The Vanishing Box by Elly Griffiths

I haven't read the other books in this series but really didn't feel like I needed to. Yes, there was some back story but I felt like most of what we needed to know was filled in. An interesting story that had some hints as to who was the final villain but some things were left in the dark.
Max Mephisto and his daughter Ruby are starting to make a name for themselves. Now they are paired up with several acts including a living tableau of nearly naked women (it's not lewd as long as they don't move). Then one of the girls is murdered and Max is pulled into the investigation. Ruby's fiance and Max's old friend Inspector Edgar Stephens is officially on the case but finds himself torn as the clues start to point at Max.

Three stars
This book came out November 2nd, 2017
Follows The Blood Card
Followed by Now You See Them
Borrowed as an ebook from Libby
Opinions are my own

             

Luring a Lady by Nora Roberts

Mikhail Stanislski is not impressed by Hayward. He's been letting the company know that his apartment building is run down but no one has been responding. So he barges in to the office and is shocked to find that Hayward is not an old man but a young woman. A beautiful woman.
Sydney Hayward is trying to defy expectations. Everyone believes that she will run Hayward for a few months and then tire of it. But this is her legacy and she's not going to let it go. Nor is she going to let it be tarnished by a run down building. When Mikhail says he works with wood, Sydney immediately hires him not realizing that he is actually an artist of some renown. Having Mikhail work for her means that they are thrown into close proximity, especially when one of her tenants gets hurt. 
Mikhail is sort of an alphahole. He's not that way the whole story but he is definitely starts out that way. Sydney on the other hand is an introduction in competence-porn. We don't get a sense of what in her background allows her to step into her family's business and there are some instances of show not tell but we do get to see her excel in dealing with the building, dealing with Mikhail, and even routing a baddie.

Three and a half stars
This book came out December 1st, 1991
Follows Taming Natasha
Followed by Falling for Rachel
Borrowed from Libby
Opinions are my own

Wolf with Benefits by Shelly Laurenston

Antonella "Toni" Jean-Louis Parker has pretty much given up her life so that she can care for her parents and her ten siblings. See, they're all geniuses while she's the "normal" one who can cope with the day-to-day but her friends and some of her family (mostly her father) have decided that she needs to get her own life so they've conspired to get her a job.
Ricky Lee Reed works for his brother's security agency. He meets Toni one day and is interested, until she turns him down. But their paths keep crossing and he is consistent in his interest.
I liked this one. Toni didn't get on my nerves as much as come of the other heroines in this series and was actually pretty good at her job once she figured out that she could do it.

Four stars
This book came out March 25th, 2014

Follows Bear Meets Girl
Followed by Bite Me
Hard copy I own
Opinions are my own

Reread as borrowed audiobook from Audible January 2024

The Estate of the Beckoning Lady by Margery Allingham

Whew. This book has a heck of a lot going on and the ending was... a little odd. I didn't read all of the books ahead of it in the series but I have read a few. I was still a little lost. There was a lot of backstory that was assumed and a lot of characters that we probably already knew. 
Campion and Amanda are visiting her old homestead along with Lugg and their son. There promises to be a fantastical weekend party but the lead up is marred by the death of a friend, the local tax collector known as Little Doom. While it seemed his death would be fairly imminent, someone may have hurried him along and Albert Campion needs to figure out who.

Three stars
This book came out January 1st, 1955
Follows The Tiger in the Smoke
Followed by Tether's End
Hard copy I didn't keep
Opinions are my own

An Unexpected Pleasure by Candace Camp

American Megan Mulcahey is convinced that English nobleman Theo Moreland killed her brother ten years ago. And now her sister is having dreams that her family believes that they should take revenge. Megan gets taken on as a tutor for the two youngest of the Moreland children, twin boys who get into mischief in every book of this series. She doesn't actually know as much as them in some subjects but she only needs to hang on long enough to find proof that Theo murdered Dennis. Unfortunately, she finds herself charmed by the family and falling in love with Theo.
The Moreland family is unusual and that means that Theo doesn't necessarily think that finding the tutor in his father's study means anything malicious. He is more amused than alarmed. It doesn't hurt that said tutor is beautiful. 
It took me a little bit to get into this book because the beginning was just a little slow. I was pretty much considering a DNF at around the 80 page mark but read the last 30 pages and decided to wade through. And it was worth it. Most of the real story action starts about three-quarters of the way in but you need a lot of the slog to really understand what is going on. Like all of the books in the Mad Moreland series, there is a lot of mystical-type stuff going on but bringing that in is when the book really started to get good.

Three stars
This book came out August 29th, 2006
Follows Winterset
Followed by His Sinful Touch
Hard copy I didn't keep
Opinions are my own

Taming Natasha by Nora Roberts

 I know I read this book much closer to the publication date and I think I even carried the series around with me for a few years so it is hard to say how well it holds up but I think overall pretty well. Spencer Kimball, composer and professor, is a little much sometimes but Natasha "Tash" Stanislaski deals with him quite well. She does run a bit from her own past but her family is there to bolster her back to where she belongs. 
Spencer is tired of New York. He grew up there, was a spoiled playboy there, almost missed out on his daughter's life there. He lost his music there. So he moves to West Virginia. And it's there that he meets toy store owner Natasha Stanislaski. First drawn to her by her looks, he soon find out that she is much more than than just her face. She is a vibrant, caring woman who might just change his life.

Three stars
This book came out March 1990
Followed by Luring a Lady
Ebook borrowed from Libby
Opinions are my own

Bear Meets Girl by Shelly Laurenston

Lou Crushek is a bear shifter who doesn't like change. At all. So when he's transferred with no notice from his police unit to the one containing all shifters, he's not happy. Who cares if his former foster mother, the head of the Bears Protection Agency, has basically doxxed him? He's also not excited to have picked up a female who seems to relish teasing him about their "dating" life.
Marcella Malone knows that Lou isn't her boyfriend. But he's so fun to tease. And it turns out that her work with the feline protection agency overlaps an investigation that he is very much an important part of. 
The more I read this book the more I enjoy it. Cella has a sly humor that makes her a great character for the series.

Four stars

This book came out March 27th, 2012

Follows Big Bad Beast
Followed by Wolf with Benefits
Hard copy I own
Opinions are my own

Reread as borrowed audiobook from Audible January 2024