Just Finished
"Robert B. Parker is one of those mystery writers that I had never thought I'd read. Not for any particular reason, I don't think. Then a few years back, my wife and I watched a few of the Jesse Stone movies starring Tom Selle and I discovered that there were a series of books by Parker on which the movies were based. I started collecting the books but have yet tried the first. I also discovered that he wrote a series on which a successful TV series was based, that being the Spenser series. I bought the first book, The Godwulf Manuscript recently and for some reason it was the first Parker book I read.
Spenser is a private eye in Boston, Mass. He is hired by Boston University to find a stolen manuscript, the titled Godwulf Manuscript, which is being held for ransom. Based on some info provided by the university security officer, Spenser checks out a female student, Terry Orchard, who is a member of a political group on campus, SCACE, who he thinks might have something to do with the theft. This leads quickly to murder, Terry Orchard's boyfriend, for which Miss Orchard is suspected. The Orchard family, a rich Boston family, also hire Spenser to prove that Terry is innocent.
So now you've got the plot, which leads to the mob, drug dealing on campus, threats to Spenser, more murders. It's a full, entertaining story. Spenser is a great character, somewhat of a throwback to those great noir detectives like Sam Spade and Lew Archer, but with his own great qualities. He's big and strong, handsome (the ladies seem to like him), a wise-cracker, but also a guy who enjoys cooking and even knows who Marcuse is. This was a great introduction to what I hope will be a great series because I plan to keep reading it. (4 stars)"
"Death Without Company is the 2nd Walt Longmire mystery by Craig Johnson. It's been awhile since I read the first and I'm so glad to revisit the Absarka Police Department in Wyoming. Such a great, entertaining, engrossing story.
It's near Christmas and the snows are starting to fall in the community that Walt Longmire polices. He's waiting for his daughter Cady to come for the holidays from Philadelphia. He is interviewing and considering hiring a new detective, Santiago Saizarbitoria and also heading to the Durant Home for Assisted Living for his weekly chess game with Lucian Connally, the previous sheriff. The trip takes a turn when a woman of Basque heritage, one Mari Baroja, is found dead at the home. It turns out that Lucian was once married to her, for all of 3 hours, and he claims that she has been murdered.
Thus begins a sometimes convoluted murder mystery, more bodies will crop up and there will also be attempted murders. How is Mari involved and for that matter, how is Lucian. Family members begin to arrive to find out what they might have inherited. It turns out Mari was a bit of a financial expert and is worth quite a bit. Her second husband, the father of her children, was an awful man, one who beat her and who has 'disappeared'. Are drugs involved? What about this past? What about the granddaughter who runs the local bakery?
It's such a fascinating story. The cast is excellent, from Longmire himself, to his assistant, Vic, down to earth and sexy, to Henry Running Bear, Longmire's oldest friend, to the other people who work at the Police department and even Dog, Longmire's inherited pet. There is great wit and humor (check out the stake out at the hospital, some laugh out loud moments there) and awful violence (the incident at the river had me holding my breath) and even spirituality (Longmire has dreams and visions that are interesting to try and dissect). It's not a perfect story (some of the crime solving seems a bit convoluted) but it's just an excellent read. (5 stars)"
Currently Reading
I've started one Science Fiction and one fun mystery / adventure.
"In 2007, the Center for Automation in Nanobiotech (CAN) outlined the hardware and software platform that would one day allow robots smaller than human cells to make medical diagnoses, conduct repairs, and even self-propagate. In the same year, the CBS network re-aired a program about the effects of propranolol on sufferers of extreme trauma. A simple pill, it had been discovered, could wipe out the memory of any traumatic event. At almost the same moment in humanity’s broad history, mankind had discovered the means for bringing about its utter downfall. And the ability to forget it ever happened. This is the sequel to the New York Times bestselling WOOL series."
"Vice President Joe Biden is fresh out of the Obama White House and feeling adrift when his favorite railroad conductor dies in a suspicious accident, leaving behind an ailing wife and a trail of clues. To unravel the mystery, “Amtrak Joe” re-teams with the only man he’s ever fully trusted—the 44th president of the United States. Together they’ll plumb the darkest corners of Delaware, traveling from cheap motels to biker bars and beyond, as they uncover the sinister forces advancing America’s opioid epidemic."
My Ongoing Author's A - Z
In my last entry on this subject, I featured Charles Dickens, Adam Diment and Garry Disher.
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| R.E. Donald |
"Disclaimer (I'll start this review by saying that the author sent me a copy because she thought it might suit my taste and asked for my comments when I read it). Having said that, let's get into the book.
Basically, Slow Curve on the Coquihalla by R.E. Donald follows an ex-RCMP officer, Hunter Rayne, who has quit the force and now works as a long haul truck driver. A friend who owns a trucking company is found dead at the bottom of a ravine, possibly due to a driving accident or maybe due to murder? His daughter, Suzanne, asks for Hunter's help in finding out the cause of his death. That is the gist of the story.
What did I like about the story? Firstly, I liked the setting, the interior of British Columbia. While I live on Vancouver Island, it was still nicely close to home and I enjoyed the descriptions of the area and just the overall setting. I liked many of the characters. Hunter is interesting, trying to deal with his past, maintain contact with his teenage daughters (he's divorced) and not sure how to go about it. His boss, El, is a strong woman who works in the trucking industry; has her soft spots but also her tough side. Suzanne and her two girls, trying to cope with the death of her father and also to keep his trucking business working, is lovely and like Hunter, I wanted to protect her.
Sorry, the ex biker and wild child, is fun and loud. Hunter likes him, uses him to help in his investigation but still doesn't quite trust him. The dialogue was natural and the writing intelligent. Unlike many mysteries, we don't have to follow a trail of bodies, which is nice. We can get to know Hunter, his friends and the story in a well-crafted, interesting story. Even the ending was satisfying. There are other books in this series and I will check them out as well. (4 stars)"
"Ice on the Grapevine is a traditional mystery featuring Hunter Rayne, a retired homicide detective turned long haul truck driver. The story opens on a July morning with the discovery of a frozen corpse at a brake check just south of the Grapevine Pass in L.A. County. Hunter, who is in southern California making a delivery, is persuaded by his irascible dispatcher, Elspeth Watson, to help clear two fellow truck drivers who are arrested for the murder. His job is made more difficult by the fact that the suspects, a newlywed couple, won't speak up in their own defense.
The circumstantial evidence is strong, and a rookie detective from the L.A. County Sheriff's Department is eager to score a win. The investigation crosses the Canada-U.S. border when the victim is identified as a second rate musician from Vancouver, and it turns out there were more than a few desperate people happy to see him dead, including the accused couple. Hunter has to use all his investigative skills to uncover the truth.
Hunter’s ex-wife maintains that by taking to the highway Hunter is running away from his past, but he believes that the solitude of days on the road is helping him to heal from guilt over the failure of his marriage and the suicide of his best friend. His life gets more complicated when he feels an unwelcome attraction for a lawyer representing one of the accused."
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| Stephen R. Donaldson |
The First Chronicles
a. Lord Foul's Bane (1977)
b. The Illearth War (1978)
c. The Power that Preserves (1979)
The Second Chronicles
a. The Wounded Land (1980)
b. The One Tree (1982)
c. White Gold Wielder (1983)
The Last Chronicles
a. The Runes of Earth (2004)
b. Fatal Revenant (2007)
c. Against All Things Ending (2010)
d. The Last Dark (2013)
Maybe I'll try the Last Chronicles someday. I much preferred Mordant's Need, which consisted of two books
"The daughter of rich but neglectful parents, Terisa Morgan lives alone in a New York City apartment, a young woman who has grown to doubt her own existence. Surrounded by the flat reassurance of mirrors, she leads an unfulfilled life—until the night a strange man named Geraden comes crashing through one of her mirrors, on a quest to find a champion to save his kingdom of Mordant from a pervasive evil that threatens the land. Terisa is no champion. She wields neither magic nor power. And yet, much to her own surprise, when Geraden begs her to come back with him, she agrees.
Now, in a culture where women are little more than the playthings of powerful men, in a castle honeycombed with secret passages and clever traps, in a kingdom threatened from without and within by enemies able to appear and vanish out of thin air, Terisa must become more than the pale reflection of a person. For the way back to Earth is closed to her. And the enemies of Mordant will stop at nothing to see her dead."
"Terisa Morgan desperately needed to escape. Gilbur was trying to kill her, Castellan Lebbick wanted to torture her, and she needed to find Geraden. Orison was being attacked by the Alend army poised at the gates…Eremis, the traitor, was working with Gilbur in league with the hated Cadwals and the Arch-Imager Vagel…King Joyse’s actions could not be explained.
Everything that Geraden loved was about to be destroyed—unless the two of them could find a way to prevent it by using the talent for mirrors and Imagery that Terisa now knew they both possessed…a talent that made them extremely powerful and extremely dangerous to Eremis. And Terisa knew that Eremis would use all the evil means at his disposal to insure the success of his master plan, which meant that the kingdom would be lost and she and Geraden would surely die."
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| David Downing |
"I was very pleasantly surprised by this mystery/ thriller. I rarely give 5 - star ratings to mystery/ thrillers, but this was an such an engrossing story. It's my first book by David Downing, the first in his John Russell series.
Russell is a British reporter living in Berlin just before WWII as the Nazis are consolidating power in the country and beginning to make waves in the world. He's a bit of a cynic, reporting on small items, making ends meet, living with his girl friend, German actress, Effi and spending time with his German son, Paul on weekends.
While in Danzig gathering information for a news article, he meets a Russian spy who offers to pay him well to write a series of stories on Germany, a comparison between Communism and Socialism (and maybe also provide the Soviets with information useful to them). Russell is also given a job teaching a Jewish family English, a family who are trying to gain exit visas from Germany (as are countless other Jews at that time). Russell finds himself becoming more and more involved in issues, trying to help the Jewish family, trying to avoid the Gestapo, and so on.
It's a very well-written story and the development of Russell's character is carefully well-crafted. I liked many of the characters; I think I've got a bit of a crush on Effi. The story builds tension excellently, the story keeps you deeply engrossed. All in all, I'm glad I discovered this and look forward to continuing to see how Russell manages to survive in Nazi Germany as war becomes more and more of a given and also to see what other situations he will find himself in. Excellent!! (5 stars)"
"This is the 2nd book in the John Russell, wartime thriller/ spy series. This story starts with news reporter, John Russell, returning to Germany from a trip back home to the US with his son. He finds that his girlfriend, German actress Effi, has been imprisoned by the SD, the intelligence arm of the SS, for stating insults about Hitler. In fact, the imprisonment is to goad Russell into working for the SD by providing false information to the Russians. He readily agrees in order to get Effi out.
At the same time, he finds himself working for US intelligence, trying to contact potential agents for them and also, in his spare time, (that's a joke of course) trying to find a Jewish girl who had been sent to Berlin by her parents, but who has ended up missing. Action is non-stop in this thriller, much like the first and in many ways it's a bit of more of the same, but still excellent. I like how Effi plays a bigger role in this story; her incarceration, making her even more aware of the inequities of the Nazi regime. The story moves to Czechoslovakia, Poland and even Russia as Russell plays the Germans against the Russians in an effort to keep his family safe and still help those in need. Well-paced and well-written (3.5 stars)"
"In the fall of 1941, Anglo-American journalist John Russell is still living in Berlin, tied to the increasingly alien city by his love for two Berliners: his fourteen-year-old son, Paul, and his longtime girlfriend, Effi. Forced to work for both German and American Intelligence, he's searching for a way out of Germany. Can he escape and take Effi with him?"
The remaining books in the series are -
- Potsdam Station (2010)
- Lehter Station (2012)
- Masaryk Station (20130
The other series that I want to try features Jack McColl, AKA Jack of Spies. It contains 4 books as of 2018.
"It is 1913, and those who follow the news closely can see the world is teetering on the brink of war. Jack McColl, a Scottish car salesman with an uncanny ear for languages, has always hoped to make a job for himself as a spy. As his sales calls take him from city to great city—Hong Kong to Shanghai to San Francisco to New York—he moonlights collecting intelligence for His Majesty's Secret Service, but British espionage is in its infancy and Jack has nothing but a shoestring budget and the very tenuous protection of a boss in far-away London. He knows, though, that a geopolitical catastrophe is brewing, and now is both the moment to prove himself and the moment his country needs him most.
Unfortunately, this is also the moment he begins to realize what his aspiration might cost him. He understands his life is at stake when activities in China suddenly escalate from innocent data-gathering and casual strolls along German military concessions to arrest warrants and knife attacks. Meanwhile, a sharp, vivacious American suffragette journalist has wiled her way deep into his affections, and it is not long before he realizes that her Irish-American family might be embroiled in the Irish Republican movement Jack's bosses are fighting against. How can he choose between his country and the woman he loves? And would he even be able to make such a choice without losing both?"
"Spring 1915: World War One rages across Europe, and the British Empire is assailed on all fronts—domestic and abroad. Amidst this bloodbath of nations, where one man’s flag is another man’s shroud, a British spy is asked to do the impossible: seduce and betray the woman he loves, again. Only this time betrayal is a two-way street.
Jack McColl, a spy for His Majesty’s Secret Service, is stationed in India, charged with defending the Empire against Bengali terrorists and their German allies. Belgium, he finds, is not the only country seeking to expel an invader.
In England, meanwhile, suffragette journalist Caitlin Hanley begins the business of rebuilding her life after the execution of her brother—an IRA sympathizer whose terrorist plot was foiled by Caitlin’s own ex-lover, the very same Jack McColl. The war is changing everything and giving fresh impulse to those causes—feminism, socialism and Irish independence—which she as a journalist has long supported.
The threat of a Rising in Dublin alarms McColl’s bosses as much as it dazzles Caitlin. If another Irish plot brings them back together, will it be as enemies or lovers?"
The remaining two books in the series are -
- Lenin's Roller Coaster (2017)
- The Dark Clouds Shining (2018)
Well, there you go folks. Another week has started and it's almost time for our evening of Tuesday TV watching.. :0)
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