Happy .... Christmas?

I know, it's really Halloween ... but I'm rambling today about two Christmas titles that I received from NetGalley so deal with it.

The first is Anne Perry's A Christmas Escape, due to be released on November 10th.


I believe this is Perry's thirteenth "Christmas" book, though it's the first I have read. Receiving my copy from NetGalley was a good excuse to finally get off my duff and read something of Perry's -- which I've been meaning to do for years.

Overall it was an enjoyable short read. I'm only giving it three stars out of five, though, because of the lack of seasonality that I was anticipating.

Charles Latterly (the brother-in-law of Perry's Victorian detective William Monk) is vacationing before Christmas on the volcanic island of Stromboli. The property where he is staying already has a handful of other guests who all know eachother -- teenager Candace Finbar and her great- uncle, the married bickering Baileys, uppity Colonel Bretherton and novelist Quinn. Charles immediately bonds with the Finbars and the property owner, Stefano. He's also immediately aware of the tension surrounding his relaxing vacation -- not only from his fellow guests but also from the volcano.

Between the bickering, a murderer in their midst, and a volcano getting ready to blow any real Christmas-y feel was lost. I had almost even forgotten that it was supposed to be a "holiday mystery" when a "Merry Christmas" was offered up at the very end. Still a decent little story and the descriptions of the scenery and the volcano were wonderful, but as a "holiday" read it's not one I'll add to my list of seasonal re-reads.

More likely to be on my holiday re-read list is the anthology from Poisoned Pen Press, Silent Nights, being published on November 3rd.

I love Poisoned Pen Press and they're commitment to uncovering lost treasures from the Golden Age of detective fiction and this anthology definitely fits. There are fifteen stories in all with a mixture of familiar and unfamiliar tales. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, Dorothy L. Sayers' Lord Peter Wimsey, Margery Allingham's Albert Campion, and G.K. Chesterton's Father Brown all make appearances. These stories alone will be worth the purchase price for many fans, but I was more excited about some of the stories by authors I hadn't read, with three standing out for me more than the rest:

Leo Bruce's "Beef For Christmas" had me chuckling from the get-go and wondering why the heck I was unfamiliar with the characters -- especially after doing a search on Goodreads and seeing that there are eight Beef books I now have to add to my TBR. Swell. Thanks a lot, Poisoned Pen Press.

Edmund Crispin's "The Name On The Window" has added another eleven titles to my TBR since I need to find out more about Fen ... and whether or not he's always as flippant as he was here. I'm hoping that he was because I do so love a good bit of flippancy. Not a Christmas-tale, really, but I'll let them slide.

Ethel Lina White. Who? Oh ... the woman who wrote the stories that The Lady Vanishes and The Spiral Staircase were based on? Two of my favorite classic thrillers? I hang my head in shame at my ignorance ... and then perk up in delight that I have, yes, even more to read. "Waxworks," according to the introduction in the book was in print before White's first novel was published. I see, now, that there is also a novel by White titled Wax and I hope that it's a blown-up version of this story ... but, of course, different enough that I won't know what will happen.

A Christopher Moore Double-Feature Ramble

I finished Christopher Moore's A Dirty Job before finally closing my eyes for my pre-work nap tonight. I realized that I never gave the book before, Bloodsucking Fiends, a proper ramble ... so I'm doing a double feature.

Like a drive-in, but books.

And no concession stand.

And no mosquitoes flying in through the window (unless, of course, you live somewhere that has mosquitoes in October and you're reading this with the window open ... in which case, you're just silly).


Technically the books are part of two different series according to Moore's website and Goodreads and the like. Moore is tricky, though, and does a lot of crossovers with characters. I'm guessing a lot of people could quite happily read one without the other but I'm not a lot of people. I couldn't make it far into A Dirty Job without backtracking to Bloodsucking Fiends because, as it turns out, there are certain itty bitty bits that make oh-so-much-more sense having read them in order.

Both stories take place in San Francisco and deal heavily in matters of death -- one of the main characters of BF being a vampire, and the main character of ADJ being a "Death Merchant" who collects souls and helps relocate them to new vessels. The two even cross paths, though you wouldn't necessarily know it unless you had read BF first .... or this ramble. There are actually three other characters from BF who appear in ADJ to some degree (well, 5 if you include the dogs) ... and one character mentioned in ADJ that will come in to serious play in the sequel to BF. Heck, one of the characters from both of these books made his first appearance all the way back in Moore's first novel, Practical Demonkeeping, waaaaaay back in 1992. Another character from ADJ debuted in a bit role in 1994's Coyote Blue.

I know, that last paragraph was kind of spoilery and I typically hate spoilery stuff (unless it's for a show I only kind of sort of care about ... and then I only read the spoilery stuff, I don't shove it in the face of others) .... but it's minor and no real spoilery specifics were give and it all only really matters anyway in that it helps to highlight the overlappiness.

(It's a word. Don't look it up. Just trust me.)

You know, screw the ramble.

Just read the books. All of them. In order of publication. Don't pay attention to what anyone (including Moore) claims to be a "standalone" or a "series" or any of that nonsense ... because Moore's world is just one big jumbled ball of delightfully heinous fuc......

Oh.

That reminds me.

Do NOT read these books (or, probably, anything written by Christopher Moore) if you:
* get offended easily
* have no sense of humor
* don't understand sarcasm
* abhor profanity

Now I have to figure out what to read next. I was going to do more Moore ... but then NetGalley ... and the guilt from all of the other books I swore I would get to this year .... and ..... and ..... and ......

#TeaserTuesday # 34 - Christopher Moore's A Dirty Job

The Book & The Tease

Christopher Moore -A Dirty Job

The Meme

#BookBeginnings and #Friday56 - Christopher Moore's Bloodsucking Fiends

I'm still working on Bloodsucking Fiends. Not getting as much reading done at work since I'm marathoning Sleepy Hollow on Hulu in order to be caught up for the big crossover with Bones ... but I'll get it done sooner or later!

In the meantime, though, I get to tease more of it thanks to Book Beginnings & Friday56! As always, Friday56 (share a blurb from the 56th page or 56% mark) is hosted at Freda's Voice & Book Beginnings (share the first few sentences & your thoughts) is at Rose City Reader.

BB Thoughts: Hooray for the Emperor!!! This was the first time he was mentioned and he'll keep popping up in more Moore books. I mentioned on Tuesday that I had stopped reading another book because of a mention of a character from this particular series ... and that I first read Bloodsucking Fiends 20 years ago so felt the overwhelming need to backtrack, re-read & refresh. The Emperor wasn't the character in question that I remembered the overlap for, but I love that he's here so very much! Moore has such an amazing talent for characters that may not seem like much but are.

Friday56: Snapping turtles do not belong in the bathtub. They just don't.

Reading With John (with a ramble from mom): Andrew Chilton's The Goblin's Puzzle

Tuesday afternoon John and I finished reading Andrew Chilton's The Goblin's Puzzle thanks to Random House, Knopf & NetGalley. It's set for release here in the US on January 19th. You can pre-order it from Amazon by clicking HERE or on the cover (and, as always, it's an affiliate link so if you do buy it we'll get a little smidgen of money in our account which will likely go towards more books. Or laundry detergent. Whatever.)


What a wonderful book this was! It was funny and exciting and oh-so-thoughtful. We haven't read very many middle-grade books together that I would consider "deep" but there were definitely some pretty deep and profound messages in this one. I wasn't really sure that John would pick up on them as he's only nine, but after he gave me his "Top Five Things" about the book I was pleasantly surprised that he seemed to get it.

Without further ado, the John part of today's Reading With John:

Now it's my turn to do my mom-ramble.

The third thing on John's list was the one that really struck me. Without giving too much away, a great deal of this story is about just that -- overcoming pre-conceived notions about who you are. Sometimes those notions are held by others. Sometimes those notions are held by yourself. You know that when you're told enough that you're this or that you start to believe it. When the things that you're told aren't necessarily positive they can really put a damper on, well, everything.

I don't know if I've ever mentioned this here, but John is a "special needs kid." He's been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder and is on the Autism Spectrum. He gets therapy in school to help with expressing himself in social situations. He sometimes breaks down or freaks out or acts up over things that normal kids probably wouldn't. He'll opt out of certain field trips or school assemblies that normal kids get excited about.

(I despise the word "normal," by the way.)

John's also an amazing artist. He builds amazing structures and models out of Legos or clay or whatever else he can get his hands on. He's absolutely brilliant with math (he says he has a calculator brain thanks to his "wiring" being different). He loves to read and make up stories and songs. BUT, because his wiring is different and because of the sometimes abnormal reactions to things he's sometimes conceived to be "odd" or "strange" or "goofy." Because he DOES have ADD and Autism he's sometimes conceived to be "less than" that dreaded "normal." We try incredibly hard to make sure that those conceptions don't sink in.

When I requested The Goblin's Puzzle from NetGalley, I admit I had a pre-conceived notion about what I was going to get. I imagined a "normal" fantasy tale to be enjoyed by young (and, maybe, not-so-young) readers. We certainly got the "normal" fantasy tale aspects with kings and queens and sorcerers and ogres and so on and so on. We also got puzzles to help solve and adventures to get excited about and, most of all, life lessons about fate and conceptions and confidence.

The ditz can be a brilliant leader.
The loser can be a champion.
The monster can be a good friend.

and the unwritten but still felt:

The "special needs kid" can be absolutely anything.