We Begin at the End by Chris Whitaker

 Audio.  10.5 hours.

Duchess, 13, has to parent both her mother and her younger brother, Robin.  When her mother is murdered, Duchess and Robin are sent to live with an unknown grandfather who is also murdered, possibly by the same man?  

4 stars.

The Last Word by Taylor Adams

 Audio.  10 hours.

Read by Carlotta Brentan.

Emma Carpenter takes a house sitting job on a deserted beach while grieving the death of her daughter.  Along the way, she angers an author with an online one-star review.  Now she'a being terrorized as the crazed author tries to kill her.  

Very unbelievable.

2 stars.

The Adjunct by Maria Adelmann

Audio.  10.5 hours.

Read by Suehyla El Attar-Young.

Sam is an adjunct professor at two Baltimore Colleges and still can't make ends meet.  I hope this is an exaggeration of life as an adjunct because it was a really sad story of how little they're paid after spending so much money to get a PhD.

4 stars.

The Bird Watcher by Jacquelyn Mitchard

 A young woman is accused of murder and her best friend from high school, now working as a journalist, covers the case.

3.5 stars.

Vera Wong's Guide to Snooping (on a Dead Man) by Jesse Q. Sutanto

 Audio.  11 hours.

Read by Eunice Wong.

Vera Wong finds a distressed young woman outside the police station and brings her home for tea.  The woman confesses her friend Thomas is missing and Vera sets out to find him.

4 stars.

Cross & Sampson by James Patterson and Brian Sitts

 Each character has an independent story with only the briefest of intersection.  Sampson works a bombing case while Cross searches for his missing son.

It was weird reading an Alex Cross book where his story is written in the third person and Sampson's is firt person.  Best I can remember, Alex Cross was always told through the first person.

3.5 stars.

The Astral Library by Kate Quinn

 Down on her luck Alix discovers a magical library where someone can live inside a book.  It sounds great until the library and its patrons come under attack.

Not a big fan of fantasy, so a bit disappointing for me.

3 stars.