When Will There Be Good News?

Finally finished the last of the Jackson Brodie trilogy and fearlessly hoping there's more in the works. (Aha! Amazon UK says there's a 4th, due there in August 2010!)

For now, perhaps I'll try some of Kate Atkinson's earlier books, though I've heard mixed results from friends who've tried and given up on them.

It's not only her writing style I loved in these three books, very literary mysteries with just the right amount of humor to offset the grisly bits. I love the stories and most of the characters.

Jackson, especially, a tired, jaded,former policeman who just can't seem to get his life together. Here's a comment of his as he thinks about Louise, a woman he hoped he might have connected with:
How ironic that both Julia and Louise, the two women he'd felt closest to in his recent past, had both unexpectedly got married, and neither of them to him.

And this from Reggie, another irresistable character, the young, persistent nanny:
She'd identified a dead body, had her flat vandalized, and been threatened by violent idiots, and it wasn't even lunchtime. Reggie hoped the rest of the day would be more uneventful.

You probably want to read these three books in order:
Case Histories
One Good Turn
and then
When Will There Be Good News?

Ah, well. Must return it to the library and cross my fingers it won't take too long for that new book to cross the ocean...




(Word I had to look up while reading and will never use in conversation?

Simulacrum:
1. image, representation
2. An insubstantial form or semblance of something; trace)