Off the Bookshelf: THE EYE OF MINDS by James Dashner

This was a featured book on Nook a few weeks ago. It caught my attention because it's the first in a new series by the author of the Maze Runner book and its sequels. A chance to see what all the fuss is about!

Okay .... this one is a mind-bender. Fun, but kind of gritty.

Essentially, everybody is into playing in a virtual reality world of multiple games. Kind of telling that the box you get into to enter the VR world is referred to as a coffin. Full immersion, senses and mind, and you feel what happens to you in the VR world. Including hunger, bruises, torture ... Fortunately, when you "die" in VR, you just re-set.

At least, until a guy called Kaine shows up and starts taking over, and people deliberately suicide, destroying their own safeguards as a last resort to escape.

Our hero, Michael, is a high school kid who is a pretty talented gamer. A government agency recruits him and his two very talented friends to investigate, figure out what Kaine is doing, where he is, and try to open up a doorway so the authorities can get in there and stop him. This is a government you can't say no to -- because they'll stop all your access to the VR world if you don't cooperate. So what else can Michael and his friends do? They put their virtual lives on the line, and things get pretty grim by the time Michael makes it to the end of the trail -- and then the answers turn his entire world upside down. Didn't see it coming -- and yet the clues were all there.

Doggone it, I'm gonna have to read the rest of the books! Hooked. Even if you're not into VR-type stories and the computer world and programming and evil sentient programs and such ... you'll enjoy this.

Off the Bookshelf: THE PERFECT CHRISTMAS, by Debbie Macomber

Don't you love book exchanges?
All the fun of getting new books to read -- without the guilt of spending money!
And another bonus -- books you know you won't read again get passed on to new homes, and people who might just decide they're keepers.

At the December meeting of my ACFW chapter, we had a book exchange. I decided since I had so many books still waiting to be read, I wouldn't bring anything home. Until ..... I saw a Debbie Macomber book was in the pile. A book I hadn't read yet.

Well, that's not hard -- she has so MANY published now. Even if you have all the Cedar Cove books and snatch up every new Blossom Street hot off the presses, there are still a lot more books to find and read -- and keep.

THE PERFECT CHRISTMAS is actually 2 novellas, plus a knitting pattern and Christmas recipes. What fun!

The first novella -- the title story -- is about Cassie, who is tired of being lonely and wants to find her perfect match for the perfect Christmas. The trials and mishaps she endures at the hands of a professional matchmaker are funny and cringe-worthy at the same time. Everybody has been in a situation similar to at least one Cassie has to endure. At the end, of course, she finds true love. But she has to fight for him -- against him!

The second novella, CAN THIS BE CHRISTMAS? follows a handful of people stuck on a train when the storm of the century interferes with plans to travel home for Christmas. At first they're all caught up in their own concerns, sorrows, and problems, but as they band together to make the situation less miserable, and as a few Christmas miracles happen, a miserable night stranded in a storm turns into a celebration, providing healing and hope.

Well, what else do you expect from Debbie Macomber? Add it to your collection.

Off the Bookshelf: HOG INSANE, by Carole Brown

Jingle bells
Ain't it swell?
Readin' good books
by a friend?

Couldn't resist that...

I've been waiting a while to read this book. I do try to pick up copies of books by my writing friends ... but with so many books already on my shelves and in my various reading apps on my iPad ... not so easy actually READING those books. (You'd think reading 1 book per week would be pretty easy to do, wouldn't you? HAH!)

HOG INSANE is the first book in the Denton and Alex Davies mystery series by Carole Brown, a fellow member of ACFW-Ohio. It's been glaring at me every time I opened up my Kindle app for what feels like months, tapping a metaphorical toe and saying, "Well? When's it gonna be MY turn?"

Well worth waiting for -- but take my advice -- don't wait! Read this one, because the next one is hot off the press, BAT CRAZY, and I know it's going to be just as much fun, with a healthy dose of "Don't go in that dark building!" and nail-biting and "Come on, come on, don't trust him!"

Denton and Alex are a newly retired couple who have set off across the country in an RV. He's pretty happy about it -- she ... not so much. Personally, I think Alex nagging Denton about eating more healthy is her way of getting back at him for dragging her around the country. The "hog" in the title is a Harley-Davidson motorcycle, and figuring out what happened to it and why and where it is after the rider is killed is just a small part of the mystery.

I like Alex and Denton, their byplay, their affection and frustration toward each other, their partnership. It was a fun book, even though there was lying and murder and threats and danger, and even one nasty guy who took a shot at their dog! Read the book, get hooked on Carole's characters and the series. You won't regret it.

Off the Bookshelf: TRICKY TWENTY-TWO by Janet Evanovich

If you haven't figured it out by now, there are several series that I love to read, can't wait for the paperback -- and thanks to Overdrive and ebooks in the library system, I don't have to fork out the $$$ for a hardback and take up more space in my bookshelves that are about to collapse....

The latest installment in the Stephanie Plum series is another grin-gasp-cringe-giggle-gulp adventure. There's a sense that Stephanie is starting to grow up, that she's putting more thought into her adventures, even when she stumbles into things that most of us would avoid at all costs. She has a couple of close calls in this one -- and honestly, sometimes you just want to reach through the pages of the book and slap Morelli until he gets some sense. Yeah, he's the grown-up in the partnership, or at least, the hopeful partnership, but ... well, he's a guy. And he's Italian, so that explains a lot of the brain damage. (Hey, I'm Italian, so I can say that, it's from experience! Italian men are ... well, let's just say sometimes I really wonder how Christopher Columbus got across the Atlantic, y'know?)

Anyway .... yeah, this is another FUN book. A fast read. A treat and a reward for me getting some major writing and editing chores done. There are a couple homicides, a not-so-grieving widow, a fraternity that makes Animal House seem a little tame, some wacko faculty and administration people, a plan to spread the plague, missing people, and the usual assortment of wackos that Stephanie has to track down and return to jail. Along with more amazing costume changes by Lula and several of Ranger's cars get destroyed yet again. I hope he has good auto insurance ...

What can I say? I never get tired of this stuff.

Off the Bookshelf: LIFEBOATS, a Tale of the Young Wizards by Diane Duane

Bottom line: Diane Duane does not write FAST ENOUGH when it comes to her Young Wizards books.

That's why I'm thrilled that another book in the series is coming out in 2016. The wait has been way too long.

Meanwhile, we have this lovely in-between tale, where many of the characters we've met in previous stories, as Kit and Nita learn their duties and grow up and juggle being teens with saving worlds and sometimes the universe, participate.

Because this one is a HUGE intervention.

A planet's moon is about to literally fall down on top of it. Ecologic disaster. Extinction of several races that share the world. While it isn't easy by any definition to shift the entire eco-system of a planet to other planets that have been prepared to take the many varieties of life on this world -- and it's not easy to prepare those worlds to take them -- it's do-able.

What doesn't seem to be do-able is convincing some of the residents of this world to leave ... They know their world is on the verge of death, which means them, too, but they don't want to leave. Finding out why, and finding out a way to persuade these people to choose life, is part of the assignment for Nita and Kit and Ronan and Dairine and Tom and Carl and the rest of the gang, from Earth and from other worlds. Can they do it?

Like, duh -- READ THE BOOK and find out.

Umm, Diane? Please write faster??????

Off the Bookshelf: DEVOTED IN DEATH, by JD Robb

Ah, the glories of Overdrive, the e-book library access app ...

When I realized that the newest In Death book had been released, I went to Overdrive and was able to access my local library system and immediately download the book and start reading. Yeah, I confess, I kind of pushed aside my current Work-in-Progress that I hope to get done by the end of the month, but as Eve Dallas learned near the end of the book, a little break from the pressure and time crunch really does do a lot of good.

DEVOTED IN DEATH is about the hunt for two -- quite frankly -- sick young idiots who think they're in love. They may be devoted to each other, and they may be jumping each other's bones every chance they get, but the fact that they get their "high" after torturing and killing people .... nuh uh, that ain't love, baby. Darryl and Ella are two selfish young twits who set off across the country on a crime spree, and when it turns bloody and they discover that the excitement of blood and death aids in the sex, well, that's all the justification they need.

It's up to Eve Dallas and her team to identify these two monsters, find their lair, and stop them before they can use up and murder their latest torture victims. The suspense of the ticking clock alone was enough to keep me reading, but what brings me back time and again to the series is the development of the relationships between the characters, and the growth of Dallas and Roarke in their relationship and their marriage. She's growing as a person, learning to see things through others' eyes, even though she still doesn't quite get all the friendship and marriage "rules." The people, the growing "family" that has collected around Homicide Lt. Eve Dallas, make up the best part of the series.

Off the Bookshelf: DODGER, by Terry Pratchett

Literary parody or homage or expanding on characters created in a famous author's famous stories seems to be the "in" thing nowadays. Such as Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.

DODGER, by Terry Pratchett, revises the world and times of Charles Dickens, so that the famous author actually interacts with the Artful Dodger, known as Dodger by everyone around him. Dodger is our hero -- as indicated by the title. He makes his living by going through the sewers of London, scavenging what other people lose or throw away, and making use of them, or getting the found items to people who can make use of them. He knows the underground of London like the back of his hand.

This comes in handy when he witnesses a young lady being brutalized and intervenes. Suddenly he is a hero, and in protecting the helpless young lady who happened to marry the wrong prince and get on the wrong side of his powerful father and interfere in the wrong way with political machinations and alliances and marriages ... well, Dodge finds himself suddenly in the spotlight and interfering with a lot of other things going on above ground, and meeting famous people, such as Charlies Dickens and Disraeli.

The Pratchett wit and social commentary and tongue-in-cheek humor are still there, just *sigh* toned down from what we're used to in the Discworld books. Still a fascinating story, and further proof positive that the late, great Sir Terry Pratchett was a master of his craft. He shall be greatly missed.