The Friday 56 – My Sister, the Serial Killer

The Friday 56 is a weekly meme hosted over at Freda’s Voice. The rules are simple and go something like this.

1.  Grab a book, any book.
2.  Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader (If you have to improvise, that’s ok.)
3.  Find any sentence, (or a few, just don’t spoil it)
4.  Post it.

Top Ten Tuesday: Oh, the Evils of Bingewatching. . .

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl.

This week’s topic is:

Bingeworthy TV Shows/Amazing Movies (The new fall TV season is starting up this month, so let’s talk about what shows everyone should watch when they’re not reading!)

Alrighty then, this was really hard for me because I don’t watch a lot of television and really don’t have a clue as to what movies are out there or have been out and what I tend to watch is usually dark – murder, blood and guts kind of thing.

So, here we go. . .

Booking Through Thursday – Mystery

This weeks Booking Through Thursday is all about Mysteries.

Do you read mystery novels? If so, why? Is it the mysteries themselves that appeal to you? The puzzle-solving? The murders? Or why don’t you read them? What about them doesn’t appeal?

I love to read mysteries. I’ve always enjoyed mysteries, which started with the Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys mystery series. I remembering gobbling them up at every opportunity; and thanks to Steig Larsson’s Mellenium Series, I’m addicted to Scandanavian mysteries, crime, thrillers, etc.

I really like figuring out whodunnit, but I don’t like having it solved before I’m even at the halfway point. If that happens it’s like truding through mud to try and finish it. But I love a mystery that really keeps me guessing and on my toes.

When I was introduced to this mystery series it was not through books, it was through the cartoon. Apparently there are over 100 books now that contain my favorite crime fighting dog, and hopefully yours too — Scooby-Doo. Every week Scooby-Doo and his band of crime solving pals would drive that Mystery Machine van right into a mystery. I loved figuring out the mysteries with them. Sometimes I got before the reveal, sometimes not.

I have to admit, I had a cartoon crush on Fred. ❤ My favorite character and the one I could relate to the most is Velma. She’s the brains of the group. A book worm. She’s super smart and logical and yeah she managed to get herself into trouble, but figures a way out. And I could definitely relate to her not being able to see without her glasses.

And of course if you have any mystery book suggestions, please share them in the comments section.

[Book Review] Woman with a Birthmark by Håkan Nesser

Title: Woman with Birthmark: An Inspector Van Veeteren Mystery (Book 4)
Author: Håkan Nesser
Format: Paperback, 336 pages
Genre: Crime, Mystery, Police Procedural
Publisher: Vintage Crime/Black Lizard
ISBN: 9780307387233
Translation Release Date: March 9, 2010
Rating: ⭐ ⭐ 1/2
[Read | Skim] [Buy | Borrow]

I read the previous Van Veeteren mysteries and I have to say this is my least favorite. Woman with Birthmark is for all intents and purposes a police procedural. It follows the detectives knocking on doors, doing interviews, fielding phone calls, and not getting anywhere — at all. It was frustrating to me as a reader, but perhaps the most frustrating part is that the killer is revealed at the very beginning; which left me nothing really to try and figure out. What’s not revealed is the why and if you’re an astute reader you’ll figure out the why after the first murder, if not than you’re sure to get after the second.

[ARC Review] A Bookman’s Tale by Charlie Lovett

Title: The Bookman’s Tale: A Novel of Obsession 
Author: Charlie Lovett
Forma: Kindle Edition
Genre: Historical Fiction, Mystery, Romance, Shakespeare
Publisher: Viking Adult
ISBN: 0670026476
Release Date: May 28, 2013
Rating: ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ 1/2

[Read | Skim] [Buy | Borrow]

I passed by The Bookman’s Tale several times on my weekly trips to the bookstore.  I picked it up, read the description and a few passages, and found it intriguing. I was perusing NetGalley one day and noticed the publisher was offering it, so I requested it. Thankfully my request was approved and I received an uncorrected proof from the publisher.

I really wanted to like this book.  It has murder, romance, sex, and the Shakespeare authorship controversy, so how could anything go wrong?  For me there were just a few too many things going on and a few times I got lost and when I tried to go back and get un-lost I couldn’t.