About Murder at Irish Mensa....
"Can brains do what police procedure cannot? Read this unusual tale of a tree surgeon
working sleuthing between energy spent looking for a new house and tending her duties
as organiser of the meeting to find the answer. You'll enjoy the ride."
Larry Winebrenner, author of the
Henri Derringer Mysteries
"This book had everything I like: cats; an unusual, feisty female; a (subtle) romantic
element; an interesting set of problems; a modicum of esoteric knowledge; gentle
humour; and a realistic characterisation of the sorts of people I tend to hang out with
myself.... It was the perfect weekend relaxation."
Francesca on Amazon.
"At first, I thought a Mensa was some kind of Irish cultural festival until I kept reading
and realized it meant super-smart people who could do things like solve puzzles in
flight magazines. The author did a fine job describing the heroine, Cara - I sympathized
with her need to find a home, love of cats and horses. A good read!"
Nancy Jill Thames on Goodreads.
"I am glad I found this author and that I read her Irish cozy mystery on days surrounding
March 17. I enjoyed both the writing and the story, and I even got part of the mystery
solved on my own, something I almost never do. This, however, did not lessen my reading
pleasure, since I was having fun learning more about the characters and getting a glimpse
of the way the story unfolded.I will certainly look to read the rest of the books in this
Mensa mystery series sometime soon."
Charlene on Goodreads.
"Great for teachers of gifted education who love reading.
A murder mystery, travels around Dublin, a MENSA meeting with members from different
counties, and police gathering clues all make for an entertaining read. The solution is
puzzling and it takes even MENSA members some time to problem solve. The story keeps
you guessing until the very end. I learned more about sight seeing around Dublin, too.
I like this book as it describes and advocates for understanding of gifted people.
I taught gifted education and was smiling at the jokes and comments about the subject."
Carolyn Wilhelm,
Goodreads
About Murder at Scottish Mensa...
"Murder at Scottish Mensa by Clare O'Beara is the second in the Mensa Mystery series.
Cara Cassidy is a member of Irish Mensa, an international high IQ society. She and her
boyfriend, Mike Fraser--also a Mensa member, attend a Mensa Weekend event in
Scotland. While there, Cara is accosted by Danny Dreffin, who is later found dead.
Mike had had a confrontation with Danny after hearing what had happened with Cara, <
and becomes the number one suspect in the murder. Cara, Mike, and others in Mensa
become involved in investigating the death to clear Mike's name.
I enjoyed this one as much as the first in the series, and look forward to reading more."
Marj's Mysteries 2014 Around the World Challenge.
About Murder at Dublin Mensa...
Mystery set in a very wealthy part of Dublin, sort of an Embassy row, with wealthy, older
families mingled in. Cara is a member of Mensa, but that doesn't seem important to the
plot - except, of course, that Cara is a smart, confident cookie. As a tree surgeon, she
sees things that others don't, and her friend Rick, asks her to see what she can find out
about the death of an elderly woman in one of the homes there. Cara ends up solving the
mystery, which puts her in great peril... A good read.
By Liz Marshall - Amazon
"I absolutely LOVE this series!!! I somehow missed #3 and read #4 first, but it really
doesn't matter with this series as all of the books are wholly separate and tell a story
all on their own. It's just that some of the characters are in all the books, and there
might be little things that go from one book to the next, but not enough to detract or
leave you feeling like you missed something. A good read, and challenging to see how
it will all play out and how the MENSA characters use their added intelligence to help
solve the crime(s). I would highly recommend this series to most of my reading friends
as most if not all are probably MENSA candidates themselves..."
Kay Compton, Goodreads
"As a writer and avid reader of crime stories, as well as lifelong scholar of criminal
justice I was incredibly eager to read this book. I have to say that
‘Murder in Dublin Mensa’ exceeded my expectations by being quite unique in many
ways.The storyline is smooth, realistic, adventurous, and full of mystery solved by a
non-detective character named Cara. The interactions between Cara and police
officer Ricky Norton are presented in a creative yet down-to-earth way.
Descriptive language painted a vivid and captivating picture that drew me in and
kept my attention all the way through. “Houses like that in Dublin are bound to be
preserved so you can’t slot in new Wavin plastic gutters and drainpipes, they’ll
have to be authentic iron.” I especially enjoyed blended information presented in
this work that both keeps the reader’s interest and shows Ireland as a beautiful land
of mystery simultaneously."
Snjezana Marinkovic, Author of
Born in Sarajevo, If, My Dawn
"The third Mensa mystery lives up to the first two... Read it!"
Francesca on Amazon
About Murder at Wicklow Mensa...
"This book was a great trip behind the scenes in Ireland. It highlights several slices
of life and many different groups of people there. We get to see inside the lives of
an office worker, police officer, porno actress, artist, small business owner, and drug <
dealer just to name a few. We even get to see a group of Dubliners take a trip to a
Mexican restaurant...
Cara’s connection with each individual made the story come to life as each
conversation with a new person helped her to piece together the mystery and locate
the killer... I would highly recommend this book to mystery lovers, food lovers
and anyone who is interested in traveling to or learning about another country."
Laura Miller on Goodreads.
"The neighbors of a man who hasn't been seen in several days, and who's known to be a
diabetic and supposed to be alone in his house, ask the police to perform a welfare
check. They recruit tree surgeon Cara Cassidy to enter an upstairs window, which will
keep them from having to destroy a locked door or lower window; once in the house, Cara
discovers evidence that a violent crime has been committed. And so the mystery begins..
I've enjoyed all five books in this series. As another reviewer here says, they're full
of varied and interesting sketches of life in contemporary Ireland. The characters are
well drawn -- even the very minor ones are recognizable individuals, and the major
characters are so three-dimensional that I now feel I know them and want to learn even
more about them. As in the other books, the mystery in this one, and its solution, are
believable and satisfying. I was especially impressed, here, by the way O'Beara lets us
know how horrific the murder is without actually showing the scene OR telling us what's
happened; we see, hear, and smell only what Cara sees, hears, and smells, and that's
enough to engage our imaginations."
M. Thornburg on Amazon
"I really enjoyed this one, and it took me longer to read than the usual books I read,
as it was way over 400 pages! Still, never bogged down or got boring, and the
mystery had plenty of twists and turns to keep it interesting. This is currently
the last
of the Irish Mensa books, and I am fervently hoping that Ms O'Beara will be adding
to the series again soon. What a wonderful and challenging read this series is - it
keeps me interested and the characters are all extremely interesting because their
high intelligence has them thinking outside the box in a lot of novel ways. It also has
me thinking of finding out about MENSA for myself..."
Kay Compton, Goodreads
About Murder Around the Clock...
"Remember gravel roads and horses being common in pastures? From the vantage point of
a former National Show Jumper Champion, the author reminisces while helping a friend
at a huge horse show (famous in Dublin) for a very good reason. She is trying to put
herself in the shoes of how life would have been when a teen goes missing. Or was it
murder? Comparing and contrasting how there were no cell phones and other conveniences
then, how could someone still find clues over 30 years later? DNA could be used if
anything was found where it might still be there --- but it looks like, no, nothing can
be found. Until a situation arises where a cell phone helps locate a kidnap victim. Fast
read and enjoyable. I like the details and explanations about horses, horse shows, and
life then and now."
Carolyn Wilhelm,
Goodreads
About the Dining Out Around the Solar System series
"This is an amazing quartet of tales about a couple of young men in a near-future alternate London.
They come from tough backgrounds, but everybody does in this future London, where corporations rule
everything. Working as feature writers for a hugely popular e-zine, they use hacking skills, kindness,
and personal charm to make themselves the team to watch, befriending people from other worlds and
uncovering plots and prejudices that make real differences in the lives of those they touch. This
series is witty, erudite, thoughtful, and very, very funny. There are digressions into how the
near-future works, and the truth is that it's a lot like what's happening in our world, with the
interesting assumptions that other worlds are populated and space travel is easy. I've read the
series several times now and find new things to enjoy every time. I can only imagine that there
hasn't been a lot of publicity for these books, because I recommend them to everybody that reads
SF, and everybody that reads them says the same thing - they're fantastic, in several senses of the word."
Beth Ayers,
Amazon
About Dining Out Around the Solar System Part 1...
"I am delighted to learn of this author — looks like I will not have to search for books until I
finish these. This book is the first one I have read and loved it!"
Carolyn Wilhelm,
Goodreads
About Dining Out Around the Solar System...
"The first good thing about what amounted to a whole week of reading (three or four
hours a day) is that the writing is elegant and easy on the eye. Each character
(every last one of them) is beautifully deep, and has a life outside the immediate
story… And Clare O’Beara writes it like a dream: Donal is an English Lit graduate
of Cambridge and Trinity Dublin, and it shows…
The climax is epic, wondrous, and beautifully executed. But she just couldn’t stop
there; she had to finish it off with another beautifully lyrical description of
life in the modern solar system."
Jemima Pett, Author of
The Princelings of the East
Link to full review.
"There's lots of pleasant surprises in store for you in this thoughtful, at times ultra-
cynical, fantasy excursion into the not so very far into the future dystopian society
of the UK and Eire....
This is high concept fantasy that does science in an holistic and well-researched
manner that takes you to unexpected places in the human spirit, whether that
resides in the breast of a native of London, or Dublin, or Mercury,
or Mars, or Saturn...
Well-written and observed, Clare O'Beara brings her considerable experience as
a journalist to bear in conjuring a totally believable future multicultural society with
bells (and knobs) on... This is a subtle meandering burn of a book with a gentle
but inexorable stranglehold on the suspense that pulls no punches for realism,
whether or not that's politically incorrect. The A-word causes a world of pain for
both our heroes, but they stick at it, and so should you, because the rewards are
all threaded through the whole and, most definitely, there in the ending.
Highly recommended for all those who don't need ray guns (or any guns much)
at regular intervals in their intellectual fantasy thrillers."
Jan Hawke,
Goodreads
"Dining Out Around the Solar System, by Clare O’Beara, follows the story of Donal,
who, along with his best friend Myron, grows from a teen with a love of books, into
an important investigative journalist. His published stories dig ever deeper into the
political morass of Great Britain’s underpinnings, making life for the friends dangerous.
Donal is a nascent hacker and novelist, living in the London of an alternative future,
where humans have discovered sentient beings on every other planet in the Solar
System and trade with other planets is starting to flourish. O’Beara’s writing is
approachable and well-researched.
If you enjoy suspense stories with science fiction twists, I believe you will find
Dining Out Around the Solar System by Clare O’Beara to be your five-star cup of tea."
DS Kane, Author of
Swiftshadow, DeathByte, GreyNet
"The title hooked me into reading a little. The story hooked me into reading a lot—
the whole book, in fact. What was so interesting? First, I’m a Yank and O’Beara is a
Brit (Irish, actually), so I enjoyed the exposure to the King’s (Queen’s?) English and
its unusual (to me) idioms, phrases, words, and misspellings (wink).
Second, Clare O’Beara knows a LOT about London, books, journalism, and people.
She skilfully worked much of her knowledge into the story, making it interesting and
entertaining. Third, the story is science fiction with hardly any science to muddle
through. There are aliens, but they’re natives of our Sun’s other planets and relate to
one another about as well as we Earthlings do. The social problems resulting from
that mixture allowed O’Beara to suggest some daring solutions from her fertile
imagination. Last, the story is clean — of editing errors, which I hate, but also clean
in the other sense. There’s some sex, but not explicit, and the language is appropriate
for all readers YA and older."
SF Writer, Amazon
"It is a sci-fi story in which characters, interactions, social themes, romance, and action
all dominate the "sci" part. The two main characters are Londoners, one from Ireland
and the other from the Caribbean. In this story the aliens do not come from distant
solar systems, but from our own 8 planets (plus Pluto). The "suspension of disbelief",
required for any sci-fi story that isn't a science textbook, mainly involves not
questioning how human-like life could have evolved on the planets that we are familiar
with. The resulting story makes this well worthwhile.
Some of the action scenes are generated as some of the articles offend high ranking
government and criminal entities who retaliate, and with various hate groups who don't
like aliens. Another aspect of the story is a rich set of many well-drawn characters
and bit players with believable interactions. It is easy to like (or dislike) the characters,
but almost none of them are the kind of wallpaper figures that typically make up most
sci-fi stories."
Systemguy on Amazon