Drawing Dead (Jake Morgan Mystery series)

http://www.amazon.com/Drawing-Dead-Morgan-Mystery-ebook/dp/B0038BZORW/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1320614535&sr=1-1
The third time is not really the charm for Jake Morgan, the Vegas poker dealer-private dick with a shady history on the Boston PD. Jake's habit of playing catch-up on obvious case facts ("You mean . . .") wears a bit thin, as does his unbelievable propensity for stumbling headlong into murder plots. But he is an otherwise-entertaining character, and this fast-moving tale delivers its share of nickel-ante charms. These include an opening set piece in which Jake ear-witnesses a killing while getting to know the victim way beneath the sheets (proving that nice guys don't always finish last). Also fun: Vegas vice cop Laura Bulloch, a martial-arts expert and part-time dominatrix who becomes Jake's next targeted lover and sparring partner. But the plot plays out in such pat-handed fashion that the stakes never feel truly high--even when Jake's forced to dig his own desert grave. In future outings, it would be satisfying to see Jake struggle more with his gambling addiction and otherwise plumb the emotional depths. But even here, he deals readers their share of winning hands.

On travel til Wednesday

I'm visiting elderly relatives in Box Elder, SD who do not have internet.

Will try to sneak out now and again to an internet cafe to post, but more than likely will not be posting until Wedneday.

Christmas Tree Wars, by Annis Ward Jackson

Christmas Tree Wars, by Annis Ward Jackson
SunnyBrick Publishers
$2.99 on the Kindle

In CHRISTMAS TREE WARS, the third novel in the Rachel Myers Murder Mystery Series, the reader finds Myers finally and completely settled in the small Appalachian Mountain community of Laurel Hill, North Carolina. The new retirement center where she is administrator is up and running and so is her relationship with Detective Robert Barnett.

News that former lover David iis married finally frees her from that relationship so she buys a new horse, goes on an exciting trail ride, and comes home to find that one of her favorite people, garden designer Danny DeBord, has gone missing.

As usual, Rachel observes from afar with no intention of becoming involved in the investigation until she is approached by a local woman whose son disappeared four years earlier in suspiciously similar circumstances.

That's all the impetus needed for Myers to delve into the search for Danny DeBord, and in the process, embroil herself to her most dangerous predicament to date.

Christmas trees figure prominently in this mystery, both from the perspective of their effects on the local environment, and their connection with the murder.

Scam, by Parnell Hall

http://www.amazon.com/Stanley-Hastings-Mystery-Novels-ebook/dp/B00457XIXA/ref=sr_1_2?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1316707996&sr=1-2

From Amazon:

Parnell Hall's Scam proves once and for all that murder can be funny--as well as mind-boggling. The charming hero of Hall's series of mysteries is Stanley Hastings, a nonviolent, slightly neurotic investigator who pays the rent by working for a New York negligence lawyer. When one of Stanley's clients claim he's being set up by one of the partners in an investment firm, the erstwhile PI doesn't take him seriously--until the bodies pile up and Stanley falls under suspicion of murder.
Hall performs miraculous feats in the course of this rollicking tale: he constructs a remarkably labyrinthine plot and manages to tie off all the loose ends while maintaining a madcap pace marked by hilarious crosstalk and knockabout interactions between Stanley and his cop foil that would do P. G. Wodehouse proud. For crime and comedy under one cover, Scam is a perfect choice.

A Movie About Sex and Death

Available on the Kindle:

A Movie About Sex and Death (The Lucy Ripken Mysteries)
Justin Henderson

In this, the last Lucy Ripken adventure that takes place in New York City, Lucy is hired by old friend Paul Wittgenstein to help him rewrite the script for an independent film he's shooting in the East Village and on the Lower East side of New York City. Lucy quickly gets into the scriptwriting mode, while at the same time getting involved with the director Wittgenstein's friends, family, cast, and crew, some of whom, including Paul Wittgenstein himself, are involved in some very kinky and ultimately dangerous sex games that take place in a couple of after-hours SMBD (sado masochism bondage domination) clubs in Brooklyn and Manhattan.

Lucy explores and is unamused and more or less bored by this scene but willing to let it go--everybody's got to get their freak on, she figures--while she does her scriptwriting work. How this work moves forward is a big part of the book, as Lucy struggles with the story she's writing, and keeps pushing ahead.

However, when the producer of the movie, a rich kid from Greenwich, CT called Christopher Wadsworth, turns up dead, the plot thickens. As does, at the same time, the plot of the movie, and as the story in the movie and the story taking place in the book around the shooting of the movie progress in tandem, the characters, the plot, and the stories intermingle, creating a compelling mix of cinema and verite. I struggled with the back and forth of this, but I think in the end that it works, as the story within the story and the story itself lend each other enerrgy and intrigue.

In the end, Lucy persists in sorting out the mess, and does so, contending with some serious moral quandaries as well as truly creepy characters along the way.

The book and the movie are indivisible, and the movie inside the book could easily be made from what is here, in the book. At the same time, the book itself could easily be made into a movie as well, with the shooting of the movie within the movie as another part of the book. They are inseparable.

And, it must be mentioned, book and movie within create a wonderful tableau of old downtown New York. It's another classic Ripken, with a soulful and irresistible Manhattan twist.

Getting on the stick...Wednesday

Haven't been posting here in a regular fashion - will start doing so WEDNESDAY. Will be posting every Monday, Wednesday and Fri.

Scared Stiff, by Annelise Ryan

Available on Kindle

In this second in the series, Mattie Winston, deputy coroner of Sorenson City, Wisconsin, is called away from a Halloween party when waitress and model Shannon Tolliver is found murdered at her home. Detective Hurley is convinced that Shannon’s estranged husband, Erik, is the culprit, but Mattie doesn’t believe he is capable of the crime. She is so convinced of Erik’s innocence, in fact, that she launches her own investigation (with Hurley’s blessing). In addition, as part of an inheritance squabble, Mattie and her boss, Izzy, must determine the times of death of a couple who died in a car accident that went undiscovered for weeks. In her personal life, Mattie is broke and and planning to divorce her philandering husband. This has the makings of an appealing series on multiple fronts: the forensic details will interest Patricia Cornwell readers, though the tone here is lighter, while the often slapstick humor and the blossoming romance between Mattie and Hurley will draw Evanovich fans who don’t object to the cozier mood.

--Sue OBrien, Booklist - from the Amazon page for the book