The Scandal (Theodore Boone, #6)

The Scandal by John Grisham
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

Appalled by Judge Yeck threatening to have a dog destroyed for barking.

This book revolves around standardized testing and how a group of teachers from a poorly performing school got together and changed test scores. Theo becomes involved when his friend April sends a letter to the school board anonymously after her babysitter tells her about the "conspiracy". April is already upset because she really wanted to get in the honors classes so she could take Art and she missed getting in by 1 point. If the teachers at the poorly performing school hadn't cheated she may very well have gotten in, so she feels justified in ratting the teachers out initially, but after criminal charges are brought against the teachers she feels bad about sending the letter.

Theo's Mother winds up representing the teachers

And Theo winds up representing an otter in Animal Court.

View all my reviews

Bullseye (Michael Bennett, #9)

Bullseye by James Patterson
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A British assassin and his wife have been hired to kill the President of the United States. An American art gallery owner (Matthew Leroux) and his wife who moonlight as assassins are determined to stop him. Mike Bennett winds up working with Matthew to save the President's life.

At House Bennett, Marvin their latest guesthouse is mixed up with a drug lord. Brian intercedes and gets the drug lord arrested, but after he makes bail the drug lord comes after Brain. Brian winds up literally running for his life.

View all my reviews

Cross Kill (Alex Cross #23.5)

Cross Kill by James Patterson
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Patterson revived Gary Soneji from "Along Came a Spider" to play head games with Alex. And while Soneji did kidnap Maggie Rose, the golden-haired daughter of a famous movie actress, and her best friend, Shrimpie Goldberg, the son of the secretary of the treasury, he wasn't responsible for Shrimpie's death. Shrimpie was in the hands of FBI agents at the time of his death. No mention is made of that or the fact that Alex's girlfriend died by lethal injection at the end of "Along Came a Spider".

This is really like a long prologue to his next book. Sampson is shot in front of Alex by someone who looks like Gary Soneji. Since Alex was supposed to have killed Soneji 10 years ago everyone doubts him. But slowly Alex begins to put the pieces together. While Sampson slowly recovers from the head wound he received Alex sets out to find the shooter. When he is ambushed by multiple "Gary Soneji's" in a warehouse he defends himself killing some and wounding others. But unbelievably it is Alex who finds himself on the wrong side of the law when he is arrested for the premeditated murder of Virginia Winslow (Gary Soneji's widow) and John Doe.

View all my reviews

Night and Day (Eve Duncan, #21)

Night and Day by Iris Johansen
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I can't wait to see how Cara and Jock's relationship develops, they are a cute couple. Jock follows Cara to Russia to watch out for her and to find a way to rescue her if needed Natalie grows increasingly jealous of Kaskov's attention to his granddaughter. Meanwhile Eve and company work on finding Ciara's treasure and creating a false treasure to fool Natalie with. Natalie eventually reaches out to Eve about exchanging Cara for the treasure and arrangements are made to meet at a park in Russia, where Cara will be on a carousel with a guard. Natalie plans to have a sharpshooter kill Cara, but Jock foils the plan by snatching Cara off the carousel. Enraged that Eve bested her Natalie plans how to get revenge on Eve.

Shortly after going for a prenatal checkup "Michael" (Eve's baby) lets Eve know something is wrong. Natalie got to Eve's doctor and had him implant a poison inside her. Now they must get the antidote from Natalie or Kaskov before the capsule burst. Cara insist on going to see Kaskov with Eve and together they convince him that it is Natalie not Eve that wants Cara dead. Cara makes a deal with him to get Eve the antidote. Kaskov takes care of Natalie and her accomplice.

With Caleb's help the antidote is administered and Eve is saved. Eve, Joe and Cara return to Atlanta where Eve eventually gives birth to Michael. Who reminds her of someone. ( Is there a Trevor connection?)

View all my reviews

Bay of Sighs (The Guardians Trilogy #2)

Bay of Sighs by Nora Roberts
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This time it's Annika's turn to find the "star", the friends grow closer and Annika and Sawyer admit they are in love with one another.

Nerezza turns Malmon into a demon and sends him after the six, but in her wolf form Riley bites him and he flees.

After they find the "Water Star" they head to Bran's home in Ireland, where Doyle used to live when he was a boy and where his brother died. This is where the "Ice Star" is hidden.

View all my reviews

Invision (Chronicles of Nick, #7)

Invision by Sherrilyn Kenyon


Great so much information is revealed. It's sort of hard to unravel and you really need to read the Dark Hunter and Dream Hunter books to keep up as some of the information in them helps to make sense of the information dump.

Xev, is Nick's great Grandfather (Jared is his son, I was right about him being Cherise's Father) and Caleb's brother. Xev & Caleb are the sons of Jaden (aka Verlyn), Madoc (Dream-Hunter series) is Nick's brother. And this is mind blowing Jaden's sister is Apollymi (Acheron's Mother). So Nick and Acheron are related (don't think either one of them know that yet).

Nick learns that Zavid's soul is being held prisoner by Noir and determines to rescue him. Before he can weird things start happening with his powers and he starts getting flashes of other peoples past and future. Aeron disappears when Nick sends him to watch after Kody and they soon realize that Nashira and Dagon are also missing. They go to Menyara for help but she is missing and they are attacked by demons. Caleb is badly wounded before Xev gets there to help. Nick's powers are being drained so he can't save him so Xev does the one thing he can do to save his brother and calls for his father Jaden. Jaden saves Caleb's life and makes up with Xev (He restores Xev's original black hair color).

Jaden sends Nick and Xev into the future at Nick's request (Nick wanted to talk to Ambrose) but he goes to far into the future and meets his daughter and Simi's son and daughter. (Nick's daughter and Simi's son are an item). New Orleans is being attacked by Cyprian. Nick's daughter is injured while talking to him and before he and Xev can help they are sent back (we have no idea who or what sent them back). We also learn that Nick and the Father of Simi's children died fighting together against Cyprian.

In Dragonmark (Dark-Hunter, #26; Dragons Rising, #1; Lords of Avalon, #5) Nick/Ambrose  is fighting on the same side as Acheron and his friends. Not sure where on the timeline this book falls but it is sometime in the future.

Simi shows up and offers to eat the demon they killed that didn't disappear. She also informs them that Aeron does have a friend in the city and that he would be better able to track Aeron. They go to Caleb's basement where Kaziel ( Hell Hound from the Dark-Hunter: Lords of Avalon series) has been living. Jaden and Kaziel go to rescue Aeron and Zavid (for various reasons the others can't go). Nick's powers return and he is able to bring Menyara back from the Kassitu where she was being held prisoner. Kaziel runs into his friend Rhibyn, called Vawn (a man trapped in a woman's body) and he helps them rescue Zavid and Aeron. Jaden turns into the Verlyn and stays behind while the others escape.

Eventually they figure out that the demon that didn't go poof is a Div and go to rescue Simi, but she has everything under control.

The team splits up with some going home with Caleb and with Xev (in cat form) and Zavid (in dog form) going home with Nick as Xev wants to be available to protect Cherise and Zavid must feed from him in order to stay out of Noir's clutches. This raises the interesting possibility that Xev might be able to bring Cherise back if she dies.

They also discover that Ambrose (Nick) doesn't destroy the world that Cyprian (Ambrose's son) does. Cyprian (who looks identical to Ambrose) kills the boys who attacked Nick the night Kyrian meet him in order to frame Nick. Kyrian and Acheron discuss how to get Nick out of trouble with the police.

And we learn that it wasn't Ambrose that gave Nick the Eye of Ananke but Cyprian with the objective of driving Nick mad. Cyprian's Mother is Laguerre. 

View all my reviews

Murder Past Due (Cat in the Stacks, #1)

Murder Past Due by Miranda James
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I have to say I was upset with Mr. James using race as the reason people wouldn't talk to Kanesha. As a native Mississippian albeit from Central Mississippi and now the Gulf Coast I do not know anyone who would refuse to talk to an officer of the law just because they were African-American. This "pretext" for Charlie and Diesel to get involved is very flimsy and insulting to Mississippians.

The story is set in the fictional North Mississippi town of Athena. Native son and best selling author Godfrey Priest has returned to Athena and among other things is donating his papers to the college, since Charlie is in charge of the archives he eventually receives the papers. But we quickly learn that Godfrey is actually there to meet his 17 year old son (Justin), who happens to board with Charlie. I really don't understand why he is boarding with Charlie when his own parents appear to live in the town.

Shortly after meeting Justin, Godfrey winds up dead. Justin finds the body and shortly afterwards Charlie appears on the scene. There are numerous suspects as Godfrey seems to have a lot of enemies in the town and after Charlie has a chance to go through Godfrey's papers, especially the box that was sent by accident Charlie jumps to the conclusion that the killer is the person who has actually been writing Godfrey's best selling books.

But Kanesha quickly disabuses Charlie of that notion and arrest the killer.

In my opinion the best thing about the book was that Charlie took his cat Diesel everywhere with him.

View all my reviews