2025 & 2026 Reading Challenge discussion

This thread is to discuss Cruel & Unusual, the fourth book in the Kay Scarpetta series by Patricia Cornwell.

Pages: 407 pages

Length: 1 month (February)

Participants: Lorraine, Dominique, Beth, Susan

Everyone reads at their own pace during a Buddy Read. Because participants can be at different parts of the book at different times, it is extremely important to mark spoilers so that the book is not ruined for someone who is not as far along as others!!!

Mark spoilers by placing {spoiler} before the text and {/spoiler} after the text but use the < and > instead of the { and }.

Here are some questions to help get the conversation started! Feel free to look up discussion questions specific to this book or come up with your own. Just make sure any questions that contain spoilers are under spoiler tags.
Discussion questions are not required but may be a fun way to talk about the book and get to know each other!

Prior to starting:
What prompted you to join this buddy read?
Have you read this author before? What do you think of their other books?

Mid-read:
What character or ideas do you relate to the most and why?
Do you have any favorite quotes or scenes?

After reading:
What was enjoyable or not-so-enjoyable about this book?
Did this book change your perception about anything, either within the book (character development) or in real life?

Looking forward to another Scarpetta book!

Starting this weekend.

Started reading today! I'm a UNIX system administrator and loving the geeky UNIX lingo happening in chapter 3

Finished.
It was ok.


(view spoiler)[ Wasn`t a fan of her niece coming back. Even though she`s older, she was just a bit too annoying for my taste. Felt a little repetitive that Kay was still getting in trouble and her job was again in jeopardy
(hide spoiler)]

This was a pretty quick read, I'm all done. Like I said in my post yesterday, I enjoyed all the nerdy, computer talk the most.

(view spoiler)[I was happy Kay got herself out of trouble. I didn't like that the she was being accused of the murders (hide spoiler)]

I was happy that the author (view spoiler)[ ended the toxic love story with Marc (hide spoiler)]

Susan wrote: "Started reading today! I'm a UNIX system administrator and loving the geeky UNIX lingo happening in chapter 3"

Have you tried the series Washington Poe by M. W. Craven? One of the main character is just very good at computer, not to say exceptional!

Lorraine wrote: "Susan wrote: "Started reading today! I'm a UNIX system administrator and loving the geeky UNIX lingo happening in chapter 3"

Have you tried the series Washington Poe by M. W. Craven? One of the ma..."

No I haven't, I'll check it out, thanks!

OMG, the Washington Poe series may be my favorite new find of 2024. I read all the books in the series last year, and book 7 is due out in June. I can't wait!

Poe and Tillie are amazing characters, seperately and together.

Usually I can find books on Libby, but M.W. Craven's books aren't coming up. I do see the library has a copy of The Puppet Show in paperback. I will have to go check it out. I prefer that instant satisfaction of being delivered straight to my iPad but oh well. thanks ladies!

Finished today. This was OK, but not the strongest of the series so far for me. Did the story seem to end super quick? Like the author found out she wasn't getting paid by the word so she decided to wrap everything up in the last 50 pages. (view spoiler)[I feel like we didn't even "meet" the actual person who committed the crimes until very close to the end... no chance to really develop a feeling for whether I as the reader thought they "dun it." (hide spoiler)]

Beth wrote: "Finished today. This was OK, but not the strongest of the series so far for me. Did the story seem to end super quick? Like the author found out she wasn't getting paid by the word so she decided t..."

Yeah it did end pretty abruptly.