Metro Girl by Janet Evanovich

Back Cover:

When "Wild" Bill Barnaby drops off the face of the earth, big sister Alex heads for Miami to save her brother. Battling bad-hair-day humidity, Miami hit men, and Palmetto bugs big enough to eat her alive, Alex pursues Bill's trail through the bars of South Beach then south to Key West and Cuba.

Turns out, in his haste to leave town, Bill "borrowed" a yacht belonging to Sam Hooker, hero of the NASCAR circuit. Hooker figures he'll attach himself to Alex and maybe run into scumbag Bill. maybe even get lucky in love with Bill's sweetie pie sister. After all, Hooker is very good at revving a woman's engine.

The race to the finish is hot and hard, taking Alex and Hooker into international water, exposing a plot to grab Cuban gold and a sinister relic of the Cuban missile crisis.
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Thoughts:

I actually read the sequel to this book, Motor Mouth, prior to having read Metro Girl, which is the first in the Alexandra Barnaby series. Turns out, that didn't matter in the slightest.

Look, I like chic-lit fluff. It's what I read when I want to knock over a book in a day's commute to and from work. So in that sense, this worked for me. And if you like Stephanie Plum books, you'll probably like these as they are straight from the same cookie cutter.

• Sassy female protagonist, pretty but not perfect, has self-depreciating insecurities and a temper
• Womanising male lead, good looking and popular, enjoys teasing protagonist while constantly trying to get in her pants and calling her foodie nicknames.
• Sassy minority sidekicks who carry guns (luckily, as protagonist doesn't like guns) - this time they are South American women.
• Somehow ends up in trouble which involves real bad guys, but always wins.

Main difference - no one is actually law enforcement here. Meaning they should be even less competent. And I haven't got a "Ranger" character yet.

With the Plum series, there was a plausible explanation as to how Stephanie kept getting herself in dangerous situations. I'm not sure how that will work out for Barney, as she is not in a job which puts her in this situations. Motor Mouth did work something out about that, but too many more in this series and they'll really be pushing it.

If you're one of those people who gets over a series when it becomes the same story re-written, you'll be over this quickly. I'm a speed reader, so I'm more forgiving about this as I'm through one of these books in around 3 or 4 hours. Intense books stress me as I can miss important points with my skimming. That won't happen with this series.

Look, as long as Janet keep writing, I'll keep reading. But this isn't going to win any awards any time soon. That said, its just a bit of fun. Its not trying that hard.

Verdict: 3/5

Delays caused by Emma

It's been a month! I blame Emma. Jane Austen's Emma, that is.

The classics have never really been my scene. For some reason, particularly if I'm not familiar with the story by way of a film adaption, I just can't picture their world, or the characters themselves. i can't care enough about them to get into the book.

Persuasion, Little Women, The Picture of Dorian Gray - none of them did it for me. Little Women and Pride and Prejudice I have since overcome post film, the others I haven't given that chance.

Anyhoo, I came across a copy of Emma and decided to see if I had grown up. I thought that matching up the characters to Clueless may help to:
A) get me through the book; and
B) keep me amused.

Apparently not.

Should I persevere? Is it worth it? Should I get a copy of a film version and watch it first? It is just crap and I will resent spending more time on it?

Help me dear readers.

K

Room by Emma Donoghue

Back Cover:
Jack is five. He lives in a single, locked room with his Ma.
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Thoughts:
Poor Jack. He's never been outside, never looked out a window, seen anything real that isn't in his room or on the TV. It quickly become apparent to the reader that Jack and his Ma are being held captive in a soundproofed shed, and no one knows they are there.

This is told from the point of view of Jack, which makes it even more heartbreaking, as he doesn't really understand the predicament he is in. He doesn't realise things on the TV are real and there is more to the world than his tiny home. He is, in fact, rather happy in his bubble of ignorance.

So when his Ma decides it is time to escape, with Jack playing the starring role in her master plan, what follows is even more dramatic than you would imagine.

I won't go much further, lest you actually be intending to read this book, except to say that it is very gripping. Despite not being a short book (it is average at 400 pages), I finished this within a day. A 3 hour commute and a lunch break to be specific. But that is also helped by a pretty simplistic dialogue with not a great deal of descriptive location settings. This works, however, because of the limitations in the protagonist being only 5.

I was interested in that while I sympathised a lot with the character of Ma (I mean, kidnapped at 19 and held captive as a sex slave - c'mon. You gotta feel badly for the lass), I didn't particularly like her much. But I don't think that really matters. I also wonder if this is one of those books that would affect me differently if I were a mother. I was pretty indifferent to We Need to Talk About Kevin, and I'm certain my childlessness had a lot to do with that.

Despite the storyline feeling a little like it was pinched from relatively recent news stories, this book was a refreshing change to the other things I've been reading lately and I enjoyed it immensely.

Verdict: 4/5

Genesis by Karin Slaughter

Back Cover:
Three and a half years ago former Grant County medical examiner Sara Linton moved to Atlanta hoping to leave her tragic past behind he. Now working as a octor in Atlanta's Grady Hospital she is starting to piece her life together. But when a severely wounded young woman is brought in to the emergency room,, she finds herself drawn back into a worls of violence and terror. The woman has been hit by a car but, naked and brutalised, its clear that she has been the prey of a twisted mind.

When Special Agent Will Trent of the Criminal Investigation Team returns to the scene of the accident, he stumbles on a torture chamber buried deep beneath the earth. And this hidden house of horror reveals a ghastly truth - Sara's patient is just the first victim of a sick, sadistic killer. Wrestling the case away from the local police chief, Will and his partner Faith Mitchell find themselves at the centre of a grisly murder hunt. And Sara, Will and Faith - each with their own wounds and secrets - are the only thing that stands between a madman and his next crime.

---

Thoughts:
I know, I know, I just said, like, 2 days ago I was unlikely to be reviewing any of these authors soon. Well, then I realised I hadn't read this year. So tough.

Sara Linton is a recurring character from previous Karin Slaughter books. I'm certain I've also encountered Will and Faith before too but I can't be bothered searching the books right now to confirm this. I'll update this paragraph if I get around to finding out this information.

This is a fairly decent crime fiction novel, made more by the characters than the storyline. I like all 3 of our major players, espcially Will who I seem to have a bit of a soft spot for. He's a man who comes from a particularly sad upbringing in state care and foster homes, where he suffered a lot of abuse during his childhood. He's dyslexic (and hiding it well) but otherwise we don't really know too much about him yet. My impression (from both this and the other book he's been in) is that he's both very private, as well as of the opinion that he's 'tainted' and that to share too much may cause people to think of him differently. Will is tied into a dysfunctional relationship with Angie, a girl with a similar past who he grew up with. Unsually for a crime novel, I ended up in tears at the end of a telling scene with Will and Angie. But then, I always was a cry-baby.

Faith is a more irritating character, but that doesn't ake her unlikeable. I find it odd that I don't relate to her easily, yet I somehow do with Will? Weird. Faithhas her own problems in this book, dealing with some medical issues, including a suprise pregnancy.

Sara is just a broken woman - the move to Atlanta made after the detah of her police officer husband (a majoy character in previous books, until his untimely death, that is). There's not too much of her here but that works for where she is in her life.

And then there's Amanda. Amanda is the head of the GBI (Georgia Bureau of Investigation) and she's a ballbreaker and I heart her. But also way glad I don't work for her as she can be (and usually is) a mega bitch. Fun for me as the reader though.

So, the actual storyline in nothing amazing - read enough crime fiction and it all becomes a bit run-of-the-mill. But the character interaction really helps this book not to feel like it's the same as every other. There's enough there to keep it enjoyable, particularly if you've read other books in the series. And at 440-odd pages, a good length - something important to me as I'm such a speed-reader (I can guarantee I'll read more books than I blogs about, casue I'm far more dedicated to reading than I am to writing).

Final opinion: 3/5

The Wish List by Melanie La'Brooy

Back Cover:
Scatty, funny and smart, Lucy is a hopeless romantic. With an unshakeable faith in happy endings, she drives her friends Meg and Chloe crazy as she tries time and again to maker her best friend Tom fall in love with her.

Then Lucy meets the man of her dreams - or so it seems. But when she's faced with a case of mistaken identity, a noble quest, a lovelorn serenade and a duel to the bitter end, Lucy must confront the eternal question: is true loove fact, fiction, or something in between?

---
Thoughts:
For a chic lit book, this is larger than your average book, which I think is a good thing. I'm a quick reader with a 3-hour commute so anything that lasts more than 1 day for me gets bonus points.

The characters in this are quite enjoyable. You always get a little bit of typecasting trying to make the characters different from each other, but this does feel cookie-cutter.

Our protagonist, Lucy, is an actress and as such suffers from a touch of the dramatic, but its funny and a little endearing, and her friends do get jack of it from time to time, as certainly they would in real life.

Lucy does, in a Friends-convenient manner, have 2 female friends. Add to that Tom, the friend she keeps sleeping with, Percy the new friend made early in the book (who is joyously British) and Byron, the new 'man of her dreams' and you get the standard comedy 3 males. Is 6 some kind of majic number for key cast? Any more than 6 and its all too much, noone can keep up?

The characters do all add to the storyline, which is something. And they are likeable without being perfect. So general win here.

The storyline is hardly unpredictable, but the chick lit genre is rarely one for twist endings. Regardless, its a well-written, fun, light-hearted read which is exactly what I was in the mood for.

Score: 3.5/5

*Image borrowed from http://www.boomerangbooks.com.au

Welcome

To my new blog. Which will hopefully be updated more than my other blog.

I've decided the problem I have with blogging is that lack of a theme. I'm not a natural writer (I don't think) nor am I particularly funny or witty and I often feel that my life to too mundane to write regular posts which people would find interesting. So it gets left.

I figure - write what you know. And I know reading. I LURVE to read. Always have, always will. And I also like to debate books with other people. So here, I hope to review books I'm reading or have recently read, and nut them out with you.

I'll try to post ahead what I'll be reading next, in case anyone wants to read along. I'm also keen to hear suggestions from people, if you think something is worth my time.

You can expect a mix of crime fiction, chick lit, easy reading, classics, biographies, and good mix of fiction and non-fiction, probably not much romance or sci-fi/fantasy.

My favourite authors are or have been:

Mil Millington
Stephen King
Patricia Cornwell
Michael Crichton
Karin Slaughter
James Patterson
John Grisham
Janet Evanovich
Jasper Fforde

So I'm a bit commercial. Sue me.

I do realise that the above authors conform to a pretty specific style. I'm unlikely to write many reviews of these authors (exceptions perhaps to Millington, Crichton and King as there is more variance there). I enjoy reading much beyond the scope of these authors, and hope to be introduced to some new authors and styles through my writing here.

Where I can, I'll also give a comparison to the film version. That said, I generally avoid these and film adaptions of novels I like, generally make me angry, unless I saw the film first. So we'll see how that works out.

Hopefully I'll get my first review up this week. I'd love to hear feedback and suggestions.

K