New Release Tuesday 3-24-26

 I don’t always get new books on New Release Tuesday, but I love when I do.

DOA On TV : The Rookie, Paradise, Will Trent, High Potential, War Machine, School Spirits

 

The Rookie   Aftermath

Lucy is still traumatized from having had to kill a crazed toxicologist.  Though given desk duty, she defies orders and is out on solo patrol.   She's first on the scene of a dangerous mob hit, but acquits herself well.   Wesley is outmaneuvered by two serial killers and a rival for the District Attorney's office.

Paradise   Jane

Good thing I pre-wrote this on paper so I could excise a few remarks.   I had no curiosity about psychopath Jane Driscoll, an assassin with no redeeming qualities.  I really wish three episodes of an eight episode season had not focused on characters we don't know and care about.  Luckily there was a bit of forward motion for Xavier, as Gary the Mailman ignites the bomb they plan to explode as a distraction early hoping to kill Xavier.  Xavier is stunned by a blast, but gets away, and Teri runs through the crowd towards him.   Jeremy enlists the aid of the architect of the bunker in making an escape.  Presley endangers Sinatra's daughter by luring her into the politics of the bunker.

Will Trent   He Lives

Someone in the writers room loves James Ulster's serial killer, because Will can't get him out of his head.  Also, it appears Ulster had fans who wrote him in prison, and he's written them back, though two months dead.  They are doing some copycat killings for their hero, though it turns out Ulster had a child who he sent his diaries to, so all his thoughts and techniques are available to another generation.

One such killing gets the GBD and Will's attention, as the victim's name is Antonio Miranda, Will's uncles name.  Fearing for his uncle he goes to Puerto Rico to find and protect his uncle, but Ulster's heir is a few steps ahead.

High Potential   Pie In The Sky

Morgan and crew investigate the murder of a beloved astronaut who was killed by a pie in the face containing nerve agents.  Nice moments as Morgan's son mourns a hero and gets a souvenir from the spaceman's journeys.

War Machine

New on Netflix, this is my kind of movie!  I'm going to go ahead and use the terms rock em' sock em' action.  In my youth, I used to watch war movies on tv all the time, likely lots of John Wayne stuff, but anything with shiny new recruits getting run through the trenches in training and coming out combat weathered and tough, I loved that. 

Here ,we have Alan Ritchison's Army Ranger recruit meaning to prove something to himself, and to go the distance in honor of his brother, who dreamed of the two of them being Rangers.  He's a little older than most and keeps to himself.  Doesn't want to be the team leader but is forced by his Training Officers to do just that.

The group has 24 hours to avoid being detected by "enemy" troops and they've a series of goals. The first is to find a downed aircraft and destroy it so the enemy can't get its tech.  When they find the aircraft, it doesn't look anything like they imagined, but they attach their charges and back up to let them explode.  

Here begins the rock em' sock em' action part.  Oops. The craft they were supposed to find is a little farther away, but they've attached charges to and have activated an alien war machine.   It reacts right away, unfolding to stand and attack and follow them through the wilderness, tracking them relentlessly and implacably to wipe them all out.   Every time they think they've lost the thing, their compasses go wild and it's on them again.   Too good.

School Spirits  Season One

This show has been on my radar for awhile, because I like ghosts, and mysteries.  Maddie Nears is dead and not happy about it. She can't recall her death, and doesn't know who killed her.  There are other ghosts residing in Split River High School, some having been there as long as 60 years.  Everyone else knows exactly how they died.   Trapped on the school grounds, Maddie has to somehow find her killer, and there are plenty of suspects.

Luckily, unlike any of the other ghosts, she is able to talk to her still living best friend Simon.  With his help and the help of a few others along the way, this spooky show is great fun.

Librariandoa's Saturday Puzzles A Fallen Phrase for 3 21 26

 Welcome, Fallen Phrase Fans.  I hope you enjoy this week's puzzle.  Look for the answer key Saturday March 28 at 7 am.

 

 

Librariandoa's Saturday Puzzles An Answer Key for the Garbled Proverbs 3 14 26

 

I hope you liked these!  Sometimes a few wise words are just the thing.

 

Wetter mate that fever       Better late than never

Paint peart newer son pair lads      Faint heart never won fair lady

I switch is dime raves mine     A stitch in time saves nine

So nets if goof mews      No news is good news

Won’t budge I took my ids covet     Don’t judge a book by its cover

 

Mary's Recipes Week 17

 Hearty fare this week except for the Fish Batter.   This week's picture is Mary at a picnic we took her to at a local park.  She loves picnics as much as I do, unlike her son, the NOPicnicsForME  Mr. DOA.

 

 

 

New Release Tuesday 3 17 26

 Arrived this week!

Doa On TV : The Rookie, Paradise, Best Medicine, High Potential, Will Trent, Scarpetta (Ep 1), The Pitt, Star Fleet Academy

 

I’ve been running behind watching my shows, and I think I’m caught up.  This might be a long post.  Take snack breaks when you need to.

 

The Rookie 

Ep 9 Fun and Games

The team investigates a couple of very different robberies.  One is totally obnoxious, as the improv prone cast of a tv show can’t stop speaking in voices and altering their expressions as they imitate the robbers who stole from them.  Every one of them is awful in their attempts to be clever and amusing.   The second robbery is committed by two girls and a third party who they won’t name, even when one of the girls dies from injuries sustained in the robbery.

 

Ep 10 His Name was Martin

 Nolan, Harper and Miles investigate the disappearance of a toxic clean up team of 20 sent to get a former psychiatric hospital ready for demolition.  There’s no cell service in the area (unexplained but ratchets things up).   Add in a bumbling, camera wielding Dash, a kid who has taken a liking to Nolan, and gets a ride along.

I personally am glued to my seat in terror anytime there’s a chase through an abandoned psychiatric hospital.  The toxic cleanup team has all gone mad, and they run through the hospital and grounds in packs chasing our heroes.  They are described as zombies at one point, but they aren’t eating anyone, so nope, not zombies.  They are just incredibly fast and very violent.

Tossed in at the end of the episode, Lucy and Celina arrive at the facility, get separated, and Lucy fights off one of the crazies, not seeing another creeping up behind her.  She had a violent fight with the first person, and is injured already, so when the second person pushes a knife towards her chest, she turns it on him in desperation and he’s killed, leaving her battered, bruised and numbed.  In shock.  Nobody seems to see how traumatized she is, and they give her space and tell her she’ll be ok, which she clearly isn’t.

Also! Wesley finds a client in his office at night when he’s working late, who we've see has mental issues, who is stabbing himself repeatedly in the leg with a large glass shard, and he needs to talk him down.

 

Paradise The Mailman

We see what happened with Xavier's wife Teri in the years since the tsunamis.  She’s fallen in with a group who are in a rather small fallout shelter inside a post office.  The mailman in question falls for Teri and builds the radio she uses to try to contact Xavier.  The survivors were handpicked for the skills they can contribute, though Teri is an expert in mushrooms. Another unlikely member is a young boy that Gary, the Mailman, saw on his route, hungry and neglected by his drug addled parents.  Teri bonds instantly with Bean.

Gary explains to Xavier how the time has passed for the survivors, and comes to the present day where he says a group of armed men came and took Teri and the other members away, leaving him behind.  He can lead Xavier to the convoy where he thinks everyone was taken. 

Xavier listens carefully, and plans to use a bomb to distract/disrupt the convoy who appear to be guarding some thing so he can get Teri back.   My thought is they are guarding Teri, Bean and the others from Gary, who shot his friend Ennis in cold blood to keep him from telling Teri the group is friendly and going to Colorado.

Next weeks episode is titled Jane, who is an assassin character in the bunker I don’t like at all and don’t want to know about.  Hopefully there’s more about Xavier and Gary, and please watch your back, Xavier, Gary’s right behind you.

 

Best Medicine Port Wenn-ings and a Funeral

Never a dull moment in Port Wenn. It’s time for the annual bird migration over port Wenn, and two dotty old sisters impinge on a bird watching expedition between Martin and Louisa.  One of the two is acting very oddly, and when she flaps her wings and leaps forward off the cliff where everyone’s bird watching, it’s a shock.  She has left commands for a week of funeral celebrations for herself that include a reading of her poetry. We find that Martin’s aunt has been under the thumb of the two sisters for decades and she can hardly contain her relief that one of them is gone.

 

High Potential    If You Come For The Queen

It’s detective Daphne’s episode as she takes the lead in an investigation of the attempted murder of her mentor Dottie at a massage parlor.  Oof! How vulnerable is a person under a towel with their face in some donut thing.  Too creepy.

Ava is called out by online class mates for getting into a special arts program because of her race, and Daphne offers advice there, as she’s struggling herself with not wanting to move forward in her career, as she thinks it will be a lifelong battle.

 

Will Trent  You’re Only As Sick As Your Secrets

Sorority boys are being stripped and killed, with tape over their mouths with words like Justice and Integrity written on them.    A nicely twisted plot for this one. 

Angie and Seth attend a baby preparation class with a new instructor who shows them all the ways their babies are going to end up dead via parental carelessness, terrifying Seth.

 

Scarpetta  Bridge of Time Part 1

I first read Postmortem in 1995, and it was the catalyst for my becoming a huge mystery reader ever since then.   At some point I stopped reading the series, but purchased Autopsy when it came out and I haven’t read it yet.   The Prime show is split between two time periods, one covering the book Postmortem, the other in the present covering the book Autopsy.

I was surprised by many character arcs in the present, I mean yikes! Marino married to Kay’s sister Dorothy?  Kay married to Wesley?  Lucy mourning her dead wife by spending all day with an AI version of her on multiple screens?   Dorothy and Kay constantly fighting?  Why don’t I recall Kay swearing so much? 

Anyway, the mystery part was good, very intriguing that the current case makes Scarpetta and Marino think maybe they got the wrong guy all of those years ago.  The actress portraying Kay’s younger self is incredible.  At first I thought they used anti-aging technology on Nicole Kidman.   Rose  McEwen, wow.

 The Pitt 4 pm

The water slide disaster wasn’t a mass casualty event, but there is plenty going on.  Dr Mohan has an anxiety attack that she thinks might be a heart attack and Robbie has no sympathy for her at all.  Lots of people are starting to crack under the pressure of this day.

One of the water park victims had her leg sheared off in her accident, and of course it’s Ogilvie whose task it is to hang onto the severed leg.  He completely bumbles the job, in every way.

Dr King, back from her traumatizing deposition, finds her sister Becca has a uterine infection from “having lots and lots of sex” causing Mel to have the most lost look possible on her face.

Did you know a foot could be “ungloved”?

 

Starfleet Academy    Rubincon

In the last episode of season one,  Nus Braka televises and transmits a trial against the Federation represented by Nahla Ake with the judge, jury and executioner role going to Caleb’s mother Anisha Mir.   Everyone is quite impassioned and the trial is well done, even Braka’s childhood memory of Starfleet destroying his home planet when he was a child.

 On the Athena, all the cadets are at battle stations, with instructor Jett Reno giving them instruction, and also making them think and solve the problems at hand, such as how to find Braka and take the wall of mines surrounding Federation space down without exploding them.

The Doctor, who was able to integrate himself into the ship computer and make it look like the Athena was destroyed, comes back out of the computer warped and garbled.  He has a solution to try for the mines, but can’t speak a single sentence that makes sense.

All in all a strong first season.  It was better by far than I expected from previews, and I’ve been entertained each week.  It has all the bones of a good Star Trek series.

Librariandoa's Saturday Puzzles: Garbled Proverbs

 

Welcome to a new DOA Puzzle type!  The first in a long time.  Presented below are well known Proverbs.  One letter of each word has been replaced.  Guess the incorrect letter in each word and voila!  I am hoping they are fun and easy so there will be five Garbled Proverbs each time it comes up as the puzzle type.  Enjoy!  The answer key will be posted Saturday March 21 at 7 am.

 

Wetter mate that fever 

Paint peart newer son pair lads

I switch is dime raves mine

So nets if goof mews

Won’t budge I took my ids cove