Books I've Read in the Last Two Months

I always love a good mystery, but a good mystery set in a city that you know very well is much better! Mary Jane Maffini's main character is Camilla MacPhee. She works as a Victim's Rights Lawyer in Ottawa. This particular novel takes place during the Tulip Festival (which is currently running). I love the dry humour, and the stubborn main character. However, as I mentioned before, my favourite part of these novels is that they are set in Ottawa. I love to be able to imagine my home town in all of its spring-time glory. I also love to be able to imagine every scene and setting of the chase scenes, it makes it much more exciting.

BTW, Mary Jane Maffini, the author, is also the owner of the Prime Crime Mystery Bookstore in Ottawa.

Along with local mysteries, I really enjoy reading historical mysteries, particularly those set in the dark and middle ages. The proprietor of The Mysterious Affair in Waterloo, ON, recommended this series to me when he was out of the book that I went in to find. I was really looking forward to read this book, but it didn't really grab me the way some of my favourite historical mysteries have. It is pretty well written, but I didn't take to the main character, Sister Fidelma. I like the main character detectives to be the constant in the book. I like it when I can have some insight into their character, and how they will act in different situations. I found that I never was able to get to that point with Sister Fidelma. I think that the learning curve also had something to do with it. This one is set in 664 AD in a place that I don't know much about. I much prefer novels set in the 11th to 14th centuries, because I can more easily imagine how the time period looks.

I've had this book since 1992, and did, at one point, get halfway through it. This morning, I finally finished it. I found the first half of the book a little dry, it was difficult to get through. I almost put it down again, but I am so glad that I didn't. The ending was so bittersweet, that I couldn't tear myself away from the last two chapters. I also have the next book, but I don't think that I will read it just yet.

My brand new all-Canada guide book arrived recently, and I am trying not to rush through reading all of the history and culture sections, and just focusing on the Nova Scotia and Newfoundland chapters, so that I will still have something to read when we are on our trip this summer. The book itself is beautiful. It has a colour section about the National Parks of Canada. Having just had a quick glance through most of the chapters, it does seem to do a great job of covering the travel opportunities in such an immense country. We'll be travelling to Newfoundland this summer for two weddings, and we'll also be touring the province. I think we will be going to St. Pierre as well, which should give me the taste of France that I've been longing for ever since I visited in 2005. Lonely Planet guides are my favourite guide books because they include tips and information about how to connect on a more local level. The only thing that could be challenging about this book would be trying to complete some of the itineraries that they include. The Ontario four-day itinerary would be extremely tough for any traveller, even a well-seasoned one who travels lightly. Canada is just too big for a four-day trip, anyway. You would never get the true sense of this country by visiting 4 cities in 4 days. You would really be spending your entire trip on the road.