Love reading: Lady Blues (A Gus LeGarde Mystery)

Some time ago, I wrote a piece about The Seacrest, a novel by Aaron Paul Lazar. This time I want to talk a bit about another of his writings.

I got the book via a free download the author was so kind to point out. Apparently there have been other Gus LeGarde mysteries, but this doesn't mean you can't read Lady Blues. You easily pick up what's happened to Gus on a personal scale. And very soon you're right into the atmosphere which makes Lazar's book so lovely to read.

After his first wife died in tragical circumstances, Gus remarried and now shares his home with his new wife and a daughter from her first marrriage. There is also Siegfried, his late wife's brother. And Gus' daughter Freddie with her fiancé and her three kids.... Not to mention the housekeeper! So you see it's pretty busy in the old farmhouse in the Genesee Valley.

In this story, Siegfried has a crunch on Lily, a Korean woman who lives with her brother Thom in a tailor shop. One day, when he brings something to repair, they see the shop is on fire. Gus and Siegfried manage to rescue Lily and her brother, but Thom is badly burned. Gus offers to take Lily under his wings and gives her a place to stay. She barely knows English though.

Around the same time, Gus meets 'the music man'. This is a gentleman who stays in a home for the elderly. According to nurse Debbie nobody has come to see him in over 30 years and he also doesn't know who he is. But once he begins taking a new medicine, some memories return.

Of course, the company who makes the medicine is not too thrilled about the (very) good results of their medicine, especially as they own a lot of old people's homes around the States. So they replace the drug by another derivative which is not as good as the previous one.

You can guess where this goes, but I repeat, the story makes a very good read. I can really recommend it to everyone who reads this.

Love reading: The Lincoln Myth (Steve Berry)

I've always been a fan of Steve Berry's books. Since I accidentally bought The Romanov Prophesy, I was hooked.C

When all of Berry's books are great reads, I especially like those which feature Cotton Malone. Cotton used to work for a special branch of the secret services, but now he runs a bookstore in Copenhagen, Denmark. He's divorced and has one son.

His former boss, Stephanie Nelle, however occasionally calls upon his services and these bring him all along the world into dangerous situations.

The strenght of Berry's novels is his thorough research. He always visits the places he writes about, together with his wife Elizabeth. Often his works deal with a secret or lost item from centuries past.

In his previous book, Malone has to investigate the myth around Queen Elizabeth the First of England. Stories go that Elizabeth was a man, dressed as woman, and it's up to Malone to prove this right. Well, Berry could be right. Queen Elizabeth never married and acted more like a man than as a frail woman.

In his new novel, Malone is called upon again. This time he has to find documents, secreted away by President Lincoln. The storyline deals with the big question if the 50 states of the US have the right to be independent again. Apparently a document, signed by the Founding Fathers, exists to prove this to be the truth. A fanatic Mormon wants to find the document too, because he sees a future for a new state (which is now Utah).

These are the kind of books that keep me glued to my chair as I read on to find out how everything comes together. They're a great read!