Illegally Yours
Rafael Agustin
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Book Website
Interview with Author
All my favorite books are funny. This memoir from a tv comedy writer recounts his childhood as an immigrant, his relationship with his parents and the choices they all made navigating the hellscape of U.S. immigration. On making a serious topic funny, Agustin said “that’s what’s been so successful for me in the book. People were like, ‘I didn’t expect to be entertained. I didn’t expect to laugh,’ because this subject matter is so heavy. And I tell people, ‘Do you think we’re just depressed 24 hours a day? Are you kidding me?’”. Highly recommend.
Sourcery
Terry Pratchett
#5 Discworld, #3 Rincewind
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Imagine Carl Hiassen set his comedies on another planet in an alternate universe, where there magicians and mythical creatures exist alongside underachievers, hustlers, competent women being ignored and pompous bureaucrats. Instead of Florida, it’s Discworld. These novels are funny and full of flawed, interesting characters. Except for Death, unless he’s not listening and then also Death. In this installment there world saving to be done, but the man for the job has lost his killer sentient luggage. Without it our man is much more comfortable with more mundane errands, like running away from danger and saving his own ass. Thank goodness for the monkey librarian.
Glass and Steele series by C.J. Archer
The Watchmaker’s Daughter
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I was three books into another series when I learned it was a spinoff of this one. Set in Victorian England, with a twist: Artisans can inherit a magical gift for making objects – think clocks or maps – extraordinary. But the less magical artisans think that’s some bullshit so it’s all very hush hush. Mystery-of-the-week style against a longer arc of a young woman discovering her past, her gifts, and a hot dude who needs her help solving a magical problem. The books in both this series and the spinoff have been quick, engaging reads, and I find I really like the realistic historical fiction with just a splash of magic.
The Mapmaker’s Apprentice
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Now that all the characters are established from book 1, we learn more about them all in book 2. I like how Matt is written, in that he is largely inscrutable to India and the audience. I like that is India gaining confidence. A fun little jaunt.
The Apothecary’s Poison
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In book 3, some of the side characters start to come off the bench and be interesting in their own right. The mystery is still fun and the characters engaging save for one aspect (spoiler ahead): I am not that interested in a character denying their feelings for another because an old aunt has class issues. Perhaps my lack of patience is because I am neither English nor of the era but there’s no chance Matt is going to let his aunt pick his wife. The audience knows that and we’ve known him as long as India has. So for her to buy into “protecting” him from her lowly station felt disingenuous for me. Like the author realized she wanted to write more than 3 books and needed to stretch out the will they-won’t they.
Veronica Speedwell series by Deanna Raybourn
Series on Author Page
This month, I read books 7 and 8 in this series that has been a favorite thus far. Also check out Raybourn’s “Killers of a Certain Age” – it’s excellent and how I went looking for more by this author.
An Impossible Imposter
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Also set in Victorian England, but this series features one of my favorite female characters I’ve read in a long time. Despite the pressures of the era, she has embarked on her own career as a scientist and travels the world, catching butterflies and paramours. At the beginning of this series she finds herself stuck in England with a fellow outcast, my guy Stoker, who has cast off his society roots to become more interesting and sometimes wear an eye patch. The series is full of humor, adventure and heart. In this installment, one of Veronica’s past dalliances returns to wreak havoc for her. I found myself frustrated with some of choices she makes here, but I’m still along for the ride.
A Sinister Revenge
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Oh Veronica. As her choices serve to isolate her, that means this installment is A LOT of talking to herself. Girl, I was with you until it meant I had to read 20 pages of internal monologue. It was the first one of these where I was a little bored. And also the pacing was a little strange, but that could be because I was flipping past a lot of monologue.
Murder in an Irish Village
Carlene O’Connor
#1 in Irish Village Mystery series
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I needed a break from Victorian England but I didn’t go far for book 1 of this cozy mystery series recommended by my mom, set in a small village in Ireland in modern times. Siobhan is navigating the loss of her parents, her new guardianship of 4 of her 5 siblings, her thwarted college dreams and her feelings for a guy who will never leave their village, when bam! Murder. That’s how the cozy crumbles, even in Irish dialect. Now she has to clear her brother’s name and face the fact that there’s a murderer amongst her longtime friends and neighbors. This is the beginning of a series but actually read well as a standalone. No cliffhangers, which I appreciate.
The Ghost Who Came for Christmas
Bobbi Holmes
#6 in Haunting Danielle series
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There are 34 (!) books in this series about a women who can see ghosts and inherits a house from a long lost aunt (another broad theme of the books I like – gifted real estate). She solves mysteries, engenders misunderstandings and talks to dead people. It’s fairly silly but also generally a pleasant read. But 34 books? I can’t imagine how this story is going to stretch that long but I’ve been reading about Ranger and Morelli for 17 years so whatever. I’m in.
