"Irene At Large" by Carole Nelson Douglas is the third Irene Adler mystery, which now brings me up to speed since I read the fourth one first. Nell is amazed when a strange man seems to recognize her on the streets of Paris before fainting dead away. Irene and Godfrey insist on bringing him back to their house so he can recover and Irene can discover who he is. Turns out he is the uncle of one of Nell's charges from her governess days, gone off to war 10 years earlier and never heard from again. He was a spy, and a bad guy is after him. Douglas tied it in very nicely with Conan Doyle's story of the Naval Treaty. Great stuff.
"Marilyn" by Lois Banner is a new biography out about Marilyn Monroe. It was kind of different, but I didn't really care for it. She makes a lot of accusations about Marilyn's supposed lesbianism without any real proof to back it up. One thing that really bothered me was how she went on and on in the book about how much Marilyn loved to be in the nude and never wore underwear, and then in the end of the book, talking about how Marilyn died and was found naked in her bed, she accuses whoever set up the scene (because of course it wasn't a suicide, or even an accidental overdose on Marilyn's part) screwed up because Marilyn always wore a bra to bed. Huh? So, she never wore underwear during the day? Just at night? Sure, that makes sense. Anyway, the book was full of things like this that just made me scratch my head.
"Bad Doings and Big Ideas" by Bill Willingham was a beautiful and fun collection of his comic odds and ends. There were lots of entertaining reads in here, and some really great artwork.
"Hot Six" by Janet Evanovitch was a reread and one of my favorite Stephanie books. Ranger is wanted for questioning by everyone from the police to the mob when Homer Ramos turns up dead and Ranger was the last one seen with him. Ranger has disappeared but everyone assumes Steph is still in contact with him, so everywhere she goes she has several different people tailing her, hoping to catch Ranger.
"The Score" by Richard Stark is a Parker novel I got quite a while ago and never got around to reading it, but it looked interesting, and it was, I liked it a lot. It reminded me of Mickey Spillane, that same sort of hard-boiled genre. Anyway, Parker is a criminal and he agrees to pull off a big heist involving 12 guys who are planning on knocking over a small town called Copper Canyon. Little does Parker know that the mastermind behind the heist, Edgars, holds a personal grudge against the town and is out for revenge because he was the former chief of police and was involved in a big scandal and run out of town. The whole thing is going down beautifully until Edgars starts blowing things up.
"Walking Dead Book 16" by Robert Kirkman continues our survivors' story. A man who calls himself Jesus shows up, claiming to be part of a larger network of survivors who want to arrange supply trades with Rick's group. Rick is naturally suspicious of Jesus, but eventually trusts him enough to take him back to his group so he can see how they function and talk to their man in charge. What Rick sees is amazing: these people are actually living, and not just surviving. They have hope for the future, and for the first time in a long time, so does Rick. I wonder if Kirkman is getting ready to wind the series down? I figured it was inevitable. They've been on the run for 2 years now. It seems like it might be time to finally settle down for good.
"The Hunter" by Darwyn Cooke is a graphic novel adaption of the first Stark Parker novel. Parker is screwed out of a lot of money by a crook named Mal, who convinced Parker's wife Lynn to try to kill him. Lynn fails, and Parker escapes, forges a new identity, has plastic surgery to give him a new face, and shows up bent on revenge. I'm really digging Parker. I can't wait to read more.
"Hello Darlin'" by Larry Hagman is his autobiography he wrote about 10 years ago. He talks about his wild Dallas days and his liver transplant. Larry Hagman is very different from his TV villain counterpart. He seems like a nice guy who loves life.
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