Good afternoon ,

My grandfather loved mysteries. Back in the 1990s (that sounds so vintage now!) he would take me to his library in Prairie Village, Kansas to search for books every week. Many times we would be at the checkout counter about an hour later with a pile of books for me and nothing for him. Every time that happened he would shake his head and say, "I've read them all."

He had read every single mystery in the library. As a kid I found this absolutely incredible. It wasn't a huge library but the section for mysteries was two whole walls! I remember looking at the walls and thinking,"How is that possible?"

I don't read mysteries too much, but when I do they tend to be written by British authors and are typically British mysteries. (Definitely influenced by my grandpa who only allowed us to watch PBS when we were visiting. If you don't know, PBS showed a lot of British shows int he 90s.)

A few weeks back I dowloaded a few audiobooks, one of them being a mystery. called The Blood of an Englishman by MC Beaton. I was looking for something different and entertaining and this book definitely delivered.

Although, since I"m new to the cozy mystery genre I found myself constantly thinking every man the protagonist came into contact with was possibly the murderer. About 3/4 of the way through the book I realized cozy mysteries include a lot of the personal life of the protagonist in the books! Since it is the 25th book in the cozy mystery series, the writer was incorporating the protagonist's love life parallel to the murder mystery. The men were love interests, not murderers!

The things you learn when reading a new genre!

By the end of the book I was completely hooked on Charles, Agatha's ex-husband. He was my favorite.

Do you read mysteries? Have you branched out to a new genre and found yourself expecting something that never came?

If you've read anything interesting lately, let me know. I'm not on to Five-Carat Soul by James McBride. His writing is so beautiful. I highly recommend the book he wrote for his mother The Color of Water.

Here's the next summer book,

Kat