Murder in Christmas River

Murder in Christmas River
by Meg Muldoon

Blurb:

Cinnamon Peters is one tough cookie.

Every year at Christmas River’s annual Gingerbread Junction Competition, pie baker extraordinaire Cinnamon aims to win, taking down any competitor who gets in her way. But when she finds a dead body in the woods behind her pie shop just days before the big competition, Cinnamon realizes that there’s much more to worry about than cookies, frosting, and gumdrops.

Someone’s out to bring Cinnamon down. And they’re playing dirty. Only Cinnamon and a mysterious stranger who walks into her life one snowy evening can figure out the mystery.  But can they solve it before Cinnamon’s chances of gingerbread competition glory crumble?

My Reaction:

Yet another 372-Pages podcast/bookclub selection!  (Shared read with Donald, as usual.)

I don't have much of a reaction to this, aside from the podcast element.  It's not my personal cup of peppermint tea.  (Not that I drink peppermint tea; I don't.  The only tea I ever drink is sweet iced tea, and that's only at family get-togethers, these days...  But peppermint tea felt seasonally appropriate, so...)  

I've only ever read a few cozy mysteries, so I'm not really familiar enough with the genre to be an effective judge of them, but this was not nearly cozy enough for my tastes.  In my opinion, you should either go heavy on the cozy or just call yourself a regular mystery.  This was neither cozy nor much of a real mystery, so I'm not sure what I'd call it... A bland romance with an extremely lightweight mystery element, maybe.  Cinnamon, the protagonist, was ridiculously morose and self-pitying, as well, which made for a less interesting reading experience.

As for humor, there were a few moments of unintended mirth, but this was not one of the best 372-Pages selections.  Not one I believe will stay with me, particularly.  Even though there was a dog!  Even a cute dog couldn't save this one...  

Search the Shadows

Search the Shadows

by Barbara Michaels

Blurb:

Haskell Maloney was cruelly orphaned when she was just a baby. Now, twenty-two years later, she receives confirmation of the bitter truth she always suspected: the fallen war hero whose name she shares was not her father. Her quest for answers—and a personal history—brings Haskell to the famed Oriental Institute in Chicago, a city in which her mother lived and thrived before her strange, untimely death. But by rummaging around in the darkness, Haskell's exposing much more than she bargained for. And now she's racing against the clock to discover who she really is . . . and why someone is suddenly determined to kill her.

My Reaction:

Eh... This one was so slow to get started!  It needed either more fleshing out to make it more engaging in the first half or to be trimmed down.  (Trimming down would probably be preferable!)  As it is, you're waiting for something to happen-- for the book to take a definite direction-- for far too long.  When things finally get moving, it's okay-ish, but certainly not one of the author's best novels.  

Random Thoughts (with possible slight spoilers):

--  I find it amusing that this author clearly considered herself very "with it" and feminist, and yet her writing has some painfully cringe-worthy sexist stereotypes.  The way she describes one female character in particular, in this book, is just... Wow!

--  The main character is a woman named "Haskell".  A bit odd, and yes, I know I have a nerve to say so, since I'm a female Michael... But I acknowledge that my name is rather odd, too.  

--  I realize she "had" to do it to get the story going in its intended direction, and ultimately you understand why, but it seemed very strange to me that Haskell breaks off her engagement simply because she suspects that the man she thought was her father (but who she had never even met) wasn't her biological dad.  I get that it might be startling and make you want to investigate and locate your biological father, but it's a weird reason to call off an engagement!  She treats Jon poorly throughout the book, really.

--  It will never cease to be gross and yucky and utterly unappealing when male characters with a romantic interest in female characters call them "child", "kid", or otherwise refer to them as being childlike.  "Oh, Haskell ... You are so damned young"?  Ugh!  

--  It always rubs me the wrong way when an author makes irritating "asides", observations, or excuses about how a character has said something that's grammatically incorrect.  Argh!  We know you know how to "write good", okay?  Give it a rest!!  Let the characters speak naturally, please!  Stop berating them (for the words you put in their mouths) and drawing undue attention to the fact that everyday speech is frequently not grammatically correct.  We already know that.

One example: 

"What do you want to know that for?"

"Your grammar is as befuddled as your reasoning," Dave said cuttingly.  

--  Twice near the end, Haskell thinks something to the effect that cigarette smoke smells nice.  My personal favorite?  "I lay still, savoring the beautiful gray light and the exquisite aroma of cigarette smoke that permeated the sheets."  This was published in 1987, so yes, cigarette smoking was more common than it is now, but even back then, didn't most people think cigarette smoke reeked?  If not, it was probably only because they were smokers themselves and were nose-blind to it.  I don't know... I'm just not buying this love for the so-called "aroma" of cigarette smoke.  Then again, I suppose we can sometimes enjoy/appreciate objectively stinky smells simply because we associate them with someone we love.  

--  I wasn't sure who Haskell's father would be, to tell the truth.  There are a handful of equally plausible possibilities, and by the time it was revealed, I just kind of shrugged... "Yep.  That was one of the possibilities I considered.  She sure did find out who her bio dad is.  (...yawn)"

--  I was similarly uncertain of how the romance aspect of the book would work out, until fairly near the end.  It was a bit out of the blue. It felt like she was steering us in a different direction for most of the book... Then you could tell that was a no-go, and she suddenly changed tack, which is something I don't particularly like in romances.  I want a chance to root for a pairing, not have two or three kind of "meh" options and no clue about where things are headed.  So yes, this was slightly disorienting, but unlike some other readers, I found the last part of the book (where the romance is resolved) generally more entertaining to read than much of the rest of it.  I might have liked the book better if more pages had been devoted to the romance instead of the dull, plodding mystery/who's-the-daddy storyline!

--  I was disappointed by the lack of exciting treasure-hunting and sorting through artifacts.  I guess I should've known that wouldn't materialize, because it would be difficult to write in an interesting way without distracting from the rest of the book, but still... I felt let down.  

--  There was very much less of the paranormal than I expected.  Some of this author's novels lean heavily on the supernatural, and for some reason I thought this one might, as well.  I wasn't so much disappointed as mildly surprised by the lack.  

Conclusion:  It took me a while to work my way through this book, and I wouldn't recommend it unless you're already a fan.  I think I've always found her works annoying in some ways, but I think I used to enjoy them more than I do now.  At this point, it seems likely that either I'm pickier now or I'm remembering liking some of her other novels better than I actually did.  I can't believe I just happened to read all the better ones first.