February - While The Patient Slept

Our theme this year is "You Learn Something New Every Month." What, pray tell, could you possibly learn from reading a 90-year-old murder mystery? Well, you could learn about an author who haled from and began her writing career in, Nebraska. You could learn that Mignon Eberhart introduced a female "detective" into novels before Agatha Christie. And you could learn about an author you didn't know about whose writing you quite enjoyed. 

This book was something of a surprise hit with most of us. It would fall into what we now call the "cozy mystery" genre, which seemed like just the kind of cleanse-your-palate read so many of us needed just now. Ann (I believe it was Ann) said she figured out who done it within the first 30 pages but enjoyed the book, nevertheless. Fortunately, she had marked the passage that gave it away for her so she could point out to the rest of us what we had missed. 

We talked at some length about what kind of person we imagined Sarah Keate to look like and who we could picture playing her in a movie adaptation. As it turns out, a movie adaptation was made shortly after the book was released but it received such poor reviews it hardly seems worth paying the $3 it would cost to watch it. 

Was it the best book we're likely to read this year. Nope. Was it worth reading? Sure; at just over 300 pages, it's not much of a time commitment, it doesn't present any disturbing themes or situations, and it's an easy, escapist read. And it even gave us plenty to talk about!