Anyway, since my last reading update I've completed 4 books. I'll update those and also the books I've started since (October has for the most part been Horror month). I'll also try and continue with my look at the Mystery genre - American Cops. Oh, November will focus on War - type books, mainly fictional, in respect for Remembrance Day. I do have one Fantasy book lined up as well, for my UK Reading Group's November Genre challenge.
Anyway, on to reading info.
Just Finished
"The World of Suzie Wong is my first exposure to the work of English writer Richard Mason. Mason lived from 1919 - 1997 and over the course of his life he wrote six novels. Suzie Wong was his fifth novel and written in 1957. The book was converted to a movie in 1960, starring William Holden and Nancy Kwan. The book had that feel to it, in my mind, you know, a Sunday afternoon matinee on TCM.
Suzie Wong is a Chinese prostitute, a bar girl, who works in Hong Kong. Robert Lomax is an Englishman. The story starts in British Malaya, where Robert works on a plantation. The owner has strict rules about the men are not allowed to fraternize with the native Malaysian girls. So to keep himself occupied Robert begins painting. Eventually, he decides to move to Hong Kong and paint there. Being limited in his funds and wanting to live in the real Chinese part of Hong Kong, he rents room in a hotel in Wanchai. The hotel is frequented by bar girls, Chinese prostitutes, who stay in the bar and pick up British and American sailors who frequent the place. They then use the rooms in the hotel with their pickups.
Robert loves the atmosphere of the hotel, uses his balcony to paint. He loves the girls, becomes a confidante of theirs. He meets Suzie Wong and they develop a close friendship with her. He loves her personality, her attitudes, her humour, everything about her. Theirs is not a sexual relationship,, in fact, he has no sexual relationships with any of the girls. He just likes the atmosphere, is inspired by the area... and it does suit his limited finances.
The two, Suzie and Robert, are like best friends. Suzie has various relationships during the course of the story and Robert is still a close friend and becomes acquaintances with these other men. It's an interesting dynamic, this relationship, Suzie using Robert's room, as a place to hang out, to discuss her life and Robert's life and their attitudes and feelings.
Of course, the feelings between the two do progress and the development of a relationship between them is well-presented. All in all, the story is interesting, emotional, peopled with excellent characters; the other girls, while not crafted in great detail, are still presented as wonderful women and individuals. The story has great emotional content and rises and falls with the various incidents that occur over the course of this excellent story. One thing that struck me, and maybe it's because I'm a man, the somewhat misogynist attitude of Robert that becomes apparent when his relationship with Suzie becomes more and more personal. Suzie doesn't want to be a bar girl if she's going to have a relationship with Robert, but then how will she support her child. Robert's attitude to this is interesting. I won't get into it but I'd be interested to see what a woman would think of it. I think it's pretty clear without me describing it.
Anyway, that little bit does not detract from the excellent story that Mason tells. It's a satisfying character driven story that will leave you feeling excellent. (5 stars)"
"Relic by authors Preston & Child was my first exposure to their writing. I had seen the movie many years ago but couldn't remember much about it. The book was an entertaining thrill ride, most enjoyable.
We move from an expedition in South America where a number of the explorers are killed. The scene moves to Museum of Natural History in New York many years later. They are in the process of preparing for a big exhibit on strange beings and habits and bodies are beginning to crop up. Is there a relationship to materials that were shipped from South America as part of the earlier expedition? You'll have to read the story.
It follows the tradition of such stories / movies as Jaws. Something is killing people and the undermanned investigators must not only try to find the killer(s) but also battle museum executives who want the exhibition to take place no matter what. FBI investigator Pendergast comes up from New Orleans on the trail of a killer who had murdered people there, who were part of the previous expedition. He works with New York cop Lt D'Agosta who is investigating some disappearances and murders at the museum. These may be related. On another avenue you have museum scientist Margo Green and novelist Smithback who are doing research on the expedition and material that was shipped to the museum from South America, as part of that expedition. Are all these investigations related? As I mentioned earlier, you'll have to read the story. :0)
As the story builds, the exhibition comes to fruition, the museum is filled with spectators and police and FBI security and a heavy rainstorm begins. Things begin to accelerate, bodies start cropping up, people get separated, the power goes out and action and tension builds and builds. We follow the various characters throughout the museum as the try either to escape or to find the killer(s). It's definitely a fun ride, lots of action and suspense. The main characters are well-developed and likable and you want the succeed. All in all, I enjoyed this story very much. Suspend disbelief and just enjoy! (3.5 stars)"
"Sharpe's Sword is the 14th book in the Sharpe's adventure / historical series by Bernard Cornwell. This story is set during the period June / July 1812 during Wellington's Salamanca Campaign in Spain. Sharpe is attached to Wellington's spy master Maj Hogan to try and find a master French spy, Colonel Leroux. Leroux is a nasty man and is set on finding El Mirador, one of Hogan's most effective contacts.
Leroux has been captured but disguised himself as another officer and escapes into a French fort near Salamanca, even though having given his parole. He kills Sharpe's company commander and a young lieutenant while making his escape. Sharpe and his men, especially his faithful Sgt Harper, because they can recognize Leroux are assigned the task of finding him when Wellington attacks to take over the three forts held by the French.
There is also a spy within Wellington's camp who warns the French of the attack, with disastrous results. There are many suspects including a Spanish contessa with designs on Sharpe, Lord Spears, one of Hogan's spies who is recovering from an injury and spending much time with the Contessa and Sharpe, and Father Curtis, an Irish priest who seems to show up everywhere.
It all makes for a great action-filled adventure, with battles, intrigue and romance. Sharpe wants Leroux's sword and to capture the French spy. Sharpe's life is threatened many times (it is an adventure, eh? :0)). All in all, one of the better Sharpe adventures, filled with excellent characters and an interesting plot. I do like how Cornwell ties the actual historical events into Sharpe's story line and highlights the actual history in the afterword. I've enjoyed this series very much and look forward to getting the next book in the series. (3.5 stars)"
"I found French Alley by Matthew Clay in a used book store in Victoria, Canada (Grafton Books; unfortunately now closed). It was one of the books in a glass cabinet, wrapped in clear plastic. I bought it on a whim as it wasn't really all that cheap. I think it is a '50s version of Harlequin romances, with more of a gritty flavor to it.
The story is about 3 women who have found their way to a burlesque club in New Orleans. There is Renee, a Cajun girl from the bayous of Louisiana. Her mother, worn from life in this environment, gives Renee enough money to escape the life and move to the city. Renee starts working in a laundromat but after advances from the owner, escapes. She meets Steve a pianist at the burlesque club who suggests she might want to work there. At the club Renee meets Kim. Kim is everyone's friend. Kim had escaped from her life with Luke whom she had married at 16. Luke took her to New York where he was supposed to be an actor and dancer, but in fact was a drunken wastrel. Kim finds work as a dancer and on discovering Luke with another woman she also moves to New Orleans. There she is in love with Red, another Luke, shifty and living off Kim. The third member of the group, the last roommate is Judy. Judy came from a wealthy family in New York, ignored by her father after her mother died and mistreated by her house keeper. After her father marries the housekeeper he tries to force Judy to marry a wealthy friend's son, but Judy runs away to New Orleans.
The three have issues, are trying to find love and romance and also work at the burlesque club. The story delves into their lives and relationships and there are differing results, some even very tragic. It's not the type of story I usually read, in fact it's sat on my bookshelf for 10 years or so. I dusted it off for a book group October genre challenge of Romance. It's sort of what I expected. It was gritty and moved along nicely, in some ways reminded me of movies of the decade by stars like Ida Lupino and such. (2 stars)"
Currently Reading
I've started 3 books since my last entry.
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| Part of this series |
"'We believe in her as in a woman we might providentially meet some fine day when we should find ourselves doubting of the immortality of the soul'
wrote Henry James of Dorothea Brooke, who shares with the young doctor Tertius Lydgate not only a central role in Middlemarch but also a fervent conviction that life should be heroic.
By the time the novel appeared to tremendous popular and critical acclaim in 1871-2, George Eliot was recognized as England's finest living novelist. It was her ambition to create a world and portray a whole community--tradespeople, middle classes, country gentry--in the rising provincial town of Middlemarch, circa 1830. Vast and crowded, rich in narrative irony and suspense, Middlemarch is richer still in character, in its sense of how individual destinies are shaped by and shape the community, and in the great art that enlarges the reader's sympathy and imagination. It is truly, as Virginia Woolf famously remarked, 'one of the few English novels written for grown-up people'."
"Jim True knows. He has returned from an out-of-body experience to find he has been brutally murdered and his body mutilated. No one can see him, no one can hear him, no one, except his killer, knows he still exists. Freed from his body, True embarks on a quest to find his killer and discover why and how he has managed to survive. As he closes in on his murderer, True discovers that even the very people he loved and trusted have betrayed him. He meets his killer, a strange and sinister figure who can also leave his body at will. An epic and deadly battle ensues between True and a seemingly unstoppable and hideous serial killer - a man now intent on even more murders, including True's wife and child . ."
"Wilson has blended H.P. Lovecraft's dark vision with his own revolutionary philosophy & unique narrative powers to produce a stunning, high-tension story of vaulting imagination. A professor makes a horrifying discovery while excavating an Anatolian archeological site. For over 200 years, mind parasites have been lurking in the deepest layers of the unconsciousness, feeding on human life force & steadily gaining a foothold on the planet. Now they threaten humanity's extinction. They can be fought with one weapon only: the mind, pushed to-& beyond-its limits. Pushed so far that humans can read each other's thoughts, that the moon can be shifted from its orbit by thought alone. Pushed so that humans can at last join battle with the loathsome parasites on equal terms."
My Ongoing Look at the Mystery Genre - American Cops
In my last entry I looked at Craig Johnson's Longmire series.
1. Julia Keller - Belfa Elkins. I've read the first two books in this series set in West Virginia and featuring DA Belfa Elkins. Keller was born in West Virginia and portrays the area excellently. She won a Pulitzer Prize while working at the Chicago Tribune. There are currently 8 books in the Bell Elkins series as well as 4 e-novellas.
"A Killing in the Hills is the first Bell Elkins mystery by Julia Keller. The story is set in rural West Virginia and Elkins is the local District Attorney. Something happened to Bell during her childhood in the town of Acker's Gap, which becomes apparent as you progress through the story. She married at a later date and moved to Washington DC with her husband, a new lawyer. Bell also got her law degree but wanted to return to Acker's Gap to help the people of that community; ending up with her going alone with her daughter, Carla.
The story starts with a triple murder in the town, 3 old men sitting having coffee at the local restaurant. Carla is one of the people who sees the shooting. Bell is also working on a case in which a mentally handicapped boy is charged with the murder of his friend. As well, Carla, a typical teenager?, is rebelling, anger issues, suspended driver's license. Bell's best friend, Ruthie, is suffering with cancer, and, oh yes, Bell's sister is coming up for a parole hearing for the murder of their father, many years ago. So, yes a lot is going on.
But Keller is able to tie this all together to make an interesting, tense story. It flows very nicely and there are characters, especially Bell (Belfa) and the sheriff, Nick Fogelsong, with long ties to Bell, who are developed nicely. The past and the present are tied together, the murderer is well-described and interesting/ somewhat scary, and the mysteries are nicely tied up. There are enough loose ends at the end of the book; especially re. Bell's daughter and Bell's sister, to make you want to find out more about this series. I enjoyed very much and look forward to trying the next, Bitter River. (4 stars)"
"Bitter River is the 2nd book in the Bell Elkins series by Julia Keller. I enjoyed the first book, A Killing in the Hills, but this one was even better. Keller is an excellent author spinning a tense mystery and crafting excellent characters.
Bell Elkins is the DA of a small town in West Virginia. She is called out by the sheriff, her friend Nick Fogelsong, when a body is discovered in her car in the Bitter River. The body is that of a young girl, Lucinda Trimble, a high school senior, who is also pregnant. The story basically involves their investigation of the murder of the girl. Complicating the story is the fact that Nick had previously had a relationship with the girl's mother, Maddie many years ago. Both had moved on, Nick marrying someone else and Maddie marrying as well.
Besides this main story, Bell is also dealing with a number of issues, her ongoing relationship with a younger man, Clay; the fact that her daughter has moved to Washington to live with her father and Bell's ex-husband; the absence of Bell's sister after her release (in the last story) from prison. As well, an ex-friend of both Bell moves to Raythune County to get away from things for awhile. He has some issues, it appears. Will these affect anything?
This is more than simply a murder mystery, as things begin to spiral out of control as the story moves along. The tension builds nicely and there are a number of surprise happenings that add to it. Judith Keller is an excellent story - teller. She develops characters very nicely, making them more than words on paper. She presents the locale and events clearly and in a manner that draws you in to the story.
I found the story flowed along smoothly and could feel the tension of the characters and events as they occurred. I enjoyed it very much. Some of the events seemed far-fetched, but in Keller's hands they just made for a more entertaining story. Well worth reading. I look forward to continuing the series. Next in line is Summer of the Dead (4.5 stars)"
The remaining books in the series are -
a. Summer of the Dead (2014)
b. Last Ragged Breath (2015)
c. Sorrow Road (2016)
d. Fast Falls the Night (2017)
e. Bone on Bone (2018)
f. The Cold Way Home (2019)
So there you go, all caught up. Now to get back to reading. Have a great week!
