After finishing Brazzaville Beach I have been power reading through some Dorothy Gilman novels I have piled up. Light reading, but she writes excellently. Tightrope Walker, about a young woman who buys an antique store and finds a note left by a desperate woman, and of course has to embark on a journey to solve the mystery of the woman and the note, was pretty fast reading. Dorothy's best books are the Mrs. Pollifax series, and the very best is her book Caravan which goes beyond the genre she normally stays within and develops into a fascinating cultural story of the Arabian peninsula and North Africa. I have a couple more of her books yet to read, but have picked up this copy of a Marion Chesney book and intend to read a few more of hers as well. This is a bonanza light reading summer!Of course Marion Chesney is M.C. Beaton, under which pseudonym she writes the Agatha Raisin and Hamish Macbeth novels. It's all about keeping my Alan Furst books and my William Boyd books to a slower pace while they gather their strength to write more! I also have Gentlemen of the Road to read, by the incomparable Michael Chabon, and his non-fiction work, Maps and Legends. Powell's Books, Portland, Oregon, has this to say.