Ten.C.S. Lewis, like Stuart Neville, was born in Belfast. Both became writers. Both wrote extrao...moreTen Things You Must Know About The Twelve
Ten.C.S. Lewis, like Stuart Neville, was born in Belfast. Both became writers. Both wrote extraordinary popular fiction which used elements of the fantastic to expose deeper themes.
Nine. Can redemption be found in the bottom of a glass? The first paragraph of The Ghosts of Belfast, reads: "Maybe if he had one more drink they'd leave him alone. Gerry Fagan told himself that lie before every swallow. He chased the whiskey's burn with a cool black mouthful of Guinness and placed the glass back on the table. Look up and they'll be gone, he thought.
Eight. The Twelve who torment this former IRA gunman Gerry Fagan are visions of the people he has slain: three British soldiers, two members of the Ulster Defence Regiment, two UFF men, an RUC officer, and four civilians (one an infant) as collateral damage. Are these (as Fagan's prison psychologist stated) manifestations of his guilt? Or is their origin supernatural?
Seven. Either way, when the spectres begin demanding bloody vengeance from Fagan, it makes a hell of a good crime novel. The victims that Fagan's phantoms demand may now cloak themselves with respectability and wear politicians' suits, but underneath they remain the same hard schemers. These sharp survivors determine quickly that someone is stacking up bodies across Northern Ireland, and they have not forgotten their very efficient ways of pursuing who is responsible. In this book, Neville very cleverly makes an investigation into the nature of responsibility.
Six.The Ghosts of Belfast, also known as The Twelve, merits comparison with the best crime stories of recent decades. If Gerald Seymour (author of Harry's Game and Field of Blood) loved Martin Scorsese's The Departed so much that he somehow had sex with it, the bastard child would be Stuart Neville's The Ghosts of Belfast.
Five. Like fellow Oo nominee The Bloomsday Dead, the action in Stuart Neville's The Ghosts of Belfast takes place in today's Northern Ireland. From immigration to economic development to politics to crime to lingering sectarian hatred, Stuart Neville delivers a post-Troubles portrait that is brutal and fascinating.
Four. The character of Gerry Fagan is more than a loose nut that has worked its way free and gone jamming up the works. Glimpses of his past and budding attachments present him as a complex character. Fagan feels a strong attraction to tall, ash-blonde reporter Marie McKenna: a local outcast for taking up with a traitorous Catholic member of the RUC, seven years past. Can he, who has never known it, find love? What about the more realistic goal: a degree of comfort?
Three. The theme of old loyalties questioned and reversed in today's complex political environment is also explored through deadly Scottish interloper Davy Campbell. A former member of the Black Watch, amazingly serving the Republican movement-? And now thrown in (when introduced) with a splinter group holding up post offices south of the border-? One of the most interesting players in The Ghosts of Belfast, Campbell is as surprising a force as Fagan. Or is there just a violence in both men that needs expression-?
Two. Stuart Neville's writing is fast-paced and character-driven, with more depth, pressure and rapid turns than a submarine battle. Great forces are engaged, and things long buried come exploding to the surface.
One.Critical Mick says: for these reasons, Mr. Neville's absorbing debut novel, The Ghosts of Belfast, was hereby awarded the 2009 Oo award for Best Book Read in 2009.
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Bang! Bang! Bang! Stab! Stab! Stab! Bad guys go "Mhoo ha ha ha ha!" The Blonde chick says "Tee hee! My hero!...moreRappman Begins
Bang! Bang! Bang! Stab! Stab! Stab! Bad guys go "Mhoo ha ha ha ha!" The Blonde chick says "Tee hee! My hero!"
Vince Flynn has accomplished what Vanilla Ice never could. Here's Rapp for Republicans. Yes, even for your Dad. Flynn's hero, Mitch Rapp, is a maverick super spy who does the dirty work that the CIA legally cannot, and he does it without ever losing a wink of sleep. In book after book, Mitch beats the snot out of all sorts of assorted foreign baddies while women swoon.
Potted plot: in "American Assassain" it is revealed how young Rapp grew from college puke to blackest of black ops operatives. There are some evil Muslim terrorists and evil Russians and evil German bankers, all of whom get blown up or shot or knifed. One is shot and knifed, just to be sure.
"American Assassain" is not to be confused with the movies "Ninja Assassain" or "American Ninja." It's all action and equally ridiculous. It's fun (1) if you're into that kind of thing and (2) in the mood, but Flynn's world is no more real than either of those flicks. I get the feeling that skimming the National Geographic article about the rebuilding of Beruit is as close as he's come to research. Maybe there was a condensed version in Reader's Digest.
While entertaining, this novel's characters and settings offer no surprises. Rapp is so perfect, he's boring: within five minutes of arriving at the secret CIA training base, his untrained civilian ass has clobbered the top dog instructor. Only a cheap shot to the nuts keeps him from humiliating the gruff ol' stock character. If that is not a sign to remove the brain before continuing, I don't know what is. It's clear Rapp will overcome every danger: all that colors the series of following conflicts is the detail of the guns used in each action sequence.
As for Lebanon, there's more observation, truth and depth in one page of Martin Malone than in all of "American Assassain." In fairness, Malone neglected to include any poodles. If you are a poodle nut then you may prefer Vince Flynn.
Critical Mick says: corn is a healthy part of any diet. It's nice when it is popped and is taken with a little butter and salt. The odd Vince Flynn won't do any harm. (less)
Ray lit a cigarette and cracked the window, humming along with the stereo. Wondering how it was that Bruce always got himself hooked up on these women named Mary. 'Thunder Road,' 'The River,' 'Mary's Place'… Christ, the man was obsessed.
Ray, if he was Springsteen, he'd have shot through for Mexico long ago, nabbed himself a Juanita, some shit like that. Ray had only ever met one Karen before, this Kiwi blonde in Hamburg with an oral fixation. Ray getting blowjobs on busses, trains, even one time in the linen closet of a motel on the outskirts of Saarbrucken, near the French border. Ray on his back in a pile of dirty sheets coming up with a whole new language all his own. (page 22)
Ray is one of the central characters in Declan Burke's second novel, The Big O. Potted plot: Frank is an inept plastic surgeon with wife difficulties. His lawyer talks him into having the soon-to-be-ex kidnapped while she is still covered by the good doctor's insurance. But Madge (the aforementioned ex) is best friends with Karen, a single thirty-something whose secrets include a stashed .44 magnum and the weekly adrenaline rush she gets from armed robbery. What does a chick like this fear? Karen is in danger of falling for the man pulled out of retirement to be Madge's "baby-sitter."
"The guy I work for," he said, "that I worked for, sometimes he needs people held a while. I'm the one who does the holding." ....
Karen sipped some vodka-tonic. "So how come you're retired?"
"It was jump or be shoved. The Fridge checked out. A new shylock took over."
"The Fridge?"
"The guy liked to eat."
"What happened to him?"
"What happens to every fridge," Ray said. "Bottom of a canal. Punctured." (page 10-1)
Yep. Our boy Ray.
There's crossing and double crossing, a detective who gets rumor of the crime, golfing tips, orphans, pats on the head, and a madman named Rossi who's out of jail and out for revenge. Oh, plus a wolf. And Elvis hair. Mayhem and marijuana, hot n' stylish, loads of heart. Loads of fun on every page. Which is nice.
This review began with Ray, but it could have just as easily begun with any of the six main characters. The Big O is told in short, fast chapters of only a page or two, alternating from the point-of-view of Ray or Karen or Frank to Madge or Doyle or Rossi. Bear with me as I draw an analogy with "The Little O..." The experience is like eating those nice, spicy olives from that vendor in the Powerscourt Shopping Arcade: each one tasty, meaty, savory, different. "I'll have just one more," is a constant promise.
Days (the novel begins on a Wednesday, packing in all its action before the end of the following Tuesday) provide larger section breaks. I guess those Wednesday - Thursday - Fridays are roughly equivalent to containers of olives, but here the unruly analogy breaks down. Even being the big fat bastard that I am, I've never sat down and eaten three tubs of olives in a row.
A final important note, though: both spicy olives and The Big O go well with BEER. Put the mouse over the pic at right for a secret message on that subject.
One niggle: the setting. Where exactly are these characters? The city is never named. Snappy dialogue refers to currency as "five grand" or "ten large" without ever adding dollars, euros, pounds or roubles. Rossi in the dole queue starts complaining that he does not know his RSI number (an Irish identifier) and then later someone starts talking of the (American) Social Security. Likewise, the links connecting these characters push the bounds of coincidence.
Mick says: the dialogue, characters, plot and action were swift, sharp and entertaining enough to merit the suspension of disbelief. The same way that Training Day is a great movie despite the yawning implausibility of its crucial coincidence. Yes, the same way that 2006's Running Scared ran so fast and slick. Winners all, big time.
Riding the movie theme hard into this review's conclusion: The Big O is the stuff Tarantino or Guy Ritchie would make into a film, a great fun film like Snatch, Layer Cake or Get Shorty. Filled with as many great characters as Pulp Fiction or (my personal fave 90's crime flick) Things to do in Denver When You're Dead. Burke's Big O would inspire a classic full of tough crooks, wise cracks, drugs, flash and boobies. "Wow," viewers would say.
And then the hippest moviegoers, leading their hot redheaded dates outta the cinema, slipping on their designer shades, would say "Yeah, but have you read the book it was based on? The book was better."
The Heather Graham who writes bestsellers may be "The Original Heather Graham," but I am willing to bet that Heather Gr...morePheeble!*
The Heather Graham who writes bestsellers may be "The Original Heather Graham," but I am willing to bet that Heather Graham the actress could toast generic white bread with more style and engagement than this sorry excuse for a thriller.
Graham has churned out an average of five novels every years for the past thirty years. How much originality is left? Imagine a high school junior staggering down Bourbon Street. "Gee whiz, I shouldn't have drank those six hand gernades. And all those shots! And that Cajun food was so, so spicy... it's churning arouund like I'm going to be sick!" Yep, Phantom Evil is as cliched, common and perdictable as that- and about as much fun if you stick around to watch if this little story will turn out like you think.
The writing is bland, repetitive, implausible, predictable, repetitive and about as scary as a DVD box set of Touched by an Angel Season Three that has never even been taken out of its shrink wrap. Mystery fans, romance fans, paranormal fans- take it from me. Skim the cooking instructions on a box of red beans and rice. That'll deliver equal flavor, satisfaction and information as Phantom Evil, and will save you countless hours of wasted time.
Potted plot: in contemporary New York, a serial killer known as "Sonny Boy" stalks and murders redheaded women in a horrifically gruesome manner, then...morePotted plot: in contemporary New York, a serial killer known as "Sonny Boy" stalks and murders redheaded women in a horrifically gruesome manner, then dials 911 to leave a disturbing message while leaving the scene. Detective William Gillette- ambitious to escape the shadow of his legendary lawman father- leads a special multidisciplinary task force determined to stop the psycho. Unfortunately not even beautiful auburn-haired police psychologist Julie Neumann can help. The only lead Gillette can find comes through a mysterious stranger who volunteers at the same shelter as Gillette's wife. With his strange clothing and foreign accent, Jonathan Hamlin has more information on these killings than any innocent civilian should, and is always willing to make Gillette a seemingly harmless trade for leads.
That's one factor about The Deal Master which impressed me. Serial killer stories are bog-standard. Bianco's detectives do pursue Sonny Boy, yes, but the real mystery involves the well-connected Hamlin. How does he know so many influential people? What hold does Hamlin have even over Gillette's father's old defence attorney friend, Jim Peters? What would happen if Gillette attempted to break one of Hamlin's deals? The action is reminiscent of the gruesomely fantastic film Saw, where the identity of the mysterious killer was not- not by a long, sick shot- the shocking major twist.
That action, in The Deal Master, progresses from skid row to the Waldorf Astoria, from the present deep into Gillette's troubled past. Legendary detective Philip Gillette was not the hero many believe. Amusing secondary characters include bumbling Italian burglar Vinnie Bats and his hairy-chested stud muffin of a nephew. The deepening difficulties with wife Nancy and growing attraction between Gillette and slender, five-eight Julie Newmann also maintain the interest. The plot kept moving along in short, cinematic chapters, racing me through the novel in one weekend.
A good read. There are of course some elements which require the brain to be left on the nightstand when picking up The Deal Master. Gerard F. Bianco states in an email interview, "I didn't want to get bogged down with the technical side of police procedure or forensics and so the research that went into The Deal Master was minimal. More than anything else, I focused on writing a good story." An entertaining story was indeed the result, but there's no denying that the real NYPD wouldn't allow a specialist unit like this one's forensic and profiling resources to pass a year without a single result. Real detectives would have hauled Hamlin's creepy old ass in and jacked up a spotlight into his eyes. Engage the dude in unorthodox bargains? You kidding me? No, Mr. Toilet Plunger Handle here gets answers quicker.
True, I'm just after reading Michael Connelly's example of how convincing procedure can be combined with character, tension, plot and pathos. I'm complaining that apples don't make good orange juice. Bianco pursues a completely non-Connelly vibe in The Deal Master. Even if portions of the novel confound police procedure, other sections are downright slick and stylish. It veers into unexpected directions- even across genre boundaries. (Ther's a major element I'm leaving out so that readers may enjoy the surprise.) Yes it's telegraphed from afar that Sonny Boy will target Gillette's dear, bangable, redheaded Julie. There's still effective prose and unexpected turns when (and after) he catches up to her.
One reassuring notable: some POD novels have been produced with questionable quality. Not so with The Deal Master. Covers, print, text, title pages- all are on par with what readers can expect from a mainstream house. Bianco's novel holds its own on any bookcase.
Critical Mick says: though I a sucker for any book full of redheads, The Deal Master is a thriller that will shock and entertain even mystery fans without such good Nicole Kidman-esque taste.
Shouldn't a mystery novel about a pathologist show a bit of cutting? Maybe a medical clue? Quirke plods through a...moreMore Elvis - Less Alvis
Shouldn't a mystery novel about a pathologist show a bit of cutting? Maybe a medical clue? Quirke plods through a 1950's Dublin February portraying a drunk who is trying not-so-very-hard to stay dried out. The other characters treat him like he is a detective. He is even summoned to meetings with a government minister who tells him to get off the case of a missing medical student. Why? It never struck me that Quirke had gotten any investigation into gear.
Speaking of gears: Quirke buys a very exclusive, very expensive English sportscar called an Alvis. The running joke is that he is a very poor driver. Amusing, original? Cough, sputter! Crash.
The same can be said of the plot. The baddie is obvious and the origin of his badness is bog-standard.
The real focus of Elegy for April is the setting of Dublin in its most repressed days. Everyone smokes, the weather is bad, people wear hats. An interesting part of Benjamin Black's 1950's: the heroes of the 1916 Rising are still very much alive, in influence if not in fact. Also: one character is the only African man in Dublin. There is some fresh material there, but its approach is deliberately distorted. Ordinary items are overdescribed in unsettling terms. This is a dramatization of Dublin on degraded black-and-white film where every frame is dim, and shot through a fisheye lens. There's no color, no fusion: nothing I'd really like to maintain from Quirke's era into our present one.
Unfortunately, here Quirke is. The BBC has commissioned a series. They will probably wheel out Brendan Gleeson in the title role: he's fantastic in every Irish crime flick. Reading Christine Falls and Elegy for April, though, I kept picturing the main character as cape-wearing, sour old Banville himself. (Except that Quirke doesn't go around exclaiming, in the third person, his own genius).
I hope they cast well Miss Isobel Galloway- the hot young redhead who Black/Banville wrote in as Quirke's totty. Crime novels never feel complete without a naked gingernut, though she alone cannot be enough to rate this tale of toads, bulls, and processed cheese sandwiches higher than two stars.
Critical Mick says: This is not the brilliant Irish crime fiction you are looking for. Move along! Move along!(less)
Abigail Rieley's Death on the Hill: The Killing of Celine Cawley is am...moreWealth! Power! Glamour! Lies! Sex! Death! Dog-related pick-up lines!
Abigail Rieley's Death on the Hill: The Killing of Celine Cawley is among the best of Irish True Crime books. Concise and every page interesting, this 2010 release from The O'Brien Press delivers the sad story of former model and businesswoman Celine Cawley and her husband Eamonn Lillis.
Taken in contrast to my previous read: Catherine and Friends: Inside the Investigation into Ireland's Most Notorious Murder. DotH carries a strong narriate, a tale told at an accessible level both to those who followed the trial in the newspapers and those who are completely unfamiliar. It has the details, the dialogue, the back and forth of the killing, the investigation and the courtroom. Best of all, it is even and respectful to all participants involved. No sides are taken, and no preaching on behalf of any side in the case's controversies. CaF jumped around, repeated itself, and assumed that readers already knew the details of the Nevin case- all to the background roar of old axes grinding.
(Naturally, though, this difference is to be expected: Rieley is a professional journalist and author. Pat Flynn is a retired policeman.)
For a fine example of everyday crime and punnishment among modern Ireland's elite, Abigail Rieley's Death on the Hill is recommended.
Rushdie pads his own diatribe of everything he hates about New York and America with reflections on creativity and destruction, repression and Cambridge, pop culture, classics, race, sex and Disney's Robin Hood, web design, Units, and plenty of dolls and puppet kings.
Potted plot: well-to-do middle-aged guy, tired of his wife, legs it over to New York and mumbles all sorts of profanities loud enough to get booted out of all-night diners. In kinky ways he shags a couple of twenty-something chicks whose names rhyme, after which he feels much better.
Amidst all the rationalization and wacky revelations, Fury contains some less-than-favorable comments about Buffy the Vampire Slayer. This is never wise.
In its favor: Rushdie may be a lofty uberintellect who refuses to condescend to interaction with quirky American book nerds, but he is not above writing well about the baser human instincts. Fury contains a spot-on analysis of the different attitudes and practices toward oral sex in Britain and the US. Bill Clinton agrees!
Fave bit: Rushdie's descriptions of a hottie that literally stops traffic.
Crime fic fans can read Rushdie's book as a psychological thriller: is Professor Malik Solanka, during his blackouts, the "Concrete Killer" who has murdered three beautiful, privileged socialites? That thread of the novel plays out very slowly as Rushdie indulges in shock-value asides about necrophilia and incest. His mystery would have been improved by a giant crime-fighting giraffe. (I am not making this up. Fury would have been groundbreaking if there was a swift, silent detective who could peek over walls and hedges, spying in through the windows of upper-story flats. The public yearns to see a bite taken outta the inaccessible top bough of the Big Apple tree.)
This is being unfair to an ambitious and innovative novel, but Fury has no kindness for anyone.
Critical Mick says: Interesting if abrasive and slow-moving, Fury is the first Salman Rushdie novel that Critical Mick read and judged for himself. At points it feels like Chuck Palahniuk lite, American Psycho lite, F. Scott Fitzgerald lite. The dialog is weak and there is a lot of opinion being sold as revelatory truth. The pacing is random. In other points Fury engages and transports. If nothing else it is convincing portrait of New York immediately before September 11.
Requiems for the Departed: Irish Crime, Irish Myths showcases magnificent stories of Ireland immemorial and unforgettable. May a perpetual light shine...moreRequiems for the Departed: Irish Crime, Irish Myths showcases magnificent stories of Ireland immemorial and unforgettable. May a perpetual light shine upon this legendary collection.
Undertow is the fourth Quigley/Kenny mystery, and its references to the sea follow with the certainty of waves. Misdeeds in the painful past- presumab...moreUndertow is the fourth Quigley/Kenny mystery, and its references to the sea follow with the certainty of waves. Misdeeds in the painful past- presumably in the previous installment, Missing Presumed Dead- take hold of Sarah Kenny, of reformed burglar Darren Wallace, of pregnant teenager Stacy Power- and drag them back into treacherous deep water.
Stacy Power visits QuicK's offices (in the same run-down Georgian house as a pirate radio station and a hospitalized lawyer) because her Slovak boyfriend, Orie Kavlar, has gone missing. It's only a few weeks until the baby arrives, and Orie would not have left her side unless something terrible had happened to him. In hopes that all will soon be sunny days again, she hands over the pension money her grandma had provided for a pram. As readers already know from the novel's gripping opening scenes, her Orie is not a friendly dolphin but a shark.
When not lying to Stacy about his nation of origin, Orie Kavlar serves as muscle for local gangster Anthony "Mink" Dunlop's human trafficking operation. Undertow, like Bleed a River Deep, explores the hidden laborers beneath Celtic Tiger Ireland's recently-popped prosperity. Without a passport or a friend, those who have been smuggled across the water in the backs of furniture vans find themselves shipwrecked on this island of Ireland- stranded, helpless, and watched over by strange native predators.
Sarah Kenny has troubles of her own. She lives in daily dread of a body washing ashore. John Quigley harbors tender feelings for Sarah, but cannot help but notice how hot a young redhead, Caoimhe Wallace, would look in a bikini. Other characters and crimes bob around like bathtoys in a drain's whirlpool. Steadily the current picks up speed and they all start to collide and spin in the race toward blackness.
The Dark Place follows Karl Kane, the gritty, gripping detective introduced in 2008's Bloodstorm. This second in the series conforms to the familiar norms of the PI genre: after a teasing, terrifying prologue Kane is seen sitting in his sweltering office on Belfast's Hill Street. In walks a woman in trouble- this time, a teenaged heroin addict whose younger sister, Martina Ferris, has disappeared. The client is deperately worried and the cops are not interested in looking for a recovering junkie with a reputation for running away, so it is down to debt-ridden Kane to take the case.
Kane's investigation takes him through the underbelly of city and society, into peripheral contact with corrupt and outmatched cops, and into his own painful past. As bodies pile up and his enemies circle in, Karl Kane learns what is rotten and terrifying behind the respectable facades of the city's elite and institutions (literally, in certain cases!). Fans of the PI form will be pleased- and be pleased that Millar is not afraid to break conventions. By the climax, there is no predicting which way Millar is going to play it out.
The places that Kane goes on his journey are exceptionally dark. Imagine Philip Marlowe investigating the disappearances from Se7en or Saw. Marlowe would probably take the first flight back to LA, but Kane is a wee harcore Norn Iron man. Graphic and violent with more deviant sex than Val McDermid and the most convincing drug trip since Gene Kerrigan's The Midnight Choir, Millar's Belfast is worlds away from the catchy punk rock jaunt of Colin Bateman's Divorcing Jack.
Like Bateman, Millar leavens his grit with humor. With Martina Ferris missing and other young, violated bodies turning up, Kane cannot sit comfortably back hammering out his own manuscripts and studying the racing papers. Is it because old Karl is a valiant knight at heart? Erm, no. He cannot sit still because he is the only PI in all of crime fiction with raging hemorrhoids.
Piles aside, Millar's dialogue is sharp and fast. The writing has real originality. I had never before heard of the villain's disturbing MO, and the manner in which Kane learns the killer's identity is both plausible and something that would never have come from an American PI novel.
David and the Bear Lake Monster is the fourth in Linda Weaver Clarke's historical romance series set in Idaho's Bear Lake Valley around the turn of th...moreDavid and the Bear Lake Monster is the fourth in Linda Weaver Clarke's historical romance series set in Idaho's Bear Lake Valley around the turn of the last century. A young outlaw in the second book, David returns as an adult to the ranch of Gilbert and Melinda Roberts to thank them for the friendship and guidance that steered him toward the path of honest living. Love is the last thing on the hardworking David's mind, until he sees Paris, Idaho's local dance teacher Sarah.
Linda Weaver Clarke writes all-ages books similar to Laura Ingles Wilder's, mixing history with romance and lessons on what makes a strong relationship. An element of mystery and danger is present in the form of outlaws and the legendary local lake monster. Seasoned readers will foresee the outcome of the various plot lines, and may prefer books with more physical contact than a two-step at the town dance. Still, kids and Clarke fans are sure to enjoy this adventure set in 1912.
Potted plot: bristling with gun porn, a colorful bunch of enormous superbad cops and crooks charge around Washington DC and Virgina horse country. The...morePotted plot: bristling with gun porn, a colorful bunch of enormous superbad cops and crooks charge around Washington DC and Virgina horse country. There are conspiracies and posturing, heavy-handed hints that perhaps X or Y is the leak within the FBI. Last Man Standing has a love interest and at one point a hottie in a swimsuit, but very little bad langauge or sex. Oh! And a brief appearance by a topless porn star with breasts so enormous they almost hide her abdomen.
Highlights include a vintage Corvette convertable with BTO blasting out of its speakers as it races up I95. Most of the novel's fun bits were provided by Italian-American sidekick Paulie Romano. Also, an interesting hint at where super-secret undercover FBI men can hide documents in plain sight. The information on how the FBI's ultra-elite Hostage Rescue Team (HRT) train for missions was interesting. But did Baldacci have to leave every last bit of his research in the novel? The result is tedious and bloated.
Critical Mick says: Last Man Standing reads like a Jerry Bruckheimer / Michael Bay film that is so bad, it went beyond Straight-to-Video and into Straight-to-Novelization.
Nature is red in tooth and claw. Scholars who have looked past A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving into what really happened with the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock will know: human history is equally savage, bloody and brutal.
George Franklin Feldman uses original written accounts and archaeological evidence to illustrate the barbarity that is often cartooned out of American history books. The European explorers we have named parks, highways, towns, counties and
funky cars after were not on a five-year mission to seek out new life and new civilizations. The natives they encountered were far from unspoiled agrarians who would cry at the first sight of litter. In more than a dozen chapters stretching from prehistory to the Indian wars of the Western Frontier, Cannibalism, Headhunting and Human Sacrifice in North America: A History Forgotten highlights select warlike tribes, conquistadors, Puritans, and horrendous individual atrocities which show our lauded forefathers at their worst.
One example chapter covered the Calusa Indians of south-western Florida. Their name for themselves translated as "fierce people." They truly lived up to it. Whether dominating surrounding tribes or massacring Spanish sailors when treasure fleets wrecked upon the Florida Keys, the Calusa delighted in slavery, torture and human sacrifice. One young castaway, Hernando D'Escalante Fontaneda, was allowed to survive, and spent twenty years among them. Upon being released, Fontaneda returned to Spain and penned a memoir. Feldman brings its grisly details of life among the Calusa to modern readers. Diaries of missionaries, soldiers, and other original observers are extensively featured. The research supporting the chapter is impressive. These sources even convey an account of the first "mooning" in American history- of Catholic missionaries by the Calusa, who were firmly dedicated to their own religious beliefs! The author's interweaving prose is informed and engaging. A clear impression is conveyed concisely: the Calusa are the natives who shot Juan Ponce de Leon when he attempted to establish a colony in 1521, and whose savage ferocity held off Spanish might for two hundred more years.
Feldman's book is culturally balanced: equal barbarity is illustrated from Indian, English, American, Mexican and Spanish parties. To continue with Floridian examples, Feldman describes the expedition of a conquistador named Panfilo de Narvaez. His force was annihilated, and given their extreme violence, arrogance and inhumanity, that was no injustice. Reading what horrors these nations inflicted upon each other, it becomes easier to understand the genocide which occurred on this continent. Cannibalism, Headhunting and Human Sacrifice in North America lets us know what lessons from history modern man should never be repeating.
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