Summertime and the Reading is Easy...

Summertime is perfect for mysteries and espionage books. Once starting down that path it's hard to divert from their allure. If they are a standalone mystery then it's easier to hop from one writer to the next. If, however, it's a series, how can you help yourself from staying with the series until the end. I want to know what happens to the protagonist.

The writer may bait the reader with a possible relationship—book after book. The writer invites the reader into an inner circle where we are privy to more and more intimate details. How can I rush off to another series without knowing what will, has, promises to happen.

As for espionage, I am captivated with the machinations of the undercover agents. I am also intrigued with those novels that insist on veracity and an accurate historical role in the story. No fudging.

Nothing will turn off a reader quicker than someone in Tsarist Russia taking the lid off a non-fat blueberry Chobani Greek yogurt.

Then every once in awhile guilt seeps in and I take out an erudite tome and work my way through multiple pages where I learn new words and ponder creative concepts. But if it's warm or hot outside I am drawn, as if with a lead rope, back to my stack of mysteries.