Review of A Fool and his Honey (An Aurora Teagarden Mystery)

I'm on a roll here. Reviewing two bad books in one sitting. Although I'm being harsh. 'A Fool and his Honey' was actually not quite bad compared to the others. The plot outline was really farfetched, but the way to the end seemed more straightforward instead of all the daily life encounters I really am bored with. I'm getting to know Roe's life way better than some of my friends.

In this novel, Roe gets a visit from a cousin of her husband. This cousin, Regina, has a baby who no one knew she expected, so everyone is a little confused in the beginning. Then, as Roe and her husband come back from a dinner party, they find their cousin gone, her husband murdered and her child lying hidden under the bed. These are the ingredients for yet another exiting mystery (I say with a deep sigh).

For as the previous novels tended to be a bit tedious, this one gets down to the point really fast and you get answers quicker than you'd expect. Of course it's something plucked out of the blue, with as much possibility of it really happening as you would see a pig fly. So definitely points for originality. Of course this is still Roe we're talking about. Her life hasn't become any interesting as of yet, although the writer seems to have gained confidence in writing the sex scenes between Roe and Martin. Nothing explicit, but very translucent and completely unnecessary.
Being infertile and having to take care of a baby, I know I would react differently. Roe is reacting to this baby as I am reacting to the novels. Tedious but unavoidable.
Even in the end as Martin disappears from the stage you don't get the emotional pit fall you'd expect. A very emotionless book, I might say.

Rating: 6 out of 10.

Review of Dead over Heels (An Aurora Teagarden Mystery)

I know I've said I wouldn't read more of Aurora Teagarden, but this is just one aspect of the OCD I'm suffering from. I just have to continue. I have read too many of them already, so I just have to read them all. It's really sad, but I can't help my compulsive need.

On the upside, I'm almost through with them. I'm lucky they aren't thick books, (why do you think I held off so long beginning to read the game of thrones series, If that had been a disappointment I was in for a long stretch).
Also, I usually mix two books, so when I'm fed up with this southern lady I just dig a little deeper into a southern vampire novel (and no, not the Sookie Stackhouse series!, although I did like those)

I won't bother with a summary from Goodreads. It's pretty straightforward. While Roe and Angel are working in the yard a body falls down from the sky. It isn't just anybody, but the feared police detective Jack Burns. Why has Burns been dropped there? Who killed him? Soon Roe finds out he hasn't been dropped in her yard randomly. 

While you get to plow through every southern convention there is, and let me tell you, they don't differ from the ones in the previous installments. We get to know Roe's daily routine, up until the clothes she wears, what color rims she has on (not really noteworthy) and how many times she has passionate sex with her husband, all the while she stumbles through the novel thinking someone else is the key to the story, while all this time she herself seems to be the reason for every hickup in this novel. I would like to see this Roe in real life, because from a timid librarian she must be magically transformed into some kind of vamp. See how money can make you pretty!
I didn't like it much this novel, but it's finished, it's in the past.. I got through it and that's a positive thing.

Rating: 5 out of 10

Review of The Julius House (An Aurora Teagarden mystery)

Since she met her fiance Martin Bartell, Roe Teagarden has never been happier. There's a difference in age and in background, but he seems to know exactly what she wants - like the Julius house. Roe is thrilled when Martin gives her the house as a wedding present. She's a keen amateur sleuth, and she has always been intrigued by its infamous history: six years ago, the family who lived there disappeared, never to be seen again. As Roe throws herself into renovating the Julius house, her misgivings about Martin's rather murky past recede. But when Roe is attacked by an axe-wielding maniac, she realises that the secrets inside her four walls - and her brand-new marriage - could destroy her. (www.goodreads.com)

Wow. And not in a good way either. I struggled through it, not expecting this kind of rubbish after the others were kind of okay.
First, each time I read this Lauren Bacall reference and I don't care, really I don't . I don't know that woman and am not about to look her up. I love to have each character developed solely in my mind and comparing to someone else is cheap and easy. And doesn't need to be mentioned in each book.
Second, I don't need to have an agenda of every time Martin and Roe get it on. God, each time I have to read such a reference I feel like I'm like 15 years too old to be reading this. Yes, they are married and yes they have lots and lots of sex. Sometimes we can grasp a good time without it actually being pointed out.
Third, lazy and sloppy story. I wasn't prepared for this and felt definitely bad for spending my time on it. Halfway through the novel I already had figured out what had happened and the 'clues' the writer leaves behind are really not necessary, it couldn't be more see through if you meant it to be that way.

My conclusion. I definitely need a break from Aurora Teagarden, because I find her to be a whiny, nosy and too naive to be believable at all.
I had read a few pages from the successor, 'Dead over Heels', but feel I probably will get disappointed. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.. so I'm switching to something else. Not sure what yet.

My opinion: 2 stars

Review of Three Bedrooms, One Corpse (An Aurora Teagarden mystery)

Deciding if she wants to go into real estate becomes a life-or-death choice for Aurora "Roe" Teagarden. A naked corpse is discovered at her first house showing. And when a second body is found in another house for sale, it becomes obvious that there is a very cool killer at large in Lawrenceton, one who knows a great deal about real estate-and maybe too much about Roe.(www.goodreads.com)

The third installment of The Teagarden Mystery novels. If you have read the Sookie Stackhouse novels before trying your hand at this, you might find the first two a bit boringly decent. Aurora is a woman who wasn't had much romantic experience and is quite naive. Well, Charlaine Harris must have thought while writing this novel that it was time for Aurora to grow up because very suddenly a hot and juicy kind of relationship falls into her lap. In the beginning she's still dating the priest but when she meet Martin she falls head over heels. Instead of a harsh break-up the priest declares he's infertile, a young woman with a daughter comes to live in Lawrenceton and there's the end scene for the priest, let's all welcome Martin, ruthless and sexy Martin, an older man with the confidence they mostly come with. I'm not sure I'm buying into all this. Sure someone can change, but either you are on the prudent side or not, that doesn't change so easily, in my opinion.
Liking it or not, that's the background for our next mystery. A young woman murdered, soon followed by another young woman and the town is wondering why the killer chooses to kill in empty houses which are for sale. Aurora tries to unravel the mystery and eventually becomes a part off it.
Comparing it to the other two, it wasn't the worst and it wasn't the best, so it goes right there in the middle.

Rating: 6 out of 10

Review of A Bone to Pick (an Aurora Teagarden Mystery)

Aurora "Roe" Teagarden's fortunes change when a deceased acquaintance names her as heir to a rather substantial estate, including money, jewelry, and a house complete with a skull hidden in a window seat. Roe concludes that the elderly women has purposely left her a murder to solve. So she must identify the victim and figure out which one of her new, ordinary-seeming neighbors is a murderer- without putting herself in deadly danger.(www.goodreads.com)

My second in row. I'm reading this at work during lunch break, which is an ideal way to relax my brain muscles.
I've been lukewarm about the first installment, and this one is a lot like it. Only difference is that I'm already a little hooked on it. At the moment I'm reading the third installment. I'm just happy they aren't too thick. I breeze through them easily.
A Bone to Pick is a better novel than Real Murders though. Instead of various murders happening in this little town, Aurora stumbles upon a skull in a house she inherited. She tries to find out whose skull it is and whether the previous owner of the house had anything to do with it. A cozy little mystery which doesn't give away it's secret until the very end. The ending does feel blunt. You trail along with 'Roe' on her little investigation while her life continues and ultimately the answer is a bit forced down our throat to put an end to this novel.
The best way to describe this book, is that it is entertaining. I read it during one of those warm March days and this story takes place during a Georgia summer which gave me a great mind set to finish it.

Personal rating: 6,5 out of 10

Review of Real Murders (An Aurora Teagarden mystery)

Though a small town at heart, Lawrenceton, Georgia, has its dark side-and crime buffs. One of whom is librarian Aurora "Roe" Teagarden, a member of the Real Murders Club, which meets once a month to analyze famous cases. It's a harmless pastime-until the night she finds a member killed in a manner that eerily resembles the crime the club was about to discuss. And as other brutal "copycat" killings follow, Roe will have to uncover the person behind the terrifying game, one that casts all the members of Real Murders, herself included, as prime suspects-or potential victims.(www.goodreads.com)

This isn't what you call high end literature, and in my opinion not all books written should be. After reading fairly heavy novels, I was ready for something lighthearted and I chose this.
I've read Charlaine Harris before, meaning the True Blood series. Almost every one. I like the novels better than I like the adaption running on the tv.
This is written before that, and you notice it in the style. It's written very matter of factly, not really getting deeper into the main character's personality. She stays a little flat. As for the other characters, there wasn't a single one I thought stood out more than the others.
The storyline is quickpaced but there's nothing much to it. Simply said, murders happens, 'Roe' Teagarden happens to be somewhere around when they discover the bodies and gets sucked in at the end. She never goes out investigating those murders, she's just an innocent bystander, a little on the pathetic side.
I'm not sure which target audience Charlaine Harris had in mind, but I think 10 to 12year olds would love to read this even if they don't know everything mentioned in the book. Even for hormone filled teenagers, this is a little too mellow.
All together it was a quick read and I'm going to read the others as well. It's much like a tv show, you might not identify with the characters, but you still want to know what happens to them.

Personal rating: 5 out of 10.

Review of Dead Reckoning

First published in 2011
Thickness: 325 pages

With her knack for being in trouble's way, Sookie witnesses the firebombing of Merlotte's, the bar where she works. Since Sam Merlotte is now known to be two-natured, suspicion falls immediately on the anti-shifters in the area. But Sookie suspects otherwise and she and Sam work together to uncover the culprit - and the twisted motive for the attack. But her attention is divided. Though she can't 'read' vampires, Sookie knows her lover Eric Northman and his 'child' Pam well - and she realises that they are plotting to kill the vampire who is now their master. Gradually, she is drawn into the plot -which is much more complicated than she knows. Caught up in the politics of the vampire world, Sookie will learn that she is as much of a pawn as any ordinary human - and that there is a new Queen on the board . . . (http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7981206-dead-reckoning)


I postponed writing this review. 
Why? 
Because I wasn't sure what I thought of it. I'm still not entirely positive or negative about this 11th installment in the Southern Vampire aka Sookie Stackhouse series. 
For starters it was better than the previous novel. Man, I'll tell you again, that was a bad little piece of fiction, not entirely rubbish because it still features a lot of recognizable characters I learned to love and cherish, but they didn't do a very good job in Dead in the family. 
But to get back to the topic, Dead Reckoning was better, if only infinitesimal. 

The action was better, the novel had more structure, but in the end I wasn't enthralled by the whiney Sookie. What happened to that girl that stuck up for herself. It seems that 'love' has taken the fight out of her. I yayed for her when she released herself from the bond between her and Eric (Thanks Amelia!!) but her reaction afterwards was just plain pathetic. 
And to be truthful I wondered why she didn't inform Eric beforehand (he might try to talk her out of it?? That was the answer she gave herself) God, I felt like she was more and more becoming like Bella instead of the powerful Sookie. 
 
In the end, she came through though. I wonder what direction she will take now. I still don't like her with Eric. 


And just to throw them in. A few things that bothered me. 
  Sandra Pelt.. She was there, and then not, and then again, and then not again, until she met an untimely death. She seemed like an annoying fly that keeps bugging you, but mostly I felt like it was meant as a pagefiller. What to do with Sookie when all things quiet down for a while?? Oh wait, let's worry for her life, as Sandra Pelt is after her again. 
  What was with the naked hideout in Bill's house? Does she really need to turn his head around like that? I know it was from a survival point of view, but still.. it felt quite redundant. I was glad to hear what became of him and Judith (see previous novel). 


Well, that's it. Still looking forward to the next one, although with less anticipation than before. 

Review of Dead In The Family

Author: Charlaine Harris
First published in 2010
Thickness: 311 pages

Sookie Stackhouse somehow survived the Faery War, but life never seems to get easy for Bon Temps' telepathic (but tip-poor) barmaid. In the tenth instalment of Charlaine Harris's resilient Southern Vampire series, Sookie and heartthrob Eric Northman come under intense regal scrutiny, but there are dangers even closer at hand: The doors to Faery slammed shut before some Fae were able to return and they're holding Sookie very personally responsible.  (Source: www.goodreads.com)


I didn't get too excited (and with this series you can take that quite literally, ^^) by this 10th installment of the famous Southern Vampires series. 
Why?
It was sloppy, written too fast with no real thread through the novel. Things seem to happen and not all that happened was explained. (Whatever happened further with Bill and Judith??) Instead of reading someone reaching some goal, or trying to survive a certain twist of fate, I read about a girl where random things happen and many many people take advantage of. 
Sookie tries to tell herself that she's an independent woman who stands her own ground, but in this novel I very much thought the opposite. 
The relationship to Eric doesn't feel credible either. A love affair can't be about the spectacular sex all the time, that's just sheer lust confused with intimacy. When I read it, I was sure that the right choice for Sookie was under her nose from the very beginning, her boss Sam. The feelings are there, but she seems terrified to act upon it. Don't know what's holding her back. She could have it all,  instead of having a boyfriend that never ages and won't give her a family she one day might want. 


Well, of course I know that many people have different opinions of what Sookie should do, and in the end it's the writer that calls the shots, but I do hope she will get a happy ending, still living and not stonecold and never-aging. With what these novels tell me, being a vampire isn't all that fantastic either. 


In comparison to other the other Sookie Stackhouse novels, this one is mediocre, if not the least so far.