Book Recommendation: How to Solve Your Own Murder

Back in the day, there was an old radio show called I Love a Mystery. It’s no secret that I do, too. A mystery can take many forms – the cozy mystery, the whodunnit, the locked room mystery, courtroom mystery, etc …

I just finished a book that has many of the things I love in a good mystery. First, there are plenty of suspects. There’s an earlier murder that may or may not be connected to the first one. There are characters you like and dislike right from the get go. There are twists and turns, and some great suspenseful moments.

I added this book to my “to read” list simply because of the title – How to Solve Your Own Murder. I was hooked right from the beginning and loved every minute of it.

Here is the Goodreads synopsis:

For fans of Knives Out and The Thursday Murder Club, an enormously fun mystery about a woman who spends her entire life trying to prevent her foretold murder only to be proven right sixty years later, when she is found dead in her sprawling country estate… Now it’s up to her great-niece to catch the killer.

It’s 1965 and teenage Frances Adams is at an English country fair with her two best friends. But Frances’s night takes a hairpin turn when a fortune-teller makes a bone-chilling prediction: One day, Frances will be murdered. Frances spends a lifetime trying to solve a crime that hasn’t happened yet, compiling dirt on every person who crosses her path in an effort to prevent her own demise. For decades, no one takes Frances seriously, until nearly sixty years later, when Frances is found murdered, like she always said she would be.

In the present day, Annie Adams has been summoned to a meeting at the sprawling country estate of her wealthy and reclusive great-aunt Frances. But by the time Annie arrives in the quaint English village of Castle Knoll, Frances is already dead. Annie is determined to catch the killer, but thanks to Frances’s lifelong habit of digging up secrets and lies, it seems every endearing and eccentric villager might just have a motive for her murder. Can Annie safely unravel the dark mystery at the heart of Castle Knoll, or will dredging up the past throw her into the path of a killer?

As Annie gets closer to the truth, and closer to the danger, she starts to fear she might inherit her aunt’s fate instead of her fortune.

This was such a great read. If you love a good mystery that is a mix of Agatha Christie and Perry Mason, you will love this one!

Book Recommendation: Everyone In My Family Has Killed Someone

No one really wants to be home sick. However, one of the bonuses of it is having some time to read. This book was something that was popping up often in my “Good Reads” app. After reading the brief synopsis of it, I decided it was one that I had to get. I had my library save me a copy and after finishing the book I had been reading, I dove right into this one.

The title grabbed me immediately. As an Italian, I immediately thought this might be some sort of mobster story. It wasn’t, but it certainly did not disappoint! If you love a good mystery, you will like this one a lot.

Benjamin Stevenson is an author who was unknown to me before picking this up. I have since learned that he is actually a very popular (and award winning) stand up comedian from Australia. This isn’t his first book either, so I have a feeling I will be checking his previous works out in the near future.

The Harper Collins website describes the book this way: “Knives Out and Clue meet Agatha Christie and The Thursday Murder Club in this “utterly original” (Jane Harper), “not to be missed” (Karin Slaughter), fiendishly clever blend of classic and modern murder mystery.” It is funny that it is described in that way, because I compared it to the movies Clue and the classic And Then There Were None.

Before I go on, let me say that I loved this book! It really has the feel of a classic murder mystery, yet set in present day. What makes this story different is that the author actually speaks to the reader throughout the story.

The narrator is Ernest Cunningham. He is a self-published author of a book on how to write a crime novel/murder mystery. As the narrator, he tells the reader that he is not a fan of various literary tricks used in novels today (like and unreliable narrator) and promises to be as reliable and truthful as possible as he relates the story. He constantly breaks “the fourth wall” as he tells the story.

Synopsis from Google:

Ernie Cunningham, a teacher and crime fiction aficionado, is a reluctant guest at a family reunion held in a snowbound mountain retreat. Three years ago, Ern witnessed his brother, Michael, kill a man and immediately shopped him to the police. This was a betrayal no one in his well-known crime family could forgive and for the last few years Ernie has been shunned by his relatives. But now they are all gathered at the Sky Lodge Mountain Retreat to welcome Michael back into the fold after his release from prison. However, on the eve of Michael’s release, the body of a man is found frozen on the slopes. While most assume the man simply collapsed and died of hypothermia during the night, Ern and his step-sister Sofia spot a strange detail – the man’s airways are clogged with ash. He appears to have died by fire . . . in a pristine snowfield . . . without a single burn mark on him. With the local police officer, PC Darius Crawford, soon overwhelmed by the death of the man no one can identify, Ernie begins his own investigation. Particularly when Sofia points out that the death has the same MO as The Black Tongue serial killer recently in the papers… It’s up to Ern to discover whether one of his family is a serial killer, before his whole family end up dead…

Ernie is good about making sure you are “keeping up” and at times will “recap” things for you, which I found helpful. I am guessing that if you read the book in one sitting, the recap might be annoying, but I read it over a couple days and found it a good thing. I admit I had pegged two or three people as the murderer only to find out I was wrong. I was totally caught off guard when they were revealed.

It is witty, has suspenseful moments, great characters, and fun. This is definitely a book that I highly recommend reading if you love a good mystery. 5/5 Stars!

Favorite Films – The 2010’s

As I looked back over the last year’s worth of blogs, I was reminded that I had yet to finish a series I started on my favorite films. The premise of the series is to pick a favorite movie (that you have seen) for every year of your life. This series started with 1970 (the year of my birth) and was broken up by decade. I concluded in November with the years 2000-2009. It’s time to finish up this series….

2010

In 2010, my oldest son would have been 8, and my youngest son was 3. Many of the movies I watched were kid movies. Some of them were good enough to rank as my favorite films.

Among the kid films I watched in 2010 were Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightening Thief, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, How to Train Your Dragon, and Toy Story 3. I guess Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 could almost be classified as a kid’s movie, but I know how much adults loved the series, too. As someone who loves time travel movies, I was left a bit disappointed with Hot Tub Time Machine. Date Night with Steve Carell and Tina Fey probably should have been a whole lot funnier, but it wasn’t. Iron Man 2 was a decent sequel. Grown Ups had potential, but was kind of a flop. The King’s Speech was a very good film. I enjoyed it a lot, but the film that stands out as my favorite is Shrek Forever After.

My kids loved the Shrek movies. I did too. Shrek the Third was really the worst of the series. I really hoped that this final film in the series would be good – and it was! The idea of an altered universe was such a great story line. It was fun to see Fiona as this great warrior and Puss In Boots as a chubby cat. It was a fitting wrap up to a fun series. I am hoping that my daughter will want to watch them with me!

2011

2011 brought me to many more kid movies, including Rango, Rio, Kung Fu Panda II, Cars 2, and the terrible revival of The Muppets. The Harry Potter series wrapped with Part 2 of the Deathly Hallows. Crazy, Stupid Love was more serious than I thought, but wasn’t a bad film. I enjoyed Limitless with Bradley Cooper a lot. Sequels included Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, The Hangover II, Mission: Impossible Ghost Protocol (which was ok), and Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (which I really enjoyed. I thought Robert Downey Jr. was good in these, despite the hate many reviews had for him). Cowboys and Aliens was a waste of time. Horrible Bosses was just ok. Bridesmaids was played up as this huge comedy, and while there were some funny parts, I really think this was more of a drama. I didn’t think it was as good as all the hype. My favorite film of 2011 was Puss In Boots.

It was neat to see the origins of this character. I am glad he got his own movie. Antonio Banderas is just perfect as the voice of this character! Just like in the Shrek movies, we also see some of the fairy tale characters. Who knew Humpty Dumpty was such a bad guy!? Loved this film!

2012

2012 brought us The Avengers, The Hunger Games, and The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. The kids and I watched Brave (which was a very good film) and Hotel Transylvania. As a fan of the Three Stooges, I was apprehensive about seeing the 2012 movie. It was not great, but kudos to Sean Hayes, Will Sasso, and Chris Diamantopoulos, who all did great as Larry, Curly, and Moe. Seven Psychopaths was actually a very good movie – Christopher Walken is excellent in it! Anthony Hopkins is very good as Alfred Hitchcock in the biography Hitchcock, but it was another biographical film that gets my vote for favorite – Lincoln.

I know many folks found this film long and boring, but I found it fascinating! I remember the first picture of Daniel Day Lewis as Lincoln – wow! It was amazing! They really made him look like him. I read often about Lincoln’s Assassination (and JFK’s, too). His story is so intriguing to me. The supporting cast was just as good.

2013

2013 had me at the movies with my kids for The Croods, Despicable Me 2, Monsters University, Turbo, and Frozen. Sequels included The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug and A Good Day to Die Hard. The Incredible Burt Wonderstone was less than incredible. We’re The Millers was quite a disappointment. Identity Thief was not as funny as everyone said it was. Simon Pegg was in two films I saw in 2013 – The World’s End and Star Trek: Into Darkness. I enjoyed Gangster Squad, but my favorite film was the biography of Jackie Robinson – 42.

Robinson is played by Chadwick Boseman, who would go on to play James Brown in 2014. As we look back, we know how amazing a player Robinson was, but this film really shows just how difficult it was for him. I really liked this film. Harrison Ford is also good in this movie.

2014

More kid films in 2014 – I watched Mr. Peabody & Sherman, Maleficent, Penguins of Madagascar, and The Lego Movie. I really liked the Lego movie. I found myself laughing out loud a lot. A Million Ways to Die in the West was just ok – Liam Neeson was a good bad guy in it. The Doc Brown cameo is a highlight. The Hobbit trilogy wrapped up with The Battle of the Five Armies. Guardians of the Galaxy was actually better than I thought it would be. Chadwick Boseman nails James Brown in Get On Up! He was perfect! A movie which surprised me was Kingsmen: The Secret Service. I don’t know what I expected it to be, but it was very good. However, for my favorite film, I will pick an oddball comedy – What We Do In The Shadows.

In the documentary style of TV’s The Office, the movie follows some vampire roommates around as the live their lives as vampires in modern times. I really laughed out loud at the wackiness of this movie. It was so good, they have a TV series based on the film.

2015

Kids movies I watched included Minions (a sort of Despicable Me sequel), Goosebumps, and the Peanuts Movie. A kid movie which was so good it almost made my favorite – the Shaun the Sheep Movie. My kids would watch these cartoons on TV and I found myself laughing as hard as they did at them. I bought them all the DVD’s and we’d watch them together. This full length movie was very well done and is one to take the kids to! Great movie!! Mr. Holmes was a very good film which focuses on the aging Sherlock Holmes (played by Ian McKellen). Jurassic World was yet another sequel to the dinosaur series Jurassic Park. Tom Cruise returns in another IMF movie – mission: Impossible Rogue Nation. My pick for favorite – Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

The saga continues! It was so good to see Harrison Ford back as Han Solo with Carrie Fisher returning as Leia. There were old favorites and new characters to further the story and we learn all about Han and Leia’s son gone bad. It was better than I anticipated, and at times the action was hard to keep up with, but as a Star Wars fan, it was satisfying.

2016

Kid films from this year that I saw included The Angry Birds Movie (which was not very good), Sing (which was full of some great music), Trolls (which I fell asleep watching), Moana (which was good), and Finding Dory (which was better than I thought it would be). Deadpool was pretty funny – but inappropriate to watch with the kids. Star Trek Beyond was a worthy sequel. The favorite pick, though, takes us back to the galaxy far, far away – Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.

What makes this such a great film is the fact that it links up the prequel trilogy to the original trilogy. You see these unknown characters in a battle to get the Death Star plans to Princess Leia. It was really an amazing film. Some people had issues with the CGI characters, but I didn’t. I thought it was awesome!

2017

2017 was a year of sequels – Star Wars had The Last Jedi, Guardians of the Galaxy got a second installment, The Kingsmen had The Golden Circle, and Blade Runner took us to 2049. I sat through The Greatest Showman – a musical which was ok, but nothing I would have picked to see by myself. I’ll go back to kids movies for my pick for favorite – The Lego Batman Movie.

Admittedly my favorite character from the 2014 Lego Movie, I was glad to see Batman get his own film. Will Arnett is great as the voice of Batman. I liked this one a lot – and I hope it gets a sequel!

2018

As the decade gets closer to wrapping up, I noticed more movies that I wanted to see and didn’t. In 2018, I wanted to see Stan and Ollie and Solo: A Star Wars Story and never saw either. I guess I need to get to the video store. Movies I did see were Deapool 2, The Hate U Give (a very good film based on the book), and Won’t You Be My Neighbor (A fantastic documentary on Mr. Rogers). Bohemian Rhapsody was just amazing! The comparison between the real Live Aid footage and the film footage was so amazing to watch. It was a very good film, and almost my pick. I had to go with The Incredibles 2 as my choice.

I waited SO long for this sequel. I hoped that it wouldn’t suck and it didn’t. I was glad that it picked up where the first one ended. It focused a bit more on Mrs. Incredible, which was ok because that led to some very funny moments with Mr. Incredible at home with the kids. This could easily be a franchise – it should get more sequels in my opinion.

2019

How sad is it that I only saw one film last year!? Really! ONE movie!!! There were plenty of remakes (all of which I didn’t want to see – Dumbo, Pet Semetary, Aladdin, Lion King)! Sequels I didn’t see – The Lego Movie 2, Toy Story 4, and Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker. I never saw Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, The Addams Family, Midway, The Joker, A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, Knives Out, or 1917. One movie I am anxious to see is The Irishman. I read the book and just need three hours to watch it! So what movie did I actually see? Urgh – I am embarrassed to even share it. I wouldn’t call it a favorite. It was ok. It was better than I thought. My kids had to explain half of it to me. But, since it is the only film I saw last year – it has to be the pick, right?? At least until I watch some of the others from 2019…..

The film I saw in 2019 – Pokémon Detective Pikachu.

See the look on his face? That’s how I feel about only seeing THAT movie!! URGH!

I really need to watch others so I can alter this …

Final Thoughts

Despite the way the decade ended … I had fun looking back through all of the various movies I watched over my lifetime. It helped me realize many movies I have always wanted to see and jot them down. It also served as a reminder of all the bad films I have seen – LOL!

I hope you enjoyed this series of blogs. you may now make fun of me about that last one!

Cheers!