Mysteries/Thrillers

[nitenurse]

Ian Rankin -- any of his Rankin series. Finally books about Scotland that don't have a drop dead romantic hero in a kilt...

He portrays a gritter, more real Scotland than most North Americans ever want to understand.

[comfortablynumb]

sleepy said:

Oooh, my guilty pleasure! I love this stuff. Even when it's bad.

And I used to love Patricia Cornwell. Now? Not so much. I keep trying with her, though, because I figure she's got to come out with a good one again eventually.

I got her new book Predator for Christmas, and I thought it was OK. I do think that her writing has gone downhill, though. I absoutely can't stand Lucy and this Benton-Kay-Marino triangle is getting tiresome.

I also like Sue Grafton's alphabet series. I just finished reading S is for Silence, and it was a good quick read.

[dnt]

I like Ian Rankin's books as well. Or I used to; the last book (Resurrection Men?) just didn't hold my interest. I don't know; I guess I found it depressing that Rebus keeps making the same mistakes. My parents are Scottish and, in a passive way, anti-independence; my mother always says that if you get a bunch of Scots in one room, they'd be too busy fighting to accomplish anything. There's a quality of self-defeatism, or even just being beaten down, that comes across through Rankin's writing that is sort of tiring to read.

[gemstone]

I've never been to much into mysteries but I listen to a lot of books on CD while working and the selection can be pretty slim. I tend to be very picky and if I don't like the tone of the book, or of the reader for that matter, I'll abandon it and go for another. Recently though I stumbled upon the books of Nevada Barr and I am totally impressed. As someone who is not a nature kind of girl at all her writing makes me want to go hiking and get out into the woods. I hope you guys haven't discussed her in another thread and come to the consensus that she's a hack writer or anything. And the woman who does the reading for the audio books is just amazing. As far as I can tell she reads for all of them and she just seems to have the perfect voice for it. I'm addicted. I might have to put aside my nonfiction books in the evening and read some of the books that I haven't already listened to.

[girlnamedcarl]

Right now, I'm listening to one of the catering mysteries by Diane Mott Davidson. And I find myself wanting to shake the protagonist violently. Her 14-year-old son gives her shit, and all she can do is buy him an expensive guitar in response? Pardon me for sounding like every old Southern woman in history, but, as I exclaimed to the tape player in my car, "That boy needs to go to military school!" (That's my answer for everything these days, but I think it applies here.)

[pathtaken]

For some reason lately I have become interested in Anne Perry's series with Inspector Pitt and his lovely wife Charlotte.
Since she seems to reference previous books a bit, I have been trying to read them in order. They are not too complicated a read, but have lots of editing problems/inconsistencies.
Anyone else notice that?

[Ripley]

pathtaken, I used to love the Inspector Pitt novels. I also recommend you read them in order because what takes place in one book is often referenced in a later book. Sadly, I had to "break up" with Anne Perry because the last two Inspector Pitt novels were so annoyingly preachy that I just couldn't stand them anymore. I didn't read the latest one that came out, but a friend of mine did and she said that AP is continuing along that line.

Oh, but the first few were so good. I hate it when I have to dump an author.

[jazz]

Anne Perry is one of my favorites. The movie with Kate Winslet Heavenly Crestures was based on her life and she did spend a lot of time in prison. I have read almost all of her books and I met her when she was promoting one of her books at Borders so I got her to sign it. She looked prettier and younger in person than her book picture and was very soft spoken. I also met Evan Hunter(another favorite)in the same Border store(they do books a lot of authors and celeb authors liek Brooke Shields).

I also like PR James and Jack Higgins. Oh and Robert Tannenbaum. I tend to buy all the books of the author if I liked the first one I read.

[pathtaken]

Anyone enjoy Martha Grimes?
Her early Richard Jury books were fun, her later kind of depressing. [Too many dead kids]
Her latest The Old Wine Shades started out good with some of the humor provided by Melrose Plant[my literary boyfriend] but the end sucked. There was no true end! Her novel from last year Belle Ruin was the same way, no effing end!
I hate to finish a book and wonder where the last chapter is.

[girlnamedcarl]

I have begun digging on the Lynley/Havers series by Elizabeth George as read by Donada Peters (with a 35-minute commute each way and shitty local radio stations, oh hell yes I rock the books on tape).