Book Review: The 18th Abduction

The Women's Murder Club novel series

I've been reading this series in order. I began with book #10. I am not interested in going back in time too far. Our library didn't have book #13. I bought it, read it, and donated it to them! 

It only occured to me, reading book #17, that they don't mention our hero's daughter in the book. I must admit, I missed that detail. Lindsay Boxer is the detective with an infant, and I just kept reading. Having finished it, I looked it up. I missed the detail: that this book's events take place 5 years prior, and the two-year-old wasn't born yet. Apparently, I am not the only one who missed that detail in the beginning of the book! 

It's a tricky part of the series. I remember juggling motherhood and work. I find it hard to believe the overtime Detective Boxer works. She has an elderly neighbour who minds her kid, but her husband is a part time stay-at-home dad. 

Finally, someone returned book #23 to the library. I read that, and then they returned #23 1/2 Lies. JB hustled in to pick it up for me. 

Imagine my shock when I gazed through the book, and found out it contains three novellas. It seems to finish off the Women's Murder Club story, then two more new books. I had questions! Did she keep on working, how did she juggle being a detective, with her and her husband's job? I appears as if there is a book 24 in 2024, which seems fitting.

I have 19, 20, 21, 22 and 23 in our local library. I finished #21 early November.

❄️ A Sunday storm ☃️

❄️ SUNDAY☃️  First, there was 9mm of rain, then it began to get colder. Ice accretion was the difficulty Monday. It is now buried under several cm of snow. And it kept snowing.

Our power flickered off and then on. There was a small outage, quickly fixed.

The icicles on the feeders looked pretty. The tree branches, not so much.

Then the snow began... They just kept drooping more and more.

❄️ Monday morning ☃️ 

We had some snow. It weighed down the branches, sticking to the ice coated branches. I do have my spiffy red boots with cleats, but the ground was warmer than the trees and it was just sludge. 

First I shoveled the sidewalk. It wasn't slippery, but the snow stuck to slush and it was heavy. Next, using the snowblower on the driveway to clear a path to haul out the garbage all was good. Next, I put out garbage. It was coffee and breakfast and I tackled the rest of the driveway.

The oak trees still have leaves, and they are weighed down with ice and sticky snow.

All the bushes lean heavily.

And those beautiful white pines... Cross your fingers for us. We spent several thousand dollars having them cleaned up with breakage from last December's storm. Then another ice storm happened in April – three days after that mess was cleaned up. I worked on it cleaning it up myself, from December to about February, when I gave up and we called in the professionals. There were broken branches high up.

The bird bath is hanging in, icicles dripping and frozen.

Joseph Brian went out for a walk. It was getting worse. 

There he is in the back 40, doing his morning walk. He took photos for me.

It snowed all day. It's 6 a.m., and I can't see any more damage in the dark. I'd love a sunny day. We need to burn off the snow and ice. 

Tracking in the snow!

Saturday night I was in bed reading when I heard wild barking. Not the normal coyote yips. It was scary, and loud. I thought maybe they'd had a kill. Cinnamon was snuggled at my feet, and he stood up in shock. Sunday morning Joseph Brian was doing his usual walk and he looked, but didn't see any signs of a carcass. I decided to go out, too, knowing that there was a storm on the way and anything out there would be buried under snow.

Cinnamon was a great helper.

It was above zero and the snow we had was quite wet. 

Cinnamon helped me search for evidence, but we found nothing. See him on the fence!

From there we searched for tracks. I found some large coyote tracks.

We searched up and down the hill beside the shed. By now it had begun to rain. Oh yuck! It was tricky tracking anything.

We are surrounded by wetland, and there are a few paths the critters take. We ended up going to The Point, me and my cat. You can see, how there is no snow in the forest, as I stood in the wetland to take a photo. 

This is the track that leads right into the wetland. It looks like bobcat tracks, I think. They are much smaller. 

I have a working theory that one of our big coyotes met our bobcat, which I only have on a short trailcam video. They avoid humans at all costs, both the coyotes and bobcats.

Sunday afternoon, in the rain, King Charles IV licked up all the bird see under the feeder.

I had a nice Facetime with Jesse, Bryony, and Cluny, who were at the cottage. 

They were going back to the city soon, since the girls are in a Vancouver panto, Beauty and the Beast. Both parents are trained actors, although Jesse is in finance these days. 

We hunkered down, JB by the fire in the basement, and me with my Christmas RomComs upstairs. I visited Norway, and very much enjoyed the adventure as we watched the rain fall outside. My Norwegian Holiday (2023) it successfully showed us some of the language, culture, food, and traditions of their holiday season. It was quite lovely, with some Nordic actors with lovely accents. 

OK, busses are cancelled today. It is a snow day, although the problem is the ice underneath the snow. Road conditions are horrid. My only job is to get the garbage 100m down the driveway by 8 a.m. Wish me luck!