Reading in Reykjavík

Title: The Surgeon Series detective: Jane Rizzoli – in this book with Thomas Moore No. in series: 1 Year of publication: 2001 Type of mystery: Serial murder, police procedural, thriller Type of investigator: Police Setting & time: Boston, USA; modern timeless SPOILER Warning: if you haven't read the books, there is a minor spoiler for book 1 in the synopsis for book 2. There are also minor spoilers in the reviews. Story: A serial murderer is on the loose in Boston and his handiwork is chillingly similar to that of another serial murderer who has been dead for 2 years, killed in self-defense by his last victim, Dr. Catherine Cordell. Police detectives Jane Rizzoli and Thomas Moore begin to suspect that there might have been two killers working together, but Cordell has no memory of another man. Before long, it becomes apparent that the killer has fixated on Cordell and has plans for her. The killer is relentless and when he captures Cordell, it is a race against time to ...

Series detectives: Paleoanthropologist and assistant librarian Megan Clark and her sidekick, history professor Ryan Stevens, aided and abetted by the Murder by the Yard mystery reading group. Type of investigator: Amateurs Setting & time: Amarillo, Texas, USA; 21st century Title: Murder in Volume No. in series: 1 Year of publication: 2000 Type of mystery: Murder Story: Megan drags Ryan, who happens to be her best friend even though he is old enough to be her father and secretly in love with her (just had to get that in), with her to a meeting to form a mystery reading group, even though Ryan never reads mysteries. A couple of meetings later, a young female member lashes viciously out against the others, belittles everyone and storms out, only to be found after the meeting outside the store with her throat slit. Megan can't miss the opportunity to use her education and examines the body before the police get there, and so gets blood on her clothes, making her a prime sus...

I am beginning to go into a reading slump. The symptoms usually start with the feeling that I have nothing to read, even though I in fact do have a TBR stack of about 300 books in my bedroom and a TBR list of over 1000, at least a third of which I can get from the library. Then I start to read one book after the other and decide I‘m not interested in any of them, and the books I am already committed to read stop being interesting. This usually leads to a cull of my TBR stack, but so far I am resisting that temptation. This has happened almost every autumn since I was in my early twenties. Much as I love this season, the diminishing daylight does mean that I start getting the winter blues and a reading slump is usually the first warning sign. School has been somewhat effective in dispelling this seasonal gloom in the past, and when I have not been at school I have learned to keep busy and find new interests to keep the blues at bay. This winter I‘m taking a second bookbinding cours...