Books I've Read This Week (June 2)

Welcome again to Books I've Read This Week. I was sick last weekend and wasted the whole three day weekend not reading. Alright, I did create my photo website and practiced my Photoshop skills, but really, what's a vacation without a few books finished at the end of it?

Here are the books I managed to read this week: Leo Laporte's Guide to Mac OS X Tiger by Leo Laporte and Todd Stauffer, Dead Man Running by Rett MacPherson, and Ladies with Prospects by Cynthia Hartwick. And I'm still working on SAMS Teach Yourself Adobe Photoshop 7 in 24 Hours by Carla Rose and Their Noble Lordships by Simon Winchester.

I figured I should bone up on the new operating system (nicknamed Tiger) on my new Mac Mini so I checked out Leo Laporte's Guide to Mac OS X Tiger. It was very helpful and made me think I should get a book like it for my personal computer library. I also need to get a good in-depth manual on Photoshop. SAMS Teach Yourself Adobe Photoshop 7 in 24 Hours has been a great way to get a thorough training in the various tools and techniques available in Photoshop but it's not exhaustive and I think I should have a reference in case I need more help. I'm on Hour 12 so I definitely have lots more to learn before I'm done.

Dead Man Running is a Torie O'Shea mystery by Rett MacPherson. Torie and her family of five live in a small town on the banks of the Mississippi just south of St. Louis. She is the town's historian and genealogist for hire who likes to stick her nose into things and ends up figuring out who dun it. I found Rett because she's in Laurell K. Hamilton's writing group and I ended up liking her mysteries for their insight into genealogy and the interplay of the town's kooky characters. Torie herself is a bit annoying but tolerable.

You may remember last week when I read Cynthia Hartwick's Ladies With Options about those clever Minnesota Methodist millionaires. I was happy to find her sequel, Ladies with Prospects, on my hold shelf on Saturday and read it greedily this week. In this second book we have a different narrator but just as fun a story about surviving the internet bust of the turn of the millennium and, again, saving their town whether the residents wanted to be saved or not.

With all the excitement of my computer and with being sick and all, I just made it to the barons in Simon Winchester's Their Noble Lordships. I may have to call it quits on this book and take it back tomorrow. I'm just not that interested anymore.

Unread books on my shelf at home:
The Rebels of Ireland, Edward Rutherfurd
A Crack in the Edge of the World, Simon Winchester
The 5th Horseman, James Patterson
Sleep, Pale Sister, Joanne Harris
The Princess of Burundi by Kjell Eriksson (who could pass up that author's name?), translated from the Swedish by Ebba Segerberg (again with the name!)

Books on hold at the library:
Virgin Earth, Philippa Gregory (in transit STILL! where's it coming from? England?)
Micah, Laurell K. Hamilton (10 of 23 holds)
Definitely Dead, Charlaine Harris (2 of 9 holds)
Darcy & Elizabeth: Days & Nights at Pemberly, Linda Berdoll (2 of 5 holds)
Nail Biter, Sarah Graves (check shelf)
Danse Macabre, Laurell K. Hamilton (5 of 5 holds)

Please email me or leave a comment if you have any recommendations for books I should read. I shockingly have four open slots on my hold list right now. I've decided to slow down a little since my list of unread books at home is a bit embarrassing. Hopefully it'll be shorter next time on Books I've Read This Week.