My only problem with the Father Gilbert Mysteries is that there aren't more of them. I own this set on CD and think they are wonderful. The stories are involving and the characters solidly done with nice little touches throughout. My personal favorite of the three stories on this CD is Where the Heart Is followed closely by Dead Air. The stories are first rate but not particularly suspenseful or scary for that matter but they are extremely well done. The only exception might be Dead Air which did give me a little shiver when I first heard it and has my eleven year old completely terrorized (in that shivery way kids enjoy) The stories are remarkably clean and appropriate for the entire… Read more
To be perfectly honest I just couldn't get past the thing with the dolphin. I thought it was sick, twisted, and unworthy of a writer of Sharyn McCrumb's caliber. I have read every single one of McCrumb's books, all three series and while If I'd Killed Him... was undeniably funny and had some very valid things to say the dolphin's final scene just ruined it for me. Maybe I'm more puritan than I'd like to think but the only thing I could think of after I finished the book (besides "eeewwww! GROSS!) was that anyone who would devalue humans as much as that character did deserved what happened to her. I'm happy to say that this is the ONLY one of McCrumb's books I've ever been turned… Read more
When I turned the last page of The Ballad of Frankie Silver I remember thinking "this is the best book I've ever read". Sharyn McCrumb's prose reads like poetry, not a single word or emotion wasted and everything she says contributes to the quality of the whole. You are never rushing through parts of the story, but instead savor every word. I just wish there were more books like it! What's so interesting is to think that the same woman who wrote Bimbo's of the Death Sun (the first of her books I read) wrote Frankie Silver. The woman's a verbal chameleon! This book caught and held my interest from the first chapter to the final page and I cannot recommend it highly enough. I… Read more
