Reading in the Pool When It's 120°

Phoenix recently made the news, not due to some dumb stunt by one of our politicians (for a change), but due to what weather forecasters now call an "excessive heat advisory." For years after I moved here, you never heard anyone make a peep about excessive heat advisories. I guess the powers that be trusted us to know that when it's over 110° you stayed inside as much as you could and if you couldn't, you tried to stick to the shade and kept yourself hydrated. 

This excessive heat advisory was for temperatures in the 115° to 120° range, and where was I? Was I staying inside? Nope! I was sitting in the pool in the shade with a big container of raspberry iced tea and my books. It did reach 120°, and airlines were canceling flights due to the heat, but I was quite content where I was. Being a pro, I have learned that there are a few things one should do in order to make reading in the pool a pleasant experience during a period of intense heat. I thought I'd share some of the tips I've learned.

Number One: a pair of gloves comes in very handy. I already knew this from experiencing many Phoenix summers. You do not put bare flesh on such things as car door handles and steering wheels when your vehicle's been sitting out in the broiling sun all day. However, my gloves are for another purpose.

When we had our pool remodeled, Denis requested this nice metal railing to be installed at the steps for our "senior years." (I can see that many of you already know where I'm going with this.) Since my knees are a few decades older than the rest of me, I already need the railing to get in and out of the pool. 

Yes, the railing is out in the aforementioned broiling sun all day, and those gloves are vital. I use a pair that I bought for doing light gardening. They have a layer of latex on the palms which gives me extra grip when I need it.

Just how vital are these gloves during an excessive heat advisory? On the day it reached 120°, I took hold of the railing to step down into the pool... and the latex on the palm of my glove melted and started to stick to the metal. I can just imagine the song and dance I would've done if I'd touched that with my bare hand! I get a bit queasy just thinking about it.

Number two: all those dishcloths I've been knitting come in handy.

In the photo, you can see my plastic tote bag that I bought at Harrod's in London. (Pool...waterproof...) You can see one of my books. (I always bring out at least two.) And you can also see a couple of my knitted dishcloths. I bring out three of those. One is used to dry off my hands. A second is to fold in half and put my cell phone inside on top of the tote. I don't leave my cell phone inside the bag because it's almost the same as putting it inside an Easy-Bake Oven. You'll see what the third is used for in a minute.

In this photo, you can also see part of one of the two umbrellas (tip number three) that shade me from the sun. Both are UV-resistant. Even though I'm sitting in the shade, I still get a tan; the sun out here is fierce. I well remember going out on a boat on Lake Powell. When Denis and I got back to our hotel room and I undressed to get in the shower, the sun had gone through my shirt and my bra: I had "lacy" sunburn on my chest!

Now you can see what I use the third dishcloth for: to put underneath my big insulated container (tip number four) of raspberry iced tea. If I were to put my tea directly on the pool decking, no matter how well the container is insulated, the ice would not last very long at all. When it's 120°, ice is important!

These are the tips I've picked up from living in the Sonoran Desert during the summer. Some of you may still think I'm off my rocker to sit in the pool and read when it's so hot, but it works beautifully for me!

Oh-- I forgot to take a photo of my mosquito deterrent (tip number five). Granted, mosquitoes are few and far between when it's 120°, but I hate 'em and take no chances. I have a small filigree lidded metal box in which I burn mosquito coils. I like the smell, and it keeps 'em away from me, and that means my reading experience is even more pleasurable-- especially when the temperature goes down a tiny bit and the humidity rises for monsoon season. 

Since I wrote this post, I've taken two more photos. (I keep forgetting that my smartphone is also a camera!) Here is photographic proof of tips three and five!

You need more than one umbrella in Phoenix!

For burning mosquito coils.

What is your favorite place to read when it's hot? Something tells me most of you prefer your tea and books to be somewhere air-conditioned....

Is This Really Friday Weekly Link Round-Up

A person can get used to routines. I know I certainly can. When I was working, my routines centered around my schedule. Now they center around Denis's. He doesn't do it often, but this week he did a favor for a co-worker and traded shifts so she could attend a special function. Instead of his Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday off (which used to be my schedule, come to think of it), he was off Sunday and worked Thursday.

What this means is that I haven't known what day it is all week.

I knew this was going to happen. I dove into my post-it notes and left myself crucial reminders all over my desk and monitors. So at least I didn't drop the ball on the essential tasks around here.

But there were the times when stray thoughts would float through my mind, and I'd find myself muddled. No, I can't set that program to record. It was on last night, not tonight! Argh!

Now I'd better head out to the corral. Or should I? Is it really Friday?


 

►Books, Movies & Other Interesting Tidbits◄

• My Cousin Rachel: Daphne du Maurier's take on the sinister power of sex. 
• I enjoyed listening to Ann Cleeves and Chris Brookmyre discussing Scottish crime fiction during this podcast. 
• Famous typos from James Joyce to J.K. Rowling. 
• How unrecognizable was the English language just 300 years ago?
• TSA has been testing something new: having airline passengers take their reading material out of their carry-on luggage before going through security screening. 
• What lies beneath the brave new world of feminist dystopian sci-fi? 
• The story of Gaelic speaking soldiers who escaped the Nazis is being turned into a movie.

►Channeling My Inner Indiana Jones◄

• The hidden treasures in Italian libraries. 
• An unexpected Viking toilet discovery leads to controversy.
• Al Capone's diamond pocket watch fetches over $84,000 at a "gangster" auction. 
• Subway digging has uncovered a "Pompeii-like scene" in Rome. 
• An old four-poster bed was dismantled by construction workers and given to auctioneers who sold it for $2900. Now it's been confirmed to be Henry VII's four-poster, and it now could easily be worth millions. 
• Archaeologists have unearthed a massive 1,800-year-old mural outside the capital of Cyprus. 
• New symbols have revealed the development of Egyptian hieroglyphics.

►Channeling My Inner Elly Mae Clampett◄

• Watch what happens when a baby Tasmanian Devil goes out on its first run. 
• How humans helped ants invade the world.

►Heat Wave!◄

• One of the best ways to survive a 120° heat wave is to laugh.

►Fascinating Folk◄

• Horse-riding librarians were the Great Depression's bookmobiles. 
• Agnes Gund sold a painting in order to start a social justice fund. You don't see many of the wealthy doing something like this! 
• The wicked wit and enigma of Dorothy Parker, fifty years on.
• Sherman Alexie on not being "the kind of Indian that's expected." 
• Michael Bond, the creator of Paddington Bear, has died. 
• It's time to bring Branwell, the dark Brontë, into the light.

►The Happy Wanderer◄

• Travel magazine Afar says this restaurant in Arizona has one of the best views in the United States. 
• Sure, you can get liquored up in Key West, but take this literary walking tour first. 
• The story behind this haunted Arizona hotel is seriously creepy.
• Take a look at La Librairie Itinérante ("the traveling bookstore") in France. 

►I ♥ Lists & Quizzes◄

• Which books do Americans take on vacation? 
• Peek inside thousands of Soviet children's books from Princeton University. 
• Nine things readers do better than anyone else. 
• Harry Potter quiz: 20 years, 20 questions. 
• Literary scarves, fingerless gloves, pillows, and more from Storiarts. 
• Enter an archive of 6,000 historical children's books, all digitized and free to read online.  
• Top ten books about lies. 

That's all for this week! Don't forget to stop by next Friday when I'll be sharing a freshly selected batch of links for your surfing pleasure.

Have a great weekend, and read something fabulous!

 

Killer Characters by Ellery Adams

First Line: "All I think about is death," said Laurel Hobbs to her friend and fellow Bayside Book Writer Olivia Limoges.

Olivia Limoges may be enjoying her new marriage, but her friend Laurel Hobbs certainly isn't enjoying her own. Laurel is struggling with a demanding job, lively twin boys, a terminally ill mother-in-law, and a husband who's mostly absent-- and when he deigns to be present, he's whiny and argumentative. Catching Steve with her mother-in-law's nurse? Laurel can't take any more.

When the nurse is found dead, Olivia's husband, Chief Rawlings, has no choice but to take Laurel into custody. The Bayside Book Writers are now a group divided, and Olivia has to work fast to prove Laurel's innocence.

Ellery Adams' Books by the Bay cozy series has been a favorite of mine since its inception. The ensemble cast, the coastal North Carolina setting with its rich history, mouthwatering food, and some fine mysteries to solve have made these books something very special. When I came to the end of Killer Characters, I knew without heading to Amazon to read reviews that many readers would be outraged. If you haven't read this last book in the series and you'd like to leave the characters surrounded by a sort of fairy tale glow, you may want to give this one a miss.

Fortunately I'm an easy-going reader because I can wait patiently for the next book in a series, and I don't send authors hate mail if they don't write the way I want them to. Frankly, I want them to write the way they want to. If my favorite authors are happy, they're going to write longer. Ellery Adams chose to end her wonderful series, not as a fairy tale, but as a story showing the growth and resilience of the main character, Olivia Limoges. People grow... people endure... by experiencing both good and bad. When this series began, Olivia was an ice queen, emotionally closed off, and watching everyone from a distance. By series end, she's made and kept, protected and taken care of, her dear friends. When I closed Killer Characters, I may have had tears in my eyes, but my heart was full. I knew Olivia and the other folks she cares about in Oyster Bay were going to be all right. 

Now... I've been talking about this as though it's a character study only, but there's an excellent mystery to be found here, too-- one that I didn't have solved beforehand-- and that's another thing I've loved about this series. If you haven't read a Books by the Bay mystery, dive right in with the first one, A Killer Plot. These characters grow and change, and you don't want to miss a bit of it.

And might I just say-- Well done, Ellery Adams! I admire your bravery in ending the series the way you wanted to end it. Olivia deserved no less.
 

Killer Characters by Ellery Adams

ISBN: 9780451488442

Berkley Prime Crime © 2017

Mass Market Paperback, 304 pages

Cozy Mystery, #8 Books by the Bay mystery

Rating: A+

Source: Paperback Swap

 

Better Late Than Never by Jenn McKinlay

First Line: "Let the wild rumpus start!" Beth Stanley cried as the cart of books she had stacked to bursting abruptly regurgitated its contents all over the Briar Creek Public Library's main floor with a loud rushing noise followed by slaps and thumps as the books landed on the ground.

Lindsey Norris and her staff at the Briar Creek Public Library are swamped with returns when they hold their very first overdue book amnesty day, but one book catches Lindsey's eye: a copy of Catcher in the Rye that's twenty years past due. Due to Ms. Cole's excellent recordkeeping, she's shocked to discover that the book was checked out by a teacher named Candice Whitley on the day she was murdered. Her killer was never found. 

Lindsey can't help wondering if the book can provide a clue to Candice's killer. Was the murderer the person who returned it? Lindsey is determined to find and bring this person to justice.

I've long been a fan of Jenn McKinlay's feel good writing, and she's delivered another winner with Better Late Than Never. In the midst of speculation over the state of Lindsey and Sully's relationship and the meddling of that British actor who insists on hanging around Briar Creek, we are served up a story about the power of friendship in a setting that showcases how libraries are changing with the times.

The characters are of utmost importance, as they should be in any cozy series worth its salt, and you can tell I've fallen under their spell after reading my remark about "that British actor." Fortunately there are some very interesting developments with that man in the book, and I certainly want to know where those are headed in the next installment. 

But it's not just the characters in Better Late Than Never that make it a winner. The solution to the mystery came out of left field and beaned me right upside the head. I love, love, love being surprised when I learn who done it! Jenn McKinlay's Library Lovers series is one of my favorites, and if you haven't given it a try, I just have to ask-- What are you waiting for?

Better Late Than Never by Jenn McKinlay

ISBN:  9780399583735

Berkley Prime Crime © 2016

Hardcover, 304 pages

Cozy Mystery, #7 Library Lovers mystery

Rating: A

Source: Purchased at The Poisoned Pen.

New Mexico Road Trip: the Randall Davey Audubon Center & Sanctuary

One nice thing about having a blog is that I can relive vacation memories for quite a while after we've returned home. Denis and I enjoyed our week in Santa Fe with its mountains, clear thin air, and temperatures a good thirty degrees cooler than Phoenix.

We spent most of one day at the Randall Davey Audubon Center and Sanctuary. Located up a canyon where the dirt road ends in its parking lot, the property was purchased by Randall Davey in 1920, and his children gifted it to the National Audubon Society in 1983. At least 190 different species of birds have visited this premier New Mexican educational facility, and those of you who have followed my blog for very long at all know automatically why I wanted to spend some time there. 

I'm not going into a long-winded spiel about the day. The trails leading up the mountainside were too steep and uneven for my knees, so while Denis tackled a trail, I found the perfect spot to sit in the shade and let the critters come to me-- and they did!

The road to the sanctuary followed the Santa Fe River for a spell.

  

The opposite side of the canyon. Some big houses over there!

The spot I chose in which to relax and critter watch.

My view up the mountain.

The lavender in particular was covered with butterflies.

And there were goldfinches to watch.

I loved these delicate little flowers.

Hummingbirds were so thick they had to look both ways before taking to the air.

And there's always one who doesn't want his picture taken....

This lizard scuttled past my toes.

Look closely enough and you can see the blue cast to its scales.

On the trip back to the hotel, some typical Santa Fe architecture.

Residents prefer native plants. Three cheers for them!

If there were any of the photos you wanted to see in more detail, just click on any one of them and a new window will automatically open so you can see them all full-size.

Hope you enjoyed our outing. Next up is the jewel in the crown of our week in Santa Fe: the Museum of International Folk Art. Let me tell you, I'm going to have a very difficult time narrowing down which photos to share with you all! 


 

Missing, Presumed by Susie Steiner

First Line: She can feel hope ebbing, like the Christmas lights on fade in Pound Saver.

Manon Bradshaw may love her job, and she may be a highly respected member of the Cambridgeshire police force, but she's thirty-nine and what she wants most is a personal life. She wants a husband and children and goes out on internet dates trying to find Mr. Right. Then-- once again-- her search for love takes a backseat to her job when she finds herself involved in a very puzzling crime.

Edith Hind is a graduate student at Cambridge University and the daughter of very well-connected parents. She's also been missing for almost twenty-four hours. Few clues have been left behind in her home: drops of blood, her keys and phone left behind, the front door ajar with no signs of forced entry. Manon knows this case is going to be huge-- and that every second is crucial to finding Edith alive.

Missing, Presumed is told in the voices of principal characters in alternating chapters: Manon; her partner in the police force, Davy; Edith's friend Helena; Edith's mother Miriam; and one or two chapters from Edith herself. It's a good way to get inside the minds of each character in order to get a clearer picture of what's going on. This is especially true once the investigation gathers steam and the lives of the people closest to Edith are put under the microscope (and often shredded). 

The one character I had the most difficult time coming to grips with is Manon Bradshaw herself. This is because, for most of the book, she is ruled by jealousy. She's not close to her family because her sibling got more attention. She looks at every other female and sees what they have that she doesn't. It's never dawned on her that maybe, just maybe, what everyone else has isn't what she needs. Seeing her finally begin to change her way of thinking was refreshing to say the least.

Although the pace of the book is dramatically slowed by what I refer to as TMM (too much middle), and it has an ending that I didn't find very surprising, I still enjoyed the book. Those alternating voices really pulled me into the story. My next encounter with Manon will be an interesting one.
 

Missing, Presumed by Susie Steiner

eISBN: 9780812998337

Random House © 2016

eBook, 369 pages

Police Procedural, #1 Manon Bradshaw mystery

Rating: B

Source: Purchased from Amazon.


 

Meg Gardiner & Spencer Quinn at The Poisoned Pen!

I think Denis has missed going to author events at The Poisoned Pen because he was ready to go before I was. The expected road construction had disappeared, and the drive across Phoenix to Scottsdale was uneventful. Denis reserved our seats, I bought some books (surprise, surprise), and we both settled down at the table in the back to read and wait for that night's authors: Meg Gardiner and Spencer Quinn (AKA Peter Abrahams).

Host Barbara Peters came out early to inform us that it was Spencer/Peter's birthday, and she passed around a birthday card for us to sign. Then when he came out to join us, we all sang a chorus of "Happy Birthday" as he was given his card and a celebratory cupcake. 

L to R: Meg Gardiner, Spencer Quinn, Barbara Peters

At first he seemed a bit embarrassed, but when he started asking for encores, I decided that he was just a big kidder. (Been a long time since I've heard anyone called that!) While Spencer was making us laugh, I kept looking at Meg Gardiner. This was the first time I'd been to The Poisoned Pen when she was there, and I hadn't read any of her books, but she certainly looked familiar. When I got home and looked up a few things online, I discovered that she is a three-time Jeopardy! winner. I've been a fan of that program since pre-Alex Trebek days, so that's why I reacted the way I did.

Barbara brought up the first book she'd read that had been written by Spencer (as Peter Abrahams-- henceforth I shall refer to him as Spencer!), Their Wildest Dreams. "That book got me interested in writing about Arizona and led me to set my Chet and Bernie series here," he said. "Speaking of Chet and Bernie, at the end of Scents and Sensibility Bernie wasn't in very good shape. I wish I hadn't done that. Not a day goes by where I don't get angry, wistful, annoyed, heart-broken emails-- a lot of them in all caps-- about it... especially since there hasn't been a Chet and Bernie book this year!"

Spencer knows how to keep us laughing.

"I thought you had a year without a Chet and Bernie book to allow Bernie to heal," Barbara said. 

"That's it! That was my plan!" Spencer quickly agreed. 

Barbara then welcomed Meg back to the United States. "Yes, my husband's job took us to London for a while, but now we're in Austin, Texas-- we just can't get enough of that humidity!" Meg laughed.

"Your new book, Unsub, taps into your childhood, doesn't it?" Barbara asked.

"Yes. I grew up in southern California where the Zodiac Killer was legendary. I also learned that there was a couple who lived within walking distance of my parents' home who were the victims of a serial killer. Things that scare me I tend to turn into fiction."

"I loved it [Unsub]," Spencer said.

"You can say that again and again and again!" Meg replied with a big smile.

"Along with Happy Birthday. We can just chant," said Barbara.

"Right, and let's do Happy Birthday again right now," Spencer joked.

After saying that she thought Gardiner and Quinn were a perfect pairing for this event, Spencer quickly agreed with his host. "Both of our main characters are strong females. Both are almost pioneers in their fields. And both have problematic fathers."

Available Now!

In talking about the ending of The Right Side, Quinn told us that he'd made it as happy an ending as he could and make it credible. Gardiner immediately said, "But it's a fair ending, a satisfying ending, a true ending. LeAnne is such an incredible character. So brave, so damaged, so out of control during part of the book and trying to figure out how to pull it back together, that if you'd made it, you know... If she'd had a cupcake at the end, it would've been false!"

"Thank God, I didn't think of the cupcake!" Quinn said, eyeing the two sitting on the table. "LeAnne is used to living in a country where strong women are advancing in so many fields. Then she's put into a medieval setting in Afghanistan. What really happens there is all about male and female.  

"I just kind of let LeAnne run. So this book is part mystery, part war novel, and part road novel. 

"The Right Side does not have a narrating dog. This dog is very different from Chet, very difficult to get to know, but crucial to what happens in the story." 

"You've written about damaged characters before," Barbara said. "I still remember your character with the asbestos disease. That was one of your most hair-raising books, and it didn't have a happy ending."

Spencer Quinn

"No, it didn't," Quinn agreed. "The character was a sculptor of some note, and when you are a person of some note, the New York Times will already have prepared your obituary. After getting his diagnosis of mesothelioma, he found a way to get access to his own obituary, and there was a mistake in it about his own life. He pulls at this thread and learns that much of what his understanding of how his life had been was false."

"That's still one of my favorite books," Barbara said.

"Nerve Damage," Quinn said to all of us in the room wanting the book title. 

Talk then turned to justice, writing, and the endings of books. "In Agatha Christie's day, readers knew that justice would be done, that there would be closure," Barbara said. "How do writers today deal with that?"

"I like to write a satisfying ending, but not a tidy ending," Meg said. "I like to leave a few threads dangling."

"And that's life," Quinn said. "In my opinion, the best crime novel of all time is Crime and Punishment. The worst crimes can never be fixed. You've torn something apart that can never be put back together." 

Meg then told us that Unsub is the beginning of a new series and that she'll be continuing the story of Caitlin Hendrix. The next book will not take place in California, as Unsub does, but almost everywhere except that state. "They do come through Phoenix!" she said. Caitlin's had a career change in book two, so there's quite a bit to look forward to.

Meg Gardiner

What's up next for Spencer? "There's a new Chet and Bernie coming up next. He's going to be okay-- it's a cheery book!" the author assured us. "I don't know what's going to happen with LeAnne. She is impossible to walk away from. I'm still considering what to do about her. My editor wanted a new series narrated by a cat and dog, but then she resigned. However, the new editor is very enthusiastic about it, too. I've gotten to know cats through being around my daughter's cats. So... first there's a new Chet and Bernie, then there will be a new kids' book." 

Spencer had a question for Meg: "Was Caitlin's father a character in your book from the get-go?"

"Yes," Meg said. "Caitlin is the daughter of the homicide detective who couldn't break the case. She's brought in because they think she's the one who can drag all the facts and insights of the original case out of her father."

"When I started writing The Right Side, I used the form used by psychologists to diagnose PTSD, and I found that doing this made it easier to move back and forth in the story," Quinn said. "When you're writing, you don't want to hear the gears shifting like it's an old clunker. And I never know what I'll use in my books. One of my daughters was on the pole vault team in high school, and I went to many of the meets. LeAnne just happens to be a pole vaulter in high school, too...."

Available Now!

There's good news about Unsub. Gardiner told us that it's been bought by CBS as an hour-long television series. "The production team has also done Justified and Elementary. I'm just...giddy!"

Quinn's Chet and Bernie series has been optioned by Hollywood "since before Dog on It came out. It's still alive. I don't know what's happening, and I've found that it's best not to worry about it."

What about character research for their books? "LeAnne popped into my mind fully formed," Quinn said. "In Afghanistan, they were used to dealing with Afghanis as colleagues or informants, and it finally dawned on them that they were only talking to half the population-- the male half. I have friends in the military who've been great. One read the manuscript with a fine-tooth comb, and another is at the top of clandestine ops."

When asked if she'd talked with any of the people involved in the Zodiac Killer investigation, Meg said, "No, but since the book has been published, I have been contacted by a few who did.

When talking about killers who stop and then start up again after years have passed, Gardiner said, "The BTK Killer was content to relive his memories when a journalist wrote a book about him. BTK said that the journalist got it wrong, and that made him start thinking again about all the murders he wanted to commit." (Excuses, excuses, eh?)

This was such an enjoyable event. Spencer Quinn's The Right Side is one of the best books I've read so far this year, and I'm really looking forward to reading Meg Gardiner's Unsub. I definitely encourage you to watch the Livestream event so you can experience every bit of these two authors talking and laughing and enjoying themselves. I'd embed the video here in this post, but it didn't behave the last time I tried doing that. Better I give you the link to click than antagonize any of you readers. I like you all too much to do that!

Last but not least, I'll leave you with my book haul from the evening---

A little something for everyone!

The Cleaner by Elisabeth Herrmann

First Line: Martha Jonas stood in front of her open wardrobe and pressed the Bakelite headphones even more firmly to her ears.

Judith Kepler is a crime scene specialist. She is a master at cleaning the most gruesome crime scenes and turning them back into habitable spaces. 

At one such scene, Judith comes face to face with her past. The murder victim knew Judith's secret: as a child she was sent to an orphanage under mysterious circumstances, and to this day she does not know the identity of her parents, but she does know that the East German secret police were always hovering in the background.

In the quest to learn both her true identity and what happened to her parents, Judith begins to ask questions. Now she's the target of some very powerful people...and her life will never be the same.

In a narrative that moves between the present day and East Germany before the fall of the Berlin Wall, Elisabeth Herrmann has created a fascinating character. Judith Kepler has many hidden depths, and she continues to surprise readers as the story progresses. In addition, a question is raised that's tangential to the plot; nevertheless, it made me wonder why I'd never thought about it before. What happens when spies and other covert operatives get old? 

Despite the questions raised and the strength of Judith's character, the pace of this book is glacial-- which could have been fixed by tightening the story (to the tune of about one hundred pages). If you're in the mood for a multi-faceted main character in an extremely slow-moving story, The Cleaner could very well be the perfect book for you.

The Cleaner by Elisabeth Herrmann

Translated from the German by Bradley Schmidt

ISBN: 9781786580207

Bonnier Zaffre © 2017

Paperback, 400 pages

Thriller, Standalone

Rating: B-

Source: the publisher