Reading in December 2017

Here I am, nearly into the middle of January, and only now working on a list of books I read in December. December was a big reading month for me; I read a total of 12 books. Three of them were not mystery novels, although two of those did have mystery elements.

In the non-crime related group, we have:

Persuasion (1817) by Jane Austen

Persuasion is the story of Anne Elliot, the middle child in a family of three girls; at the time of the book she is 27 years old and unmarried.  It was the last novel Austen wrote and was published after her death. It is a more mature novel, and certainly Anne is a more mature protagonist than the other books I have read so far. My thoughts on the book are HERE.

Not All Tarts Are Apples (2002) by Pip Granger

This book was nominated for the 2002 Agatha award for Best First Mystery Novel. There is a mystery to the story but I would not categorize it that way. The central character is Rosie, seven years old, who has been taken in by friends of her mother. The couple live over a Soho café that they run during the day. It is 1953, the year of the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, and that was fun to read about. I enjoyed all of it, the story, the characters, the narration by Rosie.

To Say Nothing of the Dog (1997) by Connie Willis

The second novel in the Oxford Time Travel series. Ned Henry has made too many trips to 1940 in search of the Bishop's bird stump, and has been prescribed a week or two in Victorian England to get some rest and relaxation. He thinks he is there to recuperate, but really he has a new mission to pursue, and he has no time to relax.

Where Doomsday Book was sad, To Say Nothing of the Dog is funny with some elements of a mystery and more than one romance. I loved it just as much as Doomsday Book. 

And now for the nine crime fiction reads.

A Fatal Winter (2012) by G. M. Malliet

The 2nd book in the Max Tudor series, set in the weeks before Christmas. Max is the vicar of the very small village of Nether Monkslip. However, because he was previously an agent for MI5, he also helps the local police out on occasion. My review here.

Evil at the Root (1990) by Bill Crider

This is the 5th book in Bill Crider's long running series about Sheriff Dan Rhodes, set in rural Texas. A wonderful series, and I will be reading them all. My review here.

The Renewable Virgin (1984)  by Barbara Paul

This was one of my favorite reads of 2017. Rudy Benedict is a screenwriter who dies after taking poison in a headache remedy. The story is about three women affected by his death: his mother, Fiona Benedict, a college professor from Ohio; Kelly Ingram, a TV actress; and Marian Larch, a NYPD homicide detective. My review here.

Where There's a Will (1940) by Rex Stout

This is the 8th book in the Nero Wolfe series, published in 1940. I have read every book in the series more than once, and I always I enjoy them. This is not the best of them, but still very entertaining to read. My thoughts are here.

The Becket Factor (1990) by Michael David Anthony

There are three books in the Canterbury Cathedral mystery series, and this is the first. They feature a retired intelligence officer, Colonel Richard Harrison, who has given up his job in intelligence to have more time to care for his wife who is disabled. There is a death at the Cathedral, and Harrison's former boss asks him to investigate surreptitiously. With the ecclesiastical background, and a hint of spy fiction, I enjoyed this book. Coincidentally, this was set around Christmas so it was a good choice for December. 

The Cuckoo's Calling (2013) by Robert Galbraith (aka J.K. Rowling)

Cormoran Strike, formerly a military policeman, is now working as a private investigator because he lost his leg to a land mine in Afghanistan. As this book begins, his PI business is not doing so well. Things start looking up when Robin Ellacott takes a job as his temporary secretary and he gets a high-profile job to investigate a suicide that occurred three months earlier. Based on reviews, I thought I would like this and I did. The main characters are convincing, the story held my interest, but the book could have been shorter.

Hit Man (1998) by Lawrence Block

Hit Man is not a novel but a series of connected stories about an assassin named Keller. He lives in an apartment in New York City and leads a normal life, except that the way he supports himself is by killing people. It was a very enjoyable read but it is an adjustment to get used to a killer being the main focus, without any retribution in the end. 

The Last Voice You Hear (2004) by Mick Herron

The second book in Mick Herron's series starring Private Investigator Zoë Boehm, set in Oxford, England. I loved the first book, and this one was just as good. Zoë is a strong female character, intelligent and resourceful. 

Skull Mantra (1999) by Eliot Pattison

Shan Tao Yun  is a Chinese investigator from Beijing who was denounced and sentenced to hard labor because he criticized the regime. Assigned to a prison work gang in the mountains of Tibet, he is called upon to investigate when a headless corpse is found on a mountainside. I enjoyed this book as much for the view of Tibet under Chinese occupation as for the mystery. 

The Renewable Virgin: Barbara Paul

The Renewable Virgin is the first book by Barbara Paul that I have read, and it won’t be my last. It was one of my favorite reads of 2017.

Rudy Benedict is a screenwriter who dies after taking poison in a headache remedy; the police are not even sure if the poison was intended for him. Kelly Ingram is his friend (and almost lover) who plays a continuing role as a beautiful, dumb blonde in the TV show (described as "Harry O in the Big Apple") that Rudy sometimes wrote for. Rudy's mother, Fiona Benedict, is a college professor who comes to New York and seeks out Kelly. Marian Larch is a NYPD homicide detective who ends up mediating between them.

This was the perfect book for me. I don't know why I waited so long to read it. The three women affected by Rudy’s death tell the story in alternating chapters. Each chapter title is the woman's name so it is very clear who is talking. They each come from different environments, and have very different personalities. The story was written and set in the early 1980's and thus reflects the experiences of women in the workplace at the time.

The plot is complicated and the background story of the TV show, Kelly's role in it, and the competition between her agent and the show's producer is funny and entertaining. The characters are very well done. The story is light and humorous, but not lightweight at all.

This is the first of seven books in the Marian Larch series, although it was an accidental series, per the author. Thus Marian does not always feature prominently in each book.


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Publisher:   Bantam Books, 1986 (orig. publ. 1984) 
Length:       185 pages
Format:      Paperback 
Series:       Marian Larch, #1
Setting:      New York City
Genre:       Mystery
Source:      I purchased this book.