We've had a rainy, windy few days. Today isn't quite so bad, but it's still a bit drizzly. And with that Valley weather update on to the subject of books. I've finished three books since my last update and have acquired a few. So I'll do the normal thing; reviews of completed books, synopses of new books and those I'm currently reading. I'll also get back to my ongoing look at women authors whose works I've been enjoying. It's been a week or so since I delved into this topic.
Just Finished
"(Ed. Note - I generally start off a review of a book of poetry by saying something like I have difficult relationships with poetry. I don't often get it.) Unfortunately I had a similar relationship with So Far So Good: Final Poems: 2014-2018 by Ursula K. Le Guin.
I know LeGuin for her excellent YA / Fantasy stories (the Earthsea stories) and her Sci-Fi (Left Hand of Darkness, etc). I didn't realize she had started out writing poetry. I discovered the book recently when I was looking for poetry by someone else and thought I should try it. The book is a collection of poems written and published just before LeGuin's death.
There is no doubt that she has a way with words, beautiful descriptions and many poignant emotions, especially the last chapter; In the Ninth Decade, which deals with her thoughts on aging and death. My problem, and it's mine, not LeGuin's, is my difficulty getting into the flow of a poem. But there were many that struck a chord with me. As I said, the last chapter especially.
Theodora, a poem about her mother was especially emotional, like this snippet from it
"Oh I was so angry at her when she died
for dying, but at last that's gone
and she comes to me again with silver
and turquoise on her wrists
in the sunlight."
Or this little gem... (and I'm a dog person)
"Company
A paw, a questing nose half waken me,
and I let him get under the covers.
He curls up and purrs himself asleep.
Cats are less troublesome than lovers."
(I had a puppy just like this)
There are other such gems throughout this collection. Don't let my difficulties grasping the best of poetry stop you from trying this book. It covers many themes and as I said earlier, Ursula LeGuin has a way with words and description. Worthwhile to see this different aspect of her mind and of her writing. (3.5 stars)"
"I really don't know how to review The Girl Next Door by Jack Ketchum. I had similar feelings about as I did In Cold Blood and it left me asking the same question... Why??
So the basic story, it's based on a true story. It's set in a small neighborhood in small town New Jersey, like Happy Days or Leave it to Beaver, where all the families and kids know each other. Except these kids sometimes play The Game..
Into this mix are thrown are thrown Meg (the oldest) and Susan (the youngest), survivors of a car crash that killed their parents. Susan has been crippled by the accident, bearing the scars and also forced to wear braces on her arms and legs. They are moving in with their aunt Ruth, single mother of Willie, Donny and Woofer. Ruth is world weary, a lady who the kids like because she gives them beer and cigarettes and treats them like adults.
The story is told from the perspective of Davey, next door neighbor and Donny's best friend. Davey's parents are in the process of breaking up (not relevant or relevant?) and he has a crush on Meg. He becomes aware that Ruth seems not to like either Meg or Susan and these feelings are echoed by her sons.
The story escalates from here, quite quickly and in a graphic, violent way. Under Ruth's guidance the boys and other neighborhood kids begin to abuse and torture Meg, locking her in the basement and taking turns committing increasingly violent acts on her. Davey is both an unwilling and willing participant, an observer more than anything.
It's a horrifying story with intimations of Lord of the Flies about it. The story was so very well written and the tension is ratcheted right from the very beginning. But it also left me feeling numb and cold and like In Cold Blood, left me wondering how people can be such monsters and even why the story needs to be told? But it drew me in at the same time, almost like Davey in some ways, one of those observers who slow down at traffic accidents. If you like horror, this story has it all. (4 stars)"
"It's been six years since I read Blacklands by British mystery writer Belinda Bauer. I don't know why it takes me so long to get around to reading an author I've enjoyed... well, actually, my wife would say I just have too many books and she'd be correct. So anyway, six years after Blacklands, I started Rubbernecker, originally published in 2013. I'm so glad I did.
There are two story lines in play in this interesting mystery. A patient in a coma (recovering slightly) believes he sees a doctor kill another coma patient and fears the doctor knows he saw him. In the alternate story-line, Patrick Fort, a young autistic man, is taking an Anatomy course and is part of a group of students dissecting a body to try and discover the cause of death. There are also threads that follow Patrick's mother, an alcoholic who has difficulty dealing with Patrick. Dozy nurse Tracy who works in the coma ward and basically ignores them has set her sights on the husband of one of the coma patients, Mr. Deal.
Patrick has searched for the cause of his own father's death (killed in a car crash) and has a hope that discovering how Corpse 19 died might help him cope with his father's death. The story takes a bit to get into but once you get into the flow of it, it is just fascinating. You have the coma patients increasing efforts to improve, to get his tongue working so he can speak as he continues to fear for his life. You've got Patrick's interactions with the other students (lovely Meg seems to actually like him), with his room mates, with his mother. As the story progresses Patrick comes to believe that Corpse 19 was in fact murdered.
The story is intricate and well-crafted and how Bauer ties them together is also excellent. How Patrick grows in his relationships (it's not an easy process), how he investigates his suspicions, all are so well - presented. The tension increases at a steady flow and as things begin to resolve themselves, lights begin to flash on in your mind.. Oh right! Cool! (my reaction anyway.) Just an excellent, satisfying mystery and ending, filled with complex characters who draw you in. (5 stars)"
Currently Reading
"A moving account of a journey through war-torn Europe.
Alone
and fending for themselves in a Poland devastated by war, Jan and his
three homeless friends cling to the silver sword as a symbol of hope. As
they travel through Europe towards Switzerland, where they believe they
will be reunited with their parents, they encounter many hardships and
dangers."
"A hair-raising chiller about a young American newspaperman caught up in a vicious maze of Cold War espionage and international intrigue."
"The magical Peter Pan comes to the night nursery of the Darling children, Wendy, John and Michael. He teaches them to fly, then takes them through the sky to Never-Never Land, where they find Red Indians, wolves, Mermaids and... Pirates. The leader of the pirates is the sinister Captain Hook. His hand was bitten off by a crocodile, who, as Captain Hook explains 'liked me arm so much that he has followed me ever since, licking his lips for the rest of me'. After lots of adventures, the story reaches its exciting climax as Peter, Wendy and the children do battle with Captain Hook and his band.
Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens is the magical tale that first introduces Peter Pan, the little boy who never grows any older. He escapes his human form and flies to Kensington Gardens, where all his happy memories are, and meets the fairies, the thrushes, and Old Caw the crow. The fairies think he is too human to be allowed to stay in after Lock-out time, so he flies off to an island which divides the Gardens from the more grown-up Hyde Park - Peter's adventures, and how he eventually meets Mamie and the goat, are delightfully illustrated by Arthur Rackham."
New Books
"When a murdered woman is
found in the city of Beszel, somewhere at the edge of Europe, it looks
to be a routine case for Inspector Tyador Borlú of the Extreme Crime
Squad. But as he investigates, the evidence points to conspiracies far
stranger and more deadly than anything he could have imagined.
Borlú
must travel from the decaying Beszel to the only metropolis on Earth as
strange as his own. This is a border crossing like no other, a journey
as psychic as it is physical, a shift in perception, a seeing of the
unseen. His destination is Beszel’s equal, rival, and intimate neighbor,
the rich and vibrant city of Ul Qoma. With Ul Qoman detective Qussim
Dhatt, and struggling with his own transition, Borlú is enmeshed in a
sordid underworld of rabid nationalists intent on destroying their
neighboring city, and unificationists who dream of dissolving the two
into one. As the detectives uncover the dead woman’s secrets, they begin
to suspect a truth that could cost them and those they care about more
than their lives.
What stands against them are murderous powers
in Beszel and in Ul Qoma: and, most terrifying of all, that which lies
between these two cities."
"The scar on Rhoda Gradwyn's face was to be the death of her . . .
When
the notorious investigative journalist, Rhoda Gradwyn, books into Mr
Chandler-Powell's private clinic in Dorset for the removal of a
disfiguring and long-standing scar, she has every prospect of a
successful operation and the beginning of a new life. But the Manor
holds a secret and deadly enemy. While she lies drowsily recovering from
the anesthetic a white-shrouded figure stealthily enters her bedroom
and within minutes Rhoda is dead.
Dalgliesh and his team, called
in to investigate the murder, and later a second equally horrific death,
find themselves confronted with problems even more complicated than the
question of innocence or guilt."
"Two decades after his adventures on the turbulent Dahlgren's world, Sven Dahlgren returns to his father's planet as a colonizer, and he discovers mysteries held over from the past."
"Catherine's last job ended badly. Corporate bullying at a top TV network saw her fired and forced to leave London, but she was determined to get her life back. A new job and a few therapists later, things look much brighter. Especially when a challenging new project presents itself -- to catalogue the late M. H. Mason's wildly eccentric cache of antique dolls and puppets. Rarest of all, she'll get to examine his elaborate displays of posed, costumed and preserved animals, depicting bloody scenes from the Great War. Catherine can't believe her luck when Mason's elderly niece invites her to stay at Red House itself, where she maintains the collection until his niece exposes her to the dark message behind her uncle's "Art." Catherine tries to concentrate on the job, but Mason's damaged visions begin to raise dark shadows from her own past. Shadows she'd hoped therapy had finally erased. Soon the barriers between reality, sanity and memory start to merge and some truths seem too terrible to be real... in The House of Small Shadows by Adam Nevill."
Women Authors I'm Enjoying - Sue Grafton (the Alphabet Mysteries)
Sue Grafton was an American author of the alphabet mysteries starring California PI Kinsey Milhone. She was born in Louisville, Kentucky in 1940 and died in Santa Barbara, California in 2017. The alphabet mysteries started with A is for Alibi and ended on her death with Y is for Yesterday. It's unfortunate that she never managed to Z before she passed away. She refused to let the series be translated into film or TV although I have read that her estate has authorized a TV series based on the books. I have so far read 20 of the series and I've got a few more sitting on my bookshelf. I'll look at the last one I completed and also the synopses of those I haven't read.Sue Grafton
"I've been enjoying the Kinsey Millhone mystery series since I discovered it early 2000s. They are one of my comfort reads. The 20th book in the series, T is for Trespass by Sue Grafton has to be one of the best so far. This story had great tension and a palpable feeling of menace.
The story follows Kinsey as she works on a number of cases; an eviction, trying to help solve a traffic accident for an insurance investigator and helping her elderly neighbour, Gus Vronsky. The story also follows Solara Rojas, the woman hired to care for Gus. Kinsey runs an check on Solara for Gus's niece, who lives in New York, and finds that there are no red flags on her. (This was a quick check as the niece is impatient and needs to find someone quickly. Solara is not who she seems and over the course of this story, Kinsey and her friend and landlord Henry Pitts begin to suspect that she is mistreating Gus.
It's a scary story and Solara is a sociopath who will do anything to get what she wants and in this case what she wants is Gus's money. We begin to find our more about her as the story progresses. Kinsey is unfortunately distracted by her other cases but she keeps coming back to Gus's case and she begins to realize that Solara is more than a match for her. Read the story to see how this is all resolved.
The story is especially terrifying for people who have elderly parents or relatives, I think, especially if they need extra help. The way Solara gains control is frightening and makes the story especially dark. It's not graphic but the implications give you cause for uneasiness. Yes, an excellent story and an excellent Kinsey mystery. (4.5 stars)"
"In 1960s Santa Teresa, California, a child is kidnapped and never returned...When the case is reopenedafter twenty years, a man - Michael Sutton - contacts private detective Kinsey Millhone for help. He claims to have recalled a strange and disturbing memory which just might provide the key to the mystery. He may have stumbled across the kidnappers burying Mary Claire Fitzhugh's body...But Michael's account is indistinct - he was only six years old at the time of the kidnapping; and even members of his family try to discredit his evidence. But Kinsey is certain there is something vital within Michael's recollections. And even when what is eventually unearthed isn't what anyone expected, she can't quite let go of the case. As Kinsey gradually brings to light the stories of the protagonists involved in the tragedy, from Country Club parents to their free-living, hippy children, the truth finally begins to emerge. And while stepping back into the past, Kinsey discovers more about her own history too..."
"Private detective Kinsey Millhone feels a bit out of place in Nordstrom’s lingerie department, but she’s entirely in her element when she puts a stop to a brazen shoplifting spree. For her trouble she nearly gets run over in the parking lot by one of the fleeing thieves—and later learns that the one who didn’t get away has been found dead in an apparent suicide. But Audrey Vance’s grieving fiancé suspects murder and hires Kinsey to investigate—in a case that will reveal a big story behind a small crime, and lead her into a web that connects a shadowy “private banker,” an angry trophy wife, a spoiled kid with a spiraling addiction, and a brutal killer without a conscience…"
"Two dead men changed
the course of my life that fall. One of them I knew and the other I’d
never laid eyes on until I saw him in the morgue.
The first
was a local PI of suspect reputation. He’d been gunned down near the
beach at Santa Teresa. It looked like a robbery gone bad. The other was
on the beach six weeks later. He’d been sleeping rough. Probably
homeless. No identification. A slip of paper with Millhone’s name and
number was in his pants pocket. The coroner asked her to come to the
morgue to see if she could ID him.
Two seemingly unrelated deaths, one a murder, the other apparently of natural causes.
But
as Kinsey digs deeper into the mystery of the John Doe, some very
strange linkages begin to emerge. And before long at least one aspect is
solved as Kinsey literally finds the key to his identity. “And just
like that,” she says, “the lid to Pandora’s box flew open. It would take
me another day before I understood how many imps had been freed, but
for the moment, I was inordinately pleased with myself.”
In this
multilayered tale, the surfaces seem clear, but the underpinnings are
full of betrayals, misunderstandings, and outright murderous fraud. And
Kinsey, through no fault of her own, is thoroughly compromised.
W is for . . . wanderer . . . worthless . . . wronged . . .
W is for wasted."
The stories are always good value for money. The complete listing of Grafton's books can be found at this link. Enjoy the rest of your week.
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