12-9-11 Something from the Nightside by Simon R. Green - Fiction

4 - I love the quirky world of the Nightside. This is the first in the Nightside series and Green does a wonderful job of introducing the weirdness and debauchery that is the Nightside as well as giving a great sampling of the characters to be found in such a place while writing in a noir style. The Nightside is a part of London that isn't, a place where it's always 3 am, a place where your every dream, fantasy, and nightmare can and will come true. Fun place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there.

12-1-11 The Girl Who Played With Fire by Stieg Larsson - Fiction

5 - This trilogy really is incredible! The first book was enthralling and the second book is just amazing as it takes you on a whole new adventure that opens up the characters even more. Lisbeth Salander is the antiheroine in these books and, as weird and unusual as she is, she makes you root for her every step of the way. This book goes deeper into who she is and how she ended up being the way she is and the story continues to surprise and shock. Seriously, read these books!

11-16-11 Grave Sight by Charlaine Harris - Fiction

4 - This is a different series by Charlaine Harris and something I think she started before the Sookie Stackhouse books. And I like it. Harper Connelly was struck by lightening when she was a young girl and ever since then she can find dead bodies and tell the cause of death. She travels with her brother and they are the people families call when they are desperate. Harris starts to flesh out the characters very well and combines the unusualness of their occupation with a very good murder mystery. I'm definitely continuing this series.

11-12-11 The Natural Laws of Good Luck by Ellen Graf - Non-Fiction

3 - This was a cute story about a woman, Ellen, who marries a Chinese man, Zhong-hua, who moves to upstate New York to live with her and her teenage daughter. The culture clash is extreme considering they each only speak a few words of each other's languages. But the most interesting part of the book is hearing the recollections of the husband's time living in China during Mao's Cultural Revolution. Those stories make this book worthwhile and add so much to letting the reader in on the character of Zhong-hua and the understanding and non-judgement of his new wife.

11-5-11 Goodnight Irene by Jan Burke - Fiction

4 - This is the first Irene Kelly book and it is a great debut. Full of twists and turns, Goodnight Irene introduces us to a feisty reporter who gets involved in a murder investigation when her good friend is killed in a bombing. As it turns out, her friend had just made a new break in a decades old unsolved murder. The question is who killed the earlier victim and who killed her friend and are they related. I enjoyed this mystery because it kept moving and kept the reader shifting blame until the end. I will definitely be reading more of this series.

11-2-11 Still Life with Chickens by Catherine Goldhammer - Non-Fiction

3 - This was a semi-amusing story about a woman starting over from a divorce. She moves her daughter and herself to a little cottage on the Atlantic ocean where they get chickens as new pets. The trials of raising chickens in a semi-urban setting are very funny at times, but this story just lacked anything to truly interest me. It's the typical story of a woman starting over when she didn't believe she would have to and adjusting to being single and raising a child alone. OK I guess if that's the kind of story you are looking for.

10-31-11 The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson - Fiction

5 - Holy Crap! This really is as good as everyone says it is! Within two chapters I was hooked and I flew through this just mesmerized by Lisbeth Salander and her completely unorthodox yet entirely reliable methods. She is hired as a researcher by Mikael Blomkvist to assist him in solving a decades old missing person/murder case. The search for the truth about Harriet Vanger is funded by her grandfather, the head of the Vanger clan. What comes out of the investigation is shocking, not only to the characters, but to the reader as well. All the layers and detail in this book will suck you in and leave you begging for more.