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.

[Karyn J. Powers]

Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson & David Oliver Relin. Put it on your list if you'd like to taste hope in our daily dose of dispair/war/economy news.

[Joy Calderwood]

SOMEBODY ELSE'S MUSIC by Jane Haddam. This series keeps acquiring more and more depth. Oh do I love watching this gang of school bullies getting their come-upance, not to mention getting scathingly analyzed. I also enjoyed meeting young Mark DeAvecca. I already read his own mystery THE HEADMASTER'S WIFE, which comes later in the series.

[I. J. Parker]

Just finished Upadhyay's THE GURU OF LOVE. I picked it up partially because the author is Asian-American (Nepal), and partially because of the title. It turned out to be an excellent book about a gentle schoolteacher who succumbs to one of his students while desperately trying to hold on to his family.
Just started a Jack Reacher novel (BAD LUCK AND TROUBLE). As all classic Lee Child thrillers, it starts with a shocking murder. Granted, these books are formula, but they are very well done, both in character type of the protagonist (take note that both men and women adore Jack Reacher) and plotting. So they are a bit over the top. Who cares, when you keep turning the pages?

[Torch]

I am currently reading Wastelands-Stories of the Apocolypse edited by John Joseph Adams. It is a collection of short stories. I love to read how different authors in the book deal with the "end of the world"...as we know it.

[Karen from AustCrime]

I've not been around here much recently - my life seems to be obsessed with how much stuff I can fit in what sized moving box, and where the hell I'm going to put everything when we finally get this move on the road. Still - I have been reading.

JF The Secret Lovers by Charles McCarry - I think I'll have to think about that one for a while. It's a spy thriller, more of a character study, and it was very elaborate.

JF Sawbones by Stuart MacBride. What is it about this man that can make gruesome so readable and dare I say funny on occasions. It's just not right.... well it's good, but I wonder what sort of sick bunny I've turned into.

NU will be The Calling by Inger Ash Wolfe, which my next door neighbour delivered to me last night muttering darkly about gory and what WAS I thinking when I suggested she buy it .... LOL

After that I'm hoping to read one of Adrian McKinty's books - probably Bloomsday Dead.

[D.R. MacMaster]

Flashfire by Richard Stark.

Just started it, but it has some interesting characters, and a nice clear, sharp writing style. I love a good heist story, and a good revenge story, and this book promises both.

[I. J. Parker]

Things are very quiet at the moment. Surely everyone's still reading?
I just finished a Robert Crais novel, CHASING DARKNESS. This is my third encounter with Crais. The first was DEMOLITION ANGEL which I couldn't get into at all. The second (don't recall the title), I believe I finished, though unenthusiastically. This one was good. He apparently made the NYT bestseller list twice before this, but I'm rarely on the the same wave length as other readers. I still don't understand what makes his books so attractive that they outsell so many others I prefer. Elvis Cole is a fairly standard P.I. protagonist, a loner trying to work in spite of police harrassment. Nothing new here. His aides are less standard: Joe Pike, the strong silent type for the heavy work, would actually be fascinating if for no other reason than that he appears, quiet like shadow, when Cole needs him; Starkey is another matter. She's a former bomb specialist who got blown up and was medically reassembled so that you think of her as the Byonic Woman. Evidently, she has a thing for Cole, who's not interested. This, too could be fascinating if we could see her feminine side, but she's androgynous and only ever referred to by her last name -- like a guy.
But the novel was very well plotted and a page turner. Maybe that explains its popularity.

[Joy Calderwood]

Proofread BLUE HAZE, an Australian historical novel-slash-romance which we are just reissuing. Read GREEN MONEY, a D.E. Stevenson novel written 1939, a sweet vacation read. Now proofreading INTO THE LIGHT, a fantasy inspirational that we entered in the EPPIEs. We're putting this one into print next.

[Jacqui Horwood]

i'm 3/4 of the way through katherine howell's 'frantic'. pacy and interesting. i'm really enjoying it. i'll also add the book has just won the davitt award for the best adult crime book by an Australian woman.

i recently read 'eat, pray, love' by liz gilbert. i don't normally read books like this one but i really enjoyed it....maybe because i'm a woman of a 'certain age'...:)

[Karen from AustCrime]

Frantic is a tremendous book isn't it Jacqui - particularly as it's Katherine's first novel. I was really really pleased to see it win the Davitt. Definitely deserves some more plaudits :)

[Nick]

When I found this site, I immediately came to this reading list to see if I could find something to read that I might have missed out on. Definitely got a few good suggestions. It was great to see some posts on Daniel Woodrell. I think he's one of the best writers, regardless of genre, in America. 'Winter's Bone' is, indeed, a fine, fine book. Also try 'Give Me A Kiss' or.....well, all of Woodrell's work is worth reading.

I love pulpy stuff and so have been having a great time with the Hard Case Crime series. I'm currently re-reading 'A Touch Of Death' by Charles Williams which, as I recall, is the book that initally got me interested in paperback original crime fiction. As it turns out, it seems that I started right at the top. Williams is a knockout almost every time. However, if I read more than two 'noir' novels in a row, I start feeling kind of greasy and have to change up (or out, or over, or whichever way you go when you need a break from those 200-page Kiss-Kiss, Bang-Bang quickies.) Recently I found a British author who I haven't seen discussed in this particular forum...though I didn't read all the posted pages. His name is Robert Goddard and not only can he write, he can plot like crazy. His books kind of remind me of Hitchcock movies, in that they quite often involve an innocent man who gets in over his head, though not in the nihilist way noir protagonists get in over their heads. Goddard's books most often have an historical component (though I'm not a fan of historical fiction) that has to discovered and delved into in order to unravel a present-day dilemma. Everyone I've turned on to Goddard's books has become a fan. They're not shoot-em-ups by any stretch, but they are, as stated, very well written and quite absorbing. Perfect books for a quiet, rainy day. For a while it was a little difficult to find his books in the US (at least in the Seattle part of the US) but it seems that he's finally catching on with American readers to some degree so it's a little easier to find him for cheap in used stores....which, for me, is the only way to check out an author with whom I'm unfamiliar. 'Play To The End,' Never Go Back,' 'Past Caring,' you name it. Haven't found a Goddard clunker yet.

[Jessica]

Right now, I'm reading the secind in the Dexter series, Dearly Devoted Dexter. I love reading from the killer's point of view, but there aren't many out there... I like it cos it's completely twisted.