Books Read in March and April 2023

I skipped a reading summary for March so this is a combo summary for March and April. I read ten books in March and five in September. In April, all the books I read were crime fiction. In March, I read a biography, a graphic novel, two books of general fiction, and a fantasy novel, in addition to crime fiction novels. 

Nonfiction / Biography

The Sisters: The Saga of the Mitford Family (2001) by Mary S. Lovell

After reading The Six by Laura Thompson, I felt like I could benefit from another look at the Mitford family. I hoped for more information about Jessica, Pam and Deborah. And I definitely got that. Also more about their parents, although their brother Tom was only touched on. See my full review here.

Graphic novel

A Man and His Cat, Vol. 3 (2019) by Umi Sakurai (Writer and Artist) 

There are 10 volumes in this Japanese manga series. In the first volume, a widower, Kanda, seeks a cat as a companion, and finds his perfect match at a pet store. The man falls in love with his new cat and names him Fukumaru. The stories in the first and second volume are mostly about Kanda learning to live with and take care of a cat. In the third volume, some earlier relationships in his life are explored. I will be reading more in this charming manga series. See my review of volumes 1-3.

General Fiction

Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont (1971) by Elizabeth Taylor

Mrs. Palfrey, a widow living on a fixed income, has just moved into an extended residence hotel in London. There are a small number of older residents who are living there permanently. She is proud and trying to fit in, and ashamed that she has no one to visit her.  It explores the time in life when people are alone and moving toward a time when they need more care, so it is not very upbeat but also not a complete downer. It was a very good book and I will be looking for more by this author.

Dear Life: Stories (2012) by Alice Munro

I started reading this book of short storied in November 2022 and finished them in March of this year. There are fourteen stories in the book. Some of them are exceptionally good and I liked the stories overall very much. Alice Munro is a Canadian author and I liked the Canadian setting. I will be reading more of her short stories. See my posts on the first eight stories and the next six stories.

Fantasy

Assassin's Apprentice (1995) by Robin Hobb

I haven't read a lot of fantasy, and certainly not a lot of high fantasy. This first book in the Farseer Trilogy by Robin Hobb has a medieval fantasy setting.  I took  a chance on this one because of Cath's review of The Mad Ship from the Liveship Traders Trilogy by the same author. I loved it and I will be reading more of the trilogy. My review is here.

Crime Fiction

Time to Murder and Create (1976) by Lawrence Block

This is the second book in the Matthew Scudder series. I read the first book in the series back in 2011 and it took me this long to return to it. My goal is to read as many books in the series as I can; there are 17 books. In this novel, Matthew is hired by a criminal to avenge his death. The criminal, who has been supporting himself with blackmail, supplies Matthew with information on his current victims, as he suspects one of them of planning to murder him. I enjoyed this book and read it very quickly, but I suspect that the series get much better as it goes along.

Baby, Would I Lie? (1994) by Donald Westlake

This book is the second book in a two-part series about Sara Joslyn and Jack Ingersoll. Both are journalists, and they are covering the trial of country singer Ray Jones for the rape and murder of Belle Hardwick. See my review here.

The Mask of Memory (1974) by Victor Canning

The Mask of Memory is the third book in the Birdcage series. The series is about a covert security group in the UK, a branch of the Ministry of Defense. In this book, one of the top agents is leading a double life. He is married to a woman who lives in North Devon; she does not know what he does for a living and sees him infrequently. No one in his group knows that he is married, or of the existence of the home in North Devon. I enjoyed the first two books in the series and this one was also very good. I will be moving on to the fourth book in the series, The Doomsday Carrier, soon.

4:50 from Paddington (1957) by Agatha Christie

This is the 7th Jane Marple mystery. Jane Marple's friend Elspeth McGillicuddy sees a man strangling a woman in a passing train. She tells the railway officials and later the police, but no one can find any evidence of a crime, and they don't really believe her. Jane Marple decides to investigate. After finishing almost all the Hercule Poirot novels in 2021, I now want to finish up the Miss Marple series.

Murder in a Nunnery (1940) by Eric Shepherd

The first of two short novels set in Harrington Convent. I read this book for the 1940 Club organized by Simon at Stuck in a Book and Karen at Kaggsy's Bookish Ramblings. My review is here.

Bad Faith (2002) by Aimée and David Thurlo

Bad Faith is the first book in a series about a nun who solves mysteries. The setting is in New Mexico. Sister Agatha is an extern nun who deals with the outside world for her order. I liked the mystery but the really interesting part was reading about the cloistered nuns and their daily life. There are only six in the series and I would definitely read more of them if I have the time.

The So Blue Marble (1940) by Dorothy B. Hughes

This book was Dorothy B. Hughes' debut mystery novel. It is unlike any other book by Hughes that I have read. In a Lonely Place and Ride a Pink Horse are noir novels, with a much more serious tone. This one is also on the noir side but more fantastical, and requires a good bit of suspension of disbelief. See my review here.

The Blind Man of Seville (2003) by Robert Wilson

Although I had decided earlier to stop reading Robert Wilson's novels because most of them had too much graphic violence and sex for me, I took a chance on this book, because it is set in Seville, Spain. This book did have those elements, but I was glad I took a chance on the book. The setting and character development was very good.

The Echoing Strangers (1952) by Gladys Mitchell

This is the 25th novel in Gladys Mitchell's Mrs. Bradley series. There are two plot threads. The first takes place mostly in the village of Wetwode on the River Burwater, where Francis Caux lives with his guardian, Miss Higgs. A murder victim is discovered near to the riverside bungalow that Francis lives in. The second follows a separate murder investigation in the village of Mede, where Derek Caux, Francis's twin, lives with his grandfather, Sir Adrian Caux. I read this book as part of a group read hosted at Jason Half's blog. The first of four posts about the novel is here.

Body Line (2011) by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

I used to love the Bill Slider mystery series but got side-tracked. In April, I decided to pick it up again with Body Line, the 13th book in the series. I had just finished a very violent and dark police procedural and I wanted to go in the opposite direction. There is a strong focus on the lives of the two major characters (Slider and his partner Atherton) in addition to the investigation of the crime. I will be looking for the next in the series.

My husband was on jury duty for a few days recently. The images at the top and bottom of the post were taken at the Santa Barbara County Courthouse, while he was there. The courthouse building has lovely grounds and architecture. Click on the images for the best viewing quality.

Hard Going: Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

I have been reading this police procedural series by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles, featuring DI Bill Slider of the Metropolitan Police, Shepherd’s Bush, West London, for many years. Not sure when I discovered it but at the time several were already published and I read them all very quickly.

Recently I was given the opportunity to review this book by Severn House via NetGalley. Even though I was only up to the 12th book in the series, and this is the 16th, I decided to break my rules and take a chance and read the most recent book in the series. I am glad I did.

I like all kinds of police procedural series. I like them traditional, with less violence. I like them gritty with cops with more behavioral or psychological problems. And in between. I see this series as a traditional, cozyish series. There is a strong focus on the lives of the two major characters (Slider and his partner Atherton) in addition to the investigation of the crime; that makes it feel more realistic.

A concise summary of this book in a brief piece on "The British Police Procedural" at the publisher's site:

Harrod-Eagles' sixteenth book in the Bill Slider series, Hard Going, has her detective inspector trying to juggle his personal life while he and his team must investigate the brutal killing of an elderly solicitor who seemingly had no enemies.

In this case, the police can find very little information about the victim. He has many friends and acquaintances in his neighborhood, and he is known for helping out hard-luck cases, but his friends can provide no background on him. No next of kin. Slider and his team must work hard to find where he came from. I think I must especially enjoy the situation where a person's identity is in question, because I just read Henrietta Who? by Catherine Aird and enjoyed that story as well. (See that review here.)

Like many long running series, this one has its ups and downs, but I have found it a series worth sticking with. The characters are likable. I find that the policemen are very well-defined characters, the other persons involved in the crime less so. These books tell the story of the day by day investigation, looking for leads and connections, searching hours of CCTV tapes to trace the activities of the suspects.The series is known for its wit and humor, but this one seemed less humorous to me. Which was fine.

Cynthia Harrod-Eagles was born in Shepherd's Bush in London, which  is the setting of the Bill Slider series. At her website, you can find a brief history of Shepherd's Bush and a lovely map. She is the author of over 70 novels, including the MORLAND DYNASTY series which extended to 35 books.

H is for Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

Today I am featuring Fell Purpose (2009) by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles for my submission for the Crime Fiction Alphabet meme.

My theme for the meme this year is mysteries that feature policemen as the main character. I am looking for books that highlight the detailed investigation of a crime and feature the use of forensic science, but there is much variety in the police procedural sub-genre, and I am not a stickler for this guideline. In this case, the book fits my goal in every way.

Description from the Kirkus review site:

Zellah Wilding, just shy of 17, always did exactly as she was told. She was sweet, she was smart, she never misbehaved—or so her daddy thought until she turned up togged out like a tart, her lights turned permanently off by a pair of tights. Finding out who strangled her falls to DI Bill Slider of the Metropolitan Police, Shepherd’s Bush, West London. Slider learns from her schoolmates at St. Margaret’s that Zellah not only disobeyed her controlling father, but had recently dropped a déclassé young beau in favor of someone else she refused to name.

The detective and his crew:

In earlier books, Slider has had marital issues which resolve over time. His right-hand man and friend, Atherton, who is also a constant throughout the series, is known for his relationship troubles. Given this, you can see that this is a police procedural series that focuses not only on the crime but on the lives of it characters.

In this book, for the first time, Slider seems to finally be at peace with life. There are always issues brewing in the background (finding a place to live that he and his wife can afford AND have room for the baby, his worries about being a good father for the children of his first marriage). Life is never easy but his personal life (and Atherton's) seems to be less hectic in this book.

There is a whole team of policemen that work with Slider that we meet and get to know. In addition to Atherton, there is his supportive boss, Porson, who provides comic relief with his invented vocabulary and mixed-up sayings.There are many others: the constables, the office manager, the forensic pathologist.

My take:

I struggled with this review because I want to convey the good points of the series overall. This book is definitely not the best of the lot, but it is a fine police procedural. I discovered this author in 2006 with Orchestrated Death (1991), the first book in the series. I read the next five books that year, then read books seven through eleven over the next few years. I just finished Fell Purpose and have the next in the series, Body Line, in the TBR pile.

The investigation is always primary in all of the books, but in this series we know that the policemen have lives and families and that life is not just work for these men. The author has garnered praise for all the books and I hope that I can convince those unfamiliar with it to try at least one of these books.

There is plenty of humor in this series, but a lot of it is buried in the language  and wordplay. (In fact, a lot of it passes me by entirely.) For instance, Porson is nicknamed Syrup because he used to wear a wig, and rhyming slang for wig is syrup. Not being up on rhyming slang, I did not get this until I read the page at Harrod-Eagles' website on rhyming slang. I point this out not because it made much difference to my enjoyment of the book, but because that is one element that makes these books so unique (and that many of its fans enjoy).

Although the crime is heinous and the police department takes the investigation very seriously, this book has a lighter tone than most in the series. This is a series I would recommend reading in order. However, this one can definitely stand alone and is very entertaining.

The speech of some of the police officers and suspects is in dialect, which I appreciated as realistic, but sometimes distracting. On the other hand, the story has clearly not been re-edited for the US audience which I really appreciate. I want the novel that I read to be exactly as the author wrote it. I think "translating" terms I might not understand insults me, and sometimes changes the meaning or the mood.

 
Other tidbits:

Felony and Mayhem, who have reprinted the first in the series, have a nice biography of Harrod-Eagles on their site.  Here is an overview of Orchestrated Death (1991) at the same site which praises the book for the authors use of puns.

Harrod-Eagles has a very comprehensive (and entertaining) site about her writings. Check here for more information on the Bill Slider series. In addition to writing this relatively long police procedural series (fifteen books at this point), she has written an even longer historical series, the Morland Dynasty, comprising 34 books.

This series has a resemblance to the Lloyd and Hill series by Jill McGown. That series has less humor, but it also combines investigations by a large team of detectives and support personnel and progressive changes in the lives of the main players, with a developing relationship, this time between two detectives.

Please visit the post at Mysteries in Paradise to check out other entries for the letter H.