Jane Austen in Boca by Paula Marantz Cohen - follows the lives of senior citizens in Jewish "retirement club" in Boca Raton, Florida. Primarily follows 3 ladies who made an unlikely trio. It follows their loves, losses and friendship. It is a great read by the pool. I miss the characters already.

Passage by Connie Willis features Dr. Joanna Lander is a cognitive psychologist at Mercy Hospital. The focus of her research is the near-death experience (NDE). She interviews people who have coded and were resuscitated to try to to identify the common elements and to see if she can find out what causes the NDE and the purpose it serves in the dying brain. She meets up with Dr. Richard Wright, who is also studying NDEs, using a drug that simulates the near-death experience. When their volunteer list dwindles and the project is in danger of losing its funding, Joanna goes under the drug herself and embarks on a series of strange journeys as she tries to piece together the clues her experiences provide.

I love Connie Willis' books, I have not read one I did not like. It is hard to put her books down once you start reading it.

Ella Minnow Pea by Mark Dunn is a story in corespondece from various characters. Ella Minnow Pea is a girl living happily on the fictional island of Nollop off the coast of South Carolina. Nollop was named after Nevin Nollop, author of the immortal pangram,* “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.” Now Ella finds herself acting to save her friends, family, and fellow citizens from the encroaching totalitarianism of the island’s Council, which has banned the use of certain letters of the alphabet as they fall from a memorial statue of Nevin Nollop. As the letters progressively drop from the statue they also disappear from the novel. The result is both a hilarious and moving story of one girl’s fight for freedom of expression, as well as a linguistic tour de force sure to delight word lovers everywhere.

Murder @Maggody.com by Joan Hess - I listened to this on cd in the car. I didn't like the reader but enjoyed the story. I always get a kick out of the latest Maggody book. I had read this one when it first came out a few years back but enjoyed it again. A fun series.

Muletrain to Maggody
Maggody, Arkansas is to (population 755, at least until Dahlia Buchanon brings her latest pregnancy to term), host a reenactment of the Skirmish at Cotter's Ridge, complete with mules, cannon, and corpses. The reenactors all have their own agendas. Jeb Stewart soaks his boots so they'll raise authentic blisters; Andrew Pulaski dreams of cutting a fine figure on horseback; Wendell Streek pores over the diary of Henry Largesse, whose unit camped at Boone Creek, where it was overwhelmed by Yankee artillery power. But it's Largesse's description of the Confederate gold, hidden somewhere on Cotter's Ridge, that piques the interest of virtually every one of the 755. Dahlia swipes her granny from the old folks' home to guide her through the ridge's caves. Ruby Bee Hanks and Estelle Oppers enlist the aid of backwoods delinquent Hammett Buchanon. Lottie Estes, Elsie McMay, and Eula Lemoy break into Headquarters House in Farberville looking for clues. When Lottie, along with Petrol Buchanon and Brother Verber, turns up missing, the heat's on Ruby Bee's pride and joy, Chief of Police Arly Hanks , to banish her old flame, filmmaker Jack Wallace, to the backlot so she can investigate.

China Bayles Herbal Mysteries by Susan Wittig Albert features herbalist China Bayles, who abandoned her career as a hot-shot Houston criminal attorney to buy an herb shop in a small town located half-way between Austin and San Antonio, Texas. Each of her mysteries has a signature herb that is connected to a major theme, and each is liberally sprinkled with information on growing and using herbs. Main characters are her friend Ruby, her lover ex-cop Mike McQuaid, as well as other friends and families.

1. Thyme of Death
China's first adventure. A friend dies--murder or suicide?

2. Witches' Bane
China and Ruby discover that the supernatural isn't funny.

3. Hangman's Root
Animal rights, academic politics, and murder--a potent mix.

4. Rosemary Remembered
Who remembers the victims of crime?

5. Rueful Death
Grace, forgiveness, and the mystery of community.

6. Love Lies Bleeding
China learns a tough lesson in love.

7. Chile Death
Hot stuff, folks! (Funny, too)

8. Lavender Lies
Mystery, murder, and a wet 'n' wild wedding

9. Mistletoe Man
What's Christmas without mistletoe? What's life without Ruby? Join China as she faces both of these difficult questions. When the mistletoe man is mysteriously run down by an hit and run driver immediate his neighbors are under suspicion as there has been a running feud with them for most of the year. But will the crazy aunt take the fall for the murder or will the real murderer please stand up? This one was a puzzlier but enjoyment to the end.

10. Bloodroot
We find out more about her relationship with her mother and her past. Leatha, China's mother, calls from Jordan's Crossing to ask for China's help in dealing with her Aunt Tullie's illness. Upon arrival in Jordan's Crossing Leatha informs China that Aunt Tullie has Huntington's Disease and struck Wiley, the manager of the plantation while in a rage about a long forgotten paper saying his great grandfather owns the property. When Wiley is discovered two days later drowned in the local pond they must all deal with the consequences of their aunt's actions. China must deal with this devastating news as she comes to understand how this affect her life as well as her mother's. When she goes to bed she dreams a childhood dream of following her Aunt and seeing her dig up an unmarked grave. When she awakes she finds Pearl's diary, Aunt Tullie's mother, and the pj's that China wore as a child stained with Bloodroot. Was it really a dream or are there really skeletons in the family graveyard that no one knows about. There are many mysteries to discover but thanks to the ghosts that speak from the past China learns the truth about herself and her past.

11. Indigo Dying
China has recently become part-owner of a combination herb shop and tea house called Thyme for Tea in tiny Indigo, Tex. But her new life-and the lifestyle of the bohemian entrepreneurs and elderly Indigo natives in the community-is put in jeopardy when Casey Ford, a reviled but powerful Indigo resident, concocts a plan to sell the coal-mining rights to a national conglomerate, a scheme that would allow him to evict most of the store owners in town once the deal is done. Ford is murdered days before he signs the agreement. Bayles and her husband, another former attorney named Mike McQuaid, find themselves stymied in their investigation of the murder by a town full of suspects who close ranks as they celebrate Ford's sudden death.

12. An Unthymely Death
Several short stories featuring our favorite characters. These were originally published in a magazine and feature many facts and recipes featuring herbs. Not as good as the full length novels but fun to read never the less.

13. Dilly of a Death

14. Deadman's Bones

15. Bleeding hearts
Coach Tim Duffy's Pecan Springs high school football team has won the state championships two years in a row -- and in Texas, that makes him a demigod. But when China's stepson's principal asks her to conduct a sensitive investigation concerning accusations of sexual misconduct lodged against Duffy, she becomes embroiled in a dark drama that, if exposed, could destroy families and ruin lives. Statutory rape and cold-blooded murder are just the beginning of this mystery…

China struggles to unravel the mysterious circumstances surrounding the murder of a beloved high school football coach and the alleged suicide of a woman who was once one of his students. A handmade quilt, sewn by a woman who went through cancer treatments, is missing from the quilt show that Ruby is in charge of. In typical New Age style Ruby decides to ask the Ouija Board to help guide her to the guilty party. Plus to complicate matters China's mother asks her to get some papers that were found after her husband's secretary's death. What China finds will rock her to the bone.

Interesting enough China's husband is out of town for most of the book. We get to see more of China interacting with other women and friends.