First post in my new chair...

We just bought a new recliner yesterday, which I’m sitting in right now, and it is so comfortable, I may never get up again!!  I feel like I’ve been swallowed up by a cloud, which is good, since I will spend more time reading if I am totally comfortable (unless, of course, I fall asleep!)

I finished reading The Dinosaur Feather by S.J. Gazan last night, and it proved to be just as engaging as it was at the start.  This Danish mystery novel tells the story of Anna Bella Nor, a PhD student and single mother who is scheduled to defend her thesis in just two weeks at the University of Copenhagen.  Her thesis adviser, Dr. Lars Helland, is well-respected and highly accomplished in his field, yet he is not very well-liked.  One day, another student, a friend of Anna’s, Johannes, shows up at the university for a meeting with Helland, and finds him dead in his office with a copy of Anna’s thesis in his hands.  Initial autopsy reports deem this a death by natural causes, a heart attack, but upon further examination, the medical examiner uncovers a bizarre twist to this death, which the police now consider murder.  The cast of strange, eccentric characters expands to include Troels, a young man who was a friend of Anna’s and who has become a successful model in the US, Soren, the police inspector heading up the Helland murder investigation, a man who has his own complex and hidden past, and Dr. Clive Freeman, a well-respected but controversial professor at the University of British Columbia who insists that birds did not evolve from dinosaurs, despite convincing evidence and long-held beliefs to the contrary.  When another murder occurs within this small circle of acquaintances, Soren and his team must determine if they are connected, and if they are looking for one murderer or two.  This well-researched, complex murder mystery will have you on the edge of your seat to the very last page, as you are drawn deeper into the cut-throat world of academic funding and research.  The backstories of most characters are complex and interesting, and while it may seem at first to be challenging to keep everyone’s stories straight, the author does a good job of recalling important details for the reader to help keep them in mind.  Sissel-Jo Gazan has a degree in Biology from the University of Copenhagen, which accounts for the complexity and detail presented in the novel.  This is her first book, which was published in 2008 in Denmark and won the Denmark Radio Literature Prize 2008 for Best Novel of the Year.  I would recommend this novel to anyone who enjoys a complex mystery that also includes interesting character explorations.

And I am nearly finished listening to Unleashed by David Rosenfelt, the most recent book in the “Andy Carpenter” series.  I will write about that next week.

I must decide what to read next, a real challenge, as I have no library books at home waiting for me to read, and of my other books for review, I am not really interested in any of the titles right now.  I guess I will have to search my personal book shelves to find something that will grab my attention.  I think it is too early to start reading I Capture the Castle, which is my next book club selection – we are meeting in two weeks, and since I’ve read this title before, I doubt it will take me that long to finish it.  Hmmm… what can I read quickly that I will also enjoy?  Maybe I should pull out a Peter Robinson mystery – they always hold my attention and make me want to read for hours at a time.

Bye for now…
Julie