Tuesday, December 09, 2008

A Good Read -

My friend Tammy from Fairlight Farms in Missouri recently wrote about the dangers of visiting a used book sale. Suddenly she not only had a "To Be Read" pile, but an "Auxiliary To Be Read" pile.

Well, I won't embarrass myself and show you a picture of our library (mostly my books since The Shepherd re-did "his room" into his office and put up 4 shelves for his books), but my newest book passion is books of crochet patterns. A friend asked me why I would BUY books of patterns when there are so many free patterns on the internet - I could not explain - there's just no comparison to having the book in hand, with the colored pictures and the glossary of stitches. You know what I mean?

So two weeks ago, when I was looking on Powells.com, which is, by the way one of THE MOST amazing bookstores on Earth as far as I'm concerned - (to quote their web site: "Powell's Books, in Portland, Oregon, is the largest independent used and new bookstore in the world. We carry an extensive collection of out of print rare, and technical titles...etc. etc.) - for a book that The Shepherd was wanting, I thought, hmm, why waste that shipping on just one book - I'll check the crochet books - and several books in the shopping cart later, I added this little gem - "Hooked on Murder" by Betty Hechtman - "A Crochet Mystery" - purported to be the "first" in a series.

Well, I'll be looking for the next book - this is a really fun read. Like Sue Grafton's Alphabet Mysteries and Diane Mott Davidson's Goldy Culinary Mysteries - the main character is a single lady who, like "Murder She Wrote's" Jessica Fletcher, is suddenly thrust head first into the middle of the murder of the leader of the town's crochet group "The Tarzana Hookers" - and to save her own skin, she needs to solve the case.

The characters are likeable, especially our heroine, Molly Pink. The boyfriend is appropriately hunky, and there is no gratuitous sex (hey, sometimes it works - but it's not needed to keep this book afloat)

As I said, I'm looking forward to the next in the series, and by the way, the author not only includes a free crochet pattern in the book, there is also a nifty recipe to boot.

5 comments:

Donna said...

Cool! That sounds like a great book. The problem with books like that is that you stay up late reading them because you are hooked but then it's done way too fast. I usually do not read murder mysteries but have recently been hooked on a series of murder mysteries set on the Shetland Islands- Raven Black and White Nights by Ann Cleeves. It's the first two of a quartet so now I have to wait for her to write and publish the next two!

Sharrie said...

I am on the same wavelength as you about having the book in hand. What could be better than ----- books everywhere?

Sharon said...

Is there anything more delicious than a good read? I don't count online. I'm a tactile person - I want to hold me books in two hands.

Leigh said...

I agree about books. Real books. I just don't like reading off of a computer screen that much. Then for patterns, they have to be printed off and that adds up. Might as well buy the books.

I'd never heard of Powell's Books, but being the book lover that I am, and happy for the link!

Kathy said...

I am adding to my TBR pile. thinking that with all the waiting I'm doing while Ralph is in for tests, etc., I figured why read the same old magazines over and over? So, I now have my ever-growing pile of TBR books.
I just hope I can stay awake to read them. LOL!