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Just some short notes about each one, I am having some horrible dizziness and nausea so looking a screens is not my friend.  I suspect an inner ear infection is the source.

The Body on the Shore is the second in a series in which to be honest, I don’t remember much about the first.  This was a really fast paced action thriller with something (bad) happening every minute.  Explores immigration, adoption, family and revenge.  4 stars

Long Way Home is the first in a new-to-me series.  I am not so certain I like DS Ferreira, she seems to walk around with a chip on her shoulder, but I do like the lead DI Zigic.  These two work in a special hate crimes unit, so whenever a victim appears to be a target due to their background, their unit is involved.  In the opening case a migrant worker is burnt to death where he was squatting, which happened to be in a young white couple’s garden shed.  Zigic and Ferreira investigate and discover the case might not be what it appears to be.  Has a “ripped from the headlines” feel due to the recent exposed cases of the exploitation of migrant laborers.  4 stars

Past Reason Hated is book 5 in the Inspector Banks series.  I started this series on the recommendation of Tina at Novel Meals here on wordpress and I am really enjoying it.  I am way behind but I don’t want to read too many of them back to back.  This installment has a Christmas setting, so I am a little out of sync for Christmas in July.  A woman is murdered and it seems that even though she lived with a partner, was involved in the community, and had living relatives, no one really knows very much about her.  Her past is shrouded in secrecy and Banks is convinced that the key to solving her murder is hidden there.  Excellent read in a great series, I think this may have been one of my favorites so far in this series.

In the Presence of the Enemy is book 8 in the Lynley series.  I will admit to having read some of this series out of order so I have some foreknowledge of what happens to some of the characters.  This book involves the kidnapping of children and a murder of one of them.  The mother and to some extent the father involved are thoroughly unlikable and I would say criminal in their callous disregard for the daughter’s safety.  Rather tragic story all the way through.  This was not my favorite in the series and doesn’t show some of the recurring characters at their best.

The New Mrs. Clifton is a book I read a blurb about and then ordered from the library on impulse.  Set in the period directly after WW II and involves a man, his sisters, and the bride he brings back after the war.  Secrets and hostility abound as his sisters and their friend, the finance he left behind when he went to war, struggle to accept this incomer.  A fine women’s fiction read, I felt it dragged a little, but that may just be me because this is not my typical type of book.  3 stars

Death of a Dreamer is book 21 in the Hamish Macbeth series.  I will admit that I have not done this series justice because I have read it drastically out of order, but nevertheless I enjoy everyone of them I read.  Here Hamish has more trouble brought to his doorstep by a new transplant from the South, Effie.  Effie has a little difficulty with telling the truth and the difference between fantasy and reality and soon her problems result in murder.  Wonderful character and setting, just a really enjoyable read.  4 stars.