"Don't Look Twice" is the second novel in Andrew Gross' Detective Ty Hauck series and I found it just as exciting as his first, "The Dark Tide". To learn more about Andrew Gross go to www.andrewgrossbooks.com or www.myspace.com/andrewgross books.
Detective Ty Hauck has taken his daughter, Jessie, to an Exxon station convenience store that he likes to frequent so they can make purchases before they head out on his skiff for a final jaunt in preparation for taking it out of the water for the winter. As they wait in line to pay, a man in a green down vest with his arms full of soda waves them ahead of him in the line. Ty sees a red truck jerk to a stop outside right in front of them and the heavily tinted passenger window rolls down. When he sees a man leaning out with a gun extended, Ty throws his daughter to the ground and covers her body with his own and yells for everyone to get down just as the shooting starts.
When it's all over, the man in the green vest is dead and others injured and Jessie is in shock with the dead man's blood all over her. As Ty and his team begin their investigation into the shooting, what seems to be a straight forward motive turns out to be a red herring and they will find many more red herrings along the way to learning the truth and seeking justice.
Ty sends Jessie to the hospital then to her mother's while he's in the throes of the investigation. His most recent girlfriend, Karen, is in Florida where her dad is gravely ill with Parkinson's. Ty's brother, Warren, who he has very little contact with, invites him and Jessie for Thanksgiving but, when that doesn't work out, he shows up unexpectedly on Ty's doorstep. As the two brothers reminisce about the past and reconnect, the investigation is ongoing and Ty also receives a very lucrative and interesting job proposition but, with his mind focused on finding a killer, he puts the offer on the back burner.
In the meantime, there are more killings and, as they identify the shooters, they end up dead, too. Ty has to discover what is going on and who is behind all these killings. Just when Ty and his team think they're ready to break the investigation wide open, someone else dies. Are the deaths random or is there a pattern? pazt
Sunday, January 24, 2016
Thursday, January 21, 2016
"Blackberry Winter"
"Blackberry Winter" appears to be Sarah Jio's third novel. She heard the song "Blackberry Winter" by Hilary Kole on the radio and thought it was beautiful and piqued her interest. Sarah also grew up in the northwest and has fond memories of hunting for blackberries with her family. After hearing the song she decided to find out what a blackberry winter was and discovered it is "old-fashioned weather jargon for a late-season cold snap--think of plunging temperatures and snowfall in May, just when the delicate white flowers are beginning to appear on the blackberry vines."
Out of that research and some personal experiences the story she has written came to her. It starts in 1933 in Seattle when a single mother, Vera Ray, has to leave her 3-year-old son Daniel home in their apartment alone or risk losing her job. She needs the income for them to survive and reluctantly tucks him into bed before heading off to work the night shift as a maid in a local hotel.
When Vera leaves work, there has been a late spring snowfall and arriving at her apartment she discovers Daniel is gone. Frantically she searches for him without success and the police do little to help her find her son. They think he's just wandered off and will return. Sara is distraught and turns to anyone who might be willing to help her find her son.
Fast forward to Seattle in 2010 when May 1st brings another "blackberry winter" to Seattle and a Seattle Herald reporter, Claire Aldridge, is assigned to write an article about it. During her research, she discovers the story of Vera and Daniel and decides she must learn what happened. As she digs deeper into the story, Vera's loss becomes her loss and she can't let it go until she discovers what happened to them. Little does she know that she will discover a link between them and her present life. pazt
Out of that research and some personal experiences the story she has written came to her. It starts in 1933 in Seattle when a single mother, Vera Ray, has to leave her 3-year-old son Daniel home in their apartment alone or risk losing her job. She needs the income for them to survive and reluctantly tucks him into bed before heading off to work the night shift as a maid in a local hotel.
When Vera leaves work, there has been a late spring snowfall and arriving at her apartment she discovers Daniel is gone. Frantically she searches for him without success and the police do little to help her find her son. They think he's just wandered off and will return. Sara is distraught and turns to anyone who might be willing to help her find her son.
Fast forward to Seattle in 2010 when May 1st brings another "blackberry winter" to Seattle and a Seattle Herald reporter, Claire Aldridge, is assigned to write an article about it. During her research, she discovers the story of Vera and Daniel and decides she must learn what happened. As she digs deeper into the story, Vera's loss becomes her loss and she can't let it go until she discovers what happened to them. Little does she know that she will discover a link between them and her present life. pazt
Sunday, January 17, 2016
"Little Failure - A Memoir"
"Little Failure - A Memoir" by author Gary Shteyngart was not particularly an easy read for me but the fact that it was on my library's "Best Picks" list encouraged me to finish it and I'm glad I did. I've also decided to read one of his novels, too.
Gary was born Igor in 1972 in Leningrad so he's a year younger than my son who was adopted shortly after he was born in 1971. Although Gary and his family moved to the United States when he was 7 years old (thanks to President Reagan reaching out to exchange grain to Russia in return for their letting Jewish families leave), he continued to struggle with what it was like to be a Russian American and not quite fitting in. At the same time my son was probably struggling with what it was like to be a biracial child in a white family in a mostly white neighborhood.
Gary's struggles of not quite fitting in with his hand-me-down clothes, learning a new language, no real friends while his parents were working hard to support him and themselves in a new country could probably be the story of any child who has left the country of their birth and emigrated with their family to a new and strange country. He was lucky that his paternal grandmother (who thought he could do no wrong) also came with them and showered him with food and love after school until his father could pick him up after work.
As an only child, all of his parents hopes are pinned on Gary and their wish for him to get into a prestigious college and become a lawyer or something equally respectable. I doubt that the word author ever crossed their minds but his maternal grandmother rewarded him for writing stories while he was still in Russia.
Gary was well aware of what was expected of him and also constantly reminded by his parents of the "little failure" they saw him as. Although the messages he received from them sound cruel, in retrospect I received similar messages from my parents but they weren't spoken out loud. I grew up feeling that I wasn't good enough and that I didn't have the ability to succeed despite my good grades in school. I had to keep proving to myself that I was worthy by finishing college and even going on to obtain my master's. Maybe all parents have a way of conveying their disappointment even when they don't mean to -- was I also that parent?
Gary ended up at Oberlin College -- not the prestigious college his parents had hoped for - and proceeded to drink and smoke his way through a hazy education where he did excel at writing, made friends, and had his first real girlfriend. I suspect neither one of us impressed our parents!
Out of college Gary found a friend and mentor who supported him in his writing efforts but also had enough "tough love" to get him into therapy ultimately.
In his late thirties and married Gary and his parents return to Leningrad to walk down memory paths and begin to see each other as individuals and adults. I saw in him the same struggle I had of needing to become independent of parents who never wanted to let me go to lead my own life even after I was married. I said and did some cruel things trying to force my emancipation while struggling with a love-hate relationship with them. So...Gary's struggles became my struggles as I read his story but I didn't have the added burdens of having to learn a new language. Like Gary I knew I was loved by my parents but sometimes that love was smothering. Unlike Gary I was surrounded by friends and had boyfriends before college. So...my life seems much easier than his. I wonder what he'd have to say about the hatred being spewed at the moment by some of our presidential candidates about allowing refugees to come to the United States? pazt
Gary was born Igor in 1972 in Leningrad so he's a year younger than my son who was adopted shortly after he was born in 1971. Although Gary and his family moved to the United States when he was 7 years old (thanks to President Reagan reaching out to exchange grain to Russia in return for their letting Jewish families leave), he continued to struggle with what it was like to be a Russian American and not quite fitting in. At the same time my son was probably struggling with what it was like to be a biracial child in a white family in a mostly white neighborhood.
Gary's struggles of not quite fitting in with his hand-me-down clothes, learning a new language, no real friends while his parents were working hard to support him and themselves in a new country could probably be the story of any child who has left the country of their birth and emigrated with their family to a new and strange country. He was lucky that his paternal grandmother (who thought he could do no wrong) also came with them and showered him with food and love after school until his father could pick him up after work.
As an only child, all of his parents hopes are pinned on Gary and their wish for him to get into a prestigious college and become a lawyer or something equally respectable. I doubt that the word author ever crossed their minds but his maternal grandmother rewarded him for writing stories while he was still in Russia.
Gary was well aware of what was expected of him and also constantly reminded by his parents of the "little failure" they saw him as. Although the messages he received from them sound cruel, in retrospect I received similar messages from my parents but they weren't spoken out loud. I grew up feeling that I wasn't good enough and that I didn't have the ability to succeed despite my good grades in school. I had to keep proving to myself that I was worthy by finishing college and even going on to obtain my master's. Maybe all parents have a way of conveying their disappointment even when they don't mean to -- was I also that parent?
Gary ended up at Oberlin College -- not the prestigious college his parents had hoped for - and proceeded to drink and smoke his way through a hazy education where he did excel at writing, made friends, and had his first real girlfriend. I suspect neither one of us impressed our parents!
Out of college Gary found a friend and mentor who supported him in his writing efforts but also had enough "tough love" to get him into therapy ultimately.
In his late thirties and married Gary and his parents return to Leningrad to walk down memory paths and begin to see each other as individuals and adults. I saw in him the same struggle I had of needing to become independent of parents who never wanted to let me go to lead my own life even after I was married. I said and did some cruel things trying to force my emancipation while struggling with a love-hate relationship with them. So...Gary's struggles became my struggles as I read his story but I didn't have the added burdens of having to learn a new language. Like Gary I knew I was loved by my parents but sometimes that love was smothering. Unlike Gary I was surrounded by friends and had boyfriends before college. So...my life seems much easier than his. I wonder what he'd have to say about the hatred being spewed at the moment by some of our presidential candidates about allowing refugees to come to the United States? pazt
Thursday, January 7, 2016
"Dead Man's Tunnel"
"Dead Man's Tunnel" is the third book in the Hook Runyon mystery series -- out of a set of four written by Sheldon Russell (www.sheldonrussell.com).
The setting: near the end of World War II after an atomic bomb has been dropped in Japan. Hook finds himself banished to the high desert area of Arizona trying to find some copper thieves stealing from West's Salvage Yard while still attending to other railroad business.
Nearby is the Johnson Canyon Tunnel which has been guarded throughout the war by two military men but no one (at least outside the army) knows why -- including Hook. When one of the guards ends up run over by a train on the tracks in the tunnel, Lt. Allison Capron is sent by the Army Transportation Department to investigate. Hook and the Lt. form a loose team trying to decide if this was an accident, sabotage, or murder. In the meantime, the other guard disappears and becomes a suspect in a series of robberies.
As usual, Hook gets himself in some scrapes inside and outside his job as a railroad Yard Dog but he also is instrumental in solving the mystery of the dead guard. I'll miss the Hook Runyan books because I am pretty sure I have now read all that have been written. pazt
The setting: near the end of World War II after an atomic bomb has been dropped in Japan. Hook finds himself banished to the high desert area of Arizona trying to find some copper thieves stealing from West's Salvage Yard while still attending to other railroad business.
Nearby is the Johnson Canyon Tunnel which has been guarded throughout the war by two military men but no one (at least outside the army) knows why -- including Hook. When one of the guards ends up run over by a train on the tracks in the tunnel, Lt. Allison Capron is sent by the Army Transportation Department to investigate. Hook and the Lt. form a loose team trying to decide if this was an accident, sabotage, or murder. In the meantime, the other guard disappears and becomes a suspect in a series of robberies.
As usual, Hook gets himself in some scrapes inside and outside his job as a railroad Yard Dog but he also is instrumental in solving the mystery of the dead guard. I'll miss the Hook Runyan books because I am pretty sure I have now read all that have been written. pazt
Friday, January 1, 2016
"1st To Die"
"1st To Die" is the first novel in James Patterson's "A Women's Murder Club" series. The story tells us how a woman detective, a female newspaper reporter, female medical examiner, and a female attorney start their "Women's Murder Club" in an attempt to solve murders created by a serial murderer of brides and grooms.
I have a vague recollection of seeing a movie or made-for-tv movie based on this book but reading the novel is so much more satisfying. This tale has so many twists and turns that I was kept guessing throughout. Just when I thought we had a solution, doubts were raised and off we go in another direction. Patterson is a master when it comes to writing mysteries -- ready to read more!!!! pazt
I have a vague recollection of seeing a movie or made-for-tv movie based on this book but reading the novel is so much more satisfying. This tale has so many twists and turns that I was kept guessing throughout. Just when I thought we had a solution, doubts were raised and off we go in another direction. Patterson is a master when it comes to writing mysteries -- ready to read more!!!! pazt
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