I’ve been chugging away on the 1927 book this week, interspersed with hanging out at the That Summer Read Along, so there hasn’t been that much leisure reading this week. But I have dipped into:
— Laurie King’s Pirate King
, the eleventh in her Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes series. (As you can imagine, I’m feeling particularly warm and fuzzy about eleventh books in series just now.) This one is set around a 1924 film production about a production of The Pirates of Penzance. And that’s not a typo. It’s a story in a story in a story.
If you haven’t read these yet, you might want to go way back to the beginning and start at The Beekeeper’s Apprentice
.
— Elsie Lee’s Season of Evil
, because when I’m in lockdown work mode, there’s nothing like one of Elsie Lee’s sassy, fast-paced, 1960’s-set romantic suspense novels.
And for the same reason….
— Elsie Lee’s The Spy at the Villa Miranda
, one of my Elsie Lee favorites, in which the recently divorced heroine goes on a tour of Greece with a retired college professor and finds herself plunged into Intrigue with a capital I.
What have you been reading this week?
I read The Heist , a fun fast read, by Janet Evanovich and Lee Goldberg. I also read two nonfiction books on legendary women for a project I’m working on.
The Mark of the Midnight Manzanilla, which wonderful! I can’t say enough good things about this one, you have outdone yourself. I am also re-reading That Summer for the readalong, which is great fun, and I am quite enjoying your contrasting styles.
One of my other favorites, Spencer Quinn, had a new book in his dog and detective series, this one Called Paw and Order…also a complete treat.
So far this has been the best book week of the year, as I also finished up Where Shadows Dance in the Sebastian St Cyr series. It can’t get much better than that!
I also finished Midnight Manzanilla and thought it was fantastic. I LOVE where Eloise and Colin are now. I don’t like spoilers so I didn’t read the teaser for Pink XII, but I’m hearing great things about it. Really looking forward to the last book.
I just started watching (after much insistence from certain friends) Haven, which is based on the Stephen King book ‘The Colorado Kid’ which meant that after three episodes I was reading ‘The Colorado Kid.’ It was an odd little book… nothing really happens, it’s a mystery without an ending.
I’m currently reading the first in Margart Stohl and Kami Garcia’s Caster Chronicles, ‘Beautiful Creatures.’ It’s kind of like a Southern Sabrina the Teenage Witch. I’m quite enjoying it so far.
Read Julie Garwoods latest “Fast Track.” Which was entertaining, as always. Then a re-read of Sarah Addison Allen’s first three books. Gosh, they are so good! I wasn’t in love with her latest book, which was hugely disappointing after a two year wait. Maybe the next one will be better.
I read The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Garmin, Garden and Table: the journal of Harald Bumbleburr by Daniel Myers, and Artful by Peter David.
I couldn’t wait and already finished reading That Summer. I just started The Thinking Woman’s Guide to Real Magic and so far it’s really good. The title caught my eye and also the recommendation on the cover from Deborah Harkness. I was hooked after just a few pages!
I read that one too, and I’m waiting for the next book!
Midnight Manzanilla and Berkeley Square – it’s impossible to decide which is better! I’m loving them both.
Finished Juliana Gray’s How To School A Scoundrel …loved it!
Enjoying the That Summer read a long.
Starting Karen Whites new book tommorrow.
I just finished The Last Honest Seamstress by Julie Garwood, a historical romance that takes place during the great Seattle fire of 1889. It centers around the remarkable hero and heroine who marry only for “financial convenience” to save their respective businesses and the mistaken notion that each does not love the other while quite the opposite is true. Having lived in Seattle for 11 years, wrapping the story in this climactic event and all of the incredible tension involved in the hero and heroine surviving is remarkable. A truly top-shelf romance in every sense of the word.
I read Playing the Odds by Nora Roberts. It’s the first in her MacGregor series and I liked it better than expected.