Sylvia's Reviews

Police detective Carmine Delmonico must track down a serial murderer of several young girls after a torso is found in an animal disposal unit.

Grisly police procedural. I didn’t get very far into it before giving up.

A runaway princess and a beaten boy find a new life in a forest hut.

Very short but charming story, quite enjoyable until I got to the simplistic ending.

Emperor Justinian assigns Lord Chamberlain John to investigate when a Court officer is found stabbed in an alley. But after a prostitute is killed and John’s old love Cornelia is threatened, the Emperor believes a dead soothsayer is the one responsible and pulls John back to his usual duties.

Well-written and involving, although a touch too much of modern attitudes. Also an exceedingly grisly account of how John became John the Eunuch, and the title didn't have much relevance to the story.

When Regent Mangan dies, his unusual cat Niffy adopts the young Prince Jamas. But it will take all Niffy’s deviousness and Jamas’ courage to stop a murderous queen.

Short book and fast read, but enjoyable.

Benedictine novice Thomasine is almost ready to take her final vows when her possessive aunt visits the convent, raving and insisting on Thomasine leaving with her immediately. But when two women die suddenly and Thomasine is the prime suspect, Dame Frevisse has little time to uncover the “why” to find the “who.”

Not the most coherent mystery ever, but it kept me reading and was set in a proper Benedictine convent.

Tarma and Kethry investigate when the captain of their mercenary troop fails to return from a trip to Rethwellan and end up organizing a coup.

More of a traditional novel than most of her Tarma & Kethry series, but still a good strong story, introducing a love interest for Kethry.

During the Civil War, Southerner and D.C. resident Harrison Raines is shanghaied into investigating the death in combat of a Yankee officer.

The first few chapters are utterly boring and only establish Harrison as a wimp and his love as a self-centered queen of manipulation. It got a little more interesting after that, but halfway through, I still had no compelling reason to pick up the book once I had put it down, and there wasn't a likeable character to keep me interested. I quit reading at that point.

Dominican Friar Athelstan was assigned by his prior to a parish in the worst part of London, and to assist the London coroner Sir John. When the coroner must investigate a murder-suicide of a prominent London goldsmith, Athelstan thinks something is fishy.

I gave up halfway through, still unable to find a plot after three questionable deaths and endless description (mostly nauseating) and emotional self-flagellation.

Forcibly retired by a heart attack, Thomas finds a new interest in life when a secret room in his newly-purchased country manor yields a 150-year-old skeleton of a boy. The police are more interested in the murdered woman found locally but cannot find her husband to charge him with the crime.

Unusual mystery but held my attention, intertwining two separate murder mysteries. Most of the events were pretty well telegraphed but I didn’t guess who was responsible for the modern-day killing. However, I think it was shabby of Aird to not let the reader in on the secret behind the murder.

Retired Mob boss hires PI/insurance investigator Amos Walker to find his partner’s daughter.

Standard hard-boiled PI story, which I don’t generally like and gave up on after 40 pages.

Bestselling psychology author Lucy Pym comes to speak at a women’s physical education college and gets to know the students and teachers there.

If there was more to this book, I never found it. The first 50 pages were so acutely boring that I gave up before I fell asleep.

Emotionally and physically scarred by a previous Pharaoh, Meren and his adopted son Kysen now serve young Pharaoh Tutankhamen as criminal investigators. When an unpopular royal scribe is found stabbed in the mummification center, Meren and Kysen must wade through a family from hell and a workplace just as vicious as the court to find the murderer.

Not as rich in atmosphere as The Mask of Ra but with a good deal more humor, and a solid storyline. Well worth reading.

Tito Amato has just finished his training and returned to Venice to sing in the opera. He also desperately wants to know why his father permitted him to be castrated as a boy to preserve his magnificent soprano voice. He encounters kindness and cruelty, but when a murder is committed and his friend is accused, he is determined to find the real murderer.

Slow start, but Myers’ tale of Tito leaving school and returning to his hometown kept me reading anyway. Vivid portrayal of the complicated business and political rivalries that ran rampant in 17th century Venice. I finished it, but I didn’t particularly like it. The few sympathetic characters seemed one-dimensional, and most of the characters were slyly self-obsessed, probably authentic to the period but not likeable.

Dispatched to Morocco to identify who has infiltrated a spy network, Mrs. Pollifax becomes suspicious of her partner when she discovers one of their targets was stabbed shortly after they found him.

As usual, fast-paced and with plenty of memorable and likeable characters. The reader has to suspend disbelief pretty hard but the storyline is worth the effort. Weak ending as usual, though, and the title is minimally related to the story.

Having destroyed the robber band that wiped out Tarma’s Clan, she and Kethry go adventuring. First Tarma helps Kethry overcome the crippling fear inculcated by a forced marriage, then they return to the Dhorisha Plains and acquire battlesteeds, and then they tackle a deadly demon.

This is what Lackey does best: not a cohesive novel but an enthralling series of connected stories. Fast, involving read.

Harrison Hull and ornithologist Alexander Wilson investigate the alleged suicide of explorer Meriwether Lewis.

Even though I normally dislike fiction about real people, I tried to give this a fair shot. But it wasn’t interesting enough to hold my attention, and a long flashback to Jefferson’s presidency just killed any willingness I still had to finish reading it. I gave up a quarter of the way through.

Princess Andromeda is tired of being treated as a child. But showing her research abilities to the Queen and her adviser makes the princess a threat, especially when she brings the people’s problems to the Queen. So Andie is chosen as a “sacrifice” to a rampaging dragon … but she and the Champion sent to fight the dragon face a surprise.

This has turned into an utterly charming series. Lackey cleaves to the letter of the classic fairy tales but turns the spirit sideways, producing a lot of natural humor, such as unicorns that become a besotted nuisance when confronted with a virgin girl. Not a very fast read but definitely enjoyable.

Leaving a would-be rapist dead, Molly flees her Irish village and escapes to America by escorting another woman’s children. But their stay on Ellis Island is dangerously prolonged when a man who threatened Molly is found murdered. To prove her friend innocent, Molly determines to find the real murderer, heading foolishly into some of the most dangerous areas of turn-of-the-century NYC.

I couldn’t get into this book. I don’t mind suspending disbelief to a point, but that a naïve Irish woman, absolutely new to any city much less New York, could not only survive but find a killer that eluded the NYPD, was too much to swallow. I gave up halfway through.

A stranger misdirected to Magdalene’s house sports with a girl and then keeps an appointment at the church, where he is stabbed and later found by his playmate. The sacristan accuses the whores of killing him, so Magdalene appeals to the bishop for help. The bishop sends an aide, Sir Bellamy, to investigate.

Slow read, and full of items that might be accepted individually but together put too much of a burder on my willingness to suspend disbelief. A woman might be running away from a false murder charge OR have learned to read somewhere OR be protected by a nobleman and set up in her own “stew” OR be protected by a bishop in return for paying a high rent. I might even accept a couple of these. But all of them happening to the same person was too much. Then she addressed her protector as plain “William” in front of his men. In fact, later in the book she addresses him (properly) as Lord William. And then Gellis pulled the stunt of having a character learn something that she didn’t share with the reader! Boooo! I don’t think I’ll be reading any further in this series.

I had the pleasure of a response from the author to a post on Magdalene I made on the CrimeThruTime Yahoogroup. She was very polite and explained a couple of items that bothered me, namely ignoring the Saxon/Norman conflict or the prevalence of smallpox scarring, saying they were irrelevant to the story, the Saxon/Norman conflict was over and the people of that time didn't notice smallpox (or lice or other common events that we would definitely notice today). That tells *me* that I wouldn't enjoy her books - I'm enough of a history buff to need more emphasis on authenticity to be able to concentrate on the story - but there are plenty of people who wouldn't notice those details and it was certainly gracious of her to respond.

Orphaned by a fire, Maelle suffers separation from her brother and sister when they are all sent to Missouri on an Orphan Train. Grown up, she is constantly searching for her siblings, but her brother is on the run and her sister doesn’t acknowledge the birth name her adopted brother flung at her before disinheriting her.

Syrupy-sweet tale of siblings facing their own problems before being reunited. But it kept me reading.