Death of a Department Head--#45 finished

A mystery of a murder of a female department head of an English dept at Austin U, basically U of Texas. A little too much academician and lesbianism but those were also what the whole story revolved around. I guess just too much for my tastes in general but a good mystery overall. The female characters were hard to distinguish apart early in the book, names similar in the sense they were not typical names and lots of similar characteristics of the characters. Seems like the book was also pushing an agenda of diversity along with the mystery. Diversity of race, gender and sexual preference all played parts, this is probably not surprising because I am guessing this is still a major issue at most universities. I know it was 20 plus years ago when I was in college, finding qualified minority candidates for professor positions was something it seemed universities were really looking for. I just thought it a little surprising in this book since this department had 2 lesbians, 3 for 4 females, a Latino male and 2 white male professors--maybe more in dept but that was all that were really brought up. Other than lacking a black professor it seems the dept was already very diverse. The black female candidate had sterling credentials so hiring her should be a no brainer but of course that was one of the main undercurrents to the murder mystery going on. The other candidate was a white female lesbian dating the dept chairperson, which really seems like a conflict of interest of major proportions that never got mentioned, which I also thought was interesting. Oh well overall an okay to good read.

I have posted it on PBS, it is the 2nd copy on the system. There had been no copies on the system until just 2 or 3 days ago, I was hoping it would be the only copy so it might move sooner. I have a feeling it might be sitting for a long time but who knows I have been surprised before about what moves.

I am still reading The Passage and have gotten past 400 pages read and moving steadily. I have also started The White Queen and only around 50 pages in. Not sure if I will start a 3rd book tonight or wait a day or two. I will probably sit in my reading room and look around at what I should read next & then decide. This was my 5th straight book of under 300 pages, I have stuck to shorter books since I have been reading The Passage which has taken just far too long for me to get through.