My Rating:

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This will be dressed as an opportunity and I’ll take it, make some sycophantic noises about how I relish the challenge and then bitch about it to Lissa later. Welcome to office life in the twenty-first century.

Lissa has this whole fantasy about meeting an attractive stranger and having a night of unbridled passion leading to an illicit affair. Unfortunately, this results in a monthly incident where she will end up doing the walk of shame, or knocking on my door to ask for help in the removal of said attractive stranger, who never ends up looking quite as alluring in the cold light of day.

Lawrence Delaney was voted ‘Most Likely To Succeed’ by his high school. But no one ever said what it was they thought he might succeed at.

‘Now here’s what I believe. Your husband is a dinosaur and eventually his kind will go extinct.’ I assumed she’s a creationist who thought God created the fossils to test his followers’ conviction.

I am completely over it. If I say it often enough, perhaps it will be true.

My Review:

This deftly penned tale was a fun, lively, and deliciously amusing ride with multiple jaw-dropping plot twists and clever unexpected shifts and reversals. Sarah Bonner has mad word skills and must have a direct bulk supply of pixie dust for her ink pen.

This nimbly written and well-nuanced missive shifted from warped vengeance to fierce revenge, on to cruel bloodlust, and back again. No one was as they initially appeared and each had their own, tightly held, secret agendas.

I fell upon this one like a binge dieter at a buffet and loved every nibble. Sarah Bonner has a new acolyte.

Mona Moon and her new husband, Robert Farley, Duke of Brynelleth are on their honeymoon at last. They are invited to a weekend party by an old friend of Robert’s family—Lady Eustacia. Mona and Robert arrive in a substantial downpour to find several other couples awaiting the appearance of their hostess. When Lady Eustacia fails to come downstairs, Mona and Robert search the manor house only to find her bedridden, drugged, and in serious need of a doctor. It is then they discover the telephone wires have been cut and none of the cars are able to drive into town due to the storm. Mona and Robert believe the invitation was a ruse, but for what purpose? And how do they help Lady Eustacia?

My Rating:

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I give you both this warning— keep each other in sight because tonight the devil will act out.

My Review:

I continue to revel in this cleverly contrived and engaging cozy series. I adore Mona Moon, a woman ahead of her time with movie star looks, boatloads of her own money, nerves of steel, and a nose for sleuthing. I wouldn’t want to live in her era but I want to be Mona Moon.

I Dreamed of Falling
by Julia Dahl

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

Although his boss had to pretend to embrace the family-friendly nature of the town whose newspaper he ran, privately he was a man with a heart as atrophied as his calf muscles.

His chin was crumbling and sobs felt like stones in his mouth.

Tara felt as if her entire body were made of wet sand. Like chunks of it might fall off if she moved.

My Review:

This was my first experience reading her work and I quickly began to covet and admire Julia Dahl’s exceptional word skills for creating and maintaining an eerie and prickly atmosphere that was taut with tension and unease while pregnant with an odd and incongruent mixture of anticipation, sensual pleasures, and deep-seated resentments.

This skilled wordsmith’s agility in shaping her deeply troubled and fatally flawed characters’ development was beyond insightful, richly perceptive, and profoundly observant. Poignant handling and thoughtful touches tucked in unexpected places added additional heft and depth to the reading experience. I was riveted to my Kindle.

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For the first time in forever all the separate bits of her– past, present and future– clicked into place and she felt whole.

My Review:

This was a lovely, amusing, and heartwarming tale that kept me delightfully entertained and fully engaged from start to finish. The writing style was easy to follow yet insightful and observant with generous lashings of wry humor and inner musings while the characters navigated the dynamics of their familial complications. I enjoyed this one so much that I find myself greedy for the rest of the series.

Poison in Piccadilly
(Fiona Figg & Kitty Lane Mystery #6)
by Kelly Oliver

Downton Abbey meets Agatha Christie in this clever locked-room mystery.

1918 London

Is Fiona Figg ready to exchange her sleuthing cap for a bridal veil?

Fiona is set to tie the knot with her dashing flyboy, Archie Somersby. But, while Fiona is busy planning her happily ever after, side-kick Kitty Lane and a group of judo-chopping suffragettes are kicking up trouble at the Piccadilly Jujitsu Club.

When Kitty is found unconscious in the locker room during a high-stakes competition, Fiona must forsake her bouquets and bridal gown to investigate. Her sleuthing leads to a posh lady’s luncheon where a mysterious death crashes Fiona’s wedding plans.

To make matters worse, the arch-nemesis of all things matrimonial, Fredrick Fredricks is up to his old tricks, attempting to put the brakes on Fiona’s journey down the aisle. Will he succeed in tripping up Fiona’s wedding vows? Or will she finally say “I don’t” to the charming devil?

With humor as sharp as a judo chop and suspense as tight as a wedding corset, Poison in Piccadilly invites you to matrimonial mayhem that will have you saying “I do” to laughter and “forever more” to page-turning suspense.

The book features real life suffragettes Sylvia Pankhurst and her bodyguards trained by Edith Garrud, who taught them jujitsu, which became known as Suffrajitsu.

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The affair, the divorce, my husband— ex-husband— dying in my arms from mustard gas, rather put me off matrimony.

My chest expanded with pride, and I felt like the buttons might pop off my blouse I was so chuffed.

The limbo of waiting always put my mind in an awkward state of relaxed agitation.

My Review:

This was an entertaining, fun, and amusing tale to unwind with between tenser thrillers. I always come away with several interesting bits of history while perusing Ms. Oliver’s cleverly conjured mysteries.

The story threads were cleverly woven with an ample supply of amusing humor and were well-researched and well-nuanced to snag my gray matter and keep me guessing. I reveled in learning more about Kitty while she unraveled the perplexing mysteries of herself. No one was as they appeared, especially a bearded and bewigged Fiona.

Julia Bird loves a walk in the countryside. There’s nothing quite like the fresh air and green rolling hills of the Cotswolds to clear your head. Unless you come across a dead body, that is…

When the local Berrywick vet, Dr Eve Davies, is found dead at the bottom of a cliff, the police believe it’s nothing more than a tragic accident, but Julia isn’t so sure. Just a few days earlier when she took her dog, Jake, to the vets, Dr Eve said she believed something awful was about to happen. It turns out she was right…

But who would want the beloved village vet dead? Was it her mother Kay, a down-and-out gambler who stands to inherit her unwedded daughter’s home? Was it her assistant Olga, who was close to getting fired? Or was it her cut-throat tennis partner Will, with whom Dr Eve had an argument shortly before she took a tumble? And who is the stranger skulking around Berrywick peering into people’s windows?

When a second body appears in the exact spot where Dr Eve was found, Julia knows it can’t be a coincidence. Both victims were pushed off the cliff, but why? Should Julia let sleeping dogs lie, or will she be like a dog with a bone to find the murderer?

A totally gripping and charming cosy mystery set in the English countryside. Fans of M.C. Beaton, Faith Martin and Betty Rowlands will love the Julia Bird Mysteries.

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My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

I mean, how long do you have to live here to be a local? Is there a secret waiting list? Do you have to wait for someone to actually die to take their place?

Strobe lighting flashed and the crowd pulsed in slo-mo. People too old to throw their hands in the air like they just didn’t care did so, the flickering lights hiding a multitude of dancing sins.

The squad called them King and Kong for a bit and Caro ignored it. “I’ve got thighs like barges and mad hair— it could be a lot worse. We need to pick our fights.”

She was small, sixtyish with a beaky nose and a lot of mascara, and she was wearing a T-shirt that read Old Age Is for Sissies.

She couldn’t go it alone at her age. She’d need someone to cherish her. She loved the word “cherish,” rolling it round her mouth and through her pouting lips.

My Review:

My hero worship of Fiona Barton’s brilliant yet itchy storytelling continues. Local Gone Missing was a twisty tale that kept me guessing until the very end. The storylines and characters were well-nuanced, compelling, and endlessly intriguing. I conjured and cast aside multiple theories as I perused but would never have come up with this topper.  The woman has mad skills!