I'm not an expert on any given genre of fiction, let alone crime thrillers, but it just doesn't get much better than Carol O'Connell's Kathy Mallory novels. Mallory (because no one dares call her "Kathy") is a child criminal turned NYPD detective of the coldest, most calculating, enigmatic type. Only through her strange and often one-sided relationships with the people who love her (despite everything) do we get a peek at a tiny sliver of her inner workings.
FIND ME may be the best Mallory novel yet. This time around, Mallory is broken-- more broken than she naturally is. Her systems are falling apart, her guard is down, and she is far from home-- tracing two paths: the path of a piece of her past and the path of a prolific and gruesome serial child killer. Both roads lead her down Route 66.
The compelling foil to both of her goals is a caravan of parents of missing children, pulled together by an online psychotherapist of questionable character, tracing the same route seeking both their lost children and publicity for their sometimes decades-old cases. As the caravan grows from dozens to hundreds, the serial killer follows, and as the body count grows so too grows their hope that they're closer to finding out what happened to their kids.
Of course, Mallory is followed into this quest by the two men who love her most, her partner Riker and her... friend?... Charles Butler. But this time it's not because they care; it's because they want to get to the bottom of a death back in NYC. A death that occurred in Mallory's apartment, on the same day that she left town.
O'Connell's effortless omnicient point of view slides you into the minds of at least a dozen characters, major and minor. Getting to know the pschology behind these characters adds to the overall suspense and confusion (in a good way).
I devoured the book in two days. With the Mallory series it helps to start at the beginning but that's not by any means necessary. Dive right in with this one.
Showing posts with label thriller. Show all posts
Showing posts with label thriller. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Saturday, November 15, 2008
CATEGORY FIVE by TJ MacGregor
I can't tell you how frustrating it has been to take SO long to read a book. This speaks only to my current health/stress and not at all to the quality of Category Five.
This book was published in 2005, before Hurricane Katrina, and it is so prescient that at times it made this Katrina survivor's knees get weak. I am also a closet conspiracy theorist, or at least a woman who is more than willing to give her ear to conspiracy theorists, and this book fed my concerns about FEMA, about our country's natural disaster response, and about our level of preparedness for disasters both man-made and natural.
I picked up this book for a number of reasons. I met MacGregor in 2002 and thought she was the bees' knees. I found it at a used book store for a couple of bucks. And when I read the back cover, I realized that it addressed a Cat5 hurricane in a marginally pre-Katrina world.
I didn't realize when I bought it that it was the 4th book in a series featuring Mira Morales, a psychic on Tango Key in Florida. But, though I normally hate picking up book so late in a series, MacGregor did enough to fill me in that I felt very comfortable with all of the characers and all of the situations. In fact, MacGregor has a book called Black Water that I feel like I could skip seeing that the central conflictof that book comes up repeatedly in this one.
All of the characters in this book are so well-drawn, from the series staples of Mira and Shepard and Annie and Nadine, to the newcomers of Tia and Crystal and Franklin. I feel safe hearing the story through the minds of any of these characters and MacGregor does an excellent job balancing the narration between these folks.
More than anything else, this book made me want to spend some time really looking into what happened during Hurricane Andrew in S. Florida. And I appreciate this call to arms. Katrina, I think, has been analyzed to death, but was Andrew so scrutinized?
This book was published in 2005, before Hurricane Katrina, and it is so prescient that at times it made this Katrina survivor's knees get weak. I am also a closet conspiracy theorist, or at least a woman who is more than willing to give her ear to conspiracy theorists, and this book fed my concerns about FEMA, about our country's natural disaster response, and about our level of preparedness for disasters both man-made and natural.
I picked up this book for a number of reasons. I met MacGregor in 2002 and thought she was the bees' knees. I found it at a used book store for a couple of bucks. And when I read the back cover, I realized that it addressed a Cat5 hurricane in a marginally pre-Katrina world.
I didn't realize when I bought it that it was the 4th book in a series featuring Mira Morales, a psychic on Tango Key in Florida. But, though I normally hate picking up book so late in a series, MacGregor did enough to fill me in that I felt very comfortable with all of the characers and all of the situations. In fact, MacGregor has a book called Black Water that I feel like I could skip seeing that the central conflictof that book comes up repeatedly in this one.
All of the characters in this book are so well-drawn, from the series staples of Mira and Shepard and Annie and Nadine, to the newcomers of Tia and Crystal and Franklin. I feel safe hearing the story through the minds of any of these characters and MacGregor does an excellent job balancing the narration between these folks.
More than anything else, this book made me want to spend some time really looking into what happened during Hurricane Andrew in S. Florida. And I appreciate this call to arms. Katrina, I think, has been analyzed to death, but was Andrew so scrutinized?
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
GREAT WHITE by Peter Benchley
Not really about a shark...
But about my hometown in Connecticut under a different name.
But about my hometown in Connecticut under a different name.
DEEP SIX by Randy Striker (Randy Wayne White)
Re-published early thriller/mystery from South Florida's Randy Wayne White writing under the pseudonym Striker.
Thursday, July 24, 2008
MAXIMUM RIDE (series) by James Patterson (first three books of series)
When I got sick, I figured the best way that my kids could help me out was by lending me books. The only rule was that they had to include an index card inside the book to tell me why they thought I would enjoy the book.
Knowing that I enjoy the occasional fantasy/sci-fi, a student lent me THE ANGEL EXPERIMENT, SCHOOL'S OUT FOREVER, and SAVING THE WORLD AND OTHER EXTREME SPORTS, Young Adult novels by popular best-selling author James Patterson. There is one other book out in the series, another book to come, and a movie in the works. Also, there's a huge web presence for this series and its heroine, the 14 year old Maximum Ride, anchored by the epic and frequently updated blog belonging to Max's friend Fang and the rest of her "flock."
Honestly, YA books are always a tough sell for me, even when they're written by experienced authors and authors of books that I love. Both Michael Chabon (SUMMERLAND) and Carl Hiaasen (FLUSH and HOOT) have let me down even though they rank up there in my top ten living writers.
The Maximum Ride books are similarly thin. I say similarly because, in general, all of these writers share the same fatal flaw and that's that one has to wonder how much time they spend with actual young adults.
I devoured the three books in less than two days. They were zippy reads and the plot (baddies in the science world have created and abused a series of mutant human beings) was compelling albeit deeply lacking in originality: mutant hybrid children with special abilities often derived from animals living in a School with some adults wanting to "use" them for good and others wanting to "use" them for evil. Has Patterson never seen/read/been exposed to X-MEN and TEEN TITANS?? More importantly, does his editor not have truck with this enormous comic and film phenom?
Can James Patterson write anything (and poorly at that) and get it sold? Yes. Yes he can. And he can because every single one of these books hit #1 on the Times Best Seller List.
I just can't believe that teens aren't insulted by these books, or at the very least by the protagonist Max Ride. Other characters fare better; her friend/possible love interest Fang, for example, is more nuanced and charming. Even the talking dog is infinitely more lovable than Max. Max makes me wonder if Patterson likes teen girls or merely finds them snarky and sarcastic. Max acts far older than her 14 years and she can't let three lines pass without throwing in a bitchy zinger.
It's pretty telling that Patterson appears to only have a single child, a son named Jack. Max represents the worst of teenaged girls blown out to stereotype. She's selfish; albeit the "mother" to her "flock"-- Max mothers her flock because it feeds Max's own need to be needed. She's short-sighted. She's incredibly easily irritated and moody. She's finicky and her allegiences change with the breeze. I'm not a mom of a teen girl, but I taught teen girls exclusively for 5 years and taught teen girls and boys for three additional years-- and heck, I WAS a teen girl for seven years-- and I'm terribly put off by Max (and to a certain extent the other female characters Nudge and Angel).
I was also pretty shocked by the extreme level of violence in these books. There's a great deal of blood and smashed bones and wanton murder.
But yes, I read all three books. The student who loaned me the book is an excellent kid. I just hope she saw through Max's thin persona as the creation of a man who needs a few more (young) women in his life.
Knowing that I enjoy the occasional fantasy/sci-fi, a student lent me THE ANGEL EXPERIMENT, SCHOOL'S OUT FOREVER, and SAVING THE WORLD AND OTHER EXTREME SPORTS, Young Adult novels by popular best-selling author James Patterson. There is one other book out in the series, another book to come, and a movie in the works. Also, there's a huge web presence for this series and its heroine, the 14 year old Maximum Ride, anchored by the epic and frequently updated blog belonging to Max's friend Fang and the rest of her "flock."
Honestly, YA books are always a tough sell for me, even when they're written by experienced authors and authors of books that I love. Both Michael Chabon (SUMMERLAND) and Carl Hiaasen (FLUSH and HOOT) have let me down even though they rank up there in my top ten living writers.
The Maximum Ride books are similarly thin. I say similarly because, in general, all of these writers share the same fatal flaw and that's that one has to wonder how much time they spend with actual young adults.
I devoured the three books in less than two days. They were zippy reads and the plot (baddies in the science world have created and abused a series of mutant human beings) was compelling albeit deeply lacking in originality: mutant hybrid children with special abilities often derived from animals living in a School with some adults wanting to "use" them for good and others wanting to "use" them for evil. Has Patterson never seen/read/been exposed to X-MEN and TEEN TITANS?? More importantly, does his editor not have truck with this enormous comic and film phenom?
Can James Patterson write anything (and poorly at that) and get it sold? Yes. Yes he can. And he can because every single one of these books hit #1 on the Times Best Seller List.
I just can't believe that teens aren't insulted by these books, or at the very least by the protagonist Max Ride. Other characters fare better; her friend/possible love interest Fang, for example, is more nuanced and charming. Even the talking dog is infinitely more lovable than Max. Max makes me wonder if Patterson likes teen girls or merely finds them snarky and sarcastic. Max acts far older than her 14 years and she can't let three lines pass without throwing in a bitchy zinger.
It's pretty telling that Patterson appears to only have a single child, a son named Jack. Max represents the worst of teenaged girls blown out to stereotype. She's selfish; albeit the "mother" to her "flock"-- Max mothers her flock because it feeds Max's own need to be needed. She's short-sighted. She's incredibly easily irritated and moody. She's finicky and her allegiences change with the breeze. I'm not a mom of a teen girl, but I taught teen girls exclusively for 5 years and taught teen girls and boys for three additional years-- and heck, I WAS a teen girl for seven years-- and I'm terribly put off by Max (and to a certain extent the other female characters Nudge and Angel).
I was also pretty shocked by the extreme level of violence in these books. There's a great deal of blood and smashed bones and wanton murder.
But yes, I read all three books. The student who loaned me the book is an excellent kid. I just hope she saw through Max's thin persona as the creation of a man who needs a few more (young) women in his life.
Sunday, July 13, 2008
BIG MONEY by Jack Getze
My grandfather, bless his dear departed heart, came to fiction late in life. He was kind of a thinky
person's Archie Bunker-- Old school New England and Irish-- and although he married an English major, fiction struck him as a frivolous waste of time until he was hospitalized for an extended period for heart problems and he realized that nothing was as frivolous a waste of time as daytime TV.
G-pa was a tough nut to crack, and it wasn't until, as a pre-teen, I placed in the top ten of the Boston Globe's stock picking challenge for kids that we ever had anything to talk about. For years after, each time I'd visit (before I moved across the street from him), he'd take me out for a banana split and we'd talk stocks until the shared split was gone.
(While I picked those stocks like I now pick football teams-- Dolphins are preeetty-- this one sucess led to a good decade and a half of wandering around miles away from my path. G-pa shipped me off to Business Summer Camp. When I applied to college, five of my eight schools were business schools. Even though I switched my major from Econ to English within a year, I still went almost straight to the business world after college.)
(Sorry kids, Mama's been laid up for a whle. The mind is the first to go. I ramble.)
Point being, when G-pa did "find" fiction, the man hit a formula he liked, began to devour nearly a book a day, and did so til he died.
"Sex and violence, Miss," he'd tell me. "I won't read it unless it's got a heavy helping of sex and violence."
If only my grandfather had lived long enough to meet Austin Carr. The old coot's big blue eyes would have teared up from joy. Sex and violence AND finance? It would have been almost too good to be true. AND Getze's books would have given G-Pa and me one more thing to talk about. Because Getze is a good writer-- a seriously good writer-- and with BIG MONEY one gets the sense that, despite having been a writer for most of his life, he's really just getting cooking.
BIG MONEY is the opposite of a sophomore slump. I dug BIG NUMBERS and gave it a very positive review last June, but Getze's second book features a far more nuanced and and charming Carr and an attention to detail in the prose that kicks the book into a deeper level of richly enjoyable zippy reading. Every metaphor and similie clicks neatly into place. The English teacher in me wanted to write "Great Verbs!" in the margins of nearly every page.
Sure, as a woman, I get a bit tired of the fact that Austin is always thinking with his little Carr, but how do you not love a man who, when all the cards are stacked against him and he's forced to stare into the dark abyss of life, he cries out like Streetcar's Stanley to the symbol of all that is right and good with the world, the holiest of holies-- Shania Twain?
Fun Fact: True Getze fans will recognize yet another alter-ego of the author making a cameo about midway through the book.
As with BIG NUMBERS, Getze will surely be cheated out of readers due to production value of the book. Both Carr and Getze deserve much better. An Amazon reviewer compared Getze to Evanovich, and as I just finished ONE FOR THE MONEY right before I picked up Getze (as with Block, I'm late to the Evanovich game too), I find the comparison apt indeed.
BIG MONEY, no whammies indeed.
person's Archie Bunker-- Old school New England and Irish-- and although he married an English major, fiction struck him as a frivolous waste of time until he was hospitalized for an extended period for heart problems and he realized that nothing was as frivolous a waste of time as daytime TV.G-pa was a tough nut to crack, and it wasn't until, as a pre-teen, I placed in the top ten of the Boston Globe's stock picking challenge for kids that we ever had anything to talk about. For years after, each time I'd visit (before I moved across the street from him), he'd take me out for a banana split and we'd talk stocks until the shared split was gone.
(While I picked those stocks like I now pick football teams-- Dolphins are preeetty-- this one sucess led to a good decade and a half of wandering around miles away from my path. G-pa shipped me off to Business Summer Camp. When I applied to college, five of my eight schools were business schools. Even though I switched my major from Econ to English within a year, I still went almost straight to the business world after college.)
(Sorry kids, Mama's been laid up for a whle. The mind is the first to go. I ramble.)
Point being, when G-pa did "find" fiction, the man hit a formula he liked, began to devour nearly a book a day, and did so til he died.
"Sex and violence, Miss," he'd tell me. "I won't read it unless it's got a heavy helping of sex and violence."
If only my grandfather had lived long enough to meet Austin Carr. The old coot's big blue eyes would have teared up from joy. Sex and violence AND finance? It would have been almost too good to be true. AND Getze's books would have given G-Pa and me one more thing to talk about. Because Getze is a good writer-- a seriously good writer-- and with BIG MONEY one gets the sense that, despite having been a writer for most of his life, he's really just getting cooking.
BIG MONEY is the opposite of a sophomore slump. I dug BIG NUMBERS and gave it a very positive review last June, but Getze's second book features a far more nuanced and and charming Carr and an attention to detail in the prose that kicks the book into a deeper level of richly enjoyable zippy reading. Every metaphor and similie clicks neatly into place. The English teacher in me wanted to write "Great Verbs!" in the margins of nearly every page.
Sure, as a woman, I get a bit tired of the fact that Austin is always thinking with his little Carr, but how do you not love a man who, when all the cards are stacked against him and he's forced to stare into the dark abyss of life, he cries out like Streetcar's Stanley to the symbol of all that is right and good with the world, the holiest of holies-- Shania Twain?
Fun Fact: True Getze fans will recognize yet another alter-ego of the author making a cameo about midway through the book.
As with BIG NUMBERS, Getze will surely be cheated out of readers due to production value of the book. Both Carr and Getze deserve much better. An Amazon reviewer compared Getze to Evanovich, and as I just finished ONE FOR THE MONEY right before I picked up Getze (as with Block, I'm late to the Evanovich game too), I find the comparison apt indeed.
BIG MONEY, no whammies indeed.
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
HIT LIST by Lawrence Block
I know. As a fairly avid consumer of genre fiction, I'm seriously behind the eight-ball with just now "discovering" Lawrence Block. But it wasn't until I read The Best Mystery Stories of 2007 that I first came across Block and his sympathetic hit man, John Keller. Yesterday (yes, just yesterday) I hunted down Hit List at a used book store and devoured it in around 24 hours.
The first hit in the book takes place right here in Louisville, and I appreciated Block's careful rendering of my fair city. I don't know if there was ever a stamp collector's store in the Mid-City Mall, but I think I pegged the MCM from the description of the mall on Bardstown Road.
Keller is charming and thoughtful and Block does an amazing job of making him heroic despite his profession and the vaguely callous way he carries it out. My favorite character, though, is his agent, Dot and despite the lack of plot motion during their endless Seinfeldian "conversations about nothing," they're some of my favorite parts of the book.
Both thriller and mystery, Hit List has almost a picaresque feel to it. Each "hit" is a story unto itself as well as a building block to the larger mystery.
The first hit in the book takes place right here in Louisville, and I appreciated Block's careful rendering of my fair city. I don't know if there was ever a stamp collector's store in the Mid-City Mall, but I think I pegged the MCM from the description of the mall on Bardstown Road.
Keller is charming and thoughtful and Block does an amazing job of making him heroic despite his profession and the vaguely callous way he carries it out. My favorite character, though, is his agent, Dot and despite the lack of plot motion during their endless Seinfeldian "conversations about nothing," they're some of my favorite parts of the book.
Both thriller and mystery, Hit List has almost a picaresque feel to it. Each "hit" is a story unto itself as well as a building block to the larger mystery.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane
The "what the hell happened?" ending of Shutter Island is as thuddingly fantastic as the "what the heck was that?" ending of Bad Monkeys was terrible. This thrilling, terrifying book kept me on edge and confused (in a good way) from beginning to end.
Lehane, author of Mystic River and Gone Baby Gone, opens the book with a mystery and then plunges us back in time nearly forty years and begins again with a second mystery. Around eighty pages into this book, I was so hooked that I told Roommate: "This ought to be a series-- Teddy Daniels and Chuck Aule are so well-drawn." He just gave me a look and said, "Wait."
Wait, indeed.
Primarily set on a island in Boston Harbor, home of Ashecliffe Hospital for the Criminally Insane, Shutter Island takes place during a 1954 hurricane. Maybe. New partners, Daniels and Aule, US Marshalls, are called in to help find an escaped female inmate who has been hospitalized after murdering her four children. Maybe. Once on the island, trapped by the incoming storm, they're confronted by resistant faculty, the possibility of unethical practices, and a deeper, more personal mystery for Daniels. Sort of.
This cinematic novel is, appropriately enough, is in pre-production for a movie release in 2009. Directed by Martin Scorsese, the movie will reportedly star Leo DiCaprio as Teddy Daniels (Leo seems too young for the part, to me) and Mark Ruffalo as Chuck Aule. Michelle Williams, the mother of the late Heath Ledger's child Mathilda, is slated to star as Teddy's wife. Ben Kingsley and Patricia Clarkson have also been cast. (The movie name has reportedly just been changed to Ashecliffe).
I haven't read any of Lehane's other novels, but they're heading for my bullpen right now. This past weekend, I was lucky enough to attend Lehane's keynote reading for Eckerd College's "Writers in Paradise" Workshop in St. Petersberg, Florida. He read a chapter from his upcoming historical fiction A Given Day about the 1919 Boston Police strike. Absolutely gripping stuff and he's a gifted, engaging reader. (And, I'm not too proud to say, easy on the ol' peepers.) This may be a book I buy in hardcover.
Shutter Island wins the prize for the best book I've read in the past few months. I've read a bunch of clunkers, I'm afraid. Yes, The Road may be the "best" book that I've read lately, but it left me feeling so thoroughly roughed-up that I can't classify it as a "good read." Important, yes. Good, not so much.
Lehane, author of Mystic River and Gone Baby Gone, opens the book with a mystery and then plunges us back in time nearly forty years and begins again with a second mystery. Around eighty pages into this book, I was so hooked that I told Roommate: "This ought to be a series-- Teddy Daniels and Chuck Aule are so well-drawn." He just gave me a look and said, "Wait."
Wait, indeed.
Primarily set on a island in Boston Harbor, home of Ashecliffe Hospital for the Criminally Insane, Shutter Island takes place during a 1954 hurricane. Maybe. New partners, Daniels and Aule, US Marshalls, are called in to help find an escaped female inmate who has been hospitalized after murdering her four children. Maybe. Once on the island, trapped by the incoming storm, they're confronted by resistant faculty, the possibility of unethical practices, and a deeper, more personal mystery for Daniels. Sort of.
This cinematic novel is, appropriately enough, is in pre-production for a movie release in 2009. Directed by Martin Scorsese, the movie will reportedly star Leo DiCaprio as Teddy Daniels (Leo seems too young for the part, to me) and Mark Ruffalo as Chuck Aule. Michelle Williams, the mother of the late Heath Ledger's child Mathilda, is slated to star as Teddy's wife. Ben Kingsley and Patricia Clarkson have also been cast. (The movie name has reportedly just been changed to Ashecliffe).
I haven't read any of Lehane's other novels, but they're heading for my bullpen right now. This past weekend, I was lucky enough to attend Lehane's keynote reading for Eckerd College's "Writers in Paradise" Workshop in St. Petersberg, Florida. He read a chapter from his upcoming historical fiction A Given Day about the 1919 Boston Police strike. Absolutely gripping stuff and he's a gifted, engaging reader. (And, I'm not too proud to say, easy on the ol' peepers.) This may be a book I buy in hardcover.
Shutter Island wins the prize for the best book I've read in the past few months. I've read a bunch of clunkers, I'm afraid. Yes, The Road may be the "best" book that I've read lately, but it left me feeling so thoroughly roughed-up that I can't classify it as a "good read." Important, yes. Good, not so much.
Bad Monkeys by Matt Ruff
Jonathan Ames of the New York Times Book Review called this: "something of a science fiction Catcher in the Rye" and maybe my problems with the genius author Matt Ruff's latest book starts there. (Maybe henceforth I should avoid all books that are compared to Salinger's classic, as I'm about to review and likewise grumble about Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld which was similarly lauded).
Ruff's Fool on the Hill may be my favorite book of all time. Let me qualify that: there are books that I adore that are "better" books, classics or more likely to become classics. But no book speaks to my sensibilities as a reader more than Ruff's debut novel, Fool. It's magical. It's hilarious. And it's superbly written. Oozes charm. It's like a better-written (sorry mega-fans) Douglas Adams' book only rooted in fantasy rather than sci-fi. In my opinion, though, Ruff's subsequent three books have been increasingly disappointing, and Bad Monkeys, although well-reviewed and prize-winning (2008 PBNA and 2008 Alex winner), felt a little insulting.
This sci-fi thriller mystery is told during a series of therapy sessions while Jane Charlotte is locked up in the Las Vegas County Jail. It traces her journey from her troubled youth to her recruitment and subsequent (maybe) betrayal by the "Bad Monkeys," a code name for a department of a top-secret organization bent on leveling out the playing field between good and evil. Is Jane sane? Is she a mercenary who murders with a gun whose "ammunition" is meant to mimic death by natural causes? Is she absolutely out of her gourd? How could a lunatic craft such a detailed and elaborate life fiction? Why does so little of her story check out? All these questions are presented to Dr Vale, her psychotherapist. But are the answered satisfactorily by the end?
The end. Hmph. The most common complaint on the book's Amazon reviews site (I'm a curmudgeon clearly, the book is averaging 4-stars) is the end. And I admit, while I was disappointed in the whole book, it was the end that made me nuts. I could handle the Shutter Island/Life of Pi level "what's really going on here" type questions. In fact, I love books that leave you wondering. But Monkeys dumps you in the middle of that quandary right away and instead of leaving us wondering, it wrapped things up in, what was in my mind, a ludicrous and unpredictable (in a bad way) way.
It's easier to be disappointed by a writer that you love than a writer you're ambivalent about. One of the things that really burned my buns is that the book is chock-full of the Ruff-ness that I love; the ludicrously clever ideas, the real-as-life dialogue, the Big Thoughts tossed around so casually. But the plot, for me, just didn't hold up.
Read Fool on the Hill instead. I do, about once every two or three years.
Ruff's Fool on the Hill may be my favorite book of all time. Let me qualify that: there are books that I adore that are "better" books, classics or more likely to become classics. But no book speaks to my sensibilities as a reader more than Ruff's debut novel, Fool. It's magical. It's hilarious. And it's superbly written. Oozes charm. It's like a better-written (sorry mega-fans) Douglas Adams' book only rooted in fantasy rather than sci-fi. In my opinion, though, Ruff's subsequent three books have been increasingly disappointing, and Bad Monkeys, although well-reviewed and prize-winning (2008 PBNA and 2008 Alex winner), felt a little insulting.
This sci-fi thriller mystery is told during a series of therapy sessions while Jane Charlotte is locked up in the Las Vegas County Jail. It traces her journey from her troubled youth to her recruitment and subsequent (maybe) betrayal by the "Bad Monkeys," a code name for a department of a top-secret organization bent on leveling out the playing field between good and evil. Is Jane sane? Is she a mercenary who murders with a gun whose "ammunition" is meant to mimic death by natural causes? Is she absolutely out of her gourd? How could a lunatic craft such a detailed and elaborate life fiction? Why does so little of her story check out? All these questions are presented to Dr Vale, her psychotherapist. But are the answered satisfactorily by the end?
The end. Hmph. The most common complaint on the book's Amazon reviews site (I'm a curmudgeon clearly, the book is averaging 4-stars) is the end. And I admit, while I was disappointed in the whole book, it was the end that made me nuts. I could handle the Shutter Island/Life of Pi level "what's really going on here" type questions. In fact, I love books that leave you wondering. But Monkeys dumps you in the middle of that quandary right away and instead of leaving us wondering, it wrapped things up in, what was in my mind, a ludicrous and unpredictable (in a bad way) way.
It's easier to be disappointed by a writer that you love than a writer you're ambivalent about. One of the things that really burned my buns is that the book is chock-full of the Ruff-ness that I love; the ludicrously clever ideas, the real-as-life dialogue, the Big Thoughts tossed around so casually. But the plot, for me, just didn't hold up.
Read Fool on the Hill instead. I do, about once every two or three years.
Thursday, July 26, 2007
The Yiddish Policemen’s Union by Michael Chabon
Chabon writes as though he is crafting poetry, not prose. That’s not to say that his work is poetic, per se, but that the art of his work is in the fact that it reads as though every word he sets to the page is a deliberate and much-deliberated choice. Thick with metaphor and simile, his writing makes the reader feel as though they’re in the hands of a author who lets nothing happen by chance, who makes no mistakes, without feeling intimidated.
You don’t have to “work” to read Chabon’s writing. It is not slow. It is not confusing. It is, simply, gorgeous.
And The Yiddish Policemen’s Union is as gorgeous as anything Chabon has written. The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay ranks in my top five favorite books ever, and this book is only slightly less astonishingly good. I struggle to put my finger on the difference between the two. Perhaps it is that K&C had an epic quality, or perhaps I just connected more deeply with the material because I enjoy comic books and NYC history.
I mean that not to diminish The Yiddish Policemen’s Union in the slightest. Nor to suggest that this book lacks an epic quality. But here the epic revolves around politics and culture, and not an individual.
Remarkable on every level, this book, like K&C showcases the depth of Chabon’s knowledge of Jewish history, knowledge that he uses to build the foundation of an alternate history, one in which Sitka, Alaska—not Israel— becomes the temporary homeland of displaced Jews post WWII. Sitka is not meant to be a permanent home, and now, in 2007, the territory is set to revert back to an American holding—“Alaska for Alaskans” is a political rally cry of the day. The looming reversion will mean another exodus for the “Frozen Chosen,” who have few, if any, viable options.
“It’s a strange time to be a Jew.” The refrain appears again and again, spoken by character after character.
At the center of the story is Meyer Landsman, divorced, alcoholic, rogue cop who lives in a flop house straight out of a noir novel. A murder has occurred in his run-down hotel home, and just when you think that the book will be a noir mystery that happens to be set in troubling times, the plot spins wide and reaching and suddenly the thriller embraces international politics, terrorism, mysticism, the second (or third) coming of the Messiah, and even the End Times.
Like any noir detective, Landsman is sympathetic in his flaws. But more than most iconic gumshoes, he’s loveable. His greatest sorrows haunt him and move him to tears on a regular basis. He’s an asshole who takes advantage of his kinder, more centered friends, but does not do so without regret. The tiny thread of a love story in the novel is among the most believable and moving that I’ve encountered of late.
My only complaint, and it’s not a complaint so much as a regret, is that Yiddish, the language of the Sitkans, plays such a central role. If I understood even rudiments of Yiddish, I might have found the book even funnier and even more tender.
As I read the last chapter, I snuck a peek at how many pages were left and saw that there were but three. I stopped reading and cursed Chabon for creating such a dense and complicated book—there was no way he could finish it in a satisfying way in three pages.
I was wrong. I am satisfied. Satisfied in that any true, tie up all loose ends, ending would create an impossible Die Hard-ish fairy tale of a thriller. His (again satisfying) ending is messy and frustrating. But the situation is messy and frustrating. Any neat ending would have felt fraudulent.
You don’t have to “work” to read Chabon’s writing. It is not slow. It is not confusing. It is, simply, gorgeous.
And The Yiddish Policemen’s Union is as gorgeous as anything Chabon has written. The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay ranks in my top five favorite books ever, and this book is only slightly less astonishingly good. I struggle to put my finger on the difference between the two. Perhaps it is that K&C had an epic quality, or perhaps I just connected more deeply with the material because I enjoy comic books and NYC history.
I mean that not to diminish The Yiddish Policemen’s Union in the slightest. Nor to suggest that this book lacks an epic quality. But here the epic revolves around politics and culture, and not an individual.
Remarkable on every level, this book, like K&C showcases the depth of Chabon’s knowledge of Jewish history, knowledge that he uses to build the foundation of an alternate history, one in which Sitka, Alaska—not Israel— becomes the temporary homeland of displaced Jews post WWII. Sitka is not meant to be a permanent home, and now, in 2007, the territory is set to revert back to an American holding—“Alaska for Alaskans” is a political rally cry of the day. The looming reversion will mean another exodus for the “Frozen Chosen,” who have few, if any, viable options.
“It’s a strange time to be a Jew.” The refrain appears again and again, spoken by character after character.
At the center of the story is Meyer Landsman, divorced, alcoholic, rogue cop who lives in a flop house straight out of a noir novel. A murder has occurred in his run-down hotel home, and just when you think that the book will be a noir mystery that happens to be set in troubling times, the plot spins wide and reaching and suddenly the thriller embraces international politics, terrorism, mysticism, the second (or third) coming of the Messiah, and even the End Times.
Like any noir detective, Landsman is sympathetic in his flaws. But more than most iconic gumshoes, he’s loveable. His greatest sorrows haunt him and move him to tears on a regular basis. He’s an asshole who takes advantage of his kinder, more centered friends, but does not do so without regret. The tiny thread of a love story in the novel is among the most believable and moving that I’ve encountered of late.
My only complaint, and it’s not a complaint so much as a regret, is that Yiddish, the language of the Sitkans, plays such a central role. If I understood even rudiments of Yiddish, I might have found the book even funnier and even more tender.
As I read the last chapter, I snuck a peek at how many pages were left and saw that there were but three. I stopped reading and cursed Chabon for creating such a dense and complicated book—there was no way he could finish it in a satisfying way in three pages.
I was wrong. I am satisfied. Satisfied in that any true, tie up all loose ends, ending would create an impossible Die Hard-ish fairy tale of a thriller. His (again satisfying) ending is messy and frustrating. But the situation is messy and frustrating. Any neat ending would have felt fraudulent.
Sunday, June 3, 2007
Big Numbers by Jack Getze
Full disclosure: I’ve known Jack Getze for around five years. He’s a dear friend for whose writing career I’ve been a big cheerleader. I can’t even pretend to be unbiased about this book. Heck, I’m even mentioned in the acknowledgements. “Lou Reads” isn’t meant to be a forum to promote my friends’ books, but I just got back from dropping in at Writers Retreat Workshop, where I caught up with a bunch of folks, many of whom have published books since I last saw them. So I’ll most likely be tackling some Friends-of-Lou’s books in the coming weeks.
I’m still a little unclear as to what a “full-boat grin” is. I just Googled it and came up with a blog entry about Big Numbers. Indiana Jones has his whip and Luke Skywalker has his light saber, but for Austin Carr, the hero (or antihero) of Jack Getze’s first book, Big Numbers, the “full-boat Carr grin” is his weapon of choice.
(Is it full-boat, as in a fishing charter captain’s grin when he’s happy to have a full boat? Or full-boat, as in the grin’s so big it looks like a boat? Full boat almost sounds like a poker term.)
Big Numbers opens with Carr in trouble. Big trouble. On a boat duct-taped to a fishing pole with a 600 lb giant tuna at the other end of the line kind of trouble. Mr. Blabbermouth apparently wants to kill Carr with a bit of panache. Just as Carr’s about to go sailing over the rail, we flash back to the events leading up to his big nap with the fishies. And no surprise—it’s hard-boiled thriller, after all—it’s a redhead.
Carr is a down-on-his luck Jersey Shore stockbroker who’s $58K behind on his child support payments. His wife has issued a restraining order until Carr can make the payments. In the meantime, he’s living out of a rusty camper in the parking lot of Luis’s Mexican restaurant—a convenient back yard for a man who likes his tequila shots doubled and in the morning—when he finds out that his “monster” client is terminally ill and has a red-headed knockout girlfriend who would rather not wait for her inheritance. Trouble ensues.
One can only hope that Carr has hellagood health insurance with Shore Securities. He makes no fewer than four trips to the hospital during the course of the book.
Big Numbers is funny and dark. Getze has a ton of fantastic zinger lines that make me so proud to know him. I have a soft spot for assholes, and Carr is a narrator who is both conflicted and decidedly wrong-headed (and downright shitty) at times. And while to some degree he’s almost a caricature (Getze cites Bugs Bunny and Vince Vaughn as inspirations), more often his serious and nearly-fatal flaws make him feel real.
It’s a quick read, a perfect beach book. I read the last half in a single sitting. And—I say this with no bias at all—Big Numbers was published by a relatively small press and the book is not getting the attention it deserves. It’s easily as good as most of the series mystery/thrillers that my family devours by the dozens. The book looks deceptively like the self-published crap you find in local bookstores. It’s a shame; what’s inside is first-rate stuff.
Visit Jack Getze's website.
I’m still a little unclear as to what a “full-boat grin” is. I just Googled it and came up with a blog entry about Big Numbers. Indiana Jones has his whip and Luke Skywalker has his light saber, but for Austin Carr, the hero (or antihero) of Jack Getze’s first book, Big Numbers, the “full-boat Carr grin” is his weapon of choice.
(Is it full-boat, as in a fishing charter captain’s grin when he’s happy to have a full boat? Or full-boat, as in the grin’s so big it looks like a boat? Full boat almost sounds like a poker term.)
Big Numbers opens with Carr in trouble. Big trouble. On a boat duct-taped to a fishing pole with a 600 lb giant tuna at the other end of the line kind of trouble. Mr. Blabbermouth apparently wants to kill Carr with a bit of panache. Just as Carr’s about to go sailing over the rail, we flash back to the events leading up to his big nap with the fishies. And no surprise—it’s hard-boiled thriller, after all—it’s a redhead.
Carr is a down-on-his luck Jersey Shore stockbroker who’s $58K behind on his child support payments. His wife has issued a restraining order until Carr can make the payments. In the meantime, he’s living out of a rusty camper in the parking lot of Luis’s Mexican restaurant—a convenient back yard for a man who likes his tequila shots doubled and in the morning—when he finds out that his “monster” client is terminally ill and has a red-headed knockout girlfriend who would rather not wait for her inheritance. Trouble ensues.
One can only hope that Carr has hellagood health insurance with Shore Securities. He makes no fewer than four trips to the hospital during the course of the book.
Big Numbers is funny and dark. Getze has a ton of fantastic zinger lines that make me so proud to know him. I have a soft spot for assholes, and Carr is a narrator who is both conflicted and decidedly wrong-headed (and downright shitty) at times. And while to some degree he’s almost a caricature (Getze cites Bugs Bunny and Vince Vaughn as inspirations), more often his serious and nearly-fatal flaws make him feel real.
It’s a quick read, a perfect beach book. I read the last half in a single sitting. And—I say this with no bias at all—Big Numbers was published by a relatively small press and the book is not getting the attention it deserves. It’s easily as good as most of the series mystery/thrillers that my family devours by the dozens. The book looks deceptively like the self-published crap you find in local bookstores. It’s a shame; what’s inside is first-rate stuff.
Visit Jack Getze's website.
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