inspector Alan Grant's research about Richard III, there was a lot more dry historical exposition than I remembered.

This is the second in the Dirty Business mystery series.
Landscape designer Paula Holliday has been invited by her old school friend Lucy to spend a weekend at a hotel and spa in Connecticut wine country. While she's in the bar waiting for her friend to arrive, Lucy is hit on by a handsome man who later is found dead behind the hotel. Of course, Paula is a suspect, and in order to prove her innocence, she must discover who is guilty.

This is the Gourmet Girl mystery series co-written byJessica Conant-Park and her mother, Susan Conant. Our heroine Chloe Carter tags along with her boyfriend chef Josh Driscoll as he films an episode of a "battle of the chefs"-style television series. They choose a random shopper at an upscale market to be the recipient of a home-cooked gourmet dinner, but the fun is spoiled when the shopper's wife dies a painful death during the meal. Josh is not a suspect, but having been the only person to witness the death, Chloe feels that she must discover whodunnit.

A Day of Authors

Today, I got up really early in the morning and drove to Cal State Fullerton. I was lucky enough to be one of the first 500 people to register for the ALPHA 17th Annual Day of Authors.

The keynote speaker was Jodi Picoult. I have to confess to never having read any of her books, but I may have to change that. She was a captivating speaker, talking about the research for three of her books in particular: Second Glance, Nineteen Minutes and her latest title, Handle With Care.


The second speaker was Nicole Mones, who spoke about her experiences in China, and her latest novel The Last Chinese Chef, which won World Gourmand Cookbook Award, 1st place in the U.S. and 3rd place worldwide as the best Chinese cookbook of 2007.

There were six breakout session speakers, and I chose Kerry Madden's session because she writes children's books, and I really miss being a children's librarian. What I hadn't realized when I registered was that her latest book is a YA-level biography of Harper Lee, who just happens to have written one of my favourite books of all time. She told some wonderful and hilarious tales of interviewing some of Miss Lee's contemporaries and neighbours. (Harper Lee herself refuses to be interviewed, because she doesn't believe a person should be biographied while still alive.)

The closing speaker was Rhys Bowen, an elegant and gracious woman whom I actually saw a great deal last week in Hawai'i. Her description of her evolution as a writer was witty and charming, and was a lovely end to a wonderful day.

Belated report: sightseeing in Hawai'i

I know, I know, I've been home almost a week, and I haven't posted photos of our trip. Apart from suffering from severe jet-lag, I've been very busy doing laundry and making actual home-cooked meals, and stuff like that.
The first couple of days we were in Waikoloa, it rained. Really rained. Hard.
So there wasn't really much sightseeing going on. On Tuesday, after my panel, Tod did some touring on his own, going to the lava flow near Hilo and north to Hawi.



On Wednesday afternoon, we went whale-watching.


Thursday, after LCC ended, we drove up through Hilo



and went to the lava flow again, just because he thought it was so cool I'd want to see it too. Along with a lot of other people, we walked about half a mile over rough, bumpy terrain to the shore.


Once we got to the shore, all we could see was a plume of smoke in the distance:


But after dark, it looked really cool! (Or do I mean hot?)


On Friday, we drove around the island in the opposite direction, and went to the caldera at Kilauea. The air was fairly thick with sulfur.



Saturday was our anniversary, so we went to dinner at a fabulous restaurant in Waimea to celebrate.


Sunday came all too soon, but after fighting the crowds at the Kona airport, and being jammed between Tod and a very large young man on the plane, I was happy to be home.

Belated Left Coast Crime summary

I did mean to post during my trip to Hawai'i, but just didn't have enough time, as I was having so much fun.
My panel (Cozies: Don't Kill the Cat. Really?) went very well, I think.

Panelists were (l-r)
(me),Mary Stanton/Claudia Bishop, Maggie Sefton,GM Malliet,


(GM Malliet), Maria Hudgins and Betty Hechtman.


Gratuitous shot of me in my new outfit:


A few other authors I met during the convention were Robin Burcell and Laurie R. King


and Judy Greber/Gillian Roberts and Louise Ure.


I attended a lot of panels and met a lot of people (not just authors), but I either didn't get pix or they didn't turn out. Left Coast Crime 2009 was a blast, though, and I've already registered for LCC 2010.

Just finished reading...

Twist Phelan is one of the authors who will be at Left Coast Crime next week. (Aside: squeee, I can't believe it's next week!!)In the second of the Pinnacle Peak mysteries, attorney Hannah Dain has joined the family law firm, Dain & Dain, in hopes of repairing the troubled relationship she has with her father and her sister (two of the firm's partners).
(Another aside: I read this thinking it was the first in the series, and now I'm disappointed, as I'm one of those anal people who must read series in order.) Her father Richard, has always been cold and distant, while her sister Shelby has always been openly hostile and antagonistic. Hannah isn't sure why they are this way, or why she needs to try to fix things, but she does.
She mitigates her distress with long bicycle rides in the desert outside the fictional Arizona town of Pinnacle Peak, which at the time of this story is in the middle of a searingly hot, dry summer.
When a seemingly routite IPO she is working on goes awry and she is blamed for it, she feels the need to find out what went wrong, and at the same time, exonerate herself.
Shelby is an appealing, if tortured protagonist, and the story is interesting and gripping. I look forward to reading more of the series.

I'm trying to read as many books by authors who will be at LCC as possible, and next up is Fools Rush In by Sunny Frazier.

My corner store

I love roses! I have 27 rose bushes in my garden. If you know me at all, you'll know that purple (in pretty much all its permutations) is my favourite colour. Blue girl
is one of the first roses I planted in my garden, and I've added some blank note cards and some postcards to the Flowers & Things section of my CafePress shop.