Category Archives: Fiction

Reviewed Elsewhere: Holiday Grind, by Cleo Coyle

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Holiday Blend

From the moment I first picked up a Cleo Coyle novel, I knew I’d found a kindred spirit – two really – one in Ms. Coyle herself, and the other in her lead character Clare Cosi, who cooks with an Italian flair and has espresso running in her veins.

Recently, I read Ms. Coyle’s latest coffeehouse novel, Holiday Grind which features cafe owner and amateur detective tracking down the person responsible for killing her customer (and friend), Alf, who spends his winter days as a street corner Santa Claus.

If you’ve never read a coffeehouse mystery, you should know that all the books are the type of cozy mysteries that go best with froufrou espresso drinks, chocolate dipped biscotti, and the crackling sound from Amish fireplaces.

Look for my review of Holiday Grind later this month in All Things Girl.

Teaser Tuesdays: Holiday Grind by Cleo Coyle

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On Teaser Tuesdays readers are asked to:

  • Grab your current read.
  • Let the book fall open to a random page.
  • Share with us two (2) “teaser” sentences from that page, somewhere between 7 and 12 lines.
  • You also need to share the title of the book that you’re getting your “teaser” from … that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you’ve given.

My teaser this week is from Holiday Grind, by Cleo Coyle. I’ve been reading it from my cozy house, where it finally feels like November (49 degrees at 6:41 PM) and taking breaks to mock the people across the street who don’t seem to know how their moving truck works.

If you don’t know the Coffeehouse Mysteries, you should seriously check them out. Anyway, here’s the teaser:

There was nothing like walking through the Village on a snowy winter night. The few vehicles on the slippery street crept along no faster than horse-drawn carriages. Every surface appeared flocked with white; the pungent smell of active old fireplaces floated through the air; and bundled couples hurried past dark storefronts, eager to get back to their warm apartments or inside a cozy pub for a glass of mulled wine or mug of Irish coffee.

As I passed by St. Luke’s churchyard, the whole world seemed to go silent, save the icy flurries that still pecked at my parka and the crunch, crunch, crunching of my winter boots. At one intersection I stood alone, watching a traffic light provide a signal for crossroads that had no traffic. Hands in pockets, I waited half amused as the bright red light flipped to green in an unintentional
Christmas display just for me.

from Holiday Grind, chapter 3, by Cleo Coyle.

Review: Heat Wave by Richard Castle

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Heat Wave
Heat Wave
by Richard Castle
Get it at Amazon >>

Richard Castle might be as fictional as belly fat on a Barbie ™ Doll, but his book, Heat Wave is a fast-paced mystery with just enough romance to keep it interesting.

As anyone who’s ever seen Castle on television knows, Heat Wave is the novel about fictional NYPD detective Nikki Heat and her shadow, journalist Jamie Rook, and both characters are clearly stand-ins for series characters Det. Kate Beckett, and Castle himself.

One might think the fact that this is obviously a well-placed marketing tool makes the book unreadable.

One would be wrong.

Heat Wave is a bit short, coming in at around 200 pages, but it’s funny, interesting, and satisfying, much as the average episode of Castle generally turns out to be.

As it’s a mystery, I won’t spoil the plot, except to mention blackouts, dual murders, and art thievery. If you want to know how those three things combine, and where the aforementioned romance comes in, you’ll have to read the book!

Review: Sarah’s Key by Tatiana de Rosnay

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Sarah's Key
Sarah’s Key
by Tatiana de Rosnay
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While there is no such thing as a term life insurance policy that repays you if you don’t like a book, it’s a pretty safe bet that if you see enough random strangers reading a novel you’re also considering, it probably doesn’t suck. That’s what happened to me with Tatiana de Rosnay’s recently reprinted novel Sarah’s Key: I’d looked at it in various bookstores on more than one occasion, but hadn’t bought it, and then, finally, after seeing too many other people reading it, I took home a copy of my very own a couple weeks ago.

I read it almost instantly, but haven’t had time to post the review until now.

In Sarah’s Key we are treated to not one, but two stories, one taking place in 1942, and the other in modern France. In the past, we are introduced to a young girl named Sarah. She is awakened one morning by loud knocking at the door of her family’s Parisian apartment, and when her mother answers the knock, they find the police waiting. Sarah’s family is Jewish, and they’re about to be part of one of the largest roundups of French Jews. Her father’s been living in the basement for weeks, anticipating such an event, and her little brother isn’t awake yet.

Given time to gather a few things, Sarah wakes her brother, and sends him to hide in the secret cabinet – literally a hollow space in the wall between two rooms – where they often play, and have created a secret lair, as children do, with food and water and books. She locks him in, and promises to come back. Sadly, she and her parents are then hustled off to the Vélodrome d’Hiver, an indoor bicycle racing arena in Paris, then to a camp outside the city, and then off to Auschwitz. While Sarah does manage to escape before the last transport, and is taken in by a French farmer and his wife, she doesn’t make it back to Paris in time to save her brother.

As Sarah’s story is unfolding in the past, however, Sarah’s Key also introduces us to Julia Jarmond, an American journalist who has lived in Paris for 25 years, and is married to a French architect. She shares a special bond with her grandmother-in-law, who is a feisty old woman, and when she is assigned to cover the memorial of the Vélodrome d’Hiver roundups, it is this woman who reveals that the family moved into their vintage Paris apartment only because it was available after being vacated by Sarah’s family.

As Julia begins to research her story, she finds herself compelled to learn about the family who previously lived in the apartment, and eventually, she does track down Sarah’s surviving family members, but only after her marriage disintegrates.

If this sounds like a depressing story – trust me, it’s NOT. It’s imbued with love and hope, and is written so delicately, so gently, that what should be horrifying instead serves as a backdrop for a wonderful exploration of history and the human heart.

Review: Hoodoo Sea by Rolf Hitzer

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Hoodoo Sea
Hoodoo Sea
by Rolf Hitzer
Get it from Amazon.com >>

There’s something really exciting about reading an author’s first work, so when I was offered the opportunity to review Rolf Hitzer’s debut novel, Hoodoo Sea, I jumped at the chance. After all, I like a good action-adventure novel, and coming home from a vacation that involved climbing lighthouses and hanging out at murky cold beaches put me in just the right frame of mind for such a work.

In Hoodoo Sea, Hitzer introduces us to Scott Reed, a NASA wing commander chosen to command the test mission of the first speed-of-light craft. Oh, and Reed, like the author, is Canadian.

Reed and his three teammates take off with no issue, and immediately head for that part of the ocean known as “Hoodoo Sea” by navy types, and “the Bermuda triangle” by the rest of us. Their craft is surrounded by a dense fog, instruments go wonky, and there are flashes of bright light. Finally, they land, but on an Island populated by hunter-gatherer types and giant wolves with flashlight-bright eyes. This is where their adventure really begins.

Part action-adventure, part survival tale, and part paranormal thriller, Hoodoo Sea is a compelling read, with strong characters and just enough detail to allow the reader to visualize the scene without feeling like it’s overkill.

I liked that the mission team included a woman, and that the American vs. Canadian bickering was realistic without overpowering the plot. I enjoyed the descriptions of the native population, including Tribefeeder Henpo, and the hints that the wolves might not be wolves.

I confess, that when my stepfather, who peeked at the book before I could, pointed out that author Hitzer is from Winnipeg, just like his main character, I was a bit concerned there would be elements of “Marty Stu-ism” – self insertion – but the story didn’t read that way.

While the ending seemed a bit abrupt, and had a sort of “but it was all a dream” cheat that most writers are warned against in high school, in this novel, that device worked well, and did not in any way diminish the story.

Congratulations, Rolf Hitzer, on a great first novel. More, please?

Check back on Monday , October 26th for a guest post from Rolf Hitzer.

Review: Dracula: the Un-Dead by Dacre Stoker and Ian Holt

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Dracula: the Un-Dead
Dracula: the Un-Dead
by Dacre Stoker and Ian Holt
Get it at Amazon >>

It’s October, and even though the temperature is bouncing between hot and cool in much the same fashion as the ball on a ping pong table, there is still a bite to the air, and something indefinable that always comes as Halloween draws nearer. It’s an appropriate time, then, to revisit a classic horror tale. It’s an even better time to experience such a tale in a new way, which is what I did over the weekend, as I immersed myself in Dracula: the Un-Dead, the official unofficial sequel to Bram Stoker’s original novel.

Co-authors Dacre Stoker and Ian Holt do an excellent job of weaving their tale with Bram’s original, and with blending familiar characters with new ones. In this novel, however, Dracula isn’t the villain the original Stoker (Dacre’s great-granduncle) portrayed him to be – though, in all truth – neither is he sweetness and light. Mina Harker (nee Murray) is also painted with a slightly different brush. In this version of the story, which picks up 25 years after the Transylvanian Count’s apparent demise, she and old Vlad consummated their relationship in more ways than just the drinking of blood, and young Quincey Harker is not Jonathon’s son, but his.

Mother and son aren’t exactly the best of friends, however, especially since the younger Harker wants to pursue a career on the stage, and not in Jonathon’s failing law firm, while Mom doesn’t seem to be aging the way a respectable woman should. This latter is also a bone of contention between Mina and her husband.

It’s not just the Harkers who figure into this sequel, however. We see Seward, Holmwood and Van Helsing all dealing in completely different ways with the aftermath of their earlier adventure.

New characters enrich the tale in this novel. Notable among them is Inspector Cotford, a Lestrade-like police detective who is working the Dracula case while also trying to solve the mostly-cold case of Jack the Ripper. His associates are given names that vampire fans of the modern era will find either amusing or jarring, perhaps both. One is Price, but I’ll not reveal the others. Suffice to say that in-jokes abound.

All in all, Dracula: the Un-Dead was both satisfying and entertaining.

Even better, Stoker and Holt have left open the possibility of another sequel.

Book Review: The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown

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The Lost Symbol
Dan Brown
Doubleday
509 pages
Get it from Amazon

I confess: I pre-ordered Dan Brown’s latest book, The Lost Symbol so I would have it in my hands on the day it was released. It’s not that I think Brown is the greatest writer in the world – he’s not – but he is very good at what he writes: escapist adventure stories rooted in plausibility. Put another way, just as a cigar store Indian can scare you if you turn around suddenly and find yourself facing one, Brown has this habit of sneaking provocative ideas into his fiction, and fiction that stirs controversy and makes you think, is never bad.

And, as they say, any publicity is good publicity.

The Lost Symbol is no exception.

In this installment of the Robert Langdon adventures, our favorite symbologist is sent to Washington, D.C., ostensibly to pinch hit as the speaker in a special event. Almost immediately he finds he was duped, and instead of acting as a guest lector, he must instead turn detective, and try to solve the necessary puzzles to open a metaphysical portal hidden somewhere in the Capitol, all before a life-long friend is cruelly murdered.

What follows is an adventure story that combines the history of the Freemasons with the budding field of Noetic Science, and takes us on a National Treasure-esque tour of D.C. in the process.

Longer than The Da Vinci code, and less controversial than Angels and Demons, The Lost Symbol is an entertaining adventure through history and Mystery, and, at 509 pages, a really satisfying read as well.

Goes well with endless cups of coffee and chocolate chip cookies.

Book Review: A Bone to Pick

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A Bone to Pick
by Charlaine Harris
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Just as looking at a jumbled pile of Ferrari parts doesn’t hint at the beauty of a finished car, so, too, does the first novel in a series not really give an adequate picture of the entire collection.

I’ve now finished the second in Charlaine Harris’s Aurora Teagarden series, A Bone to Pick, and while I found the first book enjoyable, I’m much more in love with Roe Teagarden in this second installment.

In this book, she inherits a house and a pile of money from her recently-deceased friend Jane, and later finds that she’s inherited a mystery as well. In between dealing with the fact that ex-lover Arthur and his new wife are living across the street from said house (and expecting a baby), and dating the Episcopal priest who performed her mother’s recent marriage ceremony, Roe must also figure out what the mystery is, and why she’s been charged with solving it.

As with the first novel, this book is a cozy story, gentle, and homey, and perfect when it’s raining outside, and you don’t feel very well.

Book Review: Real Murders by Charlaine Harris

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Real Murders
by Charlaine Harris
Get it at Amazon >>

When a friend gave me almost the entire collection of Charlaine Harris’s Aurora Teagarden mysteries to read, I was a little bit leary. After all, this was the same woman who had captured my attention with the Sookie Stackhouse books. How would her earlier series compare?

I had nothing to worry about, at least with book one, Real Murders. It’s the story of a serial killer who is committing crimes and staging them to look like famous murders of the past, and it’s quite entrancing. Already, I’m eager to see what happens next with Aurora “Roe” Teagarden, mild mannered librarian.

In truth, these books are somewhat akin to literary air filters, washing away the fast-paced, sex-laden stories that are so prevalent today (not that I mind sex, really, but, still…) and replacing them with slower, gentler stories where plot and character are explored with a sense of graciousness.

I’ve no idea what I’ll find in book two. But I’m looking forward to the experience.

Review: Life’s A Beach by Clare Cook

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I picked up Clare Cook’s novel Life’s a Beach because I was in the mood for a book to give me a jolt of laughter the way thoroughbreds get a jolt of energy and nutrients when given horse supplements. I was not disappointed.

Ginger is a fun-loving, woman a bit older than I am (specifically, in her early forties), with a sister about to turn fifty. She’s still living in her parent’s garage apartment (she hates the term FROG – finished room over garage), with her cat named Boyfriend and her non-committal boyfriend, a glass-blower named Noah. Glass is a trend in Ginger’s life. Between real jobs, she’s been trying to find herself, and her current incarnation involves making sea glass jewelry.

Against the background of her mother’s entree into the Red Hat Society, her father’s unwillingness to downsize and sell the family home, and her sister’s upcoming birthday, Ginger is a breath of fresh air, but living in denial, so when her eight-year-old nephew Riley gets tapped to be an extra in a horror movie, she is more than willing to go to the set and act as his guardian.

Clare Cook, who previously gave us Must Love Dogs, sends us on a wonderfully funny, sometimes sappy journey to the shore and beyond, all the while holding up a rather forgiving mirror to those of us who know that fifty really is the new thirty.