Tag: series redux

series

Series Redux: Su Lin Mysteries

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I can’t believe it’s been a whole year since I wrote about Ovidia Yu’s Su Lin mysteries, also known as the Crown Colony series, but it has because there is a new one out next week! I am still stuck at number six – because number seven hasn’t gone into KU yet or dropped to a price that falls into my Kindle range. But I do own number eight because that has. But I’m stubborn and I’m refusing to go out of order because I’ve done everything else in order. Also and this is also related, be warned: if you’re behind in the series, do not read the blurb for the upcoming ninth book The Rose Apple Tree because it’s got a huge spoiler in it for something that has clearly happened in one of those two previous books – it’s hard to tell because book 7 doesn’t have a plot summary attached to it in the blurb at all, just “The next title in the Mystery Tree series, exploring Singapore after the Japanese retreat and in the aftermath of WWII” and book 8 is tagged as being set in 1949 and book 9 in 1947. And i am not reading the samples to find out because: spoilers.

Any way, I have really enjoyed reading these Singapore-set murder mysteries which have taken us from the Abdication crisis through to the end of the Second World War, from Su Lin’s teenage years to adulthood as she straddles the line between the Singaporean community and foreigners in power – which started as the British and then changed to the Japanese during the war.

The first six are still in Kindle Unlimited and they’re well worth a look, and as you can see, you can also find them in some of the bookshops with larger mystery sections.

Have a great weekend everyone.

series

Series Redux: Mitchell and Markby

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Given that I seem to be on a massive binge of Ann Granger’s Cotswold-set mystery series, it would be remiss of me not to do a quick reminder about them. This is a mystery series that started nearly 30 years ago, but are still a lot of fun. In fact sometimes I think I like the older series better because there is a lack of internet and mobile phones. Anyway, our duo are Meredith Mitchell and Alan Markby, who meet in the first book (which I own in paperback, hence it’s absence from the photo) when a death occurs at the house where Meredith is staying. She works for the Foreign Office and is on leave from a posting abroad, he is the policeman sent to investigate. And so it continues, with the two of them tangled up in crimes, usually fairly rural ones. I’ve got as far as the a point where Meredith is working in London but has finally bought a house in Bamford (the main town in the series) although in book seven the mystery is set away from there in a different part of the Cotswolds. The solutions are twisty and in rereading them I’m almost enjoying them more than first time because they hold up so well.

As you can see these are easy to get hold of on Kindle, although perhaps slightly harder in actual book form because it tends to be Granger’s more recent Campbell and Carter or her Victorian mysteries that you see in the shops. Have a great weekend everyone.

bingeable series, fiction, Series I love

Series Redux: Cazalet Chronicles

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We’ve had events marking the 80th anniversary of VE Day this week, and so I thought I would mention one of my favourite series that’s set at least partially during the Second World War today – and that’s Elizabeth Jane Howard’s Cazalet series. I wrote a full post about the books back in 2020 and you can read that here.

The end of the war comes during the third book and as I love the children’s stories (or at least they were children at the start) the third and the fourth books are my favourites of the series in many ways. Here’s a bit from Archie and Clary’s VE Day celebrations

Showers of golden stars from rockets occurred in the crocus-mauve sky and the Palace was floodlit, and round the statue of Queen Victoria an enormous snake of people were dancing the hokey-cokey, singing and stamping their feet, and beyond, near the railings, people were chanting, shouting for the King. There were thousands of them, so many indeed and sometimes so tightly packed that they had held hands all evening in order not to get parted, and sometimes they had to shout to each other to be heard, but sometimes they simply sang whatever everyone else round them was singing: ’Land of Hope and Glory’, ’God Save the King’ and bits of the hokey-cokey.

Confusion by Elizabeth Jane Howard

Anyway, I love them, they’re wonderful and if you haven’t read them, you should. They always seem to be in print and I own them in paperback, ebook and also some on audio. That should give a sense of how dear to me they are. And as they’re not short, if you like them you have about 2,000 pages of them to enjoy.

Have a wonderful weekend everyone.

books

Series Redux: Fool’s Gold

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I mentioned a few small town series in my post on Wednesday, but I’m taking the opportunity this Friday to remind you about the Fool’s Gold series. There are twenty full length novels in Susan Mallery’s series set in a small town in California as well as twenty five novellas of various lengths. The novels come in groups – friendship groups, or siblings, or business partners – where they all getting paired off one book after another. Overall the series covers about six years in the life of the town. They’re very easy to read – and even easier to read one after another. As I said in my original post there is a slightly higher pregnancy ratio plot than I would usually go for, but they’re so relaxing I let them off. If you don’t want to start at the beginning, I suggest you start with the group of retired sportspeople that start at book 14.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Authors I love, Series I love

Belated Happy Birthday Soulless!

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One of the things that happened last month that I missed was the fifteenth birthday of Gail Carriger’s first book, Soulless. I wasn’t quite in on this from the start – I started reading her about five years in, but I have consistently revisited Soulless since – and read all of the connected books at least once. I own many of them in more than one format – Soulless I have in paperback, ebook and audiobook (which I’m actually listening to at the moment) because that is the sort of person I am. Anyway, the point of this is to point you back at my series post for the Parasolverse, although I’ve also got review posts for a bunch of the later books which I read after I started this blog. So if you fancy some vampires, werewolves and more in Steampunk Victorian London this week, these could be just the thing for you!

books, Series I love

Series redux: Campion

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BBC Four showed one of the Peter Davidson Campion adaptations the other week, so I thought this Friday was a good time to remind you about Margery Allingham’s Golden Age series. I’ve re listened to a lot of them on audiobook as well as having read all bar one I think of the original nineteen novels featuring her response to Lord Peter Wimsey. They are dated in patches – some novels much more than others – but so are some of Agatha Christie and Dorothy L Sayers. If you’re interested in the Queens of Crime and you haven’t read any of these, you should. And you can read my much longer thoughts here.

books, series

Series Redux: Willow Creek

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As Jen DeLuca had her new book out yesterday, I’m taking the opportunity to point you at my point about her Renaissance Faire series – variously known as the Well Met, Renn Faire and Willow Creek series, following a group of linked romances all set at or adjacent to a renaissance faire in the town of Willow Creek. I think they’re great fun, and make a great summer read. Here’s my original series post here, and my BotW review of Well Met and preview for Well Travelled as well.

Have a great weekend everyone.

books

Series I Love redux: Aunty Lee

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The second in Ovidia Yu’s Aunty Lee series, Aunty Lee’s Deadly Specials, is 99p on Kindle at the moment – I don’t know how long this deal is going to last, but this was a Book of the Week when I read it and so this seemed like a good time to remind you of Ovidia Yu’s excellent Singapore-set cozy mystery series. Aunty Lee is an older lady detective – something that I’ve always loved in murder mysteries – but this time she’s also well connected and relatively wealthy widow and restaurant owner. The food always sounds amazing in this, and the mysteries are fun. If you liked the society vibe in Crazy Rich Asians, this will give you something similar (slightly less affluent but still similar) in the cozy crime world. Do go and read my original series post as well and don’t forget Yu’s other Singapore-set mystery series – the historical Crown Colony series.

Have a great weekend!

books

Series Redux: Cupcake Bakery

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Amidst all the romance releases last week, the sixteenth (!!!) in Jenn McKinlay’s Cupcake Bakery series also emerged into the world. I’m still a few books behind – I still haven’t spotted number 14 in the bookstores that stock cozy crime, Amazon wants more than £11 for it in paperback (which is mad) and it’s not on kindle in the UK so I’ll have to wait. But this is my favourite of McKinlay’s series and the one where I think there’s the most potential for different locations for the characters to find bodies – particularly now they’re franchising the bakery. Although given how many bodies they find, would you want to franchise with them?! Anyway, go read my original series post about them and I’ll go off and chunter in a corner about the cost of US cozy crime mass market paperbacks in the UK!

books, series

Series Redux: Kate Shackleton

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As I mentioned yesterday, the second in what looks to be Frances Brody’s new series is out this week, so this Friday, I want to remind you about her other series – about Kate Shackleton, daughter of a senior police officer who finds herself solving crimes and becoming a private detective in 1920s Yorkshire. The series is not the fastest to get going, but i did also read them out of order which never helps! I really like them – there have been a few set in places that I know quite well, which is always fun.

Have a great weekend everyone!