What are you currently reading?

[QualityBookReviews]

An open discussion on what everyone is currently reading. Make recommendations to others, discuss what is new, hot, bestsellers, anything and everything related to books and the authors.

[Karen from AustCrime]

I've just finished ebooking a true crime book I've been looking to read for years.. so expect more on that soon, but in the meantime :) Dogstar Rising by Parker Bilal, the second in the Makana series. Really liked the first so been looking forward to this one.

[Jen Hilborne]

Reading The Caretaker by A. X. Ahmad

[Tim Scanlon]

I recently finished Gillian Flynn's Gone Girl, good read:

http://tysonadams.com/2013/01/28/book-review-gone-girl-by-gillian-f...

I'm currently reading How I Became a Famous Novelist by Steve Hely.

[Suzanne]

DEATH IN A COLD CLIMATE by Barry Foreshaw - not a novel, but rather a survey of Scandanavian mysteries.  Good analysis.

THE FATAL TOUCH by Conor Fitzgerald - an American working in Rome as a police detective; this is the third I've read and quite like them.

THE DEMANDS by Mark Billingham - at the top of his form.

THE CALLER by Karin Fossum - Well- written as always, but I keep asking myself, "Why did she write this book?"

DYING TO SIN by Stephen Booth - reliably good series, The author should get paid by the local tourist council; you want to visit.

THE CHICAGO WAY and THE FIFTH FLOOR by Michael Harvey.  In Chi, politics permeate everything.

FANTASY FOOTBALL FOR SMART PEOPLE       OOPS!  wrong list

BLACKLANDS, DARKSIDE, FINDERS KEEPERS, by Belinda Bauer.  The first was terrific.  The second was crammed with suspense but had a bit of a cheap-shot ending.  The third was in large print (much shorter); her editor must have been on her back to publish soon.  Setting is Exmoor; it reminded me that I don't know why anyone would visit there - bleak bleak bleak.  What annoyed my about the third is that much is written from the viewpoint of or about children.  Children are not small adults.  Their thoughts jump around a bit and are easily distracted.  Her children are too coherent. 

[David DeLee]

A collection of three short stories by Jeffery Deaver called TRIPLE THREAT. 1st up is a Kathryn Dance. Very enjoyable.

http://www.amazon.com/Triple-Threat-ebook/dp/B0092XN9O0

[Celia Cummings]

I started with the Elvis Cole/Joe Pike series from Robert Crais at the beginning with The Monkeys Raincoat, then I jumped to LA Requiem and now I'm filling in the gaps. I'm up to Free Fall which is.....OK. I think I prefer the later books in the series though (from what I've read, Crais would agree) :)

I've also tried the new modern-age type reading via my Christmas Kindle but...I have to say, I'm still spending more time reading physical books than the digital type. I'm so old-fashioned.  

[David DeLee]

I'd agree about the progression of the Cole series, Celia, (having read them all in order). The earlier ones were all written single, 1st person, POV, traditional PI style. And it was with LA Requiem, Crais began experimenting with multiple viewpoints and more complex stories.

Great fun, the whole series and SUSPECT is on-deck in my TBR pile.

As for the kindle and print. I enjoy both delivery systems (pros and cons to each) and go back and forth without much preference one way or the other.  Currently reading a Rizzoli & Isles on Kindle. SUSPECT I picked up in hardback (with all the discounts B&N gives I bought it for the same price as the Kindle edition. $ 14.99. Crazy, right?

[Celia Cummings]

Thanks David, you put into words everything that was in my mind :) 

[Susan]

Just finished reading a Kindle-single by Nelson DeMille. Rendezvous, set in Vietnam during the war,  with DeMille in his usual first POV mode, featuring a female sniper after a US patrol unit. A fast and furious read.

[David DeLee]

THE BLUE HOUR. T. Jefferson Parker's first Merci Rayborn novel. Read the third one in the series first (don't ask me why) figured I should read the first one next. I'm enjoying it.

[Richard Krauss]

The Big Book of Noir edited by Ed Gorman, Lee Server and Martin H. Greenberg

This big collection of short articles, memoirs and interviews makes an excellent reference volume for the bookshelf or a terrific read straight through. Its bulk is split between film and fiction. The film coverage centers on directors, but it's sprinkled with enough material on screenwriters and actors to keep the essays varied and fresh. Subjects include Fritz Lang, Billy Wilder, Robert Siodmak, Marc Lawrence, Daniel Mainwaring, Abraham Polonsky, Phil Karlson, A. I. Bezzerides, Orson Welles, John Huston, Leigh Brackett, William Faulkner, and others. It's a rich resource, uncovering hidden noir treasures and revealing new insights on classics. 

The fiction section is primarily focused on the noir of past decades. When it does devote a few pages to the contemporary scene, the cut-off is the late 90s (the volume was published in 1998). It is a golden harvest of paperback original era authors and publishers. The influence of Hammett and Chandler ever looms in the shadows, but the bright pool of the lamppost illuminates the work, and sometimes the lives, of Cornell Woolrich, Frederic Brown, Gil Brewer, Harry Whittington, John D. MacDonald, Arnold Hano, Mickey Spillane, Ross Macdonald, Charles Williams, Peter Rabe, Donald Westlake, Chester Himes, Donald Hamilton, Patricia Highsmith, Charles Willeford, Lawrence Block, and publishers Lion, Dell, Gold Medal, Lancer, Série Noire, etc. 

Ron Goulart ably handles the lone essay on noir in comic books, as the big book winds up with four fascinating treatments on radio's dark gold and television's adoption of noir's torch, left languishing by that time at the movies.

The writers who wrote all the material for The Big Book of Noir is another long list of experts in the genre. I'll be treasuring and revisiting this one for a long time. Five Stars.

[Jed Power]

Richard,

You're right.  "The Big Book of Noir..." is a great book.  Also "The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories," and "The Black Lizard Big Book of Pulps."  Although they are fiction alone, they are excellent also.  I have them all and I've been studying the stories in these anthologies, and others, for years, trying to figure out how they did it.  It's part of my daily ritual.

Best,

Jed Power