It's been rainy and windy the past couple of days. Just looking outside the patio doors, the bushes are blowing like crazy. I cleaned out the gutters at the front of the house a couple of days ago but I imagine I'll have to do them again.
I finished two books since my last update, one of them an e-book I received from the author asking for a review. I'll provide my review for both and also the synopsis of the book I've started since. I'll also continue with my ongoing look at my favorite authors.
Just Finished
"Clean Cut is the 3rd book in the DI Anna Travis crime series by English author, Lynda La Plante. Like the other books in the series that I've read, it's a gritty, tense thriller.
Travis' on and off again relationship with her boss DCI James Langton takes a big hit in this book. There relationship is always a testy one as Langton is a moody, often angry, individual. As the story begins, Langton, while going to arrest suspects in the murder of a young woman, is attacked by a machete - wielding man and suffers severe, lift-threatening injuries. The main part of the beginning of this book deals with his recovery and the pressure he puts on Anna. He is determined to recover as he wants to find the man who did this to him.
Anna is assigned to another murder investigation, working with another team. It begins to seem as though there are links to this investigation and the one that Langton was involved with. As Langton struggles to get back to work and investigate his attack and the other case, we begin to get outlines of the whole case; drugs, illegal immigration, voodoo, child abuse, etc. This is a gritty, sometimes graphic, intense thriller. It's also quite long, but it's written so well that it flows and the pages just fly by.
I like Anna Travis. She is very human (a skill at characterization of Lynda LaPlante), smart and intuitive. Even with her relationship with Langton up in the air, he still asks her back on his team and while he spends lots of time angry at the individualist way she works, she comes up with many great clues and breaks in the case. But it is very much a team effort. As the case grows and more evidence and clues and witnesses come in, the team gets bigger and bigger. It's fascinating how the trickle of clues start to add up and how the team begins to build its case.
LaPlante knows how to craft a story and develop characters. There is a tendency towards repetition as the team rehashes their evidence and build up the event timeline, but, at the same time, it is necessary. I like how the story develops slowly and then as we get to the final chapters, how they close down the case. All in all, a great, entertaining story, with a couple of little twists at the end that it will be interesting to see if they come to the forefront in future stories. (4 stars)"
"It's Coming For You: A Collection of Horrors is the debut novel for author, Donna Trovato, a collection of horror short stories. While I didn't find the stories necessarily overly scary, they were creepy, gruesome and well - written.
The book contains a collection of 10 short stories. They covered all aspects of horror; demons, murderous clowns, viruses, murdering villagers, etc, a little bit of everything. The first story reminded me a bit of the movie Darkness Falls. This was my least favorite story but even it, like all of the stories, had a nice little twist at the end. The stories seemed to get better and better as I went along. Each story had a bit of a surprise, which made them more interesting.
The stories are graphic, but not grossly so, just enough to creep you out. Trovato displays an ability to get right into her short stories and move them along nicely until the satisfying ending. She writes smoothly and to the point and you can feel the tension within the stories. I think my favorites were Haunting at 238, Fatal Forest and The Virus but every story entertained me very much. Satisfying debut. (4 stars)"
Currently Reading
"Welcome to Trenton, New
Jersey, where bounty hunter Stephanie Plum's life is about to implode
in Janet Evanovich's wildest, hottest novel yet!
FIRST A STRANGER APPEARS
While chasing down the usual cast of miscreants and weirdos Stephanie discovers that a crazed woman is stalking her.
THEN THE STRANGER REVEALS HER SECRETS
The
woman dresses in black, carries a 9mm Glock, and has a bad attitude and
a mysterious connection to dark and dangerous Carlos Manoso …street
name, Ranger.
NEXT, SOMEBODY DIES
The action turns deadly serious, and Stephanie goes from hunting skips to hunting a murderer.
SOON, THE CHASE IS ON
Ranger
needs Stephanie for more reasons than he can say. And now, the two are
working together to find a killer, rescue a missing child, and stop a
lunatic from raising the body count. When Stephanie Plum and Ranger get
too close for comfort, vice cop Joe Morelli (her on-again, off-again
boyfriend) steps in.
Will the ticking clock stop at the stroke of twelve, or will a stranger in the wind find a way to stop Stephanie Plum…forever?"
My Favorite Authors - John le Carré
David John Moore Cornwall, known for his writing name John le Carré, was born in 1931 in Dorset, England. He is a prolific writer, best known for his spy novels, especially those featuring aging, cynical spy, George Smiley. Back in the day, I remember enjoying his Smiley trilogy and also the TV mini-series based on Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, The Honorable Schoolboy and Smiley's People. I read a few others but I think after The Little Drummer Girl (which I didn't really enjoy, as I recall) i stopped reading his works for quite a long time. In the past few years I've begun again, starting with le Carré's earliest works and also some of his more recent ones. I've read 5 most recently. Let's take a look at them.
John le Carré
"Fantastic story. A classic spy novel, classic Le Carre story. His third novel, after Call For The Dead and a A Murder of Quality, it features tired spy, Alec Leamas, the British Secret Services Berlin organizer, who is called home for a special mission. I won't get into too many details as there are so many interesting surprises throughout the story that I wouldn't want to ruin the story. There is a brief role for le Carré's most famous spy, George Smiley, but the story revolves mostly around Leamas. The spy craft is interesting, the plot twisting, the story fascinating and one you will have difficulty putting down. An excellent story for those who enjoy spy dramas and also a nicely historical feel for the cold war between the West and East.. Great stuff.. (5 stars)"
2. Call for the Dead (Smiley #1).
"This is the first of the Smiley novels. I've read others before, but not the earlier ones and I now regret that. It was excellent; introducing George Smiley, already somewhat cynical, now involved in a case that traces its roots back to his work during WWII. I liked his character very much and also his two compatriots, Mendel and Peter Guillaum. Excellent introduction to the Smiley books.. Great story (5 stars)"
"This was John le Carré's 5th novel and one that did not feature his most famous spy master, George Smiley. The main character is Alan Turner, a Foreign Office employee who has been sent to the British embassy in Bonn to find out what has happened to an embassy employee, Leo Harting, a German national who seems to have disappeared with a number of secret files. This is a tense period in European history, set after WWII, when the Russians are heating up things, Germany seems to be in turmoil, looking at entering NATO, the European Common market, while students are rioting. Not the time for the British to be worried about whether one of the employees has defected to Russia with important documents. Turner, an abrasive individual, is the man to try to find out what happened. I enjoyed the pace of this story, as Turner interrogates and searches for clues in an embassy that seems to want to bury the situation. What was Leo Harting up to? Was he a mole for the Russians? Did he have other motives for the research he was conducting? It was all very interesting, except, for me, the ending, which was without any satisfying resolution. At least to me, anyway. But still an excellent example of le Carré's story telling and his knowledge of political intrigue. A solid 3.5 stars."
"Tessa Quayle--young,
beautiful, and dearly beloved to husband Justin--is gruesomely murdered
in northern Kenya. When Justin sets out on a personal odyssey to uncover
the mystery of her death, what he finds could make him not only a
suspect, but also a target for Tessa's killers.
A master chronicler
of the betrayals of ordinary people caught in political conflict, John
le Carre portrays the dark side of unbridled capitalism as only he can.
In The Constant Gardener he tells a compelling, complex story of a man
elevated through tragedy, as Justin Quayle--amateur gardener, aging
widower, and ineffectual bureaucrat--discovers his own natural resources
and the extraordinary courage of the woman he barely had time to love." (4 stars)
"I've read many books by John le Carré. He's one of the great spy masters when it comes to story telling. Our Kind of Traitor is one of his more recent stories, published originally in 2010. I enjoyed the story but I think in many ways it was style over substance.
Perry and Gail a young English couple decide to take a vacation in Antigua. There they meet a group of Russians led by Dima who attaches himself to the couple.
It turns out that Dima is a member of a powerful Russian gangster (vory) organization; their money launderer, and he wants to defect, along with his family to England. He indicates he has much to offer the UK in return.
Perry and Gail are interrogated by Luke, Yvonne, Ollie and their boss Hector back in London. Hector comes up with a plan to help Dima and his family defect. Dima is attending meetings in Paris and Bern to authorize fund transfer within the organization and feels he will be killed afterwards.
The rest of the story is the attempt by this group to help the family get back to England.
le Carré has a unique story telling style. The first half of the story is basically told via the interrogation of Perry and Gail, but in the second half there is much more action as we travel to Paris and then onwards to Switzerland. All in all it's a well told story, with interesting characters. The ending was somewhat disappointing but different. It was nice to try a le Carré story again. (4 stars)"
I have another 4 sitting on my bookshelf awaiting my attention. The complete listing of le Carré's works can be found at this link.
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