I'm catching up on my reviews so I can finish the books I'm currently reading. Here are the last three that I enjoyed. (Story, Pace, Enjoyment, Editing, and Dialogue) SPEED Reviews:
Summer's Growth by Tina Gayle (ebook)
The heroine of this sometimes steamy romance has to find a family replacement for herself as estate manager and also please the many spirits which inhabit the mansion. The pace is lively as long-departed relatives and servants hop in and out of her world to help and hinder. When a love from her teen years comes back into her life, their renewed passion complicates things. I heartily enjoyed the book and editing mistakes were very minor. The dialogue was sexy in appropriate scenes and believable in conversations with spirits and relatives. A good summer or anytime read.
Cowboy on Fire - Murder under the Volcano by Denniger Bolton (ebook)
A Texas private detective is hired by a rich friend to find his wife who disappeared from a guru's ashram in Costa Rica. The pace is a little slow at first but picks up considerably as B.B. Rivers meets some characters at the ashram, uncovers evidence and teams up with a hippie couple who run a farm and a former sports star who son was abused by the guru. The book has an authentic South American feel to it as the author lived there a while. I enjoyed that and the Texas talk of the MC in first person point of view. No major edit problems either, The dialogue was lively as was the action.
The World According to Bertie by Alexander McCall Smith (print book)
The 44 Scotland Street Book is a slice of real life in Edinburgh that is almost as good as The #1 Ladies Detective Club (Smith's previous best-seller). The story moves back and forth between the life of young Bertie and his parents, a old painter whose dog has been "arrested" for biting, two middle-aged women who are sort-of friends, the love lives of a twenty-something opportunist male and a young woman stuck with a male friend she doesn't love. (Not these two together, though). To me, the variety was good at times and off-putting at others. The change in story lines does allow the reader to put the book down and still pick it up later - even much later. The pace was appropriate to the style of writing McCall Smith uses. Editing was top-notch and the dialogue was great. I enjoyed it but it is not a quick read.
I'm not qualified to review children's books, but I want to mention one anyway. Christmas at the North Pole Compound by Christine Verstraete is a cute holiday crime short story that would be great if you have little ones in your life. (An elf detective investigates the disappearance of presents from Santa's loading dock)
Since I have six e-books and two print books to read and the final 12 chapters of Mystery at Pima Point to write, my time here is over. Happy Reading.
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