5★ “There was a jolly atmosphere, and I can understand the reason why. We each of us understand we’re in a gang and we understand we are in the middle 5★ “There was a jolly atmosphere, and I can understand the reason why. We each of us understand we’re in a gang and we understand we are in the middle of something unusual. We understand also, I think, that we are doing something illegal, but we are past the age of caring. Perhaps we are raging against the dying of the light, but that is poetry, not life. There will be other reasons I have missed out, but I know on the walk back down the hill we felt giddy. Like teenagers out too late.”
There is most certainly a jolly atmosphere, they are most certainly doing plenty of things that are illegal, and I am delighted they are over the age of caring. What a treat! Like many, I wondered if a media celebrity might be cashing in on his name to get a book published. Well, cash away, Mr Osman – this is great!
There is a murder, and then another, and the club's (and my) opinions change as we realise suspects may be future victims. But first, where are we? Kent, England.
The setting is a retirement village with an assortment of residents and visitors. The scenario is that the developer has plans to expand right over the old convent cemetery. One of the residents sits on a bench in the cemetery every day, mourning his late wife. Another man, a minister, wanders through, reading the various gravestones, which Osman describes with historical poignancy, if I can put it that way.
“The older gravestones are more ornate, more showy. The dates of death flick slowly forward as he walks. There are the Victorians all neatly in a line, probably furious about Palmerston or the Boers. Then it’s the women who sat in the convent and heard about the Wright brothers . . . the women who nursed the . . .broken . . . and prayed for their brothers to return safely from Europe. Then there were doctors and voters and drivers . . . both wars . . . then television, rock and roll, supermarkets, motorways and moon landings.”
It’s never occurred to me to think of the generations in a graveyard that way, according to the times they enjoyed or endured.
Between the general chapters of the story are diary entries from Joyce, who is the newest recruit to the Thursday Murder Club, this charming bunch of elderly amateur detectives.
Actually, we’re not so sure about their amateur status, since the group was founded by Penny, a retired Kent Police Inspector, who (illegally) saved the files of their unsolved murders when she left. Penny is now lying, unresponsive and fading rapidly, cared for by her attentive husband. Elizabeth visits her and 'reports' all of the club's findings, as if Penny might offer advice.
Elizabeth, yes, well – we know only what she lets slip from time to time, but it’s clear she was some kind of international spook in her day, although I’m not sure her day ever really ended. Little old ladies can get away with a lot, as can old gents, and it is wonderful watching them use their age and supposed weakness to their advantage the same way a girl will flutter her eyelashes to distract a would-be suitor.
At one point, a young police officer who is aware of some of what they are doing is worried.
“‘If any of this ever gets back to my superintendent, I will personally arrest you and march you into court myself. I swear, on my life.’
‘Chris, no one will ever find out,’ says Elizabeth. ‘You know how I used to make my living?’
‘Well, not really, if I’m honest.’
‘Exactly.’”
Younger people are inclined to think that “the elderly” are out of it, past it, over it, and no longer connected. Well, surprise!
However, this is more than old people showing up the young, more than a sympathetic look at ageing and care facilities, and more than just fun. This is, in fact, a proper mystery, and I look forward to reading more of Joyce’s diary and more about their exploits, past, present, and future. ...more
UPDATE: This just won The Golden Dagger Award for 2020! Robotham's second win! 4.5★ “I’m happy with who I am. I have pieced myself together from the halUPDATE: This just won The Golden Dagger Award for 2020! Robotham's second win! 4.5★ “I’m happy with who I am. I have pieced myself together from the half-broken things. I’ve learned how to hide, how to run, how to keep safe despite never knowing a time when my blood didn’t run cold at the sound of footsteps stopping outside my door.”
Evie Cormac, convincing herself she’s just fine, she can manage, don’t need help, thank you. She’s not going to meet anybody “half way” because that’s what people always say when they have no idea how far away you are from them. How do they know she’s not from another planet?
Evie was found abandoned, hiding in a house with the badly decomposing body of a cruelly tortured man. The dogs in the yard had been fed for all that time, so she obviously could have left, but didn’t. Who is she? Who was he?
She’s spent the last six years in a Home, called Angel Face by the staff, so the chapters she narrates in this book are titled Angel Face. Nobody knows her name or how old she is.
Cyrus Haven, who interviews her, is a forensic psychologist working with the police. He has his own horrific back story and narrates his own chapters in the first person.
She maintains she is 18 but has no proof, so the court stipulates a birthdate for her records, making her only 17, meaning a return to the Home. Cyrus surprises himself as much as anyone else by offering to act temporarily as her guardian.
She is understandably wary and on the lookout for any plans he has to unearth her secrets. He is equally wary, because he already knows one secret: Evie can tell when people are lying if she’s close enough to them and can see their faces well, that is.
Robotham maintains their balancing acts beautifully. The to-and-fro of their conversations, the tentative questions, the cautious answers, these are a treat. She may have an instinct for recognising a lie, but Cyrus has developed skills of his own, making it necessary that they establish some level of trust in order to live together.
“As a forensic psychologist, I have met killers and psychopaths and sociopaths, but I refuse to define people as being good or evil. Wrong-doing is an absence of something good rather than something fated or written in our DNA or forced upon us by shi**y parents or careless teachers or cruel friendships. Evil is not a state. It is a property. And when a person is in possession of enough property, it sometimes begins to define them.”
But Evie isn’t the only good girl, bad girl of the title. Young Jodie Sheehan, a teenaged figure-skating champion, has been found dead at the water’s edge by Silverdale Walk. An obvious suspect is quickly arrested, but Dr Haven (“call me Cyrus”) is sure he’s no murderer, and Evie confirms it after watching the guy.
As Cyrus investigates, he meets some girlfriends of Jodie’s who suggest he shouldn’t believe Jodie was the Disney princess some people say.
“Another laugh. Another toss of her hair and I feel like I’m 14 again with braces on my teeth and a pimpled face that betrayed every humiliation like a Magic 8-Ball.”
What is it about the disdain of a teenaged girl that withers anyone within spitting distance? And remember, of course, that Cyrus is trying to avoid any similar exchanges with his new foster child as well. He’s dealing with the unknown backgrounds of two girls of similar age. Gheesh!
At one point, Cyrus muses to himself about how some people want to believe arch villains or the Deep State are “manipulating society, pulling the strings.” It’s as if they just grab the first handy excuse for something and don’t look for all the facts. He thinks there may be more to Jodie’s story than what the police are calling the opportunistic rape/murder of an innocent young girl.
“To misquote Mark Twain, it isn’t what we don’t know that gets us into trouble. It’s what we know for sure that just isn’t so.”
There is a bit of blood and gore in a couple of places, but the story doesn’t hinge on it. It’s not the kind of mental movie where you have to keep peering between your fingers. It’s a well-written brain-tickler, and while I guessed at some of the eventual reveals, it didn’t spoil my enjoyment. After all, I only guessed – I didn’t “know”.
And lest you think Robotham is just a nuts-and-bolts thriller writer, I will quote one of many descriptions I liked.
“Silverdale Walk is a different place with the sun shining. Trees blaze orange and red while others stand naked and grey, as if the artist ran out of paint on his palette before he could finish the landscape.”
I definitely look forward to learning more about both Cyrus and Evie in book two, When She Was Good. They’re an intriguing pair of misfits, smart and putting their broken pieces back together. Cyrus has his work cut out for him.
“I cannot reach inside a brain and rearrange things. I cannot search for holes with my fingertips or repair damage with sutures and clamps, yet that’s what I have to do. Fix holes, paper over cracks, mend and compensate. I have to repair what’s broken, using words and ideas and thoughts.”
I happened to find this as an audio book, and I must say what a wonderful narrator Joe Jameson is. He is a one-man radio play, with a wide range of voices, tones, inflections, accents, and manners of speech. I usually prefer to read a text, but this was an absolute delight and has probably spoiled me for lesser performances....more
4★ “Nora went through her social media. No messages, no comments, no new followers, no friend requests. She was antimatter, with added self-pity.
She we4★ “Nora went through her social media. No messages, no comments, no new followers, no friend requests. She was antimatter, with added self-pity.
She went on Instagram and saw everyone had worked out how to live, except her. She posted a rambling update on Facebook, which she didn’t even really use anymore.
Two hours before she decided to die, she opened a bottle of wine.”
So, Nora, you’re a mess. And you know it. ‘Nobody loves me, everybody hates me, I’m gonna go eat worms’, as little kids I grew up with used to chant. You might rather be a sort of nothing.
“Nora stared down at the small mole on her left hand. That mole had been through everything she’d been through. And it just stayed there, not caring. Just being a mole.”
Well, Matt Haig has some surprises in store for you . . . and your mole!
But a warning – watch out for the wine and any other bad choices that could send you loopy. Hang on, things are going to get hairy!
Remember your favourite librarian, Mrs. Elm? Guess what? She’s still a librarian, and you, lucky you, are about to see her again.
“As she spoke, Mrs. Elm’s eyes came alive, twinkling puddles in moonlight.
‘Between life and death there is a library,’ she said. ‘And within that library, the shelves go on forever. Every book provides a chance to try another life you could have lived. To see how things would be different if you had made other choices.’”
Turns out, you have/had an infinite number of choices, Nora. Mrs. Elm will tell you about the Robert Frost poem.
“Two roads diverged in a wood, and I – I took the road less travelled by, And that has made all the difference . . .”
But then she asks you, what if there were more than two roads, an endless number of roads? What would Frost have done? What would YOU do?
Isn't it nice that Mrs. Elm is named for a tree? A tree that has, well maybe not an infinite number of branches, but a lot.
Now guess what? Mrs. Elm is going to show you an infinite number of shelves, climbing out of sight into the heavens, filled with your books, your life choices. Go ahead, be brave. Pick one and dive in! Who knows?
NORA dives in. This is fun, a bit preachy and a bit expected, but entertaining. It reminds me of the old Quantum Leap show where the hero suddenly landed somewhere in time to sort things out. Nora does much the same, seeing her life and the people in it from different perspectives. If her life changes, so does theirs.
I’ll quote from only one. No, two, because I liked the title of this chapter.
“Why Want Another Universe If This One Has Dogs?””
Below is a favourite ‘landing’, but it’s not a spoiler.
“But since entering the Midnight Library Nora had slowly got used to the peculiar. . . . She felt her ring finger.
Two rings.
The man turned over.
An arm landed across her in the dark and she gently raised it and placed it back on the duvet.”
Although the message isn’t new, and many of the situations seem a little obvious, it is an entertaining read that I hope might help pull a few people back from the brink, stop them from living and dying and measuring success by social media and dwelling on bitter regrets. Sometimes what seems obvious to me, isn’t obvious or believable when you’re in the depths of despair. ...more
4.5★ “In one study of American and Chinese people, Keltner found that after experiencing awe, people signed their names in tinier letters. He told ‘New4.5★ “In one study of American and Chinese people, Keltner found that after experiencing awe, people signed their names in tinier letters. He told ‘New Scientist’ magazine that the reason for this is that 'awe produces a vanishing self.”
I’m not a reader of self-help, self-improvement, self-awareness, self-anything books. I quite like the idea that “awe produces a vanishing self.” I remember hearing that scientists and scholars often have small handwriting. I had thought it might come from writing notes in narrow margins. Ha! (That's a comment my dad used to write in the margins as he was reading, and it’s fun to run cross them now. But I digress.)
I heard Australian author Julia Baird interviewed about her new book, which just happens to have been launched during the Covid 19 pandemic while many people are looking for some good in the world.
As for me, I borrowed it from the library (e-book) because phosphorescence and bioluminescence have fascinated me since I was a little kid catching fireflies in the summer to keep in a jar by my bedside. (Now, of course, I would leave them alone to fly freely, but I didn’t know that holes in the lid of the jar wouldn’t keep them safe. But I digress again.)
Baird is a morning swimmer, every morning, early, freezing cold, because it sets her and “The Crazies” up for the day. They call it Vitamin Sea.
In the past, she had experienced the phosphorescence of luminous plankton and had since tried to find it again. She kept watching Sir David Attenborough’s documentary, “Life That Glows”*. She joined Bioluminescence Australia on Facebook. Then one day, a neighbour told her that there was incredible phosphorescence in “their” bay at Manly Beach (Sydney)!
“The sea was black and the sky was black and I felt a little nervous: sharks feed in the dark. But just a few metres out from the shore, the sparkles appeared. I was transfixed. My fingers threw out fistfuls of sequins with every stroke. A galaxy of stars flew past my goggles. It was as though I was flying through space, like the opening scenes of the Star Wars movies, gliding rapidly through a universe only I could see.” [image] Tathra, Sapphire Coast, NSW South Coast, Australiaimage by @davey_rogers
Magic! She grew up in the Anglican Church and quotes favourite Bible passages and Psalms, but she has equal regard for whatever sustains people – faith, beliefs, traditions, cultural practices. For some people, it’s the endurance of things that keeps them going. But others, like street artists, live with impermanence.
“Street artists understand the beauty of ephemera because they trade in it. For most of us, the prospect of labouring intensely on murals while perched on ladders, cranes and cherry pickers for weeks, only to see them subsequently tagged with graffiti or smashed to ruins, is a sobering one. But for street artists, it's a singular thrill. Temporariness is part of the game.
Which on one level is shocking. On another, their attitude resembles the Buddhist view of 'attachment', which asserts that clinging to objects, people or places will only create more suffering for ourselves.”
Making sense of things - it’s all in how you look at it, isn’t it? Baird has a career as a journalist and broadcaster, asking questions, always digging a little deeper. When she speaks of the human desire to experience the natural world (patients who can see greenery and vegetation do better), she isn’t basing that on her own reminiscences of New York’s Central Park or backpacking in Asia. She refers to philosophers, to Japanese “forest bathing”, to Einstein, to Rachel Carson, to interviews with scientists, politicians, artists, and academics, as well as to actual studies, including her own.
Dr Julia Baird has a section about why, for a while, she added her title to her Twitter handle. (She is currently @bairdjulia.) It can be hard for attractive women, especially in the media, to be taken seriously. [image] Julia Baird, presenter of ABC Australia TV’s evening news panel program ‘The Drum’
“In February 2018, I was tweeting about the media’s different treatment of the private lives of male and female politicians when someone snarled back, ‘And you have evidence of this or are you just being a bitter old sexist?’
‘Yes, I have written a PhD on the subject,’ I replied. ‘So it’s Doctor Bitter Old Sexist, mate.’”
This led to a movement on Twitter with people saying they had no idea “doctorate-shaming was a thing”, which eventually ended up with hundreds of academic women using their Dr title on Twitter and the hashtag #immodestwoman going global. Good on ya, Dr Julia!
She then discusses studies showing how many men, compared to women, are introduced as Dr. She is an unapologetic activist, good researcher, and good writer. It’s a thought-provoking, interesting read, and it’s certainly timely now, when the world is dealing with a global medical catastrophe.
Who wouldn’t welcome a little phosphorescence about now? Fireflies, jellyfish, glow-worms, plankton. Stars on earth. Awe is always wonderful. [image] Bioluminescence at Puerto Escondido, Mexico
4★ “I’d imagined that she’d become unhinged by dread, but now I knew better. Oh, her freak-out had been real enough. But I’d been wrong to conclude tha4★ “I’d imagined that she’d become unhinged by dread, but now I knew better. Oh, her freak-out had been real enough. But I’d been wrong to conclude that fear had untethered her from reality. She’d just slipped the knot that tethered her to my own. How long had she wanted to do that, I wondered?”
Three couples, who are old friends and were former colleagues and neighbours, now live apart and don’t get together the way they always promised they would.
Now they’re getting together for a BBQ post the Trump election, and having a hard time realising that they are not all on exactly the same page about politics or life in general. Jack tells the story about himself and Ellie, still living in the old neighbourhood while their friends have moved further out to what they consider ‘nicer’ areas. Their two kids live across the country.
For some unknown reason, Jack and Ellie seem to be singled out as a target for some hoodlum/nuisance/burglar who leaves disgusting reminders of his visits, and Ellie is freaked out. Their daughter says come to California.
Jack starts questioning his own understanding of his wife and his friends. These are people who pride themselves on their intellect and education, so I particularly enjoyed this passage.
“My father used to say, ‘Try something. If it doesn’t work, try something else.’
“A philosopher, your old man.”
“No, a plumber.”
“See? All these years we’ve been hanging around with the wrong people. You want wisdom, consult a man who unclogs drains for a living.”
Good story. And that's a 'yes' from me, regarding consulting real people about real life. ...more
5★ “I felt like dirty broken glass. Moving an arm or a leg took herculean, agonising effort, as though all my muscles had been replaced by thin wires w5★ “I felt like dirty broken glass. Moving an arm or a leg took herculean, agonising effort, as though all my muscles had been replaced by thin wires which sliced and slashed my bones with any motion.
Despite this, my only thought was that I wanted more ice. Every cell in my body screamed for it. I wanted to feel once more the limitless feeling of total possibility of the night before. It now seemed as essential to me as water and air.”
Fascinating, compelling, terrible. If you’ve ever wondered why it’s hard to cure ice users, here’s the reason. Corey White is now a popular, well-known Australian comedian who tells a good story. His own is bloody terrifying! Language warning. As a toddler, Corey’s language was already pretty salty and so is the book. I’ll try to avoid quoting that here.
As a little boy, he was the apple of his aggressive, drunken father’s eye. Dad belted Mum and the girls but doted on his son.
“People ask me now how it was to witness my father do these things. I lie and say I was scared of him. I wasn’t. He never touched me. I was his son, cherished, granted immunity from brutality.”
Mum was no angel. He and his sisters learned to step over the syringes when they climbed into the car to go for a drive with her. That’s assuming she hadn’t taken herself for a drive and disappeared, as she liked to do.
He writes in short, sharp paragraphs at the beginning, with plenty of white space between them on the pages, almost like jotted notes. Gradually, it assumes the shape of a book. His observations and insight are clear about what was happening and how his young self was dealing with things. Not well.
“I stare down the principal, feeling powerful because I’m a psycho to him. I like that people will be scared of me. I feel invincible, like how in ‘Super Mario Brothers’ Mario touches a star and nothing can hurt him. I am bad, and I like being bad. I throw desks at teachers, I hit kids with chairs.
I know eight-year-old boys aren’t supposed to be like this, but I am not like other boys. I am different, special. I am my father’s son, and they will fear me.”
I recognise it all. A personal note. (view spoiler)[I was a volunteer tutor/mentor for many years in the public school system (in NSW, Australia), and many of the kids, from about 7 to 16, depending where I was, came from abusive households and/or foster homes. Many felt abandoned (some had been) and just wanted to belong, to be loved.
Corey could easily have been one of “my” kids – language, abuse, throwing staplers at people’s heads – running away from school. But some of the roughest were also very well-behaved with me, for the short time we spent together. They all loved having one-on-one time with someone who was paying attention only to them. (hide spoiler)]
There are some great foster carers, the ones you hear celebrated who genuinely love kids and stretch their own budgets to help them. But there are plenty I’ve heard of who just want the money the state allows for each child. We’ve all seen the movies and tv shows about these lost kids, but we haven’t yet found a way to make it better.
He was like a wild animal being beaten into submission. And then it turned out he was smart. I mean academically smart, smart enough to be accepted at a boarding school. Like a lot of troubled kids, he turned to books, but not what you’d expect.
“I discovered Friedrich Nietzsche on the shelves of the school library. I fell in love with him, devouring as many of his books as I could. Much of it was too advanced for me, but I drew close to it instinctively. His concept of the will to power struck me as true. The idea that people simply wanted to be powerful and shape the world in the way the wanted provided an explanation. Unconsciously, it provided an answer for my abuse in foster care, why what happened had happened. More than that, it also offered a way to live my life. I decided that I wanted to be powerful.”
Then there’s university, clubs, and sex & drugs & rock ‘n’ roll! He doesn’t spare himself. I can only be amazed that his will power and self-awareness have been so strong that they pulled him through. They almost didn’t, but a well-timed phone call saved him from what could have been a catastrophe.
But I’ll leave that for you to find out. He’s got enough material to last him a lifetime of performances. Terrific memoir, and it all rings absolutely true. I feel like I knew this kid and this young man. I’m just so glad he seems to have come out the other side . . . so far . . . I hope forever.
[image] Photo of Corey White as shown on the book cover ...more
4.5★ “He saw the dealers and addicts and prostitutes, going about their business in broad daylight. Knowing no cop would stop them.
This part of rue Ste4.5★ “He saw the dealers and addicts and prostitutes, going about their business in broad daylight. Knowing no cop would stop them.
This part of rue Ste.-Catherine wasn’t so much an artery as an intestine.”
Montréal, mid-winter, chasing the drugs that Gamache allowed to slip across the border and for which he has been suspended. He is the former head of homicide, now the Chief Superintendent of the Sûreté du Québec, a thoughtful, compassionate man who took a calculated risk with a drug shipment in order to shut down a big cartel.
This particular opioid has the potential to kill every user, depending on the dose, and Gamache has had nightmares about what he has unleashed on the youth of Canada. This is similar to the trolley-car dilemma, where you are asked whether you’d choose to sacrifice one person to save a group. [Here it is, if you’re interested : https://theconversation.com/the-troll... ]
Mind you, Gamache has cleaned up the rot in the Sûreté, turfed out a number of crooked cops, and recently headed up the Sûreté Academy before moving to his current (suspended) role. As is customary in this series, there is more than one thread. Alongside his ongoing issues with the department is the hunt for the drugs, plus a completely separate storyline about his being appointed as one of three liquidators (executors) of a will.
He has no idea who Bertha Baumgartner, “the Baroness”, is nor does Myrna, another liquidator and our favourite retired psychologist who now lives in and runs a bookshop in Three Pines. Three Pines! Yes, we do spend time in my favourite Canadian village, although it is far, far too cold for me. They meet the notary in a deserted farmhouse in a blizzard, where I wondered if they’d all expire, frozen, in the first chapter.
But no, Armand and Myrna made it back to Three Pines, and the blizzard blew itself out.
“Snow had climbed halfway up, blocking most of the light and almost all the view. Bur Reine-Marie could see that the blizzard had blown itself out and left in its wake, as the worst storms often did, a luminous day.
Though it was, as any good Quebecker knew, an illusion. The sun was gleaming off its fangs.”
Fangs, indeed. When the power goes out, people are pulling mattresses next to their woodstoves so they can wake up and stoke fires through the night, hoping they have enough wood at hand until this isolated village is discovered by the “powers” that be (sorry about the lame play on words).
Another young fellow is the third liquidator (sounds like a hit-man), adding to the character list, and later we meet the three offspring/heirs of “the Baroness”. The will and the family history are intriguing, and as the sons are in the financial world, there is yet another thread about that.
Of course there is a murder and an investigation.
“It was always an odd feeling, walking around a person’s home uninvited. Seeing it as they’d left it in the morning. Not realizing they’d never return. Not realizing it was the day of their death.”
I always enjoy Penny’s plots, multiple storylines and all, and she splits up the threads in separate chapters to make it a bit easier to follow. I have to say that I found the drug thread a bit weak, but the Sûreté issues have always been my least favourite parts of the books. Politics is a necessary evil, I guess. But I do like seeing things from his offsiders’ viewpoints.
“Chief Inspector Lacoste regarded the steady man in front of her, who believed everyone could be saved. Believed he could save them.
It was both his saving grace and his blind spot. And few knew better than Isabelle Lacoste what that meant. Some things hurtled. Some slithered. But nothing good ever came out of a blind spot.”
The usual Three Pines community is present, cooking and hosting unexpected visitors who’ve been caught in the snow, so we see Clara, and Ruth and ‘the boys’, Gabri and Olivier. Gabri has a running banter with Ruth, an ancient poet and heavy-drinking crone.
“Out of the darkness, just as she closed the door against the biting cold, Clara heard Gabri say, ‘Oh look. An ice floe. Come on, Ruth. It has your name on it.’
‘Fag.’
‘Hag.’”
Love them all. :)
I always look forward to this series, but I have to say the end of this book has me a little worried. Where to now? ...more
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