I’ve got some Scottish writers I enjoy reading, like Michel Faber and Denise Mina, and am on the lookout for more. I am new to Val Mc Dermid. I’ve seen some of the PBS series Wire in the Blood,  but knew this was a stand alone book, so I didn’t know what to expect from this novel. The story moves from Edinburgh, to Oxford and Croatia,  and involves serveral different points of view. There are two investigations: one conducted by Scottish police into the murder of a man […]

Man, I am just not having a good run here. Thankfully I didn’t pay anything for this kindle edition of the book, thanks to BookBub. I generally enjoy reading memoirs, getting inside somebody else’s skin, going places I never could. How could I go wrong with her tale: Spending her early childhood in Africa, then London in the swinging sixties, the tumultuous lives of artists, musicians and household names sounded like fun. All that shagging, drugs and rock and roll, right? Well technically that stuff […]

* Actual dialogue from book Joe and Anthony Russo are directors, writers and producers known for their work on the television shows Arrested Development, Community and Happy Endings. They also directed the excellent Marvel movie Captain America: The Winter Soldier. I figured I couldn’t go wrong with this gritty graphic novel. Sigh. The artwork by Fernando Leon Gonzalez refined and dirty at the same time, using a good mix of wide angle movie type shots and close up, fine line work. For such a violent […]

Okay, so I haven’t been reading so much this week. I got caught up in Witnesses, the French mini series that came out on Netflix this week. That was pretty awesome. Go check it out. Then I found a Danish show that was intriguing. And I haven’t been listening to my books on tape because I’m getting chased by zombies now during my morning walks and runs (Zombies,Run! by Six to Start. Soooooo much fun!). So this morning I borrowed/downloaded this book for free and […]

Oh, Uncle Stevie! Whenever I fall into one of your books, it feels like home. No, I don’t mean the scary-ass places you take me, but your voice, your humanity. It’s true, you had me cowering under the covers with a flashlight when I read Carrie for the first time back in the 70’s and noticed little else than the “high school really DOES suck” interwoven with the horror.  You sucked me in with a premise I didn’t think I’d be interested in (11/22/63), mesmerized […]

It’s been a long time since I read the “Girl” Trilogy, but a couple of months ago I introduced a friend to the Swedish films, so I was pretty much up to speed on the story. I remember reading that Denise Mina, a terrific Scottish writer, was going to do the comic book version for Vertigo and I made a mental note to check it out. Well that was more than three years ago, but at least now I was able to get the whole run in […]