Night and Day, by Virginia Woolf

In this novel, Katherine Hilbery must decide whether to be engaged to poet William Rodney, or to have a relationship with Ralph Denham, whom she finds much more interesting. Also in this story is Mary Datchet, a friend of Katherine's who is involved in the Women's Rights movement. Katherine's mother is struggling to put together a book about her late father, a famous poet, with help from Katherine. This book was first published in 1919. It is by far one of the best stories I've ever read.

An Unkindness of Ravens, by Ruth Rendell

A man (Rodney Williams) disappears & it is thought that he has run off with a woman other than his wife. But then a second woman reports that her husband is missing. It turns out to be that same man, for he is secretly married to two different women & has children with both. Later his body is found buried near a wood, and the mystery of his murder is eventually discovered. Turns out that the two daughters from different wives know each other, and the murder was committed by the two of them. This story is another Inspector Wexford mystery. I enjoy these British mysteries very much.

A Guilty Thing Surprised, by Ruth Rendell

This is an Inspector Wexford mystery. A woman (Elizabeth) takes a walk in the woods at the grounds of her & her husband's (Quentin) estate, and winds up murdered. Inspector Wexford and his partner, Inspector Burden, talk with the husband, Elizabeth's brother & his wife, the employees of the estate and a few others. It is initially thought that Elizabeth was possibly having an affair, meeting someone in the woods, and when caught, was killed by either her jealous husband, or the gardener, Sean, who obviously had a crush on her. It turns out a little bit different, a surprising twist at the end. The great writing of Ruth Rendell makes her books hard to put down.

Needful Things, by Stephen King

It's been over a month since I finished reading this one. It takes place in Castle Rock, Maine, where Alan Pangborn is the sheriff. He is also in some of the other Stephen King books. A man named Leland Gaunt opens a new store in town called Needful Things. He sells all different types of items, like an autographed baseball card, a photo of Elvis, a piece of petrified wood. These items don't seem all that rare, but they are powerful. When a person holds one of the items they feel transported to the place in which the item is from. For instance, the Elvis photo takes the woman who holds it onto the stage with him. The price to buy these items is not much in cash, but the buyer also has to agree to play a prank on someone else from Castle Rock. Pretty soon almost everyone in town is visiting Needful Things and then playing a prank on someone else in order to "pay" for their item. A boy throws rocks through the windows of one woman's house. She thinks it was done by another woman with whom she is already having a feud. Someone else kills the other woman's dog, but she blames it on the first woman. They end up meeting on a street corner with kitchen knives in hand. The results are horrifying, as the town is almost completely destroyed by it's residents, all of them getting back at one another. This was Leland Gaunt's plan from the start. It is an interesting book, but at 690 pages I was very glad to be finished with it.

Stephen King Goes To The Movies

This book is five Stephen King stories that all had movies made out of them. The titles are: 1408, The Mangler, Hearts In Atlantis (Low Men In Yellow Coats), The Shawshank Redemption (Rita Hayworth & Shawshank Redemption) and Children Of The Corn. I've seen Shawshank Redemption & Children of the Corn, but not the other three. Of all the stories, I liked Hearts In Atlantis best. The Mangler was also pretty good. Hearts in Atlantis is about an 11 year old boy named Bobby who meets an old man (Ted) living in the same apartment building that he lives in with his mother. Ted "hires" Bobby to be on the lookout for signs of the "Low Men In Yellow Coats" looking for him (Ted). Bobby doesn't quite believe that there is anyone looking for Ted, but after awhile he begins seeing the signs that Ted warned about, such as a child's chalk-drawn hopscotch with a moon & star drawn beside it in a different color, a kite hanging from a telephone wire, or mysterious missing pet ads tacked to telephone poles or upside-down on grocery store bulletin boards. Bobby begins to see these signs but doesn't tell Ted right away, then regrets it later, when his mother turns Ted in for the reward money. It was the longest short story (over 300 pages) in the book, but also the most interesting. The book has introductions by Stephen King before each story that describe the movies they were made into.

...And Never Let Her Go, by Ann Rule

This is the true story of the murder of Anne Marie Fahey on June 27, 1996. She was secretary to the governor of Delaware, and disappeared that June 27th after a dinner out with her secret lover and prominent millionaire attorney & former state prosecutor, Thomas Capano. Capano was then separated from his wife, but had also been secretly seeing another woman named Debbie for 18 years. Thomas Capano was a seemingly likable, quiet family man, but after weeks & months of investigation, which included Anne Marie's diary entries, emails and interviews with countless people, it was discovered that Capano had another side: a manipulator driven by power and greed. It took three years to uncover the truth behind Anne Marie's disappearance and death, her family waiting the entire time to find out where their sister was. Capano had disposed of her body far out into the Atlantic Ocean, and her remains were never found. Capano was sentenced to death by lethal injection, but several years later after a lengthy appeal, his sentence has been changed to life in prison without possibility of parole (per internet).

The Mercedes Coffin, by Faye Kellerman

When a young billionaire woman reads about a crime in the L.A. newspapers about a man found shot in the head and stuffed into the trunk of his Mercedes, it reminds her of a similar crime from 15 years earlier, the murder of her favorite high school teacher, a crime that had never been solved. She contacts the police & offers a multi-million dollar award for the solving of the cold case. Upon investigation of the two cases, detectives discover many similarities. Certain students from the high school where the teacher had worked seemed to be connected, including two aspiring rap artists and members of a late-1980s punk rock band. Detective Peter Decker, although not involved in the most current murder investigation, pokes around at solving the cold case which turns out to be connected to the more recent murder. After many interviews with the former students and the original (now retired) detectives (one of whom apparently commits suicide the day after being questioned), all the clues start to fall into place and everything points to a guy named Rudy Banks, the former lead-singer of the punk band. Just when police are ready to arrest him, Rudy is trailed to a motel where he holds 3 women hostage. After a very long stand-off, Decker convinces Rudy to let go of the hostages and walk out of the motel with hands up, but someone else (another former band member) shoots & kills Rudy as soon as he is out in the open. This is the first Faye Kellerman book that I have read, but it definitely won't be the last.