2 SF

Victory Conditions by Elizabeth Moon -  fifth and final installment in the Vatta's War series. Definitely not a standalone - start from book one and go from there. Consistently good - good characters,  good plot, good writing. Ky Vatta is in charge of the fleet going after the pirate Turek, who targeted her family for destruction. Stella is dealing with lovestruck teenagers and piratical sympathisers. Rafe is trying to clean up the company's mess while dealing with a semi-supportive board of directors, while Aunt Grace is running security on Slotter Key and regrowing her arm. Good ending to the story, while leaving revisiting possible.

Endless Blue by Wen Spencer - A missing ship's warp drive reappears and on a mission to find out where it came from, a new world and new aliens are found, along with a possible way to stop the war going on back in the rest of the universe. That is the short, uncomplicated version :)
The long version is *very* complicated - and the new world is confusing, but this has great characters. Real, flawed, confused and absorbing.


both: 100 books, A to Z

4 mystery/thrillers

Night Work by Steve Hamilton - Joe Trumbull is going on a blind date - his first in two years since his fiancee was murdered. Within hours after the date is over, the woman is found strangled. Two more women he has contact with are killed also. With the state police after him, Joe's best hope is going back through his past as a probation officer  and seeing if he can find the killer there. Not as good as his Alex McKnight series,  cliched in a few spots, but still a good read.

Guilty by Karen Robards - ADA Kate White's troubled childhood as a foster child in a bad neighborhood catches up with her when an attempted breakout from the cells in the court house bring her face to face with her past - con Mario, who killed an off-duty cop when they were teenagers - a crime never solved that she witnessed. I enjoyed it, but ... It didn't grab me as much as her books usually do - I found it very easy to put down.

Notorious by Michele Martinez - About to try a notorious rap star,  prosecuter Melanie Vargas has just received some shocking information from his attorney, who is killed by a car bomb moments later. Vargas, who shared an attraction with the deceased, is determined to find his killer. Great opening, lackluster follow-up. Vargas is interesting as she becomes slightly obsessed with the dead man, but some very cliched characters (a transparently evil attorney, an easily seduced intern) mar the rest of the story.

Dark of the Moon by John Sandford - Introduced in Sandford's Prey series, Virgil Flowers goes solo this time when he's sent to Bluestem, a small Minnesota town where several old timers have been killed, including a rich recluse hated by most of the town. Virgil likes to stir things up and see what happens, which sort of backfires when he and his new lady become targets.  Still like the Prey series and the Kidd series better, but I'd like definitely like to see more of that f*cking Flowers.


All books: 100 books