Contest

For my Dorothy-L cohorts, you have come to the right place.

Please send your name and favorite recipe to me at surlygirl819@gmail.com


All recipes will be compiled for the Dorothy-L recipe Wiki. Woo Hoo!

Entries will be accepted through June 23rd and the winners of Kaye's and my contest will be posted on the 25th. Good luck to you all!

While you're here, feel free to take a look around. See you on Dorothy-L.

~Shannon

Woods

Harlan Coben has written another engrossing story with THE WOODS (Dutton, c2007, ISBN 978-0-525-95012-7).
20 years ago, four teenagers went into the woods. Two were found murdered. Two were never seen again. One of those teenagers was Paul Copeland's sister. Now, two decades later, Paul works as the County Prosecutor for Essex, New Jersey and one of the missing from the past is found murdered, with newspaper clippings leading the police to him. Is it possible that his sister could still be alive?

Although this is written in first person, I was completely absorbed in this great story with secrets running rampant and a surprise ending. I have enjoyed all of Coben's stand-alones; I have never read his Bolitar series but I've heard others rave about it.

This book begins:

I see my father with that shovel.

Have a safe and happy weekend!

See No Evil

Hey! Welcome to my 150th post on THE HOOK, LINE AND STINKER! Wow! It's hard to imagine that I've been maintaining this for that long. I have a short attention span when it comes to a lot of things and tend to lose interest quickly. I still have a hard time posting as frequently as I'd like but that's more of a time issue rather than a lack of interest. I applaud those people out there who are professional bloggers -- I know I could never do it.

In the second book of Allison Brennan's trilogy, SEE NO EVIL (Ballantine Books, c2007, ISBN 978-0-345-49503-7)has a familiar cast of characters; some are from the first book, some are not.

From Amazon:
A troubled teenage girl has been charged with the grisly murder of her stepfather. The evidence is damning: Emily was found alone at the scene with blood on her hands, and an incriminating e-mail she wrote outlines a murder plot identical to the method of the brutal slaying. But deputy district attorney Julia Chandler believes her niece is innocent, and she’s determined to keep the promise she made to protect her dead brother’s daughter – even if it means hiring private eye Connor Kincaid . . . the man who blames her for forcing his resignation from the police department.


Together Julia and Connor uncover a chain of unsolved violent crimes tied to an unorthodox therapist whose anonymous online patients purge their anger by posting lethal fantasies. But someone in the group has turned vigilante, turning the game of virtual murder into a flesh-and-blood vendetta.


The first sentence:

The teenaged girl had the gun in her hand.

I really enjoy Allison Brennan's books, each one better than the last. This series is no exception. Set in San Diego, California, the book has great locale, interesting character dynamics and relationships and evil teenagers (aren't they all?!?). I have one more book left in this trilogy which I hope to finish in the next month, before she puts out another one.

Not so Hot-Cha-Cha

HOT STUFF by Janet Evanovich and Leanne Banks(St. Martin's Paperbacks, c2007, ISBN 0-312-94146-3) was definitely not my favorite Evanovich book and I think fans of Janet's PLUM books will be disappointed with this. (To be fair, I've never read Leanne Banks so I can't give an honest opinion to her writing, but I've read plenty of JE's books!) To me, it was a formulaic read, one that I've read before only with different main characters, different cops and different dogs, yet the same. The only saving grace for me on this book was that it was set in Boston, MA which I called home for several years.

In this book you have Cate Madigan (aspiring teacher/by night bartender) Kellen McBride Kostner (ex-cop and PI) and Beast (Bull Mastiff, havoc-creating pooch). The girl is running from the bad guys, the ex-cop is trying to watch after her and solve the crime at the same time and the dog is just getting in the way. Throw in a couple of support characters, some adorable and some annoying and you have this book.

The 1st sentence:

Cate Madigan had mentally stripped the guy across the table from her, and he'd come up short in every possible way.

I will always rave about the Stephanie Plum books because she is just my FAVORITE, but I may have to step back and quit reading these just-add-water books because they're not really doing anything for me.

Rash

RASH by Pete Hautman (Simon & Schuster, c2006, ISBN 0-689-86801-4) was one of my most current reads and a fulfillment of my "MUST READ YOUNG ADULT FICTION" thingie that I've got going on.

In this book, in the United Safer States of America of the late twenty-first century, there is an obsession with safety and even "minor anti-social impulses" are criminal.

Bo Marsten is sentenced to work in a prison camp making pizzas for McDonald's after giving a rash to some schoolmates and fighting with a peer over a girl. It is here that he is recruited to play football, an illegal sport but one in which Bo is quite skilled. While in the Canadian tundra, at this camp surrounded by polar bears, Bo also begins to question the society in which he's been raised and finds that sometimes breaking the rules is necessary, especially living in a time where safety is more important than freedom.

The book begins:

Gramps, who was born in 1990, once told me that when he was my age the only way to wind up in prison in the USSA (back when it had only one S) was to steal something, kill somebody, or use illegal drugs.

I enjoyed this book and have added Hautman's book GODLESS to my to-be-read list. It's kind of a sports book with a football angle, a futuristic fantasy with the time thing and it smacks of HOLES by Louis Sachar (a book I read when it first came out!), whether intentional or not.

A Wicked Snow

A WICKED SNOW by Gregg Olsen (Pinnacle Books, c2007, ISBN 978-0-7394-8068-7) was my latest read.

From Publisher's Weekly: Hannah Griffin has spent most of her life trying to forget the notorious Christmas Eve house fire that claimed her family and turned up almost two dozen other bodies buried in their yard; though the case remained unsolved, Hannah's mother became, posthumously, the de facto prime suspect. Twenty years later, Hannah's a happily married mother of one, a crime scene investigator for Santa Louisa, Calif., and a lifetime away from her traumatic Oregon childhood—until a series of mysterious events indicates that her mother may still be alive. Hannah reopens the case, as well as old wounds, after enlisting the help of FBI Special Agent Jeff Bauer, the still-haunted chief officer from the original investigation. Thanks to Olsen's true-crime work, the case's particulars—both grisly and mundane—all carry genuine weight, though his characters can be cloying: Hannah's neuroses occasionally seem more dingbat than damaged, and Agent Bauer's tough-but-tender act is a familiar one. That said, Olsen's flashback narrative shines with lurid, carefully distributed details, and if it ultimately overshadows the present-day plot, his bizarre, many-layered mystery will keep fans of crime fiction hooked.

The first sentence:

The girl remembered the snow and the evil that came with it.

This book is written in 3rd person, jumps back and forth between the past and present. I would have written probably almost a carbon copy of the Publisher's Weekly review as my thoughts were quite similar. One thing I did love is that when I looked up the town in Oregon, Rock Point, I found this. Very cool!

Murder with reservations

Nearly a month ago, Elaine Viets, author, contributor to this site (that's Elaine on the far right!) and member of Dorothy-L (which is how I know her) suffered from a stroke and had to have emergency brain surgery.

Now on the mend, Elaine is having to deal with the fact that her newest book, MURDER WITH RESERVATIONS (NAL, c2007, ISBN 0-451-22111-7) came out May 1, 2007 and she is unable to tour and promote her book.

That's where several other authors, bloggers, readers, friends and I come in. We are all doing Elaine's promotions for her so that she can focus on getting well.


If you find yourself at the bookstore looking for something to read, go check out Elaine's DEAD END JOB mysteries and look for this book along with the rest of the series. If you are a library user, request that Elaine's books be purchased for the library.

Here is a list of events being held for Elaine as she recuperates and a really good deal: buy 2 of Elaine's books and the Mystery Lover's Bookshop will ship one to the library of your choice for free.

Now, if only I could tell you about Elaine's experience with a hotel buffet...I'll leave that for her to do.

GET WELL SOON, ELAINE!

And don't forget...buy Elaine's books. Thank you.

This public service announcement brought to you by a voracious reader and a big fan of Elaine Viets'.

No Disrespect

Today, a patron returned the book NO DISRESPECT by Sister Souljah (Times Books, c1994, ISBN 0-8129-2483-5) and although it's not a book that I've read, I do like its first sentence:

In the projects, somebody can call your mother a one-legged whore who does nasty tricks for men for five dollars and she will still be the most important and influential person in your childhood.

I have her book, THE COLDEST WINTER EVER on my TBR shelf at home...

Bang Your Head

Well, in between reading books, I also try to keep current with my many magazines as well, and this is a new magazine to which I've recently subsribed and just luuuuvvve!

For a trivia junkie, this is THE magazine to get. There is enough diverse information in each issue to keep me reading for days.
My husband was watching TV tonight and there was a commercial for the upcoming
SNL and apparently Scarlett Johansson is hosting with musical guest, Bjork. He rolled over and looked at me and said, "What's a Beeyork?"

Of course, I deadpanned at him and said, "She's a singer, honey," and his response was, "How do you know that?"

Well, it's because I read my books. And magazines. And newspapers. And cereal boxes.
Honestly, I read whatever is within reach of my grubby li'l' hands and I've been that way my entire life. That's probably why it takes me so long to read books and post the first sentences on here. Because I'm reading EVERYTHING ELSE!

On a different note, I was very excited to see that they are coming to our local My Waterloo Days Festival. As a child of the '80's, I find this totally rad!

And on yet another note, how cool is this?

This is my husband Jeff and I in August, the day of our wedding. I think I'm going to print some of these out and give them to him for our anniversary. Isn't the first year's anniversary, paper?

And, if you think it's too cool for school, you can make your own personalized currency.

And this is here, just because I think this website should be in everyone's favorites somewhere. This is another way I stay current with today's youth. If I hear 'em say it, I look it up. In my line of business, it's great to throw the kids that come in for a loop using THEIR slanguage.

What the dead know

Laura Lippman's latest, WHAT THE DEAD KNOW (William Morrow, c2007, ISBN 978-0-06-112885-1) is a wonderful read. I'm not familiar with her series, but I would recommend each and every one of her stand-alones, this one included.

Now into its third week on the New York Times Best Sellers List, set mainly in Baltimore, MD, (Ah, I love Maryland!) it starts with a car accident and a woman involved claiming to be Heather Bethany, one of the Bethany sisters who disappeared thirty years previously from a local shopping mall.

The book then starts to flip back and forth in time, which is okay, to tell the story of the Bethany girls, how their disappearance came to affect the family unit and to let the reader in on little subtle clues leading up to the kapow! finale.

Also involved in the story are the Bethany girls' parents, Dave and Miriam as well as investigating police officers Kevin Infante and Nancy Porter and Chett Willoughby, the officer who was responsible for the case back when it first happened.

The story begins:

Her stomach clutched at the sight of the water tower hovering above the still, bare trees, a spaceship come to earth.

There is a reason her book has made it to the NYT bestseller's list and that reason is because it is just darn good!