50 Books 50 States - Eat, Tan, Read

Book 17: Kentucky

Book 2 in the Catherine Ling series. This is a spin off of the Eve Duncan series, which I am obsessed with! The first book which was #12 in the Eve series, Eve meets Catherine and helps her get her son back from a murderous Russian mafia head. I am looking forward to finding out if I like Catherine Ling as much as I like Eve Duncan. Only time will tell.

“It’s the deadliest poison known to man. He’s the only one who knows its true power. She’s the only one who can stop the evil.

The chase is on. . . .

Catherine Ling was abandoned on the streets of Hong Kong at age four. Schooled in the art of survival, she traded in the only commodity she had: information. As a teenager, she came under the tutelage of a mysterious man known only as Hu Chang—a skilled assassin and master poisoner. As a young woman, she was recruited by the CIA and now she is known as one of their most effective operatives. When her old friend Hu Chang creates a formula that’s not only deadly but completely untraceable, the race begins to be the first to get it. Catherine finds herself up against a group so villainous and a man so evil that she may not survive in her quest to protect those she cares about: Hu Chang and Luke—the son who was stolen from Catherine and only recently brought home safe. Using all of her formidable skills, Catherine Ling proves the age-old belief that what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.”

Book Review – Dark Places

Dark Places by Gillian Flynn

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Thriller

“The Devil lurked nearby in our Kansas town, an evil that was as natural and physical as a hillside.”

“I have a meanness inside me, real as an organ. Slit me at my belly and it might slide out, meaty and dark, drop on the floor so you could stomp on it. It’s the Day blood. Something’s wrong with it.”

In January 1985 the Day family was murdered in the home, all but two were killed, Libby- 7 and Ben- 15. Libby testified that it was her brother Ben that killed her mom and two sisters that night. The Kinnakee Kansas Farmhouse Massacre they called it. But had she lied.

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Book 16: Kansas

Book 16: Kansas

“Libby Day was seven when her mother and two sisters were murdered in “The Satan Sacrifice” of Kinnakee, Kansas.” She survived—and famously testified that her fifteen-year-old brother, Ben, was the killer. Twenty-five years later, the Kill Club—a secret secret society obsessed with notorious crimes—locates Libby and pumps her for details. They hope to discover proof that may free Ben. Libby hopes to turn a profit off her tragic history: She’ll reconnect with the players from that night and report her findings to the club—for a fee. As Libby’s search takes her from shabby Missouri strip clubs to abandoned Oklahoma tourist towns, the unimaginable truth emerges, and Libby finds herself right back where she started—on the run from a killer.”

I am half way through and thoroughly enjoying this book. I have already seen the movie, so I already know what the twisted ending is but it is still a great read.

Book Review – Chasing Evil

Chasing Evil by Kylie Brant

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Thriller, Romance

“Backdropped against clumps of rich black Iowa topsoil was an unmistakably human hand.”

Women’s murdered bodies are discovered concealed in the graves of the recently buried throughout Iowa. DCI investigator Cam Prescott is assigned lead on the case and they have called in several specialists to consult on it. One of those specialists is Forensic Psychologist Dr. Sophia Channing, brought in to assist by providing a profile on the suspect.
“She’d spent the better part of graduate school interning with Louis Frein, renowned profiler at Quantico’s Behavioral Science Unit. In the last decade and a half, she’d interviewed the most notorious serial killers in captivity. There was more, much more to the woman than her appearance.”

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Book 15: Iowa

“There’s nothing strange about bodies buried in cemeteries—unless they don’t belong there. And when six murdered women are discovered in other people’s graves, the hunt for a sadistic serial killer begins before he can claim a seventh victim.

Agent Cam Prescott of Iowa’s Division of Criminal Investigation is leading the search alongside forensic psychologist Sophia Channing, who knows the minds of psychopaths inside and out. And after a brief but passionate affair, she knows Cam almost as well. What she doesn’t know is that her high-profile involvement in the case has caught the twisted predator’s eye—and sparked his fury.

When Sophia suddenly vanishes, Cam and his team shift into overdrive to keep horrific history from repeating itself. But for Sophia, being trapped in the same isolated lair where so much innocent blood has been spilled may get her inside her vicious captor’s head—and may offer her the only chance she has to escape an agonizing and lethal fate.”

Book 14: Indiana

“The murder of a minister’s family near South Bend at the end of April 1989 was, at the time, the worst case of mass murder in the history of northern Indiana. Police very quickly focused on Robert Jeffrey Pelley, the son of the minister, Robert Lee Pelley, and within a matter of hours concluded that he had to be the killer.

But was Jeff Pelley, as he was called, really the murderer? The case of the Pelleys fascinated Indiana for almost two decades – for every fact that seemed to suggest that Jeff Pelley had murdered his father, stepmother, and stepsisters, there were other facts that seemed to show he was innocent.

It took Indiana authorities years to charge Jeff Pelley with the murders of his family, and still more years to bring him to trial. And the story isn’t over yet …

But the truth of what really happened on April 29, 1989, remains a mystery.”

Oooh, I do love me a good true crime mystery! 🕵

Book Review – Wolf

Wolf by Kelly Oliver

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Murder Mystery

“Jessica closed her eyes and imagined a fitting demise for the thesis advisor whose Birkenstocks had stomped on her dream of getting an advanced degree: a quick defenestration, a slow acting poison, or a hard bludgeon to his fat ugly head with the blunt side of an axe. Professor Baldrick Wolfgang Schmutzig, “Preeminent Philosopher” (and World-Class Dickhead) had insulted her for the last time.”

Jessica James is a philosopher student at Northwestern University, a long way from her Montana, trailer park home. She is secretly living in the attic of the philosophy department, sleeping on a desk but she is determined to get her doctorate. Professor Wolf is her thesis advisor and she is also his TA. Her and a couple friends decide to break into his office and snoop around while smoking pot but they find more than what they bargained for. Her thesis, looking untouched with a post dated letter pretty much kicking her out of graduate school and Wolf’s dead body in the bathtub.

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April Recap

4 Books

1,120 pages

Average Rating 3.5

Jamie Quinn Mystery Collection 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

Murder at Rudhall Manor 🌟🌟

A Smidge of Crazy 🌟🌟🌟🌟

Every Knee Shall Bow 🌟🌟🌟

I finally broke my 3 book stalemate and gave a 5 star rating! I am feeling good about April. I read more, wrote more, and posted more. It’s certainly not my best and not what I had been planning on. I was suppose to be on vacation, reading and relaxing on a tropical island. Thanks Rona! 😡 But just rolling with what happens and thankfully I was able to just reschedule for September. This month I tried to focus on the positives.

I am thankful for my health.
I am thankful that my friends and family are healthy.
I am thankful I work at home for an awesome company.
I am thankful to Barbara Venkataraman and Anya Wylde for gifting me copies of their books. 😊

Bring on May and Springtime! 🌷🌹🌻

Book Review – Every Knee Shall Bow

Every Knee Shall Bow by Jess Walter

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Non-Fiction, True Crime

“That unto me, every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear.” -Isaiah 45:23

“Vickie told friends that H.G. Wells’s fifty-year-old stories had a lot of relevance in modern America, especially for someone like herself, someone who had begun getting messages from God while she took baths and who was having dreams of great violence and a cabin on a mountaintop.”

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Book 12: Idaho

“What went wrong at Ruby Ridge? Why was Randy Weaver’s son fatally shot in the back?

How could the FBI justify shooting a woman as she held her infant child?

Why were the Weavers given a $3.1 million settlement by the U.S. Government?

Was there an FBI cover-up and how high did it go?

Every Knee Shall Bow answers the critical questions that cut to the heart of the most explosive issues in the United States today.

The Weaver Family took to the woods to escape what they believed was a sinful world on the brink of Armageddon. But Randy Weaver’s indictment on a firearms violation escalated into a deadly shoot out at his northern Idaho cabin. Before it was over, a federal marshal, Weaver’s wife and his only son were dead.”

I live about 60 miles from Ruby Ridge and to be honest I didn’t realize all that occurred here. I thought that it was a hate spreading, racist, radical, that when law enforcement came to arrest him on a weapons violation, a standoff ensued. Similar to Waco, the government made some errors in how they handled the situation and saddley that resulted in loss of life. But it seems there was more to the story than I knew and some cover up going on.

I am ashamed that this happened so close to home, that there are people so filled with hate that used to live here. I don’t want people to think that only Aryans live in North Idaho. My community has done a lot over the decades to clean the hate from our streets.

I know that I am not the only one that feels this way. Does your home have a past or present that you are ashamed of?