April's Reading

     Hi everyone. Happy middle of the week to you. Today I have my monthly book post to share for those who like to read about books.  Last month's reading  was  mostly mysteries, as well as a couple of books from other genres. I continued to  read some series and read a lot of familiar authors as well as two new to me authors. I even reread  a book off my bookshelf.

    I haven't read any of Patricia Cornwall's Dr. Kay Scarpetta novels in a very very very long time (yes long enough to use the word very 3 times 😏), but I recently noticed that back in 2021 she relaunched the series with her main character in Washington working for the government as a chief medical examiner. I thought this might be a good place to read another book from the series that I stopped following  at maybe book 8 or 10, but I don't exactly know how far I read into the series since I don't have any of these books in my personal library. This is book 25 in the series, so you can see I skipped a lot of the books before picking up this one.

    I didn't have a lot of catch-up adjustments other than having to look up online who a couple of the continuing characters were.  I don't know why I stopped reading this series either. This was actually a pretty good read except for the ending.

     Dr. Scarpetta is investigating a brutal murder of a woman who was found next to some train tracks. The woman also lived in the same Alexandria, Virginia gated housing development as Scarpetta's sister. The story then continues on to a couple of unusual situations. One of them is about Scarpetta's niece and her AI recreated partner. The partner actually died from Covid during the pandemic, but the niece still has conversations with her avatar image. That was a bit creepy. The other one is a murder in space connected to the International Space station. I thought that might be a bit far fetched until I became totally immersed in reading about it. 

      However, the ending of this book really fell flat on its face. This story had a lot of tension, paranoia and events and then all of a sudden this story was just over. I would rather have seen a cliff hanger than such a neat finish where I was told what happened to all the characters and how they wrapped up the murder, not taken through events that wrapped it up. Since I haven't read any of these books in decades, I can't remember if the other books were like this. Perhaps the story picks up in the next book in this series and this last chapter is supposed to make you want to move onto the next book. I'm a bit curious, but we shall see whether I read book 26. I might even go back to book 1 instead.

    

     My next read was this  book originally published in 1997. Oliver Sacks was a new author for me, but the name was still vaguely familiar. I discovered he wrote the book that inspired the movie Awakenings, which I have seen, so that's where I must have heard of him. In case like me you aren't overly familiar with the author, Oliver Sacks was a medical doctor specializing in neurology.

    Sacks occasionally had color migraines (migraines with aura), and that had him thinking about how and what we see. He then discovered that some people have a genetic condition called achromatopsia, which means they have no cones in their eyes and can only see black, white and grey. Imagine a world with no colors.  Besides not seeing color, when someone has achromatopsia they also have issues seeing  even in normal day light due to extremely light sensitive eyes. This light sensitivity makes distance vision almost impossible. 

    Achromatopsia is a genetic condition. Sacks discovered that although achromatopsia can happen anywhere,  the largest population of  people with this issue are on the island of Pingelap in Oceania.  He, along with 2 acquaintances, traveled to this Pacific Island to set up a clinic. One of his travel companions was a Norwegian man named Knut who also had this issue.  

   Reading about the disease and its history was very interesting. Along with the medical information,  Sachs also talked about his time on the island as well on another nearby island (nearby being relative in Oceania).  This book became a fascinating travelogue not only about the culture of the Pingelese but also about their history and the history of this whole area.  He also talks a lot about the natural history and life on these islands. 

    I found this an enjoyable read. This story wasn't very long, around 150 pages. The volume also has another book in it, this time set in Guam, which is now on my to read list. However, I wanted the story of Sack's time in Pingelap not to become blended with his time in Guam, so I took a break from the book at this point.

     For my next book I pulled book 1 in the Dr. Ruth Galloway mysteries off my bookshelf and reread it. With so many unread books piled next to my bed and so many other  books out there, you might wonder why I was  going back to  this mystery and rereading it. This series ended with book 15 a couple of years ago, and I was missing having a new mystery in the series. Also, sometimes you just want to read something that you feel comfortable with, so you can just step into the story with some old friends. 

     As I started reading, I realized I remembered the end of the story, which was OK because what I really enjoyed was watching Nelson's and Ruth's relationship begin. If you haven't read the series, Harry Nelson is a police detective/investigator in King's Lynn England and Dr. Ruth Galloway is a university professor and active archaeologist who specializes in bones. They meet in this book when the police need some help with some bones they have found of a young girl. The detective story revolves around a girl who has been missing for 10  years and then a new girl who recently went missing.

    Knowing where the series goes and being familiar with the characters and how they develop over the 15 books makes reading this book very interesting. There's many details I definitely forgot. Even though I knew how the mystery ended, it was still a good story. And it was great to see where the characters that are central to this series are in the first book. This is still one of my favorite mystery series, and perhaps I'll even reread more of the books. And if you decide to read them, you really need to start with this book since even though each book has a new police procedural, the characters and their relationship develop throughout the stories.

     I was still on a mystery kick, so my next book was #4 in the Dark Iceland series by Ragnar Jonassson. This book is set at Christmas time, and even though Ari Thor's boss has left and moved to Reykjavik, he calls Ari Thor and asks him to help out in a mystery in the town of Kalfshamarvik. A thirty something woman is back visiting the home where she spent part of childhood. The home is owned by a wealthy man, and the brother and sister who take care of the home and grounds are still living there after all these years. The wealthy man is there also. Plus there is a lighthouse, which was why this woman had lived there as her father had been the lighthouse keeper. 

   The police are called because this young woman is found dead at the bottom of a cliff. Was it suicide or was she pushed to her death? The twist is that not only did this woman die from falling off the cliff, but her mother and sister also died that way.

     Not only was this a fascinating story with just a few suspects, it was interesting to read about how Christmas is celebrated in Iceland. The author did a great job of not giving away the ending about how the woman ended up at the bottom of the cliff. I had my suspicions, but I'm glad the book didn't explain the story line until the end.

    When I finally finished listening to Ken Follett's Edge of Eternity book (see March Books for info about that book),  this book, What An Owl Knows by Jennifer Ackerman,  was my next listen. Edge of Eternity took me well into April, so this month was not a big listening month. However, I've been wanting to listen or to read this owl book for awhile, so I am glad I finally got around to it. 

   I read this author's Genius of Birds book several years ago, and it was an excellent book. Owls are one of my favorite birds so this book was right up my alley. And wow, I learned a lot about these birds. Even though different species of owls look different, I didn't know there was so much diversity between them besides their appearances. This goes to everything from feathers, eggs, where they live, how they hunt, their species "personalities", and more.  It makes me wonder how many other traits, not just for owls but of all other species, we have yet to discover. (It's probably a lot 😏.)

   The author, Jennifer Ackerman,  narrated this book, and she did an excellent job. However, I think I need to pick up a paper copy of this book because it is hard to refer back to specific points when you listen to a book. And there are some topics I want to read about again. One thing this book does is make you never look at an owl the same way. All creatures have their own unique stories, intelligence and connection to the Earth, and that is definitely true for owls.  If you like owls and want to know more about them, then I highly recommend this book.

     This book, In The Labyrinth of Drakes by Marie Brennan, is book 4 in the Lady Trent memoirs. This is  a fun series to listen to, as the  reader, Kate Reading, does a fantastic job with Lady Trent's bold and tenacious  personality. 

    This book is pure fantasy, set in an imaginary Victorian time. Lady Trent is a woman before her time who is completely fascinated with dragons. The books are set up to tell her story as she goes off on adventures to study dragons. If you're familiar with Amelia Peabody and her archaeological mysteries, think of her only instead of Egyptian ruins Lady Trent is off to various ends of the Earth where different types of dragons need to be studied. 

    In this volume Lady Trent, her scientific partner Tom,  and her brother Andrew are in an Arabian styled country named Akhia where women are not welcome to study dragons. She is however interested in breeding them, since so many dragons are being killed for sport.  Lady Trent is afraid they will be extinct before too long if they can't be bred.  She also realizes that the man whom she is falling for, the younger brother of the Sheikh named Suhail, who is also the archaeologist  she shared adventures with in book 3, can only  do so much to help her when she and Tom are told their breeding program is being pulled and they need to leave the country. 

   This book has action, romance and of course many dragons.  Plus a kidnapping by a Beaduin type of tribe and  the discovery of an ancient civilization. Plus lots of Lady Trent's personality too.  Of course it is her memoir.  This is a light enjoyable read or listen, and I enjoyed it as much as  I did the first 3 books in this series.

    My next mystery for April is book 1 in Peter Swanson's Henry Kimball mystery trilogy. Last fall I listened to book 3 (A Talent for Murder) in this series not realizing it was the third book. That mystery could definitely stand on its own, but  reading it made me curious about the first 2 books. 

     In this book you meet Henry Kimball who is a police officer in the City of Boston. You also meet Lily Kitner, another main character from book 3.  Lily is sitting at Heathrow Airport when she meets Ted Severson. They get talking and end up sitting near each other on the plane back to Boston. From this meeting a murder is planned, and then, in what I should have expected to happen but didn't see it coming, there is one gigantic  book changing twist .

      This book took no time to get into, and it was fast paced. The chapters alternated between characters, in part 1 it was Lily and Ted, and then Lily and Miranda (Ted's wife) in part 2, and finally Lily and Henry in part 3. I don't want to  give anything away, but  one thing that kept me reading was wanting to know how Lily gets to book 3.   I also loved the New England connection too as this story was set in both real and made up places that were typical New England. Most of the real places were familiar to me also.

     I was a little disappointed this book ended with a cliff hanger, and I still have no idea how Lily manages to get to book 3. But it's an easy enough fix to answer this question. I just need to read the next book which is titled The Kind Worth Saving. I'm sure you'll be seeing that book in a book post soon.

    

     Last month I reread the book Driving Over Lemons, which is book 1 in what I thought was a trilogy about the author (Chris Stewart), his wife and their young daughter Chloe as they set up life at a rural farm in Andalucia, Spain. I had read this trilogy years ago and in March had pulled book 1 off my book shelf. I planned on reading the next 2 books, but then I noticed that I could listen to this book, the latest and also 4th book in series with my Audible account for free. These free listens usually only last for a limited time, so I decided to jump ahead to this  book.

    Twenty years have passed since book 1, and the family still lives on their rustic farm. Chloe has reached her last year of high school and then moves on to college. This book is also filled with more  interesting stories, everything from farm life, from being on a British cooking show, to judging a tuna cooking competition, to heavy rain washing out the bridge and almost taking the family car away with it, to the author's first ever job and many more of life's adventures, most of them in their adopted Spanish home.

    What I liked is how each story is separate from the next but also how they all come together. This is a light and enjoyable listen, filled with some humor that made me laugh. And even better, since I listened to this volume, I was able to hear the author read his own work, which always reminds me more of a conversation with a friend. I also never even noticed that I skipped from book 1 ahead to book 4 either, but I do want to get back to the 2 middle books at some point.

     This 1959 mystery, Death in Cyprus by M.M. Kaye, is part of a "Death In" series by this author.  M. M. Kaye wrote other "Death In" books like Death in Zanzibar, Death in Kashmir and a few others.  I have a set with a few of these mysteries that have been sitting on my book shelves for a very long time. This book was originally published in 1956 in England under the title Death Walks In Cyprus.  Kaye also wrote a series of books about India which were quite popular in the late 1970's and 1980's, including the Far Pavilions which might be a name you recognize. 

   I'd read a couple of books from the set a very long time ago (I'm thinking I bought these books in the 1980's) and don't remember anything about them. I don't think I've ever read this volume. These books are not connected to each other except the general Death In theme, so you can read them in any order. 

    In this mystery you meet Amanda who is in her early 20's, and after both her parents died when she was a young child, she was brought up by her rich but very old fashioned uncle. He is taking a journey to some of his factories, and Amanda joins him. But when they arrive in Egypt, he decides he's going to places not suitable for a young lady, and he wants to send Amanda home to England. She, now being  21, decides she is going to Cyprus, much to her uncle's disappointment. He does however arrange for her to travel by ship there and then stay on the island with someone connected to his company. 

     On the ship Amanda is with a group of people all going to Cypress. There's a death within this group, and when they arrive in Cypress, the group comes back together. Is Amanda someone's target? There is a series of events that look like that might be the case. Then there's Steve, the handsome man who Amanda is attracted to, but is he a good guy or a bad guy? 

     This is a pretty good vintage mystery, reminding me a bit of Agatha Christie,  a  bit of Mary Stewart's Moon-spinners and a  bit of Daphne Du Maurier's Rebecca.  I liked the suspense and the way the story works with the scenery (which makes me want to visit Cyprus in the 1950's). And I didn't even come close to figuring out who the killer was. This book was very enjoyable so I also think I need to read some of the others in this set and not let them languish on my bookshelf.

     This book, Conclave by Robert Harris, was my last book for the month. It's another mystery suspense book, and since I enjoyed the film, I thought I'd read about the conclave process before the actual one  takes place in Rome.  I'm assuming the book's descriptions are true. Plus,  books are usually better than the films based on them, and this one is, going  more into depth into some of the situations you see in the film.  But it does stick fairly close to the film version. (Or I should say the film sticks pretty close to the book version.)

    The main character of this book is Cardinal Jacopo Lomeli. The Pope has died; now the conclave begins. I like how the characters are all humans with flaws. Many of the cardinals are power hungry, with big personalities and their own beliefs of how the church should move forward. Some are conservative, some more liberal. 

    The authors throws in a few flies in the ointment so to speak. There are protests going on; there is  a Cardinal that shows up who is not on the list; there is the rumor that one cardinal was dismissed from his position by the Pope just  before the Pope passed. Lomeli, being dean of the conclave, becomes the "detective" and if it wasn't for him, some of these questions may never have been answered. I also found the process of the conclave interesting, seeing I didn't know much about it. 

    This book was a really enjoyable read that was hard to put down. I've never read a Robert Harris book before, and he writes an interesting story. Plus it is one that is easy to read and get into. Now I  want to read some other books by this author. 

    That's it for my April reading. As always, thanks if you made it through the whole post, and if you have any recommendations, I'd love to know what they are.