In the last few months the universe has been playing with my head.
It all started with
Still Waters by Nigel McCrery. An odd book no doubt about it, but rather engaging, some outlandish plot elements alongside some sobering all too realistic elements.
then came:
Still Waters by Camilla Noli. Not my cup of tea at all.
but today arrived:
Still Waters by Judith Cutler. I'll be reviewing that as soon as I can.
A Greater Evil (Evil is Done in the US) is the 8th Trish Maguire book by Natasha Cooper.
"The clay was dead between his fingers. Cold and sticky as always, but unco-operative too. It smelled of decay. He wasn't a fool: he knew it was his mind and not the stuff itself that was the problem."
Stuart MacBride is one of my all time favourite authors. I love his books, I read his blog. I'm not so sure about his cabbage problem. I like my husband's beard better!
Flesh House is the 4th book from him:
"No, you listen to me: if my six year old son isn't back here in ten minutes I'm going to come round there and rip you a new arsehole, are we clear?" Ian McLaughlin slapped a hand over the mouthpiece and shouted at his wife to turn that bloody racket down. Then he went back to the idiot on the other end of the phone: "Where the hell's Jamie?"
I'm really pleased to be reading this first book from a new to crime author. So far it's very clever / funny.
Having read his first book way late (which I loved) I've now started on the second in a new series featuring local (to Melbourne) detective Rubens McCauley.
"To get what you want, you need to know what you want." My mother first told me this when I was a young boy. Think hard about what you want, she said, for knowing what you want is more difficult than actually getting it."
Crime Writers of Canada have announced the shortlist for the 2008 Arthur Ellis Awards for the best in Canadian crime writing and I guess you're wondering why we're announcing it on AustCrime - well Susan Parisi made the list.
The nominees include:
Best Novel:
Linwood Barclay, No Time for Goodbye (Bantam)
Terry Carroll, Snow Candy (Mercury Press)
Maureen Jennings, A Journeyman to Grief (McClelland & Stewart)
What Burns Within is the first novel in a series of police procedurals set in Vancouver from Sandra Ruttan, Canadian Author, blogger of repute and contributor to many of the lists and sites that I belong to. Having been an avid reader of her posts, getting a copy of her book for review makes for interesting reading. I'm about half way through at the moment, so more when I've finished the book. It will be released in the North American market in May, but it is due to be available in Australia sometime after that.
This is the second book in a police procedural series set in Mongolia, which is unusual enough to start off with.
"They are out on the steppe, miles from home. Miles from anywhere.
It is late afternoon, early spring. The immense sky is clear, just a few wisps of cloud against the rich blue. Everything - even the snow tipped mountains that surround them - is dwarfed by comparison."
It's been a busy long weekend around here so I've been a bit remiss in keeping up - I've nearly finished this book.
"It's eleven o'clock in the morning, late September, and outside it's raining so hard that cows are floating down rivers and birds are resting on their bloated bodies."
Having finished Still Waters by Camilla Noli last night I'm off for a palate freshner in this collection of Short Stories by Peter Corris. A great little collection in which Cliff takes the punches, doles out the retribution, untangles divorce affairs, tracks down tree poisoners and finds the killer of a local Glebe identity. Eleven stories in all - mid morning beers, crooked cops, and Sydney. Excellent so far.