WWW.WEDNESDAY

WWW. WEDNESDAY asks three questions to prompt you to speak bookishly. To participate, and to see how other book lovers responded, click here. 

PS I no longer participate in WWW.WEDNESDAY via that link because her blog won't accept Blogger comments. I mention this only to save you the frustration I experienced trying to link up.

1. What are you currently reading? Murder Stage Left by Robert Goldsborough. A Broadway producer is on the verge of the biggest hit of his career. Yet something backstage is wrong, very wrong. His cast is at one another's throats. Who is causing the friction? What can the producer do to alleviate it before the production blows up, and costs him millions of dollars? He consults genius detective Nero Wolfe to investigate the lives, loves and backstage shenanigans of his cast in hopes of solving the problem before it destroys his play. 

 

Then someone gets dead, and the case takes a sharp turn.

 

Since this is a Nero Wolfe mystery, I am now happily ensconced in the world of Archie Goodwin. Archie is our narrator and the secretary/chauffeur/legman of the famous detective, Nero Wolfe. I've always been a little in love with Archie. He loves baseball and poker and has a weakness for the ladies. He also has a quick mind and a smart mouth. He's wonderful company as he tells us about Wolfe's latest case.

 

2. What did you recently finish reading?  Everyone Here Is Lying by Shari Lapena. Welcome to Stanhope. It's a lovely suburb where everyone has a nice home, a nice car, and a dirty secret. Take that nice Dr. Wooler. He's successful and charismatic, with a beautiful family ... a crumbling marriage and a mistress. 

Behind closed doors, Dr. Wooler and his wife fight all the time, and always about Avery, their 9-year-old daughter. Avery has oppositional defiant disorder. The girl is angry, willful and arrogant and her parents can't agree on how to handle her. When Avery disappears from their home one sunny afternoon, their home and happy facade crumbles.

Where is Avery? Who is she with? Is she safe? 

Stanhope's finest are committed to finding the girl but it's not easy. While everyone in Stanhope is cooperating with the investigation, everyone is lying.

It's a twisty paranoid thriller. Not as good as the other Lapena books I've read, but solid.

3. What will you read next? Speaking of twisty thrillers, next up is a classic in the genre: Laura by Vera Caspary.