Cynthia Varady's Blog, page 10

Shamus Dust | Book Review

Shaums Dust opens in the early hours of Christmas morning, Private Detective Newman is awoken by a new client. A murder has taken place at one of Councilor Drake’s (a low-level governmental official) rental properties and he wants to know what happened. Newman, an American ex-pat who stayed in London after fighting in WWII, takes the job and is set on a road filled with blackmail, fraud, ancient Roman ruins, extra-material affairs, lots of booze, more bodies, and so many head wounds I can’t believe our intrepid shamus (another name for a private dick which I hadn’t run across before) could stand much less solve a series of murders.

Shamus Dust if fill with top-notch writing. Janet Roger does an amazing job taking the reader to post-war London with its bombed-out buildings and seedy underbelly. Her descriptions pack a punch adding to this classic noir story, lending to nuances that informed the reader in character motivations and past experiences.

Vehicle lights lit stripes along the wall and moved them clockwise around the room.

He had to be older than he looked, wore a shadow across his lip for a mustache, a pallor the gray putty of overworked glands and an air of unraveling surprise.

Fine dust drifted past the light on his desk, rising on the dry sourness your breathe in all police stations everywhere. They refine it out of passing falsehoods, routine evasions, threats and mean deceits.

Allyson looked standard legal fare: slim, medium height, boyish and dress for sixty-five, in a charcoal three-piece with a watchchain and a squadron necktie knotted with a pipe wrench until his shirt collar buckles. He had a soft, indoor pallor, ad skin and rimless spectacles, and the tight, careful accents that glide around the law in any language, in all places, at any time.

The path that Newman cuts across the city could be used to map of London. Having traveled around the area before, it was fun to see places I knew mentioned, their context changed to a cold, snowy bombed-out place I probably wouldn’t recognize. The detail Rogers gives her novel doesn’t stop with mood and scenery. Even chess master Alexander Alekhine (1892-1946) makes an appearance in mention.

Rogers delivers a classic noir detective story with way more depth that the genre typically displays. The crimes are complicated with multiple motives that made me scratch my head at times. There were so many red herrings and suspects that I admit to having trouble keeping track of what had taken place and who the players were. I found myself rereading passages over again to make sure I was navigating the plot correctly. Part of the reason for my confusion has to do with keeping the secondary characters from becoming jumbled. On multiple occasions I stopped and searched for characters’ to see where they had previously been mentioned in order to remember who they were.

Just because something isn’t easy to read doesn’t me it isn’t effective or well-written. At times, we become so used to being spoonfed information that when a book or movie comes along that actually asks us to think, we write it off as not worth our time or well done. I can see that happening to Shamus Dust. At times I was confused and had to backtrack, but each time I did, I was floored by Roger’s writing. She sets a mood that is gritty, raw, and unmistakably noir.

Another aspect of the novel that left me a tiny bit confused was Newman, an American, using British vocabulary. I know that a plaite is a braid and nail varnish is what we American call nail polish, and that a loudhailer is a megaphone, but I can’t imaging someone raised in the US using these British equivalents in a first-person internal narrative. Perhaps they would come up when speaking with a British person, but not to one’s self.

The narrative revolves quite a bit around an archaeologist named Garfield who is murdered. Garfield is gay and was involved with his assistant at the time of his death. In addition to his ongoing relationship with a much younger male assistant, Garfield also occasionally likes to pay for the company of male sex-workers. Newman handles this information with the grace and maturity I didn’t expect from an ex-army man in the 1950s. Actually, everyone handles this aspect of the case with such anachronistic liberalism that I had to double-check the status of LGBTQ folks in London after the war. Sure enough, it was illegal to engage in non-heterosexual sex acts. It was refreshing to see justice comes for those who would normally be seen as less than and written off as living a high-risk lifestyle and getting what they deserved. It was additionally refreshing to not have to slog through a narrative littered with pejorative terms.

You can purchase your copy of Shamus Dust at the following links:

Amazon
Barns and Nobel
Indiebound

To learn more about Janet Roger, check out the links below:

Janet Roger homepage
Book Inspector
NB Magazine Interview

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Truthwitch by Susan Dennard Book Review

Truthwitch is a fantasy novel by author Susan Dennard. I was surprised to discover that the Truthwitch series is listed as YA. The characters don’t seem young enough nor green enough to be YA, but then again there is heavy flirting but no sex (yet it is teased at once). The characters are all much too experienced in their various jobs compared to most in the YA genre. That being said, I didn’t find Truthwitch to be lacking, but rather the opposite. It is a well-polished piece with wonderfully crafted fight scenes, three-dimensional characters, and stellar world-building. Truthwitch is the first novel in the Witchlands series, and the first book from Dennard I’ve read. I discovered Truthwitch as one of Tor.com’s free novels. So far, Tor hasn’t let me down.

The novel opens with main characters, Safiya fon Hasstrel, a rare and closeted Truthwitch and Iseult det Midenzi, a Threadwitch, up to their necks in trouble stemming from an accidental ambush of a powerful Guildmaster. Their target had been a handsome grifter who had conned Safiya out of her and Iseult’s savings. The funds were the means for the best friends to start a new life away from Venaza City. From the inner ass-kicking that Safiya is giving herself, the reader can glean that this isn’t the first time she’s been taken in by a pretty face and put herself and her Threadsister, Iseult in danger.

While fleeing from their latest dip in the deep end, they are faced not only with angry soldiers but with the Guildmaster’s ruthless Bloodwitch who has been sent to sniff them out. This sends them on a much different path than they ever expected. Now they don’t just need to leave town, they need to try and survive.

The pair goes into hiding until they can be smuggled out of the city. Split up by their Guildmasters to try and keep them safe, Iseult becomes restless as she in a rented room under a fake name. When she ventures out, she is spotted by the Bloodwitch and runs back to her the village where she was raised to seek shelter. Safiya is taken back to her family home where she meets Prince Merik Nihar, and an ever greater political plot to either start or detour a war.

The world-building in Truthwitch is meticulous right down to the characters’ names, but might leave less patient readers scratching their heads. Dennard doesn’t handhold the reader with lengthy exposition explaining the magic system, the world’s history, or its wars and treatise. Instead, she shows you how the world works. Some of this sowing is achieved by allowing each character to be ignorant to different aspects of the events so bits and pieces can be revealed, or to just describe what it happening and allow the reader to be comfortable with not fully understanding, but place faith in the author that all will be made clear in the end.

Told from multiple viewpoints, Truthwitch gives the reader a full survey of the world, its many magics, and cultures. Whether it’s Safiya who rejects her noble roots to pursue her truthwitchery, Iseult, a hated Midenzi threadwitch (from what I gathered, the Midenzi people are akin to Romany peoples in our own world), Prince Meric who just wants to do right by his wartorn subjects, and Aeduan a Bloodwitch and fallen Carawen Monk desperate for his father’s approval. The plot is character-driven, to say the least, and Dennard holds the reins of the story firmly and never lets them slip. In fact, I liked Truthwitch so much, I bought the second book in the series, Windwitch right after finishing it.

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An Encounter with Fairies

If you’d like to hear me tell An Encounter with Fairies, visit Drive With Us Podcast.

Back in 1998, I went backpacking through Europe.  As with many backpackers traveling without an itinerary, I found myself staying (by the luck of the gods) in a decent hostel in Italy, and traveling, while only briefly, with a lovely duo from Canada, Barbara and Heidi and a nice fellow they’d met from New New Zealand named George.

One evening after spending the day hiking around Genoa, we decided to investigate the castle-like ruins at the top of a nearby hill.

Genoa, Italy

We left the hostel an hour or so before dusk, a cheap bottle of champagne sloshing in our bellies. The warm June evening greeted us with a soft breeze as we ascended the hill. The castle turned out to be a ruined fort that was mostly fenced off. One dark detached hallway still stood. By then the sun had sunk enough that no light illuminated the dark passageway. A few dares were thrown around, but none of us were brave enough to go inside.

We hiked a little further and took in the view of the glowing city below. As a night chill set it, we headed back down the hill taking wooded path instead of the road.

As we walked, fallen leave crunching under our feet, I began to see flashes of light in the trees. I stopped, searching for someone attempting to light a cigarette, but having trouble with their lighter. But as soon as I stopped and looked in earnest, the sparks stopped and I could see no one in the darkness. Confused, I continued on, only to see the flashes again out of the corner of my eye.

Perplexed, I stopped and waited. Then, like magic, a flash appeared inches from my face. Then another and another until the air was filled with floating lights.

“Fireflies!” Barbara called.

Coming from California, I had never seen a lightning bug in person before. These tiny luminescent insects were the thing of children’s books and movies where kids caught them in jars to have at their bedside.

Here I was, 21 years old, and seeing them for the first time. I reached out and closed my cupped hands around a glowing dot. When I opened my hands, I found a tiny bug clinging to my palm, its rear end lighting periodically in an iridescent green glow.

I brought it close to my face and it took flight again, and, like millions before me, over thousands of years, I had just encountered magic. I knew where fairies came from.

If you’d like to hear me tell An Encounter with Fairies, visit Drive With Us Podcast.

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Book Blurb Contest

A quick internet search for ‘writing contests’ returns an avalanche of information from contests for previously published works, unpublished works, novels, flash fiction, short stories, creative non-fiction to personal essays, the list goes on and on. But what about a writing contest for crafting a blurb for a fictitious book?

For those writers out there who have tried to boil down their full-length novel into 100 words or less knows how hard it is to write a blurb. Yet, as difficult as it may be, the art of the elevator-like pitch is a skill every writer should hone. The Query Letter has just such a contest. Try your hand at creating a book blurb for a novel you make up. Your imagination is your only limitation here.

Standard common sense applies. By this I mean your book blurb should be 100 words or less, original (no plagiarism please), free of typos and grammatical errors, and it must hook the reader. The best blurb writer will win $500 and have their blurb published on The Query Letter’s website.

The book blurb contest is free to enter and closes on September 15, 2020. Use your quarantined time to hone your writing craft and perhaps earn a little money while you’re at it.

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Home School Project #2: Card Making

How do you check off a writing and art assignment in one go? Create a card for a family member. In our case, we created cards for my nieces’ first birthday.

Here’s what you’ll need



construction paper – whatever color inspires you. This is both of the cards and envelopes if you wish to make one.paints, markers, stickers, glue/glue stick, glitter, stampsimagination

We started by using watercolor paper which I cut to a large card shape (rectangle) and then folded in half.

Next, we got to work decorating our cards with paint, stickers, and glitter.

Because we shipped the cards with a present, I made one large envelope for both cards to protect them during their journey.

Then I folded the sides in and glued the square panned onto the back. This is by no means the best way to create an envelope, but I didn’t have paper large enough to do some special envelope origami.

The Card Making Educational Bit



Art Lesson

Using creativity and imagination, kids get to express themselves artistically. If you want less free-form, you can impose limitations like draw a landscape, your family, your pet, or the person to receive the card.

Writing Lesson

Teach the parts of a letter: heading, greeting, body, closing, and signature.

Owl-Letter.pdfDownload

Card making is a great way to sneak in a writing lesson. If you have really young kids, have them dictate to you and then sign their names. Have kindergarten-aged kids trace over a message of their choosing and sign their names. Older kids can write their own messages.

Need more room for writing? Use the back of your card or insert lined pages.

More Card Making Idea

For more ideas on card making, check out RedTedArt

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Homeschool Project #1: Easy Homemade Ice Cream

COVID-19 has us stuck inside with our kiddos, trying to figure out how to teach them. Here’s a great project that will get your blood pumping, provides a quick science lesson, and has a tasty payoff.

Easy Homemade Ice Cream



Here’s what you’ll need:



1 large sealable bag2 small sealable bags1/3 cup of heavy whipping cream1 tsp sugardash of vanilla20+ icecubes1/2 cup kosher saltnewspaper or kitchen toweltape or rubber bands



Get a little exercise with easy homemade ice cream while sheltering in place.



Here’s what you do:



Add sugar, vanilla, and sugar to one of the small sealable bags. Seal it and gently mix ingredients.Place mixed ingredients into the second sealable bag and seal it. Add ice cubes and kosher salt to the large sealable bag. Seal and gently mix.Open the large bag and add the small sealed bags. Seal large bag.Wrap the large bag with newspaper and seal with tape or wrap in a kitchen towel and secure it with rubber bands.Shake the whole package for 5 minutes, check to see if your cream mixture has frozen into ice cream. If not, proceed shaking until it freezes.



Variations

Add flavored syrup or crushed fruit if desired.

The Sciencey Bit

This Easy Homemade Ice Cream experiment demonstrates “freezing point depression.” When the salt (sodium chloride) is added to the ice, it lowers the temperature of the ice and water below freezing 0C or 32F. This depression pulls heat from the cream mixture, allowing it to freeze quickly, and presto, easy homemade ice cream. The same principle is applied to snow and rock salt. By adding salt to snowy sidewalks, the freezing point is lowered, preventing ice from forming so we don’t slip when we walk.

Note: This recipe is adapted from MadScience.org

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Iliad: the Reboot by Keith Tokash

Let me begin this review of Iliad: the Reboot by Keith Tokash by saying how I grew up reading Greek myths filled with larger than life heroes, aloof gods, and beasts of epic proportions. Imagine my surprise when a copy of Tokash’s satirical novel fell into my lap. This is how every myth should be retold. I want to Iliad reboot everything: Siddhartha, the Bible, the Kama Sutra. “Iliad reboot” it all!

The Skinny on the Illiad Reboot

So here’s the premise. Gelios, the unluckiest Greek soldier to ever live is overheard by agents of Menelaus, king of Sparta, when he says something disparaging about Helen, the king’s wife. To avoid punishment, Gelios’ cousin an up-and-coming poet, Pelos (later to have the penname Homer) steps in. Pelos is conscripted to write an epic about the Trojan war (the Iliad) and Gelios is to be his personal guard. Neither is very happy with the situation.

The pair travel to Troy with the Greek army to get back Helen, who has been stolen by Paris. It turns out that Helen isn’t even that beautiful, nor is she all that important to Menelaus. This whole fiasco of waging war is to save face over having one fat tyrant mak off with another fat tyrant’s “property.” Toxic masculinity at it’s finest, if that can even be a thing.

Fake News at its Finest

While Pelos tries to write his magnum opus to appease his king and the military leaders, he finds way too many writers in the ink crock. Everyone wants to be depicted as perfect, 12-pack abs and all when they are everything but fit and godly. The divine Achilles is a fat drunk 20 years past his prime. That whole thing about his mom dipping him in a pool to make him invincible is creative license. Agamemnon is a blowhard who just wants to stab people with his sword and uses his cuckold brother Menelaus as an excuse to be a big war hero. And the Trojan Horse was just a convenient ending to an epic poem about a cluster of a war that no one could ever win, especially the Greeks.

Iliad: Reboot is a treasure of a book. I loved every page. The characters are well-written and incredibly expressive. It’s not easy to write a large ensemble cast with such depth and individually. Tokash pulls it off and makes it look effortless. I just love the idea of taking something so well known as the Iliad and retelling it from behind the scenes. If we had this type of perspective for every historical event that’s been written, we would see how history is not only written by the victors but how they tweak it to make themselves look windblown and flawless.

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Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging | Banned Book Project

Author: Louise Rennison
Publication Date: 1999
Publisher: Piccadilly Press

Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging Synopsis:

Georgia Nicolson lives with her parents, her smelly but sweet little sister Libby, and Angus—the possessed cat. Georgia tends to embarrass herself, doing things like shaving off her eyebrows accidentally and wearing a stuffed olive costume to a party.

Georgia’s best friend, Jas, starts crushing on a guy named Tom. While trying to help Jas woo Tom, Georgia meets Tom’s older brother Robbie… a.k.a. Sex God. To be clear, that’s her nickname for him, not ours. Which makes her feelings about him crystal-clear.

It isn’t exactly smooth-sailing for these two, though, and Robbie and Georgia have a few interactions that cause conflict between them. He catches her making out with Peter, the boy who gives free kissing lessons, and though he’s with his girlfriend Lindsay, Robbie is still visibly upset. Conflict only escalates when Georgia brings a neighborhood boy, Mark, to watch the Stiff Dylans (Robbie’s band) play a gig. Mark starts a fight with the band and ruins the night.

Georgia’s parents suggest a possible move to New Zealand because her Dad can’t find work, but Georgia’s not down for this move down under. No matter; her dad leaves for New Zealand to look for a job shortly after Christmas.

Georgia and Jas stalk Lindsay to see if Robbie really likes her. No, really—they follow her home (creepy) and watch her change (creepier). They witness an interaction between Robbie and Lindsay that prompts them to decide he’s not so into her. Score.

After another Stiff Dylans gig, Robbie kisses Georgia. Lindsay confronts Georgia about the kiss at school because Robbie lied and blamed it all on Georgia. Classy move, Robbie. After this turn of events, Georgia tells her mum she’s fine with moving to New Zealand.

Robbie and Georgia meet up and he says he can’t date Georgia because she’s too young. However, after Angus goes missing, Robbie finds him—and when he brings him over to Georgia’s place, they share a kiss and decide to take things slow. Everything finally seems to be looking up for Georgia… Well, until her mum tells her they are going to New Zealand, that is.

From Shmoop

Awards for Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging:



1999



Nestlé Smarties Book Prize (Bronze)



2000



Branford Boase Award (shortlisted)Sheffield Children’s Book of the Year (shortlist)Federation of Children’s Book Groups Pick of the Year and Book of the Year designationsCuffies Award (funniest novel designation)Booklist Book for Youth Editor’s ChoiceTop-Ten Youth First Novels designations



2001:



Michael L. Printz Award American Library Association Best Book for Young Adults New York Public Library Books for the Teen AgeQuick Picks for Reluctant Readers designations



2003:

BBC’s The Big Read (#127 of 200)

Reasons for Challenges:

Inappropriate for age group, Offensive Language, Sexual Content.

Locations Challenged:

2008 – Maplewood Middle School Library, Menasha, Wisconsin – A parent challenged the book after discovering sexual content. The school board retained it but created procedures to ensure that parental consent was obtained before books on the limited access list were checked out to students.

Sources:

Michael L. Printz Award, (2001). “Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging”. ALA, Awards, and Grants. Retrieved April 29, 2019, from http://www.ala.org/awardsgrants/content/angus-thongs-and-full-frontal-snogging

Banned Library, (2016). “Angus, Thongs, And Full-Frontal Snogging By Louise Rennison”. Retrieved June 2, 2019, from http://www.bannedlibrary.com/podcast/2016/10/15/angus-thongs-full-frontal-snogging-by-louise-rennison

Best Books for Young Adults. (2001). “Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging”. ALA, Awards, and Grants. Retrieved April 29, 2019, from
http://www.ala.org/awardsgrants/content/angus-thongs-and-full-frontal-snogging-confessions-georgia-nicolson

Brief Biographies, (n.d.). Louise Rennison (1951-): Awards, Honors. Retrieved on April 29, 2019, from
https://biography.jrank.org/pages/338/Rennison-Louise-1951-Awards-Honors.html

More like this

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian

Speak: a graphic novel

A Hero Ain’t Nothin’ but a Sandwich

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Lightning Blade by D.N. Erikson| Review

D.N. Erikson’s urban fantasy novel, Lightning Blade takes place in a dystopian future in Arizona. The veil between the magical world and the human world has been shattered. A police dashcam captured Kalos, a half-demon dispatching a dozen daywalking vampires. Never mind that he saved the cops’ lives, the peace and secrecy between the realms were forever destroyed. From this point on, humans focused on creating weapons that could destroy the magical community and keep the status quo. Enter MagiTekk, a company dedicated to purging magical scum.

Inside a magical internment camp equipped with psychic dampers, courtesy of MagiTekk, Ruby Calloway has sat for 20 years. She works on a list of those who wronged her and stole the only thing she ever loved, Pearl who trained her to be a bounty hunter.

After two decades of living in her prison, Ruby is freed by FBI Special Agent Colton Roark, a la 48 Hours style, to help catch a magical serial killer.

I was captivated from page one. Erikson does an amazing job of fleshing out his characters. Even secondary and minor characters are multidimensional. I especially loved Serenity, an elf, who ran a clinic and aided Roark and Ruby. There was so much history between Serenity and Ruby that I needed to know more, so I downloaded Erikson’s prequel, Bone Realm where we get Ruby’s origin story. I’m hoping the root of Serenity’s animosity will be revealed there. Enquiring minds want to know.

As far as urban fantasy novels go, Lightning Blade is top notch and I will be further investigating the series.

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Howl’s Moving Castle Review

Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones is a fantasy novel focusing on Sophie Hatter, the eldest daughter who believes she is doomed for failure. The hat shop Sophie’s family owns falls into dire straights, Sophie’s step-mother sends the younger daughters off to learn trades that will help them further themselves in the world. Sophie, on the other hand, remains behind in the shop where her step-mother hopes to groom her to inherit it when she’s older.

One afternoon, Sophie grows weary of hats and ventures out to enjoy the spring festival. While out, she runs into the Wizard Howl to takes an interest in her. Sophie has heard rumors of Howl’s love of eating hearts and runs home. Soon after she arrives, the witch of the Waste bustles into the shop and magically turns Sophie into an old woman.

Having had enough to magic and hats Sophie sets out across the hills to find her way in the world, even if she only has a few years left. On the way, night falls and she seeks refuge in Howl’s clanking, stomping, smoking, moving castle. While there, Sophie learns truths about herself and the world that she never imagined.

Howl’s Moving Castle is a story of self-realization, love, friendship, and strength. Sophie and her sisters don’t sit by and allow others to make life decisions for them. Howl, while not an evil man, he is a coward, self-centered, and a cad, much like most handsome talented young men. Michael, Howl’s apprentice is a sweet, romantic who is hellbent on pleasing his master and learning all he can so he can marry the woman he loves. Calicifer, a fire demon who Howl is bound to through a secret magical contract is saucy and witty, and one of the best characters in literature, in my opinion at least.

Diana Wynn Jones’ writing style is complex and unlike any novel I’ve read. I don’t think I would have noticed fully if I hadn’t read the whole novel around to my six-year-old son, who begged me to read it every night. Much of Jones’ syntax tripped me up and challenged what I’m used to in young adult novels. It was a refreshing change, and I look forward to reading more by Jones. She has become a family favorite.

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