What We're Reading

DEBORAH CROMBIE: I've had a request from one of our regular commenters (that would be you, Gigi Norwood!) for a "What We're Reading" update, because she needs some good new book suggestions! And we are happy to oblige.

I'm two thirds of the way through Tina Whittle's Tai Randolf #1, THE DANGEROUS EDGE OF THINGS, and I keep wanting to sneak off and finish it when I should be working.  We had Tina as a guest last week talking about her latest in the Tai Randolf series, #5, and I was so intrigued that I started the series from the beginning and I am loving it. (JRW gets me in so much book-buying trouble...)


Next up, THE NIGHTINGALE by Kristin Hannah, which just came out in paperback and looks fab.  And I've ordered THE ESSEX SERPENT, by Sarah Perry, which comes out in pb next week and is supposed to one of THE books of 2017.

On the non-fiction side, I'm reading BEATEN, SEARED, AND SAUCED by Jonathan Dixon on Kindle, a memoir of his training at the CIA (Culinary Institute of America.) (I plead research related.)

And in hardcover, Greg Easterbrook's IT'S BETTER THAN IT LOOKS, and A BRIEF HISTORY OF EVERYONE WHO EVER LIVED by Adam Rutherford. I heard Easterbrook on NPR and was so fascinated that I immediately bought the book, and the Rutherford was recommended by our own Ann Mason.

Oh, and I just finished Anthony Horowitz's HOUSE OF SILK. It's a Holmes pastiche, and very well done. I dare say Horowitz writes better than Doyle!

JENN McKINLAY: I just finished A BEAUTIFUL PLACE TO DIE by Malla Nunn. Set in 1950's apartheid South Africa, featuring Detective Emmanuel Cooper, it was a fantastic read. It fascinated me because I don't know much about that time and place but also the writing was crisp and clever, the characters sympathetic, and the relationships complex. In nonfiction, I am enjoying KNIT LOCAL: CELEBRATING AMERICA'S HOMEGROWN YARNS. I had no idea there were so many yarns handcrafted in the States. Now I want to visit them all. Next up is Anne Gracie's newly released MARRY IN SCANDAL because...Anne Gracie! No one writes regency romance as cleverly as she does. And then I will dive into WHY KILL THE INNOCENT by C. S. Harris because I am signing with Candi (C.S.) at the Poisoned Pen in May. I've told her before that  Sebastian St Cyr is my fictional boyfriend, but she insists he's actually hers. So rude. LOL.

INGRID THOFT: I’ve read a lot of intriguing things recently.  AN AMERICAN MARRIAGE by Tayari Jones is about a marriage that is put to the test when a black man is wrongly convicted of a crime and sent to prison in Louisiana.  He and his wife struggle to maintain their connection under the most difficult of circumstances.  THE FLIGHT ATTENDANT by Chris Bohjalian was a page-turner that I read in a matter of days.  An alcoholic flight attendant wakes up in a bed in Dubai next to a dead man.  What she did and who he was are just some of the questions that get answered in this suspenseful tale.  I’m currently reading MAGPIE MURDERS by Anthony Horowitz, which is a book within a book.  The story starts with a book editor reading her star author’s latest manuscript, a traditional mystery set in England in the 1950s.  I don’t want to give too much away, but the book toggles between that story and the present, and I’m equally engaged with both threads of the story.  On the non-fiction front, LOOK ALIVE OUT THERE, is a great collection of essays by the hilarious Sloane Crosley.  If you need an injection of humor into your life, look no further.

LUCY BURDETTE: Jenn, A BEAUTIFUL PLACE TO DIE was one of the top five Edgar nominees one of the years I served on that committee. I still remember it as an excellent book. I have recently finished DEATH AL FRESCO by Leslie Karst (she was a guest recently--love this series), HUMMUS AND HOMICIDE by Tina Kashian (ditto, guest, fun first in a new cozy series), and DEAD WATER by Ann Cleeves. Thanks to you all, I am now addicted to this series. Sadly, I'm getting toward the end of what's available, so I will have to beg her to hurry up and write! I may try a non-mystery next, maybe Elena Ferrante's MY BRILLIANT FRIEND, or Amy Bloom's WHITE HOUSES, or Joshilyn Jackson's GODS IN ALAMBAMA? I hate this in between feeling so suggestions warmly welcomed!

HALLIE EPHRON: I'm reading a wonderful book, THE WIDOWS by Jess Montgomery (a pseudonym for Sharon Short) and it will be published by Minotaur, but you'll have to wait for it to come out. It's a historical mystery set in Ohio coal country in the 1920s. Keep an eye on it. It's a winner. And a book that Lucy recommended by Karen Joy Fowler, WE ARE COMPLETELY BESIDE OURSELVES, beckons. I've also added AXIOS to my daily mashup of newsfeeds that are keeping me from getting my novel finished.

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Oh, I loved MAGPIE MURDERS, Ingrid, (can't wait to read his upcoming one) and THE FLIGHT ATTENDANT, too. Because things are all coincidence, I was in an airport, and needed a book and the was absolutely nothing,..until I saw A TALENT FOR MURDER by Andrew Wilson. It's the mostly-fiction story of why Agatha Christie disappeared for those two weeks.  I completely adored it! And have scarfed up all of his books now.  Kate Moretti's THE VANISHING YEAR! Yay.  I love Wallace Stroby, and am reading his terrific upcoming SOME DIE NAMELESS,  and got to love Alafair Burke's THE WIFE.  I am judging for a contest, though, and cannot talk about most of the stuff I'm reading!  (And thank you Gigi, I love doing this and hearing about everyone's reading!)

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: In audiobooks, I'm still working my way through OREGON TRAIL: A NEW AMERICAN JOURNEY by Rinker Buck. Not that it's a slog, just that I'm (thankfully) not in my car as frequently as I used to be. In my hot little hands, but haven't started it yet: HEAD ON, John Scalzi's sequel to his near-future police procedural LOCK IN. Interestingly, as a SF reader, I'm seeing a lot more mash-ups of science fiction and mystery - mostly from writers known for the former. I'll be interested to see if some crime fiction authors get into the genre-splicing game.

I'm also reading my way through the Agatha Best First Mystery nominees. I'm on THE PLOT IS MURDER by V.M. Burns, which has a delightful mystery-within-a-mystery story; and Kellye Garrett's HOLLYWOOD HOMICIDE - great characters and and a genuinely fun read. I can see why both of them nabbed the nomination.

RHYS BOWEN: I'm impressed with the amount of time the rest of the Reds seem to have to read. I find it impossible to read fiction when I'm writing as I tend to pick up another writer's style. I mailed off my latest book to the editor a couple of weeks ago and since then I have been reading nothing but books to blurb. I seem to have become the blurb queen of historical fiction these days. If there is any book about a British aristocrat in the first half of the 20th Century it is sent to me. I can't tell you about the books as they are not yet published but I enjoyed them.

 But what I am also doing is re-reading Louise Penny's series in order as I have to interview her at Malice next week. However, I'm going to Europe at the end of May and my Kindle is already loaded with things I want to read, have been dying to read.

DEBS: It's so interesting how different our reading choices are, but at the same time, books on my to-read or have-read list turn up on other people's lists. Now, if we follow even a few of these suggestions, I don't think any of us will run out of things to read anytime soon...

(And I haven't even mentioned my Bookbub addiction, which means that I buy mumble mumble $2 books a week for my Kindle--enough to keep me in reading matter for the next two-hundred or so years!)

READERS, tell us what you're reading that you love love love and that we should add to our lists!