ROSEMARY HARRIS: No, this is not really a naughty post. And it's not about bridal shower or sweet sixteen minutes or saying the words "under the sheets" after you read your fortune cookie fortune. (Haven't done that? It's fun.)Last month, while on vacation in a tiny cabin, horizontal, next to my happily snoring husband - I desperately wanted to keep reading. I fumbled around, found the flashlight (it was that kind of trip) and finished my book by flashlight, Under the Sheets. Like a kid, sneaking a few more minutes after lights out. The book in question was Lee Child's The Affair. Get your guffaws out now..Lee Child ... Under the Sheets.
The Affair..Under the sheets. I'm with you. Pretty funny. But seriously, the book was just too good to put down.
So - What was the last book that was so good you would have read it with a flashlight under the sheets?
And, okay, let's be a little naughty - add the words Under the Sheets to some book titles. Hallie's are perfect - Never tell a lie under the sheets and Come and find me under the sheets!
JAN BROGAN: I hate to admit this, in part because I was totally manipulated by my Kindle and the author, who didn't completely wrap up the story but left it hanging. But I actually finished book II on night at about 1 in the morning, ordered the third and final book in the series, and kept reading until three a.m. My husband was away on business, but really..... I am not proud of my behavior. I mean, I might as well be staying up late shooting heroin because that's a little what it felt like.
Teaser ...under the sheets?
RHYS BOWEN: I've finished re-reading Connie Willis's The Doomsday Book and you'd think that because I'd read it before I wouldn't be so caught up in the story. But I was. I knew, in theory that the heroine would be rescued and wouldn't die of plague but I had to keep clicking that Kindle page turner, eating up large chunks of valuable time when I should have been writing or eating or cleaning house. And when it ended I found I was crying. Good book if it can do that to a reader twice!
And I should just mention that my next Molly book, due out in March, is called Hush Now, Don't You Cry..... under the sheets!
HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: I can't tell you, because its going to win the Edgar. And it'll be pretty funny to add under the sheets after the title. I'm now reading Val McDermid's The Retribution (under the sheets) and Charles Todd's The Confession (under the sheets). Hooked, absolutely, on both! (And I agree about The Affair!)
(My new book is The Other Woman. The Other Woman Under the Sheets is a MUCH better title...) Ro, you are too funny...xoox
LUCY BURDETTE: Can't wait for HUSH NOW, DON'T YOU CRY, and THE OTHER WOMAN, and NO MARK UPON HER--which is on my nightstand. I know I'll be under the sheets with those! But I'm reading a lot of novels with food and cooking in them--loved loved Barbara O'Neal's HOW TO BAKE A PERFECT LIFE and Julie Hyzy's White House chef series and Meredith Mileti's AFTERTASTE. And THE HELP rates right up there with GONE WITH THE WIND in my life list.
DEBORAH CROMBIE: I stayed up WAY too late the other night reading a very advanced copy (as in PDF of typeset pages) of Marcia Talley's new book, The Last Refuge (under the sheets.) That's a good one! As is the book! And we Reds who were at ALA in Dallas scored big. Although I didn't have a chance to get a copy of Val McDermid's Retribution, I've got Charles Todd's Confession, Cara Black's Murder at the Lanterne Rouge, and Denise Hamilton's Damage Control. Temptation under the sheets! I think Hank and Hallie are tied for the best "Under the Sheets" titles, but No Mark Upon Her (under the sheets) isn't bad, either.
(Rhys, all my Brit friends keep telling me I must read Connie Willis. Now I really MUST read Connie Willis...)
JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Ro, one summer when I was doing a massive multi-week book tour with Denise Hamilton, I picked up Lee Child's THE PERSUADER (under the sheets!) I got so wrapped up in it, that I couldn't stop reading when it was time for lights out (Denise and I were sharing a hotel room.) I took the book into the bathroom, threw a towel against the door to keep the light from spilling into the room, and stayed up 'til 3 finishing it - sitting on the john! Obviously, Lee knows how to keep a reader under the sheets...Recently? I read Linda Rodriguez's upcoming
EVERY LAST SECRET (under the sheets) in order to blurb it, and it kept me up way too late in bed, despite being in an unwieldy manuscript form. I think some of my titles would work.
I SHALL NOT WANT..under the sheets. ALL MORTAL FLESH...under the sheets. Which reminds me of the way I learned to play the game: with hymn titles!
HALLIE EPHRON: Hey, we can take all of Ro's mysteries and have a little DIRTY BUSINESS under the sheets. Hmmm. Sounds like fun. I couldn't put down Sara Henry's Learning to Swim ... I would have taken it under the sheets except I go to bed WAY earlier than my husband. And some of Deborah's titles are so perfect: Now May You Weep under the sheets, Dreaming of the Bones under the sheets, Mourn Not Your Dead under the sheets
And what about Prime Time Under the Sheets.
ROSEMARY: Or..(she blushes)..Face Time under the sheets? What's YOUR favorite...under the sheets?
I'm sorry - giggle ... Cornelia Read's INVISIBLE BOY under the sheets.
ReplyDeleteI love when you find a great book you can't put down. The last one I read that I couldn't put down was Nearly Departed in Deadwood by Ann Charles.
ReplyDelete"I want to curl up with Deborah Crombie's No Mark Upon Her"
Sue B
stevebrandes(at)gmail(dot)com
The last book I read straight through was Val McDermid's A TRICK OF THE LIGHT under the sheets. Since romantic relationships were a large part of the plot it seems appropriate to add those words.
ReplyDeleteI'm dying to read Deb's NO MARK UPON HER, but if you put under the sheets with that one I imagine a woman with a ghost. Probably because I just work up and the brain's still in a strange place.
Had to stay up last night until I finished the first Sarah Booth Delaney mystery by Carolyn Haines, Them Bones under the sheets.
ReplyDelete"I want to curl up with Deborah Crombie's No Mark Upon Her"
ReplyDeleterhondastruthersatyahoo.ca
How about an alternative: what audio book makes you stay in the garage (door still open for safety!) listening, long after you get home? Faithful Place by Tana French, read by Tim Gerard Reynolds. Breathtaking.
ReplyDelete(My captcha word is too perfect: redme!)
Leslie,
ReplyDeleteGREAT TWIST. I think the last audio that had me sitting in the garage was The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lax by Rebecca Skloot.
And it had me thinking about the story, long, long, long after I'd parked the car!
Julia, you are such a doll! Every single one of your books has kept me up at night because I just had to finish. My youngest even says "Oh, she's gone. Reading one of the Episcopalian books again."
ReplyDeleteBut the very last one to do that was Hank's PRIME TIME (under the sheets). I'm trying to catch up on all the Reds books I hadn't read before I found you guys. And I like to start at book 1 and read right through. Ben kept saying, "Aren't you going to come to bed?' And I'd say, "In just a minute. Just a minute."
Given my naughty teen age mind, I love the idea of hymns - under the sheets. I'm older now, and I read what I want as late as I want. All of Hank's books make for good reading under the sheets.
ReplyDeleteThis is hilarious. It reminds that I used to do the same thing with fortune cookies fortunes.
ReplyDeleteAlas, my recent reads don't provide great fodder:
Louise Penny, A TRICK OF THE LIGHT (under the sheets)
Val McD, THE GRAVE TATTOO (under the sheets)
Alafair Burke, LONG GONE (under the sheets)
However, I'm about to begin Elizabeth George's BELIEVING THE LIE (under the sheets). That's pretty good.
Well, here goes:
ReplyDeleteFor my regular book club, re-reading Louise Penney's "Still Life" (Under the Sheets).
For library book club I was thrilled to find after all these years that I loved "Pride and Prejudice" (Under the Sheets).
And, the last one that kept me up was the natural followup to P&P, "Death Comes to Pemberley" (Under the Sheets). A magnificent effort from PD James. Felt like I'd moved from the last chapter of P&P seamlessly into DCtP. LOVED it!!
Oops, I meant, A TRICK OF THE DARK by Val McDermid.
ReplyDeleteA TRICK OF THE LIGHT was also beautiful.
I love this! It's kind of hard to answer the question,though, because I pretty much stay up too late reading almost every night. I came up with a couple of book titles of recently read books that "work"well with Under The Sheets: Laura Disilverio's book Die Buying...Under the Sheets, and Gayle Carline's Clean Sweep...Under the Sheets, and of course Rosemary's (I think someone else mentioned it earlier, and I just finished reading it - late at night over the weekend) Dead Head...Under the Sheets.
ReplyDeleteDeb Romano
I relate better to the audio book that keeps me sitting in the garage. The most recent one was Ruth Rendell's Monster In the Box, but I have done it with many of Deborah's. And I am green with envy that some of you already have No Mark Upon her on your bedside table when I have been counting down the days until I can get it.
ReplyDeleteAll the books of you Reds work so well for this.
ReplyDeleteAND ONE WAS A SOLDIER under the sheets.
NAUGHTY IN NICE under the sheets.
SLUGFEST under the sheets.
NECESSARY AS BLOOD under the sheets.
AN APPETIE FOR MURDER undeer the sheets.
I've got to stop and go back to work. This is addictive.
A DISCOVERY OF WITCHES under the sheets!
ReplyDelete