Recap of recent reading

Why, hello there blog world! I've been neglecting blogging because I hadn't really read much recently. But I shall now recap all that I have read in the past couple weeks.

First, I read part of a mystery novel called Steamed. I wasn't reading it very fast and wasn't really getting into it, but I gave it a go. About halfway through I realized that 1) after meeting a certain character for the first time, I knew that he was the killer, 2) I didn't actually care about why he killed a guy, and 3) I didn't care if the main character ended up with the guy she liked. So I bailed on the book. No harm, no foul.

So then I started reading Bad Boys by Olivia Goldsmith. By all respects I should have liked it. But man, I just couldn't get into it at all. I gave it a good go, but I didn't like the main chick...she was an idiot. And I liked her best guy friend until he decided that he should change from the awesome geek that he was into a Bad Boy. Lame lame lame lame lame. So again...bail!

After two no goes, I decided to read Pushing Up Daisies by Rosemary Harris. It was recommended to me by my mom and was a mystery novel. I kind of guessed who the killer was, but that wasn't really the big mystery. The main character finds the body of a child in the garden of an old house and tries to find out what happened, even though the body is from about 30 years prior. That mystery leads to a mystery about a young woman who has been missing for 30 years. All of that leads to a murder! It was a fun book, nothing too exciting, but the characters felt real and the police force in the town actually did a good job with their job...a rarity in mystery novels. It was a nice book to read after two failed starts.

I also read Maybe This Time by Jennifer Crusie. I like Crusie, so I liked this book. I think it was not the best choice coming off of Agnes and the Hitman because it was a lot more....calm? I dug the main character. She was strong, independent, badass, and didn't let people tell her what to do or push her around. I also found the main dude likable. And there were ghosts! In a Haunted Mansion/Castle! I mean, really, how can that be wrong? The story was fun and the side characters were all crazy and awesome. A solid read for a wintery day!

I am now switching genres a bit and reading Florida Roadkill by Tim Dorsey which is a crime caper (at least that is the genre given on wikipedia). I'd call it crime comedy? Have you ever read Big Trouble or Tricky Business by Dave Barry? They are kind of like that. The main character is a royal screw up of a human being, but I kinda like him. I also have a couple other straight fiction comedy books checked out from the library, not to mention a chick lit and a couple mysteries. I also have World War Z that I may or may not get around to reading. Depends on my mood, I guess.