Karl's Reading List

Published by Bethany House Publishers: Minneapolis, Minnesota, 1992. Book 3 of 'An Emerald Ballad.' Preceded by ' Heart of the Lonely Exile. ' Followed by 'Sons of an Ancient Glory.' Careful readers of this blog will notice that it has been a long time since Elise and I finished any combined book other than a Famous Five entry . That is for a number of reasons, the most prominent of which is that we have been busy with our drawn out move and hunt for a new house. A secondary reason, though, is that we had two physical books on the go at once, both of which were quite long: this one, and a fantasy novel called Dragon Wing (technically, we also have the final few chapters of Rachel's Tears, but that is a book we haven't picked up in a long time, and might still be some time away from revisiting). Anyway, both reasons are finally shifting. As of this post, we have finished this book and we have moved into our new home (hooray!). In fact, the night we finish...

Published by Viking Press/Penguin Random House: London, UK, 2024. Audiobook by Penguin Audio, 2024.  Uploaded to Audible 12-09-2024. Narrated by Nicola Walker. As regular readers of the blog (if there are any!) will know, this year I have discovered and read my way through the Thursday Murder Club series. Having recently finished The Impossible Fortune, which is the final (for now) in that series, I thought I'd give this book a go, as the only non- Thursday Murder Club book Richard Osman has yet written.  The big adjustment for me in listening to We Solve Murders is that, of course, the characters and settings of Thursday Murder Club are missing. It's always hard for a successful author of a successful series to launch another one, and I do think that We Solve Murders is not as 'tight' as Thursday Murder Club was - particularly the first in the series.  This, however, is somewhat unfair. We Solve Murders needs to stand or fall on its own merits. So... The mildly convo...

Published as an audiobook by Penguin Audio, 25-09-2025. Narrated by Fiona Shaw. Book 5 in the 'Thursday Murder Club' series. Preceded by ' The Last Devil to Die. ' Earlier this year I practically binge-listened to the entire Thursday Murder Club series, beginning my final review by saying that  The Last Devil to Die felt like a suitable finale. However, I also wrote that the series had ended "for now" twice, and...well... I guess I was right! About a month ago, wandering through the Richmond Mall, I noticed that a fifth book was now on sale in Whitcoulls, so I raced home and purchased my audiobook copy that same day (it feels appropriate now to keep this as an audiobook series). So, considering how 'final' the previous series finale was, how does The Impossible Fortune fare? Well, to be honest, there are moments where, for me, it felt slightly 'lesser' than what had come before it. On occasion the characters (particularly, for me, Joyce and Ibr...

Published by Page Classics/Page Publications: Location unknown, 1924. First published 1920. This is the first ever detective novel written by Agatha Christie, and also the first to introduce the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot, along with his regular associates Hastings (who acts as narrator) and Inspector Japp. It is amazing, knowing how many Poirot books Agatha Christie would write, that the character is already so fully formed in this first entry. It is also interesting to note how well written this entry is, too. The twists and turns are suitably twisty and turny, and still seem to make sense in hindsight, and Poirot is suitably clever enough. As far as set up is concerned: Hastings is visiting with a friend, John Cavendish, at Cavendish's family home, now run by Cavendish's step-mother, who has remarried since Cavendish's father died. A suitable number of suspects is on hand when the step-mother dies, seemingly by poison. Hastings calls Poirot (staying nearby) to inve...

Published by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc: London, 2000. First published 1998. Ages ago I saw the film that this book was based upon. Except for the physical appearance of the main character (who in the book is quite fat but in the film is portrayed by a young, slim Shia LaBeouf) the film turns out to be quite faithful to the plot. That makes sense, because the plot is one of those intricately constructed ones where there are a number of factors that all come together at the end - think of the way the movie Signs makes sense of every character quirk and random non sequiturs in the final showdown with the alien. Holes includes a lot of back-story, interspersing it with the 'current' events, and each event and quirk from the past (a family curse, the family name, onions, etc) all come together at the end to help resolve the plot. So, its an interesting story. I wouldn't say I was 'gripped' while reading it, but it still gives that sense of "oh, clever!" at the ...

Published in an omnibus edition: " Ordeal by Innocence "; " One, Two, Buckle My Shoe "; " The Adventures of the Christmas Pudding " as part of the "Agatha Christie Crime Collection" by Lansdowne Press: Australia, 1985 (1973). First published in omnibus edition 1970. First published individually 1960.   This 'book' is actually a selection of short stories by Agatha Christie, mostly involving Poirot. The first - and longest - in the collection is the titular Adventure of the Christmas Pudding, which involves Poirot trying to determine who has stolen a missing ruby and what they have done with it. It is not a spoiler to say that a Christmas pudding features heavily in this story. This one is fairly straightforward for a Poirot story, partially due to being a short story and partially due to logic: a subplot involving kids pretending to have discovered a murder seems very unlikely to have resulted in an actual death! The second story, The Mys...

Published by Penguin Random House Australia: Australia, 2022. Book 1 in the 'Ernest Cunningham' series. Followed by ' Everyone on This Train is a Suspect. ' This odd whodunnit, written by Benjamin Stevenson, stars the character Ernest Cunningham, an author who is writing the whodunnit that we are reading, based on the 'true story' that happened to him at his family reunion - a family that, as the title suggests - is full of killers. Ernest promises that he will not lie to us - the audience - and begins by sharing the 'ten detective commandments' of real-life detective author Ronald Knox, commandments that the character-author Ernest continually refers back to throughout the narrative. Author Cunningham (as opposed to real-life author Stevenson) has mostly written self-help books for people wanting to write fiction - including detective fiction - and as such becomes the family's go-to detective when a stranger is found dead in the snow outside their r...

Published by New Directions Publishing Company: New York, 1973 (1958). Translated from Japanese by Donald Keene. First published, in Japanese, in 1948. For the second time ever, a student recommended and lent a book to me to read. This one is an odd book. I've now had a few students tell me they enjoy it, and I find myself curious as to what exactly it is that they enjoy... The main character, Yozo, is met as a young boy, seeking to entertain those around him, and already beginning to put on masks in order to do so. He begins to see himself as 'no longer human' pretty quickly, due to the disconnect he feels between the things he does and the things he feels 'humans' would do. Throughout the book, Yozo gives in to his worst impulses more and more, feeling himself drifting further from the morality of 'humanity', and seemingly powerless to stop his descent. He takes up drinking and womanizing, and has at least two suicide attempts in the course of the book. A...

Published as an audiobook by Penguin Audio, 14-09-2023. Narrated by Fiona Shaw. Book 4 in the 'Thursday Murder Club' series. Preceded by ' The Bullet That Missed. ' Followed by ' The Impossible Fortune. ' The final book ( for now ) in the Thursday Murder Club series, this book also feels a bit more like it could be the last in the series, due to a few storylines having a more 'final' feel to them. The main mystery this time revolves around a shipment of heroin that has been snuck into the country inside an antique box. A friend of our main gang has died while in possession of the heroin, and so tracking down the killer is in order. Returning characters like drug-dealer Connie Johnson, retired KGB agent Viktor, and antique dealer Kuldesh Sharma all have parts to play for better or worse, and new characters - including corrupt antique dealer Samantha Barnes and her imposing husband Garth, all add interest to the proceedings. A secondary crime-plot involves...

Published as an audiobook by Penguin Audio, 2022. Narrated by Fiona Shaw. Book 3 in the 'Thursday Murder Club' series. Preceded by ' The Man Who Died Twice. ' Followed by ' The Last Devil To Die. ' The third book in the Thursday Murder Club series begins to shift the status quo a little. Not only does it include a potential love interest for Ron and an old-flame for Elizabeth (there is also a potential love interest for Joyce but that is less unusual), but certain background realities - like Donna and Borden's developing relationship, and Steven's battle with dementia - are made more prominent, and particularly with the latter, begin to impact our characters (and the readers!) more than they have previously. The murder investigation and main subplot are both less important on the whole than the ongoing growth and development of the main characters, and yet both of the plots also have interest. The gang is investigating the murder of Bethany Waites, a rep...

Published in an omnibus edition: " Ordeal by Innocence "; " One, Two, Buckle My Shoe "; " The Adventures of the Christmas Pudding " as part of the "Agatha Christie Crime Collection" by Lansdowne Press: Australia, 1985 (1973). First published in omnibus edition 1970. First published individually 1958. A non-Poirot mystery, unlike the (main stories) of the other two entries in this omnibus, Ordeal by Innocence has an interesting, if slightly complicated, set-up. Rachel Argyle, a woman with five adopted children, has been bludgeoned to death, and her youngest son Jacko was found guilty of the murder. After some time in prison, Jacko has died, still protesting his innocence. Two years have passed, and now Arthur Calgary - a scientist - has arrived back in England after two years in Antarctica. It turns out Arthur would have been able to prove Jacko's alibi, but due to both his absence from the country AND a convenient case of amnesia, Arthur has ...

Published by Dragon Brothers Books, 2020 (2017). Audiobook released 02-10-21. Narrated by the author. Book 1 in 'The Dragon Defenders' series. Followed by 'Book 2.' This is definitely a children's book, with its short chapters, simple plot, the decision of the main characters to purposefully side-line their parents rather than getting their support in dealing with the main issues, and its mild obsession with getting shot in the butt. It is also the first book in 'The Dragon Defenders' series, and one that impresses me by not having any other title than 'Book 1' and the series title! I believe the rest in the series have similar titles... wow. The author, James Russell, is a New Zealander and narrates his own book - it was quite odd to hear a Kiwi accent the whole way through the story, though I suppose Elise is more used to that than I am due to my narrating most of the books we read together. He reads it fairly well. The story revolves around two ...

Published by Viking Press/Penguin Random House: London, UK, 2021. Audiobook by Penguin Audio. Released 16-09-2021.  Narrated by Lesley Manville. Book 2 in the 'Thursday Murder Club' series. Preceded by ' The Thursday Murder Club. ' Followed by ' The Bullet That Missed. ' At the end of my review for The Thursday Murder Club I said "I will definitely be returning to this series." Voila. The Man Who Died Twice picks up soon after the events of Book 1, with our four heroes settling back into 'regular life' in their retirement community. However, the new peace is upended when Elizabeth's ex-husband, Douglas Middlemiss, arrives in the community incognito, hiding from a gangster who wants him dead. Elizabeth and the gang must try to protect Douglas, whilst also solving a few mysteries that arise during the proceedings. Meanwhile, Ibrahim - venturing out to town for an afternoon - is savagely assaulted by a local hoodlum, and the rest of the gang ...

Published as an audiobook by Hodder Children's Books, 2013. Narrated by Jan Francis. Book 5 in 'The Famous Five' series. Preceded by ' Five Go To Smuggler's Top. ' Followed by ' Five on Kirrin Island Again. ' Originally published 1946. Done with Paddington for now, this became our next 'dishes audiobook', and our first Famous Five book in two years (wow, time flies)! Five Go Off in a Caravan is a simple set-up, with the four kids and Timmy - wait for it - going off in a caravan together for a holiday (what a surprise!), yet the story surprised us by introducing some quite intense elements, even for a story in this series! Making friends with a boy - Nobby - who has grown up in the circus, our heroes must deal with Nobby's evil 'relative' Uncle Dan, as well as Dan's associate Lou. Dan and Lou are extremely unpleasant, both in appearance (this book does continue the unfortunate habit of having the kids decide the villains are evil ...

Published in an omnibus edition: " Ordeal by Innocence "; " One, Two, Buckle My Shoe "; " The Adventures of the Christmas Pudding " as part of the "Agatha Christie Crime Collection" by Lansdowne Press: Australia, 1985 (1973). First published in omnibus edition 1970. First published individually 1940. Another Poirot mystery, I picked up this book as a 'light read' following my successful completion of Can You Forgive Her? Like most Poirot mysteries, the plot is so twisty that it is unlikely anyone would be able to unravel it entirely on their own; however, I did manage to pick up on some hints and clues so felt not-entirely-worthless-as-a-detective by the end. Poirot visits the dentist, and notices a little bit of suspicious behaviour going on in the waiting room. When the dentist is later found dead by suspected suicide, Poirot feels like murder was more likely, even as motives for a suicide come to light. Suspects include a vanishing mi...

Published by Penguin Books: London, 2017. This book is fairly popular amongst my students presently, and (like many of the books I have read this year, it turns out) is another murder mystery. The gimmick for this one is that the crime happens during a high school detention. Each of our characters/suspects fits a broad stereotype (somewhat like the characters in The Breakfast Club ) and yet, of course, they each have secrets ready to be revealed. The secrets are particularly important in the plot of this book, as the murder victim - Simon - ran a blog in which he would reveal the secrets of his fellow students. It turns out that he had a blog post prepared in which each of our four main characters was going to be exposed in some way, and considering that each of the characters seem to have arrived in detention under suspicious circumstances, it is possible that each of them could have done it. Or is it? As with In the Hall With the Knife (the Cluedo inspired book I read earlier in the...

Published by Amulet Books/Abrams Books: New York, NY, 2020 (2019). I came across this book when I saw a student reading it in class, and was curious enough to get it out after them. As the title may give away, this book is inspired by the game Cluedo (or Clue in America). It is even subtitled 'A Clue Mystery', although it is a fairly loose adaptation, with the characters now almost all being high-school students, and their names and characters being reworked to fit that setting better. So, instead of 'Professor Plum' we now have Phineas 'Finn' Plum, who is a science geek but very much not a professor. And instead of Colonel Mustard we have Sam 'Mustard' Maestor, a relative new-comer to the school with a military school background. Mrs White, however, remains pretty much identical to her character in the game. The setting is much closer to the game, with the house in question - Tudor House - being an old accommodation building in the school grounds, with ...

Published by The Reader's Digest Association, Inc./Academy Chicago Publishers: USA, 1991 (1986). Volume 3 of 'Academy Mystery Novellas.' Preceded by 'Police Procedurals.' Volume 3 of the Academy Mystery Novella collection is focussed on 'locked room puzzles', the fun sub-genre of mysteries that involves figuring out how a crime could have taken place when elements in the story suggest it to be impossible that it could have.  I like these puzzles, and this has been my favourite volume so far as a result. The collection of novellas this time are: 'The Third Bullet' by John Dickson Carr.  This is the longest entry in this volume by far, taking up almost half the volume on its own. It is also the most complex and detailed - which makes sense. Judge Charles Mortlake is found dead, with the man who had threatened to kill him standing in the room with him, and holding a gun that had just been fired. It seems open and shut, but the man - Gabriel White - appe...

Published by Futura Publications/Macdonald & Co (Publishers) Ltd: Hampstead Road, London, 1986 (1984). First published 1980. Brother Cadfael is a monk in an English monastery in the 1100s. He tends to his garden, makes poultices and various other medical concoctions, and honours his vow of obedience to the abbot. He also, apparently, solves murders. This is the first Cadfael book I have read, but there are apparently about 20 of them (I think this is book 3). Having read this one and liked it, I imagine I'll hunt out some of the others before too long. In this particular book, Cadfael is horrified when a particular oil he has made, with one ingredient being the poisonous Monks-Hood plant, is used to commit a murder. Because of this connection he is keen to find the culprit, and more so because the widow of Gervase Bonel, the man murdered, turns out to be Richildis, the woman Cadfael considered marrying years earlier before taking his vows. Richildis's young son, Edwin, is t...

Published by Arrow/Random House: London, UK, 1996 (1995). This book surprised me. Usually when I read a John Grisham book I have some idea what to expect, particularly with the more 'famous' of his books, which include a number that have been made into movies. I knew that this was one of those 'famous movie' books, and assumed as a result that it would be a fairly straightforward Grisham novel. Well, in some ways, yes... but it also had a number of features that were a bit out of the norm. In general, Grisham's lawyer novels follow a case from near the beginning of the novel all the way through to the end, with the final verdict providing the climatic moment of the film. The Rainmaker starts off with its protagonist, Rudy Baylor, still finishing law school, and doesn't even focus in on one specific case until quite a long way through the book. Before we get there, we have Rudy working on passing the bar, being fired from an upcoming job before he even gets it, b...