DWD's Reviews

Published by Macmillan Audio in 2013 Read by Holter Graham Duration: 9 hours, 53 minutes Unabridged If you are a big fan of the TV show Criminal Minds  or the movie The Silence of the Lambs  you will probably enjoy this book quite a bit. For me, the fascination of getting into the head of a serial killer has long since passed and I end up feeling soiled and abused after every excursion into this area. But, I read the book because I do enjoy C.J. Box's work quite a bit and I grudgingly like his Cody Hoyt character - he is exasperating and full of gigantic character flaws but just when you have had enough of him he pulls himself together and he gets the job done. In a bit of a reach (actually, in a real big reach) the young female characters from his book Back of Beyond  are caught up in another dangerous situation and Cody Hoyt is called out to rescue them once again. This time they have a run-in with a long haul trucker that kills himself the Lizard King. This name is a

First published in 1958 Winner of the 1959 Newberry Medal When I was a kid I read this book twice, which for me was rare. I have always been one to prefer reading a new book than re-reading an old one. I had an emotional connection to the book dating back to fifth grade. But, I hadn't read it since fifth grade. For me, it was a book that I fondly pulled off of bookshelves as an adult but I never had the courage to re-read it out of fear of spoiling the memory of the book. What if it wasn't nearly as good as I remembered? Finally, I decided to take the plunge and see if my memory was justified. The Witch of Blackbird Pond is set in colonial Wethersfield, Connecticut in 1687. 16 year old Kit Tyler is coming from Barbados to live with her aunt who lives in Wethersfield because she is her last surviving relative. Her arrival adds strain to a family that was barely eking out a living. More importantly, her upbringing in Barbados has not prepared her for life among the Pur

Originally Published in 1975 If you have not read a Spenser detective novel and you love the detective genre, pick one up and start reading. I would start with #1 but there are 40 original novels and they all follow a basic premise. Spenser gets a case. Spenser noses around, makes a lot of wisecracks, irritates people who certainly deserve to be irritated and then he sees if there is a reaction to his nosing around. Usually, that is someone trying to warn him off or, perhaps, trying to kill him outright. From there, Spenser knows who is after him and can figure out why and he knows where to proceed and solve the case. Sounds simple, doesn't it? Of course, it is. And, the finest of wines are really just grape squeezings. Simple - but yet there is something else there. The Spenser series is one of the few series that I am willing to re-read. In this case, I undoubtedly read this book nearly 20 years ago and I barely remembered the plot. It turns out that I mis-remembered i

Originally published in 1947. In the 1930's, the "Childhood of Famous Americans" series was started with a simple biography of Abraham Lincoln's childhood. Eventually, there were dozens of books in this series. In my childhood I remember my small town library had a shelf full of these books and I read them all. Nowadays, this series has been picked up by Simon and Schuster. This book focuses on the childhood of Martha Washington (1731-1802), or Martha Dandridge, nicknamed Patsy. There is not really an over-arching story here. Rather, this is mostly a series of scenes from her childhood including having a bear cub as a pet, posing for a portrait and learning to ride a pony. There are also visits from local Native tribes. This book could be read not just as a biography of Martha Washington but also as a sample of what life on a plantation would be like for the family that owns the plantation. That being said, it doesn't really address the issue of slavery,

Published in 2014 Normally, I am not much of a fan of short stories. For me, by the time I figure out what's going on in the story it's over and then I have to go through the whole process again in the next story. The exception to this has always been Stephen King - he creates characters that the reader can buy into very quickly in a story. I will add C.J. Box to that list with Stephen King. Throughout Shots Fired  Box quickly establishes the parameters of the story and then delivers 10 good short stories. Four of them feature his previously established characters joe Pickett or Nate Romanowski. Nine of them take place in modern times. Nine take place in Wyoming. The one that does not take place in Wyoming features members of the Sioux nation who are working at Euro-Disney in France. It is one of my favorites in the collection. A quote from the book: "Giving alcohol to an alcoholic makes him happy, but it doesn't help him. Buying stuff for people who won&#

First published in 1971 Louis L'Amour wrote well over one hundred novels with varying topics, including one science fiction novel. But, of course, he is most famous for his Westerns. Under the Sweetwater Rim is a Western, but it is a different kind of Western. This novel is set in a lonely part of Wyoming during the Civil War. The war rarely intrudes out this far - usually if there is an issue it is with Indians that realized that the American national government is distracted and they can attack settlers moving out west. A wagon train setting out from Fort Laramie to the West Coast is attacked - but not by Indians. Instead, it is destroyed by a rogue group of Bushwhackers from the Kansas/Missouri/Arkansas led by a ruthless man who is known to be a superior frontiersman. Louis L'Amour (1908-1988) But, part of the wagon train survived. Right before the attack an officer from the fort who is supposed to be on leave pulled a single wagon out of the train and took. Th