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Reviews:
Amore by Laura Wolf
Andromeda on the Street of Ducklings by Judi Hendricks
Another Dawn by Sandra Brown
Another Perfect Day by Steven Popkes
Bad Manners by Chris Manby
The Bamboo Confessions by Lauren Weisberger
Bounty by Rand B. Lee
Busy Horsies by John Schindel and Casi Lark
"But Wait! There's More!" by Richard Mueller
Childrun by Marc Laidlaw
Church of the Dog by Kaya McLaren
Click edited by Arthur Levine
Collected Ghost Stories by M. R. James
A Day in the Life of my Great Brit Book Tour by Adriana Trigiani
Deja Dead by Kathy Reichs
The Dinosaur Train by James L. Cambrias
Doomsday Book by Connie Willis
El Tigre by John H. Manhold
Five by Julianna Baggott
Flip and Flop by Dawn Apperley
The Fourth Watcher by Timothy Hallnan
The Geography of Bliss by Eric Weiner
A Grave Mistake by Stella Cameron
The Great Waldo Search by Martin Handfold
Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones
I Know a Woman by Quinn Dalton
Leaving a Light On by Claire LaZebnik
Lifetime Loser by James Ross
Moving Day by Cindy Chupack
An Open Letter to Earth by Scott Dalrymple
Persistence of Memory by J. M. Snyder
Poison Victory by Albert E. Cowdrey
The Political Prisoner by Charles Coleman Finlay
Pump Six by Paolo Bacigalupi
The Regent's Knight by J. M. Snyder
Shades of Darkness, Shades of Grace
Simplexity by Jeffrey Kluger
Smoky the Baby Goat by Mary Elting Folsom and Veronica Reed
There's a Cow in the Cabbage Patch by Clare Beaton and Stella Blackstone
The Truth About Nigel by Jennifer Weiner
The Two-Month Itch by Sarah Mlynowski
Voodoo Dolls, C-Cups and Eminem by Melissa Senate
Yoga Babe by Lauren Henderson

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Shades of Darkness, Shades of Grace: 08/31/08

Take The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, remove Hercule Poirot and transplant the story to Minnesota and you get Shades of Darkness, Shades of Grace by Catherine Johnson.

Kay recounts matter-of-factly the way her brother's new bride Pamela single handedly sets out to destroy her new family. She is a fowl mouthed, cocaine addicted alcoholic and gold digger. The only good she brings to the family is a daughter born early on in the marriage.

Kay's dispassionate narrative of the four years from the marriage to the end of the book never wavers. It reads a bit like Truman Capote's true crime book In Cold Blood. It was her own cold blooded approach to the role as protagonist and narrator that first made me see the connection to The Murder of Roger Ackroyd. Kay reminded me of Dr. Sheppard.

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