What Fiction are you reading this week, Mar 28, 2021?

[hermetic]

Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library at Yale

I read all my library books and haven't had a chance to go back for more yet. So, today I'm reading a book I bought: The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle. A tale for any age about the wonders of magic, the power of love, and the tragedy of loss. I thought it would be a good read. It is.

I was trying to find something new to listen to so I read a bit of Jeffrey Archer and found I liked his writing style very much. I plan to listen to the entire Clifton Chronicles in order, starting with Only Time Will Tell. Archer certainly led an interesting life and I find his characters quite intriguing.

What's new on your reading list this week?

[Timewas]

1. Just finished

Stephen King's "Later" If I didn't know he wrote it I would have guessed dean Koontz....

[hermetic]

2. Sounds good

"..a terrifying and touching story of innocence lost and the trials that test our sense of right and wrong. LATER is a powerful, haunting, unforgettable exploration of what it takes to stand up to evil in all the faces it wears."

I thought it would be longer. Just 272 pages...

[The King of Prussia]

3. Just starting "Mrs Pargeter's Plot" by Simon Brett

Otherwise this week I have read 3 of Stephen Booth's "Cooper & Fry" mysteries. Recommended.

I used to live in the next village to Archer. I made it my practice, whenever passing his house, to let off an enormous fart. If you read some biographical details about him, you'll likely understand why I felt this to be appropriate.

[hermetic]

4. Ha ha ha

Love it!

[Number9Dream]

5. Finished "Journey of the Pharaohs" by Clive Cussler / Graham Brown

This was one of the Kurt Austin / NUMA adventure series. It was a good action, page-turner. Action taking place from Egypt to England to the Grand Canyon. It was just OK.

[hermetic]

6. Aww, that's a shame

Write up makes it sound pretty exciting.

Hope things are going well for you.

[SeattleVet]

7. The Mourner

a Parker novel by Richard Stark (the late Donald Westlake) from the 60's.

He wrote a whole series of these 'format' novels, all pretty much written in using the same pattern of chapters and sections.

Totally politically incorrect in a lot of the language, but these ARE over 50 years old, and obviously from a totally different era!

[hermetic]

9. Sounds entertaining

Parker finds himself caught in a web involving the Mob, a Russian spy, the Soviets, a two-timing blond, a double cross, and a competitor.

Westlake was quite prolific, with more than a hundred novels and non-fiction books to his credit. In 1993, the Mystery Writers of America named him a Grand Master, the highest honor bestowed by the society.

[japple]

8. Many thanks for the weekly thread, hermetic. I finished Lin Enger's book,

American Gospel which I liked very much, though I didn't love it like I did Across the High Divide.

I am now reading Michael Christie's book, Greenwood. Yes, another book about trees. After reading Richard Power's The Overstory, I saw Greenwood mentioned somewhere and started it last week. It jumps around a bit, but I love the author's style of writing and the subject matter is very important to me.

From amazon:

It’s 2038 and Jacinda (Jake) Greenwood is a storyteller and a liar, an overqualified tour guide babysitting ultra-rich vacationers in one of the world’s last remaining forests. It’s 2008 and Liam Greenwood is a carpenter, sprawled on his back after a workplace fall, calling out from the concrete floor of an empty mansion. It’s 1974 and Willow Greenwood is out of jail, free after being locked up for one of her endless series of environmental protests: attempts at atonement for the sins of her father’s once vast and violent timber empire. It’s 1934 and Everett Greenwood is alone, as usual, in his maple-syrup camp squat, when he hears the cries of an abandoned infant and gets tangled up in the web of a crime, secrets, and betrayal that will cling to his family for decades.

And throughout, there are trees: a steady, silent pulse thrumming beneath Christie’s effortless sentences, working as a guiding metaphor for withering, weathering, and survival. A shining, intricate clockwork of a novel, Greenwood is a rain-soaked and sun-dappled story of the bonds and breaking points of money and love, wood, and blood—and the hopeful, impossible task of growing toward the light.

This is a big book, 528 pages, so it will take a while to finish, but it's a nice ride so far.

I've put a couple of books on my wish list this week: Matt Haig, The Midnight Library
Sarah Penner, The Lost Apothecary

Happy April Fool's Day!!

[hermetic]

10. Ah, so it is

Don't go taking any wooden nickels. Gosh, kids today probably wouldn't have any idea what that means.

Greenwood sounds awesome. Will have to get that one.

[rzemanfl]

11. Just finished the 13th book in the Michael Bennett series,

The Russian and the 12th book of the Saxon Tales Sword of Kings. There is a waiting list for the 13th and final novel. I don't know what I will read in the interim, although the plague caused me to overlook a Walter Mosley novella in the Leonid McGill series.

[hermetic]

13. Sounds like a pretty amazing

collection. Author BERNARD CORNWELL, in case anyone is wondering.

[rzemanfl]

15. I tend to leave stuff out. n/t

[hermetic]

21. It's okay.

That's what they pay me for.

[rzemanfl]

23. I hope you get big bucks, but suspect you are pulling my leg. n/t

[hermetic]

25. We just get hot tub time

[rzemanfl]

26. Do they pay for heating the water?

[yellowdogintexas]

18. There are a good number of lendable Kindle books

I lend books to my sister quite often. All I need to do is send to her email address; she can keep them for two weeks.

I subscribe to BookBub, Robin Reads, and a couple of other free and discount E-book sources. I've discovered a number of new authors this way.

[rzemanfl]

22. Bookmarking for future reference. Thank you. n/t

[yellowdogintexas]

12. Reading the first book in "The House of Crimson and Clover" by Sarah M Cradit

It was one of those multi book series things from Amazon that was either free or 99 cents. They use these to get you to buy the author's other works (I probably got it through Book Bub; first four books)

I had put it aside, buried in my Kindle. Last week I got book one from a series called "The Seven" At the end was a blurb for Crimson and Clover...turns out it is the same author.

So I dug it out and am now reading it, and enjoying it. It's keeping me up at night, that's for sure.

The books are set in New Orleans and involve a family of (what else, it is after all New Orleans) witches.

Two New Orleans families are blessed with magic-and cursed by it. From USA Today bestselling paranormal author Sarah M. Cradit comes The House of Crimson & Clover Volumes I-IV, the first four novels in the twelve-installment House of Crimson & Clover series. Begin at the start with this collection, and dive into the secretive, ancient, and powerful world of the Deschanels and Sullivans.


Books in the series:

The Saga of Crimson & Clover
A sprawling dynasty. An ancient bloodline. A world of magic and mayhem.
Welcome to the Saga of Crimson & Clover, where all series within are linked but can be equally enjoyed on their own.

Series List
The House of Crimson & Clover Series: Dive into the secretive, ancient, powerful world of the Deschanels & Sullivans

The Midnight Dynasty Series: There's no place like home.

Vampires of the Merovingi Series: From the ashes of the sorcerer kings rose an empire.

The Seven Series: Seven siblings. Seven years. Seven spellbinding novels.

[hermetic]

14. I do love me some witch stories

Kind of a personal thing I've got going on.

Thank you for putting all the info there. Good job.

[yellowdogintexas]

17. New Orleans is the capital of witching in US literature!

I am a sucker for books set in New Orleans, even if there are no witches.

Have you read The Mayfair Witches trilogy by Anne Rice? I really enjoyed it.

Last night I was looking up the books I am currently reading; turns out I do not have the first 4 Crimson and Clover books, even though that is what the listing said I was ordering. I have volumes 5 - 8 and the first volume of The Seven.

It is not necessary to read the books in strict order but I think it would make for a more fun read.

[hermetic]

19. Yes, I really liked Rice's Mayfair witches.

That's a bummer about your book order. I just looked them up in the Fiction Data Base and can see how it would be easy enough to get confused about the exact order of the books. Looks like there's 15 altogether.

[bif]

16. "This Time Next Year We'll Be Laughing"

The Memoirs of Jacqueline Winspear. I haven't read any of her books since I'm not a mystery fan. But this was a beautiful book. Any of her fans should read it.

[hermetic]

20. Winspear is famous

for her Maisie Dobbs series of cozies.

Her memoir sounds great: "Astonishing!. This childhood memoir, though frank in its details of postwar privation, is at heart a love story—her parents’ love for each other, and hers for them and the meaningful life they gave her.”

[bif]

24. When I was reading about her life

I couldn't believe she was talking about the 1960s and 70s. England was so primitive in so many ways. She made it sound like she grew up in the beginning of the 1900s.

[Oldem]

27. The Bride of the Wilderness by Charles McCarry

The great writer of espionage novels turn his hand to the Plague of 1665, the Great Fire of London, and the New World.