Anyway on to a discussion of books. I've completed two books in August so far. I removed a book from my Little Free Library outside. Somebody dropped it off and it sounded interesting. I'll also get back to my Author's A - Z discussion.
New Book
"In Kabul, 2007, with a drug-addicted father and no brothers, Rahima and her sisters can only sporadically attend school, and can rarely leave the house. Their only hope lies in the ancient custom of bacha posh, which allows young Rahima to dress and be treated as a boy until she is of marriageable age. As a son, she can attend school, go to the market, and chaperone her older sisters.
But Rahima is not the first in her family to adopt this unusual custom. A century earlier, her great-great grandmother, Shekiba, left orphaned by an epidemic, saved herself and built a new life the same way."
Just Finished
"Slicky Boys by Martin Limón is the 2nd book in the Bascom and Sueno mystery series. The first book was Jade Lady Burning. George Sueno and his partner, Ernie Bascom are Cpl's in the 8th Army's CID organization. They spend a lot of time in Seoul's red light district, partly investigating black marketing and other crimes, but also, they just like the place.
A young woman asks them to deliver a message to her boyfriend, a British soldier who is part of the UN militaries honor guard. This message unfortunately results in the soldier being murdered. Feeling a responsibility for this, Sueno and Bascom take on the investigation. The two play fast and loose sometimes with the law. They sometimes work with the local Korean National Police. They often rile their boss, the Top Sgt in the CID with their methods.
The story is told mainly from Sueno's perspective as he is the more thoughtful of the two. He has made the effort to learn the Korean language and he respects the locals. Ernie Bascom is his wild partner, loves drinking, sex, tearing things apart... that sort of thing. Sueno asks questions and when answers are not forth coming, Ernie steps in.
The murder leads to others. We are introduced to the Korean Slicky Boys, the organized underworld of Korea, dealing in the black market, stealing and selling US items. We meet Herbalist So, the king of the Slicky Boys, always seeming to be one step ahead of the crime fighting duo.
There is another wild card in this, a mysterious serial killer, who might be an American soldier. He is a constant threat throughout the story and we do get sneak peeks at him as the story develops.
At times the story is quite far-fetched, but at the same time, it's tense, exciting and portrays a fascinating cultural conflict; that of the South Koreans and their American allies. The story moves along at an excellent pace and draws you in totally. It's a well-crafted, page turner and well worth trying. I'm looking forward to finding a copy of the 3rd book, Buddha's Money. (4 stars)"
"I read a great many of Alistair MacLean's thrillers / adventures back when I was in high school (I won't say how long ago that was). Bear Island, originally published in 1971, was one of those books. So, yes, this is a reread. I've been trying many of his books again the past few years.
Bear Island is set on a frozen island, part of Norway's Svalbard archipelago, in the North Atlantic. An old trawler, the Morning Rose, is carrying a film crew to the island where they plan to make a movie. On the way, almost immediately, bodies start to crop up. The film crew's doctor, Dr. Marlowe, suspects murder. But there is more to Marlowe than meets the eye. He hides his suspicions from Capt Imrie and the company's producer, Mr. Gerran. When the Capt wants to take the ship to another location to have the murder's investigated, Marlowe sides with Gerran to have them still brought to Bear Island where the final events will be acted out.
There are many suspects, many victims. Why are the people being killed? We hear about NATO exercises being conducted north of the island. One of the directors was a prisoner in Russia during WWII. Is he a spy? We hear about the Nazis hiding spoils of the war at locations throughout the world? Is it a treasure hunt?
Marlowe is an interesting character and there are many sympathetic characters in the story as well; Smithy, who leaves the ship and hides on the island; Mary Stuart, the 'Latvian' girl who Marlowe likes but who may or may not be involved; the loving couple, Allen and Mary 'darling'. There are also many unlikable characters who could be involved.
As with most MacLean's adventures, there is no shortage of action and he moves the plot along at a steady pace. It's a somewhat convoluted story, but that is part of MacLean's charm. Everything is resolved satisfactorily. Not MacLean's best story but still a good 'un. (3 stars)"
Currently Reading
"In present-day Russia, ruled by blue-eyed, unblinking President Vladimir Putin, Russian intelligence officer Dominika Egorova struggles to survive in the post-Soviet intelligence jungle. Ordered against her will to become a “Sparrow,” a trained seductress, Dominika is assigned to operate against Nathaniel Nash, a young CIA officer who handles the Agency’s most important Russian mole.
Spies have long relied on the “honey trap,” whereby vulnerable men and women are intimately compromised. Dominika learns these techniques of “sexpionage” in Russia’s secret “Sparrow School,” hidden outside of Moscow. As the action careens between Russia, Finland, Greece, Italy, and the United States, Dominika and Nate soon collide in a duel of wills, trade-craft, and—inevitably—forbidden passion that threatens not just their lives but those of others as well. As secret allegiances are made and broken, Dominika and Nate’s game reaches a deadly crossroads. Soon one of them begins a dangerous double existence in a life-and-death operation that consumes intelligence agencies from Moscow to Washington, DC."
"In re-creating Sherlock Holmes in previous books as an adjunct to her chief protagonist, Mary Russell, King has set the couple's adventures in a milieu consistent with her own creation and, although true to the place and period, independent of Conan Doyle's work. Holmes has been invited by his old friend the Rev. Baring-Gould to look into not only an unexplained death on the moor but, more important in the ancient cleric's mind, sightings of a phantom coach on the moor - possibly inhabited by a phantom noblewoman and accompanied by some phantom dogs. Holmes, in turn, pulls Mary from her studies at Oxford, enlists her in the quest, and finds himself taking a second seat to her endeavors. True to their expectations on the forbidding and difficult moor, the rumors have a real-world explanation, but it is one that combines more wild emotion, surprise, and frightening suspense than any ghost story could."
Bill's Authors A - Z
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| Nick Cutter |
- The Acolyte (2015)
- Little Heaven (2017).
"A good, solid horror story a la Stephen King's earlier books. 5 boys and their scout master leave their town on Prince Edward Island to spend the weekend on a smaller island off the coast. It's to be a scouting adventure weekend, hiking, map reading, etc. Unfortunately for them, another boat lands on the island, bringing an escapee from a lab who is infested with experimental worms. That is the gist of the story; the army and navy are involved in sealing off the island, the boys are isolated, trying to fend off the worms and a psychotic member of their troop. Interesting story, good solid horror. (4 stars)"
"The earth is in the throes of some sort of pandemic, the 'Gets', short for forgets. People begin to forget how to do anything, ultimately even eating. Mankind is being decimated. A small group of scientists are on the ocean floor in the Pacific, trying to harvest something called 'ambrosia', which may have properties that might cure the disease. Luke, a veterinarian who has lost his family, is called to the site by his brother, a famous scientist, and finds himself being transported deep to the facility below the waves, claustrophobic in its own right. But what he finds below is even worse than simple claustrophobia. What is ambrosia? How and why is it affecting the scientists so drastically. A tense, spooky story set in a location that you can't just leave if you want. Almost overloading the senses with creepiness. This is Cutter's second horror story after The Troop. He has a unique perspective. The story is gruesome but more tightly written than the first. I don't know which I enjoyed more, but it was definitely an exciting read. Worth giving a shot to. (3 stars)"
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| Roald Dahl |
"A wine connoisseur with an infallible palate and a sinister taste in wagers. A decrepit old man with a masterpiece tattooed on his back. A voracious adventuress, a gentle cuckold, and a garden sculpture that becomes an instrument of sadistic vengeance. Social climbers who climb a bit too quickly. Philanderers whose deceptions are a trifle too ornate. Impeccable servants whose bland masks slip for one vertiginous instant.
In these deliciously nasty stories an internationally acclaimed practitioner of the short narrative works his own brand of black magic: tantalizing, amusing, and sometimes terrifying readers into a new sense of what lurks beneath the ordinary. Included in Roald Dahl's Tales of the Unexpected are such notorious gems of the bizarre as "The Sound Machine," "Lamb to Slaughter," "Neck," and "The Landlady."
"There's the gambler who collects little fingers from losers...there's the lady who murders her husband with a frozen leg of lamb...not to mention the man who has made a machine that can hear grass scream...Roald Dahl's particular brand of bizarre, alarming and disturbing story-telling has already attracted a huge following which can only be more disturbed, alarmed and - thankfully - amused by 'Someone Like You'."
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| Elizabeth Daly |
"Mrs. Vina Gregson should be sitting pretty. Acquitted of murdering her husband, she has inherited all his money, and can afford to dress in the height of 1940s style. Unfortunately, her fashionable clothing and coiffure go unseen, and much of her money unspent, as the Widow Gregson remains essentially a prisoner, trapped in her elegant New York apartment with occasional, furtive forays to her Connecticut estate. A jury may have found her innocent, but Mrs. Gregson remains a murderer in the eyes of the public, and of the tabloid journalists who hound her every step. Worse, she has recently begun receiving increasingly menacing letters – letters written, she is certain, by the person who killed her husband. Taking the matter to the police would only heighten her notoriety, so she calls on Henry Gamadge, the gentleman-sleuth known both for his discretion and for his ability to solve problems that baffle the police. Originally published in 1942, The House Without the Door is the epitome of the charmingly civilized mystery, offering ample proof as to why Ms. Daly was Agatha Christie’s favorite writer."
"It should be a fairly routine job for Henry Gamadge: Examining the papers of a dead poet and playwright with some early promise but not much commercial success. But it's not so much the life and letters as the death of the author (murdered in Central Park) that interests Gamadge. Add in a dead witness and the odd behavior of the family, and Gamadge decides something criminal is afoot."
So there you go folks. I hope your week is going well. It's all down hill from today. :0)
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