snapshot 7.23

currently reading: I’m almost done with A Questionable Character, the latest in Lorna Barrett’s Booktown mystery series. Tricia and her sister have to try to get things back on track when a local contractor is killed. Tricia teams up with the new Chamber of Commerce intern to try to find out what happened to him. This is my first Booktown mystery, and I’m enjoying it a lot. I’m not sure yet who the killer is, but I have a guess or two.

I’m also reading A Fatal Groove, the second in Olivia Blacke’s Record Shop Mystery. I loved the first one, Vinyl Resting Place, and I’m looking forward to discovering just who poisoned the coffee that killed the mayor during their Texas city’s annual Bluebonnet Festival. When one of the Jessop sisters is the prime suspect, Juni will step in to try to clear her name by finding the real killer.

I’m also reading Amy Engel’s new I Did it for You, coming out Tuesday. It’s about a young woman coming back home, to her small town in Kansas, after a family tragedy. Greer and her sister Eliza were just teenagers when Eliza and her boyfriend were shot. The family never recovered, not even after the man sentenced for the crime was put to death. Greer has been living an anonymous life in Chicago, not really getting close to anyone, just trying not to be the sister of Eliza. But another shooting has happened, just like Eliza’s. Was it a copycat, or was the wrong person put to death for Eliza’s death? Greer has to find out, and that’s going to take her facing all her demons from that time and all the ways in which her family imploded. I’m not too far in yet, but it’s already so powerful. This is going to be one of those books that is tough to get through but also tough to set aside.

up next: August will be cozy! New Donna Andrews, Ellie Alexander, Laura Childs, Margaret Loudon, and Cate Conte. And one of the books I’m maybe most excited about, Julie Schumacher’s The English Experience, where we once again get to hang out with English professor Jason Fitger (Dear Committee Members, The Shakespeare Requirement). This time he’s traveling with students to England, so you know that will be hilarious. I adore these books, and I cannot wait to go across the pond with Professor Fitger!