Book 61: Spoken Bones by NC Lewis

 I just finished Spoken Bones and I give it 🦴🦴🦴1/2 .

This is the first book in a series that features a detective named Fenella Sallow and it wasn't bad. Fenella is an ok character, but the other detectives were all kind of the same. She's a detective in a small town with an obnoxious boss. There were lots and lots of potential suspects for the crime (a murder of a popular citizen) and, well, there were just too many suspects.  It was well written but I'm not sure if I'm interested in reading any more.

Book 60: The Ladies Man by Elinor Lipman

 I re-read The Ladies Man and give it ★★★. Not sure exactly what I loved about this book in the past. It's just kind of icky now. Gross men, meddling women, too much of a focus on looks, some body shaming--no bueno.

Book 60: The Inn at Lake Devine by Elinor Lipman

 I just finished The Inn at Lake Devine and I give it ✡✡✡✡ 1/2. 

This is a re-read of an older book (part of 'rereading Elinor Lipman' phase and I haven't read it in a long time. Natalie learns as a young girl that a resort in Vermont (near where her Newton-based family has been vacationing) is restricted (ie allows no Jews) and this fact doesn't necessarily affect her through her whole life but it has a huge influence on what happens in the story. This is a good story with a lot of humor and some important messages. I took off a half a star because as much as I love Lipman's voice, all her main characters (regardless of the book) speak in the same voice. 

Book 59: Game of Lies by Clare Mackintosh

 I just finished Game of Lies and I give it 🔍🔍🔍🔍.

This is the second book in the DC Morgan series, set at the border of Wales and England, and I liked it as well (and maybe even more) than the first one, The Last Party. Ffion Morgan is a DC who doesn't play by the rules and has never left the small town where she grew up, so her youthful indiscretions seem to follow her during the investigations she undertakes. In this book, she investigates the disappearance of a contest on a reality show that is being filmed near her town. The reality show is bonkers and I can't even describe it. There are lots of characters in this book (reality show) but it is very easy to keep them all straight. She reunites with the detective she met in the first book (Leo) and there's some good chemistry there. All in all, I really liked this book and Mackintosh reminds me a bit of Elly Griffiths so there's that. 

Book 58: The Last Word by Elly Griffiths

 I just finished The Last Word and I give it 🗡🗡🗡🗡 1/2 stars.

I am a huge huge huge Elly Griffiths fan, and this book is the fourth book in her Harbinder Kaur series. This one, though, has very little Harbinder in it, instead revisiting some of the characters from her second book, The Postscript Murders. The book focuses mainly on Benedict, Natalka and Edwin, the latter two having started a private investigation agency. They are hired by two sisters who want to pin the death of their mother on their mother's second husband. Anyway, Benedict and Edwin go 'undercover' to a writer's retreat to try to find answers. They find more murders, and many suspects. 

I didn't really remember these characters that well from three years ago (when the book was published) but it works fine as a stand-alone story. It is well written and quite intriguing, and moves along really well. The end was kind of rushed and I said 'huh?' at one point, but it was a good book that I enjoyed.

I do miss Ruth Galloway though. I may need to go back and reread them all!

Book 57: Then She Found Me by Elinor Lipman

 I just finished Then She Found Me and I give it 💄💄💄💄💄.

I'm a big Elinor Lipman fan, and I've read all her books and enjoyed them, but I like her earlier work the best. This is her first novel, set before cell phones and internet and the 'she' in the book is Bernice who 'finds' April (the me), her birth daughter. Bernice is quite the character, and much of what happens in this 1990 book is kind of problematic today. I do love this one though.

Book 56: The Lost Bookshop by Evie Woods

 I just finished The Lost Bookshop and I give it 📖. 

It's been described as 'charming and uplifting' and yes, it gets uplifting at the end and I guess there is a bit of charm but most of it is about women with abusive family members and there is nothing charming and uplifting in that.  This book is extremely well reviewed but it just didn't do it for me.

Book 55: Women of Good Fortune by Sophie Wan

 I just finished Women of Good Fortune and I give it ✡✦✧✵. Really, I give it 3 3/4 stars because it isn't a four star book, so I rounded up. 

This is a book about three women in Shanghai: Lulu, who is getting married to a very wealthy man; Rina, Lulu's roommate who is torn between her career and settling down to get married; and Jane, who hates how she looks and is married to a man who she thinks married her for her money. Lulu's mother-in-law-to-be is a horrible person, and the novel suggests that wealth=horrible people. Lulu is unsure she really wants to be married, and her two friends come up with a plan: steal all the red envelopes (filled with cash) that the couple will receive at their marriage, split the money, and then go off to live their perfect lives (Lulu will live in Thailand, Jane will get plastic surgery, and Rina will get her eggs frozen). This has "Oceans 11" vibes but without the joy and silliness of Oceans 11. There are a few good twists that I didn't see coming, and once the actual 'heist' occurs it is a fast and fun read, but these three women are so miserable that it is hard to enjoy the book before the heist begins. I learned a lot about Chinese culture so that's a plus?

Book 54: The Ravenmaster: My Life with the Ravens of the Tower of London by Christopher Skaife.

 I just finished The Ravenmaster and I give it 🐦🐦🐦🐦🐦.

This is the memoir from a man who until recently was a Beefeater (Tower Warden) in charge of the ravens at the Tower. If you've visited there, you know that there is a myth that if the ravens leave the Tower, the empire would fall (and he shares the history of this myth in the book). He travels the path of his childhood and his life in the army prior to becoming a Beefeater (he's one tough guy) and shares stories of the daily routine and the individual personalities of the ravens. It's quite chatty and charming, some might find it too saccharine but I really liked it. 

Book 53: The Woman on the Ledge by Ruth Mancini

 I just finished The Woman on the Ledge and I give it ⭒⭒⭒.

I had great hopes for this book---unreliable narrator, twists galore, and it started to have a good "Oceans 11" vibe. But I was not prepared for it to morph into a story about girls being 'groomed' and all the twisty fun kind of went away. 

Book 52: The Weekend Retreat by Tara Lashkowski

 I just finished The Weekend Retreat and give it ✦✦✦.

Three siblings and their partners travel to their palatial family estate in upstate New York to celebrate two of the sibling's birthdays. As these things tend to go with thrillers of wealthy people: they all have secrets, they all will get stuck in the palatial estate, and someone (or someoneS) will die.  That gets told in the first page! Then you have to read the story to figure out who died, what were their secrets, and why they're stuck. This one had some interesting characters but they were all pretty much awful people. It was a quick read and a good dreary-afternoon book for me.

Book 51: Don't Think Dear: On Loving and Leaving Ballet by Alice Robb

 I just finished Don't Think Dear and give it 🩰 (that's two stars).

I am a sucker for a ballet book, especially a first person one, but this is not a good book. Basically, the author borrows heavily (probably more than is academically correct) from other published works to share how dancers like Misty Copeland and Margot Fonteyn suffered and coped with the challenges of being a ballerina. Then after quoting a ballerina extensively, Robb would write a paragraph basically agreeing with the former ballerina and then giving a two sentence "and I saw this too!" which was just annoying. No new ground is tread in this book.

Book 50: My Favorite Terrible Thing by Madelein Henry

 I just finished My Favorite Terrible Thing and I give it ☆☆☆ 1/3. 

I enjoyed the first two thirds of the book--the story of a private detective finding a missing person--an author who had written a best selling and highly compelling novel who disappeared the day of her wedding. There were lots of references to Donna Tartt and I thought this book would be like that. I enjoyed following how Nina investigated the mystery. The last third of the book contains a huge twist which was creepy and unbelievable. The explanation for the twist was not believable either. So that pretty much killed it for me--4 stars for the first 2/3, two stars for the last 1/3. 

Book 49: Up-Island Harbor by Jean Stone

 I just finished Up-Island Harbor and I give it 🏝🏝🏝 3/4. 

In my search for the next Elin Hilderbrand, I gave this book a try. It's set on Martha's Vineyard, but in a 'non touristy' part so we never get quite the flavor of what it is like to live on MV. Maddie has come to visit her late Grandmother's house, which was left to her when her grandmother died. She is just planning to make a quick visit since she hadn't seen her grandmother for years (her mother died when she was a child). However, upon arrival, there are THINGS that signal to her that mayyybbbeee she shouldn't leave the island (yes, one of these is a guy, but this really isn't a romance). I loved the part of the plot about the native Americans on the island, but this book just went on far too long (three trips to the hospital for Maddie? Please).  The author will write more in the series but not sure if I'll read them or not.

Book 48: The Happy Couple by Naoise Dolan

I just finished The Happy Couple and I give it  💒💒💒💒. 

Celine and Luke are engaged. But will they get married?

That's the plot of this novel. It's told from the perspectives of Celine, Luke, Celine's sister, and a few of their friends. Celine is a pianist, and Luke is an IT who 'is bad at relationships'. They love each other, but is that enough? I really liked this book. It is written quite briskly with the voices of different people all very strong. Everyone is flawed but kind of likeable. I was very invested in whether they would actually get together or not. 

Book 47: Private Equity by Carrie Sun

 I just finished Private Equity and I give it 💲💲💲1/2.

Sun's memoir is the story of her experiences working as the assistant to the head of a hedge fund.  "Boone Prescott" (not his real name) runs "Carbon" (not its real name) and Carrie (her real name) helps run him. It's the story of how the amount of work pushes Carrie to the edge, and as a memoir it also covers earlier trauma from her parents, her ex-fiance,  and from a violent situation when she was at college. Anyway, it's kind of an interesting book but we never really know WHY the job is so overwhelming. She doesn't discuss what she actually does, so it's hard to sympathize with her (she goes into great detail about the perks---gifts, parties, trips, lunches, etcetera). I'm not sad I read this but I find it kind of hard to empathize with her about her job. 

Book 46: The Lake of Lost Girls

 I just finished The Lake of Lost Girls by Katherine Green and I give it 🌊🌊🌊 12. It's a fine twisty thriller. Read my review at Goodreads!

Book 45: Going Infinite by Michael Lewis

 I just finished Going Infinite and I give it 💲💲💲. This nonfiction book is the story of Sam Bankman-Fried, who was recently sentenced to 25 years in prison for defrauding customers in his cryptocurrency exchange. Michael Lewis is a good writer, but he knows so much about the financial world that someone who doesn't (ie me) gets lost really fast. Really fast. 

Book 44: Pete and Alice In Maine by Caitlin Shetterly

 I just finished Pete and Alice in Maine and I give it ★★★★★.

I really liked this novel. It is the start of the pandemic, and Pete and Alice leave NYC for their summer house in Maine with their two daughters and cat, Ingmar. Alice has recently learned of Pete's infidelity, so things are a little tense. As they navigate their pandemic lives, their family comes together and tears apart in ways that can only be due to the pandemic. It's a simple, real, heartbreaking and hopeful book, and I am so glad I read it. 

Book 43: Worry by Alexandra Tanner

 I just tried to finish Worry and I didn't. I give it 👎👎. I do not want to spend any more time with Jules and Poppy. 

Book 41: If Something Happens to Me by Alex Finley

 I just finished If Something Happens to Me and I give it 😕😕😕. Read my review at Goodreads.

Book 42: Friends in Napa by Sheila Yasmin Marikar

 I just read Friends in Napa and I give it 🍇🍇🍇.

This book is from Mindy Kaling's imprint Mindy's Book Studio, which focuses on Indian women writers, and I think that is a great thing. This book is not that great, though, although it has the elements I tend to enjoy: friends from college getting together, a murder, a very plot-driven story. The friends getting together are Anjali and her (non-Indian) husband, Rachel and Raj, Victoria, and Hari. The book begins with a murder of someone by a woman in stilletos, and the rest of the book is the weekend before the murder, where Rachel and Raj invite their friends to the grand opening of their Napa vineyard. There are a couple plots floating around about old friendships and new jealousies, which were pretty well drawn. I just didn't care that much about the characters, instead I just kept reading to find out who got murdered and who was the murderer. If you're like me, you'll know about 3/4 of the way in who is who.