Review: The Song is You

The Song is You by Megan Abbott

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



The third I've read, and probably best so far, of Megan Abbott's noir works, The Song is You is the story of Jean Spangler, a Hollywood starlet who vanishes without at trace after heading out to meet her exhusband/spend a night on the town (depending on who you ask). I didn't know until after I'd finished this that it's based on the true-life disappearance of Jean Spangler. This hypothetical "what if?" take on the starlet's vanishing act focuses mostly on Hollywood fixer Gil Hopkins as he tries to make sense of what happened to Spangler, and his role in her disappearance.

As has been pointed out before, Abbott knows her way around pulp. Her take on the Hollywood of yesteryear is grim and full of scandal. Pretty faces hide hollow hearts, and everyone in her Hollywood is either playing or being played. There's more sex, drugs, and violence here than you'll find in most films coming out of Hollywood today, but that puts it in good company with the books Abbott is paying homage to.

Hop's trip down memory lane, as he tries to remember the last night Jean was seen alive, takes him to plenty of dark places. It's his job, after all, to keep his clients spic and span, no matter how much dirt they roll around in, or how much blood they spill. And Hop is very, very good at his job.

The book fires on all cylinders when Hop is struggling with his conscience and trying to track down what really happened to Spangler. Half the time he can't tell if he wants to bring the truth to light or bury it so deep it can never be found. Is he covering his tracks, or exposing an injustice? That ambiguity creates a tremendous amount of tension, and make Hop one of Abbott's best creations to date. Hop's search for Spangler mimics his own search for his moral center (or, indeed, to figure out if he even still has one).

Like any good Hollywood noir, this one is full of deception; the plot twists and turns and every time Hop (or the reader) thinks he has it locked down, it slips away. If The Song is You has a flaw, it's that the plot eventually sinks a little under the weight of the twists and turns. By the end of the book, I couldn't decide if Hop was chasing the trail, or so sleep deprived and paranoid that he was creating false connections just to punish himself.

Luckily, the crisp writing and fast pace of the book more than make up for the overly layered plot. Like a lot of great noir, the devil isn't so much in the details as it is in the style and prose, both of which are top notch here.

A very solid entry; this is strong enough that it's got me wish I had more than one more of Abbott's noir novels left to read.




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Review: An Abundance of Katherines

An Abundance of Katherines by John Green

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



I recently found myself standing in a train station, facing the prospect of a very long train ride (eight hours, as it turned out) without having had the foresight to pack a book. Searching the book stand I spotted An Abundance of Katherines. I'd noticed the title before, at the library, and I'd heard good things, so I decided to give Green's novel about a boy a try.

Said boy, Colin, is a prodigy (former prodigy) who has just graduated high school (valedictorian) and been dumped by his girlfriend, Katherine XIX. You see, one of Colin's (many) quirks is that he only dates girls named Katherine. Nineteen times has our young protagonist been dumped by a girl named Katherine. His best (and only) friend, Hassan, comes up with the genius plan to take a road trip for the summer, which they hope with give Colin the time to get over his breakup and have fun just rambling around. They set out, and wackiness ensues.

So, three stars.

This probably really a two star book, saved only by the fact that I really did enjoy it. It's one of those cases where the whole is somehow greater than the sum of the parts.

This is, as other reviewers have certainly noted, a pretty formulaic book. Geeky White Guy with ennui hangs out with a Quirky Minority Friend who inexplicably puts up with GWG's crap. They have a journey (literally, in this case) of some kind, during which they meet The Girl, who is also very quirky/geeky in some way, but attractive, and who not only also inexplicably puts up with GWG's crap, but finds him magically attractive. She helps him find himself and realize that life is awesome, and they end up together. The End.

It's basically Garden State for the YA crowd.

The characters lack any real depth, and the basic plot is so formulaic, I'd guess that most readers know exactly what's going to happen with everyone almost from the moment they meet. Seriously, I almost couldn't bear to put a spoiler tag here, because this is such a "been there/done that" book.

That said... I kinda liked it. I'll admit it, it was funny! It's like going to a silly comedy after a long week. Sure, you know what's going to happen, and most of the jokes and gags are variations of things you've seen before, but that doesn't mean it isn't fun. Colin is annoying twerp of a character, and Hassan might actually be slightly offensive, but the absurdity of their situation, and the snappy "nobody is actually as clever as this all the time except in works of fiction" dialog worked for me (at least, while I was stuck on a train for eight hours).

I also liked that the narrative seemed to be deliberately structured to reinforce the lessons being given to Colin. The narrative structure is messy at first, with flashbacks being told arbitrarily as they occur to the character, but it eventually transitions, and the flashbacks are told in sequence like a coherent story within the story, once Colin learns how to tell stories.

The whole thing is pretty silly, of course. The individual components don't really feel like they belong together, especially, and few of them actually matter to the central plot. Does it matter that Colin only dated Katherines? Not even a little bit. Does it matter that he's great with anagrams or that he's a human encyclopedia or that he's terrible at making friends? Nope. You could pretty much change any of his quirks and it wouldn't really impact the story. You'd have the same story if he only dated redheads, or if he was a video game auteur.


So, there you have it, fellow readers. An Abundance of Katherines is basically the YA equivalent of a generic summer comedy. It's unremarkable, fundamentally silly, and not particularly well crafted, but you might enjoy it anyway, if the mood is right.





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Review: We Have Always Lived in the Castle

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



This book came up in discussion when a friend was asking whether to bother reading Haunting of Hill House (the answer: Do! It's considered a classic for good reason!). Having never read Jackson's tale of Merricat and Constance, I decided to read both, back to back, to compare. The short verdict: both are excellent works, well worthy of a pick up, but We Have Always Lived in the Castle creeps ahead of HoHH in my mind.

Jackson's story is memorable, to say the least. Six years ago, the Blackwood family was poisoned with arsenic at dinner. Everyone except the sisters, Merricat and Constance, ate the poison (later determined to have come from the sugar dish), and fell ill. Of those, only Uncle Julian survived. Now the sisters take care of their uncle, who is confined to a wheelchair and suffering some form of dementia, while they try to keep up their structured home life. Constance is agoraphobic, so Merricat does the twice weekly trip to town for shopping. Their lives are full of structures and routines that have taken on a ritualistic, almost magical, significance to Merricat. When an unexpected, uninvited guest arrives from the outside, it threatens to shatter the world the three Blackwoods have built for themselves.

Merricat is the true focus of this story, and not merely because she's the narrator. Her desires and actions drive the central plot. She's the most compelling of the characters, as well. Jackson gives Merricat a strong voice and personality. At 18, she still seems trapped, Peter Pan-like, in an eternal childhood. She is prone to flights of fancy and whimsy--she speaks often of wanting to carry Constance off to the moon to protect her, and of the many wonderful ways the moon is different from their home--and is obsessed with protecting their way of life, placing peculiar talismans around their property to ward of change (although she maintains it's to protect them from outsiders). Her childishness also comes out in her emotional outbursts; she breaks dishes when she is angry or annoyed, runs away to hide in the field when she can't have her way, and engages in an increasingly destructive ways to punish her visiting cousin (refusing to speak to him, pouring water on his bed, destroying the watch, filling his room with twigs and leaves, etc).

One of the most interesting elements of the book is the trick it plays on the reader. Jackson's book doesn't have the kind of shocking or twist ending that tries to trick you at the last moment. WHALitC is brilliant in that it basically starts tricking you from the first page. Jackson is teasing the reader with the drips and drabs of information about the poisoning. The villiagers tease and torment Merricat as she walks through town, singing nasty songs at her and whispering behind her back. Constance was accused and tried for the crime, but acquitted, but the town believes her guilty. Yet, to even the most casual reader, the real culprit is not hard to figure out. How many times can a character talk about wishing that others were dead, or daydreaming about their broken bodies before you start to think "Hey... maybe this is the person who killed those other people?"

Some of the most compelling and interesting aspects of the book aren't "who did it", but, rather, the realizations that start to come as the book progresses and it becomes clearer just how out of touch Merricat is with herself. Merricat describes herself walking through the town and the impression is of the proud, wealthy daughter of a family envied by the poorer members of the community, but by the end of the story, Jackson has gradually revealed details that dramatically alter this earlier assessment. Cousin Charles, for example, makes it clear that Merricat is perpetually filthy and unwashed. While this far from excuses the treatment of the family by the town, it certainly casts Merricat's interactions with them in a different light.

This is the sort of story that many readers will find themselves turning over in their heads for some time. While many readers appear to describe this, rather loosely, as horror, I felt more sad than anything. That's not to say that there aren't disturbing elements (there certainly are!), but their lives are not the stuff or horror, but tragedy. They're trapped by their own mental and emotional illnesses, and by the cruelty of the people living in the town nearby. The novels conclusion is one of the saddest I've read in recent memory.

Very powerful work, highly recommended.



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Review: The Haunting of Hill House

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House is a shining example of classic horror; four strangers gather together under the roof of the infamous Hill House to explore and seek out evidence of the supernatural, only to discover that the house's reputation for being unpleasant and hostile to visitors is well earned.

Jackson does a number of very interesting things here, not least of which is putting us in the mind of Eleanor "Nellie" Vance. Most of the novel is told from her perspective, as she gets to know her fellow companions and explores the house. Eleanor is a fascinating, if tragic, character. Her lack of worldly experiences (having spent most of her adult life caring for her sick mother) and her passive nature make her susceptible to fantasy and daydreaming, but her lack of self awareness and her conflicting desires to fit in but be the center of attention (while steadfastly maintaining that she desires nothing more than to be unnoticed) lead to many of the story's most interesting conflicts.

Eleanor quickly becomes the focus of most of the house's supernatural occurrences; her name is written on the walls several times, and she begins to identify with and feel overcome by the personality of the house. A particularly interesting section near the end of the book has her identifying so strongly with the house that she loses herself completely and begins to think of herself as an extension of the house. By the end of the book, Eleanor sees herself as part of the house, with each belonging to the other.

Because of the way that the story is presented--mostly from Eleanor's perspective--the reader is left to imagine not only some of the frightening occurrences (what, exactly, Theo sees when she and Eleanor are running and Theo looks behind, remains unsaid), but, also, the cause. Is the house haunted, as they suspect, or is Eleanor unconsciously responsible for the events that transpire (the book leaves open the possibility, unspoken, that Eleanor may be telekinetic, for example).

While the supernatural forces at play are well done, the book is perhaps most interesting for the interpersonal dynamics that are it explores. The four main characters begin the story on excellent terms and Eleanor immediately finds herself drawn to Theo. Eleanor has never had many/any friends, and Theo's vivaciousness and energy are particularly appealing to Eleanor. As the novel progresses, and the dynamics of the relationships are tested and explored, Eleanor's opinions and attitudes swing wildly, which I found tremendously fascinating. She goes from adoring Theo on the first day, to wishing she was dead by the midweek, to wanting to move in with her by the last night. Her feelings about the other guests are similarly unhinged and erratic.

The plot is fairly quickly paced (it's a fairly short work, frankly), and there aren't any moments that drag or feel too long. Jackson's prose is strong, and there are several stand-out moments, although the opening is certainly the most memorable:

No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it had stood so for eighty years and might stand for eighty more. Within, walls continued upright, bricks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone.

For fans of classic horror or people who like a good psychological study with their supernatural thrills, this is a must read.






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Review: Die a Little

Die a Little by Megan Abbott

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



Another neo-noir from Megan Abbott. This is her first novel, and I think it shows a little. Lora King--schoolteacher, spinster, faithful sister to on-the-rise DA Assistant, Bill--doesn't quite trust Bill's new wife, Alice. Lora thinks that Alice seems just a little too hard, too mysterious, and knows people who are just a little too far from the right side of the tracks. And yet... there's intrigue there, too. Alice knows people who Lora couldn't dream of. People who live fast, dangerous lives. There are times where Lora can't decide whether she wants in or wants Alice out.

This is a pretty mixed bag.
The Good: Lora's change is handled well. She starts off lily-white and pure as freshly fallen snow, but by the end of the book, she's mixing it up with gangsters, tracking down a murderer, selling people out, and straight up lying to the fuzz. From spinster to sex-pot in two acts. Abbott does a great job, there, making the changes subtle at first, and keeping Lora from even noticing them, herself.

On the other hand, there's the plot. For much of the book, I couldn't decide whether Lora was right, and her sister-in-law was a crook, or if she was a little delusional and making the whole thing up in her head, which was fantastic. There was tension, there. And when it looked like Lora was going to take things into her own hands, I thought "Oh. Ooooh. Is she going to kill her? She's totally going to kill her!" But instead of giving us a real payoff, Abbott gives us a mess of a third act where too much happens, but none of it is really all that interesting. The third act just sort of fizzles out.


Overall a solid effort, but a weak third act prevents this from really hitting as hard as it should.



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Review: Queenpin

Queenpin by Megan Abbott

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



Reading like a solid example of period pulp, Megan Abbott's Queenpin is a pleasant take on the genre staples. So you've got crime bosses covered in silk and stones, down on their luck hard boys, and femme fatales with bodies like lava and curves that don't quit. And, of course, there are double crosses and clever tricks, and fate is tempted more than once by people too stupid or too tangled up to care. Abbott's contribution here is to focus on the women of noir. Instead of following some punk as he makes a name for himself, the narrator is a young women, getting into the criminal underworld through a job cooking the books at a club. This brief glimpse at a world with very different rules spikes her interest, and, of course, she wants more. When she's taken under the wing of crime boss Gloria Denton, she gets a very different kind of education, and an introduction to the crime world that still doesn't satisfy that hunger for more.

Slick writing by Abbot, who has a firm grasp of noir conventions and knows her way around a clever phrase.



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Review: The City & the City

The City & the City by China Miéville

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



China Miéville's The City & the City is an interesting "high concept" take on the noir/pulp detective story. I picked it up seeing it on some other lists of strange but fantastic detective novels. This, as it turns out, is both.

The mystery itself is well crafted; there are twists and turns aplenty as what starts as a simple investigation into a dumped body starts to take on stronger political implications and the possibility of an international incident at work complicates the investigation. So far, pretty typical mystery fair, though. The real genius here is in Miéville's crafting of Beszel and Ul Qoma.

The easiest way I can think to describe the setting is if you took the concept of "there are two Americas" (e.g. "white America and black America" or "rich America and poor America" etc), and, instead of leaving it a metaphorical concept, made it literal. Two cities/countries that overlap in the same physical space. Some areas--entire neighborhoods even--are one or the other, but there are lots of spaces where the divisions are "crosshatch", and go from one to the other every few feet, or store front by store front.

How Miéville explores this conceptual stew is what elevates this from throw-away neo-noir. His extrapolations of what such a world would look like, how such a world would function, and how the people would see themselves (and unsee the others) is excellently done (if profoundly weird).



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Review: The Vanishing Game

The Vanishing Game by Kate Kae Myers

My rating: 2 of 5 stars



So, this book... I knew from the other reviews that this one was pretty controversial, especially as regards the ending. I didn't read any spoilers, though, so I wasn't sure what to expect. The basic premise is cool enough: Jocelyn and her brother, Jack, spent years living in a terrible foster home run by an abusive drug addict. Years later, after they've found themselves living in a stable, loving home, Jack dies in a car accident. Sad stuff. Then, a few weeks after his death, Jocelyn receives a letter that can only have come from Jack, which sends her on a clue hunting mission back to the foster home, now an abandoned, fire-damaged husk. Is Jack alive? If so, why is he hiding? What is he hiding? Jocelyn has to uncover and sort through the past to figure out the present.

For most of the book, this was pretty decent YA adventure stuff. There's danger and action and puzzles and teen romance and etc. Some of the prose is... well... not great. It's told from Jocelyn's POV, so I'm willing to excuse some of the clunkier prose as being "in character", I guess? Still, some of it is downright silly. At one point, Jocelyn's arm is injured, and has been bleeding off and on for several days. Noah makes her clean the wound and let him bandage it, which requires her to remove her sweater, since it's near her shoulder. Here, they're in a McDonalds bathroom, cleaning up:

To his credit he tried to be a gentleman and keep his eyes on my arm. I knew this wasn’t easy, since I was wearing a low-cut lavender sports bra. “Go ahead and look if you want,” I finally said.
“After all, the last time we were together I was flat as an ironing board.”
“Jocey …”
“What? It’s not every guy I let see me in my underwear.”
“I guess I’m just privileged then.”
He coated the wound with a heavy dose of antibacterial gel and covered it with gauze. “Hold this in place.” He tore off a piece of surgical tape.
After Noah finished bandaging my arm, I grabbed a blue shirt from my bag. As I pulled it on he said, “You do have a great body.”

And, cue making out. In the McDonalds bathroom.

The whole thing is awkward. Is a low-cut sports bra supposed to be sexy? Is "You do have a great body" not completely weird?

Anyway, clunky/awkward prose aside, I was actually really enjoying the mystery elements. The back stories of the characters were pretty interesting in a "Holy crap, they're all huge messes" kind of way. Is it cliché? Oh, definitely. "Mess up orphans suffer abuse" isn't exactly breaking new ground.

But the ending? Ugh.

Many people have remarked that the "twist" at the end bothered them or ruined the book. That should probably be twists. It's not just one, it's the combination of two. The big reveal about what is really going on with Jack I could deal with, but the big reveal about what Jocelyn can do? I'm just going to say it right now, giving Jocelyn psychic powers does not actually help the story. It's dumb. And other characters are just like "Oh, yeah, she's totally got TK. Cool, right? Yeah, we all knew about that." What? So stupid.

If it hadn't been for that, this would probably have been a 3.






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Review: Skyscraper

Skyscraper by Faith Baldwin

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



Baldwin's Skyscraper is a look back at a very different world. That major plot points hinge on whether or not she'll be allowed to keep her job once she's married, and whether or not her future husband will let her work seems ridiculous by modern standards, but was a very real concern when Baldwin was writing. For what is basically a period romance, this was better than I expected. Lynn is, perhaps, more than a little naïve, but her strong passion for her job and her loyalty to her friends is endearing. As long as you can get past or find humor in the outdated attitudes, this is pretty interesting.



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Review: Moth

Moth by James Sallis

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



Lew Griffin, retired and living the quiet life of an author/adjunct at the local college, is pulled back into the life he thought he'd left when a former flame passes away, and Lew learns that her daughter--who he never knew existed--might be in trouble.

As with the other Lew Griffin stories I've read, the real story here isn't the mystery or case he's working on, it's the personal lives of the people he's interacting with and, most importantly, with Lew himself. The whole story is told from his perspective, looking back on the events, and it's really about an old man musing on his life. The cases are frame, and they give him a reason to evaluate his own life. It's at turns both sad and uplifting to see Griffin struggling with himself, deconstructing his past, and trying (to mixed success) to change for the better or make peace with who he is.

Sallis' writing is, as usual, fantastic. His New Orleans is vivid and alive, even if it does seem to be overflowing, at times, with the kinds of violent folks I'd prefer to avoid. I can't testify to the accuracy of his version of New Orleans, but it doesn't lack personality.





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Review: Broken Monsters

Broken Monsters by Lauren Beukes

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



A horror/thriller set in Detroit, a bizarre murder, and the underground art/music scene features prominently? Sure, sign me up! Beukes starts Broken Monsters off with a bang: a cop finds the body of a young boy lying in the street. Not only has the poor kid been murdered, but he's been mutilated; his lower body removed and replaced with the legs of a fawn. Creepy! From there, the novel follows the multiple perspectives and the cast of characters spiral closer to each as they try to discover the truth (about the murder, about each other, about themselves).

Gabi, the lead detective, struggles with balancing her responsibilities as a parent with her responsibilities to the department. Her daughter, Layla, struggles with her feelings for a boy who doesn't care and with feeling like an outcast. TK, an elderly homeless man who helps out at the shelters, struggles with his place in the world and with making peace with himself for his past. Jonno, a former journalist, struggles with a midlife crisis, and his loneliness after the collapse of a relationship. Clay struggles with the possibility that he's losing his mind and the loss of control of his life as he feels like his dreams are taking over.

One of the strongest elements of Broken Monsters is the way that Beukes manages to create such believable characters. All of them are struggling and evolving, and all of them have their own distinct personalities. As the story unfolds and the events in the book start to take a toll on them, we see different sides of their personalities evolve and come out. As in real life, this can happen after a traumatic experience (Lay's discovery that Cas was sexually assaulted, and that the video is still being passed around the Internet), or can be a more gradual process (the way Jonno starts off a desperate sad-sack, following Jen around like a puppy, doing anything he can to impress her, but he ends up slowly losing interest in her as he finds himself drawn into the story of the Detroit Monster and eventually starts ordering her around, demanding more and more of her to keep going).

The... shift that happens in the story was unexpected but not unwelcome (although, depending on your interests, it could be). I was glad that I hadn't read spoilers about it beforehand, as it created a sort of slow burn "is it? isn't it?" as the novel progressed.

Overall, a strong, at times disturbing thriller, although, as I said to my friends, I'm officially calling a moratorium on middle aged people not knowing how to use computers or search the internet. Gabi is supposed to be something around 40ish, I think? She's got a teenage daughter, and she's feeling middle aged, but she's clearly not ancient. The book appears to be set in modern times. She's the lead detective, and clearly knows how to use the technology she needs to for work. Yet, the minute she gets home, she needs her daughter to show her how to do a Google search? Ugh. no. Annoying.

That aside, I'd definitely recommend this to my friends.



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Review: The Collector

The Collector by John Fowles

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



Fowles novel, told from the perspective of kidnapper and victim, is a mixed bag. On the one hand, he does an excellent job of painting the picture of someone mentally unstable who gradually, through a combination of inclination and circumstance, spirals out of control. On the other hand, it's clearly longer than it should be, and Miranda isn't nearly as relatable or interesting as I wish she was (although, to be fair, that could also be deliberate--she's not who F thinks she is).

In the beginning, F was mostly just an odd, socially awkward loner. His anxieties and hang-ups would have made him difficult to be around, and would be off-putting to most, but he seems to have been generally harmless, if unpleasant. Once he had money and independence, though, he suddenly found himself with the opportunity to act on impulses that he wasn't fully aware of before. You can see the self deception as the situation grows more out of control, and he misinterprets Miranda's behaviors, or deludes himself about his own intentions and actions. His attempts to convince himself that this will have a happy ending for the two of them are pathetic (deliberately so, one assumes).

Later, the reader has a chance to see things through Miranda's eyes, which is, at times, less interesting, but not fatally so. I think that there's a lot more going on there than some readers give credit for; yes, you're reading about the same events you've already seen, but, obviously, her perspective, as a captive, is radically different than his. The tricks she employs, her attempts to understand and undermine him, her struggle to maintain sanity and come up with an escape plan... I actually found it pretty intriguing. Less so, the frequent diversions into talking about GP--a sort of mentor whom she feels an intellectual (but not physical) attraction towards.

One of the most interesting aspects of the book is the sort of opposite trajectories of their emotional journey. At the start, all she feels is hatred and loathing for her captor, and all he feels is obsession (what he thinks of as love). As the story progresses, she starts to feel pity for him, and really does seem to, at times, want to find a way to help him with his problems, but he begins to resent her.

In particular, some of the later events of the captivity--the fancy dinner, and her attempt to seduce him, are really interesting told from two perspectives. As a turning point in the captivity, I thought it was excellently done--his assumption that this was merely a trick and that she was debasing herself, while she saw this as the ultimate attempt to reach out and connect with him, to force herself to give to him what she thought he wanted (human contact).

So, why only three stars?

To be frank, the book is longer than it should be. The whole "do I love GP or don't I?" bit is so boring. Maybe it's supposed to be to contrast the physical coercion that F employs with the emotional/mental coercion that GP seems to be employing? I don't know, but it didn't work for me. Even beyond that, the book still felt longer than it really needed. The whole thing felt bogged down by it, and where there should have been an incredible tension--will she escape? Won't she? What is he going to do?--it just sort of meanders along. Disappointing.

While this is probably not a particularly accurate portrait of a mentally unstable kidnapper, it has some really interesting moments, and it's an excellent example of unreliable narration being used pretty effectively (unless you really believe that F wouldn't have done anything like this under "normal" circumstances, and that the money really was to blame). Not quite in the same league as Pyscho, despite exploring similar space, but still worth considering.




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Review: The Long-Legged Fly

The Long-Legged Fly by James Sallis

My rating: 5 of 5 stars



I imagine the subtitle of this is "The Life and Times of Lew Griffin." The Long-Legged Fly is set up like a collection of short tales, capturing four glimpses of Griffin's life. We're introduced to him in 1964, when he's a young man with a grim reputation. He's a hard, tough man, well versed in the language of violence, and he's contacted to locate a missing author. In 1970, we find Griffin in his air-conditioned office, working for himself. He's set up well, and contacted to locate a missing girl of 16. By 1984, Griffin has fallen, and fallen hard. He wakes up in detox, and finds himself living in a halfway house, when one of the other residents asks him to help locate his missing sister. Six years later, in 1990, Griffin seems to be in a calmer place. He's given up PI work and passing his time writing, but a call from his ex-wife sends him back to tracking down his missing son.

The mysteries themselves are remarkable only in that they fail, utterly to be remarkable. They're all missing person cases (I leave it up to you to figure out what, if anything that means), but the cases, and Griffin's work on them, feel sparse at the best of times. The cases aren't the real draw, here, anyway. Like some of the later Chandler books, the real story is about the characters. This isn't a mystery, it's an examination of a man's life. There's richness and complexity to the portrait that develops; Griffin is at times profoundly troubled, and the sorrow that seems to follow him takes a toll on him through the years. At one point he wonders if our whole lives are spent with our best years behind us. It's a serious question in a life filled with sadness and regrets. And one with no easy answer.

That this seems to have flown under my radar for so long is tragic; Griffin easily deserves mention alongside the likes of Scudder and Marlowe. Highly recommend.





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Review: Driven

Driven by James Sallis

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



Driven doesn't quite live up to the high bar that Sallis' other works have set. The biggest problem here seems to be excess; a too-large cast of characters, too many references to events unseen, too many hints at future stories, too much everything crammed into a too small package.

First of all, there are just too many characters here for such a short book. With so many of them coming and going, it quickly became difficult to remember who they were or why they were there. Some of the characters are mentioned without actually appearing in the book, which adds to the confusion. I'm still not really sure who some of them were or what their relationship to Driver was. A few extra pages to flesh some of them out might not have been amiss.

Still, even if this felt a little mediocre by Sallis standards, it's still a damn sight better than a lot of other writers produce at their best; a three star rating probably speaks more to the overall quality of Sallis' body of work than it does to the flaws of this particular book.








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Review: Afterparty

Afterparty by Daryl Gregory

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



A strong recommendation from a friend led me to pick this up, and I'm quite glad I did. An interesting take on the near future, where designer drugs are all the rage, custom tailored to give user's a variety of experiences, Afterparty explores a lot of interesting ground.

At times, Gregory's writing reminded me pretty strongly of Scalzi, but that's not a bad thing. Interesting, memorable, and diverse characters, a strong plot that shifts and evolves as information is revealed, and a nuanced appreciation for complex issues made this a particularly enjoyable read.



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Review: Easy Death

Easy Death by Daniel Boyd

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



Easy Death treads familiar ground, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. There's a lot of life in Boyd's little pulp, and, at its best, it reads like a vintage Parker novel. Heck, at it's worst it's a far sight better than most other crime novels. There's the heist and possible double crosses and shady characters whose motivations are questionable, of course, but the characters that inhabit Easy Death have lives and motivations that never feel contrived or forced. There are backstories, both explicit and implied, that drive their actions and give them a depth not typically associated with pulps. I wouldn't have been half surprised to discover that Boyd had written other novels set in the same world, but, alas, that doesn't seem to have been the case (at least, not yet).

While Boyd is offering up the genre staples, he's having fun with some of them (e.g. no delicate molls or femme fatales here, just a horse-faced ranger built like linebacker). The chronological jumps work well to create tiny cliffhangers. These could have been annoying in less capable hands, but were used sparingly enough that it created the appropriate tension, without feeling like a crutch. The plot, which focuses primarily on an armored car heist, is complimented by several parallel subplots, and Boyd serves up some fun surprises by including the occasional feint to throw off the reader.





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Review: In the Blood

In the Blood by Lisa Unger

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



This ended up being a lot better than I thought it would be. By about halfway/two thirds of the way through, I was already pretty sure I knew the secrets and had figured out the mysteries. There are plenty of, well, not so subtle hints and clues about what/who/why, so I was engaging in a bit of eye rolling. Ultimately, this didn't blow my mind, but I was taken by surprise a few times, and it was a pretty engaging thriller, despite having a few flaws.



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Review: Defender of the Innocent: The Casebook of Martin Ehrengraf

Defender of the Innocent: The Casebook of Martin Ehrengraf by Lawrence Block

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



A handful of tales about a dapper but devious lawyer who has a simple motto, "My clients are always innocent." They're solid enough stories--someone is accused of a crime, our dashing Mr. Ehrengraf shows up, explains that he believes they're innocent (even when they don't), and agrees to help them... for a fee. The catch: he only collects if they walk free. And they always walk free.

Each of the stories is a fun diversion, although some are clearly much stronger than others (one particular standout involves the malicious pranks of a man stuck in his home by a medical condition, and how Ehrengraf deals with his situation).

It's a nice collection, but I think the stories are probably more effective in smaller doses.



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Review: Burning Chrome

Burning Chrome by William Gibson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



Burning Chrome collects ten of Gibson's short tales, exploring a variety of ideas and themes. There are some pretty amazing and far-out concepts being played with here, in typical Gibson style. Russian space stations manned by the first human on Mars risk falling from orbit in one story, while a disaffected teacher stumbles upon a shape shifting creature lurking in bars and nightclubs in another. Some of the stories--"Johnny Mnemonic", "New Rose Hotel", "Burning Chrome" for sure--take place in the Sprawl, while others are clearly set in alternate worlds.

Even the worst of these stories are still well worth checking out, and what the collection lacks in cohesiveness it more than makes up for with clever plots and intriguing ideas. "Hinterlands" (about humanity's first contact with proof of life outside our solar system) alone is worth the price of admission (disclosure: I got this from the library, so I guess the price of admission was pretty low).



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Review: Count Zero

Count Zero by William Gibson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



Count Zero is the follow-up to Gibson's (amazing) Neuromancer, and, while it follows a different set of characters and only briefly mentions (and, then, not by name) the characters from Neuromancer, it's set a handful of years after Neuromancer's conclusion. The world is still a gritty place where corporations rule the population not only with the weight of financial power, but with guns and steel, as well.

This time, we follow three converging plotlines: a mercenary trying to run an extraction on a scientist who wants to leave his employment, an out of his depth hacker on the run from unknown forces after he almost dies trying out experimental software, and a disgraced art dealer hired to find the source of a set of very unusual sculptures.

Count Zero is another thrilling adventure in the Sprawl from Gibson, and it's no wonder that he's so well regarded as a sci-fi author. Here's a world set, much like our own, but just out of reach. Gibson is looking forward and presenting us a believable version of what the future might hold. No flying cars and cities of glass and chrome, here. Oh, there's future tech, for sure; cities orbiting the planet, and spaceship freighters running cargo to distant locations, cyberspace that you log in through VR helmets, and cyborg augmentations for military and civilian use abound, but most of it feels like it could be a glimpse of a dark future yet to come.

This isn't the sort of novel where you feel a deep connection for the characters; Gibson is more interested in the world and exploring themes than in developing characters (which is fine, here). If you've read other Gibson stories, you know what you're in for, and if you haven't, this probably isn't the right starting point (since there are some pretty major plot elements that rely on an understanding of what happened in the first book).

While it's overall an excellent read, I did have two nits to pick. Marly's arc was generally... bland. She starts off enthusiastic and excited to be a part of the hunt for these strange sculptures, but ends up falling off the rails for reasons that aren't completely clear, other than that she finds her new employer vaguely creepy. More importantly, she's not actually that vital to the plot. Turner and Count Zero start off in very different places but end up converging on each other. Even though they have different goals, the connection between them ends up very clear, and it's obvious how they end up helping each other. Marly's arc, however, is far more loosely connected, and doesn't feel nearly as significant as Turner and Count Zero's. Unless I'm forgetting something, you could completely remove her from the story and everything would still end up exactly like it does.

The other nagging issue is that unexpected appearance of a hacker late in the game; her role in the story is significant, but her showing up is rather too convenient. It felt a little bit like a cheat to have her show up out of the blue to solve Zero's problems for him.

Those problems aside, Count Zero is a solid Gibson entry, and a must-read for anyone looking for more cyberpunk action after Neuromancer. Looking forward to picking up Mona Lisa Overdrive now.



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Review: Bangkok 8

Bangkok 8 by John Burdett

My rating: 1 of 5 stars



Bangkok 8 is a pulpy sort of detective story, set in (shockingly enough) Bangkok, following the investigative methods of Buddhist detective, Sonchai Jitpleecheep, as he looks into the death of a jade obsessed Marine murdered through the use of snakes. It's hard not to be intrigued with a setup like that. Sadly, too much of the book feels like an attempt to fetishize Thai culture and justify Western attitudes towards Thai women. Maybe Bangkok really is like Burdett describes, but I'd be surprised if it is.

Everyone (except Sonchai) is extremely corrupt and looking for a way to get one over on everyone else. Everyone is constantly drunk, smoking pot, or doing meth. The only female character we meet who isn't in the sex industry is the FBI agent, and all of them love what they do.

While I was intrigued by the premise, the execution felt very off-putting, and I finished the book feeling a little dirtier than when I started.



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Review: Ravens

Ravens by George Dawes Green

My rating: 2 of 5 stars



I wanted very much to like Ravens. The set-up was certainly solid enough; two aimless twenty-something losers terrorize a family who recently won a mega-million dollar jackpot in order to extort half the winnings. Great! Yes, let's do this! My expectations were for something akin to Funny Games, perhaps. The dust jacket promised that this was "frightening, comic, and suspenseful", so I cracked it open and waited for the thrills to start.

And I waited. And waited. And waited.

There were just too many major problems with this one for me to ever really get into it.

Let's start with the characters. The Boatwrights are such a cliché of the "Southern Hick" family. Alcoholic mother spending too much on gin and lottery tickets. Too cool daughter just struggling to keep her head down, avoid her family, and get out of dodge. Spoiled younger brother. Pious father who is too much of a pushover to stand up to anyone. We've seen this a million times. This is not an interesting or new. Tara is the only remotely likable member of the main cast, and even she is only really likable in contrast to the completely unpleasant ensemble. Nell, the grandmother, is okay, but, again, the wacky, outrageous grandmother trope isn't particularly new or interesting. I hesitate to even get started on Romeo and Shaw. The nature of the friendship is bizarre and unbelievable, and their "plan" is so patently absurd that I was expecting to unravel literally as soon as they put it into action.

Instead, I'm expected to believe that this farce could continue for over a week?

So, let's talk about the plot, then. Shaw is able to come into their home and take them hostage, but he doesn't confiscate their phones or limit their internet usage for days? And yet, in all that time, none of them think to call the police? None of them try to contact help? The vague threat that Romeo--who can barely keep himself from crying--is out there waiting and will supposed kill their friends/loved ones if Shaw sends the signal or doesn't answer his phone? And, really, Romeo mentions to at least two or three people that he's planning to commit murders, but none of these people think to call the police? And why is Romeo so willing to murder? Because his stupid, creepo friend says "Hey, I've got this great plan. I just need you to act like a total psycho and maybe kill a bunch of people, but that's it."?

Meanwhile, Shaw makes pretty much no effort to protect himself, either. He lets the family stay in separate rooms, doesn't restrain them, and falls asleep six feet away from one of his hostages. The family literally offers him no actual resistance the entire time they're held captive, except to occasionally talk about possibly fighting back or calling for help. The third day in.

And should we talk about the fact that apparently Shaw is just so personable that both the daughter and mother are having elaborate sexual fantasies about their captor? While he's holding them hostage and constantly threatening to kill them and everyone they love. Okay, fine, we'll pretend the whole family is suffering Stockholm Syndrome. Sure. That makes total sense, and wasn't at all gross and creepy.

Don't even get me started on the weird pseudo-Jesus nonsense that pops up in the second half, when apparently the entire frickin' town starts to think Shaw is some kind of prophet or messiah figure. All it takes to make people think you're prophet is telling them you're giving your money to charity? Who the hell are these people?

While there were some excellent individual moments and scenes, the whole thing fails to come together, and, instead, is just a big, stupid mess.





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Review: Collusion

Collusion by Stuart Neville

My rating: 3 of 5 stars







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Review: The Ghosts of Belfast

The Ghosts of Belfast by Stuart Neville

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



I tracked this down after reading The Final Silence. Interestingly, while this is listed as Jack Lennon Investigations, Jack is only briefly mentioned in this one. Still, his presence, while not crucial, still plays a role, and it's clear to me how/why the later books spin out of this one.

Instead of Jack, we're introduced to Gerry Fegan. Fegan is, we quickly learn, not a very nice man. In fact, he's one of the most feared and respected men in Northern Ireland. He's a stone cold killer who acted as an enforcer and hitman for the IRA. At the height of his career, he was who the IRA turned to when they wanted to make sure someone was "dealt with" in a very final way. Now, having spent twelve years in jail, Fegan is technically a free man. He's done his time, and the organization takes care of its own. He has a free paycheck, and no responsibilities, but drowning himself in liquor.

Technically free, because, while he's not in a prison cell, he's haunted by the blood of twelve innocent people who died at his hands. Fegan literally sees them, following him in shadows, demanding retribution. An eye for an eye; they want Fegan to go after the people who were responsible for sending Fegan after them in the first place.

Neville digs deep into the background of his characters, and traces a decades-long path of death and destruction leading up to the tenuous and fragile peace in Ireland. This is the sort of story where there are no heroes, just tough people in bad situations. Fegan is no hero, but he's not the man he once was, either. It's up to the reader to decide how far he's really come. The book gives us glimpses into the back history and lives of most of the characters; most of them are fleshed out well enough for them to feel very solid, even if they're only secondary characters. It's to Neville's credit that even some of the low legal thugs that litter this book felt like they were real people.

The plot clips along fairly quickly and manages to take a few unexpected turns. A working knowledge of modern Irish history is certainly helpful, but this isn't historical fiction, so as long as you understand the basics of the Troubles for context, I think that you can work through the rest.

All in all a very strong first novel.





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Review: Ask the Passengers

Ask the Passengers by A.S. King

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



While magical realism isn't really my favorite genre, I had heard really good things about King's Ask the Passengers, so I gave it a try. I'm very glad I did. King's novel explores a complicated and difficult subject, and it does so with sincerity and humor. Astrid's exploration of who she is and how to define herself, and her struggles with what it even means to "be" something, was very relatable.

I particularly appreciated the way that King was able to show various forms of the coming out narrative. While Astrid isn't sure how to define herself and resists the efforts of others to force definitions upon her, Kristina and Justin seem to be less concerned about defining themselves but are terrified of how others will react, while Dee is out and doesn't seem to care who knows. It was refreshing to see a spectrum of experiences and the difficulties associated with them.

King seems to have a real grasp of the intricate and tumultuous relationships, both platonic and romantic, that teens have. The book does an excellent job showing both the intensity and the fragility of feeling that teens experience.



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Review: The Final Silence

The Final Silence by Stuart Neville

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



Neville's The Final Silence is a well crafted detective/crime novel in the modern noir grain. Compelling characters and an intriguing set-up--an old man lets himself die and his young heir finds a strange album filled with letters and "souvenirs" that implicate the dead man in a decades-long series of murders--combined with the effectiveness of Neville's prose and his masterful pacing make this an excellent read.

The main protagonist, Jack Lennon, certainly has the marks of the modern noir detective with his substance abuse and a hard life made harder by not playing nice with corruption and graft, but his story arc (at least in this, the fourth in the series) keeps him from being forgettable. I like it when a character develops, something that is too often overlooked in detective stories, and the Lennon of the end of the book is not the same as the one at the beginning. There are plenty of hints at Lennon's difficult past (one suspects these would be less "hints" and more "reminders" if one had read the first three books), and you get a real sense of the loss and frustration he feels over the way his life has turned out.

The Final Silence is blessed with an assorted cast of characters beyond Lennon, from low-life crooks and crooked cops to hard-nosed but honest detectives, which help to round out the story nicely. I particularly like DCI Flanagan, and hope to see her in future books. Neville does a nice job handling her in a way that keeps her from becoming cliché; in a lesser writer's hands, she'd have become two dimensional and annoying, but the personal touches and the brief glimpses of her inner life flesh her out excellently.

I can honestly say I'm excited to go back and find the first three books in the series (didn't even realize it was part of a series until I finished it), and look forward to future installments if they're anywhere near as good as this.



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Review: Don't Turn Around

Don't Turn Around by Michelle Gagnon

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



Two teens, one broken and homeless, one from the upper crust, come to the attention of an evil corporation involved in human testing. Luckily, our intrepid youngsters are master hackers, and so they go on the run and eventually join forces. Unfortunately, the Evil Corporation has a lot more resources to work with, and keeps tracking them down. The Evil Corporation (tm) won't let a little thing like morality get in the way, and it'll Stop at Nothing to get what it wants.

So it goes.

The story clips along at a pretty fast pace, which kept me on the edge of my seat for a while. There are some interesting character moments, and the split narrative works well to give us a fuller perspective on the two protagonists, as well. Peter, in particular, feels very fleshed out, which is nice. The Evil Corporation (tm) is perhaps a little too cliché, but it's not unforgivable.

So, three stars? Well...
early in the book, there are several vague indications that Noa's kidnapping and surgery have endowed her with special abilities. It's never explicitly stated, but she heals very fast, she's rarely hungry, thirsty all the time, and she seems to be extraordinarily strong and fast for someone who was lying on a lab table for several weeks undergoing invasive surgery. But, by the end of the book, her strange athletic prowess seems to be completely ignored and forgotten, and the explanation for the testing is about something completely different. Why? How was she able to outrun highly trained guards, repeatedly? How was she able to overpower one of them? Why bother repeatedly mentioning how much better shape she seems to be in than the people around her (especially when it's clear that she ought to be in much worse shape than them)? Maybe this comes back up later in the series, but it was strange to have so many references to how hard it was for Peter to keep up with her, or about how she was, in her bare feet, outrunning the guards, etc, only to have it apparently forgotten by the end.

Also, honestly, the romance near the end? Ugh. Can't we just have one book where the opposite sex leads just have a platonic relationship? They don't know each other, they barely trust each other, they're from opposite worlds, and they're on the run from people who have shown a willingness to kill children without hesitation. Maybe that's not the ideal time for them to start eyeballing each other.



Still, those complaints aside, it's a solid enough action/thriller that I'll probably check out book two to see where it leads.




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