68.
Author(s): Sue Grafton
Title: I is for Innocent
Publication: Paperback
Pages: 329
Genre: Mystery
Acquisition:
Date Completed: August 20, 2011
Rating: ****

Freshly wounded from being fired by California Fidelity and settling into her new offices with attorney Lonnie Kingsman, Kinsey finds herself low on confidence and doubting her professional abilities. As the first case she works for Kingsman throws her curveball after curveball Kinsey loses her footing more than once, but continues to barrel through despite her own misgivings. I thoroughly enjoy how human Kinsey is, and I find her extremely attractive for her faults and quirks.

67.
Author(s): Sue Grafton
Title: H is for Homicide
Publication: Paperback
Pages:
Genre: Mystery
Acquisition:
Date Completed: August 17, 2011
Rating: ***

H is for Homicide is not as successful as previous Alphabet Mysteries; while the characters are interesting and compelling, the premise through which Kinsey finds herself in the narrative circumstances are flimsy at best.

66.
Author(s): Sue Grafton
Title: G is for Gumshoe
Publication: Paperback
Pages:
Genre: Mystery
Acquisition:
Date Completed: August 15, 2011
Rating: ***1/2

In G is for Gumshoe, Kinsey finds herself going after a Bronte-colored mystery, while ducking a hi man (and his young son) when she finds herself on a convict's blame-list. I like Dietz, but not everything in this mystery flows as naturally as other books (specifically where Grafton forces the Bronte allusions). Still enjoyable overall.

64.
Author(s): Sue Grafton
Title: [E is for Evidence]
Publication: Paperback
Pages: 208
Genre: Mystery
Acquisition:
Date Completed: August 13, 2011
Rating: ****

After a few cozy duds I decided to go with something tried-and-true to bring me out of my schlump: enter Kinsey Millhone.

I've been reading Grafton's series off and on since I was eleven, and my Gram loaned me L is for Lawless. I've never gotten any further in the series, although I own through S, largely because I keep going back to refresh with earlier books. And I keep forgetting where I left off, because I leave so much time and so many other books in-between.

This time I picked up with E is for Evidenc, because I couldn't remember the conclusion.

When Kinsey begins a routine check on a fire claim for CF, she finds herself caught up in a long-festering pool of lies, family tension, and illegal activities. Her investigation puts her under suspicion, and she finds herself working for her own cause. The case leaves a compelling line of dead bodies and old relationships, and the very human protagonist carefully sifts through the pieces- until the answer lands in her living room.

Consistent and engaging; Grafton doesn't disappoint.

P.S. Reviewing on the iPhone is tough.

65.
Author(s): Sue Grafton
Title: [F is for Fugitive]
Publication: Paperback
Pages: 352
Genre: Mystery
Acquisition:
Date Completed: August 14, 2011
Rating: ****

In F is for Fugitive, Kinsey finds herself (blissfully) out of town, and working for one of the most unpleasant families in contemporary fiction after she is hired by the patriarch to exonerate his son, who is convicted of murdering a seventeen-year-old girl more than a decade before. Grafton presents a fairly pedestrian depiction of small-town life, but somehow following the ornery community remains interesting throughout.

63.
Author(s): Laura Levine
Title: Death of a Trophy Wife
Publication: Kindle
Pages:
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Acquisition:
Date Completed: August 107, 2011
Rating: **1/2

Death of a Trophy Wife is downright silly. Although the book is supposed to be a cozy mystery, I found it to be more food porn for junk food junkies than anything else. The unraveling of the mystery happens in spite of the protagonist, who spends most of her time diving into a jar of peanut butter with a spoon, extolling the virtues of her elastic-waist jeans, and creating a cantankerous personality for her cat, Prozac. The book is likewise plagued by long asides in the form of emails from the protagonist's parents, which do little more than show that "ridiculous" did not fall far from the fictional tree. Add in several unhealthy relationships and sloppy narration, and you get Death of a Trophy Wife.

61. Bookmarked for Death
Publication: Kindle
Pages:
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Acquisition:
Date Completed: August 5, 2011
Rating: ***1/2

Nothing will put a damper on a book signing like the guest of honor dying in the bathroom, but it's just Tricia Miles' luck that that's what happens when famed mystery author Zoe Carter agrees to a book signing, despite her reclusive tendencies. With her shop closed as a crime scene, Tricia feels she has no choice but to do some investigating of her own. However, she soon finds that the instincts of an armchair detective aren't always up to snuff.

62.
Author(s): Laura Childs
Title: Death by Darjeeling
Publication: Kindle
Pages: 40% finished
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Acquisition:
Date Completed: abandoned August 7, 2011
Rating: *

Death by Darjeeling is completely without soul. Consisting almost entirely of exhausted adjectives, Laura childs continually and consistently violates the first rule of freshman creative writing: to show rather than tell. The prose is awkward and punchy, and the plot itself is tired by the time Childs even bothers coming back to it. This is a truly terrible piece of writing, and I can't force myself to soldier through another dull and laden paragraph.

60.
Author(s): Colin Cotterill
Title: Killed at the Whim of a Hat
Publication: Early Review
Pages: 384
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Acquisition: borrowed
Date Completed: July 31, 2011
Rating: ****

Set in Thailand and peppered with the brilliance of a former American President, Killed at the Whim of a Hat is a cozy mystery following Jimm Juree, a crime reporter who is transplanted to a rather rural community when her mother suddenly sells the family home and purchases a remote "resort." Constantly brooding over this twist of fate, Jimm Juree carefully catalogs all that is wrong with her new home, until she is (blissfully) distracted by the discovery of two hippie skeletons in a buried VW bus. Suddenly, this little community doesn't seem quite so dull.

However, it is a second mystery - the rather daring murder of an abbot - that really sweeps Jimm Juree off her feet, and into the community. By the conclusion of the novel it is the sense of satisfaction that Jimm finds, rather than the resolution of the crime, that is most compelling. Killed at the Whim of a Hat is more a novel of character development, with the "mysteries" functioning as a catalyst for discovery rather than major narrative motivation. Recommended.