Becky's Books –

The Hidden Child
by Camilla Läckberg  (Sweden)
2007 (2011 in English) / 400 pages
read by Simon Vance / 14h 58m
rating: B- / crime (police procedural)

I’ve been reading along in this series but Audible doesn’t have the 3rd book so I’ve missed that one. I’ve read the books numbered 1, 2, 4 and 5.  I enjoy Erica and Patrik,  the married couple – he’s the police detective, she’s a writer, and their child, Maja is now a year old (Patrick is on belated paternity leave).

In the first chapter a full 20 characters are introduced,  mostly from prior books.   >>>>MORE>>>>

The Meaning of Human Existence
by Edward O. Wilson
2013 / 208 pages
read by Jonathan Hogan 5h 6m
rating – 8.5  / nonfiction – science philosophy
(I both read and listened to this one)

Read for the All-Nonfiction reading group I was certainly not sure what I was getting into when I started this book.  I started reading the Kindle version but realized I could probably  listen to it and use the Kindle as back-up for little missed places or to clarify or whatever.  It worked quite nicely – I do a read/listen every so often.

So what is this  very interesting book about?  Well – I could rephrase that somewhat ambiguous title to   “Why Do Humans Exist?”   and it might get closer to the ambiguity.  The question of  why humans exist has two ways of answering. We have the “why” in the sense of  “for what purpose?”    >>>>MORE>>>> 

Proof
by Dick Francis
1984 / 272 pages
read by Simon Prebble 9h 43m
rating B+  / Crime (traditional/thriller)

Dick Francis is an old standby for me – I started reading his books in the 1980s, I think,  and every once in awhile I just have the urge.  I don’t read series all in a  quick row and Francis’ books aren’t series although they all have to do with  the world of horse racing.   Frances knows whereof he speaks about that subject – he was a champion jump jockey. After he retired from the racing world he wrote 42 or so books on his own,  another 4 with his son, and the last 3 have his name on them,  but were by his son.

In Proof,  the protagonist is Tony Beach, a wine merchant who has

A Plague of Secrets
by John Lescroart
(Dismas Hardy #13)
2009 / 512 pages
read by David Caldacci  15h 33m
rating – B+ / crime

I’m almost caught up on the Dismas Hardy books – 3 left but two are narrated by Robert Lawrence (and I’m used to Caldacci) and the other one is too much war stuff.  I may go ahead with those anyway, but …  There are 15 total in the series.

Dismas Hardy is a San Francisco guy – he started out as a street cop with his buddy Abe Glitsky,  but studied law and became a defense attorney.  He starts out the series >>>>MORE>>>> 

Crystal Souls icon (Spiderweb Software)

Oh my goodness –  I got the new Spiderweb Software game Avernum 2:  Crystal Souls   (great review) and I’ve been lost to the world for about 3 or 4 days.   I listen to books while I play the “casual level”  while  I listen to crime novels,  for the most part – or I get a Kindle book to go with the Audible version.   And now I get to go back to review what I might have missed.

About Becky’s little addiction –  I’ve been playing Spiderweb games for about 10 years – since Avernum First Trilogy first came out.  It’s a pretty traditional turn-based role-playing fantasy game with excellent strategy opportunities (this is NOT guesswork!), a great story line and fantastic graphics including interesting map and  twists.  If you’re a fan of the old RPG games but like them to be intelligent and without extreme adult content or violence,  I highly recommend these games.  A long time ago someone called them “the thinking man’s Doom”  (or was that Marathon.  (I play on a Mac.)

So  – after all that –  what all have I got read?  –  Proof by Dick Frances, A Plague of Secrets by John Lescroart and The Meaning of Human Existence by Edward O. Wilson (I also had the Kindle book going on that last one.)  –  Now going on The Hidden Child by Camilla Läckberg and have The Faithful Place by Tana French coming up.  (I’ll likely still be going at the game even then.)

Time to go write some reviews for those I’ve already read.

Murder She Wrote: A Question of Murder
by Jessica Fletcher and Donald Bain
2006/292 pages
Read by Cynthia Darlow 6h 47m
Rating:  B-  / crime / cozy

This was on my wish list for awhile because I loved the Murder She Wrote TV series.  Then it turned up on sale at Audible and … well… what’s a good girl to do?  I caved.

This is a sweet little romp through a cozy who-done-it,  not real “bad guys,”  clean murders – a gunshot, poison, an “accident” are the hallmarks of these mysteries.  The mystery is of the “who-done-it” variety and it’s usually solved by amateurs although the police are called in. >>>>MORE>>>>

Rage Against the Dying
by Becky Masterman
2013 / 320 pages
Read by Judy Kaye 11h 17m
rating A / crime (thriller)

This turned out to be a great book,  but I almost put it down as a “could not finish,”  because the prologue is almost all  inside the mind of Gerald, a serious creepo – one who preys on older women – and then it moves on to serial murders.  NOT my cuppa!

But before the Prologue is finished the point of view changes to that of  a 59-year old woman  who was just minding her own business,  poking around the rocks down in a wash  near her home in Arizona one day,  looking for interesting specimens.   >>>>MORE>>>>

A Place of Execution
by Val McDermid
2000 / 486 pages
Read by Paddy Glynn 14h 34m
rating A- / crime

I’ve heard this is a classic as well as being a multiple award-winner and I can see that.  I wish I’d read it when it came out, though – maybe the structure and the substance of the crime would have been more shocking,  (I think that was the intent.)  That said,  I enjoyed the book.

The frame story is set in 2001 or so with a journalist, Catherine Heathcote,  who wants to write a true crime book about the 1963 murder of Alison Carter, a pretty 13-year old girl who lives in a rather backward village in England.  >>>>MORE>>>> 

The Gift of Rain
by Tan Twan Eng (Malaysian)
2007 / 432 pages
Rating 9 / historical  fiction
1/14/15

This book started out so incredibly good for me that I began writing little summaries – I find doing that keeps me really focused for long periods of time.   The entire book didn’t live up to the promise of the first 100 or so pages,  but I kept going.   Warning – both pages are totally ridden with spoilers – more like summaries with photos and links but the review is clean.   >>>>>MORE REVIEW >>>>>

NOTES PART I >>>>

NOTES PART II >>>>

Lila
by Marilynne Robinson
2014 / 261 pages
Rating 9.25 / contemp fiction

This is the third of Robinson’s interconnected series which started with the book Gilead,  the name of the small Iowa town of the setting.  In that  first book, John Ames is an aging minister  who writes a letter explaining things to his 6-year old son who will basically grow up without his father.  In Home Ames’ good friend Reverend Broughton and his family are featured.

In Lila, we meet the woman >>>>MORE>>>>

Happy All the Time
by Laurie Colwin
1978 / 213 pages
read by Marc Vietor  6h 13m
Rating:  8 / 20th century fiction

Reading group selection – (Bookgroup List) – I first thought it was going to be some stupid romance,  but it’s somewhat better than that – in part because much of it is told from several pretty intimate points of view,  and in part because of Vietor’s very nice narration.  It gets slow in a few places but overall it’s quite interesting, though.  I’m not sure if it feels “dated” or not (1978) – it does feel old-fashioned in an American version of  Elizabeth Taylor’s novels or Penelope Fitzgerald, or Barbara Pym – others.  >>>>MORE>>>>

The Rosie Effect
by Graeme Simsion
2014 / 352 pages
Read by Dan O’Grady 7h 32m
Rating:  7.5 / fiction (humor)

This is the sequel to The Rosie Project (which I guess I neglected to review!)  and,  as with most sequels, it  loses a tad to the original.  I highly recommend reading them in order – almost mandatory with this one.

Don Tillman, our 1st person protagonist,  is a bit odd – he’s 40-something and extremely intelligent, a professor of genetics with almost no social graces.  >>>>MORE>>>>

Due to a discussion in a reading group I got to wondering about the Historical Fiction I’ve read in the past year (2014)  So I did a little survey analysis since I’d never actually done a count.    I read 20 historical fictions this year.  The quality ranged between excellent to very poor with adjectives used rather than “scores.”

By Historical Fiction I mean fiction which is about a time period prior to the author’s memory – probably before his birth.  The material has to be researched rather than simply remembered or only handed down tales from his family (memoirs are not history).

Classics are old books about old times but they’re not “historical” yet.  They’re more like historical artifacts or  historical literature.  >>>>MORE>>>> 

Yup  – here we are – a new year.   Do I have plans to read anything specific?  Yes – there are a few books on my resolutions list:

1.  Riddley Walker -by Russell Hoban (1980) – I’ve been wanting to read this for a long, long time. It’s only 229 pages but because it’s not an easy book it’ll take me awhile.  Hope to finish in January though.  I’m up to page 68 (took me a month because I’d go read other stuff).

2.  Catch up on a couple of mystery series – Timothy Hallinan,  Michael Connelly,  John Lescroart,  others.

3.  Reread Mason & Dixon by Thomas Pynchon for the Pynchon List – this is a long and intense project – starts in a couple weeks.

4.  Catch a few classics I’ve missed – maybe a Dickens, a James, an Eliot – The Octopus by Frank Norris?  I kind of need a good classic every couple of months.

5.  I don’t really want to read a lot  “more” books – 142 in a year is enough, but maybe between 144 and 180 –  12 to 15 a month,  one every 2 or 3 days.  But I would like to read the good books more carefully  and write better reviews.

6.  –  I have other resolutions about health and fitness or about home and garden and stuff like that – more like a to-do list in some ways.

Happy reading everybody – and a great 2015 in all ways!

http://betweenthepagesandbeyond.blogspot.com

The Innovators: How a Group of Inventors, Hackers, Geniuses and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution
by Walter Isaacson
2014 / 560 pages
Rating 9.25 / nonfiction – science

Very interesting book on how the computer, as we know it, came to be and how these kinds of innovators need space to develop their projects.  Contemporary tech systems certainly weren’t concocted by any one person sitting around tinkering.   All manner of people and ideas were involved from the days of Ada Lovelace in the 19th century to Steve Jobs and the artificial intelligence being developed today.  >>>>MORE>>>>

12/31/14-

This year I read 142 books,  102 fiction and 40 nonfiction. (I hope I counted that right.) These are the best of the year.  I’m not counting classics or books I read for the second time in the “best of” list, but I counted them in the total count.

Fiction:

An Unnecessary Woman
by Rabih Alameddine
2014 / 306 pages
read by Suzanne Toren 10h 28m
rating 9.5 / fiction –

Those Who Stay and Those Who Leave
>>>>MORE>>>> 

Broken Harbor
by Tana French
2012 / 456 pages
read by Stephen Hogan 19h 56m
Rating:  A+ /  crime
(4th in the Dublin Murder Squad series)

In this 4th book of the Dublin Murder Squad the featured detective is  Mick “Scorcher” Kennedy who takes on a bright rookie partner named Richie.

One nice thing about French’s series is that the books don’t have to be read in order because they each feature different detectives on the same squad.  It is usually one who was glimpsed in the prior book but this time French seems to create a whole new world.
>>>>MORE>>>>