Review: ALL THE LITTLE LIARS

All The Little Liars by Charlaine Harris
Book 9 of the Aurora Teagarden mysteries
Read by Therese Plummer
Format: ebook & audiobook
Genre: murder mystery

About All The Little Liars:

#1 New York Times bestseller Charlaine Harris returns to her Aurora Teagarden mystery series with a fabulous new book featuring the small-town Southern librarian.

Aurora Teagarden is basking in the news of her pregnancy when disaster strikes her small Georgia town: four kids vanish from the school soccer field in an afternoon. Aurora’s 15-year-old brother Phillip is one of them. Also gone are two of his friends, and an 11-year-old girl who was just hoping to get a ride home from soccer practice. And then there’s an even worse discovery — at the kids’ last known destination, a dead body.

While the local police and sheriff’s department comb the county for the missing kids and interview everyone even remotely involved, Aurora and her new husband, true crime writer Robin Crusoe, begin their own investigation. Could the death and kidnappings have anything to do with a group of bullies at the middle school? Is Phillip’s disappearance related to Aurora’s father’s gambling debts? Or is Phillip himself, new to town and an unknown quantity, responsible for taking the other children? But regardless of the reason, as the days go by, the most important questions remain. Are the kids still alive? Who could be concealing them? Where could they be?

With Christmas approaching, Aurora is determined to find her brother…if he’s still alive.

After more than a decade, #1 New York Times bestseller Charlaine Harris finally returns to her fan-favorite Aurora Teagarden series with All the Little Liars, a fabulously fun new mystery.

Source: Info in the About All The Little Liars was taken from GoodReads at https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28220808-all-the-little-liars on 15/05/2017.

My Thoughts:

I read this series, like, donkey's years ago! Then all of a sudden I come across another book in this series more than ten years later! Whoa! That is a long hiatus!! And only Charlaine Harris can revive back to life a series that long dead. I wonder why she decided to write again in the Aurora Teagarden's world, after all this time... Speaking of which, I find the story flow a little bit sluggish... Sluggish?! ...heck! It's a little bit under crawling pace... at less than a snail's pace!!... The main reason being that I have already forgotten a lot of the characters and events from previous books. So I had to stop and think, who was who? And did Roe got married before?? Yeah, that was how long ago I've read this series... But I remember Therese Plummer's sleepy voice! And am very happy to be listening to it again! But after a while, it all comes back more easily this time... after an annoyingly interminable time.... *sigh* ... did I say it was a long time ago??...

Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 4.5
Character development = 3.5
Story itself = 3
Writing Style = 4
Ending = 3
World building = 3
Cover art = 1
Pace = (7 hrs and 51 mins listening time)
Plot = 4
Narration = 4.5

Overall Rating: 3 out of 5 cherries


Books In Aurora Teagarden Mysteries:

 

About Charlaine Harris
	Charlaine Harris is a New York Times bestselling author who has been writing for over thirty years. She was born and raised in the Mississippi River Delta area. Though her early works consisted largely of poems about ghosts and teenage angst, she began writing plays when she attended Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee. She switched to novels a few years later, and achieved publication in 1981 with Sweet and Deadly. After publishing two stand-alone mysteries, Harris launched the lighthearted Aurora Teagarden books with Real Murders, a Best Novel 1990 nomination for the Agatha Awards. Harris wrote eight books in her series about a Georgia librarian. In 1996, she released the first in the much darker Shakespeare mysteries, featuring the amateur sleuth Lily Bard, a karate student who makes her living cleaning houses. Shakespeare’s Counselor, the fifth—and final—Lily Bard novel, was printed in fall 2001. By then, Harris was feeling the call of new territory. Starting with the premise of a young woman with a disability who wants to try inter-species dating, she created The Sookie Stackhouse urban fantasy series before there was a genre called “urban fantasy.” Telepathic barmaid Sookie Stackhouse works in a bar in the fictional northern Louisiana town of Bon Temps. The first book in the series, Dead Until Dark, won the Anthony Award for Best Paperback Mystery in 2001. Each subsequent book follows Sookie through adventures involving vampires, werewolves, and other supernatural creatures. The series, which ended in 2013, has been released in over thirty languages. Sookie Stackhouse has proven to be so popular that Alan Ball, creator of the HBO television series Six Feet Under, announced he would undertake the production of a new HBO series based upon the books He wrote and directed the pilot episode for that series, True Blood, which premiered in September of 2008. In October 2005, the first of Harris’s new mystery series about a young woman named Harper Connelly debuted with the release of Grave Sight. Harper has the ability to determine the cause of death of any body. After four novels, this series is on hiatus. Now Harris is working on a trilogy of graphic novels with Christopher Golden and artist Don Kramer, “Cemetery Girl.” On her own she is writing a new series set in the small town of Midnight, Texas. Harris has also co-edited a series of very popular anthologies with her friend Toni L.P. Kelner, aka Leigh Perry. The anthologies feature stories with an element of the supernatural, and the submissions come from a rare mixture of mystery and urban fantasy writers. Professionally, Harris is a member of the Mystery Writers of America, the American Crime Writers League, Sisters in Crime, and the International Crime Writers Association. She is a past member of the boards of Sisters in Crime and MWA, and she has served as president of the MWA. She is also a member of Science Fiction Writers of America, Horror Writers Association, and Romance Writers of America, just to make sure she’s covered. Personally, Harris has been married for many years. She mother of three wonderful children and the grandmother of two. She lives in central Texas, and when she is not writing her own books, she reads omnivorously. Her house is full of rescue dogs.
charlaineharris.com | facebook | twitter | goodreads | amazon | google+ | instagram

The Narrator
	Therese Plummer is an actor and voice over artist living and working in New York City. Favorite roles to date include TV: Rose Nerrick, The Good Wife, Andy in Law and Order SVU. Stage: Celebrity Row; New York Theatre Workshop, Under Tillage, The Irish Repertory Theatre. Off-off Broadway credits include The Vagina Monologues, Suzanne in Twilight of the Gold’s and Madeline in the Award Winning Samuel French Short play The Sweet Room. Comedy Credits include Improv at Upright Citizens Brigade and Stand-up at Caroline’s Comedy Club. Therese also performed her one woman show, Ribbons Undone, at the Here Arts Center. Therese records audio books for Audible.com, Recorded Books and Talking Books, Inc. As an adolescent counselor, Therese spent five years utilizing Drama therapy techniques in individual and group settings before moving to New York. She shares a passion of creating, helping and entertaining and feels incredibly lucky to do all three.
www.thereseplummer.com | twitter | facebook | goodreads | google+ | audible

FTC Disclosure:
This book was purchased with private funds.
No money received for this review.

Review: GREYWALKER

Greywalker by Kat Richardson

Book 1 of Greywalker series
Genre: urban fantasy investigative suspense
Format: paperback

About Greywalker:

When Harper comes to in the hospital, she begins to feel a bit ...strange. She sees things that can only be described as weird-shapes emerging from a foggy grey mist, snarling teeth, creatures roaring. But Harper's not crazy. Her "death" has made her a Greywalker-able to move between our world and the mysterious, cross-over zone where things that go bump in the night exist. And her new gift (or curse) is about to drag her into that world of vampires and ghosts, magic and witches, necromancers and sinister artifacts. Whether she likes it or not.

Source: Info in the About Greywalker was taken from GoodReads at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/140099.Greywalker on 19/01/2012.

[Image credit: Fyzgigg]

Review:

For a kick-ass heroine, Harper is just too stupid to live (TSTL) which brought the suspension of disbelief a notch down. I had to have breaks from the stupidity so I would stop reading this book until I've forgotten how stupid Harper is. But I wanted to like this series so much and the cover art for this series is really enticing so I would pick this book up again. It went on like that until I finally finished reading the book after a year. Pace-wise? Not a page-turner. The plot also partially depended on Harper acting stupid to create the drama, the dilemma, in the story. Which made the plot pretty weak. And as if that is not enough, our protagonist is the crowned Denial Queen of the century, steadfastly trying to bury her head in the sand. That brought the character development rating down to the boots. The world building on the other hand, is beautiful though it got a gaping hole in it. I'm an urban fantasy girl so I like magic, vampires, witches and whatnots. However I also like things to make sense. Just because it's fantasy and involves magic does not mean it does not have to follow a logical sense. In this book the supernatural world is hiding in plain sight. Most humans are oblivious but a few are in the know. Harper's city is chuck full of supernatural beings. You can't swing a cat without hitting one. And this is just one city. If we follow that pattern, then if this city exists then there must be numerous other cities around the world which is chuck full of supernatural beings. And nobody outed them out to the general public yet? After all these years? There is absolutely not one single self-serving, opportunistic bastard out there who thought that divulging the secret of the supernaturals would give him/her some sort of gain? Money, power, and/or revenge? Sorry, but don't buy that. Such is the nature of man that there is always one bad apple in a basket. So, is there a geas or spell which ensures that everybody keeps the supernatural world a secret? A task force which keeps everybody in line and ensures the secrecy? A governing body which imposes the secrecy rule? Nope! So why is the secret world of the supernaturals not outed yet?? Holey world building? Holey it might be, it is still beautiful though. And I found this artist rendition which perfectly captures the image of Harper testing the bounderies of the Grey. The picture is black and white but the world building there is colorfully beautiful!!

This book has a lot of promise and the premise is very good but the story building needs a lot of work.

Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 2.5
Character development = 1
Story itself = 2
Ending = 3
World building = 3.5
Cover art = 4.5
Plot = 1.5
Pace = 0.5

Overall Rating: 2 out of 5 cherries


Books In The Greywalker series:

Review: DEAD TO ME

Dead To Me by Anton Strout
Book 1 of the Simon Canderous series
Read by David DeVries
Genre: urban fantasy
Format: paperback & audiobook

About Dead To Me:

A new urban fantasy featuring a man working on the right side of law-with talents that come from left field.

Psychometry-the power to touch an object and divine information about its history-has meant a life of petty crime for Simon Canderous, but now he's gone over to the good side. At New York's underfunded and (mostly) secret Department of Extraordinary Affairs, he's learning about red tape, office politics, and the basics of paranormal investigation. But it's not the paperwork that has him breathless.

After Simon spills his coffee on (okay, through) the ghost of a beautiful woman- who doesn't know she's dead-he and his mentor plan to find her killers. But Simon's not prepared for the nefarious plot that unfolds before him, involving politically correct cultists, a large wooden fish, a homicidal bookcase, and the forces of Darkness, which kind of have a crush on him.

Source: Info in the About Dead To Me was taken from GoodReads at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1823237.Dead_To_Me?ac=1 on 16/04/2013.

Review:

I've had this book in my TBR (to be read) shelf for like forever. I keep picking it up and putting it down. It just can't keep my attention. My mind keeps wandering while I'm reading this book. Safe to say that the story telling quality was not compelling.

What I didn't expect was for Simon to suddenly go all-out stupid in Chapter 12. It seems like he lost all sense of self-preservation all of a sudden. No, that was not it. It seems like he was determined to get killed and everybody else around him. WTF!?! I mean, his life sucks and all, but to get too stupid to live (TSTL)? I didn't see that one coming. He was okey for the first ten chapters. I don't know what happened but it looked like he had a lobotomy in Chapter 12. I had to have frequent breaks from the stupidities. So you couldn't call this book in any shape or form "fast paced" at all. So much so that when I finished this book it was with a sense of relief rather than looking forward to the next book in the series. I was relieved to finally get done with the stupids. Then the plot... what plot? The entire book is just a retelling of about two weeks of Simon Canderous' life with no thought for plot nor story structure, and that's it! So we read about how Simon ran around from danger to danger and being stupid and got saved by sheer dumb luck. While the bad guys stupidly stumbled themsleves into captivity... Yeah, not much of a plot. The world building was sound though. No apparent cracks that I could see. I could totally believe that a hidden world like the one of Simon Canderous could exist side-by-side ours. I also like the premise of an investigative supernatural. But then again that is my favourite genre, just as the Dresden Files by Jim Butcher and the Grimm TV show are my favourites! It's just Simon's stupidity after stupidity after stupidiy which ruined it for me.

Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 1.5
Character development = 2
Story itself = 2
Ending = 2
World building = 3.5
Cover art = 3.5
Pace = 0.5
Plot = 1
Narrator = 4

Overall Rating: 2 out of 5 cherries


Books In The Simon Canderous Series:


A huge THANK YOU to The Qwillery for hosting a contest which made it possible for me to win paperback copies of Dead To Me, Deader Still, and Dead Matter by Anton Strout!

FTC Disclosure:
No money received for this review.

Review: HARD EIGHT

Hard Eight by Janet Evanovich
Book 8 of the Stephanie Plum series
Narrated by Lorelei King
Format: audiobook
Genre: crime fiction chicklit

About Hard Eight:

Fugitive Apprehension Agent Stephanie Plum has a big problem on her hands: Seven-year-old Annie Soder and her mother, Evelyn, have disappeared.

Evelyn's estranged husband, Steven, a shady owner of a seedy bar, is not at all happy. During the divorce proceedings, he and Evelyn signed a child custody bond, and Steven is demanding the money guaranteed by the bond to find Annie. The money was secured by a mortgage on Evelyn's grandmother's house, and the True Blue Bonds Bail Agency wants to take possession of the house.

Finding a kidnapped child is not an assignment for a bounty hunter. But Evelyn's grandmother lives next door to Stephanie's parents, and Stephanie's mother and grandmother are not about to see their neighbor lose her house because of abduction.

Even though Stephanie's plate is full with miscreants who missed their court dates, including old nemesis and violent drunk Andy Bender and an elusive little old lady accused of grand theft auto, she can't disappoint Grandma Mazur! So she follows the trail left by Annie and Evelyn-- and finds a lot more than she bargained for. Steven is somehow linked with a very scary Eddie Abruzzi. Trenton cop and on-again, off-again fiance Joe Morelli and Stephanie's mentor and tormentor, Ranger, warn Stephanie about Abruzzi, but it's Abruzzi's eyes and mannerisms that frighten Stephanie the most. Stephanie needs Ranger's savvy and expertise, and she's willing to accept his help to find Annie even though it might mean becoming too involved with Ranger.

Stephanie, Ranger, Lula (who's not going to miss riding with Ranger), and Evelyn's lawyer/laundromat manager set out to find Annie. The search turns out to be a race among Stephanie's posse, the True Blue Bonds' agent, a Rangerette known as Jeanne Ellen Burrows, and the Abruzzi crew. Not to mention the fact that there's a killer rabbit on the loose!

Strap on your helmet and get ready for the ride of your life. Hard Eight. The world of Plum has never been wilder.

Source: Info in the About Hard Eight was taken from at http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6425.Hard_Eight on 21/10/2012.

Review:

I have to tip my metaphorical hat to Lorelei King! She's a true professional! Words are clear and distinct. Diction, pauses and enunciations perfect. I especially like the accents and voices she gives the characters! And I also agree with her interpretation of the book! I would listen and buy another Lorelei King audiobook again.

So I was a bit disappointed with the last book in this series so I stopped listening to Stephanie Plum for a while and picked up another audiobook. After sometime, I forgot my ire and re-listened to this audiobook again simply because it was already loaded into my Samsung phone. Eventually I finished the book... Stephanie's stupid factor increased tenfold in this book so much so that it is no longer believable, no matter one does, that a being this stupid could live. Not even with sheer dumb luck. Stephanie is just too stupid to live! So you go apprehend somebody, and you leave the key in the ignition?? Not once, but twice! And guess what? The FTA (failure to appear) drives away with your CRV... The stupidity is reaching new heights that it sank the believability factor down to the bottom of the ocean! If you are going to read/listen to this book, read it/listen to it for the humour, not for the story nor the story telling quality. Because otherwise you will be bitterly disappointed.

Empirical Evaluation:
Story telling quality = 2
Character development = 2
Story itself = 2
Ending = 3
World building = 3.5
Cover art = 1
Pace = N/A
Plot = 1.5
Narrator = 4

Overall Rating: 2 out of 5 cherries