books

The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics, Daniel James Brown, 2013. Very interesting book, focusing on one rower, Joe Rantz, but really about the team and how they got to the Olympics in Berlin, and the builder and the coach. Very good book.

Couple of mysteries by Mark Douglas-Home that I liked a lot. The Sea Detective. 2015 and The Woman Who Walked into the Sea, 2016. Looking forward to the 3rd one. Interesting plots, interesting characters. Ecology a focus.

Slade House by David Mitchell, 2015. Fantasy, ghosts, built into this novel. Pretty good but not my favourtie book by him at all.

Couple more of mysteries by Mick Herron that I liked- in a series, the Slough House series of rejected MI5 people who have to work as outcasts. good plots, fun to read.
Slow Horse #1
Dead Lions, #2
Real Tigers #3

and #4 The List, have not yet read.

good memoir, iffy mystery and a poor novel

The Outsider, my life in intrigue by Frederick Forsyth, 2016. Really interesting book, a very different life. Had to go find the four old movies made from his intrigue novels.

The Killer Next Door by Alex Marwood, 2016. Too long, and too gory in parts. The only saving grace was the ending, which was a happy ending. Wont be reading any more by this author.

Amoung the 10K Things, Julia Pierpont, 2016. Got half way and quit. Dreary plot, not a single character of interest or anyone who is likeable. Not a good book.

good novel, Everyone Brave is Forgiven, 2016, by Chris Cleave. Set in London in WWII, surviving or not surviving the blizt and also set on Malta - starving people unable to leave or fight. Good characters, interesting story.

forgotten mystery, strange mystery, good novel

good novel, High Dive, 2016 by Jonathan Lee, young UK writer. He writes about the bombing of the Grand Hotel in Brighton, when Thatcher and crew were at a conference in September 1984. Very interesting characters, very good book.

Spooky mystery, hard to figure out what is going on, but you know it is not good. Even the title is played with as a concept. I'm thinking of ending things, by Iain Reid, 2016. Is she ending an affair or is it suicide??

audiobook from library, a good mystery, but all is forgotten....title, author, plot. sad state of aging brain. Found it! Before the Fall by Noah Hawley, 2016. It was good.

Started reading Startle and Illuminate by Carol Shield's grandson and daughter. Anne Giardini, 2016. Very interesting book

Family Life, a novel, 2014 by Akhil Sharma. It won an award and I don't understand why. Not a bad book, but felt half finished and not that great.

3 novels and a mystery

My Name is Lucy Barton, 2016 by Elizabeth Strout. Odd characters, odd book but good. Worth reading. Who are these people who never see their families? Don't get it, but the book was convincing.

Prep 2005 by Curtis Sittenfeld. Book about a girl who goes to an exclusive boarding school far from home for high school. An unknown environment to me. Well written book - maybe too long and wandering but interesting.

The Little Red Chairs, 2015 by Edna O'Brien. Different book, set in the present, mostly in Ireland but the story is really about Sarajevo. She brings it all together in the end. Not sure what I think of it.

The Damage Done2016 by James Oswald, shepherd by day, writer by night. No. 6 in his series, and it's good. Very enjoyable after wandering novels.

Sad book, funny book

Everything I Never Told You 2014 by Celeste Ng. Very sad book but very well written. A family that misses each other at every turn. Hard to watch the lack of communication in action, but easy to understand the reasons why. Each character gets to tell their story.

Doctor Thorne, part of the Barchester Chronices by Anthony Trollope, not sure when he wrote it but mid 19th C. Very verbose writer, my goodness! But very funny at times and very incisive in disecting his characters. Thoroughly enjoyed it.

mystery and intrigue

Six Degrees of Assissination, radio play, 2016 by M J Arlidge. Very good - many famous UK actors taking parts. Who killed the PM???

Elly Griffith's latest Ruth Galloway mystery, The Woman in Blue. Good stuff. 2016. Lots of religous icons that are very odd, but a well plotted mystery with interesting developments in the characters lives.

mysteries and non fiction

Someone Else's Skin by Sarah Hilary. 2014 Introducing Detective Inspector Marnie Rome. UK young writer. Good mystery, interesting characters, I moved right on the the second of the sereis...

No Other Darkness, Sarah Hilary, 2015. Well written mysteries, interesting character development. Am now awaiting the third in the series, not yet published.

The Defence by Steve Cavanagh, 2015. Very american, a lawyer who used to be a con artists - some of his tricks are entertaining. Fairly good book.


Year Zero, A History of 1945 by Ian Buruma, 2013. Good book, but very bleak. People were so horrible to each other. So many displaced people and nobody wants them anywhere. But interesting to read about - what a mess the world was in after the fighting stopped and how many people were still being killed.

History's People, Margaret Macmillan, 2015. Very interesting, looking at different personality traits in different famous people and how they affected events.