March 2023 Books

I seem to have read a lot of books in March though it has been a good but frustrating month. So this might be the end of my reading Agatha Christie books. There is only one more book of Christie's that I wanted to read and then who knows. Here are the books I read in March.

01 - Tommy & Tuppence Mysteries by Agatha Christie > link 1, link 2
I read these as eAudiobooks, well, Hugh Fraser read them and I listened, sort of. I'm not quite into audio books but I'm trying them out. I tried the audio in 1.5x speed which I thought was only a tiny bit faster than normal speed and then I tried at 1.75x speed and it was way too fast so I settled at 1.5x speed. If anyone else readers faster than 1.5x speed, I like to know they managed it and are they superhumans because it's just impossible to enjoy a book any faster than 1.5x speed. (1.0x is the normal speed)
    I guess what makes these books kind of boring to me is Tommy and Tuppence Beresford. Tommy and Tuppence have their nuances that sometimes made them interesting but mostly there's just nothing about them that are particularly interesting to me. Sometimes they seem like children playing spy games and even when they are middle age (the pair got to grow old through the books) with grown children, they still behaves exactly the same way. Also, whenever one or the other is in danger, I always find it a bit unbelievable that the other didn't know what to do even though it had happened several times. And what grown man still goes by Tommy? They didn't explain why she was called Tuppence, at least, I don't recall that in any of the books. I did enjoy in some way but I don't think they are for me.

- The Secret Adversary (Book 1) - It's really just a story of how Tommy and Tuppence got together, become a married couple, the mystery seems rather boring, something about finding a missing girl and some bad guy named Mr. Brown.

- N or M? (Book 2) - It was okay.

- By the pricking of my thumbs (Book 3) - A bit amusing but perhaps it was Hugh Fraser's narrating that made it seem so.

- Postern of Fate (Book 4) - Finding answers to a mystery that somehow detours into other things that maybe related to the mystery is kind of boring. I'm not sure there is an answer, you just read the last few pages and that is mostly what answers there are.

- Partners in Crime - A collection of stories that are more enjoyable because they are short. It's probably because the cases Tommy and Tuppence are working on is more upfront and there's less of Tommy and Tuppence's nuances. It amused me when Tommy impersonated Hercule Poirot, "No mustaches but lots of grey cells" which I mistakenly heard as "Your mustaches has lots of grey cells."

02 - Sparkling Cyanide by Agatha Christie > link
I enjoyed this somewhat. I didn't care much about the mystery.

03 - The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman > link
This is the book I waited a year to read from the library which I can't say is worth the wait. The first chapter was good, which reads like a prologue, and then it became meh. Sometimes this feels like a 500 page book instead of 360+ pages. There were endless introduction of people who might or might not be involved in the murder but really, all you're getting are thoughts, lots of dumb thoughts and also, lots of talk of death, dying or final days.
    I see no point in Joyce's diary entries. Her point of view is no different from the other characters and being a newbie member of the club didn't make her any more interesting to read. They could just put whatever thoughts she had into the story since we get everyone's thoughts anyway. Plus her entries are put in smaller text than the rest of the book so if you're reading the ebook like I am, you have to make a choice between reading in extra large text because Joyce's entries are so small, or you use regular size text and try to read Joyce's entries by squinting which I did because changing text size every few minutes is annoying as heck. Couldn't they just make the text the same size as the rest of the text and use italics to differentiate it?
    The mystery was just okay. Honestly, I thought this part of the book was even more bland than everything else in the entire book. This is more about the characters than the murder mystery anyway so perhaps it's why we get more of the characters than we do of the murder. I think that's why I didn't enjoy this. If the humor was funny to me, perhaps I would continue the series but it wasn't.

some Murder She Wrote covers

04 - Murder She Wrote book series > link
It's a bit strange to me to have fictional characters putting out books but it seem to be quite a normal thing now. Jessica Fletcher is played by Angela Lansbury in the tv show and her face is on every Murder She Wrote book cover which I really don't like. If she was a real author, would she put her face on the cover? This series have so far 56 books with different authors besides the fictional Jessica Fletcher.
    I find these Murder She Wrote books quite entertaining. They certainly keep me reading. I really do like Jessica because she's actually a good role model for being an active person. She exercises when gets up in the morning, takes walks or jogs, rides her bike if she is back in Cabot Cove and is constantly traveling all over the country. If Jessica is an actual author, I might even try out her books although when I think about it, I am reading her books by reading these books but let's not go there or else I'll get a headache.

- Manuscript for murder by Jessica Fletcher, Jon Land
This kept me reading but it's sort of a political thriller instead of a cozy mystery. It ended in a kind of unbelievable way. By the end I thought, "Did that really happened? Isn't it a bit ridiclous?" There were many twists and murders that it feels like there's too much of them than it was necessary which is probably how political thrillers are like, right? I didn't really enjoy this one and yet, I do find it a bit entertaining.

- The fine art of murder by Jessica Fletcher, Donald Bain
This started quite surprisingly and then it grew as it added layers and layers of plot. Things keep happening and happening and there's no answer, just more questions until the end. But it's still a decent read.

- A date with murder by Jessica Fletcher, Donald Bain, Jon Land
I think it's just odd to bring hacking into this series even if for most of the books, Jessica does research on computers. Somehow I just don't see it fits the series. I didn't quite enjoy this one.

- Killing in a Koi Pond by Jessica Fletcher, Terrie Farley Moran
This was good and it's very cozy, lots of talks of food and people eating a lot.

- Hook, link and murder by Jessica Fletcher, Donald Bain, Renée Paley-Bain
This was slightly different, less about the murders and more about Mort's missing wife and an escaped convict. I enjoyed this a lot.

- Killer on the court by Jessica Fletcher, Terrie Farley Moran
The mystery was just okay but the many details of Jessica spending time with her nephew, his wife and their son Frank just seems a bit much. This should probably be retitled What Jessica did on her family vacation because that dominated the book. I thought Frank must be the most well-behaved ten-year-old in the universe because he doesn't rebel and seem incapable of it.

- Murder on the QE2 by Jessica Fletcher, Donald Bain
I like the setting taking place on a ship. And I thought Mary Ward, a kindard spirit of Jessica's is a good Watson to Jessica's Sherlock. This was quite good, keeps you reading and guessing.

- Skating on thin ice by Jessica Fletcher, Donald Bain
I now realized Seth is like a stand-in spouse for Jessica. He certainly worries about her like a spouse. I do like that Seth and Jessica are good pals - it's nice to see a man and a woman can be friends without any type of romantic thing hanging over them. Seth uses 'ayuh' in his speech which means 'yes' in Maine which I thought was a bit old fashioned but kind of unique.
    Not quite sure I like the mystery here. I used to love watching ice skating but somehow in books, it didn't sound as interesting.

- A Slaying in Savannah by Jessica Fletcher, Donald Bain
This was good but at the end, Jessica seemed to come to a conclusion all of a sudden but mostly because they withheld information from the reader so in a way, you can't really solve the mystery, not really.

- Design for murder by Jessica Fletcher, Donald Bain, Renée Paley-Bain
This was okay though I didn't really care much for the fashion bits and the reason for the killing is a bit bland to me.

- Debonair in death by Jessica Fletcher, Terrie Farley Moran
Like all the other Murder She Wrote books, they just add on the complications. There's no such thing as a simple murder for these books. This one was decent but still the murder was what you would expect with a victim who is a womanizer. Then there was this spy Michael that Jessica knew - I just can't stand that character, it's almost like they added him into the story just to make it more complex.

- Gin and Daggers by Jessica Fletcher, Donald Bain
This is book 1 of the series. I read this after all the others books mentioned above. They pile on the plot with a hint of romance for Jessica. There was an Inspector Coots that Jessica called 'a little man' who struck me as possibly having a likeness to Hercule Poirot but that's just my thinking but he's an idiot here so who knows. There are far too many inspectors and dectectives in this mystery and I like none of them, not even Inspector Sutherland who is likely a potential love interest for Jessica. I like this but not a lot.

How is your March? I hope April will be good to you.