Craig Johnson’s entire Longmire series:
Read the new ones and re-read all of the others, twice!
Lawrence Block’s first six Matt Scudder novels
Re-read after 20 years
Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl is just as great the second time around!
Have to begin with “True Detective”, the masterful HBO series. The creators will have their hands full trying to meet that quality with the new one for 2015. Hope and assume they will.
Adele's Best of 2014
In no particular order:
Elena Ferrante - all the books in her Naples series - These are not mysteries but we'd always be happy to order them for you.
Thank you once again to Gail for answering our blog questions!
If you's like to learn more about Gail Carriger and her books click here to go to her website!
1. Did you start out intending to write three separate but linked series?
I didn't even intend to write one series. The Parasol Protectorate just kinda happened. The second Finishing School series, was intentional and by then I was on a roll and really enjoying playing in this world. So the third series came naturally. I've always admired writers like Lackey and McCaffery who do this kind of world play, so I'm delighted to be writing it.
2. Have you considered expanding the series out from the center of the empire, to say Canada, India or Australia?
Yes! In fact, Prudence, the first in my new Custard Protocol adult series, takes my characters to India. It's really fun to explore world building in other parts of the empire, not only how vampires and werewolves are different, but also how the steampunk technology has evolved in different parts of the world.
3. Have you any thoughts on writing Lord Akeldama’s origin story?
I know it, and, since he's a famous historical person, so do you if you've studied ancient history. So I guess you could say: I don't need to write it because it already has been.
4. Some authors write highly detailed outlines when plotting their books, others write down vague ideas in note books and some simple sit down and let the words flow out of them without any plan at all. What style plotting do you do?
I’m a militant outliner, to the point where sometimes I plan for events to occur on specific page numbers. A Victorian era setting can get bogged down by social convention, so I have to watch pacing. I also came to writing via YA, so I like plot to be neat, tidy, and clear. I keep notebooks with timelines, chapter outlines, gadget listings, outfit & place sketches, battle scenes, historical research notes, and general ideas and inspiration. These also include cast lists and character profiles (once a character is written). Characters are one of the few things that aren’t planned. Sometimes a character will surprise me by becoming more important, or introducing himself/herself unexpectedly. They usually know what’s going on better than I do, so I let them do it in defiance of my outline.
5. Have you ever had to throw a whole book out because you couldn’t make it work?
Like many authors out there, I've had to throw away a lot of books. I think I am up to at least a dozen now.
6. Do you keep a hand in your previous career as an archeologist?
I keep in touch with them over social media and the occasional lunch, and I follow a number of arch specific news blogs, but I'm not longer as involved as I would like.
7. If you were stranded on a desert island with your favorite & least favorite fictional characters (outside your own series) who would they be?
I am in a quandary. Many of my favorite characters, while great in a fight, might be a little challenging to live with on a desert island (like Tamora Pierce’s Alanna or Tanya Huff’s Staff Sergeant Kerr). Are we on this island vacationing? Is it a pleasure jaunt? If so, then I’m going to choose quite civilized companions. P. G. Wodehouse’s Bertie Wooster, Mara from Feist and Wurt’s Servant of the Empire series, Terry Prachett’s Death, Douglas Adam’s Ford Prefect, and Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next. That ought to be quite the merry little gathering. And Jeeves would organize it all.
8. What is your highest pinball score?
Somewhere in the region of 800,000
9. Any question you wished to someone would asked in an interview and never have?
What's your biggest dorkiest obsession?
10. Any Final Words?
Kumquat
Any of Brandon Mull's series are wonderful! But his new Five Kingdom series is exceptional! Don't forget to reserve your copy of his new book Rogue Knight with us today!
Brandon Mull - Sky Raider's Review:
It is Halloween and Cole Randolph and his friends have heard nothing but great things about the new haunted house in town. Deciding this sounds like more fun than trick-or-treating, a group of kids from Cole’s school head out to be scared out of their costumes.
The haunted house hides a much more sinister secret, a trap - one which Cole and his friends unwittingly walk into. While Cole is able to remove himself from it, his friends are not so lucky. Cole, unwilling to abandon his friends to an unknown fate, willingly follows them and their captors….to the Outskirts.
The Outskirts is an in-between place where, if you have the power, you can shape the world around you into a thing of dreams or nightmares, depending on your nature. The Outskirts are made up of five kingdoms, each very different but ruled by a single high king. An evil king, whose only love is power….
Cole, who is quickly discovered by his friends captors, is sold into slavery to the sky raiders. His quest to rescue his friends begins when he meets a unusual girl named Mira.
The biggest wrinkle in Cole’s rescue efforts? It is free to enter the Outskirts, but near impossible to leave. And even if you do, almost everyone will end up back in the five kingdoms, forgotten by everyone who loves you….
This is a fantastic start to this new series. It is action-packed and very dense (in a good way). Filled with well rounded characters, a well thought out magic system and dynamic over arching story lines, I cannot say enough good things about this book!
Now, do not read anything into the characters being sold into slavery. In this case, Mull is using it as a plot device to scatter the friends across the five kingdoms, making Cole’s self appointed task more difficult. Mull does a great job of not philosophizing on the subject or creating some sort of moral lesson, which would harm the story. Instead, this can be used as a talking point with your kids…such as how children have been sold into slavery through the centuries and even today in many parts of the world they still are not safe. But Mull does not do any of this for you. It is simply the reality of the situation the kids find themselves in, nothing more.
I enjoyed the fact there is actual crime in the book - a theft of sorts, faked deaths, people in hiding and others on the run. There are a lot of layers to this story, as it quickly turns from a simple plan to rescue his friends to rescuing a kingdom with some new friends. Mull is great at providing hints of what may come, details to speculate (read “obsess“) over and wonder about long after you have finished the book.
I would recommend this book to any boy (or open minded girl as Mira plays a very significant role in the book and is wonderful to read) 8+. I think the action-packed adventure and Cole’s determination will appeal to most anyone.
Killing Cupid will be released on December 30th!
Reserve Your Copy Today!
1. Where did you get the idea for Killing Cupid?
Being the highly creative person I am, I got the idea to write a Valentine’s mystery when my editor said to me, “Laura, how about writing a Valentine’s mystery?” In spite of much begging and pleading on my part, however, my editor refused to supply me with a plot, so I had to come up with that on my own.
I’ve always been fascinated by old-fashioned matchmakers, the kind of gals who take out ads in the back of local magazines and newspapers. Usually the ads feature a picture of a hardened blonde, shot through layers of Vaseline, promising to hand-pick the soul mate of your dreams. Call me a cynic, but I always figured these gals had to be on the shady side, and thought it might be fun to kill one off. Hence KILLING CUPID.
2. Do you have a favorite book in the Jaine Austen series? And why.
My favorite book is always the one I’ve just finished writing, mainly because I’ve just finished writing it and can take a vacation.
3. Has anyone in your family or circle of friends ever given you an idea for a story?
For years, my nephew urged me to write a book set on a cruise. I was hesitant to do so, because up until then I hadn’t set any of my books outside of Los Angeles. But my nephew and my husband convinced me to go ahead with it, and I’m certainly glad I did because I wound up writing KILLER CRUISE, which, in a truthful answer to question #2 (above) is one of my favorite books in the series.
4. Do you have an ornery cat in your life, like Prozac in Jaine’s?
Our darling cat, Mr. Guy, was Prozac’s total opposite. A sweetie pie of the highest order.
5. When receiving feedback on your books, do you prefer compliments or critiques?
Compliments. Life is hard enough without zingers.
6. Do you prefer writing full length mysteries, novellas or short stories? And why?
Novellas are much easier for me than full length books. Having spent so many years writing sitcoms in a half-hour format, shorter stories come more naturally to me.
7. What is you favorite Agatha Christie story & character? (since I see you are a fan of her work!)
It’s been a while since I’ve read her books, but I certainly loved DEATH ON THE NILE. And I remember being absolutely gobsmacked by the surprise ending of THE MURDER OF ROGER ACKROYD.
8. What is your guilty pleasure reading?
Everything I read is for pleasure. I hate struggling through difficult books. (I spent enough time doing that in school.) I’m not a trash reader, though. I like reading writers who are better than I am, on the dubious theory that somehow by reading their books I will miraculously absorb their writing skills. (I regret to say it hasn’t worked yet, but I keep trying.)
9. Do you cheat when you read? (cheating meaning you read the end of the book before you naturally get there)
I can’t cheat when I read because I read most of my books on my Kindle.
10. Any final words?
Thank you for inviting me to chat. It’s been a pleasure.
In No Particular Order
Adult:
Hazel Holt: The Cruellest Month (or any of her Mrs. Mallory books really) (Coffeetown Press)
Clare O’Donohue: Double Wedding Ring (again any of her Nell Fitzgerald Series)
Gail Carriger: Soulless (Orbit)
Alan Bradly: The Dead In Their Vaulted Arches (Delacorte)
Jenn McKinlay: Cloche and Dagger (Berkley)
Cleo Coyle: Billionaire Blend (Berkley)
Laura Levine: Death Of A Neighborhood Witch (Kensington)
Kids:
James Ponti: Blue Moon (Aladdin)
Jasper Fforde: Song Of The Quarkbeast (Harcourt)
Gail Carriger: Curtsies & Conspiracies (Little Brown)
Brandon Sanderson: Steelheart (Delacorte)
Brandon Mull: Sky Raiders (Not out until 2014, but I read the book in 2013.) (Aladdin)
Robin McKinley: Shadows (Nancy Paulsen)
Holly Black: Coldest Girl In Coldtown (Little Brown)
Charlie Huston - Skinner (Mulholland Books)
Carl Hiaasen - Bad Monkey (Knopf)
Mike Lawson - House Odds (Atlantic Monthly)
Scott Turow - Identical (Grand Central)
Craig Johnson – the entire damn Longmire series, all of ‘em!
James Lee Burke - Light of the World (Simon & Schuster)
Michael Gruber - The Return (Morrow)
Carol O’Connell - It Happens in the Dark (Putnam)
Benjamin Black (John Banville) - The Black-Eyed Blonde - (Holt, March 2014)
Some ‘true crime’ titles to include, all related to shenanigans in American history:
Daniel Stashower - The Hour of Peril: The Secret Plot to Murder Lincoln (Minotaur)
Tim Weiner - Enemies: A History of the FBI (Random House)
Lamar Waldron - The Hidden History of the JFK Assassination (Counterpoint)
Peter Janney - Mary’s Mosaic (Skyhorse)
Jim Marrs - Crossfire (Basic)
Read a number of non-mysteries this year. The best of those was Lawrence in Arabia by Scott Anderson. Besides being a fine portrait of TE Lawrence and the WWI in the Middle East, Anderson also makes clear how what the colonial powers did back then haunt us still.
The Drop - Michael Connelly (Grand Central)
The Boyfriend - Thomas Perry (Mysyerious Press) - Signed Copies Available
House Odds - Mike Lawson (Atlantic Monthly) Signed Copies Available
Betrayal of Trust - J. A. Jance (Harper) - Signed Copies Available
Unbroken - Laura Hillenbrand (Random House) (whatever its genre, a true thriller)
Whispering Death - Garry Disher (Soho)
Truth Like the Sun - Jim Lynch (Vintage)
Suspect - Robert Crais (Putnam)
The Burglar Who Counted the Spoons - Lawrence Block - Signed Copies Available
Two frankly non-mysteries, easily special-ordered at Seattle Mystery Bookshop:
The Post-Presidency from Washington to Clinton - Burton I. Kaufman (University Press of Kansas) - U.S. history from the standpoint of those who’ve been there and done that. The title could have been “Retirees Rock!”
The Last of the Doughboys - Richard Rubin (HMH) - Interviews ten years ago with the last surviving U.S. servicemen (and one woman), all gone now, who served in W.W. I.
Once again, I've read a lot (and I actually cut back on reading and reviewing this year, figuring I've saturated the market!), but I've narrowed my best-of's to three lists again. And I keep thinking I've overlooked someone, but I refuse to make a "P.S. List". At least I think I refuse...
Anyway, here's the best of what I read this year for the shop. I've listed them alphabetically by author because that's the most equal way I can figure to list them. And yeah, I cheated in spots, lumping two titles under one name. 'Cause I'm like that!
Hardcovers
Max Barry – Lexicon (Penguin)
Holly Black – The Coldest Girl in Coldtown (Little Brown)
Alan Bradley – Dead in Their Vaulted Arches (Delacorte, Jan. 14, 2014)
Lee Child – Never Go Back (Delacorte)
John Connolly – The Creeps (Atria)
Gary Corby – Sacred Games (Soho)
Jasper Fforde – Song of the Quarkbeast (HMH)
Joshilyn Jackson – Someone Else's Love Story (William Morrow) - Signed Copies Available
My Own Miraculous (William Morrow)
Craig Johnson – Spirit of Steamboat (Viking) - Signed Copies Available
Lisa Lutz – The Last Word (Simon & Schuster)
Val McDermid – Cross and Burn (Atlantic Monthly)
Thomas Perry – Ordinary Grace (Atria)
Hank Phillippi Ryan – The Wrong Girl (Forge) - Signed Copies Available
Brandon Sanderson – Steelheart (Delacorte)
Paperback
(Some of these I read as hardbacks, but they're paperbacks now – or soon will be)
Jussi Adler-Olsen – The Keeper of Lost Causes (Plume)
The Absent Ones (Plume)
Lori Armstrong – Merciless (Touchstone)
Alan Bradley – Speaking From Among the Bones (Bantam, Dec. 31, 2013)
John Connolly – Wrath of Angels (Pocket)
Jasper Fforde – The Last Dragonslayer (HMH)
Ian Hamilton – The Disciple of Las Vegas (Picador)
The Wild Beasts of Wuhan (Picador)
Hugh Howey – Wool (Simon & Schuster)
Ben H. Winters – Countdown City (Quirk) - Signed Copies Available
Northwest
(combined hardcover and paperback)
Patricia Briggs – Frost Budrned (Penguin)
Yasmine Galenorn – Haunted Moon (Berkley) - Signed Copies Available
Autumn Whispers (Berkley) - Signed Copies Available
Nicola Griffith – Hild (Ferrar, Straus and Giroux) - Signed Copies Available
Michael Gruber – The Return (Henry Holt) - Signed Copies Available
Roger Hobbs – Ghostman (Vintage)
Mike Lawson – House Odds (Atlantic Monthly) - Signed Copies Available
Benjamine Percy – Red Moon (Grand Centraly) - Signed Copies Available
Kat Richardson – Possession (Roc) - Signed Copies Available
Urban Waite – The Carrion Birds (William Morrow) - Signed Copies Available
Special Note:
I read all of Craig Johnson's "Longmire" books in one fell swoop, so they ALL belong here! I kept Spirit of Steamboat out special above because it's unique, a Longmire book that isn't in the timeline of the series. But yeah, I read them all and loved 'em.
Dear Santa,
As you know this year my gift needs are small; I possess all the fabric I need for my quilting projects, floss for cross stitch and paint for my models. Plus, due to my job at SMB, I am up to my eyes in great books I need to read for next year!
So I am asking instead of parking my gift allotment under my tree, perhaps you could drop off some items to a few other….beings. They can fulfill what I really want for Christmas this year and you, in a round about way, complete my long standing wish list this Christmas (while you have many great powers of your own, I believe if I am reading the literature correctly, forcing someone to write or print on demand would land you on the naughty list and having Santa on his own naughty list…well…might make the universe implode).
The first stop? Coffee Town Press, right here in Seattle! The gift I had in mind for them, printer ink and reams of paper. Why? They reissued the first eight of Hazel Holt’s Mrs. Mallory series and I was hoping they could bring the rest of the series back into print! In the interest of clarity here are the titles: The Only Good Lawyer, Dead and Buried, Fatal Legacy, Lilies That Fester, Lenora, Delay of Execution, Death In Practice, The Silent Killer and No Cure For Death.
The second stop, Mount Helicon in Greece, where the temple to the Muses is located (however if you know a better spot to drop their gift off, by all means!). I was thinking a traditional gift of ambrosia, wine and my first edition of Ernest Cline’s Ready Player One. With a small note asking if they could please inspire Ernie to write a sequel to his amazing first novel…..
The last location, is easy, you don’t even have to leave home to finish! Could you drop off some eggnog, spiced rum and hard cider to your hard working elves at the North Pole? As this last request will require some serious elf power to sift & search thru a whole lot of attics, files, libraries and archives to achieve. As I was hoping you could find one of the lost Shakespearean plays. Any one would due; Love’s Labour’s Won, Cardenio or a play we have never heard of…but it would be absolutely fantastic to see/read a new play within my lifetime….
I know the list isn’t an easy one, but from one obsessive completionist to another, this would substantially knock down this oh I wish list!
Your faithful believer,
Amber
Dear Santa,
What I would really like this year is a new book by Don Winslow. I know he's been busy but I've read everything from the jazzy writing of Savages and Kings of Cool, to the surf crowd's The Dawn Patrol and The Gentlemen's Hour, Frankie Machine, Death and Life of Bobby Z, Satori, California Fire and Life, and I recently reread Power of the Dog for the 3rd time. I've read the 1st and the last of the Neal Careys but they've been out of print so long, they are hard to come by. I guess I will reread the older books as I so impatiently wait for a new Winslow but if you could whisper in his ear and get him to hurry up, it would be the very best of Christmas presents. I've tried to be good this year so pretty please. Oh gosh, I must've been good as I just noticed one of the old Neal Carey books has appeared on our shelves!
Thank you, Santa.
Adele
Now in stock from Altus Press, trade paper original, $29.95
28 short stories from Black Mask Magazine, published between 1930 and 1937, as well as the two legendary Nagasaki novelettes not reissued since 1930, and the only Jo Gar novel, The Rainbow Murders, all accompanied with line drawings from Arthur Rodman Bowker, one of the great illustrators of the pulp era.
Rookie crime writer Roger Hobbs is already being seen as an old pro. The Portland novelist will be here to sign Ghostman, his debut crime novel, on Friday Feb 22 at noon. We’ve been telling you it is terrific. Now here’s another voice to back our recommendation up.
Michiko Kakutani wrote in the NYTimes that “This is the debut of a gifted crime writer who will only get better with his next endeavors.”
If you need more convincing, here’s an article about Roger and the publication of his book from The Oregonian (he graduated from Reed College.)
And, in this morning’s Seattle Times, Adam Woog wrote up a glowing review, ending it with “Overall, Ghostman is a real piece of work – without question the strongest crime-fiction debut I’ve read in a long time.”
And, if you aren't convinced by all of that, here's JB's write-up of the book from our Dec 14th, 2012 newzine:
Early in 2013, you’ll have the chance to start with a new Northwest author who should be great fun to follow. Roger Hobbs’ Ghostman follows a guy who is, in the parlance of the novel, a “ghost” – no one really knows who he is, what his name is or, to some degree, if he really exists. He no longer even has fingerprints.
He’s a highly trained and very serious fixer: he’s been on various jobs (bank heists, highly-choreographed thefts, and different sorts of illegal activities are alluded to) but for the last few years he’s been used to clean up messes left by the work of others. In that, he’s not too different from Brett Battle’s Jonathan Quinn, except that the Ghost works strictly in the criminal world, not in the world of espionage… spooks and ghosts – well, anyway, it isn’t as confusing as I am making it. The publisher likens him to Mr Wolf in Pulp Fiction, but that isn’t quite right either. This guy is far more active, always on the move, not necessarily looking for a fight but quick to take care of anyone who is. Like Reacher, and just as logical.
In Ghostman, “Jack” (the Ghost) is rousted from his nest in Seattle by Marcus, a high-powered ‘jugman’ who sets up jobs. A casino robbery in Atlantic City turned bloody, one of the thieves was left dead, the other is missing as is the money. Jack owes Marcus from a job that went bad years ago and Jack has no choice but to fly across the country to fix it: find the other thief and the money and erase any trace that could lead back to Marcus.
This debut is fast, bloody, ingenious, full of the clatter of gunfire and the solitary silence of scheming and sweating. Jack is working against a time limit, pinned between Marcus, a man he knowns he cannot cross, and another, shadowy and scary guy from Jersey who wants Jack to double-cross Marcus. Then there is that woman from the FBI and his own memories of the job in Malaysia that went bad. He must go through a couple of dozen pre-paid cell phones, a half-dozen cars and guns, not to mention suits.
Roger Hobbs will be here to sign his debut Ghostman (Knopf hc, $24.95) on Friday, Feb 22nd, at noon. He’s a young guy who lives in Portland, so we hope and expect to see him for every book and we hope and expect him to have a long a productive career writing thrillers. He’s certainly beginning it with a bang!
With all the attention this book is receiving, locking in a signed first printing is the smart thing to do.
Reserve one now!
Novels -in order of having being read:
Charlie Newton, Start Shooting (Doubleday)
Gillian Flynn, Gone Girl (Crown) - Best of the Year
Bruce Holbert, Lonesome Animals (Counterpoint)
George Pelecanos, What it Was (Hachette)
Mike Lawson, House Blood (Atlantic Monthly)
Philip Kerr, Prague Fatale (Putnam)
Jess Walter, Beautiful Ruins (Harper)
Martin Limon, The Joy Brigade (Soho)
James Lee Burke, Creole Belle (Simon & Schuster)
Tom Hansen, This is What We Do (Emergency Press)
Non-ficiton
Stuart Wexler and Larry Hancock, The Awful Grace of God: Religious Terrorism, White Supremacy and they Unsolved Murder of Martin Luther King, Jr (Counterpoint)
Lamar Waldron, Watergate: The Hidden History (Counterpoint)
Ben McIntyre, Double Cross and Operation Mincemeat (Crown and Broadway)
Gil Reavill, Mafia Summit: Hoover, the Kennedyes and the Meeting that Unmasked the Mob (St. Martin’s)
Thursday November 1st at Noon - Jo Nesbø signs Phantom
9th in this hard-hitting Norwegian series.
Harry has once again fled Oslo and all the memories it holds. But now in Hong Kong he receives word that the boy he helped to raise has been arrested for murder. Barred from the force and the official investigation, Harry sets out to investigate the case and prove the boy innocent.
Adele and Janine recommend this series highly.
Jasper Fforde - The Last Dragonslayer
Amber's Pick:
It is no secret that I am a fan of Jasper Fforde’s writing; you should see the happy dance I do when an advanced reader copy of a new book is unwrapped in the store!
However many of his first in series books have a single fatal flaw… the first third of the books are slow, seriously slow---but, after you get thru this first third, they zip by and you can’t wait for the next book to come out! (The rest of the books after the first in series do not suffer from this flaw.) It’s proven to be a significant hurdle for less patient readers (I do what I can to reassure them to stick with it).
The Last Dragonslayer does NOT possess this flaw. The book reads like a song; from beginning to end it is graceful and flowing.
Jennifer Strange lives in a world where metal, machines and magic live side by side. She runs the Kazam, an employment agency for wizards, since her boss disappeared a few months back…. add to this the fact that magic has been slowly fading from the world, making her magicians harder and harder to hire out, Jennifer has enough problems on her plate.
Then the visions start.
Around the world wizards with the ability to foresee the future are inundated with a single vision, the death of the last dragon is at hand. With this vision Jennifer’s world tilts, all the signs point to Big Magic and Jennifer is in the thick of it!
While this book is billed as a Young Adult, it is suitable for any age. It would read a bit on the cozy side for an adult, and there isn’t any teen age angst in sight!
This book is all about choice. Choosing to do the right, best or necessary thing, because Jennifer understands the value of this freedom. As a foundling, she works as an indentured servant at Kazam, and will work there until her eighteenth birthday (unless she chooses to stay). So when presented with a choice it is important to her to actively make a decision, instead of just doing her duty or letting it flit away. This theme is repeated through out the book, in great ways, never with a heavy hand.
I seriously cannot say enough great things about this book! If you are a fan of any of Jasper’s series, or need one to cut your teeth on, I would recommend this book for you!
