Gastro Obscura is a worldwide trip down memory lane and into some strange corners of the globe. Sort of a more fleshed out Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives with an emphasis on the weird or historical. Want to visit the oldest tavern in America? See the White Horse Tavern in RhodeContinue Reading
“What if Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland wasn’t something Lewis Carroll made up, but a history of what he saw when he came here?”—The Lost Wonderland Diaries Celia is the daughter of a librarian and the great-great-great-grandniece of Charles Dodson, the real name of the author of Alice in Wonderland. SoContinue Reading
Older is a sequel to Younger. Liza has come out about her age. She is now officially fifty. She has been living as a hermit for two years after breaking it off with younger Josh. Liza broke it off with Josh. She felt Josh should have a family life withContinue Reading
Maggie Crozat and her family have turned the family’s Louisiana plantation into a Bed & Breakfast. To drum up business, they make October a theme month with the neighboring B & Bs. It focuses on the town’s spooky past. But with several rougarou, a Cajun vampire/werewolf, sightings, and an argumentContinue Reading
It’s a tech company’s team building meeting in an isolated ski resort in the remote French Alps. Ten Britons go in. One by One they are picked off. Remind you of another famous, but not racial sensitive, tale? It is hard to beat Dame Agatha at, literally, her own game.Continue Reading
It Will Just Be Us is a new Southern gothic suspense tale set in the Shirley Jackson universe of ghosts and madness. Living in their family’s historic but dilapidated mansion, Samantha and her mother see the ghosts of their own pasts every day. But when Samantha’s sister Elizabeth arrives veryContinue Reading
The game is afoot In a Midnight Wood, the 27th book in the Jane Lawless series. Jane Lawless is busy! She runs a successful restaurant in Minnesota. She is a part-time true crime podcaster always on the hunt for new stories. Jane is also a licensed private investigator. While visitingContinue Reading
In The Darkest Evening, Inspector Vera Stanhope of the Northumbria Police is driving home in a blinding snowstorm when she finds a car abandoned by the side of the road. The driver’s door is wide open. There is a sleeping baby in a car seat in the back. Failing toContinue Reading
My Review Checked Out for Murder is jam-packed with relationship drama and genuine characters. When a new town resident is murdered, library event director, Carrie, investigates. She believes it might be related to an unsolved homicide from twenty years earlier. Or could it really be as simple as the victim’sContinue Reading
The blurb for Murder at Hotel 1911 drew me in. “A hotel clerk prone to panic attacks turns amateur detective in this elegant and atmospheric murder mystery.” The book’s setting in a mansion permanently stuck in 1911 is very original. In my opinion, the atmospheric setting and its associated historyContinue Reading
The Liberation of Marguerite Harrison involved breaking all of the norms within the society in which she was born. Originally, Marguerite was a rich and respected Baltimore wife and mother. When her husband died, she was only 37. So she decided to live life to the fullest. First, she becameContinue Reading
Atlas at War! contains 50 war comics that initially ran from 1951 to 1960. The comics are raw and violent—just like the wars they depict. They are definitely not politically correct, especially to the villains of World War II and the Korean War. However, the stories give us an opportunityContinue Reading
Lily Wong is a lot of things: half-Hong Kong Chinese, half North Dakota Norwegian, and full ninja. She works with a women’s shelter to extract women from dangerous situations. In The Ninja’s Blade, Lily is trying to break up a child sex trafficking ring in her own Los Angeles backyard.Continue Reading
Long-buried secrets are revealed in the Dark Hollows of Jacob’s life. Jacob lives in The Hollows in Vermont. He owns a coffee shop. Jacob also short-term rents out a cottage on his land to leaf peepers and other tourists. His large black Lab mutt, Murphy, is prominent in his adsContinue Reading
Beverly Cleary captured the rebel inside every little girl when she first captured Ramona on a page. No one could replace Beverly. However, the illustrators did change throughout the years. Louis Darling, Alan Tiegreen, Joanne Scribner, Tracy Dockray, and Jacqueline Rogers all had a hand in creating the Art ofContinue Reading
In Not Your Idol Vol 2, high school students Nina and Hikaru continue to explore their relationship. But now there is another student trying to break them up. I was disappointed by Vol 2. It was much slower paced than the first volume, which I loved. There are many conversationsContinue Reading