Paul Castellano was one of the most well known Mafia bosses of all time. This book went into great detail about the FBI trying to make a case against him, and about his subsequent death. I thought this book was really quite good, and I learned a lot about Paul. 

 This was a very good book. It is the personal account of Gerhardt Thamm, who was a German teenager during World War II. The experiences of people living in civilian Germany have always interested me. Hitler Youth was basically compulsory at this time, and it was interesting to see how different kids felt about joining. The experiences of this author were almost unbelievable, because I remember my teen years and I can't imagine being faced with any of the things that this kid was. 

 I would like to start off by saying I am not a Rose McGowan fan. I checked this book out from the local library, because I had heard so many good things about it. I never knew that she grew up the way that she did. I have a newfound respect for her and her activism after reading about the struggles she went through as a child and in her acting career. This book is a reminder for others that celebrities are human beings as well. They are real people, with real struggles, a real history, and real emotions. It was a good read, overall. 

 This book was about the life and times of Frankie Saggio. He worked for all five families in New York, refusing to be tied to any specific family as a way to keep business going and keep himself safe. He eventually turned informant, which really came as no great surprise. I really wanted to like this book. I did not. I thought it was boring and self serving, though that last part was no great surprise either. 

 I think that people have a preconceived notion of what a pirate is. In childhood, we have Captain Hook, dressed in his ruffled shirt and large hat looking quite fancy. We have the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. We have Hook from Once Upon A Time. I have certainly been guilty of thinking pirates were leather pants and frilly shirt wearing, long beard having, large hat owners. As a historian, I have learned a good deal about the Somalian pirates, but very little about pirating in the Golden Age of Piracy. This particular book covers a period of two years, beginning in 1680, when a large group of pirates gathered in the Caribbean to formulate a massive raiding extravaganza on the Pacific coast. I had no clue about any of this until reading this book.

I really, really enjoyed this book. I liked that it read like an adventure novel. A lot of people are turned off by nonfiction because they think that history cannot be exciting and must always be dry and boring, but the author of this book did a great job in keeping the interest of the reader. I liked how he made the pirates in the book come back to life when relating their adventures and experiences. The research was well done, and I learned a great deal. I am really glad that I took a chance on this book. I would highly recommend it for people who are curious about pirates. It was a lot more interesting than the couple of other pirate books I have read in the past. 

 I have been wanting to read this book for a long time. It follows the experiences of three Jewish women who were interned in various ghettos and concentration camps. Their husbands were separated from them, and they had to go through pregnancies with barely any food, terrible conditions, and in fear for their lives in a way that they never knew they could be in fear. I thought this was a really moving book, and I was so invested in these stories. 

 This was the first book I read in the series. I bought this on my lunch break at work, because I forgot the book I was reading at home. I do not generally read novels and series books, but there are a few that I read. I thought this would be interesting, as I was reading a lot of true crime at the time. I really enjoyed this book, and went to a local used book store and bought at the ones before this to read in order. This book has a lot of negative reviews, and there was even a point when Patricia Cornwell herself said this was the worst one in the series. It did get me into the series though, so there must have been something interesting in it at the time. In this book, Scarpetta leaves Florida for Charleston, South Carolina. (I love the city of Charleston, and was pleased to be reading about it in this book.) She opens an office there, which offers her unique blend of forensic services with the help of her colleagues- Marino, Benton, and Lucy. There are several murders in this book, and they seem thrown in all willy nilly, without much of a point. Lucy is absolutely intolerable, but there is nothing new about that. I did not like Dr. Self at all, possibly less than I like Lucy. It ended on a cliffhanger involving Marino, and I really dislike cliffhangers. I would not suggest reading this one first, certainly, but I would read it again in the order it was meant to be in, as there are a few events that happen that are needed for later on down the line. 

 I have always been interested in organized crime families, so I had to get this book when I found it at a used book shop. I was very interested in the story, though I felt that the book was a littler longer than necessary in comparison with the information it provided. It could have wrapped up a bit quicker. The book seemed well researched and factual. It was a decent book overall. 

 I really enjoyed this in depth look at what it is like to be a forensic anthropologist. I took anthropology courses in college and thoroughly enjoyed them. I hoped that I would enjoy this book, and I did. It is amazing to read about the atrocities that people commit against fellow people, with seemingly no remorse. It was great that these teams were able to recover and help identify some of the missing family members and their items to give people some form of closure. I cannot imagine living through the things that these people had to live through. 

 Kay is now in Boston in this book. She moves cities more than any person I have ever seen. A woman from Canada has disappeared while digging for dinosaur bones, and for an unknown reason the only evidence for the case has been sent to Kay. She believes that there is some connection between this woman and a series of murders that have occurred here in the States, and sets out to uncover what they are. Unfortunately, Benton, Marino, and Lucy all have secrets and she feels all bent out of shape and betrayed by them all. This is a common theme in the last several books, and it is tired. She is consistently on my nerves with her hurt feelings and paranoia. All people have secrets, but that doesn't mean that all people are out to see you fail and ruin your life. She needs to get a grip.