2010/12/31

Review: Enemy of God


Enemy of God (The Arthur Books, #2)Enemy of God by Bernard Cornwell

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I'm still enjoying Cornwell's version of the Arthurian legend. Using a story teller as a narrator rarely works for me because it's an excuse for a lazy writer to do massive amounts of telling when the showing gets tough. But Cornwell is not a lazy writer and Dervel, the converted Christian scribe who used to be a Pagan warrior, is the perfect voice to shine a light on what "really" happened in those closing years of the 5th Century. There's no missing the point that Cornwell has decided that the Christians did no favors by spreading their religion through what would become England, but he also isn't afraid to make the heroes of what we know as The Round Table into very, very flawed humans.



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2010/12/28

Review: The Water Seeker


The Water SeekerThe Water Seeker by Kimberly Willis Holt

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Without Will Patton narrating this, I'm not sure how much I would have enjoyed it. He does a fantastic job with the various characters and caricatures, even mastering the aging of the central character, Amos, from a young, nearly orphaned boy to a young man proving himself on the Oregon trail. As far as the story, it doesn't really take off until the second half, when Amos is rejoined with his father and starts the real coming of age portion of the book. There's a bit of a fantasy thread through out the story that doesn't add anything other than a bit of ambiance to scenes that would have been fine without them.



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Review: The Lieutenant


The LieutenantThe Lieutenant by Kate Grenville

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Great sense of time and place, but extremely predictable character development and almost no plot. The book is so shallow in the fiction department that I went on line to double check that it wasn't supposed to be young adult fiction. It's not. It's a good fast read if you're looking for a quick trip to the early days of England's settlement of Australia, but don't expect to be swept up in any of the lives of the characters.



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2010/12/15

Review: An Object of Beauty: A Novel


An Object of Beauty: A NovelAn Object of Beauty: A Novel by Steve Martin

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


This book exceeds in some areas and falls very short in others, making it an average book that wasn't painful to read. Not much of an endorsement, eh? The setting and most of the plot is the business side of the art world. Galleries, collectors, auction houses and even the FBI art squad are all players in this book. There's a lot that goes on in that world beyond the press releases that tell the public that another record has been broken at a Sothoby's or Christie's auction of a Picasso or a Warhol. Collecting art isn't primarily about collecting beautiful things for the people who play at that level, it's money first, appreciation second, or maybe third behind bragging rights. Fascinating stuff, and seen through the eyes of a narrator who witnesses his friend's (and our protagonist's)journey through that world. I found it easiest to forget that there was supposed to be an actual person penning this story, because to think that they had access to everything that Lacey (the friend and protagonist) did and thought borders on fantasy. Sure, there's a bit of terrible self referencing at the end when the narrator talks about writing the book and I suppose we're to take that as his admission that he made a lot of stuff up, but that seems more as a justification from Mr. Martin that he realizes the narration is flawed, not actual story telling. As a tacked on ending, it too can be ignored. The other major weakness of the plot is the odd bit of intrigue that pops up almost at the end of the book. There is a hint of it earlier, but if it's so important that it causes major events to happen to our main character, maybe there should have been a little foreshadowing? As it reads in the book, it happened, it was forgotten, and then, oh yeah - it's a big deal. Or was it?



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2010/12/06

Review: The Murder Book: An Illustrated History of the Detective Story


The Murder Book: An Illustrated History of the Detective StoryThe Murder Book: An Illustrated History of the Detective Story by Tage La Cour

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


If I were to judge this book solely on the number of books it caused me to add to my 'to read' shelf or movies that were added to my Netflix queue, this would be a strong six stars. The book is arranged in chapters (that read like essays written by very doting fans, so there's a star loss there) covering some of the most famous authors, characters and sub genres of crime solving fiction. The illustrations range from plates from first editions to film stills, with captions every bit as informative as the text of the book itself. The translation isn't the best, however, with some sentences lacking clarifying punctuation and others lacking meaning altogether. The order of the chapters is muddled, starting with chronological history, then jumping into author and character studies, then back to chronology. And oh, the sexism in the chapters on women writers and detectives! Even for a book written in 1971, it's offensive. But with all that wrong, it's still a great resource book for any fan on mysteries, at least those published or filmed prior to the late 60s.



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2010/12/02

Review: Sleep, Pale Sister


Sleep, Pale Sister (P.S.)Sleep, Pale Sister by Joanne Harris

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


On the plus side, it's very gothic. Every main character is not only damaged, but intent on damaging the others. There's a perverted artist, a heart of stone prostitute, a lecherous user of women, and the misused, misunderstood, emotionally stunted young woman they all revolve around. That the story is told by each of those characters in a nearly consecutive format makes it all fit together a little too neatly. There's no mystery as to who will do what to whom next, by the middle of the book you know all will be explained as soon as it happens. This was one of Harris's first books, and wasn't even released world wide until her later novels became popular. It does read as a more amateur work - there's a lot of story, a lot of character, a lot of setting - all with the feeling that it could have been done better with a little less.



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2010/11/28

Review: A Skeptic's Guide to Writers' Houses


A Skeptic's Guide to Writers' HousesA Skeptic's Guide to Writers' Houses by Anne Trubek

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Do not underestimate the importance of the word "skeptic" in the title of this book. Ms. Trubek makes it very clear from the beginning of this book that she doesn't understand why a dead author's fans enjoy visiting their homes that have been turned into shrines. I would suggest, however, that the word "guide" in the title be replaced with "journey", because that is what happens here. Do not be tempted to skip around the chapters to see what she has to say about Hemmingway's Idaho home before reading about her visit to Louisa Mae Alcott's Orchard House. This is not a guide book, but a narrative about how a literary academic discovers there is something to visiting the past, even if it's a completely falsified past as in the case of Twain's Hannibal, Missouri. Her comments in the first chapters may seem harsh and snarky, especially if you're someone who does like to see where *your favorite author goes here* lived and wrote, but don't stop reading. Eventually, she comes around to the realization that, just as there is more than one way to tell a story, there is more than one way to "loooooooove" literature. As the reader goes along with her on that discovery, they'll also get some interesting trivia and a visitor's hints about the places she visits.



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2010/11/22

Review: The Invention of Hugo Cabret


The Invention of Hugo CabretThe Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I read this entirely because I've heard some buzz about the movie being made from it, supposedly using 3D because it enhances the story, not just the box office. I wondered how a story set in 1931 Paris, about an orphan who lives in a train station and keeps busy setting the old-fashioned clocks while trying to restore something as archaic as an automatron could possibly need the flash and zoom of 3D filmmaking. What I didn't know is that this is also the story of the birth of films made to entertainment and it interweaves some of the classic scenes of the very first movies. There is a connection between the mechanics of Hugo's life and the dream of telling stories through moving pictures, and I now fully understand why the newest technology will work its own kind of magic with this story.



About the book itself, it's a graphic novel that knows there's a reason graphic is the first word in the genre. The choice to border all the pages of the book in black lends to the time period feel of the etching style illustrations as well as making this a very unique looking book. The characters are classic children's book characters, there are the helpful adults, the evil adults, and the adults that must learn through the eyes of a child. No, that's not very original, but this is a kid's book, and there's a reason that sort of story is told over and over - it needs to be told!



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2010/11/20

Review: Full Dark, No Stars


Full Dark, No StarsFull Dark, No Stars by Stephen King

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


The first piece, 1922, is nice piece of Rural Gothic, something I don't think I've read from King before. Of course there's some supernatural goings on on, used for what reads more like easy story telling than good story telling, but it's far and away the best story in the book. Big Driver and A Good Marriage use exhaustive amounts of internal dialogs, so much in the former that I really began to dislike the main character. Fair Extension is short and to the point (yes, really, Stephen King! Wonder of wonders!), but lacks the kind of staying power that, in the Afterword King says is his goal. Speaking of the Afterword, that;s really the best part of the book. King excels at writing about writing, and there's a line of advice there about writing dark fiction that every writer should have on their wall:



"... if you're going into a very dark place..... then you should take a bright light, and shine it on everything. If you don't want to see it, why in God's name would you dare the dark at all?"




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2010/11/18

Review: At Home: A Short History of Private Life


At Home: A Short History of Private LifeAt Home: A Short History of Private Life by Bill Bryson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is the first Bryson book I've read, and now I understand why there's a flutter of excitement every time he publishes a new book on any subject. He does have a gift for taking loads and loads of information and arranging it in a story like manner. The book has a "stumbled upon this when I was looking for that" feel to it, a tone that any research junkie will love and hate, but mostly love. Bryson takes us on a tour of how the homes we in the English speaking part of the world (one the few disappointments I had with the book) came to be the shape and materials that they are by touring through his own home. The trip includes many side trips, such as how concrete invented for American canals made basements possible and the many discovers made by under-employed rectors in 19th century England. The book is absolutely packed with information about when certain pieces of furniture came in and out of style, how the uses of rooms changed not only with income but because of cultural influences as well. In fact, there's so much information that at times is seems that Bryson was so intent on covering it all, he glosses when he might have dug deeper, and then sometimes digs so deep he has to remind the reader what subject he started with. The book is a bit uneven in that respect, and I can only hope he or someone else will look in to doing for the rest of the world's homes what he's done for England and the American colonies in this book.



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2010/11/11

Review: Muldoon, a True Chicago Ghost Story: Tales of a Forgotten Rectory


Muldoon, a True Chicago Ghost Story: Tales of a Forgotten RectoryMuldoon, a True Chicago Ghost Story: Tales of a Forgotten Rectory by Rocco A. Facchini

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This book is so much more than a first person account of possibly paranormal activity in the lovely old gothic style rectory at the now non-existent Saint Charles Borromeo Church. It's also a memoir of a former priest's first years answering what he believed to be his calling, serving under one of those awful demagogue priest that sound like a stereotype, but as this book shows, really do exist. There's also a lot of history about Chicago and how the Catholic immigrant demographic helped make the city what it is today, from swampland through the 1950s. The actual ghost sightings are few, but what comes between, telling Bishop Muldoon's life story, including the crazy zealot that kept him from what might have been his highest aspiration is one of those great "every body has a story" stories that read like fiction but are totally true. The writing style is so natural, I suspect that most of this book was transcribed from an oral narrative of a natural born public speaker. Each chapter ends with a epilogue, notes on things that couldn't be verified and/or the personal reaction of the author to the events in the narrative. In doing that, the author draws a clear line between fact and opinions, something a lot better known works of non-fiction fail to do.



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2010/11/10

Review: Van Gogh, Encore


Van Gogh, EncoreVan Gogh, Encore by John A. Karr

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Karr shows us the famous and infamous moments of Van Gogh's life as an artist through a 21st century filter, and creates a contemporary fiction to fill in the rest. The people that we know of that played a large part in Van Gogh last years come with him, and play similar roles as they did in the real story. What Karr does best in this book is creates the inner dialog of the mind that "saw" Starry Night, Night Cafe, Wheatfield with Crows and all those other magical recreations of light and color and movement. There are many theories of what was wrong with Vincent Van Gogh, what illness or disability caused his seizures and depressions. Instead of trying to explain the problem Karr allows it to be a tool, the very important tool of bringing those masterpieces to life. This is when this book is the most readable, when the "why" is forgotten and there's no attempt to make modern sense of a man who didn't do very well into his own time, let alone ours.



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2010/11/08

Review: The Kitchen House


The Kitchen HouseThe Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


I lost track how many times I almost gave up reading this book. As a historical, there's something a little new in the book - the life of an Irish indentured servant in a slave holder household. Unfortunately, it's used more as a gimmick, with no exploration of how the born to slavery characters would really feel about this white girl who's placed on equal ground with them. Everyone else in the story is a character: the brutal over seer, the sadistic tutor, the weak but good hearted wife of the plantation owner, and of course, the fair minded slave owner who of course is also the father of one of the slaves who he loves dearly, but darn those societal pressures, he just can't forget that she's property. Perhaps it was a mistake reading this book so closely to having read All Souls Rising, where there's no romanticizing the life of a slave. But even then, I would have had problems with cardboard characters who remember their past at a dramatic rather than a natural pace and share information when it suits the author, not when the story would demand it.



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2010/11/04

Review: The Last Witchfinder: A Novel


The Last Witchfinder: A Novel The Last Witchfinder: A Novel by James Morrow

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


A book narrated by another book. That threw me off at first, as the narrating books own voice is a little on the stodgy side. But it would be, thatbook is over 300 years old. But it turns out that Newton's PhilosophiƦ Naturalis Principia Mathematica is a natural born story teller, and as the story of Jennet Stearne's journey from student to world changing author progresses, so does the narrator's side story move along, slyly pointing out how books have changed the world. Jennet's family's business is witchhunting, but like so many children, she decides to fight rather than join. Her story is a bit Moll Flanders, a bit Forest Gump, and I mean that as a compliment. I think there might be some historical inaccuracy in how now matter where Jannett goes, her past is only held against her by the most evil of antagonists, but beyond that, this is a fun and intelligent look at the power of reason against an unreasonable world.



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2010/11/01

Review: The Widower's Tale


The Widower's TaleThe Widower's Tale by Julia Glass

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Glass weaves together many current political themes: ecoterrorism, illegal immigration, gay rights, and healthcare; throws in some instances of intellectual snobbery and agism; and even takes a stab at the death of hardcopy communication. That's a lot for one book, and yes, it IS too much. Just because a writer is good at writing from multiple perspectives (and Glass is, there's no arguing that, in my opinion) doesn't mean they have to see how far they can take that skill in one book. All of the plot lines are tied to the Darling family: patriarch Percy is the grounding character, and in the end everything does come back to him. However, some of the story threads are stretched pretty thin, while others are cut off and then picked up when it's convenient to tie up the loose ends. Perhaps it's simply a case of too much of a good thing, half of this book would have been better told by itself, either half. Together, it diminishes the whole.



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Review: Sarah's Key


Sarah's KeySarah's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


Intriguing historical fiction with an opportunity to shed a light on an event that,as the author points out, the participants tried to forget. Unfortunately, the writing is so shallow that it was hard to not get angry at the author for using such an important story to tell the really, really, really childish contemporary half of the book. The characters in both stories are flat and unoriginal, some make it all the way to stereotype level. The only thing that kept this from being a 1 star book for me was that the information dumps were very informative. Faint praise, but it's all I've got for this book.



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2010/10/27

Review: Matterhorn


MatterhornMatterhorn by Karl Marlantes

My rating: 4 of 5 stars






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Review: All Souls' Rising


All Souls' RisingAll Souls' Rising by Madison Smartt Bell

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Perfect balance of character/story/setting, this is a book that tackles a big event (Haitian slave rebellion) and brings it down to a very human size. The story is told through all the various points of view that brought about an incredibly bloody and deadly event, which in a lesser writer's hand would feel like padding. But Bell takes the time to let each character not only establish their link to history, he also makes them three dimensional enough that even the "villains" of the story have their sympathetic moments. In light of how the current nation of Haiti is so often in the news, this is a timely and very good background read.



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2010/10/21

Review: The Witch's Trinity: A Novel


The Witch's Trinity: A NovelThe Witch's Trinity: A Novel by Erika Mailman

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Basic damned if you do, damned if you don't Christianity vs. paganism witch story. The setting is a little different than most (16th century Germany, with no mention of the Reformation) and the accused woman does</> see some pretty strange things, and just when the ending seems to be going the way most of these stories go, there's a slight twist back to the hysterics that made these events possible. The epigraphical use of the Catholic church's Malleus Maleficarum as well as having the investigating friar use the book adds some historical weight.



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2010/10/18

Review: You


YouYou by Charles Benoit

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


The first few pages in I thought I was going to hate this book. I didn't think that the story would support the second person POV, I thought that the main character wouldn't hold my interest, and I expected the supporting characters to be one dimensional because that's what usually happens in second person POV. I was wrong on all accounts. Fifteen year old Kyle has failed on so many of the levels that he others have set for him that he has almost failed himself. It is the "almost" that provides an opportunity for the intriquing new kid in school to open a window (literally and metaphorically) for Kyle to escape his downward spiral. To say any more would spoil a tremendously good dark story.



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Review: Scaramouche


ScaramoucheScaramouche by Rafael Sabatini

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I am truly ashamed that I had never heard of Sabatini before I went looking for a historical fiction about the French Revolution. I had no idea that "The Sea Hawk" "Captain Blood" were books before they were two of the best 1)Pirate, 2)Sword Fight, and 3)Errol Flynn movies of all time. Now I have discovered that the man who came up with those ideas also wrote a book that at least equals Dumas' "The Three Musketeers" in every way.



Andre-Louis, our hero in every way (and that is perhaps one of the few weaknesses of this book, as another reviewer points out, he's too perfect at everything he turns his hand to) starts life as a cynical young lawyer, raised to be a gentleman. Circumstances force him to see that the class system in late 18th century France isn't the way he wants to live, his wit and bravado put him in danger, and soon he is living a life incognito as Scaramouche, the actor (to live on forever in Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody", no less). The Revolution rolls on, and Andre-Louis rolls with it, now reinventing himself as a fencing teacher. A very, very good fencing teacher, which leads him back into confrontation with the one man who caused his first run from the status quo. Along each of his lives, Andre-Louis runs across a woman he thinks of as his cousin, but only someone who's never read a historical romance can't see where that's going to end up. The ending is cliche for this genre, but the path to that finish is pure fantastic escapism.



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2010/10/06

Review: The Tailor of Panama


The Tailor of PanamaThe Tailor of Panama by John le CarrƩ

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


My first le CarrƩ, and although I understand that it's not his typical work, I can still understand why he's not only popular but well respected. This is a writer who is a master of the slow but never boring reveal. The setting is incredibly detailed without ever resorting to information dump, and every character breaths. If only the satire hadn't become so predictable, this would have been a really good book.



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2010/09/30

Review: Last Night at Chateau Marmont


Last Night at Chateau MarmontLast Night at Chateau Marmont by Lauren Weisberger

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


I was expecting fluff, so no disappointment on that front. However, fluff does not equal dumb, and when the entire plot depends on the protagonist willfully ignoring what she already knows about her new life, and then whining about it...well, that IS dumb. The supporting characters also must remain blind to her situational amnesia, otherwise not only would they not sympathize with her, one of them would have to call her out on what is truly hypocritical behavior. The one thing that kept me reading was the setting. It's not very deeply researched, but what's there is interesting enough.



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2010/09/22

Review: Speaks the Nightbird


Speaks the Nightbird (Vol. I&II) (Matthew Corbett, #1)Speaks the Nightbird by Robert R. McCammon

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


A very character driven mystery wrapped up in a whopping historical fiction. The setting what a new one for me - coastal Carolina, 1699, and once again I am amazed that any Europeans survived long enough to get a firm foothold on the new world. The witch trial aspect of the story is turned into a mystery when (slightly anachronistic?) magistrate's clerk Matthew Corbett follows his instincts and his intelligence and refuses to accept that the Devil is behind murder, arson, and whatever else goes wrong in the town of Fount Royal. The story gets a little complicated as the crimes are solved, but there are always chances to get straightened out as characters must explain the twists to each other, using thier own distinct perspectives. (Side question: Is it possible to read a well written witch trial story and not see modern correlations?)



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2010/09/15

Review: Slammerkin


SlammerkinSlammerkin by Emma Donoghue

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is not a whore-with-a-heart-of-gold story. In two years time, fourteen year old Mary Saunders goes from a life of poverty with her family to the very grown up world of the Courts of Assize. There's a lot of messages to this story - what options were available to women in Mary's time period, how did class determine a person's future and even a look at the shades of gray that lay between servitude and slavery. But Donoghue puts her characters before her statement, so that you've read the whole book before you realized you've just been schooled in women's emancipation, 1748 style. Once you've read this story, you'll never be able to say that kids are forced to grow up too fast in our time. (Side note for anyone who likes stories that pay a lot of attention to clothing of the period, Mary's life is defined not only by what she wears,first as a school girl, then a prostitute, then as a servant, but also the clothing of others, and Donoghue doesn't skimp on descriptions.)



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Review: Hawksmoor


HawksmoorHawksmoor by Peter Ackroyd

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Not an easy read, but one that is worth the trouble. Rather than bring early 1700 London to the reader (as most HF fiction writers do), we are taken back through his use of historically correct English. Nicholas Dyer is at work, designing and supervising six new churches as directed by Parliment. Dyer's personal religious convictions fall far outside of what is expected of someone given such a commision, but he finds a way to balance private with public. Meanwhile, back in our time period, some nasty murders have taken place in some very old churches, and we have a story that bridges time through the voices of two characters who are as similar as they are different. The use of two time periods is what makes a story that could have been a historic slog into a very good piece of writing. Just when you're about to give up with the archiac language, it's back to the future, so to speak, and the story whips along in it's current day ugliness.



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2010/09/08

Review: The Kingdom on the Waves


The Kingdom on the Waves (The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, #2)The Kingdom on the Waves by M.T. Anderson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is the second half of Anderson's story about a Boston born slave who sees the start of the American Revolution not only from both sides of the conflict but as someone who has a different concept of liberty than your average historical fiction character of that era. Having escaped his master and being forced into a Rebel army, Octavian moves on to relative freedom in 1795 Boston. He is hired to play in an orchestra (music is still his first love), but when the British put the city under military law, he decides to take his chances with Lord Dunmore's Royal Ethiopian Regiment. Anderson brings an amazing amount of research to life through Octavian's fellow soldier's stories as well as his descriptions of what it was to be a part of that very unique part of the war. The weakest part of the book is the varied story telling techniques, moving from narrative to journal to letter writing, all under the guise that the book was created from assembled papers, but more obviously necessary to move the story along when Octavian would have been incapable of recording his own story.



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2010/09/07

Review: The Devil Amongst the Lawyers: A Ballad Novel


The Devil Amongst the Lawyers: A Ballad NovelThe Devil Amongst the Lawyers: A Ballad Novel by Sharyn McCrumb

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


So little story, so much cynicism! A young woman in a small 1930's mining town is accused of murdering her father, and reporters from "the big city" descend to cover the story, biased and condescending to the last letter. Even the reporter who comes from the mountains attempts to use something other than hard work to get to the bottom of the story. Are there no good journalists in the mind of Sharon McCrumb? Back stories are given for most of the major characters, back stories that do nothing to deepen the shallow plot. Nora Bonesteel, the ancient mountain seer from McCrumb's (so much better than this book) Ballad Series gets her chronological introduction in this book, and she, along with the setting, are the only thing that kept me reading. This might be McCrumb's weakest attempt at story telling.



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2010/09/01

Review: Just an Ordinary Day: The Uncollected Stories Of Shirley Jackson


Just an Ordinary Day: The Uncollected Stories Of Shirley JacksonJust an Ordinary Day: The Uncollected Stories Of Shirley Jackson by Shirley Jackson

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


This collection is all over the place in content and quality. It's a posthumous publication, so it's quite likely that Ms. Jackson herself would have been unimpressed with some of these stories. Certainly, they all show her natural talent as a writer, but the stories written in college and in some cases, the ones written to fill an order from magazines are flat and unpolished. Others read like second drafts of what could have become something amazing. If you're looking for works like "The Lottery", there are a few stories that tip in that direction, especially The Nightmare and The Story We Used To Tell. There are stories that show a lesser known side of Jackson's writing, her twists on the every day life of the women of her time.



Honestly, the majority of these stories didn't merit publication. I'd only recommend this book to someone interested in reading the discards and a few hidden gems of a very talented writer.



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2010/08/25

One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson

One Good TurnOne Good Turn by Kate Atkinson

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


Atkinson uses the same story telling technique that worked so well in Case Histories - several mysteries unravel at the same time with characters slowing crossing from one to other until it's all brought together in the end. However, in Case Histories, each mystery stood on its own merit. In this book, I felt like the characters were supposed to be the story, and the crimes that brought them together were padding. Excessive, smothering, too heavy padding that would have been okay on an episode of "Midsommer Murders" (which Atkinson dares to mock, along with every other clichƩ about writers and fans of writers, apparently not seeing that she's one of them), but is cumbersome in a book with this many twists. As for the characters, there was not one character arc in this book that I'd didn't figure out by the middle of the book. Yes, there was some development, but it wasn't surprising in the least bit. The Edinburgh Fringe Festival is a great setting for this kind of story, though, and that along with Jackson Brody's negative attitude about just about everything is what kept me reading this book.



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2010/08/23

Nocturnes: Five Stories of Music and Nightfall by Kazuo Ishiguro

Nocturnes: Five Stories of Music and NightfallNocturnes: Five Stories of Music and Nightfall by Kazuo Ishiguro

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


Finished this less than 24 hours ago and the only thing that is sticking to my mind is that the singer in the first story looked and sounded like a character James Gandolfini would play. The plots are nothing new (non existent in Malvern Hills, and the dialog is labored to the point breaking at some point in each story. By the end, I felt like I was reading something Ishiguro thrown away rather than something ready to be published. To his credit, however, even garbage Ishiguro is readable if you want something fast and easy.



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2010/08/22

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

The Hunger Games (Hunger Games, #1)The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Somehow, despite the popularity of this book, I managed to escape ever having read a review or a detailed description. All I knew was that it was about a girl who has to survive a "The Most Dangerous Game" type of situation. Pretty strong stuff for YA fiction, and it turns out that the author didn't pull back from the dark side of such a plot. People must die, even good people. (No, I'm not marking this as a spoiler. Katniss, our heroine, makes that clear very early in the book.) Within the confines of the world Collins has built for the actual Hunger Games, life is not fair. The line between the haves and the have-not is drawn by proximity to the Capitol district of a post civil war North America, with those living the farthest away geographically also living the farthest away economically. That carries through to the participants in the Games, something invented supposedly to remind the various districts the repercussions of fighting against....and there is where the story starts to fall apart for me. There's no solid back story for the how and why North America remains a totalitarian state. What happened that obliterated that basic primal instinct of protecting the young? Why would people continue to have children in the outlying districts? Sure, there will always be people who go along to get along, but there will always also be people, people who don't even have children, who would stand up and say, "No, not the children". How did the citizens of Panem come to the point that they not only allowed their children to be killed year after year, but it becomes a popular entertainment if your child isn't included? Also, it doesn't make sense for a government to allow the second and third strongest competitors to be killed. In a society so interested in strength and beauty, wouldn't they be saved for breeding? I can imagine there are ways this could happen, but I want to know why they happened in this story.



I'm going to keep going with the series, partially because Collins has invented an intriguing character with Kstniss, but all because I want to see where she goes with a society that can't last the way it's been portrayed so far.



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2010/08/21

Mentor by Tom Grimes

MentorMentor by Tom Grimes

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This a memoir about that awful, wonderful, scary, magical journey that every author wants to take, the one that puts them in a place that when someone says "What do you do?" they can answer, "I'm a writer" without any fear of a followup question. Tom Grimes put in the hours, he did the revisions, he wrote and wrote and wrote. But still, it was a combination of good timing and talent that got him published. That's not great to hear if you're trying to make it as a published author, but at least Grimes is honest. Frank Conroy liked Grimes' work and was in a position to make things happen for him. Grimes never asks himself the question, "What if Frank had never saw my application?", something that could have happened very easily given the process to get into the Iowa Writer's Workshop. This is not a story about failure, so why look at what might have been? It's the story of more than getting by with a little help from a friend, it's about about one friend helping anouther's dreams come true.



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2010/08/17

A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick

A Reliable WifeA Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Really good historical, pretty good fiction. The blurbs on the back promised more than was delivered (I know, I should know better than to believe those), but there was a gothic tone to most of the story that made up for the weak tension. The predictable love triangle was saved by all of the characters being deliciously flawed.

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The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender

The Particular Sadness of Lemon CakeThe Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


I really enjoyed the first third of this book, it had all the makings of a "I couldn't put it down". Unfortunately, the first third is the book, it doesn't expand on what it a fascinating plot device. What if someone could taste the emotions of the people who made their food? What if that person was a child? How would it change how that child sees not only their family, but the world around them? There would be good and bad consequences, right? In Bender's book, however, there seem to be no good consequences, and heidn't change her one bit. Her ability became nothing more than a contrivance to explore an unhappy family. What a waste of a good idea!

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2010/08/13

The Lady and the Unicorn by Tracy Chevalier

The Lady and the UnicornThe Lady and the Unicorn by Tracy Chevalier

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


The setting and the historical aspect were interesting and informative. Perhaps a little too informative? There were no obvious information dumps, but there were times, especially when the story shifts to the weaver's portion of the story, that I felt I was reading a book entitled "Guilds in the Medieval Village" and not the fictionalized story of how a very famous tapestry came to be. As the the characters, when the're really all quite superficial and each only has one purpose in the story. What you learn about them at their introduction is all you'll ever need to know about them. My last quibble is the epilogue. If most of the characters are fictional, why tell their "what happened to" story in that way? Either it's a part of this story, or write another book.

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2010/08/10

Juneteenth: A Novel by Ralph Ellison

Juneteenth: A NovelJuneteenth: A Novel by Ralph Ellison

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


How do you judge a book that was unfinished at the time it was taken over by the editor? A book that was 40 years in the making, likely to have been published as three books if the author had finished it before he passed away? Do you judge it as a work in progress, a sketch book piece from the creaters of one of Western Literatures masterpieces? After all, Elisson never handed this book to his publisher and said "It is done". It seems unfair to judge it as a finished work bearing Ellison's name, but on the other hand, he's dead and probably doesn't care. The book IS published, it is promoted as a completed novel by the people who are making money from it (Ellison's estate as well as the publisher), so it should be held up to whatever standards the reader uses to judge other, more traditionally published books. In that case, I say that Juneteenth: A Novel, while no where near the glory of Invisible Man, is not a bad book. As character driven stories go, it's got the makings of something truly fascinating. Sen. Adam Sundraider's orgin story as Bliss, a boy raised to be a white preacher in the southern Black tradition by the charismatic Reverend Hickman, is not only a lesson in a history that could have been, it's good reading. However, as Bliss/Sunraider grows older, his trauma induced memories grow weaker. It's not that he stop remembering, he just doesn't remember things is a form that makes for good reading. Hickman disappears from the narrative for two long to explain why he was so important in the beginning. You can definitely spot that there where two books plotted at the time Ellison died, and Callahan's editing can't fill the holes between them.

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2010/08/06

Love and Summer by William Trevor

Love and SummerLove and Summer by William Trevor

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


At the beginning of this book, you will feel like you're on a time travel vacation back to a beautiful, peaceful, isolated 1950's rural Irish town. The setting is just that perfect. And then....you begin to see what goes on inside the townspeople, the scars that the past has left on them, the dreams that hold them in limbo, and you'll almost wish you'd been happy with observing the landscape and left the people alone.

This is a very good, but very sad story. It's southern gothic set in Ireland.

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2010/08/05

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson, narrated by Simon Vance

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Millennium, #1)The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


An amazingly good mystery that takes the time to wrap up ALL the loose ends. My only quibble is that the clue that breaks the leading mystery could have been discovered sooner if not for a very obvious question that the investigator should have asked much earlier in the investigation. Larsson knows what to tell, what to show, and what to leave out, making for a story that moves along quickly, despite so much ground being covered. His characters are interesting and realistic, despite the heavy objectification of the females.

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2010/08/03

Parrot and Olivier in America by Peter Carey

Parrot and Olivier in AmericaParrot and Olivier in America by Peter Carey

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


I wanted to like this more. I know I'm supposed to like this more. However, clever does not equal funny, in my opinion, and you can see this book trying to be clever. Sure, the characters have some great lines, but in a story, should you be able to see those lines coming and groan when they arrive? As a historical fiction, it's good on the history side. The idea of two men running away from the French Revolution to post Revolution America is a good set up for comparing cultures and politics. That the two men come from two different backgrounds adds some depth. But the characters are so contrived to show off those backgrounds that I couldn't see them with any sense of realism. They're farcical in a realistic setting, and that's not a good read.

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2010/08/02

The Secret Miracle, edited by Daniel Alarcon

The Secret MiracleThe Secret Miracle by Daniel AlarcĆ³n

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


This is as much a book for fans of writing as it is a book for aspiring authors. A series of questions are posed to a large (unwieldy if you don't recognize most of the names) of published authors and their answers are are given. Either some of the authors didn't answer all the questions or their answers didn't make the cut, because every author doesn't answer every question. That must be were the editing came in, I guess. This is a book about the personal habits and opinions of some writers - that's it. They all have different approaches to their craft, so in the end, this is a book that reassures that there is more than one way to finish a book.
As a reader, I found it interesting to learn a little something about authors whose work I have admired and those I haven't. Strangely enough, there were no surprises. Chabon is an arrogant word slinger and Colm TĆ³ibĆ­n is a man who works for a living.

If you're looking for a book about the grind of writing, I'd recommend Steven King's "On Writing". King is in this book, but his nuts and bolts "put your butt in the chair" method is lost among all the artistic self-hype.

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2010/07/28

The Winter King by Bernard Cornwell

The Winter King (The Arthur Books, #1)The Winter King by Bernard Cornwell

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Cornwell's take on the Arthurian legend is both violent and introspective. Of course there are battles: big battles, small skirmishes, fights between two men to settle disputes, fights between entire kingdoms to settle a slight. And Cornwell knows how to write battles so that the individual cost isn't lost in the description of the vast landscapes. But he also knows how to tell the story of what is going on inside the characters heads, why they fight or don't fight, and that there are emotions beyond greed that once turned the course of history. He approaches Arthur as someone who probably was a real man in some context, that all legend has its roots in a truth of some sort, but beyond borrowing a few key players of the legend and a very broad nod at the setting, this is his take on a war lord that was a good, if flawed, man, and the people he surrounded himself with. Cornwell also brings religion into the story more than most re-tellers of this legend, and the way he plays Paganism and the new upstart Christianity against each other is not only educational, it's amusing.

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2010/07/25

Hypothermia: A Thriller by Arnaldur IndriĆ°ason

Hypothermia: A Thriller (Reykjavik Thriller)Hypothermia: A Thriller by Arnaldur IndriĆ°ason

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


A basic procedural made more interesting in that none of the cases being investigated by missing persons detective Erlendur are "on the books" investigations. This is a realistic investigation: it's solved through dogged police work. That doesn't make for a flashy story, but it does make the heavy amount of coincidence believable in the end. The setting was entirely new to me, and I liked reading a book that was written as if I'd be familiar with the place. No heavy cultural or geographic information dumps, it was immersion from the very beginning.

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2010/07/22

The Four Seasons: A Novel of Vivaldi's Venice by Laurel Corona

The Four Seasons: A Novel of Vivaldi's VeniceThe Four Seasons: A Novel of Vivaldi's Venice by Laurel Corona

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


I'm taking away a whole star for using Vivaldi's name in the title when he's only a reoccurring supporting character in the story. The theme of the story, how art can shape lives as much as lives shape art, is shown through the lives of two sisters, orphaned as infants and raised within the very interesting patronage system that made Venice the art center that it once was. As a romance, there's a distinct lack of any kind of passion, but the setting, as a HF, is pretty well done. There's a sense of receptiveness with the descriptive passages, a problem when your entire story takes place in what was a very insular, small town kind of city. I had the feeling that the idea for the story came first and that Corona invented characters to populate it - they weren't nearly as dimensional as the orphanage, casas, and of course, this being Venice, the canals.

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2010/07/18

Dark Arrows Great Stories of Revenge Edited by Alberto Manguel

Dark Arrows Great Stories of RevengeDark Arrows Great Stories of Revenge by Alberto Manguel

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


The important thing to keep in mind when reading this collection is that the subtitle is "Great Stories of Revenge", not Stories of Great Revenge. As Manguel points out in his introduction, ...."there are many different types of revenge...", and it soon becomes apparent that what one culture calls revenge, I might call justice. A few of the stories go to the darker extremes, such as Henrik Von Kleist's "The Foundling" (so over the top, you'll think it was written by Alexadre Dumas); and August Derketh's "Miss Epperson" where the crime goes on and on but the retribution is swift. All of the writing is good (even the Faulkner story that I had to force myself to read), and this is a great way to get a taste of the darker side of some of the world's better and lesser known authors.

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The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon

The Yiddish Policemen's UnionThe Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Short review: loved the alternate history setting enough to slog through a rambling parody of a mystery. No, I don't think it was meant to be a parody, it simply read like one to me.

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Break by Hannah Moskowitz

BreakBreak by Hannah Moskowitz

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Taking the author's age (16 when this was written), this would be a strong 4 star rating. Also, the first three quarters of the book, regardless of how young the author was, would earn 4 stars. But it's a grown-up, read the whole book world when you publish, so there you have it - 3 stars.

Moskowitz does a beautiful slow reveal of the screwed up life that Jonah has partially been given and partially created for himself. It's a coming of age story, in that unless Jonah learns what he can and can not control, he's not going to make it alive. As this is something that a lot of adults never figure out, there is a real sense of danger of how far things will go, not only with Jonah's personal demons, but also in how he deals with the family and friends that his instincts tell him the truth about but his heart isn't ready to believe.

The story changes speed, unfortunately, when it starts to build for a climax rather than an ending. Yes, it makes sense that someone who's been doing horrible self destructive things would do something even more self destructive when pushed to his limits, but Jonah's never shown the least bit of impetuosity in his actions. He always put the needs of others first - that's how he got to where he ended up. If there was something that caused that sudden major personality change, I missed it.

But up until the change up of the finish, this was a very good book.

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2010/07/11

Bysantium by Stephen R. Lawhead

Byzantium (Harper Fiction)Byzantium by Stephen R. Lawhead

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


3 1/2 stars, actually.

Three distinct 9th Century settings - an Abbey in Ireland, a Viking settlement in Scandanavia, and the cities and deserts surrounding Busantium, now known as Istanbul - make for a LOT of interesting historical fun and facts. The reader goes on a journey of discovery with Aiden, a young monk who starts out as part of pilgrimage to deliver a gift to the Emperor Basil. Along the way he's captured, the rest of the monks are presumed dead, he becomes a slave and is traded and loaned out as many times as an epic requires, and runs into enough intrigue to keep his classically educated intellect alive and kicking. The book is a fun read, in a swashbuckling/religious politics mash up sort of way. I'm not sure the plot needed to be quite so, well, byzantine, but with the title what it is, I can't say I wasn't warned.

The one thing that kept me from really liking the book was the portrayal of the Barbarians. Were they really so Hagar the Horrible? I understand cultural differences, but at times they verged on comic relief. Barbarians yes, buffoons probably not.

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