Another Charlie Hardie. This time he’s stuck in a weird creepy prison scenario which was extra interesting for me because I just watched Escape Plan which is a prison escape movie. Liked it.

The last in the series. This one is in space! The whole thing is just a crazy romp and you have to be willing to watch people get really violently injured a lot but for some reason I was interested enough in the characters and what was going on plotwise that I found these books worth it.

Book one in the Charlie Hardie series otherwise known as “How much pain can one guy take?” I liked it. Lots of twists and turns and a premise that is pretty novel and leaves you wondering wtf is going on a lot of the time. You don’t love Hardie but you really do want to know what happens to him.

I think I thought this was going to be more like the John Dunning bookish mysteries. Instead this is a full out fantasy torture porn book that happens to have a library (and reading) featured in it. It ends on a slightly up note which I was hoping since the book, while well written, is a serious gorefest and slog. Read the interview with the author in LJ and while he seems like a decent guy this book was horrifying and not always in a good way. Lots and lots of brutality against everyone: children, adults, dogs, the planet.

Fascinating topic but a bit too thesis-like and I could not get through it.

Was so excited to have a huge long plane ride to go on and a NEW MAYOR BOOK to read. Enjoyed this book, did not love it. It’s the story of a close companion of Gail Zigman’s getting muredered in a hate-crime fashion and a lot of dogged police work to find the killer. I found it a bit more dull than Mayor’s other books. I was mindful of all the rehashing that is done in every book (so new readers know why Willy has one arm, for example) and I think maybe the tension in this book was supposed to be because maybe we were supposed to feel that Gail did it? But I never did. Not a ton of Vermont scenery, a LOT of “interagency cooperation” porn and what looks like a lot of set up for later books where we learn about Gail’s other political aspirations. Liked it but was not nuts about it.

Just when I was getting comfortable with Watts and his ability to have terrific female characters who aren’t always just afraid in whatever dystopian night mare he has dreamed up for them, this book comes along. I liked it. I liked knowing what had happened after some of the stuff in the first two books but gosh the sadism was really hard to take. A much more central role for one of the awful characters and a lot of close-up sadist stuff including a multi-chapter rape of a decently liked character. Did not like.