Seven Novels

Fiction

Capture by Roger Smith.  Another crime novel set in Cape Town, South Africa. Smith writes some great books. His characters are rarely altruistic and always believable.

A Quilt for Christmas by Sandra Dallas.  Because a quilt for July 4th would be a weird gift. Unless you're in New Zealand or Australia. Dang, I just looked up the average temps in Dunedin, NZ and the mean high is only 70 Fahrenheit.  I should look closer at the latitude and compare with North America.

Leaving Time by Jodi "I Sell More Books Than the Bible" Picoult.  Do you really care what the book it about? You're going to take it home no matter what.  Picoult has curly hair.  I wonder if the curls are natural.

Gray Mountain by John Grisham. You'll just read this one as well.  Dunedin has the opposite latitude of Minneapoli at 45 degrees latitude.  Lake Mills is at 43.08.

Shopaholic to the Stars by Sophie Kinsella.  I see articles and print interviews with Kinsella but I never read those.  I just read a 87th Precinct novel by Ed McBain, Eight Black Horses. That novel is from 1985 and has recurring villain the Deaf Man.

Deadline by John Sandford. This is another one that people will read no matter what. Anthony Neil Smith was grousing about how good a writer Sandford is. Plenty of writers do that, giving false complaints as a way to publicly admire and praise another person's work. There must be a psychological term for that, it's not sarcasm. I have not read a Sandford book in a few years. I used to listen to the audiobooks.

Confessions: the Paris Mysteries by James Patterson Amalgamated Author Industries and Maxine Paetro. How do you pronounce Paetro?  The dustcover says Paetro "lives in New York State." That's a lot of territory, you'd think they'd narrow that down. There is a guy in town who has a summer place on an island in the St. Lawrence River. The East side of the river is NY and the West side of the river is Canada. I made a crack about cigarette smuggling. I thought the joke was pretty good, but I bet the people living there get those jokes all the time.