One for the Money by Janet Evanovich

Another recommendation and acquired at the library...
Interesting read as it is set in New Jersey not tooooo far from where I spent four years of my childhood. So there were things that rang true and brought up lots of memories (like references to being the sewer of New York and general pollution issues...) but there were many things that were just a long way outside a 5-9 year old's experience!
A fast, light sort of read. Very interesting characterisation. I'd like to read something by Janet Evanovich that wasn't part of this series to work out just how good she is at creating these characters - particularly the narrator, Stephanie Plum. The language and grammar used so much built up her character and set the whole tone. But if that is just the way Evanovich speaks/writes then it is less interesting!!
Bits of the book were NASTY (rape and mutilation). They were over fairly quickly but left enough hanging that it was icky for rather longer.
Some gentle humour on the way through. For the general humour mixed with detective work type element, it was clearly not a patch on Thursday Next but that isn't really an insult to Ms Evanovich, just the continuing haven't-found-anything-to-compare-so-happy-Thursday-is-coming-back-this-year thing...
I expect I will read the rest of the series over time, I'm assured this is actually the nastiest of the series so far so I'm looking forward to more comedy moments in the next few!

The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne

I've just finished this (within the last ten minutes) and desparately need to talk to someone who has read it!
It is a excellent book. But I can't really say much about it. This is part of what it says on the sleeve: The story of The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas is very difficult to describe. Usually we give some clues about a book on the jacket, but in this case we think that would spoil the reading of the book. We think it is important that you start to read without knowing what it is about.
I wholeheartedly agree with that statement and thus for fear of ruining the book for anyone, do not want to say anything about it. However, I recommend it to (almost) anyone. There is one other clue on the sleeve which indicates that it is not necessarily a fluffy book. This is true, but it is still an excellent book. I suggest if you do intend to read it, ensure that you have someone else around who has either read it or will read it very quickly after you so you can talk about it.
I will be keeping my eyes open for other books by this chap. (And am now going to email the person who gave it to me so that I can talk about it!)

Mother, Missing by Joyce Carol Oates

Where to start? Well, I launched into this book with great gusto, relieved to be reading something that came as highly recommended after my few recent unsatisfactory reads.
I was involved in the characters immediately and I think that is the key to this book - the narrator is excellently portrayed - you aren't always sure you like her, she doesn't always write "well" but you are drawn to her, not to her story necessarily. So I read LOTS in the first few days of reading it and am vaguely surprised now to find that it took me almost two weeks to finish it, perhaps I became a little less involved - towards the end I did get a little less interested but not in a drastic way. I did also notice a couple of editorial errors that I can still remember now - often I notice errors but by the end of the book no longer know what they were. Perhaps because I knew I'd be writing this, I remembered or perhaps it is an indication that I wasn't so involved in the story itself. I suspect if that latter was the case, it was through self preservation. The book follows the first year of a woman's life as she copes with the untimely death of her mother. And if there is anything that REALLY scares me in the world, it is the thought of one of my parents (or my husband) dying. (Having never experienced someone very close to me dying, only my dog.) So I may have distanced myself a little.
A couple of really interesting elements to the book (without saying too much as I wouldn't want to spoil) are...
The book feels like it covers a bigger time span than one year. Although vague timings are always put on things, you do feel the sense of the slowness of time that comes when you are sad and when you are waiting for something big to happen. The book did not drag. But I was amazed when reaching the end to realise it really had covered just one year.
The other thing was, as mentioned above, the narration style. The narrator is a journalist and so much of the time "writes well". However, at points of particular sadness or particularly strong emotions, especially around memories, the writer slips into childish styles, email style communication (not going quite as far as text speak!) which creates a really interesting effect of bringing you closer to the character.
So a good book and I imagine I will read quite a bit more of her's in future.