Too Many Cooks by Rex Stout My rating: 4 of 5 stars Too Many Cooks is one of Rex Stout’s earlier Nero Wolfe’s books, but it’s as well put together as his later ones, which I’m more familiar with. There’s all of Wolfe’s idiosyncrasies, his food fetish (with attendant mouth-watering lists or descriptions — really,…
Category: Writings
Articles, essays, stories, etc.
Review: 212
212 by Alafair Burke My rating: 3 of 5 stars A nice easy read in the familiar territory of a police drama with enough personal life to give it depth. When mentally taxing tasks dominate the schedule, this is the kind of ebook to read. View all my reviews
Review: Beautiful Lies
Beautiful Lies by Lisa Unger My rating: 0 of 5 stars This ebook sucked me in, pulled me along until suddenly the romance that was going to be mysterious and slow bounced out cliches, fired off ripped abs and hot sex. Then I solved the “mystery.” Not good because since my brain injury I suck…
Review: Darkness At The Stroke Of Noon
Darkness At The Stroke Of Noon by Dennis Murphy My rating: 3 of 5 stars It’s difficult for me to rate this book. I like the premise very much, of a mystery set in the far North with a small group of suspects and the Mountie trapped with them as winter ice sets in while…
Novel Genesis
I’ve written a biography and three novels, and each has come to me or started in a different way. A conversation with my former boss at Judy Taylor’s funeral turned the light bulb on over my head to tell Judy’s mind-boggling story, to begin my long, long research and writing journey. For my first novel,…
Review: Angels
Angels by Billy Graham My rating: 2 of 5 stars This book was recommended to me as a good start for reading up about angels, as it may have been the first to be written on the subject (in the modern era anyway). It starts out well, and it does cover many aspects of angels…
Amazon, Apple, Big Publishers Frustrate Readers
I’m a writer, but I’m also a reader. My favourite format is the mass paperback — until recently. I received my Sony Reader (touch model) a couple of Christmases ago, and then when I bought the iPad, I loaded on several ebook reading apps: iBooks, kobo, Bluefire Reader, Stanza, Kindle. As a person with a…
CBC’s Marketplace Posits A Theory About COLD-FX
Bad science: have a pet theory, manipulate the results to suit it. Marketplace mimicked bad science well this past week. Their theory: COLD-FX does not work. Their results: don’t fit. A little manipulation was in order using panning camerawork, fun quizzes, people-on-the-street interviews journalists are addicted to, jerky camerawork as they follow some poor target,…
Review: Claws
Claws by Stephen Booth My rating: 3 of 5 stars Only Ben Cooper appears in this nicely short story. I like the interplay befween Cooper and Uddal; the mystery itself is Intriguing; and the ending satisfies. But this is a mystery with a message. And that message is hammered home in Cooper’s thoughts, a policeman’s…