BARNES AND NOBLE

We had a Books a Million store on the mainland when we lived on our barrier island. Here, we have a Barnes and Noble. We went in this week for the first time. People were browsing around and drinking coffee and reading.  With my eye problems, I don't visit book stores much; I'd forgotten how much I loved them. A few pix:

Cafe at the back, looking through the books:

Entrance, looking through the books:

And a lot of lures for kids:

I spent too much time in this last section!

LOCAL AUTHOR EVENT

Our Literary Guild (that used to be a Friends of the Library till they disbanded and reformed due to a conflict with the system library director at the time who is no longer in charge; in fact, our county formed our own separate system) put on an event to benefit local authors yesterday and invited twenty authors to participate. I was happily one of them. They set up tables at the Casino atrium for each of us to display and sell our books, furnished lunch, and generally catered to us for the four hours we were there. It was a lovely experience, easily one of the best put-together of its kind that I've attended.

Here are some pix. Yours Truly is in the first as we're setting up. I am fortunate my guy's done stuff like this. He made up the boards and set up the table and did all that. All I had to do was sit there. (Of course, since he practically forced me to participate since I am the shy, retiring type, I guess he felt like he had to make it easy.)

Then here's Dr. Christina Johns on the right. She's written a fictional semi-memoir.

Finally, here's Buzz Bernard. His book Eyewall, the story of a hurricane hitting St. Simons hit too close to home for me.

A fun day. Thanks go to all the volunteers who worked so hard to make it successful!

NEW BOOK OUT

My sequel to TAXED TO THE MAX is now available from Amazon. Ebook only right now but in a few days, the print copy will be out too. And if you buy the print copy, you can get the ebook version free.

Not sure why anyone would want both but anyway, that's the deal.

Here's the cover for OVERTAXED AND UNDERAPPRECIATED. Collin Beishir designed it, using one of the pix my guy took in Old Town. Pretty, isn't it?

And here's the link on Amazon if anyone's interested. http://www.amazon.com/Overtaxed-Underappreciated-Cheryl-B-Dale-ebook/dp/B00I25JU9C/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1391961620&sr=8-1&keywords=overtaxed+and+underappreciated

Whee! I see I have a review! That's exciting since I don't get many! And it's a good one!

READING CLUB

While in Alabama, I visited a reading club who call themselves the Same Sweet Girls. Don't you love that name? But the women lived up to it. They were very warm and welcoming. Not to mention delightful and lovely. And of course, anyone who reads is intelligent by default!

We met in a beautiful house, with a fish tank built into the mantel above the fireplace--I wish I'd asked how  she managed to clean it because it looked like it was inserted into a frame made just for the aquarium--and a gorgeous view of a lake. They offered wine and nibbles, of course; all gracious people offer wine and nibbles! And they were kind enough to act interested in my hardback mystery TAXED TO THE MAX, even though I'm sure their tastes run to more literary stuff than my light mystery.

All in all, I had a great time. I have a picture, but I hesitate to post it on my blog since someone might not want to be seen with me. So I'm posting my book cover instead. You'll just have to imagine several beautiful women facing the camera with one nerd in the middle and that'll be us!

MERMAID BLUES by Joel Brown

This is the second in this series I've read, and I'm looking forward to the next from Joel Brown.

Baxter, a folk/pop singer who had one big hit decades ago, is trying to make a comeback when a local Lothario turns up dead. Naturally, Baxter's semi-involvement puts his new record contract at risk. Naturally, Baxter keeps prying into the murder. And naturally, more corpses turn up.

Poor Baxter. His romance with the record company's representative fizzles (after he spends a fortune treating her to an exclusive dinner in the top of the lighthouse). His comeback concert is hit by a thunderstorm. His ex-wife's husband still annoys him no end. But he keeps nosing around looking for the killer while trying to tend to his paternal duties. He's a likable guy in a hairy situation.

The atmosphere of the touristy harbor town is wonderful. The characters come to life. And the ending is one I didn't see coming. Good read!

GOLDEN LIES by Barbara Freethy

Barbara Freethy is a nice writer and delivers her usual entertaining story in GOLDEN LIES.

When Riley takes his grandmother to the House of Hathaway to have them appraise a Chinese dragon she found in her attic, the dragon disappears when one of the Hathaways takes it off site and disappears.

The culprit is Paige's father and at first she's disbelieving (he'd never take someone else's property out of their showroom and emplorium), then shocked, and finally frightened when her father turns up in an alley, unconscious and near death. Naturally the dragon is gone.

Riley's angry that the Hathaways would try to take advantage of his grandmother and is determined that they will return it one way or the other. Paige wants to know where her father took the dragon and why. Together they go on a search that takes them to San Francisco's Chinatown leads back to China itself.

Nice easy read.

HARD BOOK vs KINDLE

Someone recommended a book on writing I hadn't read. (Unusual because I think I've read kazillions!) So I look on Amazon to find it. Sure enough, it's there.

The trade paperback edition is $6.61 while the Kindle copy is $13.99. I'm a Prime member (my guy uses it for the streaming movies) so I don't pay shipping. So I think: 6.61 vx 13.99; 6.61 vs 13.99. I love my Kindle but...

I order the trade paperback. Now I'm reading and trying to press buttons to turn pages. But I'll survive.

Oh, and after getting about a third of the way through, I realize it still isn't as good as my old favorite, SELF-EDITING FOR THE FICTION WRITER. But that's okay. It never hurts to read about craft. There may be something in here I didn't know or had forgotten.

I do think they need to set Kindle prices as low as the paperbacks though.

THE MISREMEMBERED MAN

THE MISREMEMBERED MAN  by Christine McKenna is an excellent read.

Ms. McKenna has a wonderful voice and does a wonderful job defining her characters. I know them as well as I might know my neighbors. I can see the Irish setting, hear the lilting speech patterns, visualize even the minor characters...all from her writing.

There were terrible parts of the story I didn't enjoy. Such places as the horrific orphanages Ms. McKenna writes about actually existed, and the ugliness of that reality isn't easy to learn about. But to balance things out, the characters got into situations where I laughed out loud.

When farmer Jamie becomes depressed after being left alone with his farm and its animals to care for, his friends decide he needs a good woman.

When schoolteacher Lydia gets out for the summer, her friend gives her something to look forward to besides remaining at the beck and call of her widowed, ailing mother.

This is not a romance, even though it sounds like the beginnings of one. It's a reminder of how inhumane caretakers of children can warp lives. It's also a portrait of how hope is an integral part of the human character. It's also a story of how strange life can sometimes be.

Great book.

SPIRIT FALLS

I really liked this book, SPIRIT FALLS by Robert E. Townsend. The time is the fifties, the place is northern Wisconsin, the community is comprised of immigrants and/or first generation descendents.

The main character is a sixteen-year-old boy. He and his best friend, a girl his age, trap and work together on the farm. Other people include a displaced person he crushes on, an abused girl who nowadays would be seen screaming for help, some male friends...and enemies. In this coming of age story, we see how he begins to think of places outside Wisconsin, dream of something other than farming.

The writing craft could have been better. The shifting points of view were sometimes abrupt with little transition, and with another abrupt shift within a few paragraphs so that I had to figure out who was thinking what. The characterizations were sometimes over the top, too, with some heavyhanded stereotyping and people behaving strangely. In one place an incident was referred to that didn't happen till later on in the story.

But I felt the lure of the beautiful northwest. I could see the beauty, hear the rushing water, feel the cold. Boy, could I feel the cold! This is one of the coldest books I've ever read.

And even when I put it down, I was wondering what was going to happen, and looking forward to picking it up again.

I liked it so much I intend to reread it, taking in things I missed in my haste to get through it.

This is an excellent read.

EVERY SECRET THING

A nice story by Joanna Kearsley/Emma Cole, with more suspense than romance, that interwinds events of World War II with today.
Journalist Kate is covering a trial in England when an old man approaches her. He's trying to get justice for someone murdered long ago, he says, and he has a report about it he wants to give her. Busy, she puts him off. He leaves, but mentions she has her grandmother's eyes. Surprised, she watches him go, sees a car run over and kill him.

That's the beginning of this engrossing mystery. More murders follow, one close to Canadian Kate's home, others of people who knew the old man. When she realizes someone thinks the old man gave her his report and she knows what happened, she runs. She has to uncover his story to find out who's after her.

Kate's portion, in first person, chronicles her attempts to uncover the murder and murderer.
Facts of the old man's life unfold in third person narrative from him and people who knew him, including Kate's grandmother.

A bit kitschy at times, but if you like a good story with a sprinkle of romance and a quick lesson in Canada's part in training spies for WWII, this one's for you.

SLIM TO NONE

SLIM TO NONE by Jenny Gardiner is a light, humorous slice of gingerbread with whipped cream topping.

Not really. The food and recipes I salivated over throughout my reading brought up this metaphor, but it's still pretty apt. Not quite chick lit and not quite women's fiction, this kind of straddles the two.

Abbie, the overweight heroine, loses her job as a newspaper food critic because she's gotten so fat the restaurant owners recognize her. The editor puts her on a temporary part-time column and gives her an ultimatum: lose weight or forfeit her job.

Perfect. Especially since the sleazy food-section guy (who she thought was so nice because every day he brings her pastries and other exotic confections guaranteed to add the pounds) is filling in at her job!

Now Abbie not only has to lose the pounds to wrest her job away from her stand-in who wants to become permanent, she also has to deal with a husband who wants her to ride on a Vespa, a homeless man she wants to take under her wing, and a best friend who wants to use her to cover an affair.

And this brings her to having to face her own past and the reason she hankers after food so much.

Everyone who's been overweight will get a kick out of this book. No earthshattering problems but lots of funny situations.

But avoid the recipes like the plague.

BAREFOOT Book Review

BAREFOOT is by Elin Hilderbrand, another of her Nantucket Beach books that I always enjoy.

Three women, two of them sisters, head to the beach for the summer. All have baggage. The oldest sister has brought her two young boys and is about to undergo chemo for lung cancer. The younger sister has lost her job as college professor and reputation after sleeping with a student. The friend has found out that, after several in vitro attempts, she's finally pregnant. And that her husband is cheating.

As usual Hilderbrand does a great job of drawing each woman's personality as well as the babysitter hired to help with the boys, a college student who's drawn to each of the women in turn. They all have battles to fight and decisions to make. And we're with them all the way.

Seems to me the entire book is about choices. The choices each woman and the babysitter makes, the choices supporting characters make, the choices all of us might make. Some are good, some are bad, but in the end they must be lived with.

Good book.

DIARY OF A SMALL FISH

Pete Morin's first novel is about a lawyer, a small fish caught up in a net to expose government corruption.

Massachusetts attorney Paul Forte has a passion for golf. He loves it and plays it whenever he can with anyone he can. I'm not a golfer but evidently, when someone invites you to a golf game, you don't pay your own way; you reciprocate by inviting them to play your own club course. Paul never thought of it as a federal crime.

But one morning, he wakes up and opens his door to a federal marshall. He's been subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury.

Paul's a little concerned but assumes the man they're after is a man he's golfed with. Nope. The prosecutor's set his sights on Paul. Seems he has a grudge. But no one knows why.

I consider this a 'smart' book. Not as in intelligent-smart, but as in stylish-smart. The offhand references to Hyannisport, the Shrivers, the MBTA all lend a realistic tone. The dialogue is crisp, sometimes funny. As at the end of the grand jury interrogation, after Paul had listed all the different lobbyists he'd golfed with and where they'd eaten afterward. The prosecutor asked if any of the jurors had questions for Paul. Only one of the twenty-three jurors raised a hand.

"Did you say your dinners were always at the Impudent Oyster?" she asked.

"Yes."

"How's the osso buco?"

That's what I mean about smart.

This is an entertaining read, with a hero you want to see come out on top. No dead bodies in this one, but I'd recommend it to anyone tired of the same old lawyer mysteries.

Good book.

CHASE

I just finished CHASE by Larion Wills. MuseItUp, publisher of this romantic suspense, is also pubbing my romantic mysteries as ebooks next year.

This is an enjoyable read. It starts off with Chase coming back to the town he left eleven years before to discover whether or not he'd fathered a child. His girl friend at the time had told him she was pregnant before her father had him beat up and run out of town. At eighteen, he didn't have many options and the girl wasn't always truthful.

He finds the girl wasn't lying. Chase does have a son. But the girl's disappeared and her younger sister Sydney has adopted his child and raised him.

This isn't the usual 'secret baby, fight between who gets it' romance. It's better, with the bad guy dead but still stirring up trouble. The heroine Sydney has OCD, but she was determined to save Chase's son for him because like her sister, she loved Chase. And turns out Chase loves her back.

Only now there are people who want her and him both out of the way.

I was kind of surprised at the villain's unmasking, only to be further surprised at the end though I shouldn't have been when I thought about it.

Nice story and serviceable writing. Kept me engrossed all the way through. If you like romantic suspense, you'll enjoy this.

REMEMBER ME

REMEMBER ME is by Sophie Kinsella, who also wrote the SHOPAHOLIC books, and  is a romance in that same comedic vein.

The heroine wakes up in the hospital, thinking she's the same twenty-five-year-old office worker who took a fall and hit her head. Not so. She's in the hospital because of an auto accident. Three years after the fall she thought she had the night before. She's missing three years of her life. And boy howdy, what those three years must have been like!

Her crooked teeth are straight, she's lost twenty pounds, she's now a director of her company, and she lives in a large loftstyle apartment with a gorgeous millionnaire. Who happens to be her husband.

Of course there are drawbacks. She's on a carb-free diet, she wears nothing but beige business suits, she instinctively knows how to pin her hair into a severe bun, and she's been nicknamed the Cobra or the Bitch from Hell by her department. She's also lost the friends she loved, one of whom she's known since she was six.

Between trying to adjust to her new persona and keep from breaking any more three thousand pound glass leopards (that her husband invoices her for), she's not prepared for the cute man who knows all about her life during the past three years..

If she can't remember her husband, how can she expect to remember her lover?

Cute book.

DEATH OF A TROPHY WIFE

This is the first Jaine Austen mystery by Laura Levine that I've read, but it won't be the last. Jaine is a wonderful heroine who scoffs at designer clothes and health food. She'll keep her elastic-waisted pants, thank you very much, and chomp her way through fast food places without regret.

In this book, her neighbor and friend, the gay Lance with impeccable taste, is latched onto by the universally disliked Bunny. Bunny loves his fashion expertise and she has money to support his style advice. Of course, she got it when she snagged her rich husband by convincing him to leave his wife of thirty years. Now she's busy spending his money and lording it over the peons. The ex-wife hates her, her stepdaughter hates her, her cook hates her, and a woman whose boyfriend she stole hates her. Oh, and she's having an affair with her step-son-in-law.

Pretty evil person.

Then someone murders her and Lance is accused. On leave from his job till the murderer is found, he cooks healthy meals for Jaine that she's forced to eat and donates her clothes to a thrift store that makes her buy them back.

She's got to find out who murdered Bunny and fast, before she starves to death and her clothes disappear forever.

Adding to the fun is her snobby cat,Prozac and a suitor from Uzbekistan who thinks she's the next best thing to his goat.

Very entertaining book. I didn't see the ending coming. Nice cozy for anyone who likes their mysteries with a dab of humor.

DISAPPOINTING BOOKS

I bought a book by an author I used to really enjoy. The last couple of hers that I read were kind of disappointing, but this copy was on sale and I thought I'd try it.

I won't say who it is because she's a best-selling novelist who I'm sure is a very nice person.

I will say this book was as disappointing as the last two. The writing was verbose, the story was nil, and the characters were boring. I can't help but feel that if there had been an editor who wasn't overworked and/or overawed, s/he could have coaxed a much better novel out of the author.

I finished it but it was hard.

MURDER IS A FAMILY BUSINESS

Just finished MURDER IS A FAMILY BUSINESS by Heather Haven, published by MuseItUp.

Lee Alvarez is a PI for her family firm, an investigative agency that normally handles computer type crimes. They take on a possibly wandering husband because the wife being cheated on is Lee's mother's friend. While Lee's tailing him, he's shot and murdered. Out of curiosity or instinct or something, she goes back to check on him and finds him dead. She's a suspect but not for long. But he was killed while she was surveilling him and she can't get him off her conscience.

In the process of picking up and adopting a stray kitten, dealing with her fashion-plate mother, and talking her computer-geek brother into helping her solve the crime, she finally figures out whodunnit. Readers might have figured the killer out long before the end, but the ride is so much fun, it doesn't matter.

Good book.

CREWKIN

CREWKIN is a space opera novel by Rhobin L. Courtright. The heroine, Renna, is bred specifically to work on long-haul spaceships where the crews go months, even years, in space isolation. When her ship is destroyed, the surviving crewkin are encouraged to commit suicide rather than try to live as norms (normal people). Renna is the only one to refuse. And now she can never work as a crewkin again.

So she signs on with a short-haul spaceship and tries hard to fit in with the rag-tag norms who mistrust crewkin. But the cargo they're carrying is an engine more advanced than any other spaceship engine ever conceived. An engine capable of thrusting deeper into space in a fraction of the time regular engines need. An engine with its own intelligence.

And though they don't know it, this advanced engine they're transporting is the very same engine that destroyed Renna's old ship.

HAL in 2001 was scary, but this engine is something else! It can do everything including rebuilding the ship!

Pacing is good, characters maybe not quite developed enough, but overall, a really good book! Anybody who likes SF will like it.

FIVE STAR PRESS

I got the executed contract today so I feel safe in announcing that Five Star Press has offered for my light mystery, TAXED TO THE MAX. It's due to come out in December of 2012 in hardback since Five Star, I understand, sells mostly to libraries and educational facilities.

TAXED TO THE MAX is a light murder mystery. It isn't R rated, maybe not even PG-13 rated. No heavy thinking is involved to enjoy it. In case like most people, you've been dying of curiosity about what really goes on in a property tax collections/tag office, this is your chance to find out.

As for what it's about, well...

When a tax commissioner is murdered, a young tag clerk is asked to replace him. Ha! She's not crazy enough to take on the thankless job.

But then her ex-fiance who jilted her at the altar in front of two hundred people - most of them local - tells her to turn it down, that whoever killed the tax commissioner will be gunning for her. Naturally, she can't let the snake-in-the-grass talk her out of a job he probably wants one of his buddies to have. She becomes tax commissioner to spite him.

But the snake was right. Now the murderer's after her.

So obtuse deputies guard her 24/7, tag buyers try to do all kinds of illegal stuff, and the property tax digest she's responsible for, is in the hands of the pothead IT guy.

With this much stress, what's a gal to do?

I hope all tax office people out there enjoy this as much as I enjoyed writing it!