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192. The House of Silk

Rating:  ☆☆☆

Recommended by:

Author:   Anthony Horowitz

Genre:  Fiction, Mystery, Crime

294 pages, published November, 2011

Reading Format:  Audio Book

 

Summary

For the first time in its 125 year history, the Arthur Conan Doyle Estate authorized the talented Anthony Horowitz to write a new Sherlock Holmes novel.  The result is The House of Silk which reads very much like the original Holmes’ mysteries.  Set in London of 1890, a fine art dealer named Edmund Carstairs visits Sherlock Holmes and Dr John Watson to beg for their help.  He is being menaced by a strange man in a flat cap – a wanted criminal who seems to have followed him all the way from America. In the days that follow, his home is robbed, his family is threatened. And then the first murder takes place.

 

Quotes 

“Show Holmes a drop of water and he would deduce the existence of the Atlantic. Show it to me and I would look for a tap. That was the difference between us.”

 

“For all men are equal at the moment of death and who are we to judge them when a much greater judge awaits?”

 

“We’re all on the road to ruin but some are further ahead than others.”

 

“when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”

 

“Childhood, after all, is the first precious coin that poverty steals from a child.”

 

My Take

If you are a fan of the Sherlock Holmes books, then you will likely enjoy The House of Silk.  While the original books are not of particular interest to me, I enjoyed, but did not love, this new take on the detective in the deerstalker cap.  I found Magpie Murders, a modern mystery penned by the inimitable Anthony Horowitz, far more enjoyable and engrossing.

 

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178. Magpie Murders

Rating:  ☆☆☆☆1/2

Recommended by:   Michael Koss

Author:   Anthony Horowitz

Genre:  Fiction, Mystery, Crime, Thriller, Suspense

496 pages, published June 6, 2017

Reading Format:  Book

 

Summary

When editor Susan Ryeland is given the manuscript of Alan Conway’s latest mystery novel, she has no reason to think it will be much different from any of his others.  After working with the bestselling crime writer for years, she’s intimately familiar with his detective, Atticus Pünd, who solves mysteries that occur in quaint English villages.  In the vein of Agatha Christie, Alan’s traditional formula has proved hugely successful.  When the new book (which is included for us to read) abruptly ends before the dénouement, things start to get very interesting as we are thrust into a completely different, yet inherently related, murder mystery.

 

Quotes 

“But I’m not sure it actually matters what we read. Our lives continue along the straight lines that have been set out for us. Fiction merely allows us a glimpse of the alternative. Maybe that’s one of the reasons we enjoy it.”

 

“You must know that feeling when it’s raining outside and the heating’s on and you lose yourself, utterly, in a book. You read and you read and you feel the pages slipping through your fingers until suddenly there are fewer in your right hand than there are in your left and you want to slow down but you still hurtle on towards a conclusion you can hardly bear to discover.”

 

“Rumours and malicious gossip are like bindweed. They cannot be cut back, even with the sword of truth. I can, however, offer you this comfort. Given time, they will wither and die of their own volition.”

 

“It’s strange when you think about it. There are hundreds and hundreds of murders in books and television. It would be hard for narrative fiction to survive without them. And yet there are almost none in real life, unless you happen to live in the wrong area. Why is it that we have such a need for murder mystery? And what is it that attracts us? The crime, or the solution? Do we have some primal need of bloodshed because our own lives are so safe, so comfortable?”

 

“As far as I’m concerned, you can’t beat a good whodunnit: the twists and turns, the clues and the red herrings and then, finally, the satisfaction of having everything explained to you in a way that makes you kick yourself because you hadn’t seen it from the start.”

 

“he had expressed the belief that everything in life had a pattern and that a coincidence was simply the moment when that pattern became briefly visible.”

 

“I had chosen to play the detective—and if there is one thing that unites all the detectives I’ve ever read about, it’s their inherent loneliness. The suspects know each other. They may well be family or friends. But the detective is always the outsider. He asks the necessary questions but he doesn’t actually form a relationship with anyone. He doesn’t trust them, and they in turn are afraid of him. It’s a relationship based entirely on deception and it’s one that, ultimately, goes nowhere. Once the killer has been identified, the detective leaves and is never seen again. In fact, everyone is glad to see the back of him.”

 

“One can think of the truth as eine vertiefung – a sort of deep valley which may not be visible from a distance but which will come upon you quite suddenly. There are many ways to arrive there.”

 

“I held out the packet and suddenly we were friends. That’s one of the only good things about being a smoker these days. You’re part of a persecuted minority. You bond easily.”

 

My Take

I thoroughly enjoyed the fiendishly clever and enigmatic Magpie Murders.  In fact, for four straight hours I couldn’t put it down until I finished it.  Having previously created the Alex Rider books, the television series Foyle’s War and having written for Midsomer Murders and Poirot, Author Anthony Horowitz, OBE, is as prolific as he is talented.  If you like murder mysteries, then you must check out Magpie Murders.  Highly recommended.

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174. The Cuckoo’s Calling

Rating:  ☆☆☆☆

Recommended by:   Boulder Librarian

Author:   Robert Galbraith (J.K. Rowling)

Genre:  Fiction, Mystery, Crime, Thriller, Suspense

455 pages, published April 30, 2013

Reading Format:  Audio Book

 

Summary

While The Cuckoo’s Calling, a murder mystery and book one of a series featuring private detective Cormoran Strike, lists the author as Robert Galbraith, that is a pseudonym.  It is actually written by J. K. Rowling of Harry Potter fame.  The book opens with Detective Strike hired to investigate the death of supermodel Lula Landry (known to her friends as the Cuckoo) which has been ruled a suicide by the police.  After losing his leg to a land mine in Afghanistan, Cormoran Strike is barely scraping by as a private investigator.  He is down to one client, has creditors on his back, has just broken up with his longtime girlfriend and is living in his office.  The Landry case plunges Strike into the world of multimillionaire beauties, rock-star boyfriends, and desperate designers.

 

Quotes 

“Seven and a half million hearts were beating in close proximity in this heaving old city, and many, after all, would be aching far worse than his.”

 

“Other people his age had houses and washing machines, cars and television sets, furniture and gardens and mountain bikes and lawnmowers: he had four boxes of crap, and a set of matchless memories.”

 

“You’re like everyone else, Strike; you want your civil liberties when you’ve told the missus you’re at the office and you’re at a lap-dancing club, but you want twenty-four-hour surveillance on your house when someone’s trying to force your bathroom window open. Can’t have it both ways.”

 

“Humans often assumed symmetry and equality where none existed.”

 

“In the inverted food chain of fame, it was the big beasts who were stalked and hunted.”

 

“The dead could only speak through the mouths of those left behind, and through the signs they left scattered behind them.”

 

“When you are young, and beautiful, you can be very cruel.”

 

“There’s people who’d expect you to take a bullet for them and they don’t bother rememb’ring yuh name.”

 

“Couples tended to be of roughly equivalent personal attractiveness, though of course factors such as money often seemed to secure a partner of significantly better looks than oneself.”

 

“Strike was used to playing archaeologist among the ruins of people’s traumatised memories;”

 

“I am become a name.”

 

My Take

When my son Nick was in Elementary School (he is currently a college student), he and I read all of the Harry Potter books together and we both loved living in the wildly inventive and fantastic world created by J.K. Rowling.  Based in modern day London, Rowling has created a different type of world in The Cuckoo’s Calling, one that I also enjoyed inhabiting during the almost 16 hours that I spent listening to the audio book version.  The Cuckoo’s Calling has everything you could want from a mystery/suspense/thriller:  compelling and real characters, a gritty plot that hums along at a rapid clip, an inside look at a world different from the one you inhabit, plenty of red herrings to keep you guessing and some surprise twists at the end.  It’s no surprise that I’m looking forward to reading book 2 in this series.

 

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134. His Bloody Project

Rating:  ☆☆☆☆

Recommended by:   

Author:   Graeme Macrae Burnet

Genre:  Fiction, Crime

280 pages, published November 5, 2015

Reading Format:  E-Book on Overdrive

 

Summary

A brutal triple murder in a remote Scottish farming community in 1869 leads to the arrest of seventeen-year-old Roderick “Roddy” Macrae.  While there is no question that Macrae committed this terrible crime, the authorities are puzzled as to why such a shy and intelligent boy would go down this bloody path?  Presented as a collection of documents discovered by the author, His Bloody Project opens with a series of police statements taken from the villagers of Culdie, Rossshire. They offer conflicting impressions of the accused; one interviewee recalls Macrae as a gentle and quiet child, while another details him as evil and wicked.  Among the papers is Roddy’s own memoirs, where he outlines the series of events leading up to the murder in eloquent and affectless prose.  The book also contains medical reports, psychological evaluations, a courtroom transcript from the trial, and other documents that throw both Macrae’s motive and his sanity into question.

 

Quotes

“One man can no more see into the mind of another than he can see inside a stone…”

 

“These unfortunates are distinguished by the prevalence of malicious feelings, which often arise at the most trivial provocation. They see enmity where none exists and indulge themselves in great fantasies of revenge and mischief; fantasies which they are then powerless to resist acting upon.”

 

My Take

I decided to read His Bloody Project after seeing that it was a Man Booker Prize Nominee in 2016.  The format of the book as a collection of documents surrounding a triple murder, investigation and trial in 17th Century Scotland made for a fascinating read, especially as it revealed details of the different social classes of the time.  After finishing it, I still had some questions about what exactly happened, but I think that is the point of the book.  Life is often messy and incomprehensible.  Although we would like to put people and events into neat little boxes, it is sometimes impossible to do that and we have to live with the ambiguity.

 

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115. The Snowman

Rating:  ☆☆☆1/2

Recommended by:  

Author:   Jo Nesbø

Genre:  Fiction, Mystery, Crime, Thriller, Suspense

383 pages, published May 10, 2011

Reading Format:  Audio Book

 

Summary

In The Snowman, internationally acclaimed crime writer Jo Nesbø tells the tale of Harry Hole, a troubled police investigator in modern day Oslo, Norway as he tries to track down a serial killer who murders unfaithful women during the first snowfall of winter and leaves a snowman as his calling card.  As his investigation deepens, Hole discovers that he has become a pawn in an increasingly terrifying game with a sinister killer.

 

Quotes

“Evil is not a thing. It cannot take possession of you. It’s the opposite; it’s a void, an absence of goodness. The only thing you can be frightened of here is yourself.”

 

“Good stories are never about a string of successes but about spectacular defeats,” Støp had said. “Even though Roald Amundsen won the race to the South Pole, it’s Robert Scott the world outside Norway remembers. None of Napoleon’s victories is remembered like the defeat at Waterloo. Serbia’s national pride is based on the battle against the Turks at Kosovo Polje in 1389, a battle the Serbs lost resoundingly. And look at Jesus! The symbol of the man who is claimed to have triumphed over death ought to be a man standing outside the tomb with his hands in the air. Instead, throughout time Christians have preferred the spectacular defeat: when he was hanging on the cross and close to giving up. Because it’s always the story of the defeat that moves us most.”

 

“What is worse? Taking the life of a person who wants to live or taking death from a person who wants to die.”

 

“We’re capable of understanding that someone has to drop an atomic bomb on a town of innocent civilians, but not that others have to cut up prostitutes who spread disease and moral depravity in the slums of London. Hence we call the former realism and the latter madness.”

 

“if every baby was a perfect miracle, life was basically a process of degeneration.”

My Take

While The Snowman has a certain level of creepiness to it, I was very quickly hooked into this story of a diabolical serial killer set against the unique backdrop of Norway.  Nesbø is a master of twists and there is no shortage of them in The Snowman.  I was also impressed by the character development and motivation in the story, especially of the protagonist Harry Hole.  If you like mysteries and crime thrillers, then The Snowman is worth checking out.

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113. Escape to Cabo

Rating:  ☆☆☆

Recommended by:  Pam Dupont

Author:   S. A. Lapoint

Genre:  Memoir, Crime

221 pages, published October 14, 2014

Reading Format:  Book

 

Summary

Scott Frieze (aka S. A. Lapoint) had a comfortable life in Tuscon until he decided to act on his lifelong fantasy of robbing a bank.  He got away the first time, but during his second bank job, he was apprehended and thrown into the maw of our criminal justice system.  Escape to Cabo documents how he got there and his pre and post incarceration experience.

  
My Take

Escape to Cabo was assigned by my fellow book group member Pam Dupont in anticipation of a trip with our book group to her condo in San Jose del Cabo.  Pam had met the author while in Cabo and thought it would be fun to read this book before our journey.  She was right.  It was a fun read.

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110. End of Watch

Rating:  ☆☆☆1/2

Recommended by:   

Author:   Stephen King

Genre:  Fiction, Thriller, Crime, Suspense

432 pages, published June 7, 2016

Reading Format:  Audio Book

 

Summary

End of Watch is the third and final book in Stephen King’s Bill Hodges trilogy (the first two books were Mr. Mercedes and Finders Keepers).  Hodges is a retired detective who matches wits with several bad guys.  Hodges’ most diabolical foil is Brady Hartzfield who is known as the “Mercedes Killer” and is Hodges’ antagonist in the first book.  Seemingly in a permanent vegetative state, Hartzfield is back In End of Watch with powers that enable him to the drive his enemies to suicide.  Hodges and his compatriots Holly Gibney and Jerome Robinson must figure out a way to stop Hartzfield before they become victims themselves.

 

Quotes

“It’s about how some people carelessly squander what others would sell their souls to have: a healthy, pain-free body. And why? Because they’re too blind, too emotionally scarred, or too self-involved to see past the earth’s dark curve to the next sunrise. Which always comes, if one continues to draw breath.”

 

“bad luck keeps bad company.”

 

“Being needed is a great thing. Maybe the great thing.”

 

“The seeds sown in childhood put down deep roots.”

 

“That’s me, Brady thought happily. When they give your middle name, you know you’re an authentic boogeyman.”

 

“Payback is a bitch, and the bitch is back.”

My Take

I enjoy Stephen King generally and enjoyed both Mr. Mercedes and Finders Keepers, the first two books in the Bill Hodges trilogy, in particular and was therefore looking forward to finishing off this series.  I was not disappointed.  King knows how to both create indelible characters and build suspense.  Both skills are on full display in End of Watch.  Not the best Stephen King book I’ve read, but it is certainly worth the time.

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105. Finders Keepers

Rating:  ☆☆☆1/2

Recommended by:   

Author:   Stephen King

Genre:  Fiction, Crime, Suspense, Thriller

431 pages, published June 2, 2015

Reading Format:  Audio Book

 

Summary

Finders Keepers is the second book in Stephen King’s Bill Hodges Triology (the first is Mr. Mercedes and the third is End of Watch) and the name of Bill Hodges’ Private Detective Agency.  Hodges is a retired detective who, in Mr. Mercedes which was book one of the series, stopped serial killer Brady Hartzfield before he could blow up an auditorium full of concert-going pre-teens.  While Hodges plays a role in Finders Keepers, the action focuses primarily on Morris Bellamy, a killer who murders a J.D. Salinger type figure and steals his writing notebooks which contain the fourth book in the acclaimed Jimmy Gold series with which Bellamy is obsessed, and Pete Saubers, a smart high school kid who thinks he has found an answer to his family’ money problems when he finds the stolen money and notebooks in the back yard of a house that had been occupied by Bellamy decades earlier.  When Bellamy is released from prison after serving more than 35 years on a on a different charge, he goes looking for his long buried treasure.  When he finds it missing, a cat and mouse game ensues with Bill Hodges and crew pulled back into action.  

 

Quotes

“For readers, one of life’s most electrifying discoveries is that they are readers—not just capable of doing it (which Morris already knew), but in love with it. Hopelessly. Head over heels. The first book that does that is never forgotten, and each page seems to bring a fresh revelation, one that burns and exalts: Yes! That’s how it is! Yes! I saw that, too! And, of course, That’s what I think! That’s what I FEEL!”

 

“As the twig is bent the bough is shaped.”

 

“No. I was going to say his work changed my life, but that’s not right. I don’t think a teenager has much of a life to change. I just turned eighteen last month. I guess what I mean is his work changed my heart.”

 

“They say half a loaf is better than none, Jimmy, but in a world of want, even a single slice is better than none.”

 

“A good novelist does not lead his characters, he follows them. A good novelist does not create events, he watches them happen and then writes down what he sees.  A good novelist realizes he is a secretary, not God.”

 

“Books were escape. Books were freedom.”

 

“Mostly because nobody with his kind of talent has a right to hide it from the world.”

 

“Don’t let your good nature cloud your critical eye. The critical eye should always be cold and clear.”

 

“Coldness went marching up his arms like the feet of evil fairies.”

 

“Some of you will say, This is stupid. Will I break my promise not to argue the point, even though I consider Mr. Owen’s poems the greatest to come out of World War I? No! It’s just my opinion, you see, and opinions are like assholes: everybody has one.” They all roared at that, young ladies and gentlemen alike. Mr. Ricker drew himself up. “I may give some of you detentions if you disrupt my class, I have no problem with imposing discipline, but never will I disrespect your opinion. And yet! And yet!” Up went the finger. “Time will pass! Tempus will fugit! Owen’s poem may fall away from your mind, in which case your verdict of is-stupid will have turned out to be correct. For you, at least. But for some of you it will recur. And recur. And recur. Each time it does, the steady march of your maturity will deepen its resonance. Each time that poem steals back into your mind, it will seem a little less stupid and a little more vital. A little more important. Until it shines, young ladies and gentlemen. Until it shines.”

 

“when someone says they’re going to be honest with you, they are in most cases preparing to lie faster than a horse can trot.”

 

“He kept seeing the brains dribbling down the wallpaper. It wasn’t the killing that stayed on his mind, it was the spilled talent. A lifetime of honing and shaping torn apart in less than a second. All those stories, all those images, and what came out looked like so much oatmeal. What was the point?”

My Take

I have always found Stephen King to be a masterful storyteller and he continues to please with Finders Keepers, the second book in the Bill Hodges trilogy.  Like he does in Misery, King has created a novel that is intense, suspenseful and has some interesting thoughts on a reader’s unhealthy obsession with a reclusive writer.  I found Finders Keepers to be an engrossing book (with excellent narration by Will Patton) and highly recommend it.

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68. Mr. Mercedes

Rating:  ☆☆☆1/2

Recommended by:

Author:   Stephen King

Genre:  Fiction, Crime, Thriller, Suspense

436 pages, published June 3, 2014

Reading Format:  Audio Book

Summary 

Mr. Mercedes, the first book in the Bill Hodges Trilogy by Stephen King, tells the story of a psychopathic serial killer nicknamed Mr. Mercedes after he intentionally plows through a crowd of people waiting for an unemployment fair to begin in a stolen Mercedes.  He escapes after killing eight people and wounding fifteen more.  Months later, retired cop Bill Hodges, who is still haunted by this unsolved crime, receives a crazed letter from someone who self-identifies as the “perk” and threatens more attacks.  Hodges takes the bait and starts conversing with Mr. Mercedes.  It soon becomes apparent that only Bill Hodges, with a couple of highly unlikely allies, can apprehend the killer before he strikes again in a bigger way.

Quotes

“Never tell a lie when you can tell the truth.”

 

“Every religion lies. Every moral precept is a delusion. Even the stars are a mirage. The truth is darkness, and the only thing that matters is making a statement before one enters it. Cutting the skin of the world and leaving a scar. That’s all history is, after all: scar tissue.”

 

“Hodges has read there are wells in Iceland so deep you can drop a stone down them and never hear the splash. He thinks some human souls are like that.”

 

“It’s easy—too easy—to either disbelieve or disregard someone you dislike.”

 

“Imagination is a good servant, and a bad master.”

 

“You know the three Ages of Man, don’t you?” Hodges asks. Pete shakes his head, grinning. “Youth, middle age, and you look fuckin terrific.”

 

“Any system created by the mind of man can be hacked by the mind of man.”

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10. The Life We Bury

Rating:  ☆☆☆1/2

Recommended by:  Heather Ringoen 

Author:  Allen Eskens

Genre:  Fiction, Mystery, Suspense, Crime

Info:  303 pages, published October 14, 2014

Format:  Book

 

Summary 

As part of a college English class assignment, Joe Talbert must interview a stranger and write a brief biography of the person. At a nearby nursing home, Joe meets Carl Iverson, a dying Vietnam veteran who has been medically paroled after spending thirty years in prison for the crimes of rape and murder.  As Joe writes about Carl’s life, especially Carl’s service in Vietnam, he cannot reconcile the heroism of the soldier with the contemptible acts of the convict.  Joe, along with his female neighbor and love interest Lila, throws himself into uncovering the truth, but he is constrained in his efforts by having to deal with his extremely dysfunctional mother, the guilt of leaving his autistic brother vulnerable, and a haunting childhood memory.

 

Quotes

“What if I was wrong? What if there was no other side. What if, in all the eons of eternity, this was the one and only time that I would be alive. How would I live my life if that were the case?”

“Add to that cauldron an ever increasing measure of cheap vodka–a form of self-medication that quelled the inner scream but amplified the outer crazy–and you get a picture of the mother I left behind.”

“But deep down, I knew the truth: I needed her—not as a son needs a mother, but as a sinner needs the devil. I needed a scapegoat, someone I could point at and say, “You’re responsible for this, not me.” I needed to feed my delusion that I was not my brother’s keeper, that such a duty fell to our mother. I needed a place where I could store Jeremy’s life, his care, a box that I could shut tight and tell myself it was where Jeremy belonged—even if I knew, deep down, that it was all a lie. I needed that thin plausibility to ease my conscience.”

“We are surrounded every day by the wonders of life, wonders beyond comprehension that we simply take for granted. I decided that day that I would live my life—not simply exist. If I died and discovered heaven on the other side, well, that’d be just fine and dandy. But if I didn’t live my life as if I was already in heaven, and I died and found only nothingness, well…I would have wasted my life. I would have wasted my one chance in all of history to be alive.”

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