December Reads Part Deux

LAST BREATH by George Shuman (Simon & Schuster, c2007, ISBN 978-1-4165-3490-7) is the second book featuring Sherry Moore, a blind psychic who can see the last 18 seconds of the deceased's life. This book jumps all around the country and it begins with the bodies of two women who had disappeared years earlier, found in a storage container. Sherry Moore is called in to help with the investigation. Autoerotic asphyxiation plays a key part in this story and gets quite graphic at times. The only real problem I had with the book was it had a lot of characters to keep track of and the people were here, and here, and here, and here and here, and here...I remember the first book sucked me in right off the bat. This one took a little bit.

It starts:

She didn't feel quite right about the red dress; it wasn't a red dress kind of day.

SACRED COWS by Karen Olson (Warner Books, c2005, ISBN 0-446-61685-0" is a book that has been sitting on my TBR pile for several months. Set in New Haven, CT the book is first in a series and is written in first person POV. Annie Seymour works as a crime reporter and when she is summoned to the scene of a murder - a young Yale student by day, escort by night. Digging in, Annie finds the murder linked to some high-end city official muckety-mucks and it appears her own mother may be involved! Working with Vinny and fighting with Tom, she struggles to get the up on a killer story, without getting killed in the process. Annie is a fun character but WARNING -- she likes to cuss. But then so do I, so that could have been a part of the draw for me.

The book starts out:

My hand closed over the cold steel in that second between hearing the phone ring and before my eyes opened.

BLIZZARD: THE STORM THAT CHANGED AMERICA by Jim Murphy (Scholastic Press, c2000, ISBN 0-590-67309-2) was a book I read over the Christmas break from work because they were predicting a major storm. I am not a big fan of winter and I know I live in the wrong state for that mentality, but I thought that this would put my hatred for ice and snow in its place, if only for a little while.
And it did. The massive snowstorm that hit the Northeast in 1888 was a chiller.

The book starts out:

On Saturday, March 10, 1888, the weather from Maine on down to Maryland was clear and unusually warm.

My final read for the year 2007 was a book I read much praise about: CITY OF FIRE by Robert Ellis (St. Martin's Minotaur, c2007, ISBN 978-0-312-36613-1).
This book was fantastic -- I am glad this was the last book of the year for me. Detective Lena Gamble of the LAPD is working on the Romeo case, where women are being raped and butchered and left to be found by a loved one. When Lena's dead brother's band member is found at a scene in what appears to be a murder/suicide, Lena buckles down to find the killer because now it's become personal.
Lena was a fabulous character -- very gritty, very real. I like that in a woman. And I look forward to reading more of Ellis' books.

This book began:

She rolled over in bed, nudging the corner of the pillow with her cheek and burrowing in.

Thanks for reading with me in 2007. I hope to be quicker with my posts (and more regular) in 2008 but until I no longer have to work for "the man" I make no guarantees.

Happy New Year!

~Shannon