Girl in the Rear View Mirror, by Kelsey Rae Dimberg.

  

          Ms Dimberg’s debut novel opens with her protagonist, Finn Hunt, feeling very smug indeed – she has a great new job as nanny to Amabel, the 4 year old granddaughter of incumbent Arizona Republican Senator James Martin – ‘Your Senator’ and as such, has entrée to places that previously only featured in her daydreams.  And thanks to her good looks, she is the girlfriend of the Senator’s trusted Aide.  Life is good!       

            Well, she needed a break.  Finn has left secrets behind in the MidWest from whence she came, and ‘restructuring’ is in order – she’s ready to slam shut the door on her past, and embrace her great new circumstances.  Why, even her handsome employer, Amabel’s father, eventually expected to take over the Senator’s safe seat, appears to be attracted to her, as she is to him:  such a life could go to a girl’s head if she’s not careful!

            But good times inevitably turn into their opposite:  Amabel announces that a lady is following her – ‘I’ve seen her lots of times’ – and the lady eventually contacts Finn, saying that she needs her help:  she’s pregnant to Amabel’s father and he won’t speak to her!  Finn’s attempts to remedy the situation create more problems than they solve, for no whiff of scandal must blight the Senator’s re-election campaign, especially when he has a personable young Latino running against him.  Blackmail and extortion to buy silence destroys the wonderful illusion for Finn of privilege and moral righteousness surrounding the Martin family.  Their wealth is a buttress against secrets and lies, but they are no better after all, than anyone else.  Finn’s idols indeed have feet of clay.

            More tragedy occurs and Finn is on the receiving end of it:  her job has gone and eventually, so does her boyfriend, betraying her in such a way that for her own self-respect she finally has to make a stand against the corruption she uncovers – or die trying.

            Ms Emberg is a skilful writer.  Her portrayal of life for the privileged in the great desert city of Phoenix is compelling and credible:  as we cruise through the first half of the book we have no inkling of all the trouble that’s waiting, BUT!  The action slows, the plot stutters and an entirely predictable conclusion is presented.  The Bad Guys win.  ‘YOUR Senator’ wins.  The air has leaked out of Ms Emberg’s tires.  THREE STARS.   

Flight of the Fantail, by Steph Matuku.          Teen Fiction.

  

          In a remote New Zealand National Park, a bus crashes off the gravel road into a steep gorge:  inside are seniors from Kotuku High School, all set for camping until they hit the bottom of the gorge and the front of the bus is swept away by the deep, fast-moving river.  Very few survive the trauma, but some are washed up along the banks and manage to find each other:  Rocky Reweti, class babe who harbours ambitions to be an All Black, but with a leg so badly injured the dream must surely be no longer possible;  Devin, class loser, ‘Duh-Devin’, Devin who lives with her dad in a skanky old place and never, ever talks or even looks at anyone;  Eva, class lesbian and proud of it to the extent that she took over the school PA system to announce just that, to the fury of the gay principal, who had been locked out of his office;  Jahmin, class clown and long-time detention-companion of Eva – his parents are rich as, and work for the Seddon Corporation which has mining land somewhere around here;  surely they will be rescued soon.  Search and Rescue should be sending helicopters anytime now.

            But when?  Two of the number manage to get back to the remains of the bus, finding that new kid, Theo, on the way, lying dead with a cell phone smashed into his face.  WHAAAAAT????  Their search for food, clothes and equipment takes a worrying turn – who killed Theo?  And why?

            As they establish a very rough, makeshift camp, it seems that Duh-Devin is’nt stupid after all, for her loser dad taught her all sorts of practical skills which actually improve their situation, like lighting a fire, constructing a shelter to keep the rain off, catching an eel (she was amazed that she could!), and finding some edible plants which, whilst not exactly broccoli, plugged the gnawing hunger gap for a time. 

            But what about the strange pulsing they all feel – the headaches they  experience, and the dark fantasies that threaten to overcome them unless they physically hurt themselves to banish the nastiness:  there’s something badly amiss in this part of the forest, and it doesn’t take them long to find it.

            Ms Matuku has done a fine job here of combining fact, fantasy and Maori myths to weave a great story of friendship through adversity and heartache:  the terrible situation in which her characters find themselves is hardly real, but Rocky, Devin, Eva and Jahmin are great examples of today’s generation - resourceful, staunch, loving and brave.  Great stuff!  FIVE STARS.

           

             

The War That Saved my Life, by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley.

Junior Fiction.

         

  

          It is 1939 and war has been declared between Germany and Great Britain.  Ada Smith and her brother Jamie live in one room above a pub in London with their mother;  Mam works in the pub, Jamie is school-age, and Ava goes nowhere.  She has a crippled foot and can’t put any weight on it – she crawls everywhere in the flat and depends on Jamie to bring her news of the outside world because her mother doesn’t want her near the window;  she doesn’t want people to see ‘the idiot cripple peering out’.  Mam is always in a bad mood, and when she is feeling particularly hateful she locks Ada in a cabinet under the sink, which is infested with cockroaches. 

            Life is very hard but it becomes intolerable when Ada learns that her beloved brother is to be evacuated to a place called ‘the country’ to escape the bombs that Hitler’s Messerschmidts will surely drop:  to be left behind without him is unthinkable – she will go too, and to that end practises walking on her poor deformed foot, an agonising process but practice that serves her well when the day comes and she escapes with Jamie and his classmates to the train station.  The trip is a revelation:  Ada has never seen grass, let alone trees – the greenness of everything astounds her, as does the vastness of her surroundings, and when they arrive at a small village in Kent which is to be their destination, there are even more shocks in store:  everyone looks so clean and wholesome – well-nourished.  Which she and Jamie are not.  Eventually, as the last children left, they are forced onto a lady who did NOT want to billet children:  Susan, a woman who had lost her beloved companion Rebecca to illness and is still sorely grieving. 

            The children don’t care:  they are still together, Susan gives them a bath and hot food, and they sleep in a warm bed with sheets on it!  And behind a stone wall at the bottom of the garden is a friendly pony called Butter!  Ada, who has never learned to read or write, finds that she is not ‘slow’ or an idiot after all when Susan persuades her to learn her letters so that she can help Jamie with his homework;  she even teaches herself to ride Butter even though her foot won’t always cooperate, but best of all is the news that her foot (clubfoot, it’s called) can be fixed!  If Susan can get her mother’s consent.

            And there lies the problem:  Susan’s letters are returned;  Mam remains out of sight – until she returns one day and takes Ada and Jamie back to London to another squalid room ‘because I ain’t paying nineteen shillin’s a week to no lazy slut in a fancy house to look after my kids!’

            Then the bombing starts.

Ms Bradley has given us a wonderful brother and sister to cheer for:  narrator Ada’s journey from stupid cripple to resourceful and clever problem solver is a delight to read. This lovely story is a superb  introduction for children aged 12+ to the extraordinary bravery shown by ordinary people in the face of terrible adversity.  SIX STARS!!      

All That’s Dead, by Stuart MacBride.

           They’re back!  All the great characters in Stuart MacBride’s Logan McRae novels make a reappearance, from main protagonist Logan, reluctant Inspector for Professional Standards, Police Scotland’s austere department of coppers policing coppers, to demoted DS Roberta Steel, proud vaping lesbian and champion delegator – mostly of jobs she considers beneath her station – to Tufty, alias PC Quirrell, a wee loon so out there that most of his colleagues consider him an interplanetary visitor – and of course, the subsidiary villains.  Oh, it’s a pleasure to climb (vicariously) into Logan’s Audi (he saved long and hard for those great wheels) as he is sent off after a long sick leave by his bosses on what should be an open-and-shut case, run by a Detective Inspector King:  Logan is to observe King’s handling of the day-to-day disposition of colleagues and witnesses.  There have been complaints;  King is reputed to have a short fuse, and it’s up to Logan to report on King’s suitability for major projects – like the current abduction of several very different people:  a Scottish Councillor, an Academic, and a local reality show celeb.  All had very publicly supported staying with Britain in the Brexit talks.

            Needless to say, there is no such thing as ‘open-and-shut’ regarding these cases.  The more the police dig, the less they find:  the only sure evidence they have is that these men seem to have been kidnapped by a very secret Scottish Rights group, whose main aim is to drive the English out of Scotland forthwith.  Scottish Nationalism has been a touchy subject for some time, especially with the inequality of representation at Westminster, but when the bloody hands of the abducted academic turn up at BBC Scotland, there are grave fears that pieces of the rest of him might be sent to other media.  And as we all know, bad situations can get even worse:  a tabloid reporter hints that he has evidence that the lead detective, DI King, used to belong to a Scottish ‘terrorist cell’ in days gone by. 

            Police Scotland is screaming at its Aberdeen branch to find the kidnappers yesterday and restore its public credibility – well, good luck with that , thinks Logan;  they will do their formidable best, but the situation becomes even worse when the kidnap victims are found, and DI King is with them – barely alive.

            Stuart MacBride thrills his myriad fans yet again with his consistently excellent combination of horror and humour;  no-one writes a better crime novel than he, and I reckon the only thing that will kill Logan, DS Steel and wee loon Tufty will be their evil fast-food diet (which DS Steel always drops down her front.)  Not a vitamin to be seen!  FIVE STARS.      

Boy Swallows Universe, by Trent Dalton.

           At the beginning of this explosive and brilliant story, Eli Bell is 12 years old and lives in a working-class suburb of Brisbane, Australia with his ex-junkie mum, her drug-dealer partner Lyle, and his mute 13 year-old brother August.  August is not disabled, but mute by choice;  in his opinion, there’s not much worth talking about, but he has a wealth of facial expressions that communicate his opinions perfectly, especially to Eli, who ‘reads him like a book’ sometimes whether he wants to or not.

            When his mum and Lyle go to the movies (deliver drugs to third-tier dealers) the boys’ babysitter is Arthur ‘Slim’ Halliday, an elderly ex-criminal friend of Lyle’s, who thrills Eli with stories of his time Inside, and his attempts (some successful) to escape to the Outside but – despite a decidedly unconventional upbringing and sporadic schooling,  Eli has very few complaints about his life, for he is loved by his family and loves them wholeheartedly in return.

            Until Lyle makes a fatal mistake:  his heroin supplier is Drug Lord Tytus Broz, who has all the local counsellors and coppers in his pocket:  he prizes loyalty above everything, and when he learns that Lyle has done a sneaky side deal with another supplier, there is only one solution:  the annihilation of Eli’s family, starting with Lyle, taken away who knows where, never to be seen again;  a trumped-up prison sentence for Eli’s mum, and the amputation of Eli’s forefinger in an attempt to make August reveal information even though he doesn’t speak.  Eli’s precarious but carefree life is changed forever by Tytus Broz and his goons, and whatever happens in the future is beyond his control.

            Or is it?  For Eli’s mum has always said that her two boys are special, and their next few years in the custody of their alcoholic father (Child Custody Services getting it right again!) turn out to be a time to gather strength, hone special skills, search for Lyle’s hidden drug money – and plot an unexpected revenge.

            Oh, this book is a delight!  By turns horrifying and hugely funny (nothing like humour to counter all the blood), Brent Dalton has created a family that is special indeed:  Gus, who speaks volumes with the curl of a lip and the raising of an eyebrow, and Eli, impulsive, impetuous, exuberant and bursting with life and ideas, good and otherwise:  this wonderful story should be – DESERVES to be - an Australian classic.  SEVEN STARS!     

Cari Mora, by Thomas Harris.

           Thomas Harris, the writer who introduced the world to the horrifying, cannibalistic, irresistible Psychiatrist Hannibal Lecter, has launched a new character into his singular world:  Cari Mora, a young, beautiful (naturally!) survivor of various conflicts in South America.  Abducted from her village as a child and taught lethal skills by her revolutionary army captors, Cari escaped and is now living peacefully in Miami with her cousin, niece and aunt, who suffers from dementia;  Cari is working at multiple jobs on a visa that could be revoked at any time.  Life is precarious, but it beats fighting as a guerrilla in in bloody battles for which she has no heart.

            One of Cari’s many low-paid positions is as caretaker for a notorious bayside house formerly owned by the late drug Kingpin Pablo Escobar;  there have long been rumours that this is where Escobar hid $25,000,000 in gold bullion, and it is not long before Pablo’s former henchmen turn up to try to find the loot – with the aid of Cari, for she knows the house and its environs better than anyone:  it’s a chance for her to make enough money in one hit (maybe) to enable her to make her family’s future secure.  Maybe.

            True to form, things go fatally wrong in a big way, and Cari finds herself caught between Escobar’s former lieutenants and a frightening new enemy – Hans-Peter Schneider, a German from Paraguay also interested in the gold, but principally in her, and how much money he could make if he could sell her to sadists rich enough to pay whatever he asked, for Hans-Peter caters for all tastes in ‘matchmaking’ – the baser, the better.  I have to say that Herr Schneider is the most black-and-white villain I’ve come across lately;  Mr Harris doesn’t waste time analysing to any great degree Hans-Peter’s sheer wickedness.  He is just a supremely evil dude, and it goes without saying that the showdown between good and evil at the end of the story is monumental – as it should be, but it would have been better if some of the characters were fleshed out sufficiently to make them more three-dimensional, and more real.

            Having said that (thus revealing my nit-picking nature!), Cari Mora is still a great character, so resourceful and endearing that it would be great to meet her again:  she sure packs a punch!  FOUR STARS.

              

When it All Went to Custard, by Danielle Hawkins.

            Ms Hawkins writes Chick Lit – and she’s very good at it.  Two years ago, I reviewed ‘The Pretty Delicious Café’, full of seriously predictable characters and situations, but so funny that I swooped on her latest effort with great enthusiasm, and amd very pleased I did.  Even though ‘When it All Went to Custard’ could be classified by some people as lighter-than-air reading, Ms Hawkins has a way with words that most writers would envy, and a big plus is the Kiwiness of her setting:  this time it’s beef and sheep country somewhere south of Waikato, and farmer’s wife Jenny Reynolds is shocked to find out in the most public possible way that her husband has been caught with the next-door farmer’s wife - and they weren’t making daisy chains.

            The messenger (don’t shoot!) was the farmer himself, who discovered them ‘at it’:  he immediately felt the need to appraise Jenny of the situation at her part-time job as a building control officer for the town council, and just like that, Jenny’s family life changes from mum, dad and two kids to solo mothering with defiant (‘it’s all your fault, Jen!’) hubby having the kids every Wednesday and every second weekend.  In the meantime, she is left with a farm (leased from her parents when they retired) to run, and no clear idea about how she can make a future for herself.  There is the added complication of her sister, who wants their parents to sell the farm so that she can be advanced money ‘from her inheritance’ enabling her to buy ‘the house of her dreams’ in Wellington:  a rock and a hard place is where Jenny’s fetched up, and it doesn’t feel good.

            But faint-hearted chickies never get anywhere, as we all know:  Jenny rolls up her sleeves, girds her fruitful loins and flings herself courageously into the Great Unknown – and an affair (can’t you see it coming!) with  wronged next-door neighbour farmer who’s a grumpy bugger, but he loves indoor plants and has a heart of gold – and a gay brother who is deathly afraid of emerging from the closet.  Endearing minor characters (and some nasties, too) fill the pages most satisfyingly, but Ms Hawkins writes about children best of all, especially their conversations:  I defy anyone not to recognise their own children in Lily and Nathan, not to mention fat dog Tessa, who is a very important dog indeed!  FOUR STARS.