What Book Are You Currently Reading?

Revival by Stephen King - VERY long winded book with little pay off. not his best

Shadow on the Hill: The True Story of a 1925 Kansas Murder by Diana Staresinic-Deane - interesting book about a woman murdered with an old fashioned stove lid.  Her husband was tried twice and a black man was also fingered for the crime simply because he was black, and no one could think that one of their other neighbors could have committed the crime. It remained unsolved officially, but there was word of a prominent town man on a horse who probably did it.

Enemies a History of the FBI by Tim Weiner - wow, it's a good thing we really don't know exactly what's going on in the FBI, I think we'd be more worried knowing than not knowing. The place sounds like a mess since Hoover died

Blowing through the audio books here lol

Working Stiff by Judy Melinek, MD and T. J. Mitchell - Wow interesting and informative - this book will make some of you squirm. It's bout the career of a Medical Examiner in NYC. She was in NYC on 9/11 too. Interesting occupation - she wanted to be a surgeon but she discovered 36 hour shifts were not for her, so she changed careers. Fascinating stories are in this book, but if you read it, be fully prepared to hear all the gory details.
Interesting bit of trivia Seakazoo :  She said, if you die in your apartment alone and you have a dog, your dog will faithfully stay by your corpse for several days - but if you have a cat, the cat will eat when it is hungry without hesitation - including feasting on you! She's seen it. a cat will start with your eyeballs ...and I'll spare you the rest of it's gory feast lol

Yeah that was a lot of creepy goodness. One thing about a lot of his stories is that they build and build to a crescendo and then at the shocking moment - boom, they end. You don't get to know if anyone was successful in vanquishing the monster, you're just left with the terror.

Next I am listening to Lovecraft's Monsters a compilation of stories written for the shared Cthulhu Mythos by such writers as Neil Gaiman, Joe R. Lansdale, Caitlin R. Kiernan, Karl Edward Wagner, Elizabeth Bear, and Nick Mamatas.

The Devil's Rooming House by M. William Phelps- True Crime book about a woman in Connecticut who in the late 1800's ran  home for the elderly and infirm. They (or their families) would sign  contract for $1000 to have her give room and board to people for their remaining years of life, and to take care of their nursing and doctor care. She'd pretty much have them sign over their remaining wealth and then have people go out and buy Arsenic in order to take care of the rat situation in the home and barn on the property....and she would take care of the turn over problem when clients didn't die in a timely enough manner in order to open up a bed for another $1000 from someone else.
This story gave birth to the idea for the play and movie Arsenic & Old Lace

17 Days by Arthur Herzog III - The Katie Beers story. About a little 10 year old girl whose Mother and Godmother fought over  all the time. The Godmother needed her for companionship and help because she was handicapped, and her mother who lived drunk in filthy conditions. She went off to play games with an adult family friend who turned out to hve a child molester. He was also a construction worker, who built a secret extension to his house under his shed. The place had a series of complicated secret panels and locks - some of which required tools to open and close. It had CCTV a bed and a bucket. He locked her in there and didn't let anyone know until the girl talked him into giving himself up 17 days later.
Katie Beers is now about 36 years old and happily married with children.

The Phantom Killer by James Presley  - about a series of murders in Texarkana similar to Son of Sam and and The Zodiac Killer sprees. This killer wore a hood, approached couples in cars late at night and tortured and killed them with shots to the back of the head mainly.  After about three incidents the Texas Rangers had the area well under surveillance so he shot a couple in a house from outside the house, and pretty much disappeared. They caught a suspect but got him put away on a different charge so the Phantom Killer Case was never officially solved.
This story is the basis for the movie The Town That Dreaded Sundown
 
John Wayne Gacy:  Defending a Monster by  Sam L. Amirante and  Danny Broderick - A very complete telling of the Gacy case, from the lawyer who defended him in court - this is one of the best on the subject  - very interesting inside information.

Little Demon in the City of Light: A True Story of Murder and Mesmerism in Belle Epoque Paris by Steven Levingston - this book about a murder in the 1880's explores the question of whether or not someone can be hypnotized into committing a murder as claimed in this case.

Did She Kill Him?: A Victorian Tale of Deception, Adultery & Arsenic by Kate Colquhoun - Also in the late 1800's, a woman is accused of killing her husband and the following trial.

The Killing of Karen Silkwood: The Story Behind the Kerr-McGee Plutonium Case by Richard Rashke - Basically they skim through Silkwood's life and the rest of the book is about the fallout from the investigation and hearing of the company Kerr-McGee and how much of a cover up job they were trying to pull over the country and government (and how much government was involved) in terms of public safety vs profit and production.

The Longest Day by Cornelius Ryan - All about D-Day.

"Trigger Warning: Short Fictions and Disturbances" by Neil Gaiman

"Foucault's Pendulum" by Umberto Eco

"Foucault's Pendulum" is fucking dense. But so, so good.

I've got that on my "To Read" list before the movie comes out.

Finished "Ancillary Justice" by Ann Leckie. Bringing my Hugo count to...something. I'll have to look into that. Pretty good book, though.

I will now be reading "2061: Odyssey Three" by Arthur C. Clarke.

Good People by Markus Sakey

I had to set "Foucault's Pendulum" aside for awhile. It was beginning to frustrate me. Instead, I picked up "The Leftovers" by Tom Perrotta.