“It was a book. The most exquisite jeweled book I’d ever seen. And possibly the oldest. It was large, about twelve inches tall by nine inches wide, and almost three inches thick. I suppressed the urge to whip out my metal ruler.”

Murder Under Cover
By Kate Carlisle
(Book #4 in the Bibliophile Mystery series)

Brooklyn Wainwright’s best friend Robin has just returned from a trip to India and one of the first things Robin has to do is hand over an exquisite copy of the Kama Sutra to Brooklyn so she can restore it and appraise it for a friend of the family. Brooklyn can barely wait to get her hands on the book but first she wants to hear about Robin’s trip to India and about the new man in Robin’s life.

Robin’s happiness is short-lived though because just a day later and the next thing Brooklyn knows is there is a pounding on her door at 5 a.m. in the morning and when she and her handsome boyfriend, British security expert, Derek Stone go to the door they find Robin in tears, in a trench coat and covered in blood.

Amidst the tears, Brooklyn and Derek find out that Robin woke up to find her boyfriend dead beside her. The apartment was ransacked and she doesn’t understand how she could have slept through all that happened. Police are called in and Brooklyn once again finds herself in the middle of an investigation.

As Brooklyn and Derek trace Robin’s recent history they wonder if the beautiful book Brooklyn is supposed to restore could hold more secrets than they imagined. Once again Brooklyn’s kooky family and neighbors rush in to help and all the while Brooklyn still manages to do some bookbinding on the side.

These bibliophile mysteries are very fun for me to read because of the focus on bookbinding. In this one for example, Brooklyn talks about her favorite tools and I can’t help but be a bit jealous of the book press she mentions that she has. If you feel like you might be left out of the loop, don’t worry there’s a glossary covering bookbinding terminology.

It’s a cozy mystery that is quite predictable but I know I’ll be back to read the next book in the series just to see what kind of book Brooklyn will be restoring.

Source: Personal copy

I have to tell you something funny that happened on Valentine’s Day. My husband and I don’t typically celebrate it in a big way. This year I thought it would be fun to surprise my husband with some German chocolates. So guess my surprise when he presented me with a bag and it was filled with the same German chocolates! Ha, ha… We had a good laugh and now we’ve got lots of yummy stuff. Needless to say, I headed off to the gym today.

On the reading front I put aside all of my books in progress to focus on I Will Have Vengeance by Maurizio de Giovanni, which is my book group read. I was expecting something a bit more gritty being that it’s part of the World Noir series but it’s not. Our main character is a tortured soul that’s for sure but there’s something about this story that doesn’t make me immediately think of noir. Which is not to say this book isn’t a great read. It is. Anyway, I should have it read in time for Tuesday’s discussion.

I also had a coupon for Half Price Books but unfortunately I didn’t find anything that I had to have. The couple of books that I really wanted they didn’t have so can you believe I left without buying anything? That’s ok, I sort of made up for it when I got home as I ordered The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. I keep hearing about this book everywhere and I must read it.

Oh and I just read an article today in our local newspaper about the emergence of literary magazines in Austin. I must find some of these!  So that’s the scoop around here. I have a bunch of new ARCs to tell you about but I really want to get back to my book for now so more on those soon.