3

Enjoyed the latest James Patterson novel. "Private #1 Suspect" written with his author du jour was a sequel. Fortunately I was able to remember the background from the previous book so I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Jack Morgan is the head of a PI agency called Private and it's state of the art. He needs his own company when he's framed for a murder of a former girlfriend. In addition he's pressured by the mob to help them find 30 million in prescription drugs that disappeared. Throw in a serial killer and a movie star that likes young girls and you have a pretty hefty line up. Good job!

2

Loved the new Tami Hoag novel, "Down the Darkest Road." She went back to her former novel and brought some characters back. She also went back in time to 1990 so the police work was different and so was the life style with no electronics and DNA was still sketchy. The character was a mother of a girl that had been missing for four years and her husband had killed himself from his depression. She was left with a younger daughter and a life of wanting revenge on the monster who took her daughter. They know who it is and the police can't do anything about it. No evidence that can be used. He's known for his record as a pervert but nothing more has been proven. The mother is taking things into her own hands since the police can't do what she can. Good read!

1

10 days to finish this book and it was excellent. Don't know why it's taking me so long anymore to read something. I don't get my lunchtime to do it since it's so noisy in our breakroom and sitting in the car can get a little cold and uncomfortable. Anyway, "The Lady of the Rivers" by Philippa Gregory was excellent. She takes a relatively obscure character out of history and gives them the credit they deserve. In this case it was Jaquetta who is descended from Melusina, the river goddess. As a young teen she met Joan of Arc and was present for her execution. She learned then to keep her second sight quiet but when she was given in marriage to Duke of Bedford he kept her a virgin so she could scry for him as a pure maiden. He introduced her to a mysterious world of learning and alchemy. Her only friend is the duke's squire, Richard Woodville. When the Duke dies she marries in secret to Richard. She's fined by the empire for marrying without permission but she is a favorite at the court of King Henry VI and a friend to his bride. Her husband is made a Baron and they have a small estate he inherits from his father where they raise their 12 children. One dies in adolescence. They both spend the majority of their time away from the family at court. Love Philippa Gregory and her history lessons.

#88

Looks like I'm ending the year with just 88 books read. My last two were not winners. Patricia Cornwell did it again with her latest "Red Mist." Almost 500 pages and it didn't get interesting until about 450 pages. She killed off a major player. Maybe she'll continue to do that until it's just Kay Scapetta and we can bury this series. I keep hoping that Patricia will come back to her beginnings but I think she's wandering farther away.

No big plans for New Year's. I have to work since I got those 6 days off over Christmas. They close the store early on Saturday but I have the late shift on Sunday which will ruin any plans with the family on that day.

#87

I can't believe it took me 17 days to read this latest novel. It's not that it wasn't good....it just was a very slow read. "The Surrendered" by Chang-Rae Lee started in Korea during the war and ended probably at the turn of the century. Flash backs kept occurring and one minute June was a young orphan in Korea and the next she was a woman in her late 40's dying of cancer but on a quest to find her estranged son in Italy. She enlists her ex-husband to help find the son he didn't know he had. I'm so glad to be finished with it!

Had another short visit from my Colorado friend and her son. They came yesterday early afternoon and left this morning. Her mother passed away last week so she's back in Virginia trying to settle the estate. The tragedy is giving us more chances to visit.

Christmas shopping is pretty much done. Not much under the tree but I did it pretty much in an hour or two. Wrapping took longer than buying. Still wishing I didn't have to bother but it's coming whether I want it or not.

I was scheduled to work 10 days but I didn't make it the 10th. I had stomach distress and knew that if I tried to work and couldn't get someone to cover me in time, there would have been "clean up in aisle one" at the store. I took Friday off and was scheduled for Saturday and Sunday. Now I work 4 and am off for 6 over Christmas. I'm sure I'll pay the price for those 6 days off.

#86

Finished the latest James Patterson novel, "Kill Alex Cross." It is a sequel that Patterson still writes on his own. This was one of his best. The plot was two fold. Alex Cross was called to help when the President's children were kidnapped from their private school. At the same time terrorist activities were taking place in Washington. At first it was thought that the two were connected. The two stories ran simultaneously and created a good read. Scary because it could happen.

Picked up my new iPhone 4S tonight. It was great until I came home and connected it to my iTunes and suddenly it was my iPhone 4 all over again. Everything I downloaded as far as apps turned my new phone into my old one. Now I have to restore the 4S and figure out how to keep my apps. Always something.

#85

Got the latest book by Clive Cussler and his author du jour. "Devil's Gate" was a Kurt Austin sequel and was filled with lots of adventure. A whacky ruler of Sierra Leone has decided to take over the world with his latest weapon. Using electro magnetic pulse he will disable whatever he aims at. Of course Kurt and his sidekick, Joe, are caught up in the whole mess. He'll save the world, as usual. Fun read.

#84

Don't know how I missed this novel by Mary Higgins Clark and her daughter Carol. I've been reading her forever and somehow I missed this little story. "The Christmas Thief" is very typical of the Higgins Clarks. Short, non-gory, non-sexual, and no filthy language. How refreshing! Just a cute little mystery about a missing Rockefeller Center Christmas tree and a con man. That's all you get!!

Got just a few days till Thanksgiving and haven't even shopped yet. Better get my butt in gear and get that turkey and stuffing stuff. That's my contribution to this year's big doings. I'd really just like to stay home in bed with the covers over my head. Same for Christmas. I'm officially cancelling it!

#83

Finished a novel by Ariana Franklin titled "Grave Goods." It was a sequel to another novel that I've read by her and I'd forgotten about it. It took a while for me to get into the story but in the end it was okay. Set in the late 1100's, it sent the heroine on a mission by Henry II to find out if the bodies discovered at a monastary were that of King Arthur. Henry hopes the bones are Arthur's so he can put down the Celtic rebellion for good. The heroine is Adelia Aguilar and she's the Mistress of Death. Trained by her father in medicine; she has to hide her abilities and pretend to be the assistant of an mid eastern companion. She not only proves the skeleton to not be Arthur but finds the answer to numerous mysteries.

#82

I don't think I'm going to make it to 100 books this year but I guess I'm doing okay. John Grisham's "The Litigators" was an excellent read. He never disappoints. David Zinc is a small fish in the pond of 600 lawyers working for a big firm and making $300K a year but has no life. International finance is not doing it for him. One day he snaps, gets drunk and finds himself in a two man boutique law office of ambulance chasers and decides that this is what he wants. The spiral down is when one partner decides to take on a big drug company in a mass tort suite for people who are supposedly dying from a cholestoral medication. No one at the new firm has ever tried a federal case and David has never tried any case. The whole story is great!

#81

After five days without power and a night in a motel, we finally got power back. Since my Grisham novel was locked in my locker at work and I finished the last book, I grabbed another off my pile that I picked up either in NYC or Borders and got hooked on it. Antoinette van Heugten's "Saving Max" is a great read. It was as good as a Grisham novel with great twists and turns. I figured out pretty early in the novel who done it and why but that was okay. It was a great read. Max is a 15 year old autistic child whose mother is a lawyer in NYC. She's trying to do what is best for him and that is to have him checked out at the best pychiatric clinic in the country. That would be Maitland in the mid west. She jeopardizes her job to take him there and suddenly they are both involved in a battle to save Max's life. Now I must read the Grisham novel before I forget what I've already read.

#80

I was into John Grisham's latest novel when I unfortunately left it at work on Saturday. We were having a freak snow storm that left us buried in tree branches and no power. We had 8 inches of wet and heavy snow that clung to the leaf ladened trees and made a royal mess of everything. Beautiful? Yes. A nightmare? YES! We have not had power, water, or heat now for 3 days and there's no end in sight. We've been staying up during the night feeding wood to the fireplace and each of us is sleeping on a sofa as close to the fireplace as we can get. Today we let the fire go out for the first time and headed for a real meal and then to a shower at my daughter's house. It was nice and warm and comfy but we're back home now and the fire is going again and we're trying to get the chill out before night. I missed work yesterday and had the day off today but I must go back tomorrow for the late shift.

Anyway, I picked up one of my books from either NYC or the Border's closing and it was "Remarkable Creatures" by Tracy Chevalier. Very informative and historically correct. There really were such characters as Elizabeth Philpot and Mary Anning and they were important in the discovery of fossils and skeletal remains of creatures that had yet been unknown. Found along the beaches of Lyme, England these women joined forces to become some of the leaders in their field even though as women they could not get the recognition of their discoveries at the time. Great read! Back to Grisham tomorrow when I get back to work and retrieve him from my locker.

#79

James Patterson and his author du jour wrote a little novel in a cross between Nicholas Sparks (not as good by far) and Mary Higgins Clark. "The Christmas Wedding" is about a mid fifties mother who decides out of her three suitors/friends to marry on Christmas Day and have all her family come. The family hasn't all been together since she was widowed 3 years before. She won't tell anyone, including the groom which one she is picking until she is walking down the aisle. We get a little background about each of her grown kids and a little background on the three potential grooms. Cute little read.

#78

Well Nicholas Sparks has done it again! I didn't have to use a tissue since I figured out 30 some pages from the end who was going to die in this one but it was still a great read. "The Best of Me" kept me reading and I couldn't put it down. The typical boy from bad side of town meets girl from the good side of town and the parents interfere and keep them apart. She marries someone else and has a good life. He never got over her. New circumstances cause them to meet up again and the magic is still there. Of course there are other twists and turns that make it a Nicholas Sparks novel versus a Danielle steel novel. Guess we'll be seeing this one on the screen soon.

A day off on Monday, late shift on Tuesday, a day off today, and early shift tomorrow. Makes for a rotten day off. Especially when you have to wait around all day for the Fed Ex driver who never comes at the same time and you have to sign for a package or they won't deliver it. Keeps me from doing any errands or anything fun.

#77

Finally finished the afghan for the new baby of the Assistant Store Manager. The kid will be able to use this till he's in college. Got a little out of hand.

Finished reading Elizabeth Strout's "Olive Kitteridge." It was an interesting novel. All centered on a small town in Maine and the main character Olive. Once a school teacher and apparently a not great wife or mother but her husband loved her dearly and her son held whatever it was against her. The novel was about a lot of different people in the town and each chapter told a different story. Olive and her husband were laced throughout some of the chapters. Enjoyable read!

#76

Took me ages to get through this book. Not because it wasn't a good read but because I've been doing my knitting project and it hasn't given me much time to read. This was not the best Harlan Coben book that I've read but it was still okay. "Miracle Cure" was written back in the early 90's and it was about the AIDS virus and a clinic that claimed to have found a cure. Problem? Cured patients are being found murdered. Suddenly and well known basketball star finds himself with the virus from a transfusion and things get even worse. Of course it's one of the good guys that has turned bad. I was sure that I'd read all of Coben's books but found this one that had been republished. Hope there are more somewhere.

#75

Boring, boring, and most boring is all I can say about "This Beautiful Life" by Helen Schulman. Just could not get my mind wrapped around this story. Middle aged couple with a 15 year old son and a 6 year old Chinese adopted daughter. Son gets caught up in a scandal when a 13 year old girl sends him a very pornagraphic video via email and he in turn forwards it to his friend and needless to say, it is around the world in days. He gets expelled and the parents are trying to get him through this tough time. They end up fighting and even though the son is returned to school in just a couple weeks, his life is in shambles. The mother can't handle it and the father is just concerned with being the big deal bread winner. I won't even go into what the young daughter got into when she discovered her mother's computer with the infamous video on it. Guess I couldn't get lucky with all my recent purchases.

Visit

After too many years, an old friend popped up and came for a visit. She's been living in Denver and her mother suffered a stroke which brought her back to the east coast and a few days with me. Great to reconnect with old friends. The visit has kept me from reading my usual amount and then I decided to also take up the knitting needles and produce a baby gift for my Assistant Store Manager who is close to delivering a baby boy. I had three days off for the friend's visit and it just made me greedy for more.

#74

Clive Cussler and his author du jour did not hit it out of the park with "The Race." This is his Isaac Bell and the Van Dorn Detective agency series. Just didn't enjoy it. It was a airplane race back in the early 1900's when air travel was still new. The contestants set off from NYC and travel across the country to California. The winner gets $50,000. Everyone is routing for America's newest sweetheart to win. She's young, a farm girl, and her estranged husband is attempting to kill her.

#73

Another of my favorite authors has started a saga. First in the series is "Only Time Will Tell" by Jeffrey Archer. I was off for two days and I started it late yesterday and just finished it. Not a small novel, either. Young Harry Clifton is born in the early 1920's into poverty in Bristol, England. His mother is a waitress and his father a dockworker. Or was he? Mom had a little fling with the wealthy dock owner's son just weeks before her wedding to the dock worker. Little Harry was born 8 months after the wedding with no one questioning his paternity since the husband thought he was her first. Dad dies mysteriously a short time after Harry's birth. Young Harry shows great potential and ends up making his way through prestigious schools on scholarships and becoming best friends with none other than the son of the wealthy dock owner's grandson. Yep! His half brother, but, of course they don't know they are siblings. Only three people know the truth about the paternity. Loved the way Archer wrote this one and am anxious for next spring's release of the second book.

Back to the grind tomorrow for an 8 day stretch. Won't be off now until my friend shows up on the 24th for her visit. With a little luck I'll get 3 days off in a row so that we can catch up.