FREEZING by Clea Koff ***

Really fast paced and readable novel. It felt like you know the characters, they're all very distinctive and likable except of course the bad guys. I liked the forensics, the science and explanations of the deaths but for a murder novel I would have preferred more in depth of the the killer/killers by that I mean their mental thoughts, their processing of information. I feel it lacked something I can't describe as far as the murders and it being a mystery.

The personal issues that were involved either weren't well described or not traumatic enough to cause the disturbances acted out by the characters. Going into forensics is an expectation of working with bodies, not being traumatized by all associated with the job. She picked the wrong profession? The writer seems to be over awed by her own job description. 

The one incident of a guy being blown up in front of one of the  main characters wasn't touched upon enough to satisfy my curiousity about why it affected the person to any extent. Wasn't enough. The reasoning of the killer to "get" Houston wasn't explained well, nor did Houston ever even KNOW why the killer was killing because of him. I don't really know either. Not explained a all.

Good library book but could use some work. To me it seemed like a work in progress, not a done deal.

The END of the WASP SEASON by D. Mina *

Written by a woman from Scotland. Confusing. I'm getting descriptions of everything in the room, the stairs, the books, furniture. It goes from one confusing scene to another. A driver is never named yet there is a conversation between the pregnant female investigator and the female driver. I really am being dragged thru this room by room, person by person all with partial personalities. I'm not going to finish the book. It's way too boring for me.

I have no idea what relation anyone has to anyone else and at this point since the author doesn't WANT to tell me I don't care anymore.

WHAT DOESN'T KILL YOU by Iris Johansen ***

I actually couldn't wait to read this and put a hold at the library for it but once I started reading it I found it to be extremely repetitive, somewhat boring and very little action. I barely cared about the characters who seem mostly robotic or make believe or whatever they are. There's a lot of philosophizing that really is circular in it's thinking: round and round and round over and over again.

Someplace in this hodgepodge of sloppiness is a story about some poison, or tampering with stem cells and people trying to get it and other people trying to stop them and protect themselves. The bulk of the REAL story could have been over in 5 chapters or so but I was dragged kicking and screaming thru 406 pages. So many times I didn't want to continue.

I feel so so about it. If there's story, it's not easy to pick it up; it totally gets interrupted many times with either her childhood, her kids childhood and nothing at all about the obvious HIS FATHER. Since she trusts so few people who the hell was the baby daddy?

L.A. MENTAL by Neil McMahon ****

Honestly I have no idea what the L.A. Mental is all about..the title. It doesn't seem to fit the story. The story is about people who are making a movie. Then it's about some of them having nano technology they put into cocaine or in a bath so others inhale it. Then they have these remote controls to control people with either ecstasy or violence. At one point the FBI are involved but you really don't see much of them, or have a clue what they're doing in the story. Only one person gets arrested. They never stop the nano stuff from being anywhere. No scientist tries to cure anyone. Nanos remain in place in their brains.

Later there are truck loads of this stuff dumped and burning in a port so many people are going to be exposed. Next book I suppose. Meantime I found the premise weird. I found the nanos had magical unrealistic powers and the main character thinks he discovered layers of "gods" that watch silently as all this goes on. It's a lot of fictional junk to be tossed on a reader so stay awake. Not poorly written, but confusing at times. Ok library find.

SON OF STONE by Stuart Woods *

Bazillionaires owning planes, flying them, directing business, having friends and parties with their bazillionaire over talented kids with IQ of 180 or something, making movies at 16 yrs old getting millions for it while still in school =basics.

Stone falls in love, her ex boyfriend isn't happy. They get married, children are involved, all geniuses who don't get into trouble. Life is happy, rich, tits are thrown in men's faces while they're getting waited on, the rich are waited on hand and foot, can't even get a slipper without some asshole passing it over to them. They are all too beautiful to mention. The rich unavailable life to 99% of America and I'm supposed to feel sorry after reading 229 pages of this boring ostentatious crap that someone gets shot. O no! It's the wealthy trillionaire wife! Her ex shoots her, then the housekeeper shoots him. OVER in a second. WOW
Hated it. Boring shove diamonds in your face crappola. Stay off Woods. I feel guilty giving it ONE star.

BACK OF BEYOND by C.J. Box ***

Interesting storytelling. Some alcoholics from AA are being bumped off. Then some people go on a camping trip in Yellowstone where more people are getting bumped off. I liked most of the story, I even liked the cranky cop Cody Hoyt, he has a nice sense of humor about his superiors. His son is one of the Yellowstone campers along with some other kids.

What stumps me is some guys who went to an AA meeting were told about a plane full of money that crashed in Yellowstone. Big deal right? But what I don't know is how the killer found out what story was told in the meeting. HOW? There is no explanation about how she knew anything about what they talked about in the AA meeting.

Not only that but there was no explanation about WHO or HOW the people got killed after leaving the campsite. WHO did the killing? No mention of anyone leaving the campsite,  horsese missing (hard for a clackety noisy horse to quietly disappear) and for all I know the guy leading the campers did it, or his girlfriend did it or this female killer did it but we never really get to know the whole story about those episodes which if you ask me are rather IMPORTANT to the story. So there was more information about Yellowstone and Cody with his cig/alkie issues than the MEAT of the story like WHO frickin DONE IT. The only one we know is a undersheriff (whatever he's under) did something to almost kill Cody. That's it. Ta-da.

DEATH BENEFIT by Robin Cook *****

Really good reading, easy style, limited amount of characters, all very distinguishable. About 2 doctors working on the newest research to replace body parts by growing them using cells, and water baths, plus a new sort of dot matrix thingy, which is so advanced technologically it's hard to imagine. A med student gets involved by studying beside the 2 docs when suddenly both docs are murdered. She runs around being abducted, beaten and still clings to the facts and tries to expose their deaths.

The other part of the book is about the evil money brings to people who value it above all else. Some people are so fearful of losing insurance money of diabetic patients who will have a future of growing their own pancreas that they are determined to stop progress.

Very satisfying ending for all involved and I found it fast paced and hard to put down. Cook always has very interesting over the top in advance technology medicine stories. Some parts leave you wondering if it's even possible to do what he describes. I would buy the book. Very good.

KILLING KATE by Julie Kramer ****

Quick moving, with humor here and there. A reporter is doing a couple stories and gets personally involved and on the killers list of victims. The ridiculous enters when she believes she has a guardian angel who is really the killer following her around. She actually BELIEVES she has a guardian angel in the flesh. Dimwit. I hate religion tossed haphazardly into my reading material. I don't enjoy fantasy writing.

Her boyfriends name throughout the entire book was I believed "Garnett" then in one paragraph on page 269 she begins to talk about someone named Nick. WTF is a Nick? Where'd that come from? Suddenly one section, on one page, his name turned into Nick. So most of the time during the story she writes using his last name for everything??? Who does that? I never met anyone calling their husband or boyfriend by their last name IRL. That sort of threw me off track. Lots of other people in the book have their first names used so I don't understand why Garnett is favored over Nick. Confusing.

So people are being killed, serial style killer and she's writing stories for her paper about it and doing a little investigative work and interviews that lead her around in and out of trouble. That's about the jist of it.

NEED YOU NOW by James Grippando **

People praise this "nail biting style"on the cover and I was mostly bored propping myself up to keep track of names, agencies they belong to, good or evil, lying or not, it was a smallish book but most of the time I was confused. It wasn't my fault either. Cast of hundreds of characters, self important higher ups nobody cares about.  Many descriptions of physical things, more so than people or their actual feelings.

Money is missing, no one ever finds it, no one ever knows what it financed, lots of people are killed mostly in disgusting I-don't-wanna-know ways. Thoroughly disappointed, normally I like his books.
His leading character's job description: Wall Street advisor at the worlds largest Swiss bank. WTF does that mean? I never once saw him working, or doing anything related to work, or even in a Swiss bank. WTF does Lily do that directly ties her to billions of dollars in losses suffered?
Beyond my care meter. Blah. Mostly due to the plethora of side characters I don't GAS about.

DEADLY MAGIC by Ilona Benzel *****

No wasted words here. This is a horror novel about a magician finding a mirror from area 51 in New Mexico. He thinks he can add the magic in the mirror to his act because things disappear into it and sometimes return, alas, sometimes they don't.

Eventually he disappears, house is sold, mirror is found and suddenly people who visit the house suffer disturbing fates. People are compelled to kill others.

What horror is taking place in the home previously owned by the magician, what new monsters are slowly developing to take over our world.

I really liked the book, fast paced, well developed characters. Can't get it from library but it's on Amazon and ready for kindle as well. Worth the cover price.