Wolf in the Shadows by Marcia Muller

In this one, Sharon's long-standing (several books now) boyfriend disappears and she goes after him. And she doesn't get fired or quit her job after all.

Fool Moon by Jim Butcher

With the Dresden books, you can always be confident that the title fits the story - even when it is a pun. Fool Moon - Full Moon - and the story is about -- have you guessed? Of course, you have - werewolves. It seems that there are several types of werewolf, and they all appear in the story. I do not propose to enlighten you on the subject. Read the book.

Storm Front by Jim Butcher

I had planned to catch up on all this stuff during the break. Spring term begins tomorrow - and I now have fifteen books which I haven't posted. Oh, well ---

I had recommended the Alera books to a former student and he came in a few days later talking about the Dresden books, so I thought it might be time to reread - and catch up with - this series.

Things do get gruesome - ripping hearts out and such - but the principal characters are entertaining and persuasive. After Gandalf and Dumbledore, Dresden is hard-working and fallible, and he gets beat up a lot, but he is well-intentioned and manages to save the day.

Waterfall by Lisa T. Bergren

Very teen angsty, but not bad. It kept me reading - if only to see what crisis was going to be so compelling that our heroine would give up her medieval sweetie and return to her proper century. So, that should have telegraphed the basic plot. Teenage sisters trapped for the summer on an archaeological site in Italy accidentally discover a "portal" which transports them back to the 14th century.

In the manner of stories of this type, main character sister falls for a local princeling, who also falls for her and all the subsequent implausibilities are quite readable and fun.

There was one major problem with it - an issue which I have addressed at length on other books in this list. Where do these people get their titles? The title of this book has absolutely nothing to do with the story, nothing! It is clearly intended to be the first in a potentially endless series which is titled River of Time (nothing like telegraphing the plot of the entire series), but there is no allusion to time as a river or a current, and even then one might expect some connection between the plot and the title. It is as if the writer had this "concept" and then couldn't quite make the story fit the concept, but was so enamored of it that she couldn't turn loose of it and chose a more appropriate title.

Oh, well.

Strong as Death by Sharan Newman

Catharine and Edgar have undertaken a pilgrimage to Compostela to pray for a child. Catharine lost one child at birth and has miscarried several times. Edgar fears that she is in danger of lapsing into a religious mania of the sort that has her mother locked up in a convent. Apparently convents were the 12th century equivalent of mental institutions for the wealthier end of the economic spectrum. Poor people just got to go crazy where they stood.

Of course, the murders occur on the road among their group of pilgrims. That is quite logical, what is somewhat less logical is that every important cast member finds reason to come along - Catharine's father, his brother Eliazar, and their nephew Solomon. And in the course of the action, all of them get accused of murder.

The murders themselves are gruesome and creative and the murderer remains hidden until the last chapters, but that is part of Newman's trademark. More of Hubert's family turns up - in quite an unexpected manner. And everyone in their group on the pilgrimage has something to hide.

This book sees the death of Peter Abelard, who had been a mentor to both Catharine and Edgar. They did go visit him shortly before they left, in fact, he is the one that recommended the pilgrimage by interpreting a dream of Catharine's.

Dark Tort by Diane Mott Davidson

I think I have read this before in the period of this blog. For one thing, it was already on my kindle. Definitely a clue. This one is set in and around a law firm. Goldy is on the scene because she has been catering breakfasts for the firm and meeting a young intern and neighbor of hers at the law office's kitchen for cooking lessons while she preps for the breakfasts. The intern is the victim and the plot is all the usual intrigue and jealousy. A good read.

I am enjoying the fact that they have started tacking the recipes on the end of the book instead of imbedding them in the story. I'm sure they are excellent recipes, and the food talk makes it all very tempting, but I have finally faced the fact that the likelihood that I will ever prepare any of those concoctions is vanishingly small.

Captain Vorpatril's Alliance by Lois McMaster Bujold

What fun! Ivan has definitely gotten short shrift in the whole saga. Maybe his apparent ineptitude is only a result of being a pretty normal kind of hero placed in the midst of a clan of truly extraordinary heroes. Maybe Bujold was feeling guilty - or perhaps she had really run out of options with Miles. He is now married with children, and has rather aged out of the system. Are we now going to have to wait for the next generation of Vor offspring?

Typically, for Ivan, he walks into a situation to help out a friend - well, maybe Byerly isn't a friend, but Ivan has that British sort of guilt complex about holding up the side (in a Russian sort of way). In the course of which help, he meets a beautiful girl, and marries her (quite by accident, sort of).

For followers of the Vor of Barrayar, Bujold gives us background on the colonization of Barrayar which has not been addressed so explicitly before. After all, Ivan has to explain his homeland to his lady-love. And typically for Ivan, once he has married Tej, with the understanding that they will divorce as soon as possible, he actually falls in love with her. And, since Tej is his counterpart in terms of ranking in her family (somewhere on the level of the adored family dog, much loved, but of whom little is expected), she does the same. Throw in a couple of rather dominating mothers-in-law and you have fuel for any quantity of confusion.