Following the death of her co-writer, Em is fighting hard to progress her latest book. Teddy used to handle the interviews, a star in his own right, but Em is almost too nervous to proceed with the biography of a talented film director. Caroline, Teddy's widow, is clearly jealous, but she has exp...
good creepy book -different from her usual fare good quick read It did not make sense until the end. Story of a vindictive woman. Difficult to follow.
#4 Carlotta Carlyle mystery set in Boston, MA. Carlotta, a private investigator who drives cab to fill in the monetary gap, picks up a fare she recognizes--Dee Willis, a blues singer/guitarist who has increasingly gained fame and fortune over the years. The same Dee Willis whom Carlotta used to p...
I don't like the term "chick lit", although I use it frequently, generally for aesthetic purposes. (It sounds better than "women's lit" or "feminist lit", in my opinion.) I use it to describe a vast amount of stuff that probably isn't chick lit, including everything from Camille Paglia to romance...
I've read one other mystery written by this author and featuring this female private investigator. This one features the P.I. going undercover on a big freeway tunnel project in Boston. First, regarding the setting. I don't get the same feel for Boston as I do in Dennis Lehane's novels. Perha...
This is a good, quick Barnes’ read starring the part-time Private Detective/Cab Driver, Carlotta Carlyle. As usual, Barnes does do her research. This time, Boston-based Carlotta gets involved with a case at her own work-place Green and White Taxi. Carlotta discovers four bugs in the restroom. ...
Another piece of the puzzle is put together as more is revealed about Carlotta Carlyle’s intriguing world while reading this 3rd book in the series, especially about her little sister Paolina (from the Big Sisters program). Carlotta takes her responsibility towards her little “sister” very seriou...
Sometimes books get on our TBR piles in the strangest ways. A few years ago I did a library display on Cold Cases. If you’ve read anything I’ve reviewed you’d probably know I love to read about these unsolved missing person cases. Anyway, I bought the book Cold Case by Linda Barnes for that displ...
#2 in the Michael Spraggue III series.Michael Spraggue III series - Michael Spraggue, a wealthy private eye turned movie actor, is in the middle of making a trashy Hollywood movie about -- what else? -- a private eye, when he gets a phone call from his sometime lover and current business partner...
Pleasant, but so unmemorable that I'm having trouble even conjuring the interest to write a review. The sort of book that doesn't inspire enough glorious frustration to write a rant, nor the adoration to pen a slavering paean to its greatness.Carlotta Carlyle, the story's protagonist, is a former...
#5 Carlotta Carlyle PI mystery set in Boston, MA. Each Friday for several weeks, Carlotta receives a photo of a young girl from birth upwards, and then the girl's mother arrives with her psychiatrist to bring her the last one--a photo of young Rebecca Woodrow just before she died. Her grief-stric...
"Barnes builds her plot like a fine pastry, layer by layer." Chicago Sun-Times A Michael Spraggue mystery. When the great chefs of New Orleans stage an elegant banquet, tempers burn hotter than cayenne pepper. Up-and-coming Cajun chef Joseph Fontenot is found with a slender French cooking knife ...
#3 in the Michael Spraggue series. This series featured Michael Spraggue III, an actor/investigator. It amazing how many detectives have independent means (in this case a wealthy aunt of Boston old money), but maybe not - how else could they afford taking pro bono cases. Spraggue appeared in 4 en...
He’s a good cop, if such an animal exists. We used to work the same shift before I decided—wrongly—that there was room for a lady PI in this town. Who knows? With this case under my belt, maybe business’ll take a 180-degree spin, and I can quit driving a hack. See, I’ve already written the offici...
Dark wood showed through the white paint, especially at eye level where most of the graffiti were scratched. DORIS LOVES JOEY. DORIS PUTS OUT. Paolina wondered what moms said when they brought little kids into the bathroom and the four-year-olds asked about the swear words on the door. Even as sh...
Dammit, he was late. After eight o’clock and Darien’s bash scheduled to begin at nine. Spraggue knotted his tie and checked his reflection in the mirror. Not that any of Darien’s carefully chosen society guests would deign to arrive on time. Where in hell was that cab? He dialed Hurley’s phone nu...
My toes are nothing but blisters. I totally chose the wrong shoes.” “I didn’t call about your feet, Roz.” Mamma Vincenza’s parking lot attendants had been a washout: They didn’t recall the Volvo; they didn’t know the whereabouts of the Gianelli Jag, and I was currently navigating a narrow North E...
I scanned the riverbank as I drove, looking for boathouses, wondering whether Dowling, who’d used the river as a road the night of the money drop, might have traveled it again the night he died. Stands of high cattails blocked my view. By the time I found a parking place in the Square, I was eigh...