Books Read in July 2025

 

Another month where every book was a very good read. I finished seven books in July. Two were short story books; that is unusual. Four were crime fiction, including one espionage thriller. And one science fiction story in a military setting. At the end of July I had only read 12 books for my 20 Books of Summer list. It is now mid-August (unbelievable!) and I have only read two more. So I don't think I will finish all 20 books for the challenge. We'll see.

Fiction

Five Tuesdays in Winter (2021) by Lily King

I started this book of short stories in December 2024. I read the first four stories and I liked them all; you can check out my thoughts on those stories here. In July, I read the remaining six stories in the book. Many of those stories are slice-of-life stories. I especially liked the characterizations; the stories were serious but ended on an upbeat note. Check here for my thoughts on the last six stories.

Olive, Again (2019) by Elizabeth Strout

Olive, Again is the follow-up book to Olive Kitteridge.  It is a very good book but not an easy read. Olive is in her seventies in this book. She is widowed and has a tenuous, troubled relationship with her son and his family. This is described as a novel composed of interrelated short stories. Only seven of the thirteen stories are directly about Olive and her life in Crosby, Maine. The other stories take place in the same area or nearby but Olive is not the main focus. See my thoughts here.

Science Fiction

Ninefox Gambit (2016) by Yoon Ha Lee

Ninefox Gambit is a military science fiction/science fantasy/space opera novel. I did not know a lot about the book going in, although I assumed it was a space opera because of the cover illustration. The world building was very complex and confusing for me, but the writing was very good and pulled me into the story. I loved the ending. See my thoughts here.

Crime Fiction

At Bertram's Hotel (1965) by Agatha Christie

This is a Miss Marple mystery with a huge cast; the plot can be confusing, but it is an entertaining story set at a lovely hotel. Chief Inspector Fred Davy is a Scotland Yard detective who does most of the detecting. See my thoughts here.

The Amateur (1981) by Robert Littell

Charlie Heller is a cryptographer for the CIA. When his fiancée, Sarah Diamond, is murdered by terrorists at the American Embassy in West Germany, the CIA decides not to pursue her killers. Heller is determined to find them and kill them himself. So this is a revenge thriller. Heller has none of the necessary skills, but he forces the CIA to train him. Nothing in this book is predictable; the story was compelling and I enjoyed it very much.

The novel has an interesting history; the story was first written by Littell as a screenplay, and was made into a Canadian film released in 1981. Shortly after that, the novel was written based on the screenplay. Recently another film adaptation was released starring Ramie Malek.

The Murder of Mr. Ma (2024) by John Shen Yen Nee and S.J. Rozan

Reading this book was a no-brainer for me. I will try anything written by S.J. Rozan. I was a bit uncertain about a book that she co-authored but still, it seemed like a safe bet. 

The two protagonists of the book are fictionalized versions of Judge Dee Ren Zie and Lao She, a Chinese academic and author. I have never read any of Robert van Gulik's Judge Dee mysteries, but my husband has. The story focuses on their investigation into the deaths of Chinese immigrants in 1924 London.

I was very happy with this book. It felt like an adventure story as much as a mystery, and was a lot of fun to read. John Shen Yen Nee and S.J. Rozan have come together in a great writing partnership and you can read about that at CrimeReads and Mystery Fanfare. The second book in the series is already out and I will be reading it.

A Death in Tokyo (2011) by Keigo Higashino, translated by Giles Murray

This is the third book in the Tokyo Police Detective Kaga series to be translated to English from Japanese. I have read the two previous books that are available in English, and they all work well as standalones. Detective Kaga is not part of the homicide division, but he often works with the homicide detectives when the case in in his district. He works in an intuitive way, and follows up painstakingly on every detail. In this case a prominent business man has been murdered; he is found at the base of a statue on a bridge, but that is not where the murder took place. His wife and two teenage children don't know why he was in that area of town. It is a very complex case, and has an interesting and complex resolution. 

The photos at the top and bottom of this post were taken by my husband at the garden center during our last visit. We enjoy both buying plants and supplies and viewing the variety of plants and pots and decorations on display. Click on the images for best viewing quality.

Books Read in June 2025

 

I read six books in June, and all of them were from my 20 Books of Summer list. I liked all the books; four of them were upbeat and fun; two of them were more serious and somewhat depressing.

Fiction 

Table for Two (2024) by Amor Towles

This is a short story collection. There are six stories plus one 220 page novella. The short stories are all set in New York City. See my post on some of the short stories here.

In the novella, "Eve in Hollywood," Towles returns to a character in his first novel, Rules of Civility. I did read that book, but I don't think you need to have read it to enjoy the story. "Eve in Hollywood" is set in the Golden Age of Hollywood, and it features Olivia de Havilland as a character. I enjoyed the novella very much.

The Burgess Boys (2013) by Elizabeth Strout

I have read four books by Elizabeth Strout, and I have rated all very highly, but they are always difficult reads, with hard to like characters and family difficulties. This one is my favorite so far. My review here.

Fantasy / Time Travel

Oona Out of Order (2020) by Margarita Montidore

I read this book because I like time travel books and this one was on a list of "time loop" novels (the film Groundhog Day is a good example of a time loop). In this book, Oona jumps from one year to another year in her life, randomly. I liked it. I have been thinking about it off and on since I read it. But it can be frustrating. My review here.

Crime Fiction

Death by Accident (1998) by Bill Crider

This book was my first read for 20 Books of Summer. The Sheriff Dan Rhodes series by Bill Crider is set in a small town in Blacklin County, a fictional county in Texas. It is a cozy series; Sheriff Rhodes solves crime mostly with his intuition and avoids computers where possible. Death by Accident is the 9th book in the series. See my review.

Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone (2022) by Benjamin Stevenson

This story takes place at a remote ski resort in Australia, where Ern Cunningham's family is having a family reunion. They are coming together because Ern's brother is getting out of prison, after having killed a man. Family relationships are strained. Shortly after the majority of the family arrives, a man's frozen body is found near the resort,  and the weather begins to get very bad, threatening to snow in all the guests.

This is a very unusual mystery. Ern Cunningham, who is narrating the story, writes books about how to write mysteries. The books starts with a list of classic rules for mysteries as published by Ronald Knox in 1929. So it is a traditional fair play mystery, but of course there is lots of misdirection in the clues, and for the most part the author kept me fooled for most of the book. I enjoyed the book, although I sometimes got frustrated with the repetition of the "rules." I liked it enough so that I will read the next one to see how it goes.

A Death in Summer (2011) by Benjamin Black

This is the fourth book in the Quirke series written by John Banville, under the name Benjamin Black. Quirke is a pathologist in Dublin, Ireland in the 1950s. He often is called in to examine dead bodies before they are moved, and to perform autopsies. Inspector Hackett will sometimes seek his advice on crimes, when he thinks the case is tricky. I like the slow pace of the writing and the emphasis on the characters as much or more than the crime investigation. I like the continuing characters. This one was about a sordid subject, and depressing. Yet I will persist and read more of them. 

The photos at the top and bottom of this post are recent pictures of plants in our back yard patio area. The top photo is of a cuphea plant (on the left) and a blue sage plant that are hummingbird attractors. They have been doing a good job of attracting hummingbirds and bees.

The two photos below are closer shots of blue sage plants. We have two other pots of those plants in the back. I love the little buds on the blue sage. Click on the images for best viewing quality.

Books Read in May 2025

 

I read seven very good books in May. Six crime fiction books, including one spy fiction thriller, plus one science fiction novella. Looking back, I was surprised to see that five of the authors were new to me. 

Science Fiction

Exit Strategy (2018) by Martha Wells

This is the fourth entry in the Murderbot Diaries series. The main character, Murderbot, is partly robotic and partly human. This novella concludes a story arc concerning Murderbot and Dr. Mensah and her scientific research team. It would spoil too much to tell much about this story, so I will just say that I have enjoyed the first four books and intend to continue reading the series. I found each book a fun read because Murderbot is such a good narrator. This was the perfect time to read this book because the new Murderbot TV series premiered in May. See my review of the first book in the series, All Systems Red.

Crime Fiction

The Charm School (1988) by Nelson DeMille

This is the first book I have read by Nelson DeMille. It is a spy fiction novel set in the USSR, first published in 1988, not long before the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War. The copy I read, a trade paper reissue published in 2017, includes a very good introduction by the author. The most interesting thing about this novel for me was seeing a portrayal of political and diplomatic relations between Russia and the US at that time. The setting is primarily in Moscow. The Charm School is a secret facility that was training Russian operatives to infiltrate the US and live there as US citizens. If you like spy fiction, I would recommend trying this, even though it is 750 pages long. I enjoyed reading it very much.

Common or Garden Crime (1945) by Sheila Pim

This is a cozy mystery published in 1945 and set in 1943 in Ireland. Gardening is a central theme in the story.  I like the characters and the village setting, and the story was told with subtle humor. See my review.

Claire DeWitt and the City of the Dead (2011) by Sara Gran

This was another very different mystery novel with a strange private detective. I read this book because it was compared to The Spellman Files by Lisa Lutz, and there are similarities; for example, a detective who is driven and doesn't fit in with others. Claire DeWitt describes herself as the best detective in the world, and she is very expensive. She returns to New Orleans, where she was mentored by a rich female detective for several years, to attempt to find a man who disappeared at the same time as Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast. Everyone assumes he is dead, but his nephew wants to find out for sure. There are flashbacks to Claire's earlier years in New Orleans; a multitude of quotes from a French detective, Jacques Silette; and several strange dream sequences. I liked the setting of New Orleans, a couple of years after Katrina, showing how much the area was affected. I borrowed the book from my husband and he has the other two in the series, so I will read more of them.

Thursday Night Widows (2005) by Claudia Piñeiro

I was introduced to this book by author and blogger Margot Kinberg. This book by Argentinean novelist Claudia Piñeiro is set in a secluded elite community thirty miles outside of Buenos Aires, where only the wealthy are able to live. The crime that occurs is revealed in a limited way at the beginning of the book, then the story starts again from when the main characters buy into the neighborhood. The story is told from multiple viewpoints. One notable feature is that several chapters are told in 1st person plural, which combines the voices of multiple women who live in the community. That works well to convey certain information, but can be confusing, especially the first few times it is encountered. The relationships within the community begin to fall apart when the changing economy in the early 2000s affects people's jobs and income. This novel is focused on what leads up to the crime and not on who did it. Thursday Night Widows is an excellent book and I will be looking for more books by this author.

A Meditation on Murder (2024) by Susan Juby

This is the second book in the Helen Thorpe mystery series, following Mindful of Murder. The author is Canadian and the setting is British Columbia. The main character is a former Buddhist nun, currently working as a butler. Helen isn't really a sleuth, but more or less solves the crimes accidentally, and helps people out along the way. In this book she is working for a very rich couple who loan her out to an impossibly cranky rich man who needs help with his daughter, who has used her money to get involved with a group of social media influencers. Helen starts out knowing about as little about influencers and social media as I do. This is not a thriller by any stretch of the imagination, but tension is provided by the cutthroat behavior of the influencers and two murders of people associated with the influencers.

My favorite part of the book is the mindfulness theme. Helen is a very appealing character, who is (almost) never ruffled by anything. I was introduced to the series by Bill Selnes at Mysteries and More from Saskatchewan.

Star of the North (2018) by D.B. John

This is a thriller that mostly takes place in North Korea. The story revolves around three characters: a Korean American woman whose sister went missing when she was spending her gap year in South Korea; a highly placed official in North Korea who goes to the US for a diplomatic mission; and an older peasant woman who is living and barely surviving in a North Korean penal colony. See my review.

The photos at the top and bottom of this post were taken at the Santa Barbara I Madonnari Street Painting Festival, which takes place every Memorial Day weekend. I plan to share more photos from the event in a future post. Click on the images for the best viewing quality.

 

Books Read in April 2025

In April I read eight books: one nonfiction, one graphic novel, one time-loop novel, one very long fantasy novel, three crime fiction novels, and one book of mystery short stories. 

Nonfiction, Books about Books

Book Lust to Go (2010) by Nancy Pearl

I have read all of the Book Lust books by Nancy Pearl several times, and I enjoy them each time. I find something new every time, possibly because my tastes change over time. The subtitle for Book Lust to Go is "Recommended Reading for Travelers, Vagabonds, and Dreamers." Because the book was published in 2010, it could be considered out of date, but for me that is one of its charms.

Graphic novel

Here (2014) by Richard McGuire 

This is a graphic novel that shows the reader the history of one room over the life of the house. It actually does more than that, because there are scenes showing the location /setting of the house going back before the house was built, back into prehistoric times. There is not much text to this book at all; the story is told more in pictures. It is 304 pages long. I think the book definitely bears rereading, probably multiple times. 

Speculative Fiction / Time-loop

On the Calculation of Volume I (2020) by Solvej Balle, translated by Barbara J. Haveland

I first heard of this book late last year when my husband sent me an article from the Atlantic about it. The author is Danish; the book is very short, about 160 pages. In the article the novel was described as a time-loop story; I had never heard of that terminology for that type of time travel. One comparison is to the film, Groundhog Day, but this story is much more introspective and the story is handled very differently. The book is part of a seven volume work and only the first five have been translated to English at this time.

I liked the book but I was underwhelmed by the lack of resolution at the end. Obviously as part of a series of seven novels, I should not have expected anything else, but I was also disappointed in the repetitiveness of the story. Those who liked the story more than I did praised the meditative and philosophical aspects. I normally love things like that, so maybe I need to read it again more slowly. I plan to do that before moving on to book 2.

Fantasy

Royal Assassin (1996) by Robin Hobb

This is the second book in the Farseer Trilogy, following Assassin's Apprentice. The main character in this trilogy is FitzChivalry, a royal bastard who becomes the king's assassin in the first book, a fact that he and only a few others know. The story is very dark, with little relief. Fitz is shunned by most people in the court and leads a difficult life. Yet, I care about many of the characters, and loathe all the bad ones.

At this point I plan to continue reading the whole series, which includes a total of 16 books. Only problem is that each book is longer than the last. This book was 650 pages approximately. The third book in the series is closer to 750 pages. But I will persevere. I gave this book 5 stars and it is a page turner. I was introduced to this author and this series by Cath at Read-Warbler.

Crime Fiction

My Name is Michael Sibley (1952) by John Bingham

This was John Bingham's first novel. It is a very compelling and well written mystery; his writing is quiet and restrained. The narrator of the story is Michael Sibley, who tells  the story of his school days with John Prosset and how he grew to hate him. See my review.

Come Death and High Water (1988) by Ann Cleeves

Ann Cleeves' first series featured George and Molly Palmer-Jones. George is a serious birder and worked for the Home Office before he retired; Molly is not a birder but often accompanies him on such activities. Cleeves wrote the first two books when she was living on an island with her husband, who ran a bird sanctuary there. The books in that series are set in locations related to birding. Come Death and High Water is set on an island with a bird observatory. I enjoyed the first book in the series because of the birds and the setting, but this book was even better, with an interesting group of characters and a more focused plot. There are eight books in the series and Cleeves wrote them between 1986 and 1996.

Reader, I Buried Them and Other Stories (2022) by Peter Lovesey

On the occasion of his hundredth short story, Peter Lovesey assembled this collection of his short stories. It includes sixteen stories, one piece of nonfiction about George Joseph Smith and the brides in the bath, and a poem. I started reading this book in 2022, and I reviewed ten of the stories at that time. It took me until this year to read the rest of the book, and my thoughts are here.

The Spellman Files (2007) by Lisa Lutz

I loved this book. I like books about families, and I like private detectives as the focus. In this case, the private detective agency is run and operated by the family. Izzy Spellman, the middle daughter, tells her story. As far as the crime goes, this book is lighter than most mysteries, but there is plenty of depth in the family relationships and issues. This is the first in a series and I will be reading more of the books. See my review.

The photos at the top and bottom of this post were taken at the end of April in our back area. The rest of the yard is a mess, but these two plants are making me happy. Click on the images for the best viewing quality.

Books Read in February and March 2025

 

I read a lot of good books in February and March, in a variety of genres and different settings. 

Fiction

The Goodbye Cat (2021) by Hiro Arikawa, translated by Philip Gabriel

This book consists of seven short stories; all of the stories are about cats and are set in Japan. See my review.

Rachel's Holiday (1997) by Marian Keyes

This book was one of two books I read for Reading Ireland Months 2025. It is the second in Marian Keyes' Walsh family series. The story focuses on Rachel, the third of five sisters, after she overdoses on drugs and almost dies. I enjoyed this book and the preceding one, Watermelon. See my review.

Plays

Much Ado About Nothing (1598) by William Shakespeare

I read this play for my Classics Club Spin in February. I haven't written a post about it but I will do one, soon I hope. I was leery of reading any Shakespeare play, so I picked a comedy that I was more familiar with. I read the play in the Folger Library Edition which presents explanatory notes on the left hand page and the actual text of the play on the right hand page. That was useful at first but with the last three acts I found I could pick up the meanings myself and move faster through the play. All in all it was a good experience.

Historical Fiction

A God in Ruins (2015) by Kate Atkinson

I am sad that I don't have time to review this book, because I loved it so much when I read it. I did not like the ending and I still gave it 5 stars. It is a hard story to summarize and describe. This book is sort of a sequel to Life After Life by the same author. Life After Life was about Ursula Todd, and is a time loop novel, where portions of Ursula's life are repeated over and over with different results. A God in Ruins is about Ursula's brother Teddy. It also has a strange structure jumping back and forth to various times in Teddy's life and focusing most often on his years in the RAF during World War II.

Science Fiction 

The Ministry of Time (2024) by Kaliane Bradley

This was another book that I rated very highly, even though it was confusing and I was not fond of the ending. The book is advertised as time travel, romance, espionage, and "a workplace comedy." Looking back on it, it does have elements of all of those, but having these thrown into one book diluted each of them. Nevertheless, it was a compelling read and I wanted to get back to reading it every day. The characters were interesting and fleshed out and mostly sympathetic. One thing I especially liked was that I learned a lot about the Franklin Expedition, a failed attempt to find the Northwest Passage. I have never been interested in that story but now I am. 

Diving into the Wreck (2009) by Kristine Kathryn Rusch

This is the first book in Rusch's Diving Universe series. The protagonist in this story is a woman who makes her living diving into derelict ships out in space. She does these salvage operations to support herself, but her real love is history and she likes to study the ships. See my review.

Crime Fiction

Silent Parade (2018) by Keigo Higashino, translated by Giles Murray

This book is the 9th book in the Detective Galileo series, but only the 4th book translated to English. It is about two crimes that take place in Tokyo, separated by about 20 years. In both cases, young girls have been killed. The suspect is the same for both but all the evidence is circumstantial. Detective Chief Inspector Kusanagi turns to his old friend, physics professor and sometimes police consultant, Manabu Yukawa (aka Detective Galileo), to help solve the murders. See my review.

Fall From Grace (1991) by L.R. Wright

This is the fourth book in one of my favorite Canadian mystery series. The main character is Royal Canadian Mounted Police Sergeant Karl Alberg. I have found most of the books in the series to be more of a character study than a mystery. See my review.

The Little Old Lady Who Broke All the Rules (2012) by Catharina Ingelman-Sundberg, translated by Rod Bradbury

This book is  kind of a comedy / heist / romance all mixed into one. (The romance is very low key.) It is the first book in the League of Pensioners series. The main characters are all around 80 years old and living in a retirement home that is going downhill. The owners are medicating the residents to keep them in line and manage costs. Five of the residents, three women and two men, decide to carry out some robberies, sort of a Robin Hood scheme to give money to the poor. I enjoyed reading this book, but it required suspending my disbelief a lot. 

I have seen a lot of good reviews of this book, but this review at AnaBookBel was my favorite. The book was published in 2012 in Sweden, then a few years later in the UK and the US, but this was the first I had heard of it. It was an interesting picture of Sweden. 

Scene of the Crime (2024) by Margot Kinberg

This is the fifth novel in Margot Kinberg's Joel Williams series. The setting is academia; the protagonist is a college professor in Tilton University’s Department of Criminal Justice. Joel is not a policeman but he was in the past, and he has ties to the police department. Thus, the books are part academic mystery and part police procedural. I have read the four previous books in the series and this was another good one. See my review.

Winterland (2008) by Alan Glyn

This book is another book I read for Reading Ireland Month 2025. It is a thriller, and I don't always like those, but this one worked for me. Very dark and a good bit of violence, but none of that bothered me. Two men named Noel Rafferty die in one day in Dublin. The younger one was part of a gang; the second one was his uncle, who was chief engineer for the development of a high rise building.  Supposedly the second death was the result of a car accident, but Gina Rafferty (sister of the older Noel Rafferty) doesn't believe that. And she refuses to stop asking questions. I liked the book; if you are OK with thrillers and enjoy reading about Ireland, you might enjoy it too.

Three Witnesses (1956) by Rex Stout

This book is a collection of three novellas in the Nero Wolfe series. In January, I reviewed "Die Like a Dog." In March, I reviewed "The Next Witness" and "When a Man Murders." All three novellas were entertaining and clever.

The photos at the top and bottom of this post were taken at the Santa Barbara International Orchid Show that we attended in March. I plan to share more photos from the show in a future post. Click on the images for the best viewing quality.