Reading Summary for May 2018

May was another good reading month, all of the books were winners. Most of them came from my TBR piles, although two were borrowed from my husband. Mostly crime fiction, as usual.

This time I only read one book outside of the crime fiction genre. It was nonfiction, and it was a great choice.

A Spy Among Friends: Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal (2014) by Ben Macintyre

I was about to read Young Philby by Robert Littell but decided that I wanted to know more about the Cambridge Five before I read any more fiction related to that group. My husband had this book in his stacks and very kindly let me read it. It was perfect. The focus is on the longtime friendship of Nicholas Elliott and Kim Philby. They were both officers in MI6 for many years. The story is very interesting, the writing is fantastic, and there is an afterword by John le Carré. I still want to read more in-depth about other spies in that group but this was a great introduction.

And the list of crime fiction read:

Downfall (2018) by Margot Kinberg

This is the fourth book in the Joel Williams series. Joel is a former policeman who has left that job to teach criminal justice at Tilton University. I enjoyed visiting with Joel again, and this time he moves outside of his university environment. See my full review.

The Victoria Vanishes (2008) by Christopher Fowler

The Bryant and May mysteries star two elderly detectives, Arthur Bryant and John May, members of the fictional Peculiar Crimes Unit. The series is set primarily in London. Bryant witnesses a drunk woman coming out of a pub in a London backstreet and the next he learns she is dead. But when he goes back to the scene, the pub has vanished and the street is different. Thus this is obviously an homage to Edmund Crispin’s The Moving Toyshop. 

Portrait of a Murderer (1933) by Anne Meredith

First sentence: "Adrian Gray was born in May 1862 and met his death through violence, at the hands of one of his own children, at Christmas, 1931." So we know at the beginning who will die, and not too long after that we learn who did it. An inverted mystery, a format I generally enjoy. My husband read this in April and encouraged me to read it. I enjoyed it immensely.

The House at Sea's End (2011) by Elly Griffiths

This is the third book in the series featuring forensics archaeologist Ruth Galloway. Ruth lives in Norfolk in an isolated cottage on the saltmarsh. She is often used by the police as an expert when unidentified bones are discovered. This time the bones date from World War II, and this leads to very interesting story from that time that ties in with the present.

Cutter and Bone (1976) by Newton Thornburg

Why did I wait this long to read this book? It is a very well-written thriller, although extremely bleak. But best of all for me, it is like a tour through Santa Barbara and surrounding areas in the mid-70's and the author obviously knew the area. The book was adapted to film with the title Cutter's Way.

Unorthodox Practices (1989) by Marissa Piesman

And here is another novel that I should have read long ago. It has been on the TBR piles for nearly 12 years. Nina Fischman is a Housing Court attorney, Jewish, single, and a little bit worried about that. It was a lot of fun, humorous, I found myself laughing out loud (very unusual when I read a book). The first half was better than the second half and the mystery was slight, although interesting. 

Traitor's Purse (1940) by Margery Allingham

This 11th in the Albert Campion series, published in 1940, is entirely different from the preceding books. Albert Campion awakens in a hospital bed with amnesia; he doesn't know who he is but he knows he was on a very important assignment. He leaves the hospital with the help of Amanda Fitton, who is his fiancée but it takes him a while to realize that. I loved it. See my full review.

The List (2015) by Mick Herron

A novella in the Slough House series, set between Dead Lions and Real Tigers. I haven't Real Tigers yet, so thought I would read this one first. Very good, mostly about a spy who handles older, retired spies, but featuring some of the characters in the books.