What's Wrong with America Besides Murder and Mayham

   My to-read piles are sinking as I try sift through the stacks. They no long threaten to topple over. Sometimes, I get rewarded with a discovery -- a book I didn't know I had -- like Jane Haddam's Glass Houses. It was tucked under a bunch of paperbacks in the corner, most of which were dumped on the trade-pile after a couple pages of reading. [So, you don't get to know which books they were.] 

   So what's so special about a Haddam book -- besides being a competent mystery with well-defined characters and convoluted plot lines with red herrings galore? Haddam always offers her readers several viable, three dimensional candidates for the perpetrators.

   Well, for me, there's a wonderful fantasy rendition of an intricate but gentrified Armenian neighborhood ... with a restaurant the feels like the bar in Friends. Not only does everyone know you name, but they know your business as well. The reader gets to know the people too ... and keep tabs on them from book to book.

   Haddam's strong point is the character-driven mystery. She often presents a body or two while introducing her cast of possible killers. Then, Gregor Demarkian, the Armenian "Hercules Perriot", comes on stage as a consultant to the police to find a serial killer, a task complicated by the fact the police detectives investigating the Glass Houses murders are totally unprofessional. One of the key questions in this novel is whether the man arrested near a dump site is guilty or not or just plain crazy.

    The mystery gets solved. They always do, don't they? Readers go along for the ride and a chance to solve the mystery before the "big reveal".

   The prize in Glass Houses, though, isn't finding the serial killer, but the depiction of a  British reporter doing a life style piece on miserable, downtrodden Americans coping with crime-ridden chaos and discrimination on the mean streets of Philadelphia while a serial killer's on the loose -- a  fact which seems to validate her opinions, at least to herself..

Recommended even if much of the crime-solving isn't realistic. 

Yeah, I consider cozy mysteries fantasies.

~~#~~

    My writing plods along with the outline for my new Cassy Mae story settling in. Even have two added scenes outlined to add danger to her bus trip to safety. I'm trying to think of a better title than Demon Eyes. Yeah. It's another Andor story. Given how slow I write, people'll be lucky to see it by June -- unless I get my new website up so I can post snippets.

   Most of my free time has been eaten my new author's website. I'm in the process of matching line placement and fonts on each page. Sorry I haven't posted a new snippet in a while. I can no longer go into my live site to change anything because my revised site has commandeered my web building software access.

   So, here in Colorado, the sun is shining, and I'm planning a demon attack. So, just to celebrate the survival of the one lone pansy in the last snow storm, I'm offering Doom Comes for a Sold Soul for free until the18th, Ash Wednesday. You can visit Smashwords for a sample. If you'd like to add the short dark fantasy story to your device, there are several formats available. The code for the freebie: TP76B

Visiting Your Favorite Fantasy and Realistic Worlds

When a writer creates a realistic setting, readers will imagine much more detail than the actual words used. That's one of the wonderful things about books. I'm sure you have your favorite settings/worlds and react to the world the writers created.

 [Any comments about your favorites welcome.]

If you've read this blog, even sporadically, you've gotten an idea of what kinds of worlds I like to lose myself in. I think of them as fantastically wonderful settings for characters to act in, and where I can enjoy arm-chair adventures. You may or not agree with me or the books I like. But, I'll bet you have your own worlds/settings you like to return to. 

Over the last few weeks, I've returned to several worlds worth mentioning, but they didn't really give me any new insights into the writing process. Even so, I'd like to review them.

Flowering Judas by Jane Haddam. Her running mystery series, featuring detective Gregor Demarkian, has run for years with Haddam delivering competent entertaining puzzles in each book. Here, Demarkian, a retired FBI agent and consultant, is brought in to find out why the body of a man missing for years is suddenly found hanging from a bill board in his home town. Yeah. Demarian's up for solving the puzzle as he chases the clues through an unknown town. While Haddam's interesting plots shine, I think her three-dimensional characters sparkle more.

Even though my favorite part of Demarkian's world, the Armenian enclave along Cavanaugh Street, has a small role in Flowering Judas, I give the book Five ***** Stars.

Death of Yesterday by M. C. Beaton. Another long running series, this time set in far northern Scotland, features Sergeant Hamish MacBeth, a genius at solving crimes and avoiding promotion. He also has problems getting married, a strong sub-plot in this book, and his nosy, small town neighbors always make matters more difficult. 

Beaton creates tangled plots that begin with a tiny wiggling thread of a crime, often a murder. The more MacBeth investigates, the more tangled the thread becomes. The ending comes as a surprise because the real criminal behavior is more serioyus than offing a stand-offish artist who gets killed because she sketched the wrong person.

Death of Yesterday only gets Four**** from me because Beaton's writing is trending towards cookie-cutter descriptions, though her characters remain interesting. Even the detectives in the home office, who are jealous of MacBeth's success rate, supply a few surprises.

Last but not least, Hunted by Kevin Hearne. Atticus O'Sullivan is still running from various preternaturals and pantheons, with only a few allies besides his Irish wolfhound and Granuaile, the new druid he just finished training. And that causes problems for the book. The opening was one big long chase ... for about half the book. Even Atticus rising from the "dead" almost failed to save this book from a competent, but Three*** Star rating. Hearne's sense of humor saved his rating in my eyes. If you like an irreverent take on life in general...and gods in particular ... this book is worth the time to read it. I give it Four**** Stars.

You think that's a lot of books to read in two weeks? I still had another one about Henry the VII I didn't review. Guess I could say, I can read a thousand page book a week ... but I don't want to. I prefer variety. 

~~#~~

Not much new stuff written this week. The big achievement was finishing the content edits for The Ghost in the Closet. Did have to change the name of my main character from Doodie to Dumdie. Seems my editor came from another part of the country. This California girl didn't associate the name "Doodie" [which was explained in the  story as coming from the way Dumdie sang to herself as a child] ... with "doggie do", which term I do understand ... though I tend to use the term sh*t.

Now that the copy edits are done, I can send the story to the formatter. Think I can get it published by before the 11th? If you like me on Facebook you'll know when The Ghost in the Closet comes out for free on Smashwords.

Still I wonder: What reasons have caused you to change a character's name?

Though I managed to get this blog done, it seems tinkering with my website ate my whole week-end.  I still have to change the inevitable typos and glitches yet, but I like the change in appearance so far. You can check it out, if you want.

Marking Time?

or, why can't I seem to put "finis' on Emma?

 

The Read:  Finished Jane Haddam's Living Witness and felt disappointed -- even with Demarkian and Bennis getting married in the epilogue.  (Being a fan makes you think/do strange things sometimes.  Like stare at your overstuffed bookshelves and wondering if the first Demarkian novel where Gregor meets Bennis, in the midst of solving a murder, is somewhere behind the Anita Blake books.)

Why disappointed?  Well, for one thing,  I didn't guess the culprit soon enough ... or the motive.  Part of this was because I don't think Haddam gave enough clues -- or maybe, buried the clues in the polemics, and I missed them when I scanned.  We got the message that a sizable part of the population was against the secular humanists taking "God" out of the schools in the prologue.  --  I put "god" in quotes, because even the various Protestant sects can't decide on one interpretation of "god".  And, I don't even want to get into the goddess or hermaphrodite arguments.  --  I didn't think Haddam needed to spend such a huge amount of space repeating the same arguments over and over again.  What's wrong with a 300 page book?

Overall, I found the book a reminder to keep it sweet (or sour) and simple.  Less sometimes really is more.

Progress:  I think I'm going to get to the end over Emma's everlasting revisions.  I'm somewhere in the  middle of  "20s" chapters out of 33, I think.  Actually, it's going really fast (except when I think about Maren).  I even have a new query to send out ... with an emphasis on emotions rather than plot.  We'll see what happens when I send out another batch of queries.

So far, no one seems to responding to any of my submissions, and I can't do status queries until March.

Maren.  I've got a weird opening started.  I like it, and that worries me.  Whatever, I signed up for a critique class (sponsored by the Northern Colorado Writers) taught by Victoria Hanley, a young adult fantasy writer.  First I thought I'd learn more about doing useful critiques -- since I noticed my comments seem to get stuck in a pattern.

Now, I'm glad I did because I have some new writing to play with.  There are three people signed up so far so I'm looking forward to some really good discussion.

Trivia:  We are going out for lunch to amuse the old man -- Thai curry.  

Yesterday, I went to the Northern Colorado Writers coffee where we discussed time management and social media at length.  

Tonight, I'm going to my lackadaisical critique group.  I don't mean this as a put down, but it consists of women who have a lot of stuff going on in their lives, like the deaths of a parent and husband.  It's more they think submitting four pages is a big deal.

Dallying with Delay

The Read:  Am deep into Living Witness ... enjoying having my prejudices tickled.  It's always reaffirming to have writers agree with you on topics -- in this case about evolution and people's attitudes towards religion.  Only wish Jane Haddam had trimmed the prose by, maybe, a third?  The padding reminded my of Stephanie Laurens paeans to passion and Laurell K. Hamilton's latter-day descriptions of Anita Blake's sex life. -- Like enough already.

Don't get me wrong.  As an Anita Blake fan, I'm waiting for Skin Trade, the Las Vegas tiger book #17, to come out in mass paperback.  Today, a new hardback-- Flirt #18 -- appeared on the New York Times best sellers list plus there's a pre-pub of another hardback at Barnes & Noble (Bullet #19).  So, I should be getting #17 in paperback soon.  Maybe by summer.

The Guardian Weekly had a little note about Catherine Cookson, a British writer who specialized in poor spunky women from northern England succeeding in life (all to often with an advantageous marriage), being dropped from the Top Ten most popular library authors in Britain.  Who replaced her?  American thrillers filled with sex and gore. [Maybe not at the same time.]

I noted it because Catherine Cookson was once one of my favorite writers along with Nora Lofts and Georgette Heyer.  Cookson's been haunting me.  Her minor works are part of the inches I want to prune from my bookshelves.

Progress:  In case you didn't notice, I'm working on a new query for Emma.

Trivia:  It's still snowing, and I'm hankering for home-made chocolate chip cookies. 

Giving Up Early

The Read (or Watch?):  Tried to watch more episodes of Witchblade last night.  My son warned me it sort of fizzled in the middle, but I found I couldn't make myself listen to the bombastic opening again -- and the DVD won't let me fast-forward.  Besides, they jumped into an alternative reality where they seem to be repeating the previous episodes with different endings.  Didn't stay around to be sure.  --  Jane Haddam's Living Witness was calling.  Read a chapter of that and went to bed early (ie: before 11:30 PM).

The structure of Living Witness follows the same pattern as Cheating at Solitaire- prologue, part 1, part 2, part 3, epilogue, .  I can't remember how long she's been doing this, and I'd endanger my life if I tried to find her previous books on my bookshelves to find out.  (Have I mentioned I gotta weed the shelves as well as the boxes under the bed?)  

The conflict this time is between the Darwinists and evangelical religionists.  --  One of my favorite rants concerns the differences between the acceptance of faith and fact.  (In case you're wondering:  I think they're two different levels of experience.)  Of course, at least a couple people will get murdered, but I haven't gotten there yet.  For some reason, Gregor Demarkian has been called into the case before the murders begin.

Are you thinking that Haddam writes mysteries not fantasy.  I'd disagree.  Her Cavanaugh Street is as good as fantasy gets with a permanent cast of interesting characters.  With the preparations for Gregor's marriage to Bennis looming on the horizon, I'm prepared to enjoy all sorts of series regular in-jokes along the way.

Progress?:  Emma is scarfing up my time ... except for this morning when I've been fiddling my life away online.  Seems I decided to change my italics for underlining.  Of course, nothing is ever that simple.  Am finding all sorts of "was" constructions, "as"es, and adverbs.  Not many, but enough to slow me down.

Worse.  I'm finding superfluous phrases like "on the table" or "for them" when its obvious from the previous text.  Result?  Feeling hopeless ... if I was that kind of person.

Trivia:  We're getting dustings of snow, but not enough cold to kill the bugs.  At least it's melting on the street.

Promotion:  The Northern Colorado Writers blog The Writing Bug is doing some sort of blog fest.  The members write on a number of different subjects you might enjoy.  Check:  http://tinyurl.com/yc74gmn 

Finished ... Tra-lah-lah!

Yeah.

Got Emma's Revision Done.

Now I gotta think.

To market or not to market.

Think I'll let her ferment for awhile.

Current Read:  Still working on the books I bought during my Christmas splurge.  (I let myself buy everything in sight.  Fortunately, my tastes and vices center around books rather than shoes.  Ferragamas anyone?) 

 

My current reads were a book of short stories which ended up on the trade pile.  I don't know where Shirley Damsgaard's The Seventh Witch -- an Ophelia and Abby mystery -- is going to end up.  I've read some titles in the series before.  Enjoyed them.  But don't think I shelved them.  I also didn't remember I'd bought the series before until I got to around page 10, and Damsgaard mentioned Ophelia's adopted daughter, Tink. -- Which goes to show the power of the back-of-the-book-blurp.  Of course, it hit my soft spot for Southern Gothic and sensible witches.

But, I'm thinking structure now.  I've got Maren chewing at me.  She's only in the "journaling" stage.  But, I have to think about where I'm going to start her book.  Damsgaard starts with a prologue featuring the villainous family, aka the opposition.  Maren has a short-story-length back story which would be hard to include in snippets to explain where she came from.  At the moment I'm thinking dividing the book into four or three parts, books-within-a-book so to speak.  Sort of what Jane Haddam did in Cheating at Solitaire.  In short, a series of interconnected novellas. --  Decisions.  Decisions.

As for the progression of Witches, the complications in the plot happen at regular intervals with new characters appearing (well-foreshadowed) as they are needed, including an ratcheting up of the romance between Ophelia and an FBI agent.  I also liked the relatively short chapters, and the lean writing style that brought the book in at just under 300 pages.  The book also offered a good object lesson -- what festering jealousy can do to family relationships.

Progress:  See above.  No, I didn't sprain my arm patting myself on my back for finishing my revisions of  Emma by the end of January.

Demons/Gargoyles/Britt.  Funny things happen after a manuscript is done.  Grandson told a story about Jessus, angels, dragons, and getting your chores done.  He reminded me of a crucial fact.  If angels have feathers, they must shed.  So I wrote another 600+ words (Freezing myself at 3 AM because I couldn't sleep without the scene appearing and reappearing.) having Britt counting coup against the demons and gaining a talisman.  I also intensified the romance between Britt and Cahal a bit, under the baleful eye of Britt's mother.

The only problem I see here is that I've really opened this up for a sequel ... series? ...  and I don't think I want to deal with the demon society I hinted at.  Too much of the demonologies are just avatars for Christain seven deadly sins.  --  But, as Scarlett said, I'll think about that another day.  I haven't sold the thing yet.

Maren.  I threw out the back story to the mercies of a critique group.  Unfortunately, the idea sailed -- the idea of an adolescent from an agrarian, magical  world being thrown into ours.  Talk about food for thought ... and of course, how to structure the thing.  Also, is this a cliche?  I looked on the shelves at B&N and didn't see anything on that order.

Trivia:  We are in salmon eating season.  First, NW coast siblings sent home-smoked, Indian-style salmon.  Then, another sibling sent Myers lemons to encourage us to eat fresh salmon.  In both cases, Sockeye which isn't really a salmon. Still, yummmm.

 

A Nothing Day??

Lessons from My Reading:  Didn't accomplish much yesterday, but did finish Haddam's Cheating at Solitaire.  Looked at her rather sparse site this morning out of curiosity and discovered this is her 25th Demarkian book.  Guess you don't have to get elaborate when you got that kind of track record.  Still, 25 books with the same people in the same world???  I wonder if that's why the de-emphasis on the Armenian community, though references are made to it.

(I have a soft spot for well drawn communities.  Maybe that's why I like Charlaine Harris so much.)

Back to the point, sort of.  Solitaire is a snide look at the teen celebrity factor.  ala Brittany and Lindsay or whomever I saw on magazine covers while stuck in the grocery check out lines and can't remember.  (Being a compulsive reader can be a bi**h.)  Still, it's the camera hordes that come off pilloried ... even though Haddam recognizes that they have to make a buck.

The plot unfolds against the background of rampaging paparazzi.  As for the construction of the book, there was a part 3.  The prologue introduced the characters as they wandered about Margaret's Harbor, small isolated island community where a movie was being shot.  Part 1 introduced Demarkian (with the preparations for his upcoming wedding), took care of the first murder, and presented the first red herring.  Part 2 introduces Demarkian to the town and ends with the second murder/death/red herring.  Part 3 wraps it up with the loner islander being the culprit of the first murder with the other stuff being complications.  The epilogue sets up the simple wedding of two of the characters as a contrast to the Demarkian's upcoming wedding spectatucular.  All in all, I'd  put this in the common "three act structure".

Frankly, I found the book a small disappointment.  I had the culprit (The term villain doesn't fit here.) tagged in the prologue when Haddam was introducing everything in Margaret's Harbor because he was the only one that fit the profile.  The tension was reduced because of it.  The paparazzi did destroyed one crime scene in a rather grotesque manner, but they were not a murderous horde pillaging the city.  Mostly, they just made lives inconvenient.

Progress:  As I said I didn't accomplish much.  Did finish all the run throughs for revising one chapter of Emma (the new additional chapter 19.)  Was a page into the second run through on chapter 20 when I realized my brain was mush.  So, I played a couple games of spider solitary and went down and read.

Critiquing.  Did get one critique done.  Now have to read through it again.  Two more to go for this week. 

Trivia:  Actually, it's not trivia.  Haiti is so terrible that it got into my wallet as well as the local food bank.  

When the US economy turned sour,  I decided to concentrate my contributions in one place.  Since the conservative good old boys of my county have a problem admitting poverty is a problem, even for working people, I decided on feeding locals.  I'd hate to come face to face with a hungry kid when walking to indulge in coffee.

Watching the Slow Carousel

Lessons from My Reading:  Still ploding along with Jane Haddam's Cheating at Solitaire.  Don't get me wrong.  The book's slow reading because there's so much in it.  Location background.  The characters interacting with each other and their heads.  Then, there's the murder mystery.  Somewhere in all the movement, clues are hiding. 

(Sometime I'm going to have to do a little research to see if real murders are as interesting as fictional ones.  Also, how the number of fictional murders compares to the real murder statistics.  The schemed ones.  Not the stupid or emotional ones.)

One thing made me pause in my reading.  The divisions of the book.  The prologue I understood.  Then, Haddam has a Part I and II.  I can be generalized as more character introduction, including detective Demarkian.  II seems to be concentrating on Demarkians reaction to all the significant characters.  I flipped through the pages and didn't notice any Part III, though there is an Epilogue.  I don't understand dividing the book like that.  Seems to me following the story from beginning to end is simpler.

Did like the assigning of numerals to the changes in point of view within the chapters though.  Made as much sense as using the "###" convention.

Progress:  Emma.  Am half way through my revision.  Also, writing a lot of notes to myself about things I need to do in upcoming chapters.  I find the revision process fascinating ... sometimes I cut out whole paragraghs because they sit like a rock in the narrative flow.  Fewer times I add one.  Always I look to replace a bunch of verb parts (to be forms mostly) with one verb.

Emma's paused on the edge of entering Faery, and I'm dreading revising the next section.  How do you make a magical place unique and different.  My critiquers have already said I don't convey enough sense of wonder.  But then, Emma is a rather phlegmatic character.  --  Think selling the book will rest on how well I accomplish the above.

Trivia:  Watched a rerun of Castle last night and am looking forward to Monday's new episode.  I like the way Castle's family life frames the detection part of the story line. 

It Snowed ...

Lectures from my Reading:  Have gotten all the way into Jane Haddam's Cheating at Solitaire to page 120-something.  As I said before, it's a dense read.  Not only are her paragraphs long, but the sentences too.  I didn't do a readibility analysis on the text (Too lazy, and I don't think it's important enough for the effort.), but I'm betting it's way up in the upper high school grades.  --  (I naturally write about the sixth-seventh grade level with short paragraphs.)

Example from when Haddam is describing a media feeding-frenzy (which I found funny):  "And Al Jazeera," Stewart said blandly.  "Great story about the decadence of the West with a great excuse to run pictures of girls in their underwear."  --  (That was a quote from dialog.  Note she got away with the dreaded adverb.)

Haddam must of had great fun poking (skewering ?) the celebrity scene complete with legitimate news and the paparazzi chasing the same non-story.  No chihuahuas as yet, but I think they've all been exported to Colorado to find normal homes.  (Local readers know that Denver shelters have been getting shipments of unwanted chihuahuas from LA for adoption.)

As always, the writing is for savoring as Haddam puts her characters on a POV carousel, each commentary inching the action forward.  I know the clues are embedded in each character's soliloquy, but they're rather difficult to find.  So far, I've caught only one dissatisfied loner who might meet the culprit profile.

Progress:  Emma.  Am up to chapter 10 and should get more done today.  No TV programs I want to watch tonight, outside the news.  Did get critiquers comments transferred too.  *ducks head in embarrassment at the mistakes*  (Honest, I did proof the stuff before I submitted.)

Critiquing... Got caught out doing a bunch of stupid mistakes.  Maybe not stupid, but things I know I shouldn't do ... or know better ways of doing.  --   I wonder if anyone has ever written a marketable book making every craft error imaginable.

Maren ... I've given up on actually trying to draft the first chapter.  My brain can't handle the two projects at once.

Trivia:  Chickened out of driving fifteen miles in the snow to have breakfast with a friend.  We rescheduled for lunch tomorrow.  The old man is amusing himself chasing a persistent squirrel out of our linden tress.

Seeking An Launching Pad

Lectures from My Reading:  I hear over and over how people hate prologues.  Then,  Jane Haddam has a 48-page one in Cheating at Solitaire -- describing possible suspects wandering through an afternoon until she ends with the discovery of the murder victim.  

Next, she "starts" chapter one back on Cavanaugh Street (in a former Armenian ghetto in Philadelpha) with Gregor Demarkian, her detective, wondering how he can avoid the preparations for  his wedding to Bennis Hannaford, with whom he's been living and solving murders with for years.  The fussiest of his wedding preppers is tired of his fidgeting and suggests he go find a police department that has a murder they can't solve.  The book is off and running.

(I'm looking forward to a lovely read.  But, Haddam's writing is dense so it'll take me longer than most books.  We're talking page long paragraphs here.)

Still, Haddam has given me a possible idea for starting Maren with multiple viewpoints as a way to fill in a lot of backstory since her being shoved through a portal to earth starts the story.  I don't think I'm going to set up a series with Maren as the mystery solver,  but it may help me launch the chapters in my first draft.  Wonder how many people I can turn off by that.  --  Oh.  It's all in the execution, AWer's say.  Now I have to wonder about writing it right or executing my chances of getting the finished project published.

Progress:  Emma.  Revised chapter 6.  Wishing I wrote faster.

Maren.  Thinking more than anything else, but taking some notes.  Have to go back and try to clean my second card table so I have more room to spread out my notes...

Critiquing.  Am behind for the local group which meets Wednesday night ... in a predicted snow storm.  Waiting for a new chapter from my on line critiquer.  Decided I'm too busy and not ready for a beta reader.

Trivia:  Enjoying the same old rut.  Chiropractor on Tuesdays so I can sit at my computer and still unbend when I get up.  More important.  I'm meeting with a website person to polish my blog.

In My Comfortable Rut

What My Reading's Telling Me:  Finished Victoria Hanley's Violet Wings.  Must say I liked it better than other books of hers I read.  And, not only because of the short chapters.  Hanley has an interesting take on faery and a neat, non-conforming main character, Zaria, who ends up endowed with the highest level of magic to the consternation of the fairy establishment.  (Sounds like a cliche, but it isn't.)

Though she doesn't go into much over-explanation/description in the story line,  I'm assuming her fairies are human sized from Zaria's experiences in the human world.  Also, liked the way the back story was handled by quotes from a "history" text.

 

Hanley uses total desperation to free Zaria from the climatic confrontation.  The villain has Zaria confined in a Troll-magiked robe unable to use her wand's magic and all her friends give testimony against her as the villain manipulates the crowds and council.  In short, everything evil is Zaria's fault, and it is assumed the villain wants Zaria's magic.  More important, Hanley neatly foreshadowed the crucial pieces of information that free Zaria in the historian's discussions of food and the symbiosis of human and fairy worlds.

The wrap-up leaves a huge gateway open for a sequel.  I hope it's the book Hanley's been revising.  Though I'm cringing at the thought of buying another hardcover book.

Progress:  Emma.  Still revising.  At Chapter 4 still.  But I find I'm going over each chapter at least three times.  

Also, cleaning my "desk" (two card tables set together).  Only one of them is piled with print-outs and notes now.  I have a waste basket full of recycling the next time we go.  

Trivia:  Didn't do any work last night.  Watched a re-run of Castle.

Find I'm reading Jane Haddam's Cheating at Solitaire, with all it's rich characterization.  One down from the to-read pile.  Some day I should read all her Demarkian mysteries in sequence.  Won't be soon since they are scattered all over my disorganized book shelves.