Origin in Death J.D. Robb Grade: B+ Sensuality: Warm

As somebody who doesn't generally read romantic suspense (the exception to the rule being Anne Stuart and now, J.D. Robb), it'll probably sound strange for me to say that the suspense component of Origin in Death is what I liked best. That's not to diminish the relationship component here, but it's not as front and center as it is in some of the other installments to the In Death series.

As Eve and Peabody are leaving the Willard B. Icove Center for Reconstructive and Cosmetic Surgery after questioning an injured woman in a self-defense case, they are called to the office of the center's founder. He's been found dead, with a scalpel in his heart, oh-so-precisely placed. The killer seems quite sure of herself; she appears on security tapes entering the building and making her way to the doctor's office, where they meet. No tape exists of the actual killing. Oddly enough, though, the killer is once again seen on tape as she leaves the building looking like nothing untoward has occurred.

Icove's son, Willard Jr., worked with his father, assuming leadership responsibilities for the center over time. It doesn't seem as though money or jealousy are motives, so Eve and Peabody move on to Willard Jr.'s wife, a beautiful woman who for some reasons sets off Eve's internal red flag system. She talks with Mira, who knew Icove and was quite fond of him. With Roarke's help Eve digs deeper, and discovers some encoded files on the dead man's computer. Only women are featured in the files, and there are cryptic comments associated with them. Eve soon realizes that the respected doctor was involved in some sort of experiments involving these women, and because of the encryption, determines they were likely unethical, if not out and out illegal.

She confronts Willard Jr., who is not happy with her new line of questioning; she gets the same response from Mira, and they become hostile colleagues rather than the surrogate mother/daughter they've increasingly been to each throughout the series. Eve begins to suspect Willard Jr. is complicit...were he and his father involved in the sex trade, could they have creating made-to-order babies, or is it something even more sinister? And how does a boarding school fit into the case? Eve's sure it does, but she hasn't yet put all the pieces together. The mystery widens further when Willard Jr. is killed and the murder scene, in his house, looks "off."

While all that is going on, it's nearly Thanksgiving, and Roarke has invited his entire Irish family to cross the pond to celebrate. He's excited at the prospect of their visit, but not quite sure what to do with the various aunts and uncles, nieces and nephews, when they arrive. Eve feels even less sure of how to handle all these people, but she does her best to lend support to her husband. As you might imagine, her definition of "support" isn't quite how you or I might define it, but she makes the effort, and Roarke appreciates it.

The scenes involving Roarke's extended family at the mansion are terrific. Not only is the contrast between Eve as highly competent cop yet less than fully functioning human being thoroughly explored, but these moments provide great visuals, comic relief, and after Roarke's aunt wanders into Eve's office, helpful insight into the case.

Genetic engineering is something we read about fairly often these days. Whether it's cancer cell research to cure disease, putting sperm in a centrifuge to increase the likelihood of boy babies, or the notion of cloning, how much should science be tempered by medical ethics? This question is multiplied in 2059, and as the mystery unfolds, it becomes impossible to put the book down. Watching Eve catch the trail, and how she follows it through, is incredibly interesting, and increasingly exciting.

It seems that there are two types of Robb readers; those who prefer the mysteries, and those who prefer the relationships. Although there's nothing wrong with the latter in Origin in Death, it's the mystery that will engage you and keep you turning the pages as you - and your heart - race to the finish.

TTFN, Laurie Likes Books

Last night we finally got around to watching the first two hours of PBS's ten-part documentary, Carrier. Film crews spent six months aboard the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz as it deployed to the Persian Gulf. Some 5,000 crew live on the carrier, and this series, which was shot in 2005, took three years to edit. It shows.

And it's not stodgy - or simply a recruiting film, which would have hacked me off. So far the soundtrack is excellent; episode one featured music from The Killers, one of my favorite bands of the last few years.

In the first two hours, several officers and enlisted personnel are introduced, including a rather aimless young man with a pregnant girlfriend back home, a middle-classed Republican kid who "reads a book a month," a young woman determined to break her family's cycle of poverty, and two female fighter pilots who must contend with being the odd man out in a nearly all-male career path. As several point out early on, the Nimitz is like a big floating high school, with lots of drama among the crew, who are mostly 18 - 21. Some are gung-ho about the war, one questions "why we’re fighting to defend someone else’s freedom when we barely have our own."

It's an incredibly tough life, from the noise of the runway atop the carrier to the bombs carried beneath. Everyone is always aware of the dangers they face, and of the damage they can cause. As one of the officers says, "We want our friends to think we're their best friends...we want our enemies to think we're their worst nightmare." Both the grunts and the pretty-boy flyboys have their moments on camera, and all acknowledge that each performs an integral task.

The necessity of team work is what comes through most loudly throughout the first two hours of the documentary series. If a nail remains on the runway and a plane hits it, it could cause great damage. If bombs aren't loaded correctly, the plane might blow up, and if the catapults aren't working on take off, the pilot might die.

I'm not sure how many hours as yet remain unaired, but if you've got the chance to catch at least part of Carrier, please do.

TTFN, Laurie Likes Books

This morning I received an email from Amazon. Kindle's are in stock, and they will be sent two-day mail - for free! Since people have been waiting for up to two months to receive their Kindles before now, this is exciting news. And, to provide incentive for Amazon affiliates to promote that fact, they are offering a 10% commission from anyone who orders the device through a participating affliate like AAR. If you've been thinking about the Kindle, as you know I have, consider taking advantage of this "special" and receive your devide asap. Simply click one of the banner ads/book-sized ads we have running throughout AAR, this blog, AAR After Hours, or below:

If you do, AAR will earn $40 (a much greater commission than we receive on book orders, which generate about $0.50 per book ordered). It would be particularly handy since I've cut off the major source of site revenues. Although I can't get the commission if I order one for myself, my husband just informed me that he will be buying me a Kindle for my birthday. I'm plotzing with excitement - my birthday is at the end of May.

And that's not all...last night we went to not one but two Border's bookstores so I could buy the seven or so books I wanted to pick up for May - it seems an extraordinarily good month for books. After visiting both stores, I ended up with everything on my list except for one book, which hasn't been released yet. Right now my biggest decision is choosing between Anne Stuart's Fire and Ice, To Taste Temptation, by Elizabeth Hoyt, Keri Arthur's The Darkest Kiss, and Forever in Blue, the fourth of Ann Brashere's Traveling Pants series.

I worked on my Shelfari shelf again yesterday and this morning; after inputting part of 2006's reads, I decided to start back at the beginning and inputting 1993 and 1994. Then I had one of my brilliant ideas...to create an All About Romance group on Shelfari to help readers connect more easily and discover commonalities, and suggested that if you belong to the AAR group and AAR's forums, that you include your Shelfari shelf address in your AAR Forums sig line.

One benefit of being busy putting into action all these new ideas is that it keeps me away from Packrat, my new favorite time vacuum at Facebook. Why, I managed to not play at all today...yet!

I must say, officially ending AAR's ad program has left me energized and happy to be online, after a long fallow period. It's a good thing, too, since I've got several other J.D. Robb reviews to write here on my blog. Well, it's time to get back to Shelfari, and 1995's reads.

TTFN, Laurie Likes Books

Yesterday I saw where Amazon's Kindle is now in stock and ready for purchase, but for me it's still a little pricey. I'm waiting for version two myself. I continue to love my e-Bookwise, albeit somewhat less at this point, and since I use my laptop as much as I do, I thought I'd look into .rb converters. I hadn't known there was one. Let me backtrack a bit.

When I first bought my e-Bookwise, all the books I bought for it were in .rb format, the format specifically for the device. Later I began to buy in html format whenever possible, or in lit or pdf format if necessary, simply because if the e-Bookwise ever went defunct, I wanted to still be able to read those books. Unfortunately, converting the lit or pdf file via a converter isn't always easy - or possible - if the file is encrypted, so I've taken to simply reading e-books off my laptop. It's not as convenient as reading them off my e-Bookwise, but at least I can read them.

So after salivating over the Kindle yesterday, I thought to myself, "Hmm...I wonder if I can at least convert my .rb files to be read on my laptop?" Googling revealed that the answer was yes, and that the converter's creator is none other than Amber, whose lit and pdf converters I already use (I actually have two lit converters...the other is ConvertLIT GUI). ABC Amber Rocket eBook Converter offers a thirty-day trial, after which a license is less than $20.00. I took about an hour yesterday and converted all of my .rb files. If I decide to buy the converter, it apparently can do the files in batch form. which would be fabulous.

I think this is a very good thing; buying .rb files makes for easier access on my e-Bookwise, and if I want to read them on my laptop, now I can. I'm still leery of buying any more e-books until I break down and buy the Kindle (hopefully in a year or so the price will have gone down), but at least I know I'll always have access to everything I've already bought.

TTFN, Laurie Likes Books

More than four in ten of us call it "soda," another 25% or so call it "pop." For just about two in ten of us, it's "coke," and I'm one of the 10% for whom it the stuff is considered a "soft drink." And two percent each call it "soda pop" or something else altogether...perhaps fizzy water?

TTFN, Laurie Likes Books

Okay, so my anal retentive qualities are not as pronounced - or as funny - as Phil Hartman as the Anal Retentive Chef (or Anal Retentive Handyman, or Anal Retentive...), but I've got my moments. It all started with Shelfari.

Originally I set up my Shelfari shelf solely to provide an online listing of all my Desert Isle Keepers. Later I started to compare my books against my Shelfari friends, but earlier this week realized I can't do a true comparison unless I actually input more than just my DIK reads. So yesterday I started, and input those books I've already read this year that hadn't earned DIK status, and just now finished with those I read last year, graded B+ - F. Because I am among the Anal Retentive Romance Readers, I had to put my books in alpha author order using their "list view" reorganizer, and then had to gerry-rig their rating system against my grading system. For them, 5 stars is defined as "loved it" and four stars is "really liked it." So far, so good. But rather than their three stars being defined as "average," it is instead defined as "liked it." Two stars is "didn't like it" and one star is "hated it." That really doesn't work for me. What to do, what to do? And we won't even get into the fact that I uses plusses and minuses.

First, in my reader profile, I indicated that for me, three stars means average. But to really make my point, I also decided that any book earning a C- from me would be entered as a two star read, which I also indicated in my profile. I know that Rachel Potter, who wasn't going to do the Shelfari thing at all, changed her mind, and actually input her reviews. I don't think I'll do that, but I may add a statement to those C- books on my Shelfari shelf, just to reiterate what I did...and why I did it.

Who the fuck cares? I honestly can't say what drives me. But I've got a little time on my hands, and since Kate Cuthbert - damn her! - got me addicted to Packrat on Facebook, I think it's a more productive use of my time to work on my Shelfari shelf.

Also, it occurred to me last night that Shelfari does in a more formalized, and far simpler fashion, something that we instituted at AAR way back when, in terms of our All Time Favorites and Reviewer Profiles. I'm going to encourage all of our review staff to consider starting Shelfari shelves for at least their DIK reads, which we will then paste as widgets into their profile pages. I think it's easier to feel a part of a community if you have reference points, and sharing books read and their rating is a big part of that.

As for me, I'm taking a break before attempting to start on 2005. That was a huge reading year for me, and because it also included many e-books and short stories that will frustrate me by virtue of the fact that they won't be found on Shelfari, I need to be in a better state of mind before tackling it.

TTFN, Laurie Likes Books

All Together Dead Charlaine Harris Grade: C- Sensuality: Subtle

Every May for the past seven years, another installment of Charlaine Harris' Southern Vampire books is released, and I buy it...in hardcover. I may not get to it right away, but I try to do so before the previous years' book is no more than a vague memory. I guess I waited too long this time, but until a post on one of our forums about the series alerted me to the fact that I'd actually missed the 2007 release, I'd forgotten about it. I guess reading our C+ review just moved it onto the back burner for me, where it stayed.

Actually, though, I don't think the problem was too long a wait. It's more that quite a bit occurs between All Together Dead and Definitely Dead, and most of that quite a bit - Hurricane Katrina, which negatively impacted the power (and financial) base of the Vampire Queen of Louisiana - is presented as a fait accompli. As a result, I felt a step behind as the story unfolded.

Between the Queen's losses and a case brought against her by the minion of her now-dead undead husband, the King of Arkansas, the international convention of vampires is sure to be a political nightmare for the Queen, who asks Sookie to be her eyes and ears among the humans accompanying the other vamp leaders. Although something horrendous happens whenever Sookie gets involved with the supernatural, she wants to money the gig will bring. Even if that means time spent with her ex, Bill Compton, and Eric, vampire sheriff of New Orleans, whose connection with Sookie becomes a major issue in this installment to the series, particularly now that Sookie is fast becoming involved with weretiger Quinn.

Murder, bombs, and protests by members of Fellowship of the Sun, a KKK-like group introduced in Living Dead in Dallas, plague the conference, and while Sookie has an ally in telepathy, Barry the Bellboy, working the conference, they don't always see eye to eye. Then too, there are issues involving Quinn that need to be resolved. Not only are many of her "friends" surprised that he hasn't told her about his past, he's aware that Eric and she share blood, at the confab for the third time, in order to strengthen their psychic bond for the good of the queen. Pam, Eric's lieutenant, has already warned Sookie that Eric is in love with her. Certainly there's some evidence of that, but reading Eric's motives is like trying to solve a Chinese puzzle.

Charlaine Harris is in no way following the path of Laurell K. Hamilton; both heroines may have multiple male suitors, but Sookie is more of a one-guy gal than Anita. Still, it is these male suitors vying for her attention that sustained my interest, as such, in the story. I can't say I much enjoyed Sookie as mercenary. I'll buy her May 2008 release in hardcover, but if it's not a significant improvement over All Together Dead, it'll be paperback city in 2009...well, I guess 2010.

TTFN, Laurie Likes Books