Red Wolf's Room

  After reading Footsteps in the Dark , I tried to find more obscure female mystery writers that are not quite so well known and found The Crime at Black Dudley by Margery Allingham. What interested me was the dinner party that turns into murder. It reminded me of the Hercules Poirot mystery Lord Edgeware Dies and Clue .  Unfortunately, the murder gets upstaged for the second half of the book by another crime, and the solution to the first mystery was unnecessarily dragged out for me. I lost interest in the last third of the book and just wanted it to end. The book is written in true Roaring Twenties lingo, so there were quite a few times where I couldn't understand what the characters were saying, even with context.  In the reviews I read before picking up this book, I learned that Albert Campion is Margery Allingham's detective, but his debut novel (this book) does not have him as the protagonist and frankly, he's not even a detective. He is strangely almost always up...

  Thanks to Sia for giving me ideas while writing this post.    -- Spoilers -- A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson left me feeling unsettled, much like The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins. Real-life mystery-thrillers seem to have that effect on me. I think it was worse in this book because when I was halfway through, I had the brilliant idea to look at the sequel excerpt because I wanted to see what the next mystery would be. However, I spoiled myself for one of this book’s culprits. I didn’t expect Book 2 to continue from Book 1. I expected it to start anew like the other books (not just mysteries) I’ve read and later down the line mention Book 1’s culprits. So knowing whom I thought was the only culprit, I reflected on Pip’s investigation thus far and was upset that we had had only one conversation with Mr. Ward and nothing was given away. We also had one or two quick encounters where Pip runs into him and asks him a question or two. It wasn’t hard to re...

In the Woods by Tana French is Book 1 of the Dublin Murder Squad series and takes place in the mid-late 90s. This story has cellphones, but it has the 90s essence I remember; we were on the cusp of impressive technological advancements. The internet was only just picking up speed compared to what it is today. Why was I thinking about this while reading the book? Well, at the time, I had just discovered Stuart Mackey on TikTok through a duet with another content creator, Queen Astraea . And like with DannyPhantom.Exe , I have a few similarities and interests in common with Stuart. I've become one of his active supporters.  Back in April, he did a Live on TikTok and was transparent with his viewers. The next day, he had a story on Instagram to which I commented on and he responded. It is this action that got me feeling so grateful for the technology in this era, to be born in this era, despite my daily gripes about various types of tech. I am grateful to be able to communicate wit...

  Murder is Binding by Lorna Barrett is a cozy mystery and Book 1 of her Booktown Mystery series. It includes the elements of a classic mystery in a succinct and compact writing style. I often turn to cozy mysteries when I want the suspense and intrigue of a good mystery but in a Hallmark-type of setting. I enjoyed putting my detective hat on for this mystery and ended up being half-right at the end. It was challenging since the story went some place I hadn't expected, and I found myself constantly going back and forth with uncertainty about the culprit's identity, their means, their motive, and who or what was a red herring. It was a fun read, but it does have its faults. Summary In the quiet town of Stoneham, New Hampshire, Tricia Miles finds the dead body of her neighbor, Doris Gleason, in Doris's Cookery bookshop during a fire. Tricia and her sister, Angelica, do their own investigation since the local sheriff is trying to pin the crime on Tricia. While she's look...