GREAT READS FOR NOVEMBER, 2013

The Good Lord Bird, by James McBride

The Good Lord Bird – so rare and beautiful that should anyone be fortunate to see one, they immediately exclaimed ‘Good Lord!’  - was a member of the woodpecker family in mid- 19^th century America.  It was also adopted as a good omen by Captain John Brown, fanatical anti-slavery campaigner and founder of a ragtag ‘army’ formed to bring freedom by fair means or foul to the Hapless Negro.  Brown was absolutely certain of the righteousness of his cause and its eventual success because God was on his side;  God directed his every thought and deed:  even if it involved theft and murder, the noble end justified the basest means - which brings me to reflect that if Captain Brown had been born in medieval times he would have been canonised, as so many Catholic saints were, their piety and martyrdom overshadowing any dark deeds committed in furthering their Great Work.

In Mr McBride’s superb story of Brown’s last violent attack against the evils of slavery he recreates Brown’s strength and power – and madness, as seen through the eyes of Henry, a negro child kidnapped/freed by Brown from a lowly tavern in Kansas.  Because of his small build Henry is immediately mistaken for a girl and christened Henrietta, and because he is a shrewd, clever little boy he decides that it would be politic to keep up with the charade, for these wild-eyed abolitionists are touchy varmints, some frighteningly ugly and all armed to the teeth.  He wants to go home, home to his master, Dutch Henry!  Dutch wasn’t so bad as slave owners go;  Henry always got fed and had a place to sleep.  Being free with Captain Brown is not half so secure;  most of the time The Old Man’s fellow zealots do not eat unless they can find something to hunt or steal, and winter is coming on.  Sifting through peoples’ garbage for scraps is not uncommon.  Henry plans to flee back to slavery and a steady diet as soon as possible but true to form, plans and circumstances inevitably change.

Henry’s reluctant adventures with The Old Man and a host of wonderful supporting players are uproarious and unforgettable, especially as he falls in lust not once but twice, and has increasing difficulty disguising the very obvious fact that ‘the sap is rising’.

He goes on a tour of the northeastern cities with The Old Man to raise funds for The War on Slavery and is amazed at the outrage and disgust that good folk feel towards the bondage of the Negro, but what puzzles him most is that ‘everybody got to make a speech about the Negro but the Negro.’  His brothers in the Free Northern States are conspicuous by their absence, their reluctance to be involved.

As all students of American history will know, John Brown eventually planned his ill-fated war against slavery by attacking the Armoury at Harper’s Ferry Virginia with a view to taking weapons and hostages, then fleeing with hundreds of ‘freed’ negroes to the Allegheny mountains which he considered impregnable against attack because of steep, narrow passes that needed fewer men to defend.

And as history tells us, he failed mightily, in spite of the nobility of his motives and the greatness of his cause:  his ‘negro army’ never materialised, thanks to inept planning, procrastination and misunderstanding.  His raid on the Armoury at Harper’s Ferry brought about the deaths of many, including his own by hanging on December 2 1859 – but not before he passed on his Good Lord bird feather to Henry before his death, firmly convinced that it was still an omen of good things to come for the Negro, if not now, then in the future.  And he was right:  within a year, the American Civil War had started.  The Cause was joined.  Emancipation was four years distant.

Mr McBride has proved in previous works his literary worth:  in ‘The Good Lord Bird’ he shows yet again his prodigious writing skills, breathing wonderful life into characters and events that fractured and changed a great nation.  Madman, hero, Saint:  John Brown’s body lays a-mouldering in the grave, but his truth still marches on.  Hallilujah!  This is a great book.

A Man of his Own, by Susan Wilson

Ms Wilson’s story begins with a great quotation from Corey Ford:

 ‘ Every dog should have a man of his own.  There is nothing like a well-behaved person around the house to spread the dog’s blanket for him, or bring him his supper when he comes home man-tired at night.’

Amen to that!  Ms Wilson must love dogs very much – she seems to specialise in books that involve our Best Animal Friend (see November 2010 review below). As every dog owner knows, they can have no truer friend, no ally more staunch, and no pet to love them with more selflessness than a dog. This story demonstrates beautifully the vital connection between man and canine and the bond formed between an aspiring baseball pitcher and a stray puppy he found at the back of a tavern in 1938, and his inability to turn his back on his new responsibility.  Rick Stanton manages to further his baseball career, look after his new friend Pax and meet his future beloved human companion, Francesca.  Life is happy indeed for all three – until the Japanese attack Pearl Harbour on December 7, 1941 and the United States declares war on Japan and the Axis powers. The world has intervened in the Stanton’s lives, irrevocably changing their carefully laid plans and goals – Rick is drafted into the Army, and Francesca goes to work in a wire factory for everyone must ‘do their bit’. Even Pax is volunteered for duty as a War Dog after Francesca sees a magazine advertisement for intelligent pets to be considered for the newly formed K-9 force:  the right candidates will be used as scouts, casualty dogs, messengers and sentries in the theatre of war and will be returned home to their owners at the end of the war – if they survive.

Rick fights his war with courage and fortitude but pays a terrible price in the defense of his country:  his dream of being opening pitcher for the Boston Braves will never be realised for he sustains terrible wounds in a German ambush;  his injuries bring him home but destroy forever he and his wife’s dreams of having a family.

Pax the War Dog also returns home – with his handler, a young man who has never had anything or anyone to love in his short life until he entered the army and applied to be a dog handler:  Keller Nicholson is saddled with the task of returning his beloved Pax to the dog’s owners – he toys with the idea of just running off with Pax, his devoted companion, but that would be dishonourable:  he must see the Stantons and inform them that he needs the dog more than they do.  Until he meets them, and realises that their need for Pax is greater than his own.  Rick is a paraplegic;  his pitching arm has been blown off and he is plunged into depression;  Francesca is valiantly trying to be Supercaregiver but is not physically equipped for the task;  Keller cannot bear to leave Pax, so suggests that he could do the ‘heavy lifting’ of Rick that Francesca cannot:  the ideal solution, one would think.  The Stantons gain an aide and Keller gets to stay with his beloved canine partner.  A win-win situation.

But it isn’t.  Ms Wilson charts the waters of the psychological horrors of war with great skill;  her characters are always credible, and while her coverage of the war is sketchy (to say the least!) her account of the terrible, lasting damage that war inflicts on those at home as well as those who fight is poignant and real.  For want of a better description, this novel is a real heartwarmer, and I defy anyone not to shed a tear at the end.

ONE GOOD DOG, by Susan Wilson

I have been reading a lot of very mediocre stuff lately;  consequently it was a pleasure, a DELIGHT, to come across this lovely story by Susan Wilson.  This is her sixth novel and the first I have read – it’s strongly reminiscent of Garth Stein’s wonderful ‘The Art of Racing in the Rain’ in that part of the story is narrated by the Good Dog of the title, but there the similarity ends, for Chance is very different to Stein’s Enzo;  in fact he fancies himself as a bit of a dude, an ex-fighting dog and a mighty street warrior with pit-bull ancestry  – until he ends up in the pound on Death Row.  He is rescued, albeit reluctantly, by Adam March, who because of a careless promise he made, needs to find a dog as a substitute pet for a homeless man he doles out lunch to everyday  at a shelter for indigents.  Adam, by his own standards has hit the bottom of the barrel, too:  he is a former top executive of a huge corporation who loses everything –carefully sculpted wife, spoilt daughter, several homes, the bulk of his money and social status – when he strikes his P.A in a fit of uncontrollable rage. He is sentenced by a spectacularly unsympathetic judge to a year’s community service at the shelter.  ‘You’re an arrogant bastard who needs to learn some humility’, says the judge, and this is what this book is about:  learning to be humble, learning to redeem oneself, learning to make real friends, and learning to love again.  It’s definitely a feel-good novel and in the hands of a lesser author these themes would seem chintzy and old-hat, but Ms Wilson’s considerable writing talents chronicle Chance and Adam’s experiences together in entirely credible fashion.  Highly recommended.              

LAST GREAT READS FOR OCTOBER, 2013

Emperor of Thorns, by Mark Lawrence

Here is the final book of Mr Lawrence’s mighty trilogy chronicling the life of Honorous Jorg Ancrath, scion of one of the cruellest kings of the Broken Empire, all that is left of Europe after a terrible war wrought nuclear destruction a thousand years ago.  (See ‘Prince of Thorns’ review below).

Jorg has not improved as a person since we left him bloody but victoriously enthroned at Renar four years ago; despite gaining a wife and baby son he is still intent on furthering his ambition, be it power or revenge, by any means possible.  Honour and scruples are for weaker individuals, those who lack the heart to stand against him:  so far in his short life he has been able to out think and outwit all his adversaries, as much by his almost suicidal courage as an obstinate and unstoppable instinct always to do the opposite if someone tells him ‘no’.

In his latest epic adventure he has great enemies to conquer, and a huge prize to win – to be crowned Emperor at the Congression of Vyene, held every four years to see if there is one amongst the various kings of the continent who is worthy of such power.  Jorg also dreams of killing his father (who tried to kill him) as slowly and painfully as possible.  As the king of Ancrath, dear old dad wields a lot of power with his vote, and his influence and contacts are legion.  It will be enormously satisfying to get rid of him at Vyene – and the sooner the better.

But.  As always the best-laid plans of mice and men oft go astray:  on his way to Vyene, Jorg encounters Chella, a necromancer he thought he’d vanquished;  she is now an agent of the fearsome King of the Dead.  He is also disarmed by the unexpected love he feels for his newborn son, so much so that he will murder any and all who mean his family harm.  He is much troubled by these alien feelings, for to Jorg they are fatal signs of weakness.  He should be able to sacrifice his family to his plans for his subjects without a backward glance – ‘it’s useless to save one unless you can save them all!’

And let us not forget the Builders, those shadowy, elusive ancestors who have left their mysterious traces throughout the Broken Empire – their avatars still remain, intent on finishing what they started with their nuclear war so long ago, and to defeat them Jorg must not lose the murder, hatred and evil in his heart, his very best weapons, even though those same weapons are poisoning his soul.  ‘We’re fashioned by our sorrows – not by joy – they are the undercurrent, the refrain.  Joy is fleeting’.

Remorse is catching up with Jorg.

I was very fortunate to be able to read ‘Prince of Thorns’ and ‘King of Thorns’ consecutively, but had to wait more than a year to read ‘Emperor’ – and that is a shame, for I lost the thread of the story, forgetting quite a bit of the detail in spite of Mr Lawrence’s helpful synopsis of the first two books;  consequently I became a bit mired and confused with the flashbacks, exciting though some of them were – in fact the plot became so convoluted and weighed down by scientific and mathematical mysteries that it lost its impetus for me.  (Doubtless there will be legions of readers for whom that erudition wouldn’t be difficult, but my dad made me leave school early, education being wasted on girls.  So there!)

Having said that, the plot picks up mightily when the assembled cast arrives at the Congression:  the action is heartstopping and the twist in the tale at the very end is masterly.  Mr Lawrence’s prose is stark, powerful and superb, as befits and describes his unforgettable anti-hero:  there is a wonderful poetry to his writing and it is a shrewd move to finish Jorg’s story leaving everyone wanting more – this reader hopes and expects that Mr Lawrence’s next work will be just as gripping.  And I hope we’ll see it soon.

Prince of Thorns, by Mark Lawrence

You read it here first:  What an adventure!  Mark Lawrence’s debut novel has all the requisite ingredients for the ideal fantasy – a wronged and vengeful hero, warring kingdoms, ghosts, necromancers, murders most foul, and a complete lack of honour, except amongst thieves.

At the tender age of nine, Prince Honorous Jorg Ancrath was forced to witness the slaughter of his mother and younger brother William by Count Renar of the Highlands and his troops.  If he expected his father the king to avenge their dreadful murders, he is sorely disappointed;  instead, the king negotiates compensation in the shape of land and horses for his loss.  Seeds of hatred and revenge are sown in the fertile ground of Jorg’s grief and heartbreak:  he takes to the road and joins a band of mercenaries and outlaws, and because he no longer cares if he lives or dies, he becomes their leader through sheer recklessness and a bravado that is fearless and suicidal – oh, Jorg has problems, alright – he has already lived five lifetimes and he’s only fourteen!

Mark Lawrence has created a rip-roaring, no-holds-barred, heart-in-the-mouth pageturner in this first book, and in spite of the reader knowing they shouldn’t believe a word of it, they are totally sucked in, swept along with the clever plot and more action than a body should rightly have to endure – oh, it’s great stuff, and this is just the first book of a Trilogy.  ‘King of Thorns’ is next, and a fascinating question for the reader is to figure out exactly the timeline in which Mr Lawrence has set his stories:  a vastly altered central Europe might be the setting, but who can be sure?  Everyone fights in armour with medieval weapons, but Jorg wears a wrist-watch!  (which doesn’t make an appearance till book two) – and he lets loose what seems suspiciously like a nuclear explosion halfway through book one.  I have come to the conclusion (I’m ashamed to say it took me a while) that Jorg’s story is set far into the future:  it’s possible that the world we knew has been destroyed for whatever terrible reason, and the regenerating human race hasn’t progressed beyond another Medieval Age in its attempts to survive.

Which all adds to this trilogy’s great appeal.  ‘ Prince of Thorns’ was a gripping read, but book two, ‘King of Thorns’ is even better.  Roll out book three!  Mark Lawrence isn’t just a good storyteller – he’s a great one.  Whatever I read next, this will be a hard act to follow.            

AND SOME MORE GREAT READS FOR OCTOBER, 2013

Dexter’s Final Cut, by Jeff Lindsay

Ah, Dexter.  Dark disciple of drastic solutions to dreadful problems;   lover of alliteration;   pseudo-pillar of society, proud possessor of wife and ready-made family and respected blood-spatter expert for the Miami Dade Police Department:  could the latest book in this excellent series (see November 2012 review below)  be Dexter’s final, fatal foray into murder and mayhem?

OK, I’ll stop right there with my attempts at alliteration – they’re not a patch on Mr Lindsay’s, but I do hope that this won’t be the final Dexter adventure.  If a cold-blooded, relentlessly efficient and remorseless killer can endear himself to millions of readers, then anti-hero Dexter is a riotous success, a total knock-out - because he’s funny.  And brilliant.  And up until now, entirely unable to feel any emotional response to anyone he knows, including his family.

When this story begins Dexter is just boogying along in the same old groove, going to work, going home to the family, and sometimes departing from the norm with late night trips to find a ‘playmate’, someone who has committed a terrible crime for which he cannot be punished by the law – until Dexter decides that it is time for the miscreant to sin no more.

Life is uneventful, until a new TV crime series starts filming in Miami, and Dexter and his grumpy sister Detective sergeant Deborah Morgan are seconded as technical advisers to the production, Deborah being the ‘inspiration’ for TV star Jackie Forrest’s character, and Dexter’s expertise in forensics as a guide for Robert Chase, former megastar who is nearing his use-by date.  Needless to say, the novelty of explaining his work to his handsome but dim pupil palls very quickly for Dexter;  besides, Robert (call me Robert, not Bob) doesn’t seem to have the stomach for the latest grisly murder, that of a young woman found savaged, raped and carved up in a dumpster.  Robert’s definitely a workplace hindrance but one that Dexter has to cart around like a large colicky baby – then another young woman is found, defiled in the same heinous way and disposed of in another dumpster, and when the third blonde corpse is discovered it becomes obvious that the beautiful Jackie Forrest has a stalker, one who is killing women who resemble her, and he states that she will be next.

Dexter, much against his wishes is nominated to be her bodyguard for the duration of the shoot;  wife Rita and children are told by Deborah that he is away on highly secret business and Dexter moves into Jackie Forrest’s luxury hotel suite.  Here the reader could be forgiven for expecting the action to proceed in an orderly predictable fashion, with Dexter, happy murderous beast that he is, finding and despatching the stalker in his usual efficient and clandestine way before Ms Forrest is attacked – or at a pinch, even after a nail-biting confrontation occurs – from which she is rescued, of course. 

Sadly, no.

Mr Lindsay shocks us all with the direction of the plot, for the unthinkable happens more than once:  Dexter discovers that his raisin of a heart is not completely dry – he starts to experience feelings.  And because these alien emotions confound him he is not his usual sharp, analytical self.  He makes several crucial mistakes, errors which have the reader screeching ‘For God’s sake, Dexter – pull yourself together.  Man up!’  But he doesn’t.  When the story ends he is fathoms deep in the darkest ordure ever, with no obvious way up, facing punishment for crimes that he didn’t commit.  Is Dexter doomed?  Will he survive to kill another day?

I can’t imagine that Mr Lindsay would pay any heed to the writer of a Library blog in far-off Hobbitland and her pleas for Dexter adventure # 8,  but what about all the other millions of Dexter fans out there?  It will be all Mr Lindsay’s fault if they get in a sulk, for he has created an unforgettable character in Dexter and his Dark Passenger, so much so that his literary demise is unimaginable.  I have no realistic idea how Mr Lindsay can resurrect Dexter from his impossible predicament, but I have faith.  I hope he doesn’t leave him in the shite for too long, though;  Dexter’s fastidiousness is legendary and the suspense will kill me!  Highly recommended.

The Dexter Novels, by Jeff Lindsay

For those who haven’t yet met Dexter, you’re in for a rare treat:  Dexter had a chaotic, dreadful childhood, so horrific that it engendered within him feelings of homicidal anger that could never be sublimated into any kind of force for good.  Fortunately for him, he was adopted into a good family and his foster-father was a policeman, tired, burnt-out by his job, and disgusted that so many of the really bad guys didn’t get the punishment that they deserved.  Harry the policeman recognises Dexter’s proclivities when he discovers Dexter’s secret cemetery of missing neighbourhood pets;  he also knows that Dexter won’t ever lose the killing urge, so decides to train him to use those urges only to dispatch the killers that society would do better without. 

‘Let’s get you squared-away, Dexter’, he says, and with the benefit of his excellent police training Harry turns Dexter into the ultimate killing machine for good – and how never, ever to get caught.

Oh, these books are SO enjoyable, especially as Dexter is such a complex character:  he freely acknowledges he is a monster;  he can’t feel emotion; (which comes in handy when he removes his victims – their pleading is useless);  he is handsome, witty and clever;  (he happily admits to this) he loves alliteration;  (dashing Dexter, daring Dexter, deadly Dexter, Devil-may-care Dexter etc.) and he has the perfect disguise for all his serial-killing:  he is a blood-spatter expert for the Miami Police Department.  Life is good!

Jeff Lindsay peoples his series with excellent minor characters;  Dexter’s Bull-at-a-Gate sister Deborah, a bona fide police detective who, unsurprisingly, has problems accepting what Dexter is, and Rita, Dexter’s girlfriend – who mystifies him with her devotion, her ability to speak sentences faster than he can process, and her two children, mysteriously silent little creatures who appear to communicate with each other telepathically but depend utterly  on our hero to stay with their mother and not desert them.  Dutiful Dexter.

And then there’s Sergeant Doakes:  it takes one to know one, as they say.  He’s on Dexter’s case, recognises the Beast Within because he has one of his own, and informs Dexter – often – that ‘Ah’m gonna get you, motherf*cker’.  Fair enough.  Sergeant Doakes gives Dexter a lot to think about.  Dithering Dexter.

Ah, this is a great series:  Mr. Lindsay has given us a unique new character in thriller fiction, and I wouldn’t miss a single one of his adventures.  Daring, dauntless, dreadful:    Dexter is DELICIOUS.

FIRST GREAT READS FOR OCTOBER, 2013

Abide with Me, by Sabin Willett

Here’s an ambitious undertaking:  a modern retelling of ‘Wuthering Heights’, Emily Bronte’s classic Gothic novel.  Those tragic lovers Heathcliff and Catherine Earnshaw are transformed into small town Vermont inhabitants Roy Murphy, ‘trailer-trash’, and Emma Herrick, beautiful daughter of the town’s first family.

In their teen years they spend an idyllic summer together before Emma departs for Yale and all the privileges her background affords.  Roy has no such glittering prospects on the horizon:  he has already been in juvenile detention, and is almost illiterate thanks to long absences from school.  His appearance leaves a lot to be desired, too – menacing and/or intimidating, take your pick – in fact any reader could be forgiven for wondering why the patrician Emma would waste even a glance in his direction, but there you go;  it’s that old animal magnetism, that ‘opposites attract’ theory proven true yet again that has Emma ensnared – but only for the summer, she thinks.  Yale will be her release from this obsession that enslaves them both, and Roy has joined the Army, so the affair will die a natural death.

But it doesn’t.  Roy endures a baptism of fire in Afghanistan;  always so solitary in the past, he learns to depend on and enjoy the fellowship of his colleagues, and for the first time relies on them to have his back, as he has theirs.  He suffers pain, terror and unimaginable loss during his time at Firebase Montana, but throughout he is sustained by his memories of his beautiful summer with Emma, the best summer of his young life:  he has to survive so that he can return to his great love, for those were his last words to her:  ‘I will come back’ -   spoken to someone who was enormously relieved that he was leaving so that she could end family horror at her uncharacteristic behaviour, and pursue her own ambitions for a life that did not include Roy.

Mr Willett paces his story well.  He has an excellent ear for dialogue and idiom and has created some great minor characters among the town’s inhabitants,  enlisting them as a kind of a Greek Chorus to relate and comment upon the unfolding tragedy of Roy’s eventual homecoming.

For return he does, to find that Emma has found another and all he has left are his memories.  This time they provide no solace and single minded determination turns to vengeful obsession, wreaking predictable and terrible results.

It is no easy task (and some would consider it an affront) to transform a singular and much-loved classic into a modern story that relies heavily on 21^st century events, but Mr Willett succeeds, capturing the essence of Heathcliff and Cathy and effortlessly clothing them in their new contemporary lives to thrill the reader once more.  What a fine writer he is.  Miss Bronte would be pleased.  Highly recommended.

The Heist, by Janet Evanovich and Lee Goldberg

I have been a devoted fan of Ms Evanovich and her bungling bounty hunter Stephanie Plum (not to mention Stephanie’s sidekick ,former ‘Ho Lula, now an inept filing clerk but magnificently unaware of her shortcomings:  what a neat character!) since ‘One for the Money’.  Ms Evanovich has now reached # 20 in the series, the latest being ‘Takedown Twenty’, a treat I have yet to enjoy.  In between times, she tries her hand with other characters and now she has teamed up with Lee Goldberg (so sorry, Mr Goldberg – despite the stellar qualifications you enjoy in the book jacket notes you are a man of mystery to me) to produce a new set of ongoing characters in ‘The Heist’, the story of goodies and baddies collaborating in an uneasy partnership to catch the ultimate Ponzi schemer, an investment banker who has skipped the U.S.A. with $500 million.  His whereabouts are now unknown.

All very well and good:  the bones of the plot are sound.  the FBI figure that it takes a conman to know one and help them apprehend Mr Banker, so make a deal with Nick Fox, a crook they have just jailed, thanks to the determined -  not to say obsessive - efforts of their agent Kate O’Hare to Bring Him to Justice:  a phony escape is arranged and Mr Fox makes his getaway as part of the deal.  The only fly in the ointment is that no-one kept Agent O’Hare in the loop:  she is dancing with rage – puce with it, and decides that that S.O.B. is not going to get away from her.  He is not going to outsmart her.  Even if she has to kill him she will bring him back alive!

Fair enough.  The only problem is the writing.  The first chapters are just about the klunkiest things in print:  Agent Kate is slim, trim,  an ex-Navy seal, trained to a standstill in myriad different ways to kill.  Naturally, she is blonde and possesses sparkling blue eyes.  As an added bonus her Dad is also an ex intel operative, with favours owed to him all over the globe from his many secret missions on behalf of the U.S.  He rescues her a lot, which is good because it keeps his clandestine skills honed and besides, it gets him out of the house.

Nick Fox is charming, irrepressible and a lover of the high life.  Naturally, he has windswept brown hair, dark brown eyes and a lazy smile.  And formidable, crooked skills that enable him to pull off breathtaking crimes of absurdity.  Just like real life!

The only requirement to make all this silliness work is that the writing must be credible – and seamless, and that doesn’t happen until at least chapter six, before which it is almost possible to tell when either or is saying, ‘well, you can have a turn now’.  Because I am so familiar with Ms Evanovich’s style it was pretty easy to work out when she was at the helm, and as always, the minor characters are great fun, and fans of hers take heart:  there are twenty seven more chapters to go and it does get better.  Despite the wild plotting (including lightning fast trips to Greece, Berlin, Bali and other more remote Indonesian islands, where Agent Kate’s Dad gets to quote geographical info about each destination with Wikipedia-like ease – oh, the joys of cutting and pasting!) Nick and Kate Get Their Man, no-one gets rubbed out except the bad guys, and Kate’s dad has so much time away from home that he’s looking forward to his former life as an Old Fart.

It’s a sure thing that a sequel will be planned; I just hope that by the time it appears, all the rough edges of this new partnership will have disappeared and what was a fun concept becomes a great series.     

    

VERY LAST GREAT READS FOR SEPTEMBER, 2013

The Silver Star, by Jeannette Walls

Jeannette Walls is justly renowned for her wonderful memoir ‘The Glass Castle’, and her novelised version of her Grandmother’s life ‘Half Broke Horses’ (see February 2010 review below):  her third book is fiction, concentrating on the lives of two sisters, Liz and Jean Holladay, and their attempts to make a decent life for themselves – they are convinced that they can;  that nothing can bring them down – as long as they stay together.

They are the daughters of two different fathers.  Their mother Charlotte is a self-professed free spirit, going where the road takes her as a backup singer, songwriter and guitarist.  When the story starts 12 year old Jean, always nicknamed Bean, and 15 year old Liz are waiting patiently for their mother to return from several days away in Los Angeles looking for recording work.  They are used to her absences and can look after themselves reasonably well – for a time, until a series of adversities make Charlotte decide that she should have some  solo headspace ‘to get herself back on the right creative and spiritual track’ so that eventually they can continue being a merry ‘tribe of three’, for who needs anyone else when they have each other?  She just needs a little break. 

Except that Bean and Liz know that they don’t have their mother at all:  they can only depend on themselves, and when the authorities start taking an interest, they embark on the only plan they can think of:  a bus trip to Virginia where Charlotte’s estranged family live – the only relatives they know about for Charlotte would never discuss the girls’ fathers except to say that one was a wastrel and the other was ‘beneath her’.

Liz’s resourcefulness enables them to make the arduous journey from California to Virginia, there to arrive unannounced at the ancestral home and find that the rich family Charlotte had scorned and fled from in her efforts to find herself has entered a decline;  the big white house on the hill is decaying, the land around it run down and untended, the family cotton mill has been sold and their Uncle Tinsley Holladay has turned into a semi-recluse after the death of his wife Martha.

Such shocking realities would daunt most people and the girls are no exception, but for all his eccentricity Uncle Tinsley is a kind and decent man;  he takes his new-found and desperate nieces in, giving them some sorely-needed stability in their lives.  Bean makes contact with her father’s family  and life looks up – until they start looking for work so that they can buy themselves new clothes to start the coming school year.

And that is when this lovely story takes a nasty turn, for the only person to  employ them in such a depressed small town is a tyrant and an abuser who regards them as easy game, to be reeled in whenever he pleases.  It is only a matter of time before a chain of events is set in motion, causing the town to be divided and people’s loyalties tested along with newly-forged family bonds.  Liz’s courage and resourcefulness runs out, and Bean finds a much-needed bull-at-a-gate gumption and steadfastness that obviously comes from the other side of her family - for their mother proves yet again that when it really, really matters, she still has feet of clay.

For this reader, Ms Walls has done it again, creating in strong and lucid prose great characters and a wonderful account of the ties that bind – and those that tear us apart;  strengths and weaknesses that exist in every family, as we all know.  Highly recommended.

Half-Broke Horses, by Jeannette Walls

Jeannette Walls, long-time journalist and already well-known for her celebrated memoir ‘The Glass Castle’, wanted to write a memoir of her maternal Grandmother, Lily Casey Smith , but Lily turned out to be such a larger-than-life character, so singular and indomitable that writing of her in the third person fell flat on the page;  turning her story, all true, into a first-person narrative and therefore a novel, was the only way that Lily could leap satisfyingly off the print and into the reader’s mind and heart.  The prose is matter-of-fact, without frills, chronicling Lily’s life from the age of six in the early 1900’s when she helped her father break horses;  how her younger brother Buster got the only long-term formal education ‘because he was a boy and he would inherit the ranch’, whilst she and her sister were educated by Dad, who was well-read but had his own radical ideas about politics, government and civilization in general.  When she was thirteen she was allowed to board at a mission school for six months, but was sent home because Dad had spent her tuition money on eight Great Danes, from whom he was going to make a killing when he bred them;  sadly, his next-door neighbor shot them as soon as they ventured onto his land, thinking they would kill his stock.  Lily, naturally, was bitter that her tuition money disappeared so quickly, but was eventually dispatched at the age of fifteen to a tiny settlement in Northern Arizona as its teacher.  The First World War had started;  able-bodied men were enlisting;  women were moving into the factories, so she was offered a job as a relief schoolteacher at Red Lake, five hundred miles from her home, a journey she undertook on horseback without a backward glance.  It took her a month, and this reader is still in awe of her accomplishment, written about not as a huge, brave undertaking, but just as a statement of fact:  this was how it was ‘back in the day’.  In the course of Lily’s life she learned to drive a car, fly a plane, manage a huge ranch in Arizona with her second husband (the first was a bigamous, low-down  no-gooder), and led the kind of life that makes us city-slickers quake at the mere thought of the hard work, hardship and privation.  She was a woman of huge heart, unshakeable conviction, great humour and rigid opinions, particularly about her daughter’s choice of a husband:  ‘You need a steady man.  He ain’t steady.  What are you going to do for a honeymoon?’

‘Oh, I don’t know – we’ll go where the road takes us.’

  ‘Well honey, you’re in for a ride.’  And eventually had to wave them off as ‘they took off off up the street, heading out into open country like a couple of half-broke horses.’

Magic.

YET MORE GREAT READS FOR SEPTEMBER, 2013

The Son, by Philipp Meyer

What a privilege it was to read this book.  It is a novel in the grand style, epic in every sense.  Chris Cleave, a writer I much admire, stated in the jacket notes that it should come with its own soundtrack, and all who read this wonderful story will know exactly what he means, for this is a great family saga couched in the birth and tumultuous history of Texas, that wild land won from Mexico in a bloody war and proclaimed a State in 1836, the year Eli McCullough is born.  He is the younger son of a settler who also doubles as a Ranger, protecting with his companions and neighbours their fledgling properties from rustlers and no-goods – mostly Mexican, or those bloodthirsty Comanche.

In 1849 when Eli is 13 and his father is away Rangering, Comanche attack the McCullough farm, raping and butchering Eli’s mother and elder sister and kidnapping Eli and his brother Martin.  White captives are as good as money in the bank to the Comanche:  when times are hard they can always ransom them back to the palefaces.  Martin, scholarly and introspective, does not survive the arduous trip back to the tribal village, but Eli is made of something stronger;  he not only survives but embraces all that is fair and good about his captors and stays with them until the smallpox kills those he most loves and starvation forces the rest of the band to ransom him back to the nearest white outpost.

Eli is the patriarch of this story.  He narrates his own sections of the book with a verve and gusto missing from his son Peter, also a narrator through his journals.  Peter sees himself as a man of lofty and noble principles when compared to his father – but he cannot help noticing that all their Mexican vaqueros would follow Eli through hellfire but never for Peter would they show the same devotion.

His principles are put to a terrible test and found wanting when his father and  friends mount a punishment for cattle-rustling that turns into a massacre of his nearest neighbours, a family descended from Spanish nobility.  This crime reverberates through succeeding generations, becoming the metaphor for the dog-eat-dog ruthlessness of the early founders of the Lone Star State, and the tipping point for Peter who is forced to realise several bitter truths about himself that he finds intolerable to live with.  He becomes the Family Disgrace and is never mentioned by future descendants, most notably J.A. McCullough – Jeannie, a determined chip off the old Eli block, driven to succeed and thus earn the respect of her male counterparts in the Oil industry.  Sadly, this seems to be an unattainable goal:  her femininity will always bar her from that exclusive club of Good Ole Boys and she is fated to end her long life contemplating her many life regrets, chief among them being that she could never be A Son.

Mr Meyer has written a great novel;  a story as austere and beautiful as the country itself, with colourful characters as flawed as the times -  especially Eli, that small brave man who becomes a titan of Texas history, a ruthless murderer to his son Peter, but a man who would speak the truth at all times – and who knew the truth about himself and was not afraid to live with it.

And Chris Cleave is SO right:  this is where great rolling, crashing musical chords by John Williams or Howard Shore should knock us off our feet:  this epic demands nothing less.  ‘The Son’ should become a contemporary American classic.  Very highly recommended.

Let Me Go, by Chelsea Cain.

They’re back again – burnt-out but brilliant Detective Archie Sheridan, his nemesis the evil (but gorgeous) serial killer Gretchen Lowell, and Susan Ward, ex-reporter (she was sacked) and surly freeloader at her Hippie Mum’s house (just for a short time.)  Ms Cain’s five previous books in the series have had all the successful ingredients for the perfect thriller:  smart plotting, lashings of suspense, credible characters, and black humour to burn:  it is a recipe that can’t fail – can it?

Well, this time I think Ms Cain has missed the bus.  It’s not that this reader grew tired of Archie and Gretchen et al;  it’s just that this time around it seems that there are no new ideas.  There is a distressing sameness, a tired, here-we-go-again familiarity with plot twists and turns that in all other books (see December 2012 review below) seemed fresh and new;  now the reader, instead of being pleasurably excited merely thinks ‘Oh, for Heaven’s sake:  get on with it!’

And that’s a shame, for Ms Cain is a clever, witty writer;  she can evoke atmosphere and dread with the best of them: sadly, in this story suspense takes a back seat.

Gretchen has escaped – again – from custody.  No-one knows where she is and Archie is being kept out of the loop on any relevant developments by his friends and colleagues, who know what a destructive hold she has on him.  It’s for his own good – at each meeting she keeps on removing important bits of his anatomy – there’s not much left!  Archie’s marriage is over (now that’s a surprise) and he has embarked on a new affair, strictly physical with his neighbour downstairs.  Who is a Gretchen lookalike.  Right.  Susan, who harbours strong feelings for Archie (and what woman does not, despite his lack of a spleen and multiple scars (one in the shape of a heart) compliments of Gretchen) has been invited to a very posh party given by her boyfriend’s hugely rich and powerful drug-dealer father, there to be kept against her will in spite of FBI surveillance.  Archie also has an invitation and who should be there but Sex Bomb serial slasher Gretchen – oh, everyone turns up;  it’s quite a party and the plot thickens at an alarming rate;  in fact the plot moves so rapidly and so many new, minor characters are introduced that the story takes on a Keystone Cops quality.  Suffice it to say that blood runs freely, bodies (mostly killed very messily by Gretchen) litter the landscape and the good guys escape by the skin of their teeth:  predictably, so does Gretchen which naturally means that there will be book number seven.  This could be a bridge too far for this reader;  much as I have loved the previous stories I think Gretchen and Archie should settle their differences – kill each other or move on!

   

Kill you Twice, by Chelsea Cain.

This is the fifth novel in Ms Cain’s series of the battle of wills between Super Detective Archie Sheridan, brilliant but damaged White Knight in the fight against evil, personified by gorgeous serial killer Gretchen Lowell.

Not much has changed in Ms Cain’s plotting armoury:  yet another crazed killer is on the loose in Portland Oregon, despatching victims in new and hideous ways, and this time leaving not a single clue for Archie and his dedicated task force.  It becomes increasingly clear (especially as Gretchen sends him tantalising messages from the mental hospital where she is now incarcerated) that he will have to consult the fiendish Ms Lowell in a bid to find out more about the killer:  it takes one to know one, as they say.

Archie survives the meeting – just;  as the awful Gretchen was heavily drugged and restrained his physical health was not endangered, but oh, what about his head:  it was nearly done in!  Talk about fatal attraction – the old, dreadful chemistry is at work as always, and Archie must contend not only with that but also the determined advances of Susan Ward, irritating girl reporter, and a new and sizzlingly sexy occupant of his apartment building.  His problems with women appear to be endless – and baffling to the reader, because Ms Cain’s description of his physical appearance is less than kind:  one can only conclude, then, that his aftershave is irresistible.

Regardless, Gretchen’s information, supported by determined sleuthing from Ms Ward, moves the action along at a hectic rate.  Although she has unkindly characterised Portland as having more than its fair share of crazies, Ms Cain knows its topography well and is masterly at evoking atmosphere and suspense.  I defy anyone not to keep reading until they reach the end of this great page-turner, especially when Gretchen breaks out of the hospital, leaving a trail of corpses behind her (oh, she’s so resourceful!) and has one last, revealing meeting with Archie.  It has to be said that Ms Cain’s plotting is getting a little wild, but roll on, Book Six - I’ll be waiting!

     

MORE GREAT READS FOR SEPTEMBER, 2013

The Cuckoo’s Calling, by Robert Galbraith

(pseudonym for J.K. Rowling)

Ms Rowling has been a busy girl, producing a new novel within a year of her first foray into adult fiction, ‘The Casual Vacancy’.  I was disappointed in that book (see November 2012 review below) but feel that this latest story has more meat on its bones, more to offer the reader in plot and characterisation – and certainly more optimism than ‘The Casual Vacancy’s’ singularly unpleasant storyline.

This time, despite a bewilderingly complicated narrative of events and a tendency at times to lay on the drama with a trowel, Ms Rowling has produced a very respectable thriller.

Cormoran Strike is the illegitimate son of a SuperGroupie and a notoriously hedonistic Rock Star.  The groupie died of an overdose, and Rocker dad is famously disinterested in any of his progeny.  Cormoran has had a predictably chaotic childhood but distinguished himself when he entered the military police arm of the Defence forces, winning a medal for saving lives in Afghanistan – and losing a leg in the process.

Since his medical discharge from the Army, life has been unkind to Cormoran:  the business he established as a Private Investigator is failing;  he has been kicked out of the flat and the life he had with his uppercrust girlfriend Charlotte;  he owes money everywhere; he is overweight, unfit, down and out – in short, he’s a big fat mess.

Enter Robin, newly engaged and working as a temp until she gets a job befitting her formidable skills as a SuperP.A.  She is sent by her agency to Cormoran’s office for two weeks, only to wonder why she is there when it is patently clear that Cormoran doesn’t have enough work – or means – to employ her;  plus he’s camping in his office because he can’t afford to stay anywhere else. 

Until an expensive-looking lawyer visits the next day to hire Cormoran’s services.

John Bristow is the adoptive brother of very famous super model Lula Landry, whose suicide three months before caused huge amounts of publicity world-wide – but Bristow refuses to believe that she killed herself:  she was murdered.  He will pay whatever it costs to prove that Lula would never take her own life;  he loved his little sister and he wants her killer brought to justice, and here is a hefty advance to set everything in motion.

Things are looking up!  Cormoran’s spirits rise with his bank balance;  there is now money in Petty Cash for Private Eye and Temp to have Tea and bikkies whenever the mood takes them, and an amazing change in his social status as Bristow arranges for him to meet Lula’s former friends and associates.  From being on the bones of his proverbial one day, he is dining and clubbing with the Beautiful People the next.

Ms Rowling writes well about the fashion world and the seamy side of beauty.  She has a great ear for dialogue and idiom – even Orstrylian gets a mention! – and she is very careful with her plotting.  She does tend to overwrite more than a little, though, one fine example being when Cormoran finally reveals to the killer that The Game is Up:  it takes sixteen pages, with the killer snarling at strategic points ‘where is your proof?’ and ‘you’ll never prove a thing!’ before finally lunging at our amputee hero with a knife, causing this reader to shriek  ‘and about flaming time, too!’ 

Wouldn’t you know though that Cormoran has a trick or two up his sleeve – not to mention a prosthesis next to his chair -  and all works out well in the end, causing us all to think that perhaps there might be another opus featuring Cormoran and Robin, both endearing characters in their different ways.

I shall welcome it if that’s the case but have a tiny request:  Ms Rowling’s characters were ‘besuited’ and ‘bejeaned’ more than once ( I am presently betrackpanted as I type) – could one hope that she finds a less irritating way in the next book to describe what her characters are wearing?  (Just asking.)

The Casual Vacancy, by J. K. Rowling

J. K. Rowling is known the world over for her wonderful Harry Potter series, one of the great morality tales of the last hundred years and the books that brought children back to reading.  She is a fitting companion to Tolkien and Lewis.  She is the deserving recipient of numerous prestigious literary awards and charitable causes and could rest easily on her laurels:  instead, she has produced her first adult novel, eagerly awaited by us all.

And it was hugely disappointing – at least for me.

We are in the land of the Muggles now.  There is no magic to transform us and bear us away to the delights and frights of Hogwarts;  there is not a vestige of humour to leaven the bleakness of Ms. Rowling’s plot or the singular nastiness of her characters;  everyone to a man (or woman) is morally bankrupt, and proud of it, and the ending is as tragic as the beginning.

Local counsellor Barry Fairbrother dies of a brain aneurysm in the car park of the Pagford Golf Club, where he and his wife were about to have dinner to celebrate their 19th wedding anniversary.  His shocking and unexpected demise means that there will now be a vacancy on the Pagford Parish Council, run as a mini-fiefdom by Howard Rollison, the local Deli owner.  He prides himself that he is the nearest thing to a mayor that pretty, picturesque Pagford has, and as soon as he installs his son Miles as Barry’s replacement they can both carry the vote to rid the village of the financial responsibility of The Fields, a dreadful housing estate that encroaches their borders, thanks to a land deal of fifty years before.  The Fields is full of lay-abouts, losers and junkies, and the particular eyesore that Howard wants to be rid of is the Addiction clinic which, because it is within their rural boundary, is Pagford’s expense to bear.  Howard never liked Barry anyway (because Barry was a product of The Fields);  good riddance to bad rubbish.

Howard is shocked to find that several other people, all for different reasons,  are eying the vacancy as well and have put themselves up for candidacy.   The ensuing election battle is the main impetus of the story, pitting various factions against each other and revealing secrets and sorrows that should have stayed hidden. 

The late counsellor Fairbrother is revealed as being more of a positive influence on everyone than at first thought, especially when his surviving friends and neighbours prove themselves to be much the lesser when it comes to the crunch of filling his very big shoes – not just on the council, but as a mentor to the local youth, particularly those from The Fields.  This is a very negative book – not because it is poorly written, (how could it be?  Ms Rowling has proved her literary credentials time and again) but because she doesn’t give the reader any hope that the bleak literary portrait she paints will ever change. 

Hope:  that vital and most cherished human emotion – the reader needs to feel hopeful of a better outcome in this story as much as in real life;  what a shame Ms Rowling doesn’t allow us that privilege.  Maybe it’s me and my yen for happy endings, but give me Hogwarts and its denizens any old time, for  Ms Rowling’s Muggles aren’t nice to be near.