Hawkeye: Anchor Points by Kelly Thompson (Writer), Leonardo Romero (Artist), Michael Walsh (Artist), Jordie Bellaire (Colorist), VC's Joe Sabino (Letterer)

Hawkeye, Kate Bishop, is new to Venice Beach, California and to the PI business. She doesn’t even have a PI license, mainly because she can’t afford one. But she takes inspiration from her friend one-time superhero and now PI Jessica Jones. Her first case to find out about Brad gets interrupted by a bank robbery that the police don’t necessarily appreciate her help on.

When Mikka comes into her office worried about online harassment from her blog that she is concerned could turn into real life harassment or worse she takes the case. After sneaking onto the college campus computer room to try to try to trace back where the guy originally transmitted from she runs into Quinn who she “hires” to help her with this task.

She quickly finds the stalker, but it turns out that he isn't the only one and that a mysterious organization that he belongs to call TBC or Take Back Control is involved and may have kidnapped Mikka.  This book also includes her working on the case of Brad with Jessica Jones which leads them in another direction. Hawkeye is an awesome character who's intelligent, just as talented as her older brother Clint, and a real smart aleck.  This was a fabulous comic which is no surprise as the writer has written many Star Wars, Rogue and Gambit, and Captain Marvel comics. I highly recommend this book.

Link to Amazon:https://www.amazon.com/Hawkeye-Bishop-Anchor-Points-2016-2018-ebook/dp/B06ZZZ7PWC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1534521983&sr=8-1&keywords=hawkeye+anchor+points

The Beautiful Mystery by Louise Penny

In 1833 Dom Prosper brought back to life the Abbey of St. Pierre in Solemes, France and made it his goal in life to change the Gregorian chants from the corrupt and barbaric thing they had become into the pure thing of beauty they had once been originally.  Unfortunately, no one knew what they sounded like all those years ago.  A search was begun to find the earliest sheet music of Gregorian chants. In the ninth century, a nameless monk got the idea to write down not just the words but also the music of the chants. Not knowing how to describe the music he used squiggly lines representing his hand directing the choir indicating how long to hold the note and whether to go up or down.  These are referred to as neumes and became the first written musical notes ever.  The only problem was that no one knew what note to start the chant out on.  They had to guess. The Gregorian chants are called the beautiful mystery because they affect people on a deep level. The monks believe they are singing the words of God and take the singing very seriously.

Chief Inspector Armand Gamache and Inspector Jean-Guy Beauvoir have been called out to a remote monastery of Saint-Gilbert-Entre-les-Loups because a monk has been murdered there. Brother Mathieu was found in the Abbot's private garden with his head bashed in.  The monks are all walled in and the place is only reachable by boat. No one is let into the monastery.  Not long ago the monks recorded themselves singing their Gregorian chants and sold them to family and friends and to the local store. Somehow they got out and they sold millions worldwide.  Eventually, the press found out where they were and people began to flock to their island. The Abbot went on television and explained that their's was a quiet monastery. They took a vow of silence and that no one would be allowed inside and soon people gave up coming for the most part. 

The monks were talking about doing a second album. That seems to have been the problem. The Abbot and Brother Mathieu were the best of friends until the album happened. The money from the album made it possible to fix the roof and install geothermal heating and solar panels on the roof.  Some of the people believed it was God's will to break the vow of silence and make another album and go on tour.  These people sided with Brother Mathieu. Those that sided with the Abbot believed that they should not turn away from their old ways and be tempted by money. That God would provide for anything they needed. The others said he had and that the second album was the how he was providing.  It was a bitter divide. 

Brother Mathieu died with a piece of vellum in his hand that contained sheet music written with neumes on it and Latin words on it.  While Gamache is getting a monk to translate the music and Latin and make a copy of it for him, the Superintendent of the Surete arrives by plane with the coroner's report.  But that's not why he's really there.  He, as always, has an ulterior motive and it's not good for Gamache whom he hates with a passion and wants to destroy.  This is a brilliantly written book that keeps you guessing right up to the end.  And the use of the Superintendent was a masterstroke. I cannot wait to read the next book to see how the fallout from that carries on.  I cannot recommend this book enough.

Quotes

Beauvoir had never liked dark chocolate. It seemed unfriendly.

-Louise Penny (The Beautiful Mystery p 65)

Beauvoir was Cancer, which always annoyed him. He wanted to be Scorpio, or Leo. Or even that ram thing. Anything other than the crab that, according to the descriptions, was nurturing, nesting, and sensitive.

-Louise Penny (The Beautiful Mystery p 134)

“We have recorders and violins. Or are they fiddles? I’m never sure what the difference is.”

“One sings, the other dances.”

-Louise Penny (The Beautiful Mystery p 146)

Beauvoir knew that the root of all evil wasn’t money. No, what created and drove evil was fear. Fear of not having enough money, enough food, enough land, enough power, enough security, enough love. Fear of not getting what you want, or losing what you have.

-Louise Penny (The Beautiful Mystery p 159)

Just our luck. Every other monastery makes alcohol. Brandy and Benedictine. Champagne. Cognac. Wine. Ours sings obscure songs and breeds near extinct chickens. No wonder they almost went the way of the dodo. 

-Louise Penny (The Beautiful Mystery p 213)

Link to Amazzon: https://www.amazon.com/Beautiful-Mystery-Chief-Inspector-Gamache-ebook/dp/B0071VURHW/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1534162956&sr=8-1&keywords=the+beautiful+mystery+by+louise+penny 

Motor Crush Vol. 2 by Babs Tarr (Creator), Brenden Fletcher (Creator), cameron Stewart (Creator), Heather Danforth (Colorist), Victoria Evans (Colorist), Ellen Alsop (Colorist), Aditya Bidikar (Letterer), and Logo, Publication Design, EGP in-World Captions (Tom Muller)

In the last comic, Domino Swift, an up and coming motorcycle racer who was going up against Decimus Wexler during the day and racing illegal street races at night to win crush, this pink crystal that you put inside your motorcycle to make it run faster.  When Dom loses her bike she turns to her old friend Lola for help and Lola reluctantly lets her use a bike she has and agrees to be her mechanic with Dom's dad. Lola has problems of her own. She owes lots of money to the producers who run things in Nova Honda.  There's a mysterious man in black who knows more about Dom than she does like why she needs her inhaler and he wants to tell her more, but Dom wants nothing to do with him.  When Dom is in an accident and her inhaler is empty she is desperate and decides to try the crush, which would kill a normal person, but with her, it heals her.  Then Dom devises a plan to get them all out of the trouble they're in with the producers on race day but when someone forces a lot of crush down her throat during the race, she jumps up and runs off really fast and ends up far away.

What Dom doesn't realize when she gets to where she is is that two years have passed and everyone believes she is dead.  Decimus Wexler dropped out of that last race on moral grounds leaving a jerk named Clover to win it.  When they came to collect on her wager they took over her dad's garage and turned it into a chop shop. The producers gave them a choice: Lola and her dad could work for them or they could die. Lola has moved on from Dom and has a girlfriend now named Bea who lives with her.  Crush is now more illegal than ever and rigorously hunted down by enforcers who beat down anyone who has it. Dom's father is an enforcer. He blames the crush for his daughter's death.

Dom needs crush desperately so she goes in search of Calex the head of the gang she used to race against for crush.  He knew her as Cricket.  There aren't many left of his gang but they're willing to break into the producer's facility that contains the crush because it will be worth it.  Dom convinces Lola to help her.  There is a surprise waiting inside for Dom.  And the mysterious man in black reveals who he is and insists on having his say and showing her what he needs to whether she wants to know or not.  This is such a fabulous series and the big reveal at the end of this volume will floor you. Dom is such a great character and I love Lola who's brilliant with anything mechanical and tells Dom what she really thinks. Calex is a fun character because he is always providing sarcastic comments.  This book delves deeper into Dom's past and how it effects things today.  I highly recommend this book.

Link to Amazon:https://www.amazon.com/Motor-Crush-Vol-Brenden-Fletcher-ebook/dp/B07B68D7F4/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1533903878&sr=8-1&keywords=motor+crush+volume+2

The Other Lady Vanishes by Amanda Quick

Set right before World War II, this book is technically a sequel to The Lady Vanishes, but you don't have to read that book to read this book.  Though characters from that book do show up in this book, you won't be lost.  Adelaide Blake was being held in a mental hospital against her will. She was put there by a man that may have been her husband. She doesn't remember marrying him.  While in the hospital she was experimented on with a drug called Daydream that was meant to make her suggestible but instead causes violent hallucinations. She was the second patient to be experimented on with the drug. No one knows what happened to the first person.

But Adelaide escapes from the hospital and heads to Burning Cove, California and gets a job at a tea shop as a waitress and tisane maker. The shop gets a variety of clientele including famous celebrities and the famous Madam Zolanda the psychic to the stars who insists she come to her show and offers her two free tickets. Not wanting to anger the customer she agrees.  Mr. Jake Truett a man who has been coming in every day and has already made a bad fumble of an attempt to ask her out on a date that failed miserably insists that he come with her.

Truett's wife committed suicide supposedly and she was a client of Zolanda who pocketed her diary which contained some incriminating items in it. Zolanda has been blackmailing her family over it and they asked Jake to get it back for them.  After predicting a bloody death at her show that night the next day she is discovered by Jake and Adelaide on the ground outside her home as though she had jumped or been pushed off of her roof.  A piece of a blue glass bottle stopper was found at the scene by Adelaide who recognized it from the hospital as from a container that held the drug. Zolanda's partner Thelma Legget took off with all of the blackmail material from multiple clients.

Meanwhile, Conrad Massey, Adelaide's supposed husband is desperate to find her because he needs her money and he's pressuring Dr. Gill the head of the hospital to find her. Dr. Gill knows where she is, but he knows that Adelaide had many friends including a PI friend, Raina, who would go looking for her if she disappeared.  Dr. Paxton, a "doctor" who invented a diet drink is the co-conspirator to Dr. Gill and he is staying in Burning Cove keeping an eye on things and looking for a way to get Adelaide.

When Thelma tries to sell the blackmail material she winds up dead, but was it a blackmailer or someone part of the Daydream drug ring that killed her?  Her and Zolanda were supposed to deliver Adelaide to Dr. Gill.  Jake's interest in her was making that even more difficult. This book is great.  Just when you think you have it all figured out Quick pulls the rug out from under you.  The characters are wonderfully created.  I especially liked Raina and hope to see a book devoted to her in the future.  She's a tough woman who's been through something pretty bad back east and been made better for it.  She's also a very smart and savvy person who can really handle herself and looks after those she cares about.  This book is a well-spun story that could have stepped out off the screen of a noir film but is not written in the noir style.  I really liked this book and I highly recommend it. 

Link to Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Other-Lady-Vanishes-Amanda-Quick-ebook/dp/B074S5CT81/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1533729999&sr=8-1&keywords=the+other+lady+vanishes+amanda+quick

Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder

This book starts off with the family leaving Wisconsin and heading west where there aren't so many people.  They leave behind grandparents and friends and leave in a covered wagon and cross the frozen Mississippi at the end of winter. The family consists of Charles and Caroline, the parents, and Mary, Laura, and baby Carrie.  They make the dangerous journey across the country to land in Kansas in Indian Territory and find a nice spot near a creek and decide to make a house.

This is where the kinda boring part comes in where if you ever wanted to know how a log cabin was built you will be thrilled to know that this book tells you how.  From laying down the logs with notches in them in order to lay the logs on top of each other to how to pull the logs up on top of each other once they reach a certain height. Also how to build a roof and a fireplace and a stable.

In the midst of this, they have adventures with Native Americans and wolves who surround the house and howl most of the night. The Native Americans come and take food and tobacco from them and scare the daylights out of them. But that won't be the only interactions they'll have with the Native Americans.  They'll also meet neighbors who help out in times of need and trade services like helping to get your well dug if you help to get his well dug. 

I first read this book when I was eight or nine years old. My book club decided to read this book for its selection this month which is why I reread it. It's interesting to go back and reread your childhood favorite books from a different perspective.  I was a little bored at first by the simplistic writing and the how-to-build-a-log-cabin bit, but it picked up and became compelling and exciting to the point that you forgot the writing and got caught up in the story.  There's a reason this book is a classic and read by so many even today.  I recommend this book to people of any age.

Link to Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Little-House-Prairie-Ingalls-Wilder-ebook/dp/B01C2LYEOC/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1533558556&sr=8-3&keywords=little+house+on+the+prairie+books

Ultimate Spider-Man Vol. 4: Legacy by Brian Michael Bendis (Writer), Mark Bagley (Penciler), Art Thibert (Inker), David Sharpe (Letterer), and Transparency Digital (Colors)

In this book, Peter is dating Mary Jane Watson who knows his secret identity as Spider-Man. The Green Goblin, aka, Norman Osborn is dead and Harry has just returned from an extended leave of absence where he has forgotten that the Green Goblin is his father.  Gwen Stacy, a new student, has caught the eye of Harry.  Peter has just been grounded by Aunt May for coming home late after being in New Jersey dealing with Doc Oc, but she lifts the grounding when Norman Osborn's assistant comes around asking if Peter can come over for dinner with Norman and Harry and for Peter to make sure he brings his backpack--the one he keeps his spideysuit in. It would seem that Norman is alive after all.

Norman takes him aside and injects himself with the serum to become the Green Goblin for a short while then reverts back and explains to Peter that he will no longer be Spider-Man. That from now on Peter works for him and if he doesn't do as he says he will come after Aunt May and Mary Jane and then kill him slowly.

Peter is approached by Nick Fury of S.H.I.E.L.D. who tells him that Osborn wants Peter to kill him and that they have information on all sorts of things about him but no evidence of any wrongdoing so until he actually goes after Peter or his Aunt or Mary Jane there's nothing they can do, but that they will be watching.  Which is, of course, no help to Peter. What will he do and will Harry get caught in the crossfire?  There's something off about the art. Maybe it's the coloring which was done by a digital company.  The eyes are huge, too, though.  It's kinda odd. But the storyline is interesting, which is no surprise as it was written by Brian Michael Bendis who writes Spider-Man comics, but who also created Jessica Jones, so I am recommending it for that reason only.

Link to Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Ultimate-Spider-Man-Vol-Legacy-Graphic-ebook/dp/B00AAJR3OW/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1533299655&sr=8-1&keywords=ultimate+spider-man+vol+4+legacy+book  

The Woman in the Window by A. J. Finn

This book is meant to remind you of the Hitchcock movie Rear Window. As a matter of fact, it brings that movie up several times as the main character is a fan of old suspense movies and is constantly watching them.  Dr. Annie Fox is a child psychiatrist and an agoraphobe who is separated from her husband and her daughter who moved away from their New York City home to a place of their own far away after the incident and she talks to them daily by phone.

The book starts on Sunday, October 24 with the moving in of a new family, the Russells.  The teenage son, Ethan comes over and gives her a lavender candle as a gift from his mom, Jane.  Annie spends her time looking out her window through the lens of her camera spying on her neighbors and observing their lives.

On Halloween, some kids egg her door and when she tries to make an attempt to stop them she falls flat on the ground at her doorstep.  That's when Jane Russell shows up and gets her back inside her house and puts a little bit of brandy inside of her.  She happens to be holding a photo album of her son Ethan and shows her the pictures. Annie's basement dwelling tenet David cleans up the eggs for her when he gets back from one of his jobs.

Annie spends a great deal of time drinking wine that she swallows her meds with which is dangerous.  She also goes online and helps others on a website forum for agoraphobes.  She helps lots of people but she's feeling particularly proud of the work she's doing with GrannyLizzie in Montana who is a good listener and helping her talk about what happened to her to cause her agoraphobia.

Then one night she hears a scream across the street and calls over there to see if everything is all right but Alistair, the cold hard man who seems to bring fear into his son claims nothing is wrong. Earlier when Jane had visited again she said that Alistair could be controlling and looked worried.  Neither one of them wants Annie interfering with Alistair.

Then one night after drinking two bottles of wine and having one of her suspense movies on, Annie looks out her window through her camera and sees Jane arguing with someone across the street and then sees blood on her chest and a silver object sticking out of her chest.  She drops the camera and runs to find her phone and call 911.  After calling them she realizes she must go over there to try to give Jane medical attention and try to save her. So she grabs her umbrella which is the one thing that worked once before to get her to walk a few feet outside by wielding an open umbrella in front of her.

But she doesn't make it all the way across the street. She only makes it halfway and ends up in the park in the middle before collapsing.  The police find her there and take her in once they realize who she is.  She is forced to explain her situation to them and they tell her they searched her home whose door was open since they weren't sure which home was the one being attacked and found the wine bottles and the pills and suspect that she imagined the whole thing.  It gets worse when they take her home and Alistair produces Jane Russell and its a different woman altogether.

 Who is this imposter if the real Jane Russell was murdered?  Or did she imagine the whole thing?  David was over at the Russell home helping to put together bookshelves but he never saw the wife or heard the scream, however, he says he had his headphones on and wouldn't have heard one if there'd been one.  Ethan seems really terrified to speak out against his father and what is going on in the house and he seems to be lying to protect his parents from the police and to Annie.

As the book slowly unfolds you begin to learn what really happened to her to make her an agoraphobe and it's unbelievable. You really want to tell her to cool it with all the wine drinking. I mean she drinks vast amounts of the stuff. It's causing her to lose credibility with others. Not to mention it's bad for her.  This book is a suspenseful as the movies she watches. You can't flip through the pages fast enough to find out what happens next. It's filled with lots of "gotcha" moments and you really don't know where it's going until you get there.  Annie is an interesting character. She is a broken woman who used to be a strong woman who made her living repairing some of the most broken children.  Physician heals thyself does not apply here because she is incapable of doing so.  But in her brokenness, she is a compelling character because she could be any of us. This is a truly remarkable book and one worth reading.  I very highly recommend reading it.   

Quotes

 My dear girl, you cannot keep bumping your head against reality and saying it’s not there.

-Dr. Brulov (Spellbound)

Link to Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Woman-Window-Novel-J-Finn-ebook/dp/B06Y55Z36S/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1533121644&sr=8-1&keywords=the+woman+in+the+window