Category: Series

The Hidden Staircase – Carolyn Keene

Nancy Drew 02: The Hidden Staircase by Carolyn Keene. Penguin Young Readers Group I read the 1959 revised Kindle Edition.  This Second Nancy Drew story is as good as the first. A nicely crafted story. Not a ‘solve it yourself’ story but a good tale. Reading through this the thought that kept coming around was ‘wholesome’. There is a wholesomeness that envelopes this story.

It starts with Nancy’s friend Helen enlisting her help to solve a ghost haunting mystery at her great-grandmother’s estate Twin Elms. Nany, with her dad’s approval, agrees to help, but prior to leaving for Twin Elms, Nathan Gomber, a attorney representing property owner’s whose land is being purchased for a railroad project arrives and warns Nancy not to leave her father’s side as he is in great danger.

Nancy’s dad encourages her to continue to Twin Elms and help her friend’s great-grandmother as he has business and will be in Chicago for a few days. He say’s that he will rendezvous with Nancy on his way back at Twin Elms. However, he is kidnapped enroute. While Nancy works to discover her father’s where-abouts she continues to discover more secrets about the mansion at Twin Elms. These explorations lead to her father and to a plot to defraud the railroad company he is working for.

I don’t know what technically is considered ‘young adult’ fiction but Amazon has tis listed as good for ages 8 to 12 and grade 3 to 7 which sounds appropriate with the caveat that this edition was written in 1959 and is has some colloquialisms and language that are archaic in today’s parlance. But Nancy is presented as a level headed young woman of eighteen with a keen sense of observation, intrepidness, and perseverance with all the customary manners of a young lady of the 1950’s.


   Nancy ignored Gomber’s remarks. Shrugging, the man pushed his way into the hall. “I know this. If anything happens to your father, you’ll never forgive yourself. But you can’t blame Nathan Gomber! I warned you!”
   Still Nancy made no reply. She kept looking at him steadily, trying to figure out what was really in his mind. She was convinced it was not solicitude for her father.
   Nathan Gomber changed the subject abruptly. “I’d like to see Mrs. Turnbull and Mrs. Hayes,” he said. “Go call them.”

Paper Son – SJ Rozan

Paper Son – SJ Rozan, published by Pegasus Books July 2, 2019. This is the twelfth book in the Lydia Chin/Bill Smith Mysteries.

The major theme on this seems to revolve around family, and family ties that connect through distant, and up to this point, unknown relations. Lydia Chin is told by her mother that she, and her partner Bill need to go to Mississippi and investigate the circumstances of her cousin Leland’s incarceration. .. Lydia doesn’t know if she is more surprised by her mother acknowledging her investigating profession, or the fact that she has cousins she never knew about in Mississippi.

When she gets there she’s greeted by her uncle Pete,  her cousin Jefferson’s been arrested for the murder of his father, her uncle, Leland. And we learn the another unknown cousin of hers, Raymond,  uncle Paul’s son, is running for governor of Mississippi. Paul’s son in law Frank gives the reader an insight into who race and family play out in politics here in Mississippi.

Through the course of the investigation, Lydia and Bill come across two sisters, one recently deceased and the other in a nursing home. Through them we see a subplot weaving through about how the bitterness we carry around not only affects our lives but the lives of those left behind.

But the title of this novel Paper Son goes to the heart of the story. The original Paper Son, Lydia’s great-grandfather, becomes a ‘paper son’ when friend of the family returns from worming on the railroads in the United States in the late 1800’s. And, because of immigration law changes, Chinese people are not able to emigrate to the United States as freely as they had been able to. A loop hole in this law allows children of Chinese people already living in the United States to come here from China. Because her great-grandfather changes his identity to become the son of the family friend he is able to emigrate and enjoy the benefits of opportunities.

   My mother made a wordless, but nevertheless easy to understand, sound. She said, “Have you discussed the situation with the White Baboon?”
   Wait. Was my mother really asking me what Bill thought?
   “Yes,” I said cautiously. “He’s – ” I stopped myself before I said stumped. Why cap this new well at the moment it started to flow? “He doesn’t see the answer yet, either. But we’re working on it.”
   “Please continue to work on it.” My mother paused, and I could have sworn her voice softened the tiniest bit as she said, “The Delta of Mississippi is not different from other places. Cuckoos do not hatch from robin’s eggs there. This is only a case, Ling Wan-ju. It’s more important than others because it involves family. But for all that, this is no different from other cases you have solved. You must use the same detecting methods you have used in the past. Please call me tomorrow when you have made progress.”
   And she hung up.

Deadly Secrets – Robert Bryndza

Deadly  Secrets  – Robert Bryndza published by Bookouture in 201? I read this on my kindle. This is the sixth in the DCI Erika Foster series. It’s a brilliant British police procedural mystery set in contemporary London.  I’ve really enjoyed following this series. I’ve been taken with how well developed the entire cast of characters and how those characters have deepened and developed over the course of the novels.

This sixth novel starts up right where the fifth novel finished up… almost immediately. It’s the Christmas right after the Marsh twins were rescued by Erika and she’s been invited over for Christmas lunch. Apprehensive about the situation Erika is relieved when she encounters a crime scene on her way there. So, she stopes and takes charge of a situation unfolding where a burlesque dancer has been slashed to death just outside her door apparently as she arrived home where she lived with her mother.

Well, as the investigation unfolds,  a local young peeping Tom flees the scene with his camera as he’s been hiding up a tree. Erika and Mc pursue him as he flees home where he lives with his parents, one of which is a retired barrister.

It seems this young mam has a somewhat unhealth fascination with his exotic neighbor. Ha and his camera are later taken into custody. After some intense questioning about photos found on that camera he commits suicide in his cell.

But he isn’t the only man, or woman that had crossed paths with the statuesque victim. They’re were at least two married men with whom she’s had relations with in her neighborhood. There’s also the dotty old lady that she made money caring for. Seems their is an issue of stolen diamond earing, or is there… and then there is her son who seems to be skulking around.

But all that’s really known from the CCYV footage is that the perpetrator was wearing a long coat and… a gas mask!

I enjoyed this novel so much because it’s a return to the first novel. The previous novels to this one were straight forward police procedural mysteries where the action was the story. In this book, we see Erika returning as the detective. This really is more of a whodunit mystery and there are some clues to follow along. Things are always what they seem and the solution comes down to Erika seeing certain inconsistencies and working past appear to answers to get to the real solution…

Marissa Lewis’s body lying in the snow. A crime scene always tells a story, and the small front garden in Coniston Road told of a violent struggle. The sheer volume of blood, caking Marissa’s body and the surrounding snow. Her shoe, left lying close by; her vanity case, broken on its side, the contents spilling out into the snow. Her keys still dangling in the lock of the front door. If Marissa had reached her door a few seconds earlier, would she have been able to turn the key and get safely inside?
Erika found it a struggle, the balance between feeling sorrow for a murder victim, and shutting it out. To stay sane, it was easier to dehumanise a dead body, and think of the person as an object: a thing, or a piece of evidence. Erika could never do that, though, any more than she could come home from work and live a normal life.

Murder On The Left Bank – Cara Black

Murder On The Left Bank – Cara Black published by Soho Press 2018 – 276 pages… I checked this out of the library. It appears to be the eighteenth book in this Aimee Leduc Investigation series. A location mystery set in the city of lights, Paris.

How much detail is too much detail? It’s a personal question that can only be answered personally.  And since I am here to off my own opinionated review… I think this has too much detail. In just a couple of quick paragraphs (see quoted below) where a suspect, Danlin, is being tailed by our detective Aimee, our attention is drawn to four landmarks. Each gets its own quick tourist blurb. Now don’t get me wrong, I love location mysteries. But i like to really feel a part of the setting I like to take it in on a tactile level. .. the sights, the smells, the tastes, an immersion. .. but I feel that this book is more of a whirlwind group tour rather than a slower self-directed excursion.

There is an such an abundance of unconnected landmarks… this local flavor of detail is like a seasoning… meant to add a bit to the story, but here, it’s used almost to the point that of being the main ingredient!  Like, with you touch up a piece with a little glitter.. it serves as a highlight, but then you get these objects that are so encrusted with glitter you can hardly tell what the hell object is.

Well, as far as the plot goes, an attorney Bisson, whose a relation of a friend of Aimee’s seeks her help to locate a notebook that his nephew, who has been murdered, was suppose to deliver. It’s just another ball to juggle in the multitasking universe that is her life. Between working with her agency’s partner Rene on a proposal for a security system for the Bibliotheque Francois-Mitterrand Library and spending time with her bebe Chloé she agrees to look into the matter, low key.

As she starts probing around, she finds that a notorious shadow group called The Hand is also looking for this notebook behind. Where agents of the Hand responsible for the murder, or was it drug related as the police would have us believe?

It seems that this organization has been present in prior books in this series.

Aimee needs to track down a girlfriend of Bisson’s nephew to help she’d light on the notebooks hiding place. In tracking this girl down we accompany Aimee as she treks about Paris. Will she find this mysterious Katrine before the Hand can strike? Once you can weave your way around the landmarks littering your path, you have a real mystery to follow.

I think that I will try to read the first in this series and see if I can get the satisfaction I seek in it.

   He followed the steep rue Renault in the direction of Maison-Blanch. Nearby lay the decrepit Panhard and Levassor car engine factory, commandeered by the Germans during the war to manufacture airplane engines for the luftwaffe.  On the other side, the cavernous la Petite Ceinture, the abandoned nineteenth century rail line that had once belted Paris.  Now overgrown, a deserted place where disoriented  cataphiles emerge from the catacombs to find themselves with junkies and foxes. Parts of the Left Bank were wilderness,  green where nature had rooted in the cracked stones. She loved the wild flowers sprouting on the tracks and the neighborhood groups that planted allotments of vegetables and kept rabbits.

   Danlin woven through the small tress to Jardin du Moulin de la Pointe, a park where mills once harnessed the power of la Bievre. Here the Petit Ceinture tracks led into a tunnel. He got off his bike. She parked, grabbed her jacket, and picked her way down to the tracks in her ballet flats along the winding path lined by bushes and trees.

Cold Blood – Robert Bryndza

Cold Blood – Robert Bryndza Bookouture (September 20, 2017) 357 pages.

The fifth DCI Erika Foster novel is another great read. This time out, as DC Peterson recovers from his wounds, two bodies are recovered from the banks of the Themes. Dismembered and stuffed into suitcases… who could do such a horrible thing… and how does someone become a person capable of doing that? This is the story that answers those questions. As DCI Erika Foster and her team track down those responsible for these murders, the split narration shows how an ordinary person can become a person with the capacity to commit murder.

During the course of this investigation Erika continues to check on Peterson while he’s recovering. But, in a sudden twist Erika is betrayed by one close to her and she’s attacked while delivering evidence to the forensics unit. We follow Erika as she recovers from her wounds. The physical one she received during the attack, and the other… well… she is still coming to terms with the death of her husband years ago. She returns to Slovenia to stay with her sister and enjoy her niece and nephew.

During Erika’s recovery, the case is assigned to a drug investigation unit within the department where it becomes ‘lost in the tall grass’ until Erika returns. With new evidence, new perspective and renewed engagement Erika takes charge of the investigation again and her dogged pursuit of these ruthless killers brings about another tense and trilling conclusion.

Erika looked down at Nina’s body and felt an overwhelming sadness. How could a young girl with so much promise stumble down such a dark path? She looked back to the cave, and could just make out Max Kirkham’s feet through the gap in the rocks. It was quiet, and the light was fading, and she shivered. With her free hand, she closed Nina’s eyes.
   The wind whistled across the heather and the air was bitterly cold, and Erika paced up and down to keep warm. She thought how long she had hunted for these two people, and of the trail of destruction they had left in their wake. And now she was alone, guarding their bodies.

Over My Dead Body – Rex Stout

Over My Dead Body: A Nero Wolfe Mystery – Rex Stout I read the Kindle Edition. This is the seventh Nero Wolfe novel and was published in 1940. This book stands out in the Wolfe cannon as stating that Nero was born in America but this is not the case. In a subsequent interview Rex Stout says that Nero was not being completely forthright with the G man intruding in his personal affairs. This story is a classic mystery but with much fewer clues that the usual Rex Stout story imbedded within making this a relative difficult whodunnit… basically it comes down to guesswork after multiple suspects are interrogated and eliminated.

As it is, the plot begins as a young Montenegrin woman arrives at Wolfe’s office to plead for his help in a case involving a friend of hers, also Montenegrin, whose been accused of stealing diamonds. After a brief discussion, the young lady accused may be Wolfe’s adopted daughter. Archie is dispatched to look into the matter.

While looking into this at the fencing studio where both women are employed. Wolfe’s daughter has an apparent alibi corroborated by an English customer. As the situation is being resolved, the Englishman is found murdered in one of the training rooms of the studio. While the police are summoned to investigate this, Archie finds that the murder weapon is wrapped in a fencing glove and nestled in the pocket of his overcoat hanging in the office where all the customers and staff of the studio where congregated.

As this fencing glove and its item, may implicate Wolfe’s daughter, Archie returns to Wolfe’s with it while the police are investigating back at the Studio. At this point, Inspector Cramer arrives at Wolfe’s suspecting that with all the foreign intrigues and suspects, he came solve the case quicker by camping out at Wolfe’s. Wolfe, in a unusual manner agrees to let him stay and oversee the operations.

Most of the cast of suspects are brought before Nero at his office in what is to be his customary trademark. They are questioned vigorously with Cramer observing… after some time, deductions are made and Wolfe reveals the murder and the motive… in classic, customary style.

Ps. This is a really good episode in Nero Wolfe Mysteries from A&E Network!

“Have you registered?”
“No. I am not an agent of a foreign principal.”
The G-man threw one knee over the other. “The law applies to agents of foreign firms, individuals or organizations, as well as to foreign governments.”
“So I understand.”
“It also applies, here, both to aliens and to citizens. Are you a citizen of the United States?”
“I am. I was born in this country.”
“You were at one time an agent of the Austrian government?”
“Briefly, as a boy. Not here, abroad. I quit.”
“And joined the Montenegrin army?”
“Later, but still a boy. I then believed that all misguided or cruel people should be shot, and I shot some. I starved to death in 1916.”
The G-man looked startled. “I beg your pardon?”
“I said I starved to death. When the Austrians came and we fought machine guns with fingernails. Logically I was dead; a man can’t live on dry grass. Actually I went on breathing. When the United States entered the war and I walked six hundred miles to join the A. E. F., I ate again. When it ended I returned to the Balkans, shed another illusion, and came back to America.”
“Hvala Bogu,” I put in brightly.
Stahl, startled again, shot me a glance. “I beg your pardon? Are you a Montenegrin?”
“Nope. Pure Ohio. The ejaculation was involuntary.”

Crusader’s Cross – James Lee Burke

Crusader’s Cross – James Lee Burke Simon & Schuster; Reissue edition (July 12, 2005) 337 pages.

The story starts out in a flashback with Dave and his brother Jimmy spending the summer of 58 in Galveston where they were rescued from the surf by a girl… who is eventually taken and subsequently disappears. Later, in the current time frame,  a former classmate of Dave’s, who’s path in life is to run into trouble inevitably finds it and on his deathbed has a confession he gives to Dave,  his uncle, formerly a sheriff’s deputy, had been involved in the girl’s disappearance back in 58.

Dave is reluctant to visit ghosts of the past until an incident where two corrupt sheriff’s deputies take a forceful interest in what might have been said to Dave by an old school chum. Meanwhile,  a series of killings has taken place in the suburbs surrounding New Orleans with one of the bodies discovered in New Iberia parish where Dave has just been rehired by the sheriff’s department.

So, while Dave is officially looking into  the current homicide he’s conducting a reluctant parallel, personal investigation into the past. Which is not something that a wealthy powerful old family wants to have happen. And Dave does not react well to the intimidation tactics of people in power.

In this novel Dave is constantly making bad choices that have serious repercussions for those around him. His reckless encounter with a genteel belle whom he used to know inadvertently corrupts a crime scene. He meets openly, in public, with a witness willing to talk and she subsequently turns up dead. And a verbal confrontation he orchestrates in a posh restraunt turns into an assault and leads to Cletus offering to help his perjured witnesses.

Its not only incredible how Dave turns this around… its miraculous!

“The problem isn’t just the beef at Clementine’s. Its you Dave. You don’t like rules and you hate authority. You wage a personal war against guys like Val Chalons and take the rest of us down with you. No amount of pleading with you works. People are tired of following you around with a dustpan and broom.”
“I’ll clean out my desk,” I said.
“You force your friends to hurt you, Dave. I think that’s a sickness. But you act like it’s funny,” she said.

Neon Rain – James Lee Burke

Neon Rain – James Lee Burke – I read the Pocket Books (Simon and Schuster) paperback version.

Right off the bat we get poignant social commentary and we meet New Orleans homicide detective Lieutenant Dave Robicheaux who may just be the target of a hitman… seems he’s investigating the suspicious drowning of a prostitute in a parish in south Louisiana that ties back to the New Orleans mob. But its deeper than just the mob… soon South American gun runners are setting him up to take a fall for a federal agent’s death. Then, suspended from the force he continues his own investigation following it wherever it leads stepping over bodies as he goes.

From a Calloused parish sheriff and a pair of his corrupt deputies, to biased and apathetic Internal Affairs investigators, the mantle of Noir fiction rest well on this first Robicheaux novel. His life, from serving in Viet Nam to facing down crime in the underworld of New Orleans while battling the bottle and other demons from his past make for a character that is surprisingly introspective and takes the time to see the beauty around him. Burke takes the time to paint a visually lush and fertile environment throughout the novel. It’s a treat for the senses and an immersive experience.

This is the third novel of Burke’s that I’ve read…. I suppose its about time that I got to read the book that started the whole series. This came out in 1987; over ten years from the first Spenser novel and five years before the first Bosch story… which is now on my list to read. There’s something about the narration of the Robicheaux stories that jumps to life… I just wish that they came out with scratch and sniff pages!

   She sat beside me, wiped ointment on my cuts with a piece of cotton, snipped adhesive tape into strips with the scissors, and taped down two big, folded squares of gauze on top of the ointment. Then she rubbed her hands over my skin, down my shoulders and back, across my chest, her eyes looking over my body without embarrassment, as though she were discovering me for the first time. I leaned her back on the bed and kissed her mouth, her neck, unbuttoned her flower-print blouse and placed my head against the red birthmark on her breast. I felt her body stretch out against mine, felt the confidence, the surrender that a woman gives in that moment when she no longer hides her hunger and instead blesses you with a caress that is always unexpected and heart-rushing and humbling in its generosity.

This time I wanted to give her more than she gave me, but I wasn’t able. In seconds I was lost inside her, her hands right against my back, her legs in mine in almost a material way, and when I tried to tense and stop because it was too soon, she held my face close to hers, kissed my cheek, ran her fingers through the back of my hair, saying, “It’s alright Dave. Go ahead. It’s alright.” Then I felt all the anger, the fear, and the heat of the last two days rise inside me like a dark bubble from a well, pause in its own gathered energy and momentum, and burst away into light, into the joy of her thighs, the squeeze of her arms, the blue tenderness of her eyes.

Foreign Deceit – Jeff Carson

Foreign Deceit: A David Wolf Mystery – Jeff Carson, Cross Atlantic Publishing 2013. I read the Kindle Edition from Amazon

This is a first novel from what I can tell by author Jeff Carson. It’s a mystery of the thriller variety. While awaiting a potential promotion to Sheriff, Deputy Sargent David Wolf gets notified of his brothers suicide in a small city in northern Italy. Circumstances surrounding his brothers death have details that do not ring true, so he goes there to look into it and bring the body home. While investigating with the help of an attractive, young police woman Lia Parente he uncovers more than just the local charms. The book ends with his return to Colorado and a nice hook into volume two. The e-book edition I read, the first two chapters of the second book in this series are provided.

After letting this sit and digest with me, nothing there really stands out that I can recall with good texture. Perhaps the thing sticking out to me the most is Lia’s ability to drive an Alfa Romero very well, and that she may be ‘vivacious’ but I would have like to have spent more time at the post-climax of the novel exploring that in better detail.

Between Colorado and northern Italy Carson does a decent job in describing the landscapes and settings, but nothing really grabs me with any detail, or texture. I’m not expecting James Lee Burke pastoral here. But given two opportunities to bring a place to life I see an opportunity wasted I suppose. The language used is… standard, no, flat. Yeah, I would describe the descriptions as flat.

“Wolf had been studying the foliage of the area, and could only come to the conclusion that nature looked confused. There were palm trees, pine trees with long drooping limbs, stiff spiked trees with red flowers that looked like fruit, large-leaved prehistoric looking bushes, pine trees you might see in Colorado, and a variety of exotic-looking foliage he’d never seen. The lawn was lush green, full of grasses and thick-stemmed wild flowers with tiny yellow and blue blossoms, and at least a foot tall. One thing was certain—this area got a lot of rain.”

The area is well described, yet… nothing really has a texture. And this marks the description of, well, everything. Its there, but not that we ‘feel’ it. Even the Italian dinner scene at Detective Rossi’s house lacks texture…and if anything is ripe for pulling all our senses in, its an Italian dinner… I WANT to taste that spaghetti! And experience Office Parente… now THAT would be a sensation to textualize!

Bitter End – Rex Stout

Bitter End: The First Nero Wolfe Novella – Rex Stout . I read the Kindle Edition of the original story published in 1940. A classic who-dunit mystery. The clues are there to follow for the observant.

The story starts out where someone has evidently tampered with a jar of pate at the residence of one Nero Wolfe. Poison is suspected and an outraged Wolfe vows to find the dastardly culprit behind this assault on his palate. As fate would have it, Miss Duncan, niece to My Tingley of Tingley’s Tidbits who makes the pate, arrives to engage Wolfe to investigate the product tampering. Among the close knit circle of suspects is: Miss Yates, in charge of production; Mr Cliff, a VP of a competing firm; Philip, Mr Tingley’s adopted son; Mr Judd, a mysterious banker who is also looking to buy Tingley’s Tidbits; and Miss Murphy, assistant to Miss Yates.

The investigation takes a turn for the worse when Mr Tingley is found murdered in his office and Miss Duncan apparently struck unconscious at the scene. The homicide brings Wolfe’s foil Inspector Cramer into the story. With the looting of papers at Tingley’s office, the murder may not be related to the product tampering, but rather the curious birth and adoption of Philip who may be set to inherit the business.

But in the end, deductive reasoning and a careful examination of the facts presented soon turns up the guilty party. And the description, the narrative… its first rate!

It sure was a ramshackle joint. From a dingy hall a dilapidated stair went up. I mounted to the floor above, heard noises, including machinery humming, off somewhere, and through a rickety door penetrated a partition and was in an anteroom. From behind a grilled window somebody’s grandpa peered out at me, and by shouting I managed to convey to him that I wanted to see Mr. Arthur Tingley. After a wait I was told that Mr. Tingley was busy, and would be indefinitely. On a leaf of my notebook I wrote, “Quinine urgent,” and sent it in. That did it. After another wait a cross-eyed young man came and guided me through a labyrinth of partitions and down a hall into a room.

Seated at an old, battered roll-top desk was a man talking into a phone, and in a chair facing him was a woman older than him with the physique and facial equipment of a top sergeant. Since the phone conversation was none of my business, I stood and listened to it, and gathered that someone named Philip had better put in an appearance by five o’clock or else. Meanwhile I surveyed the room, which had apparently been thrown in by the Indians when they sold the island. By the door, partly concealed by a screen, was an old, veteran marble-topped washstand. A massive, old-fashioned safe was against the wall across from Tingley’s desk. Wooden cupboards, and shelves loaded down with the accumulation of centuries, occupied most of the remaining wall space.

“Who the hell are you?”