Gilbert M. Stack's Blog, page 46

Miss Frost Braves the Blizzard by Kristen Painter

Miss Frost Braves the Blizzard by Kristen Painter

This is hands down the best of the Miss Frost mysteries in the series thus far. Miss Frost, daughter of Jack Frost and Santa Clause’s sister, manages a toy store in the supernatural town of Nocturne Falls where they celebrate Halloween 365 days of the year. The crisis begins fairly innocuously when a local faerie dies and it is discovered she has an obsession with Miss Frost’s family. Furthermore she is in possession of a magical snow globe that allows communication with other globes of its type—a magical secret of the winter elves which it begins to appear the dead woman secretly was. When the globe accidentally gets broken, a vortex is created that allows a tribe of yeti to transit to Nocturne Falls where they immediately begin to create the blizzard conditions they call home. To make matters worse, they kidnap Frost’s best friend and plan to sacrifice her in a magical ritual to protect themselves.

 

This is a tough one—how can Frost save both the town and the friend? There’s both a serious mystery and an impressive physical threat in this one—all handled without getting into the sort of gritty violence that typifies so many urban fantasies. And if that isn’t enough, Santa Clause comes to town. Well done, Ms. Painter.

 

The Reacher Experiment by Jude Hardin

The Reacher Experiment by Jude Hardin

If you like Lee Child’s Jack Reacher series, you are certain to enjoy this collection of novellas by Jude Hardin. The premise is that in a future United States that has very little difference than the current one, someone starts trying to kill a man named Rock Wahlman. The reason, it turns out, is that Rock is the result of a cloning experiment that the government is now trying to cover up. Unfortunately for the government, the man they chose to clone was Jack Reacher and Rock is every bit as hard to kill as the original man he was based upon.

 

This series is a very quick read, conveniently broken up into small novella-sized books that keep the action flowing. There were many endings that pleasantly surprised me and had me jumping to the next book. All in all, this collection is a worthy tribute to Lee Child and his most famous character, Jack Reacher.

 

Miss Frost Cracks a Caper by Kristen Painter

Miss Frost Cracks a Caper by Kristen Painter

When Jayne Frost’s ex-best friend (Lark) shows up in Nocturne Falls apologizing for having broken Jayne up from the love of her life back in college and wanting to make peace between them, Jayne proves herself to be both too kind and too naive to be the winter court princess Painter has described. She goes out of her way to not nix Lark’s chance of being DJ at the Black and Orange Ball and in doing so, sort of makes herself responsible for the criminal acts that occur at the party. It was totally unnecessary, but I think Painter can be forgiven as there would not have been a story without this bit of stupidity on Jayne’s part.

 

Throw in that Jayne’s two boyfriends both have to bail on her for the ball and you have the excuse to introduce a third love interest for Jayne – a necromancer who makes his living baking tasty treats at Zombie Donuts. Jayne is immediately smitten and the reader is left to wonder if Painter is going to further complicate the princess’ love life or is getting ready to break off the cutesy love triangle of the first three books.

 

The mystery – theft of a lot of important and pricey jewelry –only starts about halfway through the book and is more interesting for the problems the thefts cause Jayne than for the problem itself. All in all, this is an okay addition to the series, but far from its best.

 

The Black Death by Doresey Armstrong

The Black Death by Dorsey Armstrong

In the middle of the fourteenth century, Europe was devastated by a plague which has come to be called the Black Death. It killed at least fifty percent of the population. Dorsey Armstrong’s Great Courses book on the subject is the single best account I have ever encountered on the subject. She takes her time with the subject matter, starting with the many theories on what diseases the Black Death might have been composed on (and modern scholars think it was almost certainly more than one—bubonic, septicemic, and pneumonic plagues, with a sprinkling of hemorrhagic fever and anthrax). She also traces how the plague spread in different waves across the continent, looks at communities that were devastated, and then takes the time to explore the plague’s impact on the economy, religion, literature and art, the social order, and more. This is a great way to educate yourself on the most devastating plague to ever strike the western world.

 

Miss Frost Saves the Sandman by Kristen Painter

Miss Frost Saves the Sandman by Kristen Painter

The Sandman is a celebrity in the supernatural world—one who can assure that everyone is able to get a good night’s sleep. So when the Sandman comes out with a children’s book that is guaranteed to put children to sleep within the first reading, it’s big news, even if normal humans don’t know about that guarantee. Finally, when the Sandman decides to launch his new book tour at Miss Frost’s store in Nocturne Falls, we have the set up for a great little mystery. You see, there is a downside to the Sandman other than him being a mega-diva, and that’s his ex-wife, Luna, who is in charge of the world’s nightmares. And Luna has decided to use the launch of the Sandman’s new book to try and get back together with him. Or is that, get even with him…

 

This is Painter’s third Miss Frost mystery and it continues that delightful mix of a light-hearted tone with a serious mystery. We were just over halfway through before I figured out what was going on and the tension continues to build throughout the story. Another fine mystery set in Nocturne Falls.

 

The Caped Crusade by Glen Weldon

The Caped Crusade by Glen Weldon

This is a great little book about Batman and Batman’s fans—giving both the history of the characters and how fans have responded to his evolution. The point that comes through most strongly is that there are actually many “batmen” – not just the one. In a non-comprehensive list: there is the Batman of the 1960s television series, Frank Miller’s Dark Knight Returns, several from the various movies, the detective, the Super Friends, and well you get the idea—and no fan appears to like all of these different “batmen”.

 

This book will walk you through all of it, showing how things like the charges of indecency that led to the comics code, and the reactions of fans, helped the character to evolve. To make the book even more fun, you will see yourself in many of the pages, responding to the new Batman being offered at any given time.

 

Decider by Dick Francis

Decider by Dick Francis

One of these days I’m going to list out my favorite Dick Francis stories and I think that Decider will rank number three. It’s a wonderful mystery and an even more wonderful story of a father and his young sons. Through a complicated series of events, Lee Morris has come to own an eight percent share of a racecourse and that share drags him into the highly complicated politics of the uber rich Stratton family. The Stratton’s are a highly dysfunctional family with dozens of secrets some of which are worth killing over.

 

But in addition to the classic mystery, you get the story of Lee and his sons and it is both heartwarming and critical to the development of the plot. Add in that Lee is a builder—a restorer of wrecked homes—and you get two score interesting pieces of trivia about the building trade and what it takes to run a successful business like a pub. And of course, there is racetrack lore aplenty as you will always find in a Francis book.

 

The only thing wrong with this novel is that the mystery gets solved and the book comes to an end.

 

Typhon by John Triptych

Typhon by John Triptych

There’s a new sea monster swimming the ocean depths and it’s almost as scary as the men who designed it and are trying to cover up its existence even as the body count grows ever higher. There’s a lot of death in this book as one would expect from a creature able to sink ships. Unfortunately, that means that most of the people you meet in these pages will be casualty list by the end of the book. A lot of the fun comes from hoping that many of the frankly evil bad guys will be among those numbers. This novel will especially interest those who like deep sea diving and submarines. I can’t attest to the accuracy of these accounts, but it certainly felt real to the non-specialist. So if you like your monsters over-sized and your body count mountain high, you might give Typhon a try.

 

The Red Box by Rex Stout

The Red Box by Rex Stout

Nero Wolfe is browbeaten into leave his home to investigate a case. That little fact alone should be enough to get any Wolfe fan to read this novel, but of course, there is so very much more to this story in which no one—not even the murderer’s intended victim and those who care about him—will reveal the information Wolfe desperately needs to prevent a crime. This is a novel that shows you how very good Wolfe is when the chips are down and he has nothing tangible to move on. It’s especially exciting toward the end when we realize that he had figured out almost everything that was happening in the first couple of chapters and most of the rest of the book is a desperate search for evidence (or, as is often the case in these books, for Wolfe to concoct convincing enough evidence to trick the villain into revealing him or herself. In the last book, I was thrilled to have figured out the bulk of what was happening right from the beginning of the story. This time I had no idea who the bad guy was until Wolfe revealed him or her to the reader. And not having figured it out did not reduce my enjoyment a single iota. The Red Box is simply another great Nero Wolfe mystery.

 

Why Superman Doesn't Take Over the World by Brian O'Roark

Why Superman Doesn’t Take Over the World by Brian O’Roark

This is a book that promotes itself on being about the economics of superheroing, and it is. Everything in the superhero life is looked at through the lens of the field of economics. But I think it’s really about motivation. Why do superheroes become superheroes? Why do they wear costumes? Why do they sometimes fight with each other? Why don’t they all become rich from their powers? Why don’t they try to take over the world? It’s not actually very deep, but it is a lot of fun.