Scene of the Blog Featuring Teresa of Views from My Highland Cottage!

This is a bittersweet post: the last Scene of the Blog. It's been a good run, and I've met many wonderful book bloggers through this weekly feature. I can remember asking other bloggers on Twitter if they thought this idea would fly. Little did I know that it could-- and would-- for four years.

I am thrilled to introduce you to a book blogger I just recently met, Teresa of Views from My Highland Cottage. No, I'm not whisking you away to the Highlands of Scotland; I'm taking us all on a visit to a certain home in a National Historic neighborhood in Shreveport, Louisiana. Teresa's blog is a wonderful mix of books, photographs, and perspectives on life and on her historic neighborhood. If you haven't visited Views from My Highland Cottage, please please please take this opportunity to do so. You'll be glad you did! (Don't be shy-- say hello while you're there!)

If you're visiting from Teresa's blog-- Welcome! I'm glad you stopped by to see the wonderful spots where she reads and blogs. If you'd like to see any of the photos in larger sizes, all you have to do is click on them, and they'll open in new windows. There are some very large photos, and for those (once you have them up in a new window) you may have to click on them again to get them full size... just because Blogger likes to be contrary that way.

Once you've feasted your eyes on Teresa's book haven, you're more than welcome to take a look at previous participants' spaces. Click on the Scene of the Blog tab at the very top of the header on this page. There are two ways to search: by Blog Name or by Location. Now, let's go on a very special tour. I've always hoped I'd find a book blogger with one certain item in the home, and Teresa's got it!

There are treasures ahead!

A variety of views can be found in my blog, Views From My Highland Cottage—book reviews to be sure, but also views of life in a National Historic District, plus photographic views of our house, hobbies and travels.  Believe it or not, Louisiana does have some land above sea level and our neighborhood is a bit higher than land originally settled in Shreveport, the mid-sized city in Northwest Louisiana where I live and write.  The Highland in the blog title is named after the Highland neighborhood where my husband and I live in our large, rambling white frame house. 

Reading nook in the guest cottage

Nestled in her cottage reading nook

Hidden behind our house is a small guest cottage, built of recycled materials in the early 20th century.   It is here that I often tuck myself away in a corner to read and write.  In an old gold brocade wingback chair my sister-in-law gave us, my legs propped on a yard sale hassock, toes touching my books, I happily spend hours in the evenings.

I’m a relative newbie to blogging but I’ve kept lists and synopses of books read for years, and I’ve journaled my every mundane thought-- I mean profound perspective on life-- off and on since I was a teenager.  My friend, Jennie, creator of A Garden Carried in the Pocket that has been featured in Scene of the Blog, came over one Saturday last March and helped me set up a basic blog, and I’ve been learning about blogging by doing it ever since.  There is so much more I want to learn to make my blog more visually appealing and organized.  For now I’m happy when I find time to post.

Another cozy reading spot

Our house has many nooks for reading and writing so it’s a wonder I make it to work on any given day.  I could just move from spot to spot, reading and writing, all day long. 

An alternate space for reading in the cottage is the sofa if I tire of cramming myself in the cozy corner.

Blogging in the cottage

My lap top is usually set up on the vintage dining table in the cottage if I want to blog here...

One shot of Teresa's library

...but my favorite blogging area is my library where the majority of my books find a home.

More of Teresa's library

[Pardon me for intruding on Teresa's tour, but this is it! The one thing I'd always hoped to find in a featured book blogger's home-- a library ladder! When I first set eyes on this photo, I got up and did a not-for-YouTube happy dance, complete with a couple of whoops and hollers.]

Blogging in the library

Reading spot in the library

In the winter I can be found reading on the love seat in the library next to the old Dearborn heater.

Reading on the landing

Upstairs on the landing is another spot hidden away for more books and stolen moments for reading while life continues on the first floor. 

Reading in bed? You bet!

Of course every reader goes to bed with a book and, in my case, my journals.  My husband’s father was born in this bed so it has been in his family for a long time.  I love the grandeur of this reading spot, but I do need a foot stool to get into bed!

I’m an educator and have been most of my life.  I love learning new things, seeing new places and meeting new people.  The blogging world is one just opening up to me and I look forward to more explorations of its many facets and possibilities.

Thank you so very, very much for taking us on this tour of your lovely home and its many spots for reading, creating, and contemplation. You're an inspiration, Teresa! Your blog is one that I enjoy reading very much, and I know that your readership will grow and grow!

While I'm on the subject of thanks, I'd like to thank each and every one of you for your support and your participation during the four years I've run this feature. To all who shared their reading and blogging spaces, to everyone who faithfully showed up each week to check those spaces out, it's been a marvelous run.  

Thank you. From the bottom of my heart.

Fatal Induction by Bernadette Pajer

First Line: The first indication that Professor Benjamin Bradshaw's life was about to plunge again into chaos appeared in the form of a flatulent horse eating Mrs. Prouty's broad beans over the garden fence, its huge teeth tugging greedily at the vines.

It's 1901, and another school year is about to begin at the University of Washington in Seattle. The obsessively organized Professor of Electrical Engineering, Benjamin Bradshaw, has everything ready for his classes which allows him time to participate in an electrical competition.

In this second book in the series, we get to see Bradshaw not as a teacher, but as an inventor who can lose all track of time down in his basement-- to the dismay of his housekeeper Mrs. Prouty. Unfortunately Bradshaw is not going to be left to his stimulating muse. Mrs. Prouty insists on complaining about the horse that's been eating her beans for hours, and when Bradshaw goes to investigate, he finds the horse hitched to an empty peddler's wagon. Although he searches, he can find no trace of the owner or his daughter, only bottles of Ralph's Restorative-- a tonic that has been making people ill.

Then the entire nation is thrown into shock: President McKinley is assassinated. But Bradshaw can't get the idea out of his head that a little girl is missing and may be in danger. Although he can't let the girl's disappearance go, he seems to be getting very little help from either his friend, Detective O'Brien, or Detective March, a policeman who tries his best to be helpful.

Trying to be his own investigator down in the Tenderloin (an area on the waterfront where all sorts of saloons, brothels, and other sources of vice abound), Bradshaw quickly learns that the only results he may get as a detective are results he doesn't want: putting his own son's life in jeopardy. Then as a few more pieces of information click together, the professor realizes that there may be a way to get the information he needs: turn his electrical invention into a trap to catch the killer.

I enjoy these Professor Bradshaw mysteries. Pajer's research into Seattle's history brings the city and the times to life in a very natural way, whether it's an amusing scene that lets us know how Profanity Hill got its name or by adding a character named Nell "Harry" Pickerell, a real young lady who preferred to go about town dressed as a man.

Another thing that is so enjoyable about these books is the way in which Pajer makes the history of electricity and of electrical inventions fascinating. We tend to take all things electrical for granted. Unless we live in areas that experience terrifying storms, most of us have never known more than a few minutes scattered here and there when we couldn't turn on a light or reach into the refrigerator for a cold drink. Pajer makes the early days of electricity and the inventors who bent it to their will exciting.

Even better than the historical detail and setting are Pajer's characters. Benjamin Bradshaw has known tragedy in his life. Although he still disappears into a fog of inventive fury, he is slowly coming out of his self-induced solitude and is making friends. His relationship with his son is an important feature in the books, and he even has his eye on a young lady-- although at this point he's still much too shy to do anything about it. (And I certainly wouldn't recommend his inviting Missouri Fremont over to dinner if Mrs. Prouty is doing the cooking!)

Yes, these are characters a reader can grow to care about very quickly, and even though it's not necessary to read the books in order for them to make sense, I think you should consider it so you can see how the characters and their relationships grow and change over time.

The only thing about Fatal Induction that I can't rave about is the mystery itself. Let me rephrase that. The mystery is a good one, it's the identity of the villain that I had trouble with because the minute the person was described I thought to myself, "Bingo!" As to the reasons behind the villainy? I didn't have those figured out at all, and oftentimes that's the most important part of the crime, isn't it?

If you're in the mood for an historical mystery that sets you down right in the middle of Seattle in 1901 with a good puzzle to solve and excellent characters to help you along the way, Bernadette Pajer's Professor Bradshaw mysteries are just the ticket.

Fatal Induction by Bernadette Pajer

ISBN:  9781615954025

Poisoned Pen Press © 2012

eBook, 250 pages

Genre: Historical Mystery, #2 Professor Bradshaw mystery

Rating: A-

Source: the author, in exchange for an honest review

The Roadside Cafe Oracle

You Are Grounded

You feel like you live a life of abundance. There is so much in your life to feel thankful for. Making the little things wonderful is important to you, and you try to add a bit of comfort to each day. You often help others with their problems. You offer practical and workable solutions. You stick with what works and avoid novelty for its own sake. You know there is no need to reinvent the wheel.

The Roadside Cafe Oracle

Scene of the Crime with Author Bernadette Pajer!

I have a fondness for the history of Seattle, Washington-- as I think anyone would after taking the Underground Tour downtown. When I learned that there was a new historical mystery series set there, you know I had to get my hands on the first book. I was hooked on Professor Benjamin Bradshaw before I'd finished A Spark of Death, and if you like good historical mysteries, I think you will be, too.

Bernadette Pajer

Bernadette Pajer is the author of the Professor Bradshaw mystery series. She's a graduate of the University of Washington and a proud member of Mystery Writers of America, Sisters in Crime, Northwest Science Writers, PNWA, and the Seattle7Writers.org.

Research is Pajer's favorite activity, and she happily delves into Seattle's past and the early days of electrical invention as she plots Professor Bradshaw's investigations. Pajer lives in the Seattle area with her husband and son.


Here are a few more links just in case you feel like learning even more about this talented writer:

Bernadette Pajer's website

Bernadette Pajer on Twitter

Bernadette Pajer on Facebook

Bernadette Pajer on Goodreads

Now it's time for the fun stuff-- the interview!

What was the very first book you remember reading and loving? What makes that book so special?

I must have been about ten when I read A Long Way to Go by Borden Deal. It's about three children on vacation whose parents leave them for the day at a motel daycare and never return, so the children, afraid of what the authorities might do to them, decide to walk home. Six hundred miles!  I remember being so amazed at the children's daring. One of the kids, a girl I think, was overweight when they set out and in great shape when they arrived home, and all of the kids matured and learned on the journey. I escaped completely into the story and for a very long time after reading it would often think about what that sort of adventure would be like. I haven't read that book as an adult, but I'm now curious if I would still enjoy it as much. 

No other book stuck in my memory until I was about twelve and read Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. I remember being surprised that an assigned school book was an amazing, bizarre story, and it, too, pulled me completely into another world, engaged my imagination, and made me think about so many things in a totally new way. I hadn't I realized until then that many books adults read, even the classics, were entertaining stories about people and ideas that could be so engrossing. Coincidentally (or is it synchronicity?),  in the wonderful way our lives circle and intertwine, I recently learned that the inspirational advice given me by Richard Bach at a chance meeting when I first began to write had its origins with Ray Bradbury. (You can go to Blogtalk Radio to listen to William Kenower's interview with Richard Bach.) 

Outside of your writing and all associated commitments, what do you like to do in your free time?

Read! Sorry, but it's true. I love to go RV'ng with my husband and son, have backyard BBQ's, walk ocean beaches, travel, and eat great food other people have prepared. But all of those things are made better with a good book!

If I were to visit your hometown, where would you recommend that I go? (I like seeing and doing things that aren't in all the guide books.)

Seattle Mystery Bookshop  (Seattle, downtown), Uppercase Bookshop  (Snohomish), Edmonds Bookshop
(Edmonds), Eagle Harbor Books  (Bainbridge Island), Queen Anne Books (Seattle, Queen Anne Hill), Vashon Bookshop  (Vashon Island), Elliott Bay Books (Seattle, Capitol Hill), A Book for All Seasons (Leavenworth),  Third Place Books (Lake Forest Park), and University Book Store (Seattle, University district.) 

But not in that order because that would be a crazy zig-zagging drive. Each of these stores is located in the heart of a great little town or neighborhood (in or near Seattle ) you could explore, and you'd meet the nicest booksellers and book lovers! The University Bookstore is located within walking distance of Denny Hall on the UW campus, the building known as the Administration Building to Professor Bradshaw!

[Now... does this woman know the perfect tour or what?!?]

You have total control over casting a movie based on your life. Which actor would you cast as you?

Oh, good grief, no! Dull movie! I am a writer without any drama in her personal  life, thank goodness. A contented life does not make for a good screenplay. Now if you were to ask about my Professor Bradshaw, well, then I'd say I'd love Masterpiece Mystery to do a series and I'd give them free rein with the casting because they are brilliant at it. I'm hoping if I say this enough online then someone with the ability to make it happen will make it happen. [I think it would make a perfect television series!]

Who is your favorite recurring character in crime fiction?

Benedict Cumberbatch

Since I currently adore Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock in the new BBC series, I'd have to say Sherlock Holmes, but I'm also a fan of Hercule Poirot and his little grey cells.

[I don't like Cumberbatch at all. That's why I didn't track down a photo of him....]

Name one book that you've read that you wish you had written. What is it about that book that made it come to mind?

Honestly, I don't wish I had written any books but mine. To me, books are like children—as a writer, I might envy the talent revealed in books written by others but I don't covet the books. What I wish when I read great books is to be able to make my own stories come alive with the same brilliance.  I'm currently reading Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter and finding the writing marvelous and will likely read it a second time to study.


How did you celebrate when you first heard you were to be published?

By editing! The news came by email from Poisoned Pen Press. I'd been working closely with an editor on the first 60 pages of A Spark of Death with the hopes that if they liked my revisions, they would make an offer. I figured I had a few weeks of work ahead of me yet, when an email popped in congratulating me and saying my book had been slotted for publication July 2011! I sat absolutely stunned. Then I think I gasped, squealed, tried to explain to my son, who was seven at the time, what I was freaking out about. My husband was home and out in the backyard, stretched out in the sun. I danced around him with the news, being quite silly, and I grabbed my sun hat and threw it in the air. Then I called my agent, then my mom, then my sisters. Then I sat down and got to work!


What did you do the first time you saw one of your books on a shelf in a bookstore?

Took a picture! Asked the bookstore if I could sign them, and they let me! They didn't even ask for identification.





I don't know if you've seen it, but I love Parnell Hall's video about book signings. What is the most unusual experience you've had at a book signing or author event?

I haven't seen it, but will look for it. Nothing unusual has happened to me. I told you my life was delightfully dull. So far, my signings have been wonderful, and the biggest surprise to me has been that people who don't know me personally have come simply because they like my books. It's heartwarming and gratifying to think my books are out there in the world, making friends independent of me.


What's the best thing about eBooks? What's the worst?

I don't think I have anything revolutionary to add to the great eBook debate. I love that I can read a book anywhere, anytime, from my "cloud," on my phone or computer or Nook. I hate that during this time of transition, many wonderful bookstores have not survived. But I believe-- people being who they are— that books in all formats will survive, and we'll eventually find a new balance and new business models that will keep readers, writers, publishers, and bookstores thriving.

On Sale Now!

Thank you so much for spending this time with us, Bernadette! It was such a pleasure to be able to get to know you a little better.

May your book sales do nothing but increase!

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Stop by tomorrow when you'll be able to read my review of the second book in the Professor Bradshaw series, Fatal Induction!

Reconnecting on This Weekly Link Round-Up

It's been a quiet week here at Casa Kittling, and sometimes that's just what the doctor ordered. Denis and I are getting excited about our trip to the UK next spring, I'm mentally packing the new luggage and wondering if I dare travel with just my Nook, and at the rate the pool water is cooling down, I'll soon be setting up reading shop in a poolside chair instead of in the pool. I've read some wonderful books in that pool this summer. Perhaps I can squeak in one or two more without having icicles hanging off my ears....

On a more personal note, I'm renewing acquaintance with a very dear friend. I won't go into how and why we grew apart. She knows, and I know, and that's enough of that. Suffice it to say that I wasn't happy with the status quo and decided to give it one more try. Words cannot express how I feel about having her back in my life again. It's almost as though I've had a limb reattached. As we all know-- life's just too damned short. If something similar has happened to you and you're missing a dear, dear friend, try making a connection one more time. It doesn't matter one little bit what happened or who was at fault. What matters is the hole that's in your heart. Make the connection. It's worth it.

Links? Oh yeah. I've got a few of those around here somewhere. Let me take a look....


Bookish News & Other Interesting Stuff

• The Delights of the Montague Bookmill.
• Want to know why your library doesn't carry a lot of eBooks? Read What's a Library Dollar Worth?
• Why can't this happen to you and me? A possible Renoir surfaces at a Virginia flea market.
• What does your bookshelf say about you?
• Fifty Shades of Grey is the book that Britons are most likely to leave behind in their hotel room. (The other titles in contention are interesting, too.)
• Squatters reopen a library in north London after the council closes service.
• Nothing like doing a little do-it-yourself home renovation and discovering an ancient Mayan mural in your kitchen.
• On a canine note, have you met Zeus, the world's tallest dog? Or have you heard about Ginger, the golden retriever that turned a stroll on the beach into a drug bust?
• HomeGoods has one of those little style quizzes where you choose the five photos you like best and their guru tells you your style. Evidently I am "Spa Life." (HomeGoods, that doesn't mean I'm redoing my house any time soon!)
• If you've got an extra £4,000,000 lying around, you can buy yourself a Cornish harbor at Charlestown. (I've always wanted to visit Cornwall....)

Book Candy

• I love bookmarks, and I love these Be Right Back bookmarkers. Click on the tiny photo above the price, and you can see the others that are available.
• A massive river of 10,000 discarded books rages through Melbourne, Australia.
• Check out Share Your (Book)Shelf at Tumblr-- and share your own!

eBooks & eReaders

• Will the new Nook tablet run Windows 8?
• For $15 Amazon will allow you to opt out of all the ads on the Kindle Fire HD special offers version.
• The new Amazon Kindle Fire tablets will be available in the UK starting October 25.
• Overall eBook growth slows down, but children's digital books show record sales.
• If you've got a Kindle Fire HD tablet and you also listen to audio books through Audible.com, Amazon has a new feature that will sync the eBook and the audio book as you read. The downside? You've got to buy the Kindle and the Audible versions of the same book.

Social Media Tip

• How to stop Facebook from tracking you. (You know... I don't go anywhere super exciting on the internet, but why does every website seem to think it has the right to follow me? And that just reminded me of the photos that were taken and published of the Duchess of Cambridge. Don't get me started!)

I  ♥  Lists

• 10 great books that should be movies
• 20 famous authors' school photos
• 10 bookstores repurposed from unused structures
• 30 authors inspired by cats
• The politically incorrect etymologies of 11 words and phrases
• I could sit and watch 'em all day, so why not... Top 10 Literary Otters?
• The Top 7 Femme Fatales

New to My Google Reader

• Too Fond
• loiteringwithintent

That's it for this week. Don't forget to stop by next weekend when I'll have a freshly selected batch of links for your surfing pleasure!

Hearse and Buggy by Laura Bradford

First Line: Claire Weatherly looked around the empty stockroom, kneading the small of her back with stiff, tired fingers.

Claire Weatherly has finally called her marriage quits; her high-powered Wall Street husband is going to have to find someone else to berate and ignore. She decided to stay for a while with her Aunt Diane, the owner of the Sleep Heavenly Inn in Heavenly, Pennsylvania, but after six months, Claire knows she's found the lifestyle she's been craving and the place where she wants to live her life.

Her shop, Heavenly Treasures, is doing well, and Esther, the young Amish woman who helps her, is doing a wonderful job. The former tenant, Walter Snow, had cheated the local Amish out of a lot of money, but once they realized that Claire was not cut from the same cloth, more and more are bringing her their handmade crafts to sell. But when Walter Snow is found dead in the alley outside Heavenly Treasures, Claire knows that suspicion is going to fall on many of her new friends.

Hearse and Buggy is a light, quick, enjoyable read. As Bradford introduces her cast of characters, she imparts quite a bit of knowledge about the Amish, which should please most readers. Claire herself is an appealing main character who has always dreamed of a slower pace of life and has finally found it-- and several new friends as well. And now that she's found what she's been searching for, she's willing to defend it.

Aunt Diane is a level-headed, positive source of support for Claire, as well as being a fount of information about the area and its people. And in this first book, Claire wastes no time in having two very eligible, handsome men looking at her with interest and speculation.

One-- farmer Benjamin Miller-- is Amish and recently widowed. He's available in every way but his faith. The other-- police detective Jakob Fisher-- is Amish and was born and raised on a farm outside Heavenly; however, he decided to become a policeman after vowing to live in the Amish way. As a result, he is shunned and can have no contact with his family or any other member of the Amish faith.

Normally I can do without a strong romantic element in the books I read, but in this case, it's a very interesting angle and gives the characters much more depth. Claire, in particular, can be of great service to Jakob since she has a good relationship with the Amish. She can ask the questions that wouldn't be answered if Jakob were the one asking them.

I didn't find the mystery in this book very difficult to solve, and of the three Amish women portrayed in the book, two were a bit too fragile for my taste, but I did enjoy the book. Bradford has set the stage for what could be a very strong and interesting mystery series.

Hearse and Buggy by Laura Bradford

ISBN: 9780425251317

Berkley Prime Crime © 2012

Mass Market Paperback, 288 pages

Genre: Cozy Mystery, Amateur Sleuth, #1 Amish Mystery

Rating: B

Source: Paperback Swap

Scene of the Blog Featuring Rory of Fourth Street Review!

It's always a pleasure to stumble across a new book blog and see that you share some reading DNA with the person who's created it. Is this week's featured blogger a nut about crime fiction? Nope, but then I do have more than criminal reading genes, you know! Rory is an eclectic reader who once harbored hopes of being the female version of Indiana Jones. (As long as there's no snakes, I'm right there with you, Rory!)

This Coloradan is a librarian by day and a book reviewer by night, writing adult and children's reviews for the National edition of Examiner. The simple, clean design of her blog, Fourth Street Review, reminds me of the photos you're about to feast your eyes on. If you've never visited Fourth Street Review before, I certainly hope you'll take this opportunity to do so-- and please don't forget to say hello while you're there!

If you're visiting from Rory's blog-- Welcome! I'm glad you stopped by to see her creative spaces. If you'd like to see any of the photos in larger sizes, all you have to do is click on them, and they'll open in new windows. If you'd like to see the reading and blogging spaces of previous participants, click on the Scene of the Blog tab at the very top of my header. There are two ways to search: by Blog Name and by Location. Rory's waiting to give us the tour, so let's not keep her waiting!

A primary reading spot!

We moved into our house nearly two years ago, but as we are still in the process of renovating, multiple and mobile blogging stations are a necessity. One of the selling points of this house (for me) was that it has a room that was clearly destined to be a library. In addition to housing most of my books, it serves as one of my primary reading and the occasional blogging location. There is an identical bookcase on the other half of the room, but the state of the shelves is so chaotic that it borders on embarrassing.

[The shelves above my desk are in the same category, Rory!]

Who could resist reading in here??

The other location where I can be found reading or blogging is in bed. The bedroom was the first room to be redone right after the move. The previous owners had glued(!) and haphazardly nailed old floorboards to the walls, those boards had become infested with a variety of creatures. The final straw was one night when I pulled back the bed sheets – there were spiders in the bed. My family’s lucky I didn’t run screaming for the hills (it was close; I am not a bug person). At any rate, I now treat my bedroom like the bug free reading sanctuary it has become. It also explains the prevalence of white – bugs cannot hide on white furnishings.

[No, they can't. I remember an old white fake fur bedside rug from years and years ago. The owners of the apartment building should've spent a few dollars having the apartments sprayed because I could sit in bed and watch earwigs crawling across that rug, heading right for me. Okay... now I've given myself goosebumps....]

Can't get much more organized than this!

Ironically, perhaps the place I blog from least is the office. I think the only way I get in there is if the rest of the house is asleep! You can see a little bit of my system on the shelf. Library books get their own category, then there is the to be read and to be reviewed pile. The books have sticky notes indicating publication and review by date if it’s an ARC.

Start 'em early, I always say!

We take reading seriously at all age levels! :-)  I do a lot of reading in the boys’ room as well – though it is certainly not my reading.

As I am a fairly recent entrant to the book blogging community, I feel like there is still so much to learn (and other bloggers to stumble across, so please stop by and say hello)! 

For me, blogging started as a way to talk books to others who actually wanted to hear it! Despite being a librarian, I don’t know many people who enjoy reading with the same passion I do. I work in a highly subject-specific research library, which leaves little room for talk about fiction, so this has been a wonderful outlet. 

It has been rewarding (and a bit of a relief to be honest) to find there are other people out there who share the same fictional love for Mr. Edward Fairfax Rochester that I do!

[You betcha! Forget that mangy Heathcliff. Give me Eddie any day!]


Thank you so very much for allowing us this glimpse into your home and creative spaces, Rory. We certainly appreciate it. I would also imagine that I'm not alone in thinking your home looks like it belongs on the pages of House Beautiful. You're doing a fantastic job of renovation!

Don't forget to stop by next Wednesday when I'll be featuring yet another book blogger from our worldwide community!

Judgment Call by J.A. Jance

First Line: The car stopped in the middle of a stretch of rough dirt road.

Sheriff Joanna Brady's daughter Jenny decides to go for an early morning ride and stumbles across the body of her high school principal, meaning that Joanna's personal and professional lives are about to meet head on. Not only did the murderer have to pass right by the ranch, the situation gets even stickier when a photo of the dead woman's body gets posted on Facebook. Joanna knows that there's only one person who could've taken that picture: her own daughter.

As the investigation begins, Joanna would dearly love to avoid her mother, who's one of the people in charge of Bisbee's big art show and auction, but it's not meant to be. Joanna has to juggle her demanding mother along with the touchy situation with her daughter, a murder investigation, budget cuts, new employees, and a coroner who thinks he's God's gift. Only her writer husband and energetic toddler aren't adding to her to-do list.

As Joanna deals with that to-do list, the investigation seems to point to a group of teenagers who have a grudge against the deceased high school principal, but the more the sheriff digs, the more she learns that the educator had lived a very secretive life. Joanna knows that the woman's buried past undoubtedly holds the key to identifying her killer.

I make no secret of the fact that J.A. Jance's Sheriff Joanna Brady series is one of my all-time favorites, and Judgment Call is one of the very best in the series. It's not necessary to read these books in order for them to make sense, but when you do-- as I have-- you can't help but appreciate and admire Jance's skill at putting together a wonderful cast of characters in the perfect setting.

Yes, the story is a strong one that blends good old-fashioned detective work with the ever-pervasive internet. I knew who the killer was, in a manner of speaking, but I swung and missed at a fast ball of a clue that the author threw right down the middle of the plate and could only exclaim at my blindness when the all-important identity was revealed. But story isn't the only good thing about a Sheriff Joanna Brady novel.

The setting-- the very real old mining town of Bisbee, Arizona-- is pitch perfect. Jance grew up in Bisbee, and you can follow the directions she gives in her books like a road map through the area and the town. When a chase at the end of the book veers onto a dirt "road" that heads up a mountain to the cell phone towers, I had to smile. I've been on that trail, and there's no way a limosine's going to make it in one piece. Strong story and a strong setting. Are you still with me?

If you are, then let's add that cast of characters I mentioned earlier. Throughout the series I've watched Joanna Brady grow as a person, as a wife, as a mother, and as the sheriff of one of the largest counties in the United States. She continues to grow with each book; in this book, she sees her mother in a new light, and she learns something about her father's death that leads her to making a very important decision, a judgment call. Joanna may not always make the right choice, but you respect how she comes to make each one.

It may be Joanna's show in this book and in this series, but she's not the only character you come to care about. Her husband, her children, her mother... you even grow to know and care about Joanna's co-workers and people like Junior, a developmentally disabled man who works at a local diner. Jance's Joanna Brady novels are what I like to call "slice of life" books because they are so real, so down-to-earth, that you feel as though you know these people. You come to care for them, and you come to each new book wanting to know where this latest adventure will take them. If you like to feel involved with the characters in the books you read, come on down to Bisbee, and sit a spell with the Sheriff of Cochise County, Arizona.

Judgment Call by J.A. Jance

ISBN: 9780061731167

William Morrow and Company © 2012

Hardcover, 387 pages

Genre: Police Procedural, #15 Sherrif Joanna Brady mystery

Rating: A+

Source: Purchased at the Poisoned Pen.