My thoughts on the mystery genre

 This topic from Long and Short Reviews was an interesting one.

I've been reading murder mysteries more often recently, although I tend to be quite selective as to which authors I read - I love Agatha Christie and Richard Osman, but some other authors just don't work for me. That said, I only really have one criterion for mysteries, and it's one that I first noticed while watching an episode of Jonathan Creek, a show which is a bit dated now but was famous for its convoluted methods of killing.

It's quite simple. I never make any effort to try and guess who the killer is - I know this is part of the fun for many people, but I'm happy to just watch and enjoy the journey. So if I manage to figure it out before the big reveal, then the writer clearly isn't trying hard enough. I want to be surprised, and if I'm not surprised, it's a failure for me.

I'm not sure why I have this criterion specifically for mysteries, since for other genres I'm perfectly fine with knowing the ending beforehand. But when it's a murder mystery, I don't want to know and I won't try to guess, so there's no excuse for not surprising me.

So what are your thoughts on the mystery genre?

What I do when I'm bored

 I'm quite looking forward to reading everyone else's responses to this topic from Long and Short Reviews. It would be very interesting if people were saying they went hang-gliding when they were bored. Sadly I can't claim to do anything quite that exciting.

It's rare that I am genuinely bored as I have a great capacity for daydreaming, so I can sit for ages staring out of the window, deep in my own thoughts. If I do get bored it's most likely because I've got so much time on my hands that even daydreaming has lost its charm. This usually means that I'm stuck somewhere like a hospital waiting room or a coach coming back from London, both of which take hours.

If I know I'm going to be somewhere a long time I take my Kindle with me so I can read. I also do prep work for whatever I'm currently writing and save it to my phone. I've managed to kill a lot of time that way, although I would just like to point out to whoever services coaches that they really need to get a better quality reading light. I could barely see my Kindle the last time I came home on a coach.

Maybe that's one of the reasons they all have charging ports in the back of the seats now. Can't see to read? Here, try surfing. There's even free Wi-Fi!

So what do you do when you're bored?

A genre I want to read more of

 Having had a quick break from Long and Short Reviews topics thanks to being on holiday, this one was an easy one. I've been trying to catch up on my reading and there is one genre I've definitely neglected.

Historical. Both fiction and non-fiction.

I have a lot of historical writers on my "following" list on Amazon and haven't seen any new ones from them lately, so I'll have to go searching for some new ones. My favourite period is the Wars or the Roses and Henry VIII, but I'm looking to branch out, maybe into the Georges - I've read further back into the early Henry periods, but not much further forward.

I also love American history, but most of my reading has been on the presidents and those close to them, so I need to look around for some interesting figures. I have a biography of J Edgar Hoover on my to-read list and I'm sure there are others I can find.

So which genre do you want to read more of?

Books with fantastic endings

After a quick break I'm back on the Long and Short Reviews topics, and this one intrigued me. I can think of plenty of books with endings I liked, but not many of them were fantastic.

I ended up with just one. "The Beguiled".

"The Beguiled" is a book which suffered a lot when the film was made, as not only did it seem to be written from bullet points while missing all the character development, but the trailer gave away the ending. Which is a shame, because I genuinely didn't see it coming.

Spoiler alert for those of you who haven't read the book or seen the trailer...

The women and girls are housing an injured soldier in a school, and gradually coming to realise that he's doing them more harm than good by manipulating them all. So how can they get rid of him?

Well, one of the girls happens to know where some poisonous mushrooms grow...

So which books did you think had fantastic endings?

Soak Up The Sun now released!

 Book 6 in the Rock My World series is finally out!

A weekend of summer fun leads to a passionate escape in the sun.

When Tamarie Morgan goes to PeakFest with her friends, her primary concern is avoiding her friend Veca’s creepy boyfriend, Sy, who drunkenly assaulted her two months previously and has refused to leave her alone ever since. However, when Tamarie is checking out the stalls and connects with Kaleb McAdams, the drummer for headline act Puppetmaster, a heated encounter backstage leads to Kaleb inviting her to ditch the festival with him. Kaleb wants her to be his plus-one at lead singer Cassian’s wedding—and when Veca and Sy break up the following day and start packing to leave, Tamarie and her friend Dannika decide to take Kaleb up on his offer.

Tamarie is initially impressed by the glitz and glamour of being a rockstar girlfriend, even for a short period of time, but is abruptly brought back down to earth when the press get a compromising photograph of her and her reputation is called into question. She soon realises that for her Kaleb is more than a brief fling, but when the other band members’ plus-ones tell her being a rockstar girlfriend has an expiry date, Tamarie finds herself wondering if they’re right. Will Kaleb still want her after the wedding is over, and can she deal with all that being a rockstar girlfriend involves?

Amazon UK: https://tinyurl.com/53ruyun3

Amazon US: https://tinyurl.com/mwpb5zbr

Totally Bound: https://www.totallybound.com/book/soak-up-the-sun

And all week books 1-5 are 99c at First For Romance: https://www.firstforromance.com/series/rock-my-world

Plus Totally Bound are running a giveaway! Enter now to win a selection of print books, a $10 gift card and books 1 to 5 in the series.

https://offers.bookbooster.io/soak-up-the-sun/c24511/

Good luck!

Funniest advice I've ever received

 When this topic from Long and Short Reviews came up I had, in fact, just been discussing this with my husband, as there was one piece of advice I was given as a teen which immediately leapt to mind. I don't know if I found it funny at the time, but it does make me laugh now.

It was, essentially, "You don't have the face to seduce a man, so win him with chocolate." A version of the way to a man's heart being through his stomach, I suppose. And I do have a face like a bag of spanners, so they probably had a point.

I did try this out a few times and I can't really argue its effectiveness. I managed to get the sixth form heart-throb to sit next to me all morning after I tried the old "The vending machine gave me two bars of chocolate by mistake, do you want the other one?" And when my husband and I first started dating, I would leave a Mars bar in his coat pocket so that he could find it while walking home at night.

According to him he didn't remember me doing that, but he did remember I always had a stock of Wispas when he came over.

So what funny advice have you received?

Would I stay in a haunted house? Why or why not?

 I had to laugh when this topic from Long and Short Reviews came up. Why? Because never mind if I would - I already have.

I had already attended a few paranormal investigations while I was writing "I Heard Your Voice", so when I saw that Mosborough Hall in Derbyshire were doing a deal on their haunted suite, my husband and I decided to give it a go. I can't remember what type of ghost they were supposed to have, but my husband is a huge sceptic, so I figured he would be the best person to have around in case a white lady appeared in the middle of the night.

I'm sorry to say that no ghosts turned up. We didn't even have any mysterious knocking on the pipes. The receptionist didn't look too surprised when I mentioned our complete failure, although she may have simply been relieved we weren't demanding our money back for the lack of paranormal activity. It was a perfectly nice hotel - just completely free of ghosts.

So would you stay in a haunted house?