Candy Cane Murder by Joanne Fluke

Started: 12/3/2025

Finished: 12/3/2025

Year: 2007

Pages: 148

Genre: cozy mystery

Grade: B

Reason for reading: continuing with series, library book

Type: hardcover

Blurb (from Amazon): "A collection of three holiday mysteries includes stories by Joanne Fluke, Laura Levine, and Leslie Meyer, and features fourteen Christmas recipes"

Opinion: I only read the novella from Fluke and it's another body discovered by Hannah and where she helps solve the whodunit. Decent mystery-took a while to figure it out and why.

All of Us Murderers by KJ Charles

Started: 12/2/2025

Finished: DNF

Year: 2025

Pages: 331

Genre: mystery

Grade: F

Reason for reading: library book

Type: paperback

Blurb (from Amazon): "When Zeb Wyckham is summoned to a wealthy relative's remote Gothic manor, he is horrified to find all the people he least wants to see in the world: his estranged brother, his sneering cousin, and his bitter ex-lover Gideon Grey. Things couldn't possibly get worse.

"Then the master of the house announces the true purpose of the gathering: he intends to leave the vast family fortune to whoever marries his young ward, setting off a violent scramble for her hand. Zeb wants no part of his greedy family―but when he tries to leave, the way is barred. The walls of Lackaday House are high, and the gates firmly locked. As the Dartmoor mists roll in, there's no way out. And something unnatural may be watching them from the house's shadowy depths…

"Fear and paranoia ramping ever-higher, Zeb has nowhere to turn but to the man who once held his heart. As the gaslight flickers and terror takes hold, can two warring lovers reunite, uncover the murderous mysteries of Lackaday House―and live to tell the tale?"

Opinion: Blah. None of the characters are interesting enough for me to continue. Everyone seems petty and only out for an inheritance.

Force of Nature by Jane Harper

Started: 11/30/2025

Finished: 12/2/2025

Year: 2017

Pages: 324

Genre: mystery

Grade: B

Reason for reading: library book, continuing with series

Type: hardcover

Blurb (from Amazon): "When five colleagues are forced to go on a corporate retreat in the wilderness, they reluctantly pick up their backpacks and start walking down the muddy path.

"But one of the women doesn’t come out of the woods. And each of her companions tells a slightly different story about what happened.

"Federal Police Agent Aaron Falk has a keen interest in the whereabouts of the missing hiker. In an investigation that takes him deep into isolated forest, Falk discovers secrets lurking in the mountains, and a tangled web of personal and professional friendship, suspicion, and betrayal among the hikers. But did that lead to murder?"

Opinion: Decent mystery mixed with a serial killer

The Ex-Girlfriend Murder Club by Gloria Chao

Started: 11/25/2025

Finished: DNF (had to return to library and I don't want to finish it)

Year: 2025

Pages: 309

Genre: mystery

Grade: D

Reason for reading: library book

Type: paperback

Blurb (from Amazon): "The body in the closet was going to be a problem. Kathryn Hu knew it. Yes, Tucker Jones was a cheating scumbag, and yes, she’d agreed to meet Olivia and Elle—Tucker’s other girlfriends—to exact revenge for all he’d put them through… But then they found him. Dead.

"Do they look guilty? Yes.

"Do they feel guilty for having wished him dead just hours before? Maybe a little.

"But—solid motive and a crime scene covered in their DNA aside—they’re innocent. They swear.

"To clear their names, Kat, Olivia, and Elle team up to find the real killer. But as they go undercover and lie to everyone, including the hot detective working the case, they realize that every person in their ex's life had a reason to want him dead. Will they uncover the truth before they go down for a murder they didn't commit?"

Opinion: Amazon describes this as laugh out loud....nope...not in the least. You have 3 women old enough to NOT play the stupid disgusting pranks that were described-especially when one is a lawyer. Yes he was a cheating ahole but just move on. The murder mystery was ok.

The Academy by Elin Hlderbrand and Shelby Cunningham

Started: 11/24/2025

Finished: DNF

Year: 2025

Pages: 413

Genre: literature

Grade: F

Reason for reading: library book

Type: hardcover

Blurb (from Amazon): "It’s move-in day at Tiffin Academy and amidst the happy chaos of friends reuniting, selfies uploading, and cars unloading, shocking news arrives: America Today just ranked Tiffin the number two boarding school in the country. It’s a seventeen-spot jump – was there a typo? The dorms need to be renovated, their sports teams always come in last place, and let’s just say Tiffin students are known for being more social than academic. On the other hand, the campus is exquisite, class sizes are small, and the dining hall is run by an acclaimed New York chef. And they do have fun—lots of parties and school dances, and a piano man plays in the student lounge every Monday night.

"But just as the rarefied air of Tiffin is suffused with self-congratulation, the wheels begin to turn – and then they fall off the bus. One by one, scandalous blind items begin to appear on phones across Tiffin’s campus, thanks to a new app called ZipZap, and nobody is safe. From Davi Banerjee, international influencer and resident queen bee, to Simone Bergeron, the new and surprisingly young history teacher, to Charley Hicks, a transfer student who seems determined not to fit in, to Cordelia Spooner, Admissions Director with a somewhat idiosyncratic methodology – everyone has something to hide.

"As if high school wasn’t dramatic enough...As the year unfolds, bonds are forged and broken, secrets are shared and exposed, and the lives of Tiffin’s students and staff are changed forever."

Opinion: The writing style was fine. Just didn't care about reading about teenagers in boarding school.

Cold Snap by Marc Cameron

Started: 11/17/2025

Finished: 11/23/2025

Year: 2022

Pages: 336

Genre: mystery/thriller

Grade: B+

Reason for reading: continuing with series, library book

Type: hardcover

Blurb (from Amazon): "After an early spring thaw on the Alaskan coast, Anchorage police discover a gruesome new piece of evidence in their search for a serial killer: a dismembered human foot.

"In Kincaid Park, a man is arrested for attacking a female jogger. Investigators believe they have finally captured the sadistic serial killer. But one deputy is sure they have the wrong man.

"In the remote northern town of Deadhorse, Alaska, Deputy US Marshal Arliss Cutter escorts three handcuffed prisoners onto a small bush plane on route to Anchorage. It’s a routine mission and a nonstop flight—or so he thinks. When the plane makes an unexpected landing in the middle of nowhere, all hell breaks loose.

"Back in Anchorage, deputy Lola Teariki has traced the dismembered foot to a missing girl—and the serial psychopath who slaughtered her. It’s one of the prisoners on Cutter’s flight . . ."

Opinion: Intense. Two cases that ended up being more related than initially thought. Very good continuation of series and ending leads to the next book.

Ladder of Years by Anne Tyler

Started: 11/14/2025

Finished: 11/17/2025

Year: 1995

Pages: 327

Genre: literature

Grade: C

Reason for reading: library book

Type: hardcover

Blurb (from Amazon): "The headlines are all the same: Beloved mother and wife Delia Grinstead was last seen strolling down the Delaware shore, wearing only a bathing suit and carrying a beach tote with five hundred dollars tucked inside. To the best of her family's knowledge, she has disappeared without a trace. But Delia didn't disappear. She ran.

"Exhausted with her routine and everyone else's plans for her, Delia needed an out, a chance to make a new life for herself and to become a different person. The new Delia can let go of all the hurt and resentment that left her stuck in her past. As she eagerly sheds the pieces of herself she no longer needs, Delia discovers feelings of passion and wonder she'd long since forgotten. The thrill of walking away from it all leads to a newfound sense of self and the feeling that she is, finally, the star of her own life story."

Opinion: Relateable but predictable. Wasn't horrible. Wasn't great. Average

Dedication to Murder by Lauren Elliott

Started: 11/13/2025

Finished: 11/14/2025

Year: 2023

Pages: 314

Genre: cozy mystery

Grade: B-

Reason for reading: library book, continuing with series

Type: paperback

Blurb (from Amazon): "Wedding bells are about to ring again in Greyborne Harbor, and as Addie slips into her white dress her thoughts are focused on a bright future with Dr. Simon Emerson. But a discovery in her attic leads her to startling revelations about the past. As the owner of Beyond the Page Books and Curios and a lifelong bibliophile, Addie is delighted to find a rare collection of classic children’s books gathering dust in a secret room beneath the rafters, including a first edition of The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams. To her surprise, a handwritten inscription on the title page provides a clue to unraveling a complex mystery in Addie’s family . . .

"But that’s only the first surprise in a series of shocking twists that will turn Addie’s vision of where her life is going and where she’s come from upside down—including a suspicious death in the present that suggests foul play."

Opinion: Different than the other books in the series. Two pretty interesting mysteries that are tied together.