The Cozy Mystery List Blog

Cozy Mystery (and Other Favorite) Books, Movies, and TV

Dorothy Gilman's Mrs. Pollifax Mystery Books

I have a terrible pattern of downloading books from audible.com and then saving the ones that I REALLY want to listen to. It’s a habit quite like my habit of putting off reading my favorite authors. I always want to know that “they” are there waiting for me in my To Be Read book shelf. (Right now I have a lot of TBR mystery books! Monica Ferris, Katherine Hall Page, Patricia Moyes, Ruth Rendell, Camille Minichino/Margaret Grace, Susan Wittig Albert, and a WHOLE LOT MORE!!!)

However, today I decided to bump up one of my very favorite authors. I was just in the mood to start listening to a mystery book that I absolutely knew was going to be able to “deliver.” So my book of choice to start listening to was: Dorothy Gilman‘s Mrs. Pollifax Unveiled.

For those of you who are not familiar with Mrs. Pollifax, she is a woman of “a certain age” who has joined the CIA at a time in life when other people might enjoy sipping lemonade in a hammock under the shady limbs of a dogwood tree. (OK, I know that isn’t a great example, since most of us would rather be doing that… especially if we could be reading while lulling the time away, enjoying a cool breeze… But, you know what I mean…)

Not so for Mrs. Pollifax! As a member of her local Save Our Environment Club, a woman working toward becoming a black belt karate athlete, and a prize winning geranium grower, Emily Pollifax is not content to just enjoy a leisurely life. And, she is really good at her spy job. She fools the “bad guys” every time… with her innocent looks, and her outrageously “old lady” hats. (I don’t think her hats are described with that term, but that’s how I would describe them.)

Dorothy Gilman has given me hours of reading enjoyment… whether I listen to her books or read them. Mrs. Pollifax is a character who comes to us fully-developed, very three-dimensional, and an added benefit of her work as a spy is that she travels the globe, going to exotic locations which we (the readers) are able to enjoy.

PS… For those of you lucky enough to be heading to New York for the Edgar Awards at the end of this month (April 27-29) >>> Dorothy Gilman is going to be the Grand Master!

May 2010 Mystery Book New Releases

The following mystery books will be released in May 2010:

Elizabeth Lynn Casey (aka Laura Bradford): Death Threads (This will be the 2nd in the Southern Sewing Circle Mystery Series…)

Bill Crider & Clyde Wilson: Mississippi Vivian (This will be the 2nd in the Ted Stephens Series…)

Clive Cussler: The Adventures of Hotsy Totsy (This will be a Stand Alone for children…) (Another  very successful mystery author for adults has written a novel for children. I know I have written – many times – about how great I think this is!)

Denise Dietz: Soap Bubbles (This will be a Stand Alone…)

Earlene Fowler: State Fair (This will be the 14th in the Benni Harper Mystery Series…)

Carolyn Haines: Delta Blues (This will be a Stand Alone Anthology, edited by Carolyn Haines…)

Charlaine Harris: Dead in the Family (This will be the 10th in the Sookie Stackhouse Southern Vampire Mystery Series…)

L. C. Hayden: When Death Intervenes (This will be the 5th in the Harry Bronson Mystery Series…)

Elise Hyatt: French Polished Murder (This will be the 2nd in the Daring Finds Mystery Series…)

Joyce & Jim Lavene: A Timely Vision (This will be the 1st in the NEW Missing Pieces Mystery Series…)

Donna Leon: A Question of Belief (This will be the 19th in the Guido Brunetti Mystery Series…)

Amy Myers: Tom Wasp and the Newgate Knocker (This will be the 2nd in the Tom Wasp Mystery Series…)

Robert B. Parker: Blue-Eyed Devil (This will be the 4th in the Virgil Cole Western Series…)

Nancy Pickard: The Scent of Rain and Lightning (This will be a Stand Alone…)

Ann Purser: The Hangman’s Row Enquiry (This will be the 1st in the NEW Ivy Beasley Mystery Series…)

Joanna Campbell Slan: Photo, Snap, Shot (This will be the 3rd in the Kiki Lownstein Scrap-n-Craft Mystery Series…)

Leann Sweeney: The Cat, the Professor and the Poison (This will be the 2nd in the Cats in Trouble Mystery Series…)

Elaine Viets: Half-Price Homicide (This will be the 9th in the Dead End Job Mystery Series…)

♦ To go back to the Cozy Mystery Book New Releases page click here♦

J. B. Stanley (aka Jennifer Stanley) A New Favorite Mystery Author for Me!

Well, I am off of the “catch-up-with-all-my-favorite-Cozy-mystery-authors” bandwagon, and it’s only April! Some of you may remember that I set a goal at the beginning of the year to read through all of my favorite authors so that I could enjoy their new mystery books as they published them. That goal has flown with the wind!

Instead of enjoying my favorite Cozy mystery authors, I am finding myself enjoying NEW Cozy mystery authors. The latest addition to my new list is J. B. Stanley (aka Jennifer Stanley).

I just started her (new to me) Supper Club Mystery Series, and I am finding myself really looking forward to those quiet times during the day when I can get some reading done. I have tried a few other new (to me) authors recently, and found myself struggling to get to page 100 of their books, which is the (absolute!) most I “make” myself read a book that I am not enjoying. Now that it is taking me longer and longer to read books these days, I simply do not want to waste my time reading books I don’t enjoy…

Anyway, Carbs & Cadavers is the first in J. B. Stanley‘s Supper Club mystery series, and I am absolutely loving it. It has a lot of Cozy characteristics: small town where everyone seems to know each other, non-police main character, no gruesome details or explicit adult situations, author’s command of the language (making it unnecessary to need to use profanity to get across strong emotions), and main characters with whom I would enjoy spending time. It also has something which very much appeals to me: the main characters don’t all have long, unruly, beautiful, auburn tresses, and they aren’t (unbeknownst to them only!!!) beautiful people with perfect bodies.

Could You, Would You, Vote, Vote, Vote!?!

Most of you are familiar with Maria E. Schneider, a site reader who writes mysteries AND frequently leaves comments here. Some of you may remember when Maria asked us to help her decide on the book cover for her last book, Executive Lunch.

Maria has a new book that is in the process of being published, and she would like some help deciding which of book covers is the most preferred by mystery readers. Maria has the possible covers from which to choose for her new book, Tracking Magic.

Here is her site’s address to go cast your ballot:

http://www.bearmountainbooks.com/ (The voting is over.)

I know which one I like the most, how about you?

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