When Meaning Has Waned Being Mortal by Atul Gawande Musings on California’s new doctor-assisted suicide law – San Francisco Magazine 2016 February 11. Does It Dignify? God’s Hotel by Victoria Sweet
Category: Books
Reviews of books and other printed and visual media
Fern Michaels
When the Snow Falls is a collection by Fern Michaels, Nancy Bush, Rosanna Chiofalo, and Lin Stepp connected by couples finding romance in snowy climes. The library has this filed with the Christmas books but the stories didn’t have much to do with the holidays. I most related to Fern Michaels’s story, more for its…
Susan Elizabeth Phillips
Match Me If You Can as a book on CD read by Anna Fields was an amusing long-drive listen with a few LOL moments and only a couple of winces and eye rolls. The Chicago setting and realistic professional (and somewhat professional) women was appreciated. As in some of the Regency romance series the preponderance…
Adult Comics Collections
Stephan Pastis Pearls Before Swine Pearls Before Swine, copyright 2005, is interesting for Stephan Pastis’s Introduction in which he comments on influences such as Mr. Bill on Saturday Night Live and Wylie E. Coyote. Not so compelling (to me) are the subsequent strips with Pig getting injured and Bob getting burned. I found that I…
Castle Krentz Quick
Jayne Ann Krentz publishes under her married name (Jayne Ann Krentz), her given (maiden) name Jayne Castle, and and her pen name Amanda Quick. Her Krentz novels are in the murder mystery / thriller / romance genres with a contemporary setting – often the wine country north of San Francisco. Many of the lead characters…
Thriller Romance Novels
Contemporary Thriller / Mystery Jayne Ann Krentz See the Castle Krentz Quick post for reviews of books by Jayne Ann Krentz under her married name (Jayne Ann Krentz), her given (maiden) name Jayne Castle, and and her pen name Amanda Quick. Her Krentz novels are in the murder mystery / thriller / romance genres with…
Paranormal Romance Novels
(Also see the Adult Paranormal Fiction post.) Contemporary Paranormal Lynsay Sands Argeneau series Entertaining and sexy ‘immortals’ (in the vampire) mode long for their life-mates – a life-mate being the one person whose mind you cannot read… unless you’re in the throes of sexual passion – but then have to overcome a life-threatening obstacle or…
Contemporary Romance Novels
Elsa Watson Dog Days by Elsa Watson offers a lightly amusing take on the ‘Freaky Friday’ premise – but with a woman and a stray dog swapping places. I was willing to suspend belief for the story, but found myself getting impatient with the characters and their dialog so I skipped chunks to get to…
Historical Romance Novels
‘Historical Romance Novels’ are set in bygone eras other than ‘Regency’. Thirteenth Century Maya Banks (Note: ‘Neamh Alainn’ is ficitional.) Never Seduce a Scot by Maya Banks is both entertaining and eye roll inducing – likable characters once you get past the (supposedly) thirteenth century Scottish Highlander gender-appropriate behavior. I liked the story a lot…
Miscellaneous Adult Fiction
War and Its Aftermath Nine Stories Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger, though much less well-known today than Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye, was quite popular at the time of its publication in 1953 – particularly the semi-autobiographical story “For Esme – with Love and Squalor”. This story was notable for its handling of recovery from…