Books I've Read This Week (June 9)

Hi again. I'm glad you're back for another Books I've Read This Week. This week I read two Sue Grafton stories and one mystery translated from the Swedish.

And today I started Simon Winchester's A Crack in the Edge of the World about the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. He starts by describing the other seismic events around the world in the year that led up to the San Francisco quake. It was highly reminiscent of the events nearly a century later that culminated in the Sumatrian tsunami in 2004. Crazy earth.

While reading Susan Albert's blog recently, I was reminded of Sue Grafton's alphabet series and the fact that somewhere along the way I had stopped reading them. But I can't remember which was the last one I read and it's been long enough that I wouldn't necessarily remember the earlier books anyway. So I started at the beginning, A is for Alibi. You know how I need to read things in order!

I actually checked out two compilation books that have three books each in them. And, man, are they heavy. I thought I'd look for a couple of the stories in paperback too so I could continue the series and not be dependent on just reading at home (we all seen that hasn't been too successful lately). I found only B is for Burglar but I'll look again tomorrow. So I finished A and B this week and will move on to C this weekend (and maybe more). I do enjoy her protagonist, Kinsey Milhone. I just forgot how much.

I haven't knowingly read many books translated from other languages. I wish I wouldn't have known it when I read The Princess of Burundi by Kjell Eriksson. I felt super-aware of it the whole time I was reading and it was rather distracting. Perhaps it was because of that that I felt the story was not very enjoyable. Or it might have been because it took place during winter in Sweden which made me feel cold and depressed. Or maybe it really was slow-moving and disjointed. So, despite the really cool names of the author and translater (Ebba Segerberg), I didn't think the book was all that cool.

Unread books on my shelf at home:
The Rebels of Ireland, Edward Rutherfurd
The 5th Horseman, James Patterson
Sleep, Pale Sister, Joanne Harris
Cross Bones, Kathy Reichs
Behind the Curtain, Peter Abrahams
The Fan, Peter Abrahams
Three Complete Novels (A–C), Sue Grafton
Three Complete Novels (D–F), Sue Grafton

Books on hold at the library:
Virgin Earth, Philippa Gregory (in transit, it must be lost)
Micah, Laurell K. Hamilton (10 of 24 holds)
Definitely Dead, Charlaine Harris (ready for pickup)
Darcy & Elizabeth: Days & Nights at Pemberly, Linda Berdoll (2 of 6 holds)
Nail Biter, Sarah Graves (due 6/26)
Danse Macabre, Laurell K. Hamilton (5 of 13 holds)
The Memory of Whiteness, Kim Stanley Robinson (ready for pickup)
Icehenge, Kim Stanley Robinson (1 of 1 hold)
G is for Gumshoe, Sue Grafton (ready for pickup)
Down the Rabbit Hole, Peter Abrahams (ready for pickup)

I also am still working through my Photoshop book. I need to do some more lessons in that this weekend. It's good to have so many options to fill my time. I'll let you know next time how much I got done in Books I've Read This Week.