Ocean City Free Public Library Book Blog

      The Silkworm by Robert Galbraith (pseudonym of J.K. Rowling) is the second in a mystery/suspense thriller series featuring Cormoran Strike, an young English military veteran turned private eye after a significant wartime injury resulted in the loss of one of his legs, and Robin Ellacott, Strike's secretary, assistant, and detective-in-training.  The plot of the book picks up not very long after the conclusion of the first novel in the series (The Cuckoo's Calling ), with Strike's private investigative services seeing a rise in business following his minor celebrity status due to his successful resolution of the Lula Landry case (the main plot of The Cuckoo's Calling) . Strike is hired by the wife of a formerly prominent author with the job of finding said formerly prominent author who has gone missing. The novel follows Strike's investigation into the disappearance of Owen Quine, and as a result gets drawn into the cutthroat (sometimes li...

"The Great Recession has shuffled Clay Jannon away from life as a San Francisco web-design drone and into the aisles of Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore. But after a few days on the job, Clay discovers that the store is more curious than either its name or its gnomic owner might suggest. The bookstore’s secrets extend far beyond its walls." (from the Goodreads review page.) ***       Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore  by Robin Sloan drew me in with a description of a millennial-ish aged person reevaluating their options and transitioning from the mindset of "I need to find a career that highlights my talents and specific training" to "I need to find a job--any job--because I need to pay my rent. Also food would be nice." Once again, I stumbled upon a character with identifiable traits and personality development. The narration style employed by Sloan was also very reminiscent of the narrator from Ernest Cline's Ready Player One ; which, in...