Naked Heat (Nikki Heat #2)<\/b>
\nThe second Nikki Heat book, a tie-in to the TV series Castle, felt more polished than the first — the mystery was more interesting, the characters were more developed, and it felt a bit less like an episode of the TV show with the names changed. While its similarity to the ‘feel’ of the show was a big plus for the first book, I think it’s good that the books are starting to find their own voice. Though I imagine most people buying them are fans of the show, it’s better if they’re able to stand as novels in their own right. The story opens quite a while after the first one, at a point where Rook and Heat have broken up off camera and haven’t seen one another for some time. I admit I was a little confused as to why it seemed to take so very long for him to write his article about Nikki (it’s only just been published as the book opens), but this was a minor quibble. I expect that as long as the show manages to keep getting renewed, ABC will be happy to keep this revenue stream open, so if we’re lucky we’ll have book 3 arriving next fall.<\/p>\n
Plum Pudding Murder (Hannah Swensen #12)<\/b>
\nThe twelfth full installment in the Swensen series takes place in December, a week or so prior to Christmas. The recent trend in the books has been to set them over holidays and other school breaks so there’s some excuse to bring Hannah’s younger sister Michelle home from college. I’m not sure I like this overuse of the third Swensen sister; there’s not really enough for everyone to do as it is, so I feel like the supporting cast is really getting short shrift as more and more people become ‘regulars’. At any rate, the victim here is again an outsider, so Hannah’s interest in the killer is more academic than anything — I certainly understand the need to avoid killing off all of the townspeople, but Fluke does it best when she introduces a background character at least in the previous book and then proceeds to kill them off in the next. Or, if not that, then the killer is someone ‘known’. You feel more interest in their fate. The most notable thing about this title is what’s missing, which is any reference at all to the fact that Hannah’s mother just published a novel in the previous book. This has been a common trend in the Swensen series — a plotline will wend through several books until it comes to fruition, after which it’ll be dropped like a hot potato and never referred to again. Apparently we’re not supposed to wonder how the book is selling?<\/p>\n
It’s a Book<\/b>
\nI’d been shown this book by our children’s librarian, who ordered it for herself, though she ultimately decided not to put it on the shelves. It later generated quite a discussion on the state librarian mailing list. I ordered a copy for Dorrie, and even if she were verbal, I don’t think I’d have any particular qualms about reading it to her. The ending aside, it’s an interesting commentary and though there are a few bits I would change because I don’t think they flow as well as the rest, it’s not a bad picture book.<\/p>\n
Apple Turnover Murder (Hannah Swensen #13)<\/b>
\nFinally, some progress! Sort of. We zip ahead to June after our previous Christmas outing, where we hear nothing about the project Michelle had been working on before. But that’s okay, because we have as our victim Bradford Ramsey, aka the only man on Earth who has ever seen Hannah naked. Now there’s no proof at all that she’s anything but an old maid! Naturally he is a cad, who screws over colleagues and screws women with abandon, and no one really mourns his passing. But in the end the murderer is tracked down and Hannah even manages to remember she has a cell phone. On the relationship front, it’s implied both Mike and Norman are getting tired of dangling after Hannah, though they both deny it (Mike even tries to pull ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ as if no one ever used that line before). I’m doubtful that this will signal real progress, but at least we’re left with some interesting plot lines hanging in wait for the next story.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Naked Heat (Nikki Heat #2) The second Nikki Heat book, a tie-in to the TV series Castle, felt more polished than the first — the mystery was more interesting, the characters were more developed, and it felt a bit less like an episode of the TV show with the names changed. While its similarity to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2,29],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flaminggeeks.com\/k\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flaminggeeks.com\/k\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flaminggeeks.com\/k\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flaminggeeks.com\/k\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flaminggeeks.com\/k\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1052"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/flaminggeeks.com\/k\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1056,"href":"https:\/\/flaminggeeks.com\/k\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052\/revisions\/1056"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flaminggeeks.com\/k\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flaminggeeks.com\/k\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flaminggeeks.com\/k\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}