Naked in death (in death #1) (nudez mortal [Portuguese])

By Nora Roberts:

Images.gr-assets.com. (n.d.). [online] Available at: https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1462140609l/30070295.jpg [Accessed 30 Dec. 2016].

Novel first published in July 1995. It was my first meeting with a crime novel by Nora Roberts. It's a very nice novel, because it mixes the typical police literature with a love story. But do not underestimate the author as police writer! Nora Roberts is very good at imagining crime scenes and suspense. The novel is written in a future age, but without eccentricities.
Some quotes from this first book of the «In death» series, preceding «Glory in death», by the pseudonym J. D. Robb:

• «"(...) She told me once she'd never planned on making a career out of professional sex. She'd only gotten into it to make her family crazy. But then, after she got into it, she decided she liked it." (...) "So she stayed in the life, and killed two birds with one fuck. (...)"»
• «Eve hated funerals. She detested the rite human beings insisted on giving death. (...). There might be a God. She hadn't completely ruled such things out. And if there were, she thought, It must have enjoyed a good laugh over Its creations' useless rituals and passages.»
• «I hate to wast time», Roarke said.
• «"(...) Some men find the cool, disinterested, and understated attractive. Makes them think you're deep. (...)"», Mavis said, Eve's friend.
• «"So how did you get rich?" She asked him./"Various ways." (...).», Roarke replied./«"Name one."», Eve requested./«"Desire" (...).», Roarcke said./«"Not good enough." (...) "Most people want to be rich."», Eve said.»/«"They do not want  it enough. To fight for it. To take risks for it."», he aswered.
• «(...) She didn't have your thoroughness, Eve, your control, nor your enviable concentration.», Roarke said.
• «And it was terrifying to realize she believed him, and not be sure, not be absolutely certain if she believed because she needed to.»
• «"(...) The most obvious would be the subject could find her self-worth only in sexual skill. She either enjoyed or detested the act."/(...). "If she detested it, why would she become a pro?"/"To punish."/"Herself?"/"Certainly, and those close to her."»
• «"Whatever we've done in genetic engineering, in vitro, with social programs, we still can't control basic human failings: violence, lust, envy."/"The seven deadly sins."»
• «That was the biggest problem with getting used to someone, she thought. You were lonely when they weren't there.»

As pequenas memórias (Portuguese) (small memories)

By José Saramago:

Bibliblogue.files.wordpress.com. (2016). [online] Available at: https://bibliblogue.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/500_9789722118316_as_pequenas_memorias.jpg [Accessed 11 Dec. 2016].

It is an interesting memoir of a sad man, who bitterly mourns his youth of poverty. No man should be saddened by his past. All that Saramago lived was beautiful, unique, and he should feel proud.

Some passages from the book:

• «Let yourself be carried by the child you were.», by The Portuguese King Dom Duarte, in «O leal conselheiro [Portuguese] (The loyal counselor)».
• The parents of Saramago:

Propor.esccb.pt. (2016). .:: ProPor .::. José Saramago ::.. [online] Available at: http://propor.esccb.pt/saramago/saramago_biobiblio.htm [Accessed 11 Dec. 2016].

• Village of Azinhaga and the river Almonda, Golegã, Santarém:

6.fotos.web.sapo.io. (2016). [online] Available at: http://6.fotos.web.sapo.io/i/B4e0876c0/19812430_GfzW7.jpeg [Accessed 11 Dec. 2016].

Grandeturismo.com. (2016). [online] Available at: http://www.grandeturismo.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/IMG_9480.jpg [Accessed 11 Dec. 2016].

• Saramago with his mother, at the door of the ground-floor house where he was born, in Azinhaga:

Propor.esccb.pt. (2016). .:: ProPor .::. José Saramago ::.. [online] Available at: http://propor.esccb.pt/saramago/saramago_biobiblio.htm [Accessed 11 Dec. 2016].

• «Only I knew, unaware that I knew it, that (...) it had been written that I would still have to return to Azinhaga to finish being born.»
• «For each olive tree plucked, the European Community paid a premium to landowners, mostly large landlords, (...).»
• «It is now said that it is returning to plant olive trees, but of those that, for many years that live, will always be small. They grow faster and the olives are easily picked.»
• «This loss, however, has long ceased to cause me suffering because, by the reconstructive power of memory, I can raise its white walls at every instant, (...).»
• Olive grove:

Pakandl, P. (2016). [online] Emforma.net. Available at: http://www.emforma.net/imagens/olival.jpg [Accessed 15 Dec. 2016].

• «(...) the dense forest of tamarins, (...)»:

Lepidoptera.butterflyhouse.com.au. (2013). Australian Tamaricaceae. [online] Available at: http://lepidoptera.butterflyhouse.com.au/plants/tama/tamaricaceae.html [Accessed 16 Dec. 2016].

• Fagus:

Depositphotos, I. (2016). Feuilles de hêtre à grandes feuilles d'automne. [online] Depositphotos. Available at: http://fr.depositphotos.com/4203704/stock-photo-fall-leaves-of-american-beech.html [Accessed 17 Dec. 2016].

• Ash trees:

ArbreMons, (2011). Panoramio - Photo of Fraxinus angustifolia. [online] Panoramio.com. Available at: http://www.panoramio.com/photo/55469768 [Accessed 17 Dec. 2016].

• Populus alba L.:

Bico, M. (2014). Panoramio - Photo of Choupo ou Álamo (Populus alba L.), Jardim Botânico de Almada/ Casa da Cerca, Almada, Portugal. [online] Panoramio.com. Available at: http://www.panoramio.com/photo/108318215 [Accessed 17 Dec. 2016].

• «(...) the Paul de Boquilobo, a lake, a swamp, a marsh that the landscape maker had forgotten to take to paradise.»:

Visitportugal.com. (2013). Reserva Natural do Paul do Boquilobo. [online] Available at: https://www.visitportugal.com/pt-pt/NR/exeres/939FE05F-5E3C-47BC-8E2C-9E0E7B63F2E0 [Accessed 17 Dec. 2016].

• Blackberry bush:

Xavier, J. (2010). As amoras silvestres. [online] As plantas. Available at: https://asplantas.wordpress.com/2010/09/29/as-amoras-silvestres/ [Accessed 17 Dec. 2016].

• «(...) to listen to (...) the silence of the forest broken only by the tweet of the birds and the ranger of the branches under the impulse of the wind, (...)»
• The morass:

Cm-santarem.pt. (2016). Caracterização Ambiental. [online] Available at: http://www.cm-santarem.pt/concelho/caracterizacaodoconcelho/Paginas/ambiental.aspx [Accessed 17 Dec. 2016].

• «(...) weeping willow which grow in water, they aren't, one might say, a special justification in an age such as ours, in which, at five or six years of age, any child of the civilized world, even sedentary and indolent, (...) has already decimated the terrifying exercise of mechanical dragons awaiting the gold of Fort Knox, has already blown the king of tyrannosaurs to pieces.»:

park, S. (2016). Willow tree in park. [online] Dreamstime.com. Available at: https://www.dreamstime.com/stock-photo-willow-tree-park-image15383980 [Accessed 17 Dec. 2016].

• Fig tree (Ficus):

INTERIORES, R. (2016). ÁRVORE: FIGUEIRA. [online] Rwpaisagismo.blogspot.pt. Available at: http://rwpaisagismo.blogspot.pt/2012/12/arvore-figueira.html [Accessed 20 Dec. 2016].

• «Very little, in fact, but it is very likely that the heroic winner of tyrannosaurus would not even be able to catch a gecko at hand.»
• «Uncle António Barata did not spend saliva in circumlocutions, metaphors and periphrases, he called him silly directly, with all the letters. (...) Leandro (...) was dyslexic.»
• «(...) the most primitive of the refreshments that have already passed through my throat: a mixture of water, vinegar and sugar, (...).»
• «(...) many hours spent in vain (in vain, to tell the truth, none, because, without my realizing it, I was "fishing" things that would not be less important to me in the future, images, smells, sounds, breezes, sensations).»
• «In fact, child cruelty has no limits (this is the underlying reason not to have them also that of adults).»
• «(...) and two little drawers on the sides, full of odds and ends that were of no use and were going from one year to the other without visible changes of content.»
• «((...) in those days, "returning to penates" meant simply "returning home").»
• «I was 10 years old, but I read plainly, and I understood perfectly what I read, besides I do not make, at such a young age, too many spelling mistakes, which, by the way, is no merit worthy of a medal in that time.»