December Series CAT: A series that is new to you

Well, it's self-explanatory, really. I'm sure we've all added plenty of new series to our wishlists because of this CAT.

I'm interpreting the topic as a series that I've started this year. Feel free to interpret the topic any way you like!

Apologies to The_Hibernator if you were just about to start this thread.

I have just started The Killings at Badger's Drift, by Caroline Graham, which is the first in the Midsomer Murders series, and the reason why I would like to count any series started this year!

Thanks, Pam, for taking this on.

I've had Still Life, the first book in Louise Penny's Inspector Gamache series, on my TBR forever. I'm hoping this is the month that I finally start this series!

>2 pamelad: I love the Midsomer novels and TV series. I've only read the first 5 of the novels, which the first TV series was based on. After that, the TV series went its own way. But reading No. 5 Faithful Unto Death, I realised that Causton was actually quite near where I grew up (although it isn't called that).

After watching the images of Venice flooded again, I'm thinking about reading my first Donna Leon.

My DIL has urged me to try the Flavia de Luce series. I will try to bring Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie to the top of my list this month. I know some people love this character and others, I think on this thread, were underwhelmed. I will give it a go and weigh in as to whether I will add it to my on-going series reading.

I may read in a graphic novel series—definitely new to me—because I need a graphic novel square for BingoDOG. I also have a long list of new-to-me series in translation that would also fill a Bingo square.

I might read Murder in the Mystery Suite by Ellery Adams. I figure light reading in Dec is necessary.

I read Diamond in the Rough by Jen Turano, in the American Heiress series. (It is almost December, right?)

After having attended Bouchercon and buying a ton of books, I have quite a few new to me series to try. I think I'm going to give An Untimely Frost by Penny Richards a try.

I have several possibilities, but I think I will choose Rebecca Tope's Cotswold Mysteries series. I have an ebook box set of the first four.

I am hoping to get to Tales Of The City by Armistead Maupin.

I feel in the need of a light mystery read for December so I am going to try the first book in the Daisy Dalrymple Mystery series, Death at Wentwater Court by Carola Dunn.

To Everyone Here
Before we say goodbye to this CAT, can any of you share your preferred method for keeping track of your series? I used FictFact for a bit but then it closed. Now that I am going to add another series to my life with this challenge, I am feeling the need to track them better. I'll probably just do an Excel spreadsheet, but I am open to suggestions for anyone who has time to post. TIA

>14 beebeereads: I was trying a spreadsheet, but I liked being able to see the next book in the series. So I made a collection called ‘series’ and can enter the next book that I want to read and with one click I can see all the books in the series. I just keep the next book I want to read, or the start of the series. I’ve been keeping all the ones I’ve read this year in the collection, but I think I’ll remove them at year end

>14 beebeereads: I have added a collection (Status: Next in Series) and put many of those in it. Then, when I complete a book in this collection, I put the next book in the series in this collection. This method does mean that if I don't own the Next, I have to catalog it and add it to the Wishlist collection and usually I put it in the To Read collection as well. This method seems to be working pretty well for me, mainly because I've been pretty diligent about recording when I've finished a book, moving it to my "Status:Finished in 2019" folder, etc. I wish I could automate it a bit more but I haven't figured out a good way.

>16 NinieB: - That's a good idea. I've been trying to keep it on a spreadsheet, but not showing the titles; just the book numbers colored for read, unread but have, and don't have. I might try to set that up once I get my 2020 thread up and running.

I am going to read A Rising Man by Abir Mukherjee.

>15 raidergirl3: >16 NinieB: >17 dudes22: Thank you all for sharing your methods. I have set up a very basic spread sheet with Authors-Series Identifier and then numbers 1 - 20. I don't want anything too laborious so this will at least let me keep track of where I am in each series. I will also try setting up a new collection for Series to list upcoming reads in each series. I don't always use LT to track my TBR. I typically use it to track what I have read and am currently reading. I have a few books listed as To Read or Considering. I think I need to do some housecleaning this winter. I use GR as well and I keep a wishlist on Amazon. Maybe time for some consolidation! This could be another whole topic.
Thanks again for your suggestions!

>19 beebeereads: - I found that I had a tendency to buy books at library sales that I already had, so that's when I added them to my "to read" collection. Now I at least know what's in the house.

>20 dudes22: Yes thank goodness Amazon reminds me when I try to re-buy a Kindle book on sale! My other books are procured through the library so no harm, no foul if I duplicate! Thanks for the motivation.

I have a few possibilities for December:

- Mew is for Murder / Clea Simon
- Once Every Never / Lesley Livingston
- Wolf by Wolf / Ryan Graudin

ETA: I'm leaning toward "Mew is for Murder", as I believe it's been on my tbr the longest. And it has been a long time!

Oh, and with a December wrap-up, thought I would do a reminder that when we were planning this one, we had an entire other year (plus more, I think!) of ideas that could last us and not have to repeat a theme! I will probably suggest this one again for 2021... :-)

I tried the new-to-me series A Pint of Murder, by Alisa Craig, set in New Brunswick in an indeterminate decade. I was able to cross that series off my list; the book didn't encourage me to read more in the series.

I'm thinking I'll read A Share in Death by Deborah Crombie or The Crow Trap by Ann Cleeves.

Of course, like many others, I have a long list of series I want to start so we'll see where I actually land!

>1 pamelad: Well, if we can interpret the challenge to include new to me series that were started this year, the possibilities are even more interesting.....

Carlos Ruiz Zafón states in his preface that El príncipe de la niebla is the first in a series of loosely connected books. I've also got the third in my TBR, coming next.
Can't say that this was good, though. It's his first book, and it shows.

ETA

I started two new series so far this month. Everywhere That Mary Went by Lisa Scottoline is book 1 in the Roasato & Associates legal mystery series. I enjoyed this and especially liked the Philly setting. Soulless by Gail Carriger, book 1 in the Parasol Protectorate series. I can't believe I waited so long to finally get to this. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Finished A Dangerous Duet which is the first in the Victorian Mystery series and definitely new to me.

A rising Man didn't appeal, so I'm reading Burn This by Helen McCloy. It's not the first in the Basil Willing series, but it's available for free in the Open Library, and free is good. Going well so far.

Finished Burn This, which turned out to be overly contrived. Published in 1980, it was the last in the Basil Willing series which started with Dance of Death in 1938. I'll try one of the earlier books.

I'm reading A Summer to Remember by Mary Balogh, which according to some sources is part of her Bedwyn series. I haven't read any of the other Bedwyn books yet, although I have Slightly Dangerous on my shelves.

Finished Eva's Eye by Karin Fossum which is first in the rather long running Inspector Sejer series but new to me.

I'm about to start Snowspelled by Stephanie Burgis, which is the first novella in her Harwood Spellbook series.

I completed the first in the Vera Stanhope series, The Crow Trap by Ann Cleeves. Three stars. I'll continue with the series.

I finished the final book in the Trilogy of Fog, Las luces de Septiembre, which was meh at best. I won't look for the second book.

Read An Untimely Frost by Penny Richards which is the first in a series featuring a young woman in Chicago who joins the Pinkerton.

Adastra in Africa by Barry Windsor-Smith is a short graphic novel about a "disgraced princess", Adastra, who restores a starving, arid, desolate African village to health. She is a character in Windsor-Smith's Young Gods comics and this particular novel was created to be part of a comic book series called Lifedeath. These series are very new to me.

Wolf by Wolf / Ryan Graudin
3.75 stars

What if the Axis had won World War II? Yael was a little girl and had been one of the medical subjects in one of the concentration camps. What they did was inject her with something to make her appear more Aryan. Turns out she could do more than appear Aryan after a while – she could “skinshift” to look like anyone else. Because of this, she was able to escape, and years later, in 1956 when she is 17-years old, she is part of the resistance and she has a mission – she is impersonating a girl motorcycle racer. Once she wins, she’ll have access to Hitler…

This one took a bit for me to get “into” it, but once it got going, I thought it was good. We go back and forth in time from current day Yael in the resistance to young Yael in the concentration camp and everything leading up to how she got to her current mission. There was a good twist at the end and it is a series (or maybe trilogy?), so I will continue.

A Rising Man by Abir Mukherjee is set in Calcutta in 1919, the last days of the Raj. OK, but too long and the pace is too slow.

ETA I doubt that people in 1919 were talking about 'progressing' things, windows of opportunity, or en suite bathrooms. The main character has a quite unnecessary morphine dependence. This does not make him more interesting.

I have read the first in the Daisy Dalrymple cozy mystery series, Death At Wentwater Court by Carola Dunn.

I'm starting The Raven Boys which is new to me.

>41 majkia: Ooh, I hope you enjoy it! Since it's the first book in the series, there's a lot of place-setting, but I was definitely invested in the characters by the end.

Read Genesis volume 1 of Memory of Fire, hope to finish the trilogy before the end of 2019. This is new to me, new author, very different style of telling history.

>42 christina_reads: I'm about a third of the way through and enjoying it. I especially like the style of writing.

COMPLETED The Cotswold Mysteries Collection by Rebecca Tope, a box set of the first four in her Cotswold series, which was new to me. This is definitely a series I will be continuing with as I enjoy the characters and the stories are different enough that it hasn't become repetitive so far. My only reservation is that the books seem grounded enough in reality that the implausibility of murder following our main character, a house sitter, wherever she goes becomes starker.

Emily: Evan's Girls / Elle Klass
3 stars

Emily was adopted when she was young enough that she doesn’t remember her biological family. She is happy and isn’t interested in learning about them. All she knows is that they died in a car crash. As she grows up, though, she overhears discussions that make her wonder, though she never questions it. However, things get dangerous for her as an adult once she is married and has a family of her own.

I really liked the first ¾ of the book, but it took an odd turn and I wasn’t crazy about the ending. This was book 2 in a series; I “won” the book in a giveaway without realizing there was a book 1, so I hadn’t read it. Up until the end, I don’t think I needed to, but the main character (based on the title of book 1) does make an appearance at the end. Since I found the ending, not just odd, but somewhat confusing, I wonder if it would have been better to have read the first one first? Either way, up until the end, I thought I was going to (go back and read book 1), but the odd turn the ending took just didn’t… I just didn’t like it, so I don’t think I’ll plan to read the first one (nor will I plan to read the 3rd). I still gave it an “ok” rating, though, as I did really liked most of the book.

>42 christina_reads: I finished The Raven Boys. Very atmospheric, almost gothic in texture and plot. Not at all what I expected going in, and that's a good thing.

>47 majkia: Ooh, I'm glad you liked it, and I think you'll like the rest of the Raven Cycle as well! I really enjoy Stiefvater's writing style. Her stand-alone novel The Scorpio Races is one of my favorite books.

Got the second book in Memory of Fire done. Really liking this series.

I recently read Murder Most Malicious, the first book in the Lady and Lady's Maid series by Alyssa Maxwell. An enjoyable historical mystery series reminiscent of Downton Abbey; I plan to seek out the next book.

I read The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie first in the Flavia deLuce series.

A clever English countryside manor mystery where the protagonist is an 11 yr old girl with a passion for poison and all things chemistry. Her character is well drawn and charming. The mystery was solvable early on, but the way it played out had some twists. Bradley's descriptions of both character and place are authentic, detailed and atmospheric. For that alone, I added a star. I would continue if I didn't have so many series started and not finished!