2010 February » Birdbrain(ed) Book Blog

TSS (February 28): February wrap-up

Posted by Anastasia on February 28, 2010 8 Responses »

Feb 282010

~~So I didn’t meet my goal of reading 25 books this month, but I almost made it!~~ Surprise! I just accidentally read all nine trade paperbacks of the Preacher series today. Um. So I met my goal after all!

Anyway, this month was, overall, so-so. I’ve been worrying lately that I don’t have enough discussion posts, or just posts that aren’t book reviews. I’ve been thinking about adding another meme or two– maybe I should start doing Library Loot again? And maybe one new one, something related to…I don’t know. Book covers? What do you think? Are there any specific memes y’all are interested in me doing, or should I just do whatever?

I think I just kind of feel dissatisfied with my blog and where it’s going. I want to rev things up a bit! I just have to figure out how to do that.

Sunday Salon Stuff

Books read this week:
36. You’ve Got Murder – Donna Andrews [rating: 4/5]
37. Dead End Dating – Kimberly Raye [rating: 3.5/5]
38. Murder with Peacocks – Donna Andrews [rating: 4/5]
39. Mister B. Gone – Clive Barker (read by Doug Bradley) [rating: 4/5]
40. Scales of Justice – Ngaio Marsh [rating: 3.5/5]
41. Dissolution – C.J. Sansom [rating: 4/5]
42. Preacher Vol. 1 – Garth Ennis & Steve Dillon [rating: 4.5/5]
43. Preacher Vol. 2 – Garth Ennis & Steve Dillon [rating: 4.5/5]
44. Preacher Vol. 3 – Garth Ennis & Steve Dillon [rating: 4.5/5]
45. Preacher Vol. 4 – Garth Ennis & Steve Dillon [rating: 4.5/5]
46. Preacher Vol. 5 – Garth Ennis & Steve Dillon [rating: 4.5/5]
47. Preacher Vol. 6 – Garth Ennis & Steve Dillon [rating: 4.5/5]
48. Preacher Vol. 7 – Garth Ennis & Steve Dillon [rating: 4.5/5]
49. Preacher Vol. 8 – Garth Ennis & Steve Dillon [rating: 4.5/5]
50. Preacher Vol. 9 – Garth Ennis & Steve Dillon [rating: 4.5/5]

Review: Dying in Style by Elaine Vets

Posted by Anastasia on February 26, 2010 No Responses »

Feb 262010

32. Dying in Style by Elaine Vets
Publication: Signet (October 4, 2005), Paperback, 288pp / ISBN 0451216792
Genre: Mystery
Rating:
Read: February 19, 2010
Source: PBS
Summary from Amazon:

Mystery shopper Josie Marcus’s report about Danessa Celedine’s exclusive store is less than stellar, and it may cost the fashion diva fifty million dollars. But Danessa’s financial future becomes moot when she’s found murdered, strangled with one of her own thousand-dollar snakeskin belts-and Josie is accused of the crime.

Review

This is a tricky review to write. On the one hand, I really liked the majority of this book. On the other hand, it’s kind of boring.

What I liked was: Josie’s weird job (mystery shopper? interesting!), the tense how-will-she-prove-herself-innocent setup, the beginning of the mystery. Also, the tone of the book was really fun, so even though I was on my edge of my seat waiting to see what’d happen, I wasn’t so nervous I had to stop reading lest I give myself an aneurysm. The balance between relaxed and OMG WHAT NEXT was excellently written.

What I didn’t like: Josie’s mom (who is the worst mother character I have ever seen in a cozy), the solution of the mystery (wtf?), the idea that anyone could actually live as a mystery shopper with a kid to support (don’t think so).

The whole plot of “must solve mystery so I don’t go to jail for a crime I didn’t commit” is somewhat overdone in cozies, but it was actually really handled well, here. I actually did believe that Josie could go to jail! I was nervous for her, and I wanted her to get solving that mystery ASAP so I could stop worrying about her future. Josie herself is a very likable character, so that helped things. And there’s some very interesting tidbits about rich women trapped in loveless marriages and unable to leave, etc etc. That had some depth.

But the mystery? Oh, the mystery.

It started off so good! What happened at the end, there? The solution? The murderer? Blah. Boring.

Nevertheless, it’s a promising series and if I can get over how irritating Josie’s mother is I’ll definitely keep on reading it. I just hope the mystery is a little bit better put together.

And

Find your own copy @ Amazon or IndieBound. Want my copy? Buy it here.

Other reviews: Bookfoolery & Babble | Amberkatze’s Book Blog

Review: Murder 101 by Maggie Barbieri

Posted by Anastasia on February 24, 2010 No Responses »

Feb 242010

31. Murder 101 by Maggie Barbieri
Publication: Minotaur Books; 1st edition (November 27, 2007), Paperback, 320pp / ISBN 0312947623
Genre: Mystery
Rating:
Read: February 18, 2010
Source: PBS
Summary from Amazon:

Safely outside the New York City limits, St. Thomas College was supposed to promise peace and quiet. Unfortunately, English professor Alison Bergeron has found it to be anything but. She recently divorced a fellow faculty member and, more recently, her car was stolen. Then one evening, she gets a visit from two homicide detectives from the NYPD. The good news is that they found Alison’s beat-up Volvo; the bad news is that the body of one of the students in her Shakespeare seminar was in the trunk.

Now, not only must Alison continue to hoof it to campus (a fate almost worse than death), she’s become a prime suspect for a murder she did not commit—and her efforts to clear her name have landed her in hot water with an even hotter Detective Bobby Crawford, who happens to be a former altar boy, and the sinfully suspicious nuns of St. Thomas. All hell’s about to break loose if Alison can’t find the real killer…before it’s too late.

Review

I talked a little bit about this book last Thursday, where I mentioned that Alison, the heroine detective, doesn’t really fit into any of the cozy mystery cliches. She’s not plucky. She cries a lot, and tends to throw up when she’s nervous. She’s also not really nosy or prone to solving anything, and that’s where my disappointment lay with Murder 101.

See, I appreciated Alison as a character because she wasn’t cliched– but I’m disappointed because neither dos she have any interest in solving the mystery until maybe two chapters from the end! Murder 101 is less “amateur detective solves mystery” and more “amateur detective has inappropriate relationship with police officer while HE solves the mystery.” Seriously, the whole book was basically Alison flirting and making out with a police officer who’s technically supposed to be surveillance-ing her because she’s a suspect. HELLO. She’s a murder suspect, stop trying to get in her pants!

That whole thing made me really uncomfortable, because how good a police officer is this guy if he can’t maintain a professional relationship with the suspects he’s investigating? And then Alison doesn’t bother trying to figure anything out until after she’s been kidnapped twice and hit over the head a few times. Bah.

I think maybe this book was more Alison growing a spine than learning how to be a detective, and that maybe the next book will have her being more pro-active in whatever mystery she’s entangled herself. So even though I liked the humor, and the mystery was intriguing, and Alison was weird enough for me to like her, I was still disappointed. The good stuff made up (mostly) for the stuff I didn’t like, and it’s not a bad book, but it might be a while before I read the sequel.

And

Find your own copy @ Amazon or IndieBound. Want my copy? Buy it here.

Other reviews: The Book Resort Reviews | Miss Print | Southern Princess

Oh! And that summary? Yeah, there’s no suspicious nuns. Only one nun shows up, and she’s more grumpy than anything else. Stupid lying back-cover summaries.

Review: Crewel World by Monica Ferris

Posted by Anastasia on February 22, 2010 No Responses »

Feb 222010

30. Crewel World by Monica Ferris
Publication: Berkley (March 1, 1999), Paperback, 256pp / ISBN 0425167801
Genre: Mystery
Rating:
Read: February 17-18, 2010
Source: Borrowed
Summary from Amazon:

When Betsy’s sister is murdered in her own needlecraft store, Betsy takes over the shop and the investigation. But to find the murderer, she’ll have to put together a list of motives and suspects to figure out this killer’s pattern of crime.

Review

Themed cozy mysteries have been all the rage for at least ten years, and some of them are better than others. I tend to go for unusually-themed cozies now, like tea or, I don’t know– truck drivers. I think needlecraft is a pretty unusual theme! And I really appreciated that this book had a lot of needlecraft-related info without being overly conspicuous about it, so that both newbies and people already familiar with needlecraft could enjoy the book. Sometimes themed cozies go overboard with that stuff, with a recipe after every chapter or something, and it can get annoying. Crewel World had a good balance between mystery and theme, I think.

Anyway, this one has the middle-aged divorcee (with a cat) character again, but it’s actually a lot more candid about middle age than I’ve seen in a cozy before. When was the last time you’ve read about an amateur detective who’s going through menopause and all the problems it entails? And that it’s affecting their detecting? Yeah, that’s what I thought. I liked that Crewel World didn’t pretend its detective was a twenty-something in a fifty-something’s body! Not that I want extensive details about a character’s hormonal balance, but the added realism was nice. And I liked that Betsy is a spunky character without being over-the-top; her moments of worry about money, the future, how the heck she’s going to run a craft store, etc, was a good garnish.

Plus, of course, one of the main characters dies. That was pretty freakin’ unusual.

What I liked best about Crewel World is that it takes the conventions of small-town cozy mystery and twists them a bit. Margot may have been used to all the conventions of living in a small town, where everyone basically knows each other and everyone is poking their nose into your business, but Betsy isn’t used to that. It was interesting watching her adjust to living in a smaller city after living in big ones her whole life, and the sort of…culture shock, I guess? that she and her friends go through as they try to figure each other out.

The mystery was good, if a bit slow. I figured out who the killer was about thirty pages from the end, but up until that point I had no idea who it was. The mystery wasn’t really the best part of the book, however– that was the Betsy-adjusting-to-small-town-life plot. I’m also not sure how Betsy is going to cope with being an amateur detective after this mystery. In this book she’s motivated because her sister is killed; that would motivate anyone to detecting! But she doesn’t seem like the nosy type, and I’m not sure how successful she’d be in other situations. I suppose I’ll have to read one of the other books in the series and find out.

If you like cozy mysteries but tend to get annoyed with the cliches, you’ll probably find Crewel World really refreshing. It’s not fast-paced, but it’s a fun book with some unusual details in it. Plus, if you have any inclination whatsoever to needlecraft, this book’ll make you want to start a project immediately after reading it. Oh, how I wish I could knit/crochet/cross-stitch…sigh.

And

Find your own copy @ Amazon or IndieBound

Other reviews: The Mystery Reader | Joy’s Blog | Fibreholic

Is it hard to cross-stitch? I never got the hang of knitting, and I haven’t tried crochet, but cross-stitch looks fun. Time consuming, but fun.

TSS (February 21): The travel shelf

Posted by Anastasia on February 21, 2010 No Responses »

Feb 212010

Yesterday I took all my books off that one shelf that tilts dangerously over to one side, turned it around so it lent the other way, and then reshelved the books. This was exhausting. I hadn’t realized how many books I had on there! But now the bookshelf leans only a little bit to the left instead of a LOT, so, uh. That’s good? (I have no idea how to fix it. I can’t drill a thing into the wall to keep it locked into place. I must have just messed up the construction of it and now it’s impossibly messed up.)

Anyway, that bookshelf is almost entirely for my TBR books (I have more TBR books on other shelves), but I dedicated one shelf specifically for travel books. Looking at my collection, I have definite favorite genres, and also not a lot of recent publications. This is probably why when I think of myself traveling around the world I’m always in a 1930′s costume– because that’s the best time period to travel!

Here’s my shelf:

I’ve grouped them vaguely by genre. And because I’m kinda obsessed about this, let’s go over just which books are on that shelf! These are all nonfiction books, by the way. If I included fiction books where people traveled I’d need a whole other bookshelf! Continue reading »

Review: Death by Darjeeling by Laura Childs

Posted by Anastasia on February 19, 2010 No Responses »

Feb 192010

29. Death by Darjeeling by Laura Childs
Publication: Berkley; Reissue edition (May 8, 2001), Paperback, 256pp / ISBN 0425179451
Genre: Mystery
Rating:
Read:
Source: Borrowed
Summary from Amazon:

When a man is poisoned by tea, Theo is the prime suspect. Now she has to prove her innocence and track down the real killer-before someone else takes their last sip.

Review

Now, y’all have probably realized by now how much I like tea. And you know I like cozies, though I’ve had some problems with them earlier this year. So! A cozy mystery where the victim is killed by a poisoned cup of tea, where the amatuer detective owns a tea shop, and ever other paragraph has something related to tea in it? That cozy mystery is pretty near a perfect fit for me.

I especially like Death by Darjeeling because all the elements of a cozy are in it, but they’re put together in such a way that it’s not annoying. I mean, Theo is a middle-aged single woman, BUT she doesn’t have a cat (she has a dog instead!), she doesn’t fall the potential murderer, she actually does now how to run a business and does it rather successfully, and she’s nosy without being over-the-top about it. I really liked her, actually.

The setting, Charleston, was vibrant without being overly described, and the people were Southern without being caricatures. It felt like a really friendly town, with interesting stuff in it. I liked it. And the mystery was pretty good, too. I never figured out who did it until the reveal at the end, and that’s a pretty difficult thing to accomplish with me (I’m always on the look out for red herrings and clues, etc).

The only thing I didn’t like was how overly emotional everyone was. I don’t know if it’s a Southern thing or what, but at least two of the character were in tears more than half the time they were onscreen, and even Theo teared up once or twice. It was a little bit annoying, yeah.

All in all, however, Death by Darjeeling was a fantastic cozy mystery that I really enjoyed reading. I’m definitely going to try to read the other books in the series, and I’d recommend this book to anyone who wants something fun to read.

And

Find your own copy @ Amazon or through IndieBound

Other reviews: Okbo Lover | The Mystery Reader | Babbling Book Reviews

Thursday Tea (February 18): Murder 101

Posted by Anastasia on February 18, 2010 No Responses »

Feb 182010

Thursday Tea is a weekly meme hosted by yours truly. To play along, all you need is some tea, a book, and the answers to these questions: what tea are you drinking (and do you like it)? What book are you reading (and do you like it)? Tell us a little about your tea and your book, and whether or not the two go together.

The book: I’ve gotten back onto a cozy mystery kick, which is super handy because I’ve got a bunch of them stocked up from the last time I was in the mood for a cozy. I’ve already plowed my way through two and am onto my third, Murder 101 by Maggie Barbieri.

It stars an English professor, Alison Bergeron, who’s under suspicion for a murder she didn’t commit. I’m only a little ways into it, so I can’t tell if it’ll be good or not, but so far it is! I like how weird Alison is– she doesn’t fit neatly into any of the cozy mystery heroine cliches. She’s young, she’s not fiery or plucky, and I’m pretty sure she doesn’t have a cat. She is newly divorced, but that’s not so bad, considering all the other differences.

The tea: I haven’t had any of my fancy teas in a few months (blood orange! fairy vanilla…thing!), and they’re basically just sitting on my shelf getting expired. So I made an effort to bring my tea ball thing with me and now I’m drinking Pomegranate black. It’s good, though a bit weak for me. I need to steep it longer, I guess.

(Stash Tea’s website has gotten a facelift, by the way; have you noticed?)

Do they go together? No one’s busted out any beverages except water and martinis yet, so I don’t know if Alison is a tea drinker or not. She’s kind of high-strung, though (she’s already thrown up three times from nervousness and I’m only 40 pages in!), so I’m not sure any sort of caffeine would be good for her.

What are you drinking/reading this Thursday?