My internet usage is going to bit a bit restricted for the next few weeks. I feel like I gave it up for lent too. I hadn't realized how much I depend on it. Probably good for the whole family but strange. I have finished a few books. I suspect I will finish several more books now. :lol: Garden of Lies by Amanda Quick....This one was really good.https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/24358781-garden-of-lies. It has the feel of the first book in a series but doesn't appear to be. Nightshifted by Eddie Spencehttps://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12905583-nightshifted..... This is the first in an interesting series about a nurse who is recruited to work on the paranormal floor at her county hospital. I will read more of these. Betrayal of the Blood Lily by Lauren Willig....I knew I was saving this one for a reason. Takes place in India......so I have now visited India. I have some cozies set in India too. ;)

How fun! We want to come too! Kathy, you at least already have grandchildren. You can be the fun grandma. I am currently busy trying to decide what to save in case I have grandkids. Save your frog mold and make the chocolate frogs for xmas as soon as they read the first HP. Obviously you are very qualified. Make sure to give us your review also.

I just finished Dreaming Anastasia and enjoyed it. It's fluff with a Russian folktale twist so I think I just got my fairytale Bingo square. So while I was setting it up in Goodreads I discovered it's a trilogy. I found them in overdrive and can check them out, available. My question for Heather is......Do I want to? Have you read the sequels? This is a series that could go downhill very quickly! ;)

Ali, I am glad these have turned into good treadmill books for you. I ended up really enjoying the last part of the second Kate Shackleton. The fist part was a bit slow, maybe I just didn't notice it in the first book. I think I got caught up in the setting (I like visiting old mills) and the background character information while reading the first. For the second book the setting didn't fill in as well for me. Odd because Harrogate is a favourite place irl and I know where most of the places mentioned are. My imagination just refused to fill it in to that time frame. I will definitely resume reading this series later this spring!

Sending :grouphug: to Kathy and her family

Somewhere on one of my lists I think I have a mystery set in Burma. If I find it I will post. I was saving for my next serious attempt at around the world. I would love working in a research library I think. Peaceful, maybe.... That being said I don't find working in a regular old library as a volunteer nearly as glamourous as I expected. It's work....I am happy to do it because our village gets to keep the library but not what I anticipated! Yorkshires.......I don't like to make Yorkshire's from scratch. I never know what to do with all that leftover oil....people dump it down the drain which just bothers me. Anyway I buy frozen (which are really good consistently ;) ) and we had none in the freezer. As today's meal was cleaning out our freezer and fridge ds had to live without them! So roast potatoes, parsnips, and sweet potatoes, to go with a pork roast. Carrot Cake (purchased) for dessert. Two other books that are in progess: Dreaming Anastasia by Joy Preblehttps://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8256691-dreaming-anastasiawhich is a YA a checked out for dd as travel fluff. Since I like Romanov books this one was intriguing. Not bad so far..... Garden of Lies by Amanda Quickhttps://www.goodreads.com/book/show/24358781-garden-of-liesA BaWer read it last fall and loved it, no idea who. I have had it on hold every since. I started it last week when sleepy and read enough to be utterly confused ;). Decided to give it another try when out doing errands with dh this afternoon and got hooked. So glad I didn't return it!

Not in the US and had no idea it was today. Not at all sad about no Superbowl but Puppybowl sounds great. :)

Good evening all, I will be finishing the second Frances Brody (Kate Shackleton) book later tonight. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15793108-a-medal-for-murder. At the halfway point and am enjoying it although I don't think I like the mystery as well as the first. While I still like Kate, the sleth, none of the new characters are sympathetic so not as wrapped up in this cozy. My roast dinner is close to done. I need to finish cleaning and organizing for our trip with final bits tomorrow. In order to pack today I ended up straightening everyones drawers. One thing leads to another....

I would organize the transcript by subject not years.

MC Beaton has written several historical romances that are fluffy and fun under the pen name of Marion Chesney. They republished them as ebooks and used the Beaton name fairly recently. They offered several first in series last year for free. These are easy emergency reads.....most that I have read are less than 200 pages. Here's a list http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/c/marion-chesney/ Thanks for letting everyone know Kareni!

Mel, I am glad you found the mystery series. I did have fun hunting for it and am a bit surprised I didn't run into it before because one of my libraries does have the series in overdrive. I plan to read the first one soon! I finished Silver Borne in Patricia Brigg's Mercy Thompson series so a Bingo block completed. One of this year's reading goals is to finish reading that series.

As you may have figured out our family owns several kindles....I now have 5. :lol: The newer Kindle fires all tell me my estimated read time for the book when I start. I can also look at time left in the book or chapter as I read. Of course this all gets really messed up if I leave the kindle on a read a bit while doing something else like cooking, suddenly 50pages is estimated as several hours! :lol:

Naturally I had to go looking for the cozy series. ;) Just wanted to let people know the first book in this series by Sherri Bryon is free on kindle. I downloaded it. :) They look fun and the "too American" has me curious.https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25599162-tapas-carrot-cake-and-a-corpse?from_search=true&search_version=service.

Spy Car, I have a couple of questions regarding Chester's breed. We have friends with a houseful of Rhodesian Ridgebacks (5) that are incredibly intelligent and high maintenance like your buddy. I know your dog at a distance would look just like one of their dogs, you have to get close to see the ridge. When you pet a dieback the texture is unusual, rough as opposed to smooth. I assume Chester has smooth fur? Now for my behaviour question. When Ridgebacks are playing with each other they frequently go for each other's ears. They have some tussles that look really dramatic to an outsider but are really more of bored children entertaining themselves. I think pit bulls have the same behaviour which is why their ears were docked for years. My Spaniel somehow ended up with a group of Rottweiler buddies that he knew from puppies. All male. It was the oddest dynamic, my little guy was always allowed to win. His Rottweiler friends were roll over and show him their belly at let my little dog growl and sniff. It was a hilarious sight. Unfortunately he thought he was superior to all Rottweiler's which was a huge problem. For some odd reason he wasn't the king of all Rottweiler's! I think you probably know where I am going with this. I wonder if the pit bull may have a ridgeback for a friend that he played rough with and approached Chester thinking it was play. The ear grabbing is what is making me wonder. My friend's Ridgebacks are very well trained and great dogs, no worries ever about my kids with them or in public. They just wrestle rough with each other, frequently grabbing ears. It looks painful but I have been assured generally harmless. These dogs can also open doors, microwaves, ovens, and refrigerators to get food. :lol: Everyone, this is a behavior question because dogs in general fascinate me.

I love Sea of Trolls! I actually reread them later.......

:grouphug: I am so sorry. In my experience dog parks are generally smaller and always fenced in the US. This tends to mean owners let their dogs off lead with less training (I can't think of a better word) than an owner would here. In my experience people love to go inside the fence and let their dogs play. Dogs run free in our parks/footpaths pretty often if the owner knows the dog will return when called which I think is a behavior standard that may get skipped at dog parks. The lack of fencing means and unleashed dog can run for miles so the dogs do have an added level of training that go off lead. For instance we went for a long countryside walk today and a cute little spaniel ran right back to his owner to get his leash on when he saw us. Bill, before I forget I am glad you are both OK.

For a big shop after she arrives you could just go online with ASDA (Walmart Store) or Tesco, Sainbury, or Morrison and have things delivered. Grocery deliveries and online shoping are both really common and easy here. She can get towels etc. all in one big shop that you can set up from home if you want. I think the first delivery is even free right now. ;) They do a great job and you just hand something back to the driver if you aren't happy with it and he removes it from your bill. I did check and she definately has an asda. For our family the grocery bills are much cheaper here then in the US. I buy quite a bit of fresh fruit and veg really inexpensively because each food chain has 5 on sale for a pound or less each week. For instance a nice size bag of apples or oranges were 59p at aldi yesterday. I am not sure how my shopping habits would scale down to one. But cooking at home saves lots of money. Poundstores have lots of great deals also.......cleaning supplies are especially good there.

I wouldn't load her down with extras that cost less in the US either. If the item is already owned and unused in the US send her with it if you know she needs it immediately on arrival but I wouldn't go shopping for supplies. These days you get 1 carry on and one approximately 23 kilo bag for free. Next bag is $60 or so. Third bag more. I also want to highlight Laura's charity shop comment. Charity Shops are amazing places where great bargains can be found. Most places have a few.

Flying into Manchester is easy. Good direct flights daily out of Atlanta and Orlando for a start with the Delta/Virgin partnership. Train service there is great with an easy station at the airport.

I suspect he was but have been looking on google and can't confirm. The character doesn't appear to have a great deal in common with Edith Pargeter according to the bio summary I just read. The character is a well to do older woman who is the widow of a rather shady character. She has many friends with unusual pasts thanks to her husband and equipment like lock picks and revolvers. She is very resourceful. I suspect it is simply Pargeter solves clever mysteries. This author worked for the BBC for years apparently and the characters in both of the series I have read are cleverly done. These aren't fat wordy books with endless descriptions but he manages to the make characters and scenes that I can picture pretty vividly with little effort. Most lean to the comedic. These books are quick reads, I read most of this one early this morning while waiting for everyone else to wake up! Returning to Pargeter....I have caught similar little references in his books so doubt the names are coincidence. Clever bits where it flashes through your mind but I can't think of a single one for an example right now. I will try and visit my librarian friend tomorrow and see if she knows more.

The book does look good. Every time dd and I start planning to make ice cream dh goes and stocks the freezer with our favorite flavors and we give up happily. He thinks it looks like a lot of work.....plus we never plan to make his favorite, chocolate(boring). So he buys for all tastes. Well ladies, I no longer feel guilty that a GH mystery and an Ian Rutledge returned themselves unread this morning! I can't remember who was reading Simon Brett's Mrs.Pargeter series a couple of weeks ago but I finally found and read the first one A Nice Class of Corpsehttps://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17208684-a-nice-class-of-corpse. It was really well done. A really fun cozy that just flowed along. Mrs. Pargeter is a fun character and I am looking forward to reading more of her adventures. In this one she moves in to a retirement hotel at the seaside where residents are dying mysteriously. It was actually written in the late 80's but is actually done well enough so for the most part it isn't very dated.

We have a couple of unused ice cream makers also. :lol: Great intentions but I never do it. Jane, when we moved I had to leave behind stacks of cookbooks, most given away but a small box lives in storage of sentimental ones made by groups I belonged to. When going through them I realised that many of them were being kept for one or two really favourite recipes. I went to work with a photocopier and kept the favourites that way. They are stored in a box under my couch now!

Congratulations! I can't think of anything to add to Laura's suggestions right now other than a good waterproof jacket would be useful but that can be bought here.

DS has his exams scheduled so doing a happy dance. He will do Calculus AB and Computer Science. He needs these AP exams badly so very relieved he is sorted. Things are looking pretty grim for dd's exams. New exam coordinator at the school who does not wish to accommodate outside students who are doing exams not planned by the school. We are all an odd combo of relieved and sad. Glad because it will make a busy couple of weeks easier....house guests and a couple of days filled with major outside events for both DC. But sad for Dd because she has been preparing for Latin. Calculus BC was the other which I can't figure out why she can't take it with the other calculus exam takers. Oh well, we are trying one other place but aren't optimistic. For her these are extra so not getting upset. She is happy not to be testing on her birthday this year. :lol:

This book looks fabulous but sounds really familiar. I am going to request it and see if I have already read it. VC ....I hope Wee Girl is able to start sleeping through the night soon. DS used to walk in his sleep when he was upset by anything. Crossing my fingers that it stays in the past. It is hard to sleep when you are listening for the slightest odd noise. Much better a shared responsibility for both parents. ;) I have talked about trying to read a Terry Prachett book for awhile. Many of you and my dd love them. I have started (thanks to my Kindles not syncing correctly I read many of the beginning bits multiple times in order to find my place) and am finally enjoying Guards!Guards! . Not sure that I will read more of this series because the lack of chapters is really irritating. Are all of his books one long chapter? It is funny and I do enjoy the characters but may not be me for 40 or so books! I picked it from a list of Epic books for Bingo. I wasn't in the mood for LotR or Narnia. It's number 38 on this list http://bestfantasybooks.com/best-epic-fantasy.html.