A CATERED BIRTHDAY PARTY by Isis Crawford **

Mostly boring. Generic murder mystery with typical plot. If you switched weather and food along with a few names you could republish this as Catered Barbeque and there are plenty of other Catered-whatevers. These people have to all be 100 lbs overweight but actual physical traits aren't mentioned all that much. All they eat is cake, cookies, pies etc.

Every chapter is basically hash and rehash of every suspect, with every reason on the planet why he or she could be the killer and how they did it. Just over and over and over discussing this are 2 sisters and whoever else they corner to hear them while moving dogs around, eating and snowing.

Not a big fan. BUT if you need something to fall asleep reading this is probably good for nodding off. B-O-R-I-N-G to S-N-O-R-I-N-G.

I wasn't even going to mention the fact she has a Richard and a Rick. How many frickin names are there? A billion? We gotta have Rick and Richard? (FYI Rick is a Richards nickname) Melissa and Missy. Annabel, Joanna and Anna. SHEEESH. Get a book of names from around the world to put this crap to bed. Where's the creativity? Not HERE!

The ART of RACING IN THE RAIN by Garth Stein ****

I did buy this one because I have read it. Someone else recently mentioned how great it was so I bought a copy cuz I wasn't that impressed the first time around. It's about life from a dogs point of view with some philosophy thrown in here and there. The dog Enzo begins with an owner, Denny who then finds true love, marries, moves around and accommodates his life to fit hers and their kid then the wife has health and submissive family issues and I won't give it away more than that. Personally I think she needed a spine insertion. Or she's just an asshole.

Denny is a race car driver and the writer/dog have a jones for it which I don't really care about and all the racing crap including who's famous and who I don't GAS about, all could be deleted without me noticing. Writer likes to philosophize about life as a race in the rain. Not a 'dog' lover book in particular. Promotes nothing about spay/neuter, litters, or poor breeding practices or pet overpopulation etc. Contributes nothing there so I guess in general I don't understand what the point of telling it from the dog view is. Why? What's the point? Cuz the dog wants to be a human and believes in reincarnation? Is that the point? What goes around comes around? I suppose that must be the point. Not impressed. It's ok, fair. Not one of my favorites. Much prefer Marley and Me if I had to choose between them. The Dalai Lama book I recommend if you're interested in reincarnation.

Looking at it philosophically myself the human race is not to be admired. If you doubt this go to a shelter and watch them put dogs to sleep and ask where did all these innocent dogs COME FROM, HUH???? WHERE? It would be a better story if the human aspired to reincarnate back as a dog...a higher form of life in my opinion. Don't even bother me with your shit until you've seen dogs euthanized. Really.

QUEEN of the NIGHT by J.A.Jance ****

Was good reading but every introduction to a person required a paragraph to a page of long ago history which in most cases didn't have anything to do with this story. I said "most' cases but there were a few related. I just never knew which boring rehash I had to know and which I didn't. In all likelihood not knowing would have been fine. Here's an example of WTF do I care: "Brian drove Delia back to her home in Sells. He knew that at one time she and Leo had lived in the house Delia had inherited from her aunt Julia in Little Tucson, but sometime in the recent past they had moved back into the Ortiz family compound behind the gas station." Do I GAS? No. Is it moving the story line forward? No. So lots and lots of little tidbits like that draining your interest level.

Basically well written, over-detailed, sentimental, flowery, some romance, with some hocus pocus thrown in for spice. Not bad, not great. So so. Something to read without ripping your hair out but nothing a guy would want to read. In the same vein as Fried Green Tomatoes with murders.

About 25 people involved in their own private worlds, and in the end they are related by marriage or friendships or something and their stories intertwine because of the murders. Story is more focused on the inter-relationships and lives of everyone than the murders.

9 DRAGONS by Michael Connelly ***

Haven't read enough to rate yet but so far so good. I like the smart cops, I like the quick investigations and logical way of reading crime scenes. I enjoy that small stuff and it's written well so I'm not bored. Nice intro to new characters and scenes but there is some manly push and shove, that as a female I don't get. Guess there's a lot of testosterone flung around. Small things I wouldn't think would irritate a guy make dents in their egos here. Am waiting for someone to whip it out and piss on someone else....stay tuned.

Now I get to conclusion jumping. On and on. Some guy was extorting a store owner who is now dead, the cops automatically assume he's the killer, so they are following him all over town (boring BTW) as he then extorts the son. Why on gods earth would someone extort the son after he killed the father? Did he threaten the son? Nope. Did he say, what happened to daddy will happen to you? Nope. Did daddy pay the extortion fee? Yup. Dead anyways. Seems like RED HERRING is written all over this aspect. Writer drags me around without explanation. Don't like it. Not only that but the cops are working for no pay overtime wasting MY TIME with the car chasing b.s.  Get it over. Please. I'm sure this'll take up about 4 chapters. GRRREEAT.

Absurd: the entire cops case is based on NOTHING. No evidence whatsoever. Nice police work. All done on assumptions forcing facts to fit the crime blahblahblah. Now the hero is racing off to Hong Kong to save his kidnapped idiot child who befriended a suspicious character linking to this entire thing a week ago??? WTF? Weeks BEFORE the shooting. Preplanned super intelligent triad criminals. LOL This cop looks like a bumbling moron, he has no evidence linking anyone to anything. What a dork.

Absurd: Guy tells ex wife who's living in Hong Kong when he gets there he'll need a gun. Does wife get one during those 24 hrs waiting for him to arrive so they can immediately get down to the business of finding kidnapped asshole teenager? No! They waste time after he arrives driving all over to get a gun.

FRANKENSTEIN City of Midnight by Dean Koontz****

Well, another book of the series down. I liked it but again, feel like it's written for a younger audience. NTTAWWT. Some absurdities but I guess the title is a clue for that. Like tumors running around without their pants on meanwhile some comedian PD officers (who are VERY funny BTW) are driving around town with gigantic guns hoping to kill hard-to-kill monsters but everytime I get close to seeing something happen the book ends. That's one reason I don't like series. End something. The only ending here is someone's (Arnie) safety the rest is still hovering over the equator like gnats.

FRANKENSTEIN Prodigal Son by Dean Koontz ****

Well I had to go to the library and order these back books so I could figure out the entire series. The book is a page turner, very quick read. It's dark and scary with Frankenstein still alive creating monsters. The progression from the 4th back to the 1st book is sort of odd because it's more scientific and clone-y by the 4th book.

There are a lot of iron clad rules by which the monsters live such as they are unable to commit suicide, they can't fall in love, they can't turn on the creator, they can eat almost anything, they have 2 hearts blahblah and this is going to have to carry thru every book in the series but I don't remember any of these rules in book 4. Also these monsters are supposedly placed all over the country in positions of power and have taken over some other people's lives but the stories get very concentrated into one or two of the monsters without ever delving into the rest of them or what the hell they're doing. It's like they're forgotten or something. Unless they're not fully integrated yet? Never explained. There are things I don't like about the book, such as that. I don't like how unkillable they are and can run so fast as to beat out cars because I don't think this is going to hold up for the entire series. I don't remember that in book 4. We'll see.

Maybe it's designed for younger readers? I don't know. It's fast paced, easy to follow and well written but I don't know why I'm not more impressed. Maybe it's too superhero/monster for me. Like a kids comic book? Not sure.

The BRICK LAYER by Noah Boyd *****

Starts off a tad slow for me with 3 separate scenes that feel unconnected but once you get to chapter 4 it all moves along better. It flows nicely, not overboard on descriptions or names and feels very realistic except for the women who are overly attracted (body language?) to some of the men but 'some' men think if you look at them you want them bad....haha.

So it's well written, intense and after you get into it a bit you don't want to put it down so it's entertaining and informative because author is a former FBI agent. I too have total disregard for authority so I like that about the main character, it's like he's inside my head sometimes.

It's about a terrorist group messing with the FBI and either killing them, framing them for crimes or manipulating their actions; all for ransom.

I must say, if the PD, FBI and/or CIA are half as stupid as some writers portray them we are all in for a world of hurt.

Good reading.

BLACK FRIDAY by Alex Kava *****

Starts a little slow but builds up well. Human 'bombs' go off in the mall of America and all hell breaks loose. People are scrambling to figure out who/why and others are trying to survive with the killers on their tail. Pretty good story telling but there are some "last book" issues. Yeah I don't care what happened to everyone in the last book, thanks. Some of the angst can be explained by the past like why so and so is still shell shocked or depressed over someone's death but don't give me the entire old book in the new one with explanations for each character. It can be said, 'they worked together before' and I'll survive.

Otherwise it's good reading, a page turner, with good descriptions, and writer is a step ahead of me- which is a novelty. Worth your time for sure.

THE ARK by Boyd Morrison ****

Just started it and so far I'm hooked into the story line. Easy to read, slow intro of characters, good descriptions without wasting my time...so far....

I thought it has an interesting story line but there seems to be a lot of religious themed novels out there. This one is about finding Noah and his ark whatever the interpretation wants to be. I swear if you took religion out of fiction novels apparently some people have nothing much to say.

It's a good library book, there's some romance; nothing heavy but it's ok. Now for the WTF's; a female killer puts poison on a guy and at the same time she could have done it to the female with him. No idea why not but the point is that her killer boyfriend is proud that she didn't fuck that up. Well I think she did sir, as she only killed the guy. Not the female who now has the knowledge you're trying to cover up. I don't understand how this gets by since they both are so proud of her killing abilities...right?

You can safely skip chapters 26-30 gratuitous action adventure---> spoiler:
One bad guy dies but they get the secret suitcase from the good guys. Nuff said, continue on....lots of tough muscular men and skinny hot broads....have at it.

The last chapters is a fight with Ulrich vs Tyler Locke. It's very disruptive when one paragraph is about "Tyler" doing this and that, then the next paragraph "Locke" is in this or that situation. Shit...can't you stick to one frickin name? WTF?

HOTHOUSE ORCHID by Stuart Woods*****

Just starting this one and Holly, our heroine, is a CIA pro who gets followed by a car with blue lights, injected and wakes up naked from the waist down with a needle mark in her neck. At the hospital there is not one mention, not a tiny hint about a rape test kit being used so; WTF??? Naked? Drugged? No rape kit? Did I miss something about Holly being a man? So it's mentioned a day later. Too little too late. Any chick wakes up in the dirt without panties is gonna swiftly panic about rape, pregnancy, some dirty, disgusting manhandling etc. But she's very blase, relaxed about the whole incident and hasn't thought or mentioned it again. Not realistic in my opinion. Also she's a PRO CIA op with yrs of training and can't recognize a bubble light on top of a dash or roof as opposed to a full bar of lights in a town where she once was a chief? Come on ... sucker. Nobody has dash lights that can stop traffic that I know of.

Well I think basically it's well written and smooth, easy reading. I sincerely like it. I do have questions, however. On page 39 Holly's date doctor Josh is speaking about her family and says about her father what a nice guy blahblah and "his wife" is nice not "your mother" is nice. How does he know that's not her mother? Must have missed something? Enquiring minds want to know.

Ex CIA agent "Jack Smithson" is a fickle fellow. He's in love with one chick, she's killed, he falls immediately in love with some other chick all in about 5 chapters. Love=trivialized. Just leave your thinking cap behind and read it for entertainment value, it's a good read. No thinking!