Review of D.J. Donaldson’s Sleeping with the Crawfish

 I love the title of the D.J. Donaldson book, Sleeping with the Crawfish. It was the first thing that drew me to the crime fiction novel. This third installment of the series about Kit Franklyn and Andy Broussard is just as exciting and entertaining as its two predecessors.

In this book, Kit is “taking a break” from her stressful job as a psychologist but Andy at the medical examiner’s office needs her help. Little did she know that her life would be put in danger by becoming involved.

The numerous plot twists and turns draw in the reader and keep him hooked to the end. This detailed forensic piece with the New Orleans almost mystical setting cannot help but keep the guesses flowing as to who dunnit.

Sleeping with the Crawfish is a great book. I recommend it to mystery-lovers and Louisiana-lovers alike. I give it 4 stars.

If you are interested in purchasing the book, you can buy it here.

 

Book Review: Bad Karma in the Big Easy by D. J. Donaldson

I was intrigued by the prospect of reading Bad Karma in the Big Easy by D.J. Donaldson since it deals with post-Katrina New Orleans. My family also survived Katrina, although from about 200 miles away.

The setting of the story is the time immediately following Hurricane Katrina in August, 2005. Chief Medical Examiner Andy Broussard is tired and overworked in the temporary morgue. He is perplexed by the bodies of three women who were found naked in the lower Ninth Ward, the scene of much of Katrina’s destruction. There are unusual similarities – the primary one being that these women were murdered.

Kit Franklin, forensic psychologist, is drawn into the case. There are many unusual twists and turns in this mystery. People are not who they seem to be and the killer surprises everyone.

Although part of a series, Bad Karma in the Big Easy reads just as well as a stand-alone novel. Connections to prior books only bear a brief mention and are not crucial to this story. The book is an enjoyable read, although some of the situations are quite horrifying and reluctantly believable. The characters all have depth and I was sympathetic to both Kit and Andy.

I give Bad Karma 4 stars. It’s a good mystery with a satisfying ending. I highly recommend it.

 

We Spell the Way We Speak – Faulty Friday #4

In the Faulty Friday #4 post this week, a church sign depicts a common error. Often, we spell things the way they sound. As a result here, what should be “Congratulations” shows up as “Congradulations.”

It pays to ask a friend or consult a dictionary if you are unsure about spelling!

Have a blessed Easter weekend!

 

Faulty Friday #3

It’s not the best photo, I know, but you try taking a picture of the TV!

The person in charge of our local channel line-up from Comcast must have been a little sleepy when typing in the 9:30 pm television shows. I had never heard of “The Beautiful People Show” before but I really have never heard of “The Beauitiful People Show.”

Have a great, typo-free day!

Faulty Friday #2

What’s wrong with this picture?

PLEASE tell me you know.

I snapped this photo while sitting at a loooong red light here in town. Errors in advertising are particularly depressing to me. If you want more business, get your ads proofread to ensure that they’re correct. Not everyone notices these types of mistakes but many people do. I, for one, do not patronize businesses with errors in their advertising.

NOTE – The mistake in the photo above is that there should be no comma after the word “reliable.” When in doubt about adding a comma, DON’T!

Faulty Friday #1

Beginning this exciting posting venture has not gone as smoothly as I had hoped. I’ve been swamped with a large editing and rewriting project that has taken every bit of my spare time this month. Then, when I finally had the actual time to work on the post, I experienced a number of unexpected, unwelcome and frustrating image difficulties. I hope that is now all in the past.

My first Faulty Friday photo was snapped on my Kindle last night. I’m reading an interesting YA novel, the first in a series, obviously written in UK style. In spite of the differences with American English and style, things were going along swimmingly until I noted the error. Do you see it?

Hopefully you noticed that the word “taught” is incorrect. Taught refers to prior teaching. The word that should have been used is “taut,” which means tight.

Yes, these are the types of things that keep me up at night. Feel free to send me your “oops” in books, advertising or wherever. I may just share them on this page. Stay tuned. There will surely be more errors to follow!

 

 

Introducing Faulty Fridays

Photo courtesy – http://freedigitalphotos.net

I love to read. It really doesn’t matter what. I’m partial to suspenseful fiction but I also read the daily newspaper, signs as I drive down the road, web articles and I’m a real sucker for print magazines. I love ’em.

One thing that really aggravates me to no end is to see a mistake in print. A self-described grammar nerd, I really am bothered by this stuff. I see errors in the books I read – whether in DTB (dead tree books) or on my Kindle. I see TONS of oopsies in our local paper who shall remain nameless and in signs advertising businesses.

There may be a variety of reasons for these mistakes. It could be that someone didn’t catch the error when copy editing or proofreading. This does happen. No one is perfect. It could be that someone is a terrible speller and doesn’t realize it or even worse, a bad speller who knows he is a bad speller but doesn’t bother to look up something anyway. It could also be that a person truly believes something is written/spelled correctly when it’s not.

Anyway, after seeing thousands (or more) of these mistakes over many years, I thought it might be fun to share some of these on a weekly basis. I now photograph the errors I see (if it’s safe to do so) and will publish them here on ReaderJots in a post every Friday that I plan to call “Faulty Friday.”

Feel free to contribute  in the comments section or, if you have a blog, you can participate there, too, by joining the Faulty Friday movement.

Look for the first post on Friday, March 7. I’ve got a couple doosies up my sleeve. Just wait.

The More You Read . . .

“The more you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.”

~ Dr. Seuss –  “I Can Read With My Eyes Shut”

ReaderJots Now Offers Editing Services

Photo courtesy of: http://www.tiresias.org

If you have a letter, email, manuscript or paper that needs some fixing up, I can do it!

– misspellings

– typographical errors

– punctuation

– syntax

– grammar

All quotes are given on an individual basis.

As a prolific reader and writer for more than 20 years, I also hold a Bachelor of Arts degree in English and a Master of Arts degree in Elementary Education. I write for and edit many blogs on a variety of topics and would be pleased to work with you.

Books Read 2013

1. 1-1-13 Camping and Woodcraft ~ Horace Kephart

2. 1-4-13 The Barefoot Executive: The Ultimate Guide for Being Your Own Boss and Achieving Financial Freedom (A) ~ Carrie Wilkerson

3. 1-5-13 Get Lucky: How to Put Planned Serendipity to Work for You and Your Business (Did not finish – it was OK) ~ Thor Muller and Lane Becker

4. 1-10-13 Defending Jacob: A Novel (A) ~ William Landay

5. 1-17-13 Alex Cross’s Trial (A) ~ James Patterson & Richard DiLallo

6. 1-19-13 Les Miserables ~ Victor Hugo

7. 1-21-13 The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich (A) ~ Timothy Ferriss

8. 1-23-13 The Most Successful Small Business in the World: The Ten Principles (C) ~ Michael Gerber

9. 1-30-13 The Boy in the Suitcase (B) ~ Lene Kaaberbol and Agnete Friis

10. 2-5-13 In the Night Room (A) ~ Peter Straub

11. 2-11-13 Folly (A) ~ Laurie R. King

12. 2-15-13 Sharp Objects: A Novel (A) ~ Gillian Flynn

13. 2-19-13 Notorious Nineteen: A Stephanie Plum Novel (A) ~ Janet Evanovich

14. 2-20-13 Dark Places: A Novel (A) ~ Gillian Flynn

15. 2-23-13 Down the Darkest Road (A) ~ Tami Hoag

16. 2-24-13 Greedy Bones (A) ~ Carolyn Haines

17. 2-25-13 Phantoms (A) ~ Dean Koontz

18. 2-26-13 The Glass Rainbow (A) ~ James Lee Burke

19. 2-27-13 The Handmade Marketplace: How to Sell Your Crafts Locally, Globally, and On-Line (A) ~ Kari Chapin

20. 3-6-13 After Dark (A) ~ Phillip Margolin

21. 3-8-13 Icebound (B) ~ Dean Koontz

22. 3-10-13 Shattered (A) ~ Dean Koontz

23. 3-13-13 And the Soft Wind Blows (B) ~ Lance Umenhofer

24. 3-14-13 Hero at Large (A) ~ Janet Evanovich

25. 3-16-13 June Bug (Murder-by-Month Mysteries, No. 2) (A) ~ Jess Lourey

26. 3-19-13 May Day (Murder-by-Month Mysteries, No. 1) (A) ~ Jess Lourey

27. 3-22-13 Knee High by the Fourth of July (Murder-by-Month Mysteries, No. 3) (A) ~ Jess Lourey

28. 3-25-13 August Moon (Murder-by-Month Mysteries, No. 4) (A) ~ Jess Lourey

29. 3-31-13 The Knightmare (A) ~ Deborah Valentine

30. 4-4-13 The Passage: A Novel (A) ~ Justin Cronin

31. 4-10-13 The Disillusioned (A) ~ D.J. Williams

32. 4-14-13 The Twelve (Book Two of The Passage Trilogy): A Novel (A) ~ Justin Cronin

33. 4-18-13 September Morn (Murder-by-Month Mysteries, No. 5) (A) ~ Jess Lourey

34. 4-23-13 The Cuckoos of Batch Magna (A) ~ Peter Maughan

35. 4-30-13 The Storm Protocol (B) ~ Iain Cosgrove

36. 5-18-13 Flush (A) ~ Carl Hiaasen

37. 5-22-13 October Fest (Murder-by-Month Mysteries, No. 6) ~ Jess Lourey

38. 5-25-13 November Hunt (Murder-by-Month Mysteries, No. 7) (A) ~ Jess Lourey

39. 5-29-13 Star Island (A) ~ Carl Hiassen

40. 6-4-13 The Moonlit Mind: A Tale of Suspense (A) ~ Dean Koontz

41. 6-8-13 Victims: An Alex Delaware Novel (A) ~ Jonathan Kellerman

42. 6-13-13 Inferno: A Novel (A) ~ Dan Brown

43. 6-18-13 Oddkins: A Fable for All Ages (B) ~ Dean Koontz

44. 6-22-13 Odd Interlude #1 (An Odd Thomas Story) (A) ~ Dean Koontz

45. Odd Interlude #2 (An Odd Thomas Story) (A) ~ Dean Koontz

46. Odd Interlude #3 (An Odd Thomas Story) (A) ~ Dean Koontz

47. Odd Apocalypse (A) ~ Dean Koontz

48. Murder for the Bride: A Novel (A) ~ John D. Macdonald

49. Murder Passes the Buck: A Gertie Johnson Murder Mystery ~ Deb Baker

50. Breathless: A Novel (A) (re-read) ~ Dean Koontz

51. Murder Grins and Bears It (A) ~ Deb Baker

52. Murder Talks Turkey (A) ~ Deb Baker

53. Murder Bites the Bullet (A) ~ Deb Baker

54. Revenge (A) ~ Christine Carminati

55. The Alchemyst: The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel (A) ~ Michael Scott

56. The Magician (A) ~ Michael Scott

57. The Sorceress (A) ~ Michael Scott

58. The Enchantress (A) ~ Michael Scott

59. The Necromancer (A) ~ Michael Scott

60. The Warlock (A) ~ Michael Scott

61. Walking Across Egypt (A) ~ Clyde Edgerton

62. Dance Hall of the Dead (B) ~ Tony Hillerman

63. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (B) ~ Muriel Spark

64. The Appeal (A) ~ John Grisham

65. The Floatplane Notebooks: A Novel (B) ~ Clyde Edgerton

66. Joyland (A) ~ Stephen King

67. Sunset Limited (A) ~ James Lee Burke

68. Dr. Sleep (A+++) ~ Stephen King

69. Fatal Burn (A) ~ Lisa Jackson

70. U is for Undertow (A) ~ Sue Grafton

71. The Bad Place (A) ~ Dean Koontz

72. Hide (A) ~ Lisa Gardner

73. Time Bomb (B) ~ Jonathan Kellerman

74. Servants of Twilight (A) ~ Dean Koontz

75. The Face of Fear (A) ~ Dean Koontz

76. Skinny Dip (A) ~ Carl Hiassen

77. Secrets to the Grave (A) ~ Tami Hoag

78. Wicked Game (A) ~ Lisa Jackson and Nancy Bush

79. Heart and Soul ~ Maeve Binchy