First up, a quick, laugh out loud read. Kate Siegel's mother is crazy. Quite literally. Luckily Kate has a good sense of humor about it, because I would be mortified. It reminded me of Justin Halperin's "
Shit My Dad Says".
I enjoyed Jaycee's first book, "
Stolen Life", and I was eager to hear about how she's been coping and adjusting to life after being held hostage by her kidnappers for 18 years. Jaycee is doing very well, enjoying life and having new experiences. She has developed a proclivity towards Starbucks, though, which makes me sad. Hopefully she'll get a Dunkin' near her soon and she can have better coffee :)
I always enjoy Philippa Gregory's books, and "Three Sisters, Three Queens" was no exception. It was written from Margaret Tudor's point of view. I honestly don't know much about Margaret, so it was fun. She starts off as a spoiled, whiny little brat who is constantly worried about outdoing her sister in law, Katherine of Aragon (whom she calls "Katherine of Arrogant" behind her back) and her little sister, Mary. At the age of thirteen, Margaret is married off to the much older King James of Scotland. Her father, King Henry VII, hopes the marriage will broker peace between the two warring kingdoms. James seems like a kind man who sincerely does want peace, but then when Henry VIII comes to power he struggles with his brother in law. While Henry is off warring against the French, James goes to defend his borders and, at Queen Katherine's command, is killed rather than taken prisoner.
I always knew that, but it never really occurred to me that James was Henry and Katherine's brother in law. That his wife, Margaret, was Henry's older sister. This book kind of rammed it home, how devastated Margaret was to lose her husband and how Scotland was left with a two year old boy King. Margaret does the best she can to hold the country together and keep the peace with her younger brother, but when she marries a second time, beneath her, for love, war breaks out in Scotland. Her second husband, Archibald Douglas, is not well liked by half of the population, and everyone's taking sides. Margaret and Archibald fight quite a lot, and he seems to have been married beforehand, rendering their marriage invalid. When Margaret seeks a divorce, her brother is outraged. Until, of course, he wants a divorce of his own.
Honestly, Margaret doesn't come off as very likable. She's constantly harping about how much better off her sisters are treated and respected and delights in their misery. I kind of didn't feel too sorry for her when bad things happened to her.
And a couple of fun Stephanie Plum rereads by Janet Evanovich (I needed something light for out by the pool). "Four to Score" finds Stephanie looking for waitress Maxine Norwicki after she steals her pig boyfriend Eddie's car (Eddie deserved everything he got in this book, by the way). Vinnie hires Joyce Barnhardt, Stephanie's arch-rival (the one she caught her husband cheating with back in the day) to go after Maxine because he feels Stephanie's not taking her job seriously. Sally Sweet, the transvestite, makes his first appearance in this one as a code cracker helping Steph decipher Maxine's coded messages to Eddie. When Stephanie's apartment is firebombed, she has to move in with Joe Morelli. A total hardship :)
"Hard Eight" has Stephanie in real danger. She's looking for a woman who disappeared with her daughter. The problem is, Evelyn is in the middle of a nasty divorce and her soon to be ex-husband, Steven, forced Evelyn to take out a custody bond and if she doesn't turn up with their daughter soon Evelyn's mom is going to lose her house. Steven is mixed up with a real nasty character named Abruzzi, who comes after Stephanie with both barrels, not believing she doesn't know where Evelyn is hiding Annie. Apparently Annie took something of his he wants back. I think three cars bit the dust in this one, and Stephanie comes home one day to find a dead man on her couch. Ranger is prominent in this one, so it was fun.
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