The Mark of Athena

I was very excited when a message from the library popped up, telling me this book had arrived. But the thing that made me the most excited? On one of the last pages, a few little lines reading: The House of Hades, coming Fall 2013. For whatever reason, correct or incorrect, I thought The Mark of Athena was the last book in the Heroes of Olympus series. I'm so glad there's at least one more book!

I felt like I needed a refresher from The Son of Neptune before I started this one...I kept mixing up which of the "new" characters came from Camp Jupiter and which ones came from Camp Half-Blood.

I liked the book - the adventures were exciting and there were enough of them, but not too many (if that makes sense). I did kind of wish we got to see more of Camp Jupiter and Camp Half-Blood preparing for their inevitable meeting (maybe that will happen in the next book?). The little teaser glimpses of what was going on that the seven got to see through Piper's knife were revealing, but I wanted more!

I'm on track for 16 books in the first four months of 2013...yahoo!

The Man Who Smiled

This book was weird. I didn’t really like it. It’s definitely my least favourite of the series. It is apparently actually the 5th book (it should come after Sidetracked), but it’s not listed in the lists in the Vintage editions. The edition I read was published by The New Press. I was not thrilled with the translation – there were a bunch of weird errors. There were also a few fact check errors and I’m not sure if they are actual fact check errors or other problems with the translation.

Reading this one out of order demonstrated how well the others are written to be stand alone books if need be. There were a few references to events in this book in The Fifth Woman and One Step Behind, but I didn’t feel like I was missing much. This book filled a few details that were nice to know and enhanced the story, but they weren’t necessary to the plots of the others.

I’m glad I read this after The Fifth Woman and One Step Behind because I disliked it enough that I may have just stopped reading the books…but now I’m waiting for the next two books to show up at the library…in the meantime, I might read some other author!

One Step Behind

I think this might be my favourite of the series so far. I like the way Ann-Britt Höglund has been developed and I like the new chief. This plot line was the most twisty-turny so far and I liked how it was done…I could seen the connections, sort of – it was like they were just outside my peripheral vision.

I was a bit annoyed at Wallander though with his health issues, but that seemed to be a plot device.

I read it in a day and a half, so a reread might be a good idea someday!

The Fifth Woman

 

Possible SPOILER ALERT at the end of the post. There is a warning below too.

 

Unfortunately 2013 did not start the way I had hoped…I ended up with bronchitis and an infection and spent a lot of time in bed and on the couch at the beginning of the month. But, that did give me the opportunity to read a lot.

And because I still had a ways to go to get through my library books before they were due to be returned, I stuck with Kurt Wallender. Again, I was surprised by the identity of the killer and the discussion that surrounded that in the book.

Possible spoiler coming up
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

One thing I’m unsure of…the skull that is mentioned on the dust jacket of my book and is discussed throughout the book – is that just a random clue that didn’t actually have anything to do with the crimes and ended up not being a clue? I sort of felt like it was left dangling, but I might have missed something…

Sidetracked

Yes, another. This one was interesting. I was surprised to find out who was committing the crimes – the reader knows throughout who it is, but some of the details about that person really surprised me.

Again, I read this too long ago to really comment on it…I liked it, or I probably would have stopped reading these books…

 

And with that, the books of 2012 are complete…63, wow!

The White Lioness

 

I made the mistake of requesting a whole whack of Henning Mankell books at the same time from the library…a mistake because of course they were all ready to be picked up within two days of each other and because I had to request them, that means three weeks to read them, that’s it, because in all likelihood there are others who have requested them after me.

Good thing I like these books!

The White Lioness is the third in the series of Kurt Wallander mysteries and it takes place in Sweden and South Africa. One thing that drives me nuts about some mysteries is the amount of coincidence. Mankell’s books have a lot of coincidences, but the reader knows they exist (even if the connection isn’t obvious) before Wallander does…and somehow that makes it more believable to me.

So, because I’m so slow and because I’ve read four other Mankell books before I read this one, I don’t have a lot to say. I did enjoy this book and I might just have to sit down and reread all of them one day, because I’m certain I missed a lot.

The Drowning

Ugh…I had a bit of trouble with this one…and most of my complaints come from a place that I liked in the previous books – I liked that Erica was involved on the periphery of the investigations that Patrik was working on, but in this one, I felt like Camilla Läckberg let Erica get too invovled.

In The Hidden Child, I didn’t feel like Erica’s involvement was intrusive – I understood why she was there because the family history she was researching and the crime that Patrik was working on (while on paternity leave) ended up being linked. But this time, I cringed a bit when she got involved. And I thought the constant references to Erica’s and Anna’s pregnancies got to be a bit much…

I had no idea where this story was going – the twists were good and the ending was surprising. I had to go back and reread a few parts once I was just done, just to get everything straight in my mind.

And the very last page made my head spin. I’m glad the next book will be out in the next few months…cliff hangers like that make me anxious!