Lost in Translation by Nicole Mones

(This is the first of the many books I picked up during my library spree. Despite the name and setting, it is not related to the movie starring Bill Murrary.)

This book compelled me. The front cover shows the naked back of a woman. The back cover describes the book as erotic and haunting. Alice Mannegan hides from her past and her family connections in China. She works as an interpreter, and has illicit liasions with Chinese men who never learn her real name. Then an American archeologist seeks her services. He speaks no Chinese, but he is on the trail of a missing artifact that could change the historical record.

( A quote. )

Mones' writing reminded me of AS Byatt's writing in Possession. There is a similar feel, although the quotes from Teilhard de Chardin and Lucile Swift are not woven in as skillfully as were the quotes from the writers in Posession - possibly because they are real and not just made up for the occaision. This novel is steeped in a sense of place - the China of now, the China of fifty years past, and the China of the Cultural Revolution. I read it in less than 12 hours. It would be a great book to read while on the plane to another country. Four stars.

The Third Circle by Amanda Quick

The Arcane Society series covers several centuries of the exploits of an organizations of psychics. Jayne Anne Krentz writes these books under several different pen names. (The Victorian ones have pictures of statues on the front. The modern ones have pictures of couples embracing. The sci fi ones haven't started coming out yet, but I would really like to see if she can pull them off!) Her pen name Amanda Quick is used for Victorian settings, and under this pen name she wrote The Third Circle as well as Second Sight, which have been my two favorite books in the series so far.

Leona Hewitt has been practicing as a professional psychic, specializing in chasing away bad dreams, since the mysterious death of her mother. Finally, she has a lead on the family heirloom - a crystal known as the aurora stone - and she is determined to steal it back from those who hold it. Matters get a bit more complicated, however, when she discovers a dead body - and another intruder, who is very much alive (naturally, he is also male, single, virile, and hawt!) - in the mansion she is searching.

I was a bit confused by who some of the characters were - it is somewhat assumed that you have already read the previous three books in the series. The characters also did not stand out vividly to me - I had a hard time remembering the heroine's name for this review! Nonetheless, this makes pleasant light reading. Three stars.