GET YOUR TAILS READY BECAUSE...

...TRACY CLARK IS COMING OUT WITH THE THIRD BOOK IN HER CASS RAINES CHICAGO DETECTIVE MYSTERY SERIES IN MAY OF 2020!  Go 'HEAD, Ms. Clark!  You better sign those contracts and get these books out!

I ain't mad at'cha!  You better come through with your series! (Something told me the cover was going to be red!)

YOU CAN CATCH UP WITH CLARK'S SERIES BELOW (AMAZON AFFILIATE LINKS)

BOOK 1

BOOK 2

{What This Chile's Been Reading} Sisters in Crime Situation

Hel-looo-oooooooo.  What's up, y'all?  What is everyone over yonder reading?  Trust you're all doing well out there in this heat.

All right...
  
Books/Authors Mentioned (links are all Amazon affiliate)...

A bit of blog postie on my little reading "project" at Comic Towel 

Most of you guys are familiar with these ladies, but for those in the back...

{Spotlight Release} A Killing Fire by Faye Snowden

Hel-looo-oooooooo.  What's up, y'all?  What is everyone over yonder reading?  Trust you're all doing well out there in this summer heat.

All right...

A Light (Spotlight) on author Faye Snowden's book, A Killing Fire.

"As a child forced to witness her father’s crimes, homicide Detective Raven Burns dedicates every waking moment to proving that she is not her father’s child. But when she shoots a suspect who has what turns out to be an unloaded weapon, Raven finds that she must confront both the demons of her past and the stains on her soul in order to stop a killer."

{Let Me Know} Is Mercedes Lackey's "Arrows" Trilogy Worth It?

Not too much to add here that hasn't been said in the video.  LOL.  Heck, the title alone, right?

Anyway, books and such mentioned (all links are Amazon affiliate):

1.  By the Sword 
2.  Diana Tregarde Investigates (Children of the Night, Burning Water, & Jinx High)
3.  The Complete Arrows Trilogy (Valdemar) 

Plain Vanilla BORING by Susan Wittig Albert

"China and Ruby Wilcox are presenting their annual 'Not Just Plain Vanilla Workshop,' always a huge hit with customers at Thyme & Seasons Herb Shop. But someone involved with the workshop is driven by a deadly motive, and China soon finds herself teaming up with the very pregnant Pecan Springs police chief Sheila Dawson to solve a vanilla-flavored murder. 

Sheila, happy to get out from behind the chief’s desk, is investigating the death of a botany professor, a prominent researcher specializing in vanilla orchids. China is trying to help a longtime friend: the dead professor’s ex-wife and a prime suspect in his murder.  

However, there’s no shortage of other suspects: a betrayed lover, a disgruntled graduate student, jealous colleagues, and a gang of orchid smugglers. But the lethal roots of this mystery reach back into the dark tropical jungles of Mexico, where the vanilla vine was first cultivated. At stake: a lucrative plant patent, an orchid that is extinct in the wild, and the life of an innocent little girl."

A. Just. Plain. BORING. Book.

As many who frequent my book blog know, I love and adore Susan Wittig Albert’s China Bayles series. My loyalty for the series' is boundless. I love the mysteries, small town setting and herb shop hook. Most of all, I love the business owner/attorney duality of China Bayles' character. This series has gotten me through some hard times, as well as joyous times. So, in essence, I’m pretty tied and committed. Nothing but excitement comes out of reading a new title in this series.

Yet, here I am reading through the 27th latest entry into the series darn near sleep. A Plain Vanilla Murder was a complete and total bore! There's no way around it. I halfway want to believe Albert was trying to get back into plotting a light murder mystery. Because in the previous two books she veered away from doing so. But man, oh man. She veered Vanilla over a ravine and into a compose heap. Straight-up boredom. Still, let me get into what I found aggravating and boring about A Plain Vanilla Murder.

Week Two Prep: AUGUST BWM AUTHORS SERIES CLEAN UP

GETTING READYYYYYYYY!

My mood slaying (in a good way) these series DOWN

WEEK ONE: AUGUST BLACK WOMEN MYSTERY AUTHORS SERIES CLEAN UP

Do you ever start a mystery series and it takes you years to complete it? Or, if the series is on-going, it takes you years to catch up with the latest release? Too many books, two little time? Or is it the other way around?

Either way...

I also find myself starting new (usually exciting) mystery series each year. I also find myself juggling too many series each year. Then I find myself losing sight of one or two series each year–in favor of a new love. And, hell, each year I’m spending more money on books instead of reading what I already got! (Or that's speculation and not fact–I'll have to check my wallet.) So with all that in the air, there comes a season of buckling down and finishing what one has started ages ago. And that season is now.

So with that all in mind... here's my latest focus...

I must finish the last two books in Barbara Neely’s Blanche White series. As well, I have to finish the final book in Nora DeLoach's Mama series. Both series written by black women mystery writers. Both carrying respective protagonists sharing her unique crime-stopping traversals through the genre. I began both series years ago, and have been collecting/reading entries in each series off and on for too long. Until now–this week.