Book burble: In hindsight, I marvel at how clueless I was . . . What I ask myself even now is whether I should have picked up the truth any faster than I did, which was not nearly fast enough.

A glamorous redhead wants to locate the son she put up for adoption thirty-two years ago – an easy two hundred bucks for P. I. Kinsey Millhone. But when Kinsey finds she was paid with marked bills, and her client is nowhere to be found, it becomes clear the mystery woman has something to hide…

Meanwhile, in helping the widow of an old friend – the recently murdered P.I. Pete Wolinksy – with some paperwork, Kinsey uncovers a link between the late investigator and an unhinged man with a history of ruining lives.

As Kinsey investigates this sociopath further, she soon becomes his next target. Now Kinsey must prove her case against him, before she becomes his next victim.

‘Kinsey Millhone is up there with the giants of the private-eye genre . . . Exhilarating’ Times Literary Supplement
‘Brilliant . . . Heaven knows what we’ll do when Grafton gets to Z’ Daily Mail

X – SUE GRAFTON (2015) | ISBN: 9781447260172 | Publisher: Pan MacMillian

Some hurried notes… another satisfying read from Grafton - Kinsey as ever battling to do the right thing, battling with herself over issues of morality and again, she’s been here before, battling to secure her own personal safety! Lots of activity in the grey areas here as the straight black & white path can sometimes totally enmesh the wayward in undue punishment or leave the guilty completely unpunished. Reading these out of sequence as I have been doing I’m finding any overarching themes are neatly handled so the whole is still perfectly understandable – hurrah!

Here Kinsey is given some serious run-around-in-circles-time-being-conned, by a pair of fiendishly inventive, quarrelling lovers, not that her understanding falls into place till later. Meanwhile, working for the wife of one of her old mentors means Kinsey finally has to re-assess her appreciation of her relationship with that mentor and events get incrementally more and more dangerous until Kinsey is fighting for her life!
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Sunday was the Edinburgh BookCrossers Xmas Bash at The Filmhouse and this book was released there, or if not picked up it was to be placed on the OBCZ [Official BookCrossing Zone ] window-sill book shelf.

Hello book finder, if you aren't familiar with BookCrossing – WELCOME!

Feel free to keep this book it is yours to do with as you wish, read it, or pass it on to keep it travelling. You can leave notes anonymously or if you journal this book as a member, you will hear from the book on its travels. If you do join you’re quoting bookcrosser – rainbow3 – as your referrer would be very gratifying. Thank you and HAPPY READING!

Picked up at the Old Gang Meetup.

I loved this and didn't want to put it down. Very annoyed that I was working from home and didn't have a commute to read it on. This time Kinsey didn't have a proper client and was working on a case for her own satisfaction and to repay a debt to a late colleague. She was very tenacious and again, I would have given up before her.

Sending this out on the Sue Grafton ABC murders spiral.

reet petite
diane-fraser
greenbadger
Maranlin
penelopewanders
lamelemon
Ollie 1976

Thanks very much

Loved this. There were 3 threads. The neighbours, Ned Lowe & the rich Greek couple. I couldn't think how the threads would end.
Going to Diane -Fraser.

Received today. Thank you very much😊I’m currently reading two books so it maybe a week or so before I get started on this rather thick chapter of Kinsey’s life but I’m itching to read it ASAP.

It's arrived, thank you!
It's the fourth ray/ring book to arrive in the space of four days which seems to be the way these things always work. So it may take me a little while to get to.

The next episode in the Kinsey Millhone series. Kinsey is asked to look for the son of a glamorous and wealthy woman - who turns out not to be all she appears. In another thread, Kinsey is helping the widow of former colleague Pete Wolinsky with some paperwork, she uncovers a secret and ends up involved in a dangerous situation with a group of women who've been involved with the same man over the years. And Kinsey and Henry are once again having trouble with their neighbours. An exciting read and I like the way that the ending of this one is not all black and white, though the joins between the different parts were less smooth than in others in the series.

On its way to Maranlin.

Received today! Thank you for sending it to me, greenbadger.

This is another very thick book in the Kinsey series. I find it a bit daunting starting such a book wondering how I will ever finish, and then I am surprised at how fast I read it. There are three themes here, and I wondered if I could keep all the characters straight in my head, but then did not find that to be a problem. There is the usual wrap-up at the end, but some aspects are not so black and white so are left to one's imagination.

Mailed today to penelopewanders. Enjoy!

This was waiting for me when I returned from holiday last night. Thanks so much for making the books in this spiral available, and thanks, maranlin, for sending!

Here again Grafton is juggling more than one case at the same time - none of which she is actually getting paid for. There's the one she is initially hired to do, there's the follow-up from Pete, and then there are her suspicions related to her new neighbors. This allows for a bit of hopping to and fro, but it doesn't really get confusing.
What surprised me was the about-turn concerning Pete. In the previous book, there is no question about his lack of moral scruples, his willingness to bend the rules to suit himself, even at the expense of others. Here at some point Kinsey starts referring to him as her friend, and by the end it seems she does feel that way.
I am often surprised by the risks she takes - directly confronting the people she knows are playing fast and loose with the law, for example, but she almost comes out without a scratch.
On another note, I only recently heard the term burking for the first time, in a James Patterson book, so it was interesting that it is mentioned here again, only a few weeks later.
I've read this on a trip to Switzerland, but will post it when I get back to France.

Once again a Sue Grafton book leaves a small post office in central France and heads off to Romania. Soon the spiral will be fully unravelled and it may be a while before rings go from here to lamelemon. This being said, we have met in other rings and rays, so I think we will again. All the best - enjoy!

Safely picked up, thank you!

I enjoyed the alternation of parallel plots. I was curious if more would come out of the parading of past love interests. The last book is next - and I don't think I'm ready to let go.

Thank you for sharing. Will post this week along with W.

Posted with W last Tuesday before leaving on holiday. Hope it reaches Ollie swift and safe :)

received as part of Grafton spiral