Review: Enemy of God

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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Review: The Water Seeker

The 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 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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Review: An Object of Beauty: A Novel

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

The 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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Review: Sleep, Pale Sister

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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Review: A Skeptic's Guide to Writers' Houses

A 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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Review: The Invention of Hugo Cabret

The 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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Review: Full Dark, No Stars

Full 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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Review: At Home: A Short History of Private Life

At 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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