A new book award

A friend sent me a link to a website with a new book award, but I'm not sure how I feel about this one. It seems like a nice idea, a bunch of high profile people from publishing getting together to give awards for the best books. (The committee has best-selling writers, editors, agents and other people like that.)

They're called the Mystery and Thriller Book Awards or maybe The Only Real Book Awards. (I'm not sure which.)

The reason I'm not sure about it is because of the first award they're giving. They award is for Laura Lippman, which is nice. I like Laura's books, even though they're not cozies. (Yes, I do read books other than cozies!) But the part I don't like is that they say they're giving it to her because she's the only woman writer "with ba**s."

As you probably know by now, I don't really like language like that. I think it's demeaning when people have to resort to four letter words to express themselves. (Call me old fashioned, but that's how I believe.) I also think it's wrong to say that Laura Lippman is the only woman author who can write great books. That's nonsense!

There are so many wonderful women out there writing books today. People like Julia Spencer-Fleming, Janet Evanovich, Marcia Muller, Margaret Maron, Donna Andrews, Denise Swanson and Rhys Bown. And there are many others, too.

I don't think it's right to try to build up one writer by tearing down others, even if that writer is really good like Laura Lippman is. Anyway, let me know what YOU think by leaving a comment.

Deadly Vintage by Elaine Flinn

This is a hard book for me to review. I really liked Flinn's first three books featuring Molly Doyle, the antiques dealer who lives in Carmel, California. Molly had an exciting life in New York before her husband left her and destroyed her reputation. Now she's trying to start a new life in California, building up her own business and raising her niece Emma.

The reason it's hard for me to review is because I'm not sure this is a cozy mystery. Molly is a good character and I usually like her a lot -- even if she does smoke and swear, two things that I don't really like to see in a book. This book seemed to have more violence than the others and just a harder edge overall. That's why I'm not sure if Flinn is still writing in the cozy genre. It seems like she's trying to be more hardboiled. And I think that's fine, but I'm not sure if that's what her fans will be expecting when they pick up Deadly Vintage.

In this book Molly is helping redecorate one of the local wineries. The owner of the winery is married to a real jerk, an abusive husband who Molly hates right away. (I hated him, too! I don't like seeing characters like him too much.) Things get really bad when Molly is at a party at the winery and the husband is shot dead right in front of her! That was an unexpected scene of violence, that's for sure.

Molly is a suspect in the murder for a while and...Well, I don't want to give away any of the story! (Like I said before I hate spoilers.) But I will say that Molly does her usual smart job of helping the police chief solve the crime.

I like Molly (even if she does smoke) and I like her niece Emma, a real cute kid. The police chief is okay, too, but he shouldn't always be cussing. (People don't have to cuss to be tough in books.) So while I liked the book, and it's a good story, I wasn't sure if Flinn was trying to write a cozy or something else. If it's something else, I think she should tell her fans that so we know what to expect.

Zapped by Carol Higgins Clark

Carol is the daughter of Mary Higgins Clark and she writes some really good books of her own. Her new one is called Zapped and its the new book in the series about detective Regan Reilly. Regan and her new husband have just returned from their honeymoon and started their new life together.

They decide to renovate their apartment but this leads to complications when Regan uncovers a clue to a possible crime. Regan's husband Jack, an NYPD detective, is investigating a case of his own. Is it possible that the two cases are connected? As if that weren't enough, they uncover a third case together, which they have to investigate. (That ones a little scary, about a crazy woman who likes to brand men.)

I like Carol's books because they're lighthearted but still have good mysteries in them. Zapped is no different. Regan is a character you can really like and it's so fun to watch her new life as a married woman! Whether or not you've read this series before, Zapped is a book I think you will like.

I Heard That Song Before by Mary Higgins Clark

Mary Higgins Clark has written so many wonderful novels over the years. A lot of them have been real favorites of mine. (I especially liked Loves Music, Loves to Dance.) One of her latest books is I Heard That Song Before and it's another good one.

Kay Lansing grew up living literally in the shadow of the Carrington Family's mansion. Now as an adult, she has reconnected with Peter Carrington, the family's scion, and fallen in love. It looks like they might have a wonderful life together. But he's got a dark secret from his past that threatens everything.

Mary has a great way in all her books of creating characters you can't help but like and stories that keep you up all night. They feel like ordinary people, the kind of people you could really know and like. I think that makes her stories that much more scary.

Mary proves that you don't have to have a lot of sex or language in a book that make it interesting and very suspenseful! I recommend you try her books today.

Strangers in Death by J.D. Robb

Although I don't read a lot of romances, I love Nora Roberts. She has a way with characters that really makes you want to read her books. The books she writes under the name J.D. Robb are favorites of mine, too. They're mysteries set in the future, usually with a good love story thrown in as well.

Eve Dallas is a homicide investigation in New York City in the year 2060. When a rich businessman is murdered while having kinky sex, Eve is in charge of solving the case. I won't give away any more of the plot -- I hate spoilers! But it's an interesting mystery, even though I figured it out before Eve did! (The story is a lot like the movie Strangers on a Train and even the title is similar.)

I love the characters in the Robb books, especially Eve and her wealthy husband Roarke. She creates such suspense and you just want to keep reading, even after it's time to go to bed. I don't know how Roberts writes so many books but keeps them all good! I guess that's why she's one of my favorite writers.

Plum Lucky by Janet Evanovich

How can you not love Stephanie Plum and Janet Evanovich? These books were consistently favorites with so many readers at our library and they're favorites of mine as well. They have a little more sex and foul language than most cozies. (I've heard some people call these "medium boiled.") But they're so much fun and do darn funny that I love them anyway.

This is either the second or third of the "Between the Numbers" books in the Stephanie Plum series. These books are a little bit different than the ones with numbers in the title. They all feature Diesel, who is sort of a naughty angel or maybe just a wizard. Anyway he has magic powers, although they don't come in handy most of the time.

In Plum Lucky Grandma Mazur finds a big bag of money (it's St. Paddy's Day!) and that lands her in a whole heap of trouble. Stephanie has to help her out, along with help from her friends Lulu and, of course, Diesel.

All of Janet's books are funny and the ones with Stephanie are my favorites. If you like to laugh, then these books are for you.

The Black Dove by Steve Hockensmith

Some of my friends might disagree that The Black Dove is a cozy, but I think it's close enough. Besides, I really liked the new book by Steve Hockensmith, author of Holmes on the Range, a book that was very popular with our patrons at the library.

Gus and Otto Amlingmeyer are a pair of cowboys in the Old West who want to be detectives. Their hero is Sherlock Holmes (they can't get enough of his adventures, which they read about in pulp magazines) and Gus in particular tries to use the great detective's methods of deduction to solve crimes.

The West isn't really a place for a couple brothers who think with their heads rather than their fists, so they don't have much luck getting work as detectives. So they make a case their own when a friend of theirs (Dr. Chan from On the Wrong Track) is murdered.

There's a little bit of salty language in The Black Dove, along with some violence. But this is still a book that I would recommend to my mother (82 years old and reads more than I do!), so I will recommend it to you, too.

Curse of the Spellmans by Lisa Lutz

I was a big fan of Lisa Lutz's The Spellman Files when it came out last year. It reminded me a lot of some authors I read like Janet Evanovich and Sarah Strohmeyer. (It wasn't as good as Evanovich, but it was better than Strohmeyer.) It was about a young woman who works in her family's private detective business. Funny, but with a good mystery. I really liked it.

So when I saw that Lisa had a new book coming out, I ordered it right away from the local bookstore. This was something I didn't want to miss. Although it's not as good as the first one, Curse of the Spellmans is another good book.

Izzy Spellman is back and she gets into even more hilarious trouble in this sequel. She even meets a guy this time, although he's not what she thinks at first. The story is good and I really like Izzy's character. (One thing that bugged me is that the book has silly footnotes. At first I thought it was kind of funny, but then I got tired of them.)

One of the things we always looked for at the library was how an author's second book did. A lot of times a first novel would get a lot of attention, especially if it made the bestseller like like Lisa's first book did. In my opinion, her second book was a little bit of a letdown. I still wanted to write about it, because Lisa's a good writer and I think people who liked the first one will like this one, too. But I hope she does even better if she writes another one.

Welcome to my new blog

I'm a retired librarian living in Ft. Worth, Texas who loves mystery novels. As you can tell from the title of this blog my favorites are the cozies. But in my job I read everyone, from Chandler to Christie, Lippman to Bruen, and I still do today. Now that I only read for pleasure I'll mostly be reviewing the books I really love.

I hope you enjoy my posts. I'll try to make them interesting! Please leaves comments if you stop by.