It was a beautiful day to start the week. If tomorrow is like this, I'll go for my weekly walk tomorrow morning. Tomorrow is also our Tax prep day and Jo and I also go to pick up our new glasses.. Busy busy! We went for a drive today, Jo driving and me checking out the newest Local Free Libraries. I provided a book at each one we visited and also managed to find 4 books. All in all a great day out. Even the puppies liked being in the car. Jo is preparing supper as I write this; one of her discoveries as we explore different foods to help with our diets. Tonight it's baked salmon with baked asparagus, potatoes and garlic... It's fantastic.
For today's post I'll provide reviews of the two books I completed this weekend and also the synopses of the next two books I'm reading, plus those of the 4 books I picked up today. Then I'll start off my new Reading Theme - Women Authors.
Just Finished
"I've been enjoying the Cadfael mysteries since I discovered the books in early 2000's. I had watched the TV show starring Derek Jacobi as the sleuthing monk and then discovered the book series. Neither have ever disappointed. The Hermit of Eyton Forest is the 14th book in the series by author Ellis Peters.
This 14th novel is set in October 1142. The war between King Stephen and Empress Maud has run into a stalemate with Stephen holding Maud blockaded at Oxford. In Shrewsbury, where Cadfael works at the monastery, life is quiet and the war hasn't been affecting life. Hugh Beringar, the local sheriff, is happy with the peace and quiet. Young Richard Ludel, ten years old and heir to the Ludel estate, attends the monastery as a pupil. His father dies and Richard's grandmother wants the ten-year old married off to the daughter of a nearby landowner. This causes friction between Abbot Radulphus and Dionisia, the grandmother. Richard's father wanted Richard to get his education before taking over the estate.
There are other goings-on that will provide for entertainment. A hermit monk has turned up with a young assistant, Hyacinth, and is given a cottage in Eyton Forest next to the Abbey's forest land. Things start going wrong on the Abbey lands, including an injury to the forest manager. Also showing up is an angry landowner from down south, seeking a runaway worker. He stirs things up uncomfortably for Shrewsbury. A murder will take place, Richard will disappear and Cadfael will be in the middle of everything.
As always, Cadfael is an interesting, solid, common sense character. Abbot Radulphus plays a strong role, both as Richard's protector and at staring down Dionisia and Drogo Bosiet. There are strangers about, who are all interesting and all suspects. Hugh plays more of a peripheral role in this story but you always feel his commanding presence. You get mystery, love and romance, and tension in this entertaining, excellent historical mystery. Check out the Cadfael series. Trust me. (4 stars)"
"Easy to Kill by mystery grand-dame Agatha Christie was also published under the title Murder Is Easy. It was originally published in 1939. I had previously seen a TV adaptation of the book as a Miss Marple mystery. In fact, in the book, it's classified as a Superintendent Battle mystery. Miss Marple does not play a role in the written story. There was another TV adaptation from 1981, which features Bill Bixby in the lead role and, instead of playing an ex-English police man returning from the Far East, he is supposedly a computer expert. So with all that lead in out of the way, on to the story itself.
Luke Fitzwilliam is on the train to London, having just returned from a tour of duty as a police officer in Asia. On the train he meets Lavina Fullerton from the town of Wychwood under Ashe. In the course of their conversation she tells him that she suspects there have been a number of murders in Wychwood and, because she feels the local policeman isn't up to the task, she is going to present her case before Scotland Yard. The next day, Luke discovers that Lavina has been hit and killed in a hit - and - run. Later he reads that a Dr Humbleby of Wychwood has died of septicemia. He finds this odd because Lavina had indicated that she felt the good Doctor would be the next person to die. Using his good friend Jimmy Lorimer to set things up, Luke heads down to Wychwood to investigate, staying with Jimmy's cousin, the lovely Bridget Conway.
So that is the crux of the story. Luke rolls through various suspects; the lawyer, the doctor, a strange off-putting owner of an antique store, etc as he tries to ascertain whether murders have indeed been committed and, if so, who are the main suspects. Bridget, engaged to a newspaper man, a man much older than her, assists him. There is definite friction between the two, Luke and Bridget that is. Call it sexual tension if you'd like.
It's an excellent story and was not ruined at all even though I'd seen the TV adaptation. Christie creates such great characters and wonderful personal interactions between them as you delve further into the mystery, that the mystery, while the major component, is made richer by the characters themselves. There are many suspects, possible motives and as the story progresses, increased tension. The great Superintendent Battle in fact only arrives on the scene late in the story so the main characters remain Luke and Bridget. The story flows so nicely and is so entertaining, a joy to read. (4 stars)"
Currently Reading
"Five Days Out of Time
… that was how the ad had described the Zodiac
cruise on the “weirdly misted” English river. The passengers were the
usual, unusual lot: a couple of unpleasantly hygienic Americans, an
aloof Ethiopian doctor, a snooping cleric with a wall-eye, an artist
running away from her success…
But they were not all what they seemed.
For
Inspector Alleyn knew that one of them was the faceless “Jampot”—the
ruthless killer who could take on any personality, whose thumb was a
deadly weapon. The problem was, which one?
Alleyn had five
days to trap him, or the other passengers would pay with their
lives—and one of those passengers was Alleyn’s wife!
"Gipsy’s Acre was a truly beautiful upland site with views out to sea – and in Michael Rogers it stirred a child-like fantasy. There, amongst the dark fir trees, he planned to build a house, find a girl and live happily ever after. Yet, as he left the village, a shadow of menace hung over the land. For this was the place where accidents happened. Perhaps Michael should have heeded the locals’ warnings: ‘There’s no luck for them as meddles with Gipsy’s Acre.’ Michael Rogers is a man who is about to learn the true meaning of the old saying ‘In my end is my beginning.’"
New Books
"With the redolent atmosphere of Ian Rankin and the spine-chilling characters of Thomas Harris, Mo Hayder's The Devil of Nanking, takes the reader on an electrifying literary ride from the palatial apartments of yakuza kingpins to deep inside the secret history of one of the twentieth century's most brutal events: the Nanking Massacre. A young Englishwoman obsessed with an indecipherable past, Grey comes to Tokyo seeking a lost piece of film footage of the notorious 1937 Nanking Massacre, footage some say never existed. Only one man can help Grey. A survivor of the massacre, he is now a visiting professor at a university in Tokyo. But he will have nothing to do with her. So Grey accepts a job in an upmarket nightspot, where a certain gangster may be the key to gaining the professor's trust. An old man in a wheelchair surrounded by a terrifying entourage, the gangster is rumored to rely on a mysterious elixir for his continued health"
"A deadly tide of poison
flows into ocean waters. A ghost ship drifts across the empty northern
Pacific. A luxury Soviet liner blazes into a funeral pyre. The
Presidential yacht cruises the Potomac night—and the President
disappears without a trace.
Dirk Pitt takes on a sinister Asian
shipping empire in an intercontinental duel of nerves. In his most
dangerous, fast-paced adventure, he fights to save the US government—and
to seize one desperate moment of revenge!"
"A Tale of Two Cities is Charles Dickens’s great historical novel, set against the violent upheaval of the French Revolution. The most famous and perhaps the most popular of his works, it compresses an event of immense complexity to the scale of a family history, with a cast of characters that includes a bloodthirsty ogress and an antihero as believably flawed as any in modern fiction. Though the least typical of the author’s novels, A Tale of Two Cities still underscores many of his enduring themes—imprisonment, injustice, social anarchy, resurrection, and the renunciation that fosters renewal."
"A stolen child.
An ancient evil.
A father’s descent.
And the literary masterpiece that holds the key to his daughter’s salvation.
Professor David Ullman is among the world’s leading authorities on
demonic literature, with special expertise in Milton’s Paradise Lost.
Not that David is a believer—he sees what he teaches as a branch of the
imagination and nothing more. So when the mysterious Thin Woman arrives
at his office and invites him to travel to Venice and witness a
“phenomenon,” he turns her down. She leaves plane tickets and an address
on his desk, advising David that her employer is not often
disappointed.
That evening, David’s wife announces she is leaving
him. With his life suddenly in shambles, he impulsively whisks his
beloved twelve-year-old daughter, Tess, off to Venice after all. The
girl has recently been stricken by the same melancholy moods David knows
so well, and he hopes to cheer her up and distract them both from the
troubles at home.
But what happens in Venice will change everything.
First,
in a tiny attic room at the address provided by the Thin Woman, David
sees a man restrained in a chair, muttering, clearly insane . . . but
could he truly be possessed? Then the man speaks clearly, in the voice
of David’s dead father, repeating the last words he ever spoke to his
son. Words that have left scars—and a mystery—behind.
When David
rushes back to the hotel, he discovers Tess perched on the roof’s edge,
high above the waters of the Grand Canal. Before she falls, she manages
to utter a final plea: Find me.
What follows is an unimaginable
journey for David Ullman from skeptic to true believer. In a terrifying
quest guided by symbols and riddles from the pages of Paradise Lost,
David must track the demon that has captured his daughter and discover
its name. If he fails, he will lose Tess forever."
Women Authors I Enjoy
Over the past couple of years I've explored books I've enjoyed reading in the past years. I've looked at mysteries Sci-Fi, Favorite Authors, etc. For the next while, and I imagine it'll last for the rest of the year, I'll look at Women authors I've been trying and enjoying since I moved to the Comox Valley. I've highlighted many of them already under various categories. I'll try to cover books of theirs that I've either not read or not previously mentioned. Anyway, we'll see how it goes. I'll work alphabetically through my list and at the end of each letter will highlight any authors where I've read or have only one of their books. So with that introduction, let's get started.
1. Margery Allingham. I've highlighted Allingham both in my Mystery discussion and more recently in my favorite authors theme, as I've enjoyed 9 of the 16 books of hers that I have on my bookshelf. Allingham lived from 1906 - 1966 and was best noted for her Albert Campion books. Here are a few of the books I still have to look forward to enjoying.
Margery Allingham
"Way back during the crusades Richard I presented the Huntingforest family with the tiny Balkan principality of Averna but since then the kingdom has been forgotten, until circumstances in Europe suddenly render it extremely strategically important to the British Government. They hire unconventional detective Albert Campion to recover the long-missing proofs of ownership - the deeds, a crown, and a receipt - which are apparently hidden in the village of Pontisbright. On arriving in Pontisbright, Campion and his friends meet the eccentric, young, flame-haired Amanda Fitton and her family who claim to be the rightful heirs to Averna and join in the hunt. Mr. Campion and his two young friends, Eager-Wright and Farquharson, posted as the Hereditary Paladin of Averna and his entourage! Unfortunately, criminal financier Brett Savanake is also interested in finding the evidence of the oil-rich state's ownership for his own ends. Things get rather rough in the village as Savanake's heavies up the pressure on Campion to solve the mystery before they do. In the course of the hunt, Campion dresses in drag, takes refuge in a tree, is nearly drowned in a mill race, and his friends find themselves bound and gagged in sacks, shot at, and witnesses to a satanic ceremony led by the local doctor. The rural calm of Pontisbright is well and truly shattered."
"Starring Albert Campion, bland, blue-eyed, deceptively vague professional adventurer, and Great Aunt Caroline, that formidable and exquisite old lady, ruling an ancient household heavy with evil. Uncle Andrew is dead, shot through the head. Cousin George, the black sheep, is skulking round corners. Aunt Julia is poisoned, Uncle William attacked. And terror invades an old Cambridge residence."
"Old William Faraday is dead, apparently of natural causes. Another man is dead too, and it was certainly murder. Mr Campion and his family are back in Pontisbright, along with Magersfontein Lugg and DCI Charles Luke. Danger is hardly unknown in this idyllic Suffolk village, but it is a less romantic peril than on Mr Campion's first visit, more than twenty years ago. Mr Campion's friends Minnie and Tonker Cassands put on a cheerful face as they prepare for their annual party at Minnie's house, The Beckoning Lady, but Minnie has serious problems with the Inland Revenue?and the dead man in the ditch is a tax inspector."
"In Hide My Eyes, private detective Albert Campion finds himself hunting down a serial killer in London's theatreland.
A
spate of murders leaves him with only two baffling clues: a left-hand
glove and a lizard-skin letter case. These minimal clues and a series of peculiar events sets Campion on a race against time that takes him
from an odd museum of curiosities hidden in a quiet corner of London to a
scrapyard in the East End.
Allingham shows her dark edge in Hide My Eyes and evokes the sights, sounds, and inimitable atmosphere of Fifties London."
"Finding himself the
victim of a botched kidnapping attempt, Val Gyrth suspects that he might
be in a spot of trouble. Unexpected news to him – but not to the
mysterious Mr Campion, who reveals that the ancient Chalice entrusted to
Val’s family is being targeted by a ruthless ring of thieves.
Fleeing
London for the supposed safety of Suffolk, Val and Campion come face to
face with events of a perilous and puzzling nature – Campion might be
accustomed to outwitting criminal minds, but can he foil supernatural
forces?"
So there you go, the first look at a new discussion topic. I hope you enjoy it.
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