Baltimore Blues by Laura Lippman - Tess Monaghan's friend is having trouble with his fiancee. He wants to hire Tess to investigate, even though she's not a PI, but an unemployed newspaper reporter. Her meddling leads to her friend being accused of murder and that, of course, leads to more meddling. A somewhat convoluted plot. And I didn't find Tess likeable during most of the book, but I think she's changing. Written in 1997 and the beginning of a 12 book series so far. I've read the author before but somehow have missed this series.
3 stars
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The Road to Little Dribbling: Adventures of an American in Britain by Bill Bryson - twenty years ago the author wrote a book, Notes From a Small Island, about his travels in Britain and now he decides to revisit some of the towns and surrounding areas. The book is filled with lots of interesting tidbits and descriptions of a countryside the author obviously loves. It also has a few curmudgeonly rants - he's my age so I did identify with some of them. IMO, they weakened the book. The first page did have an amusing story that had me laughing out loud and my family looking at me like I was crazy. Some language.
3.5 stars
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Apprentice in Death by J.D. Robb - the 43rd(!) book in the series starts from the viewpoint of the killer targeting apparently random people at a skating rink. In the blink of an eye, three people are dead and Eve Dallas heads the investigation. This seems more of a police procedural than previous books, we know the killers identity fairly soon and then it's all about how to catch them. I enjoyed this more than the previous book.
3 stars
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You Look Like That Girl: A Child Actor Stops Pretending and Finally Grows Up by Lisa Jakub - the author became an actress at age 4 almost accidentally. She stayed in the business 18 years, starring in Mrs. Doubtfire and Independence Day. But acting for her only fed her insecurities. She left Hollywood at 22 and reinvented herself. Verged on the whiny for me, but I'm in the minority on Goodreads.
3 stars
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Closed Casket by Sophie Hannah - Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot in a another mystery. Poirot and Inspector Catchpool (the narrator of the story) have been invited to the estate of Lady Playford, an author of children's books. At dinner she announces she has changed her will to leave everything to a man who is dying. Of course murder ensues, although maybe not the expected victim. What follows is a convoluted plot with lots of red herrings and peopled by some of the most unlikeable people I have ever met on a page. Not Christie worthy, imo.
2 stars
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Charm City by Laura Lippman - the second Tess Monaghan novel and she's starting to grow on me. She takes on some new responsibilities and seems to be growing up. This time around, she's hired by a newspaper to find out who caused a damaging story to be published. And then the subject of the article commits suicide. These books seem to be as much about the city of Baltimore as they are about the story. Published almost 20 years ago, it's interesting to see the women characters struggling to be accepted in the workplace. Things have changed a lot and yet so much is still the same. Anyway, the plot was nothing special, but I'm curious to see how Tess continues to change.
3 stars
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