Seth's comments (member since Sep 17, 2008)

Seth's comments from the Pick-a-Shelf group.

Angle Of Repose, by Wallace Stegner--my review.

5 stars out of 5!!!...although, this is a sad read. Depressing, at times. But it's a stunning literary achievement, and though marketed chiefly as yet another "Penguin Classic" (at least that's my edition), this also counts as a splendid historical novel.

It is a historical novel because the bulk of the narrative deals with Susan and her husband Oliver Ward, who's marriage we get a peek at, as it was, in California (plus Idaho and Mexico, etc.) between 1876 and 1890. Having just read this after devouring a compelling history book simply called California, by Kevin Starr, I can appreciate the trials and tribulations of Susan and Oliver, as Oliver tries and often fails to succeed as a mining engineer in 19th century Cailfornia. Interesting to compare fact and fiction...but you don't need to read any histories of any US States to feel the full emotional impact of Angle Of Repose. It's a tragic but unforgettable story, and the historical details regarding land development and industrial development in what was then a blossoming, booming place is just the icing on top. Despite all the expansion going on in California at this time, Stegner's read is about the human factor, the setbacks, the schemes gone wrong, and the deaths, that happened if you were to use the microscope to peer closer. The story of Oliver and Susan Ward--especially Susan--is unforgettable.

The framing narrative featured in this novel takes place around the time it was written. What I mean is, this Pulitzer Prize-Winning novel was published in 1971, and the book is initially--and then occasionally--set around that time (an interesting time in California, in its own right). Lyman Ward, a hapless historian and professor, who has lost part of his leg, and his wife, has retired to isolation to research the lonely life of his grandmother, Susan Ward. He learns more than he bargained for, including the fact that documents don't tell you everything; sometimes you have to guess, based on the evidence. Anyway, it is the sequences involving Lyman Ward doing his research that then propel us into the past, which is where the bulk of the novel takes place...though Lyman Ward of late 60's/early 70's California has his own struggles, and cultural alienation, to deal with. His painful immersion into his grandmother's tragedy seems to upset his present.

A wonderful work of fiction (including historical fact woven into the fiction), but almost guaranteed to evoke much sadness in any reader with a heart, and a penchant for deep contemplation about what worth is a life that was not the life desperately hoped for. Good stuff. Rich stuff.

The Blackest Bird, by Joel Rose--Seth's Review.

3 Stars.

Actually, I remain very confused about how many stars, out of five stars, this book really deserves. The first half--the action-oriented half, the half with the murders in it, and the prison fire/prison break, the half featuring the calumny and vendettas of the various members of the gangs of New York, the half in which Edgar Allan Poe has not yet become a bit tiresome in his moaning--is a 4-star half of a promising Historical Mystery.

Then, things seem to go a bit wrong. Set in 1840s New York, it may begin to dawn on the reader that--while each individual scene gives decent details of whatever set-piece is being featured, thus illuminating various facets of New York at this time--New York as whole is not successfully portrayed. You might not finish this book thinking "Well! In addition to a lively plot, what really dazzled me was the incredible evocation of New York as it was!". We get the pieces of this New York that serve what is a fairly entertaining crime story, and that's about all. Somehow, it ends up seeming to be a historical view with a narrow focus, created with tunnel vision. This is to some degree understandable, as there is a plot to be maintained--but I don't recall having the same reaction to the New York of Jack Finney's marvelous novel called Time And Again.

Then there is the Edgar Allan Poe factor. Given his state of mind throughout at least this part of his life, he makes a wonderfully creepy murder suspect...but the total emphasis on him, this fictional Poe drawn from real life data, slows the book way way down in the second half. Some interesting characters from earlier on have disappeared completely, and we are left with a smaller ensemble domiinated by Poe and Constable Hays, who spends a few late chapters merely trying to track where Poe and his immediate family (sick young wife and aunt/mother-in-law) have moved to next without telling anyone (suspicious behaviour when highlighted in a crime novel, but actually Poe just never seems to have any cash).

I enjoyed this book very much while reading the first half; I really thought that maybe I was onto something spectacular. And then the winds changed and the book developed a bit of a sluggish hobble. The final act, involving the solution to the crimes at the beginning of the book, seems very distant from the actual mayhem perpetrated so many pages ago (the plot moves through several years, and risks alienating the details of the crimes themselves from the sudden solution at the very end; the reader is assumed to have kept a few things sorted). The final problem, for anyone looking to this book for a fictional frolic laced with what seems like actual facts, is the author's Afterword, which reveals, point by point, how much fudging of the truth has gone on to create the story. Don't read this and finish thinking "Well! I've delightfully and inadvertently learned a lot of Poe facts, and Colt (gunmaker) facts, and 1840s famous personages in New York facts!". Erm, not so, apparently.

Anyway, I dunno. It's a fun book while you read it, though the air of excitement leaks out the longer it goes on, leaving disappointing deflation for the reader. But the taste provided of this 1840s New York is fun while it lasts, and Edgar Allan Poe--as I said--makes a quality murder suspect.

Oh. And. I must point out as well that there is no excuse for typos on the covers of books! "Nineteenth", guys. Not "Nineteeth".

An Irish Solution, by Cormac Millar--my review.

Well, despite my claims to the contrary (on another Thread), I managed to cram in one more crime/mystery read this month!

This Cormac Millar novel--which gives a fictional treatment to drug-trafficking in Ireland and the narcos who combat it--is a bit complicated, but does decide to gradually unravel itself in the back half. There are a lot of characters, be they high or low-level criminals, corrupt or non-corrupted law enforcement officials (including lead character Seamus Joyce of the Irish Drug Enforcement Agency), schoolgirls and nuns, healthy or ailing wives or mistresses or girlfriends, reporters and internet hackers, and some visitors from Germany and the United States who have become involved in Ireland's drug-prevention plans of the future, whatever they may be. There's also violence, murder, bribery, alleged pedophilia, and, if we're lucky, a hero or two. One clean lawman tries to stop the frame-up of a semi-respectable twit who is tricked into taking the fall for...well, arguably a whole lot of gangsters and a whack of sleazy cops and politicians. Some of it even works out nice. Some of it stays a bit confusing. 3 stars.

Oops. Wrong thread for my review. Ah well. I meant well. Blame the two beers.

Oops. I'm changing my platform. I'm Crossing The Floor, as it were. The historical pick for me in November will be The Blackest Bird, Joel Rose (instead of On Secret Service, by John Jakes; sorry Mr. Jakes, but I will eventually get to your book).

Ok. So, my final crime-novel pick for our little genre focus this month was: The Outfit, by Richard Stark (who is actually Donald Westlake).

Before me, most of the goodreads reaction to this book has been 4 or 5 star ratings. I definitely enjoyed it, but I fail to see exactly what is so spectacular about it that I could possibly rate it that high.

My Review:

This is kind of Crime Novel as Wish-Fulfillment Fantasy. Would we not all like an opportunity to rip off Organized Crime, and get away with it? After all, what's wrong with stealing from criminals? Put the kids through college, make a better life, and divert some of that dirty money into good things, happy things. Alas, I would expect to be found hung up on a hook, somewhere, with pieces missing, were I to try anything like this. And, I don't have the connections, or the pipeline of scumsucker gossip--such as exists for various conveniently-placed characters, like in this novel--to just spring into action because I've known for several years where "The Syndicate" has some dirty money stashed, awaiting transport to the top men. I haven't had some ex-con spill his guts to me about what safe numbers-racket proceeds are stowed in, waiting to be claimed, if perhaps I can come up with some machine-guns.

But the hero of this book--well, actually he's more of a marginal hero, because, after all, he's a criminal too, but, y'know, you're supposed to root for him in these books about him, cuzz...he wins--who is called Parker, has the ways and means to make life tough, in the pocket book--well, okay, in big metal safes ripe for the looting--for "The Oufit", and all the leaders and minions of "The Outfit" who, it seems, have gotten soft and weak. Parker knows who to see to get weaponed up. Parker knows who to enlist in various hits on Mob money-nests, because that's what real friends are for. The book starts with The Outfit making life unlivable for him, so he launches his own USA-wide campaign against them simply by shooting off a few letters to old pals who, it seems, have all been sitting on secret info that would allow them to, say, rip off some vulnerable Mob cash-depository before, say, the money gets sewn into a low-level gangster's suit and hotfooted off to the airport. Nice to have friends willing to piss off Organized Crimesters, while you, Parker plan on how to invade the Head Cheese's home, in Buffalo.

This is a simple story. One of these Parker novels got filmed as the Mel Gibson film called Payback, and this is also a fun, if simple, bit of mayhem, which would give you a quick idea of what's going on here. I suppose--hmmm--I suppose my problem with this book is that it contains no surprises. because Parker is too good at what he does. And much as I like bad guys turning around to notice big chunks of their ill-gotten green has disappeared, Parker is a hard character--at least in one quick, thin book without an emphasis on in-depth characterization--for me to rely on for wish-fulfillment thrills. I don't really identify with him, despite him doing what it would be cool to do. So, in a book where I feel a bit distanced from all the characters, and where we have no truly unexpected plot folds, I can only say "3 Stars" and also say that I would probably enjoy checking in with Parker at least one more time. Donald Westlake's masterpiece (under any name) remains the monolithic romp called Dancing Aztecs.

By The Pricking Of My Thumbs, by Agatha Christie-- my review.

The word on some of Ms. Christie's later works is that they can be a bit incoherent, fuzzy, muddled...thus of course making them lesser crime novels. My experience has been that this is true. Witness By The Pricking Of My Thumbs, which--when you compare it to something like And Then There Were None, written when the author was at the top of her form-- glimmers with some of the old magic, but does crumble into confusion just a tad in the late-going. To wit: it don't all fit together right.

This mystery novel, first published in 1968, was Agatha Christie's attempt to bring back her detecting duo Tommy & Tuppence, a married couple with a talent for getting immersed in danger. I must have read their first outing-- The Secret Adversary--way back when I was, oh, maybe about thirteen years old. It made a huge impression on me. It is a cracking good mystery; it was fun watching the subplot of two young sleuths fall in love; and it opened my eyes to the fact that espionage and spy-jinks, with their link to world affairs most likely in the arena of politics, could be a fun part of a mystery, even for a youngster (taking a chance on Eye Of The Needle, by Ken Follett, at around this time of my life, also cemented my attraction to spy fiction).

Anyway, I only read Agatha Christie books occasionally in my adult life, and besides seeking out Poirot's herculean efforts of detection--cuz he's a legend--I like to check in with Tommy & Tuppence now and then. Postern Of Fate was, interestingly, my return to the adventures of these sleuthing lovebirds, and I recall very little about the book, except that--as one of Ms. Christie's last books--it was...strange. And, yes, muddled. A book not tamed and made complete. By The Pricking Of My Thumbs, thankfully, is not that bad. In fact, it's kind of fun, as a Halloweeny-ish pick (I'm reading a lot of Horror these days, too). I do wish that Tommy & Tuppence--older now--would have got mixed up in more international/political/"who's the bad spy" intrigue, but instead, with this tale, they investigate the disappearance and likely murder of an old woman in a nursing home. A creepy nursing home. The trail leads to a village in rural England. A creepy village. With a creepy house. A creepy house with split personalities, if that makes sense (it will if you read it). All of this because of a creepy painting, which has also undergone a creepy...adjustment. The painting of the house is what leads Tuppence to take the train out to Creepyville, England (my nomenclature for now), WITHOUT her husband, who's connection to spy-stuff--now that he's aged somewhat--seems only to get invited to dreary international seminars and talks that serve mainly, it seems, to take him out of the action long enough for his wife to find out just enough village secrets to get her bashed on the head, after which she goes missing too!

Yikes.

The problem with the book is that once Tuppence is nosing around the creepy village, she and the readers get subjected to an onslaught of info that seems to be taking the story in various directions, not all of which end up mattering. HEY, don't get me wrong, I'm all for red herrings and false trails--but at the end of this book, when an evil-doer is cornered (well, actually the evil-doer is the one doing the cornering, as we see one of our detectives in extreme jeopardy from a fairly depraved individual!) we get "the Evil-Doer's Grand, Explanatory Speech". Which is fine, I suppose. Except that said Speech refers in a kind of halfhazard fashion to lots of info thrown at us at about the mid-portion of the book, and it is hard at that point to mentally travel back and sort through what was relevant, half-relevant, and total balderdash or idle gossip. Even when one does the sorting and remembering (or simply does a re-skim of earlier gossip, chitchat, and history-of-the-area burbling), what does emerge is a scenario based on some strange and tenuous logic. It's as if the author had thrown in a bunch of stuff willy-nilly for shock-value, and when she shakes it all out at at the end, she does it a bit confusingly (which was not a problem in the earlier books), and does it that way so that we hopefully don't notcie that it's kind of a weak idea in the first place, full of things that seemed important, but turned out not so important after all. Although having said that, there is one aspect of the original premise that brings to mind Agatha Christie's old expertise at making one believe something completely, and then it simply gets turned over on its head!!

This looked like a great Agatha Christie choice for the Halloween season, specifically, but it was really only mildly satisfying. Mood: good. Mystery: merely adequate, with lumps. I would suggest, instead, A Murder Is Announced, or The Hollow, or Curtain: Poirot's Last Case (my personal Christie fave). If you are less interested in Christie as Creepy, and more interested in meeting Tommy & Tuppence, proceed immediately to The Secret Adversary.

Down River, by John Hart--my review.

If you take any kind of Acting classes where they make you do improvisation, or they give you some kind of scenario to expand on, or even if you're handed a scene from out of Shakespeare or something, some advice you might get is not to start out too intense or angry. This is because the scene needs somewhere to go. It needs to build. If you start out at a high level of anger, you can't take it up to the next level, because you're already there.

Even if the Instructor loves your intensity, and lets it go a few times, it will get to be TOO MUCH, and you'll be asked to tone it down...

Enter author John Hart, and his crime novel, Down River...

This book starts out intense, stays intense, and ends intense. There is virtually no humour in these pages at all. Yes, on the face of it, why should there be? This is the story of a young man who must flee his rural family life, once his stepmother fingers him for a brutal murder. The father takes her side. Many in the town assume he's guilty--well, I mean after all, there's an eyewitness. But he gets off due to the glaring problem of no motive.

Actually, that's the backstory for Down River. That happened five years before the book begins. The story begins with our accused but acquitted murder suspect returning home thanks to a cry for help. And when he gets home, there's nothing but bitter feeling all around. Everyone one he encounters seems to have some reason to make his life miserable...either for coming back, or running off in the first place. An ex-lover, siblings, the long arm of the law, the father, and do I even need to mention the hostility of the stepmother?

It's all very intense. It's VERY intense. Everyone is very upset. Rival factions either opposing or supporting a big-money land development deal--with threats flying around (chiefly directed at our protagonist's stubborn father) don't help things any. Then there's an assault, and guess who is the best suspect! Later, there's a corpse, and as people stop saying "I'm furious and I don't want to talk about it--Go away!", and instead start saying "I'm finally going to get this off my chest...", all the dirty dirty secrets come out.

I give this book 4 stars out of 5. Though I worry about this writer milking intensity and angst for all it's worth in book after book. The pace of this story is great, but when you marry that with a kind of bleak, angry narrative that never relaxes and takes a breath, you get a book that may not appeal to everyone. If the book has a weakness, it is that after the first 50 pages, it has nowhere else to go, in terms of mood and intensity. The "family secrets" aspect of the plot is not entirely fresh, but does have some fresh angles; I confess that I had something all figured out pages before it was revealed...and then when it was revealed (at the moment I expected) it turned out I was completely wrong! So that sort of trickery is a plus! And there's nothing like relentless intensity to keep the pages turning. But I can't help feeling it was all a bit much. Certainly I might not be as riveted if this went on in the author's next book.

On Secret Service, by John Jakes.

The Wounded And The Slain, by David Goodis--my review:

I've recently been reading some books about the Caribbean, whether they be fiction, or in the case of one history book, non-fiction. It started with a short-story collection called Trinidad Noir, which gave me some authors to follow up on, whenever their little bios indicated actual novels written and published. But then I was at the bookstore, which had set up whole shelf of nothing but the "Hard Case Crime" series as part of their huge Crime And Mystery section...and the first book I picked up to read the back cover for info was set in Kingston, Jamaica. So that seemed appropriate; it was also tempting to finally read a David Goodis book--a fairly major hardboiled crime writer I had not as yet sampled--and here was a "longlost" novel by him now back in print.

It's pretty good. It's kind of a psychological thriller, as a man who has given up on life in general goes wandering into the slums of Kingston late at night to meet his destiny. A vicious attack results, as well as some drama concerning who the police think did what, versus what actually happened...and all this is balanced with our "hero"--James Bevan's--crumbling domestic situation; he's on vacation in Kingston with his wife, who doesn't want anything physical from him, and this has wreaked havoc with the marriage, and driven Bevan to drink, and thoughts of suicide. He's on the edge, right when we enter the novel.

The character of the wife--Cora Bevan--seems like an aspect of the book that may emerge as a weakness. We basically see her through her put-upon husband's eyes at first, and it feels as though she is not going to be fully fleshed out, and possibly left as the "spouse from hell", the cause of most of why we pity Bevan himself. When Bevan treks out for his harrowing adventure and we see her hanging around the pool with her eye on another man--a better man in every way--it looks like we Cora may only be there as the catalyst for James's woes, and as expected, the narrative follows him, not her.

But then, Cora is reluctantly yanked into the crime elements of the story, and it is interesting to see what the real husband/wife dynamic is like here, once James is in big trouble. She becomes part of a tricky scenario that would get Bevan out of Kingston, instead of dead or in jail, if that's possible. And the odds are definitely against him.

I would have liked to give this lively book a 4 star rating out of 5, but I think that this is one of those books that is quite compelling while it is being read, but ultimately does not leave an indelible impression, the way a great crime novel really would. It's an easy read, with some plot twists that put the lead character in an intriguing predicament, one that tests his underlying moral fibre, assuming it was not lost ages ago. As for the Caribbean details--well, I've never been to Jamaica, so I'm hardly an expert. But having read a few pertinent novels (and one history book) before this, it seems that the author does not embarrass himself with the depictions of the natives, or with the little details, like references to the sugar trade.

Swell. Tried to stay away from spoilers. Not likely too many people will chase after this out-of-print author anyway. But the books are around...they're around.

Listen, for October, I'm reading alternating Crime and Horror novels. I guess I'm allowed to come here and post reviews of the Crime choices throughout the month?

Mark Of Murder, by Dell Shannon--Seth's review.

Elizabeth Linington--under the pseudonym Dell Shannon--wrote many mystery novels starring her fictional creation Lt. Luis Mendoza. He's a handsome, hot-blooded, somewhat hot-headed cop, with a talent for hunches. Which is not to say that the reader is not given at least some clues, before the epiphany strikes our hero.

In this one, we get two mysteries for the price of a single book, both steeped in lots of detail even just in the first 50 pages (while Mendoza is off in Bermuda, with his wife, on vacation!), with more startling developments adding to the complexities of each cases.

The cases? A serial killer is on a knifing spree in LA, at night. The book starts with a fourth body being found, which means lots of witnesses and locations for Mendoza's colleagues--including big Sgt. Hackett to follow up on. But Hackett gets distracted by the slaying of a chiropractor, in his own office, courtesy of a bullet. This murder takes about ten pages to obviously become more complicated than the simple burglary-gone-wrong it resembles on the surface. This chiropractor, it turns out, is at the centre of an ever-expanding web of strangness (where do you want to start? the wife? the nurse? the appointment book? the disappearing sterilizer? the clue clutched in the dead man's hand?).

Anyway, vacation over for Mendoza, when his pal Hackett ends up in a coma after a suspicious car accident, after mentioning to a few people here and there that, overworked as he was through the day, he was going to be following up on a few lines of inquiry regarding BOTH cases? So really, we have a third mystery landing on top of the other two: if someone tried to off Hackett, was it because of his snooping around after the Slasher on the loose, or did he get too close to the chiropractor killer? This is part of the fun of the book--Mendoza trying to discover what Hackett discovered (tough if you gotta wonder who's even lying about seeing him that night). Plus, Hackett's tragedy makes the book a bit more personal for all the cops run ragged on these cases, especially Mendoza, which means the reader, too, is hoping it all gets solved and justice is divvied up.

This is a short novel, with tons of stuff going on. The author doesn't waste a page. Dialogue is clipped, characters are fleshed out at a whirl, and subplots--such as Mendoza thinking about quitting, after seeing what's happened to Hackett--are dealt with briskly...perhaps to the detriment of the novel really achieving something truly special. The fact is, a mystery like this, as it begins to see its layers of complexity, its red herrings and false scenarios, gradually peeled away to reveal what is actually the truth, stands or falls on how clever the original premise is, as well as how clever the real clues are. Riveting as this little rocket of a novel is most of the way along, I confess to getting my own hunch about who the chiropractor killer was, and why the murder was committed. As far as our knife-wielding pattern-killer plotline goes, this turns into more of a chase scenario--albeit an exciting one, and one that comes after much dogged policework coupled with some shrewd psychological insights--than any kind of puzzle for the ages. No, the dead chiropractor plot is the one with the real whodunit angle, and I don't think Dell Shannon matches some of her other efforts, such as in Root Of All Evil, or Ace Of Spades.

All in all, though, the pace and the complexity--as well as a fairly satisfactory climax--might make this a good choice for anyone wanting to meet a somewhat neglected detective of yesteryear, Lt. Mendoza.

No movie of Anubis Gates yet...although there's an intriguing thought!

1. The Anubis Gates, by Tim Powers
2. Orbitsville, by Bob Shaw
3. The Painted Bird, by Jerzy Kosinski
4. Quick Service, by P. G. Wodehouse
5. The Wandering Jew, by Eugene Sue

The mystery novel that I plan to read in October is The Mark Of Murder, by Dell Shannon.