Mailbox Monday

Mailbox Monday gathers together for readers the books that came into the house last week. (feel free to share yours) Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles and humongous wish lists.

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I'm collecting the series by C.S. Harris via eBay -- I had previously read them from the library. This series features Sebastian St. Cyr, Viscount Devlin, an investigator in Regency England. There are five books thus far with a sixth scheduled next March ... a very long way away. (sigh) In the mail during the week are:

- WHAT ANGELS FEAR (book 1): Set in England in 1811. When Sebastian Alistair St. Cyr, Viscount Devlin, is accused of the rape and murder of actress Rachel York, mistress to various members of Spencer Perceval's wobbly Tory cabinet, Sebastian goes "on the lam," in the words of young Tom, his adopted companion and faithful servant, and must spend frantic days in clever disguises chasing "across London and back." Uncanny powers of sight and hearing help him to identify several suspects, including Hugh Gordon, Rachel's fellow actor and ex-lover; shadowy French émigré Leo Pierrepoint; and even his own wayward nephew, Bayard Wilcox, who had been stalking the victim for weeks. Also implicated is portrait painter Giorgio Donatelli, for whom Rachel often posed nude, whose current patron, Lord Fairchild, is expected to be the next prime minister. Waiting in the wings to rule over this gathering chaos is dissolute Prince George (aka Prinny), soon to become regent for his incompetent father, George III.

- WHY MERMAIDS SING (book 4):Sebastian St. Cyr, an unconventional nobleman with a talent for detection, is called in by Westminster chief magistrate Sir Henry Lovejoy after two scions of the upper classes are found butchered and left on public display. St. Cyr soon finds a connection between the killer's calling card and a John Donne poem. As shadowy figures threaten and the parents of the victims display an inappropriate hostility to his efforts, the sleuth doggedly persists, uncovering a secret with shocking repercussions for London's upper class. Neatly meshed in the page-turning whodunit plot are major developments in St. Cyr's love life.

Also in this week were two books for Father's Day gifts for my dad -- so they came in, they went out again:

- THE POACHER'S SON by Paul Doiron. Doiron’s debut crime novel is set on the coast and in the North Woods of Maine, the home of rookie game warden Mike Bowditch. As tensions rise across the state with the impending sale of huge tracts of paper-company forest land to an out-of-state developer, Mike receives a strange message from his father, left on the same night the paper company rep and a state trooper are shot and killed after a heated town meeting. With realistically flawed characters and a strong sense of place—both on the coast and in the woods—the novel avoids tourist stereotyping, of Maine itself and its citizens. As a game warden, Mike is devoted to upholding the law, and as a conflict appears to develop between that responsibility and his love for his estranged father, he finds himself with both his job and life on the line.

- NORTH BY NORTHWESTERN: A Seafaring Family on Deadly Alaskan Waters by Captain Sig Hansen. The fishing vessel captain prominently featured in all three seasons of Discovery Channel’s Deadliest Catch tells his family’s story and that of the Norwegian American role in Pacific Northwest fishing—and not only in the now-declining crab industry. If this family saga has a hero, it is Sig’s father, Sverre, who survived immigration from Norway, service in the cold-war army, several shipwrecks, and raising three civilized, if somewhat original, sons to become one of the deans of the crab-fishing fleet in its golden era and still die peacefully at home. Captain Sig still takes his father’s boat into the Bering Sea, one of the harshest environments fishermen have ever faced, and is proud in a gentlemanly way of his Norwegian heritage and celebrity status. Nothing more nor less than a cracking good sea story.

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I took today off from work to attend an adult ed class of MS Publisher. I learned a whole heckuva lot so I'm well pleased that it is worth the time and expense. I have another class tomorrow.

Hey did you see the tornado footage on the news that hit here? It tore the roof off our multiplex sports/entertainment arena. We got marble-sized hail at the house here but the tornado didn't touch down until it passed us by on the West end but hit a little further east. There hasn't been a tornado touchdown since 1957 I think they said.

Steve is staying a little late after work to do some recycling. I've got Lie To Me to watch tonight. Otherwise, I may audition a read but I do have the new Karin Slaughter being auto-delivered tonight on the Kindle for the morning so I guess I'm actually set for a bit.

Much love,

PK the Bookeemonster