Colorways by Vicki Welsh

I kicked off the new year with a great biography, Cleopatra, and that was probably my favorite book of the month. I had one disappointment, Boom Town, and a few “pretty goods”. I attribute it to trying to force feed books on particular topics. I don’t mind a failure here and there. That approach also got me one really good history book about the town of Tombstone, AZ.

Tell me what good books you rad this month? If you live int he East, I assume you had lots of reading time while locked in from the storm.

If you have any interest in Cleopatra or the time of Cleopatra, this is a great book to read. Stacy Schiff does a great job of dispelling most of what we think we know about Cleopatra, thanks to Elizabeth Taylor and Hollywood. Her sources are of Cleopatra’s time, as much as possible and reveal a complex, brilliant and captivating woman.

The storytelling style is interesting and it was never boring. Definitely worth a read.

Michael Connelly is the author of the popular Lincoln Lawyer and Bosch series. This time he’s out with a new series set on Catalina Island, off the coast of Los Angeles. Detective Stilwell got involved is some ugly department politics and has been set to Catalina to cool his jets for a while. While there, he’s taking a liking to the place, people and pace. He deals mostly with low level crimes.

One day he receives a report of the body of a female found weighted at the bottom of the harbor. Her only identifying feature is her purple hair. Around the same time, he receives a report of a stolen item from an exclusive fishing and boating club. Stillwell is restricted from investigating the murder, because of the aforementioned politics, but he’s not restricted from investigating the theft. The two might be related.

If you like the other Connelly series, you will enjoy this new one.

Chris and I selected this book to listen to during our ride from Virginia to Arizona. We planned our route to go through Oklahoma and thought this history of Oklahoma City would be interesting.

It wasn’t.

There are 3 story arcs in this book. One is the rough and tumble history of the foundation and development of the city. Second, is the very detailed history of the Oklahoma City Thunder basketball team and third is the weather and the most famous tornado to hit the city. The history part is told with a strong bias from the West Coast liberal author. The basketball part requires you to REALLY be interested in basketball. We aren’t. The third part was actually interesting and barely got much attention.

In the end we skipped half the basketball part, listened to all the weather parts and gave up on the history when he blamed everything bad on white men and talked about how much better his home city of Seattle is.

I asked Grok for some recommendation for books set in Tucson. This was one of the recommendations and, since I love Barbara Kingsolver, I selected it. It was written in the late 1980’s, I think and seems to be set in that time.

Taylor Greer is trying to escape rural Kentucky and find a new life away from her newly-remarried mother. She heads West with little money and a barely-running car. Along the way she gets some odd jobs to help her through. In Oklahoma she is handed a young Native-American girl, about 3. The mother begs Taylor to take her because otherwise she will not survive. Taylor finds out quickly that there’s something wrong with the girl but she’s determined to care for her as best as she can. She calls her Turtle.

Taylor and Turtle land in Tucson where they start to build a life.

All of Kingsolver’s books are beautifully written stories about the human condition. There’s no great mystery. Just people finding their places in the world. This one is an early book and considered a classic. I don’t think it’s as good as Demon Copperhead, but it’s still a great story and Taylor is a very sympathetic character.

This is another book that I bought specifically for this trip. I saw it in a gift shop bookstore last year. I wasn’t sure I would like it so I waited and purchased it from Thriftbooks. It turned out to be a good purchase afterall.

I wanted to read it this year because we are planning a day trip to Tombstone and I thought a pre-trip history lesson might be in order. I really enjoyed this because it put Tombstone and the events there in context of the settlement of the West. The first chapter is all about the settlement of the west. The second is a detailed history of the Earp family. Then it gets into the settlement of Tombstone and the arrival of the Earps, Doc Holloway, the Clantons and others to the town.

It’s a surprisingly interesting book and if you love American history you will want to read this one. It’s not available in audio; you’ll have to ready this on on paper.

Michael Koryta is one of my favorite mystery writers. He is able to put his reader right into the story. I once had to take a break from one of his books because the cave scene made me feel claustrophobic. That’s how good he is. This book, however, is my least favorite of the 8 books I’ve read so far.

Frank Temple III had led a very interesting life, thanks to his father, Frank Jr. Frank Jr was a US Marshall who was also a contract killer. When Devin Matteson gave him up to the FBI, Frank Jr committed suicide. Frank III ahs always been clean of that business but has never been able to shake the suspicion.

Seven years after his father’s death, Frank returns to the family cabin on a lake in Wisconsin because he’s heard that Devin has returned there. Devin’s cabin is occupied by a couple that he doesn’t recognize, assassins have arrived in town and the FBI follows. Now Frank has to assess whether his father taught him everything he needs to know.

It’s a good story and there are good characters but the telling (or maybe the narration) is kind of all over the place. I had a little trouble following everything that was going on.