I am writing this while sleep deprived, guzzling a cold brew, having stayed up all night reading. At some point I remember my husband telling me he was going to bed and me telling him I’d be right up. The next time I looked up I had finished The Last Thing He Told Me and, aside from my reading light, the house was pitch dark. The Last Thing He Told Me is an excellently plotted … Continue reading The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave
Lila Macapagal has moved back to Shady Palms after a hella-bad breakup, and is trying to help her aunt with her restaurant, which is in financial trouble. When Lila’s ex-boyfriend drops dead during his meal with his stepfather, the restaurant’s landlord, Lila becomes the prime suspect. She decides to investigate the nefarious ex to find out who really killed him. Lila is…not great at detecting. Lila’s investigation mainly rests on her going to different restaurants, … Continue reading Arsenic and Adobo by Mia Manansala
I have barely ever mentioned the Murderbot series in the past year, so it may have escaped your notice. I definitely cannot adequately transcribe the noise I made when I received an ARC of Fugitive Telemetry, the newest in the Murderbot Diaries. I was in the midst of yet another re-read of the series, and having a brand-new Murderbot story was a delight. And now everyone gets brand new Murderbot to read! In October 2020, … Continue reading Fugitive Telemetry by Martha Wells
An Unexpected Peril was, as expected, perfect vacation reading. Veronica and Stoker are assisting with the preparations for an exhibit at the Curiosity Club commemorating a mountain climber, Alice Baker-Greene. Greene died in a climbing accident in the country of Alpenwald, and the princess of Alpenwald has arrived in England for the opening of the exhibit, which is as much about the country as it is about Greene’s climbing achievements. Then, in short order, they … Continue reading An Unexpected Peril by Deanna Raybourn
The Diabolical Bones is the second book in the Bronte Mystery series. I enjoyed the first book, The Vanished Bride, and the second book can be read as a sequel or a stand-alone. In The Diabolical Bones, the siblings (Branwell, Charlotte, Anne, and Emily) attempt to solve a mystery concerning a skeleton that is discovered walled up in a local mansion. To whom did the skeleton belong, who put it there, and why? The mystery … Continue reading The Diabolical Bones by Bella Ellis
The Wife in the Attic is a retelling of Jane Eyre where a lonely governess falls for her employer’s mysterious wife, and contemplates whether murdering him is the easiest way out of their predicament. For many of you, that’s all you need to know to one-click. Go forth and enjoy this audiobook which is available on Audible now, and as an ebook in Fall 2021. This book is a gothic delight. It’s unsettling but not … Continue reading The Wife in the Attic by Rose Lerner
There’s a theme to The Mystery of Mrs. Christie and it’s, “Maybe don’t fuck with your wife when she invents unsolveable ways to murder people for a living.” In a lot of ways this book is a historical Gone Girl, which normally would be my jam, but I found the suspense disrupted by the fact that this is based on a real event and I already knew what happened. Add to that, we spend a … Continue reading The Mystery of Mrs. Christie by Marie Benedict
Jane Eyre is in my top ten favorite books and I’m very protective of it. I wrote a short book called Pride Prejudice and Popcorn: TV and Film Adaptations of Pride and Prejudice, Wuthering Heights, and Jane Eyre, in which I concluded that any adaption can work as long as it stays true to the themes and characters of the source material. The Wife Upstairs is hard to review because how it works on its … Continue reading The Wife Upstairs by Rachel Hawkins
As I sat down to draft my review of Pretty Little Wife I realized it was going to have to be somewhat brief. It wasn’t that I didn’t have a lot to say about the book (I do!), it’s that this thriller is so beautifully plotted and executed that saying too much about the book would ruin the reading experience for other people. It’s one of those frustrating situations where I just want to shove … Continue reading Pretty Little Wife by Darby Kane
Tara: When I’m looking up f/f titles for Hide Your Wallet posts, I occasionally come across a blurb that sounds so full of crazysauce, I immediately show Shana. The latest was for Queen of Humboldt. Check this out: Marisol Soltero’s life is built on big scores and fast women. From her nightclub she rules over the Humboldt Park neighborhood of Chicago with ruthless calculation. Though everyone knows her as the Queen of Humboldt, Marisol lives … Continue reading Queen of Humboldt by Tagan Shepard
Vanishing Falls is one of my few DNF’s of the year, and it’s extremely unusual for me to DNF a mystery at all (I need to know what happens!). This book pretty much failed on all counts, though, and I couldn’t force myself to finish it. First of all, I picked up this book expecting a Gothic mystery, but that’s not what this is. The book is set in the Tasmanian town of Vanishing Falls. … Continue reading Vanishing Falls by Poppy Gee
