Tag Archives: Suspense

December 29, 2023 · 12:01 am

Golden Gate by Amy Chua

book cover

“Evil is everywhere. Where you least expect it. It can seep out of the radio. Or a lobster salad.”
“Oh, Issy—why do you say that?”
“Because it talks to me.”
“What talks to you?”
“Evil.”
“Iris talks to you, and evil talks to you?”
“Yes.”
“Are they the same?”

Part of me wanted to shut her up—if there’s one thing I couldn’t stand, it was a rich girl who felt unlucky in life. But another part knew that what she was saying was factually true. Her family was a train wreck, almost as bad as my mine except rich. Meanwhile, a third part of me couldn’t help noticing her long lashes and her lips—she had what they call a rosebud mouth, a perfect version of it. “I may have misjudged you, miss. If I did, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t soften on me,” she said.
“If it was a hundred in the shade, I wouldn’t soften on you, miss.”
“Good. Because I’m bad, Detective. I do terrible things. And if you soften on me, I’ll do them to you.”

There are six primary (fictional) females driving the story in The Golden Gate, with Detective Al Sullivan functioning as the hub to which they all connect and around whom they all spin. There might have been a seventh, but Iris Stafford plunged down a laundry chute in 1930 at age seven, under mysterious circumstances, and appears now mostly in memories, dark visions, and dreams. Her sister, Isabella, all grown up in 1944, is a knockout, as was their mother, Sadie. The Stafford girls have two first cousins. Cassie Bainbridge is an expert hunter, (think Artemis) and a frightening wonder to behold when butchering large game. Nicole is fascinated by the far left, maybe dangerously so. Then there is Genevieve Bainbridge, grandmother to Iris and Isabella, Cassie and Nicole, mother to Sadie and John (who does not much figure in any of this.)

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Professor Amy Chua – image from AboveTheLaw.com

Genevieve is 62 when we meet her, through a deposition she is writing for the DA. There are eleven parts to this document, sub-chapters, spread throughout the book. It is through these that we learn of the events circa and before 1930. But take her words with a shaker of salt. This Bainbridge is an unreliable narrator. She is faced with a very tough situation. The DA has made clear his belief that one of her three granddaughters is guilty of murder, and he is squeezing her to finger the guilty party, lest all three suffer consequences. The events of the novel take place primarily in two times, 1930, when Iris dies, and 1944, the today of the tale.

Detective Sullivan is having drinks with a young woman in the hotel bar, when he is summoned by hotel management, about a report of gunshots in one of the rooms. Walter Wilkinson, an industrialist running for president, has acquired a new bit of decoration in his room, a bullet hole above his bed. He offers a tale about a Russian Communist assassin, is relocated to another room, and goes about his night, as does Sullivan. Until a call comes in several hours later. The renowned Claremont Hotel in Berkeley, CA, need some assistance dealing with a newly deceased guest. Mr. Wilkinson had clearly had a pretty tough night.

A crew of detectives is called in. Guests, employees and everyone in the vicinity are identified and interviewed, and clues begin to emerge. Timelines and whereabouts are established. Who saw whom emerge from what room, or walk down which hall, at what time, dressed how, gender, ethnicity, age, and so on. The usual procedural digging offers up a list of folks who may have had it in for WW, for a wide range of issues, some personal, some professional.

Complications appear like shadows at dusk. Was it the same shooter both times? And what about the unusual way in which his body was left? Witnesses can be unreliable. You cannot believe everything people tell you. Can you believe anything? In fact, there is a sufficient number of the questionably balanced in this novel that the place could be known as much for its head cases as for its headlands. The constant lying and misdirection offer up enough twists to make this read feel like a very tasty bowl of rotini. And it is indeed very tasty.

There are two levels at play, the payload, a take on the time and place, and the mystery…well, mysteries. We are eager to learn not only what happened to candidate Wilkinson including wondering if he had it coming) but to Iris Stafford. Did she really fall down a laundry chute to her death? Or was there some dark force at play responsible for killing a seven-year-old child? Chua does a great job of keeping us guessing, and there is plenty to guess about. I figured out one element about halfway through, but there were many others I did not see coming at all. There are surprises aplenty.

So, who killed WW (who is loosely based on Wendell Wilkie)? Who was that cowled person seen leaving the scene of the crime? Some people were seen entering and leaving the victim’s room, including an Asian woman and someone answering to the description of the three cousins. Interestingly, Wilkinson had a connection with Madame Chiang Kai-shek.

Speaking of which, Chua peppers her novel with actual historical figures. The First Lady of China did, in fact, live in Berkeley during the period of the novel. Her reason for being there is not known. Chua offers one possible explanation. August Vollmer is a name you are unlikely to know, but he was a seminal figure in the evolution of policing. He served as police chief in Berkeley for a time, and is lightly incorporated into the tale, as Al’s mentor, among other things.

Place is of paramount importance in good detective tales, and Chua further satisfies the historical need by telling us about the construction of the Golden Gate Bridge, offering some of her characters a role in its opening. She also writes about the boom-town growth of the area during World War II, when it replaced Pearl Harbor as the premier shipbuilding location in the states, producing an astounding number of vessels for the war, and in so doing, attracting workers from around the country. Some were more welcome than others, as one might expect. There are union issues, housing shortages, poverty, racism, political intrigue, sexual shenanigans, tong gangs, and appearances by two noteworthy ahead-of-their-time accomplished female professionals.

Bigotry was shameless and rampant, with Mexicans forcibly “repatriated” by the hundreds of thousands, the Chinese Exclusion Act still in place, and hostile derision openly directed at “Okies,” a term then referring to poor white migrants from the Dust Bowl. In the 1940s came the Japanese internment, when full-fledged American citizens were literally caged off. For the first time, Blacks came to the Bay Area in significant numbers, pouring in from the American South in search of jobs, only to find themselves subjected to vicious prejudice, excluded by labor unions, denied entry into restaurants, theaters and hotels, and barred from living in white neighborhoods. Throughout this period, numerous other ethnic groups—such as Italians, Greeks, Poles, Slavs, Hungarians, and Jews—occupied a subordinate position too, not yet considered fully white. – from the Author’s Note

Chua builds this into her characters.

I chose to make Detective Sullivan a light-skinned mixed-race man in part because Berkeley’s police force in the 1940s included almost no women or minorities, but also because I wanted to explore the phenomenon of racial “passing.” Sullivan is part Mexican, part Nebraskan, and part Jewish on his Mexican side…But Sullivan can pass as white and chooses to go by Al Sullivan rather than Alejo Gutiérrez for reasons he has not fully admitted to himself. – from the Author’s Note

In fact, there is enough passing here to make one wonder if Berkeley streets are constructed of all left lanes. In addition to Al, noted above, Japanese characters pass for Chinese. Gay characters pass for straight. One does what one must to survive in a hostile environment. Pathological liars pass for honest citizens. Crazy people pass for sane, and rich kids pass for revolutionaries. But another way to look at some of this is as reinvention. Sometimes you need to change how you present yourself to the world, change how the world sees you, in order to become your truest self.

Al is a good guy, conflicted about his decision to conceal his heritage. In addition to his detective work, Al must handle a family problem. His half-sister does not function well in the world, has issues with substances and decision-making. Somehow, she produced an amazing kid. Miriam is eleven going on thirty, from having to cope with so much. She could use some more schooling, but is uber bright, and she loves her uncle Al, who is put into the position of having to take care of her during of her mom’s absences. The love between these two glows like a lighthouse beacon glaring through thick bay fog. Some of the most wonderful scenes in the book are those between Al and Miriam.

While it is not a large element, there is also occasional humor.

I hate to say it of a fellow Berkeley officer, but Dicky O’Gar was so thick he couldn’t tell which way an elevator was going if you gave him two guesses.

The events take place in the Berkeley Hills, for the most part. So, near to, while not exactly one of, the ground-zeros for hard-boiled detective yarns. There is some nifty noir-ish patois, (the second quote at the top of this review offers an excellent example) but I would not call this a noir novel, per se. While there is plenty of darkness and grim reality, there is enough optimism to float it out of that sub-genre.

Gripes are few. I found the explanation of one of the deaths that occurs less than satisfying. There is a taste of a fantasy element, revolving around the continued presence in the Claremont of the late Iris Stafford. While it adds atmosphere, it suggests more than it actually delivers.

Bottom line is that The Golden Gate is a first-rate entertainment, with fun, quirky, interesting fictional supporting characters, an introduction to some actual historical people of note, an insightful look at a vibrant place in an exciting time, a primary character to care about, and mysteries to keep your gray cells sparking. What’s not to like?

I put my collar up, pulled my hat brim down, and set off through the drizzle, wondering how much I’d been played in the last seventy-two hours and by how many different women.

Review posted – 12/29/23

Publication date – 9/19/23

I received an ARE of The Golden Gate from Minotaur Books in return for a fair review. Thanks, folks, and thanks to NetGalley for facilitating an ePub as well.

This review is cross-posted on Goodreads. Stop by and say Hi!

=======================================EXTRA STUFF

Links to Chua’s personal, FB, Instagram, and Twitter pages

Profile – from Wikipedia

Amy Lynn Chua (born October 26, 1962), also known as “the Tiger Mom“, is an American corporate lawyer, legal scholar, and writer. She is the John M. Duff Jr. Professor of Law at Yale Law School with an expertise in international business transactions, law and development, ethnic conflict, and globalization.[5] She joined the Yale faculty in 2001 after teaching at Duke Law School for seven years. Prior to teaching, she was a corporate law associate at Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton. Chua is also known for her parenting memoir Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. In 2011, she was named one of Time magazine’s 100 most influential people, one of The Atlantic’s Brave Thinkers, and one of Foreign Policy‘s Global Thinkers.

The Golden Gate is her first novel.

Interviews
—–Washington Post – Amy Chua says her hard-boiled detective also is a bit of a ‘tiger mom’ By Sophia Nguyen
—–USNews – ‘Tiger Mom’ Amy Chua Writes First Novel, ‘The Golden Gate’

Item of Interest from the author
—–Macmillan – Discussion Questions

Items of Interest
—–Wiki on August Vollmer, mentioned in Chapter 3, and throughout
—–Wiki on The Mann Act – mentioned in Chapter 14.4
—–Wiki on The Golden Gate Bridge

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Filed under Fiction, Historical Fiction, Mystery, Noir, Reviews, Suspense

Tagged as book-review, books, books-of-the-year-2023, California, Fiction, ghost, Historical Fiction, historical-fiction, Mystery, Noir, Suspense

October 13, 2023 · 12:01 am

Holly by Stephen King

book cover

I had to write this book to write one scene, which I saw clearly in my mind. Holly attending her mother’s zoom funeral. I didn’t have a story to go with it, which was unfortunate, but I kept my feelers out because I loved Holly from the first and wanted to be with her again. Then one day I read a newspaper story about an honor killing. I didn’t think that could be my story, but I loved the headline, which was something like this: everyone thought they were a sweet old couple until the bodies began turning up in the backyard. Killer old folks, I thought. That’s my story. – from Author’s Note

Holly Gibney, partner in the Finders Keepers Detective Agency she inherited from Bill Hodges, (of the Bill Hodges trilogy, in which Holly first appeared) is called in by a distraught mother, Penny Dahl. Her daughter, Bonnie, has been missing for three weeks, and the police are at the point of washing their hands of the case. A peculiar, ambiguous note had been found on her bicycle. But there was no helmet found. Curious, no?

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Stephen King – image from New Hampshire Magazine – illustrated by John R. Goodwin

Holly is on her own, as her partner is laid up with COVID. She has just attended her mother’s funeral. So Holly is emotionally laid low. People close to her have urged her to take some time to grieve. Still, a case might be a way to keep moving, so the game is afoot. It is not long before another missing person case shows up in her research, and another. Tough to prove, but Holly suspects there is a serial killer at work. The book opens with

It’s an old city, and no longer in very good shape, nor is the lake beside which it has been built, but there are parts of it that are still pretty nice. Longtime residents would probably agree that the nicest section is Sugar Heights, and the nicest street running through it is Ridge Road, which makes a gentle downhill curve from Bell College of Arts and Sciences to Deerfield Park, two miles below. On its way, Ridge Road passes many fine houses, some of which belong to college faculty and some to the city’s more successful businesspeople—doctors, lawyers, bankers, and top-of-the-pyramid business executives. Most of these homes are Victorians, with impeccable paintjobs, bow windows, and lots of gingerbread trim.

Hmmm, maybe King was not quite done with thought processes from his novel, Fairy Tale. One of those Victorians is home to a couple of octogenarians, mostly-retired professors at the nearby Bell University. They seem ok to a brief glance, but spend time with either one and you might feel the urge to pop up and say, “check please.” Both are considered, at the very least, odd, by those who know them. Some find them creepy. They are far worse.

Holly is assisted in her investigation by two associates from prior cases. Jerome and Barbara Robinson are both game to help, but both have other things going on, so are not entirely available. This is a crucial element in sustaining tension, (along with hoping Holly can figure out what is going on in time to save Bonnie) as their disconnection from Holly keeps her from figuring everything out much sooner. What happens if you have, among the team, all the pieces to the puzzle but simply cannot get them all on the table at the same time?

The story proceeds as, um, a procedural. Discover this clue, follow it, find another clue, follow that, and so on. Keep the unconnected breadcrumbs floating about in one’s consciousness until it becomes clear where they lead. There is nothing paranormal going on in this one, although abnormal would certainly fit.

Two time-lines swap back and forth. In the present, July 2021, Holly pursues her investigation. In the other we flash back to each of the victims, who they were, how they were taken, and how they were treated once captured.

King wrote this book during the height of the COVID pandemic, and wanted to make that a major part of the novel. We encounter Holly when she is disconnecting from her mother’s funeral. She, and others, had attended via Zoom. Mom was a diehard, literally, anti-vaxer. Buh-bye. And from what Holly expresses about the dearly departed, she is not all that sad to see her go. Throughout the story, Holly has to decide, mask-or-no-mask, for every interview. Shake hands or bump elbows? She is maybe OCD, or even somewhere on the autism spectrum, but she certainly has an enhanced intuition that some think might be a form of the shining made famous in the book by that name. Maybe she is just a really gifted detective? There is no overt diagnosing of Holly’s abilities or limitations in the book.

In addition to the presence of COVID, King offers looks at a range of people and their political attitudes. A bowling alley manager is a full-on conspiracy theorist. Emily Harris’s diverse bigotries are baked in. Speaking of bigotries, one that 76-year-old King addresses is ageism. It usually manifests in presuming the elderly to be incapable of or disinterested in this or that based simply on their age. This is a bit of bias that Holly shares, to her own peril.

I know that there are a lot of people out there on X, or whatever you want to call it, that are convinced that Covid is over and it’s not a going concern anymore. What do you think of that idea?
Well, Holly’s mother is a Covid denier, and she dies in the hospital of Covid. And to the very end, she’s saying, “I’ve just got the flu. The flu is what I have.” And I think that it goes back to this is not a new thing. There have been people for years who have just been vaccination deniers who say that if you get a vaccination for a certain kind of thing, you’re going to cause birth defects in your children, this and that. Or if you vaccinate your children, they could have strokes. And you see the same things about the Covid vaccinations. There’s this constant story that thousands of people are dying of heart disease because of the vaccinations. It’s not true, but it’s gained a lot of credence. So there’s a lot of that. And I tried to put that in the book. There are characters in the book who just say, “I don’t believe in this bullshit. It’s all crap.” And that’s the life that we live. And I always try to reflect the time that I’m writing in. – from the Rollingstone interview

It is easy to root for Holly Gibney as she struggles to learn the truth. This keeps us interested in the book. King is right to keep going back to her. (this is the sixth time) She is sooooo engaging. But there is another course in this meal. King points out how holding false beliefs can lead to mayhem, even death. It certainly did for Holly’s mom, and there is at least one criminal motivation in here that is based on a non-COVID-related disproven theory.

This may not be to everyone’s taste. “I’ve had enough” was the note left on Bonnie Dahl’s bicycle. But I bet that by the time you finish reading Holly you will be hungry for a second helping.

The outsider masquerading as Terri Maitland was evil. So was the one masquerading as Chet Ondowsky. The same was true of Brady Hartsfield, who found a way to go on doing dirt (Bill’s phrase) even after he should have been rendered harmless. Rendered that way by Holly herself. But Roddy and Emily Harris were worse.

Review posted – 10/13/23

Publication date – 9/5/23

This review is cross-posted on Goodreads. Stop by and say Hi!

=======================================EXTRA STUFF

SK’s personal and FB pages

my reviews of some other books by this King
—–2022 – Fairy Tale
—–2020 – If It Bleeds
—–2019 – The Institute
—–2014 – Revival
—–2014 – Mr. Mercedes
—–2013 – Doctor Sleep
—–2009 – Under the Dome
—–2008 – Duma Key
—–2006 – Lisey’s Story
—–1977 – The Shining

Other King Family (Joe Hill) books I have reviewed:
—–2019 – Full Throttle
—–2017 – Strange Weather
—–2016 – The Fireman
—–2013 – NOS4A2
—–2007 – Heart-Shaped Box
—–2005 – 20th Century Ghosts

Interviews
—–Rollingstone – Stephen King Knows Anti-Vaxxers Are Going to Hate His Latest Book: ‘Knock Yourself Out’ by Brenna Ehrlich
—–GMA – Stephen King talks new book, ‘Holly’ – lightweight, but with some nice personal details re SK
—–Talking Scared – Episode #155 – Stephen King & Writing From the Nerve Endings with Neil McRobert – audio – 1:08:56

Songs/Music
—–Pretty Little Angel Eyes – chapter 9 – Roddy sings this to Emily while serving her supper

Items of Interest from the author
—–Entertainment Weekly – excerpt from Chapter 2
—–SK reads – excerpt – video- 8:00
—–Entertainment Weekly – excerpt – print

Items of Interest
—–League of Gentlemen – Special Stuff
—–Angela Lansbury and Len Cariou – A Little Priest – original cast recording

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Filed under Fiction, Horror, Mystery, psycho killer, Suspense, Thriller, Thriller

Tagged as Fiction, horror, Mystery, procedural, Suspense, Thriller

July 7, 2023 · 12:01 am

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson – introduction by Jeffrey Keeten

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The power of this tale is the fact that nearly everyone on the planet knows the story, even though few have actually read the book. For the Victorian reader, Stevenson hides the twist of the book until near the end. For those readers, Hyde and Jekyll were two men until Jekyll’s confessional letter sets them straight. – from the intro

He is not easy to describe. There is something wrong with his appearance; something displeasing, something down-right detestable. I never saw a man I so disliked, and yet I scarce know why. He must be deformed somewhere; he gives a strong feeling of deformity, although I couldn’t specify the point. He’s an extraordinary looking man, and yet I really can name nothing out of the way. No, sir; I can make no hand of it; I can’t describe him. And it’s not want of memory; for I declare I can see him this moment.

There is much to be gained by re-reading the classics. Great works of literature are considered great for a reason, mostly because the truth of their excellence persists over time, as each generation discovers them anew. In a parallel vein many become embedded in our culture, and suffer, in popular application, the erosion of original purpose, of nuance. A 2012 study of memory found that:

Every time you remember an event from the past, your brain networks change in ways that can alter the later recall of the event. Thus, the next time you remember it, you might recall not the original event but what you remembered the previous time. – from the Northwestern article linked in EXTRA STUFF

I expect this can be applied on a grander scale, to society and culture at large. Our recollection of the stories produced by the Brothers Grimm in the 19th century, for example, bears little resemblance to the truly grim tales they actually told, thanks in considerable measure to Disney. On becoming popularized, stories can become simplified, stripped down. Alice might recognize the great peculiarity of reducing complicated things to their elements to the extreme of absurdity.

“Well! I’ve often seen a cat without a grin,” thought Alice; “but a grin without a cat! It’s the most curious thing I ever saw in my life!” – Alice in Alice in Wonderland

What we have achieved in our collective recollection of The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is just that, a grin without a cat. Jekyll has been reduced to a well-meaning physician, and Hyde a monstrous container for human evil. Black and white. Jekyll good, Hyde bad. Not so fast.

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Stevenson in Samoa – image from Britannica

Jeff Keeten, long-time Goodreads superstar reviewer, offers his take on the book in a thoughtful introduction. He points to the existence of an earlier, possibly more lurid version, of the novella, a 19th century Go Set a Watchman. Good or bad, it would have made a fascinating counterpoint to the final. Keeten provides some wonderful details about the writing of the story, and shows a thematic continuation from Stevenson’s prior work.

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Jeffrey D. Keeten – image from Gravelight Press – it is remarkable what vast amounts of makeup and digital touching up can accomplish

For a quick refresher, there has been a series of dastardly deeds committed in a London neighborhood. We learn of these through Gabriel John Utterson, a lawyer, and friend of Jekyll. A culprit has been identified. Mr. Hyde, a known associate of Doctor Jekyll. Utterson is asked by Jekyll to treat Hyde as his heir. But as knowledge of Hyde’s activities becomes more widespread, Hyde must go into hyding (sorry). Exposition is handled via direct observation, but also via documents from another professional peer, and Jekyll’s final message to Utterson.

I read the original version of this novella (thirty-something thousand words) a lifetime ago. Can’t say that I remember it from that reading all that clearly. But I do recall the sense I have acquired from seeing multiple productions of the story on screens, and in print, both tellings of Stevenson’s story and interpretations of the work that extracted, or tried to extract, the substance of the allegory and apply it in a modern context. In its simplest understanding, the story highlights the conflict between good and evil in human nature.

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John Barrymore in Hyde mode – 1920 – image from Public Domain Movies

There are many tales that address what the natural state of humanity is, i.e., how might we behave without the benefit of civilization. Lord of the Flies pops to mind as a premier example of the genre. Keeten, in his excellent introduction, points out that Stevenson had shown in his other work an interest in internal moral divisions within people. Britannica describes Treasure Island as at once a gripping adventure tale and a wry comment on the ambiguity of human motives. But divisions are not necessarily slashed in straight lines down the core of our moral being. More than all else, one thing stood out for me in this latest reading. It is not a battle between good and evil. It is much more an attempt at accommodation. There is plenty of cat to go with that conflictual grin. Jekyll is no paragon. (BTW, according to Daniel Evers, of the University of Bristol, the proper Scottish pronunciation of Jekyll is ‘Jee-kul.’ – article on this is linked below.)

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Spencer Tracy in the dual role, really, really wants you to pay your share of the bar bill – 1941 – image from Fiction Fan Blog

He does not so much conduct objective research into where in people is drawn the line between good and evil. On the contrary, Jekyll knows he has urges and desires that are not considered socially acceptable. He is not so much looking to suppress those by some form of internal bifurcation. No, no no. He is looking to give his dark side free reign, while sparing his Jekyll side the inconvenience of conscience. So, what was Stevenson writing about? What was his intent? To show the hypocrisy of the Victorian upper class? I have not seen any specific report that he was a political writer in the way of Dickens, who used his work to highlight the class horrors of an age. Stevenson’s aim seemed more tilted toward demonstrating the internal conflict between good and evil that permeates us all.

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Frederic March’s 1932 version ignored Stevenson’s subtle distinction between the two – image from Fiction Fan Blog

And what is the relevance to today? How might we use the lens of this tale to gain a focus on our present? As noted above, classic tales are often reinterpreted to offer us a new take on modern themes. My favorite among these is the 1990s staging of Richard III, with Ian McKellan. I was blessed in being able to see it in person in Brooklyn, and later as a film. It was breathtaking, using a 16th century drama as a vehicle for portraying 20th century fascism. I get chills still, just thinking about it. It became clear to me that RLS’s scenario could be applied, as well, to the contemporary political realm.

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Richard III as a fascist dictator … Ian McKellen in the 1996 film image from The Guardian – photo by Ronald Grant

In this take, the good doctor might be seen as the Republican Party of the mid-to-late 20th century. No longer the party of Lincoln, the GOP largely abandoned the good work their predecessors might have been proud of. Instead, particularly after the Southern Strategy of Richard Nixon, it became a party that was not only willing to tolerate its excesses, the racism

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(In 1971 – Dr Jekyll and Sister Hyde offered an interesting twist – image from British Horror Films

that opposed civil rights legislation, the classist hostility that opposed the New Deal and Great Society, and any allegiance to sustaining a fair voting system. They understood that they had these urges and constructed potions meant to separate the worst behavior from the respectable core. This is where we get the Tea Party, Q, Oath Keepers, Proud Boys, Three Percenters, and other on-the-ground kinetic actors, spurred on by demagogues spreading disgraceful lies, the Rush Limbaughs of the world, the Alex Joneses, the demagogues-du-jour on Fox News. The party wanted to let their fascist freak flag fly, but deniably. So, Jekyll wanted to give his dark urges a way to be sated, while maintaining a clear conscience, or, at the very least, deniability. Doctor Jekyll is not a good guy. And, as with the GOP, once you breathe life into your darker side, that darker side will not be satisfied with partial residence for long, no matter how many lies he tells, or how much orange hair dye he might use. As with Jekyll, over time, the GOP feels less and less constrained by decency, as they boldly attack voting rights, civil rights, even the law itself, with a decreasing need for an external beard. What might Jekyll v. Hyde stand for in your understanding of the 21st century? There may be other elements that jump out for you, aspects that shift your take on the dumbed-down vision most of us have of the J/H conflict.

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In a 1990 production, Michael Caine is really tired of the other actors calling him Alfie. – image from TV Worth Watching

There is a short story added on at the end, Markheim. It is rich with familiar elements and it is clear that, published only a year before J/H, it was a primary source from which the longer tale grew. It would be easy, though, to see it as an alternate ending to the later novella.

Eddie Izzard has signed on to play a trans Dr Jekyll in an upcoming production

And, of course, it would be perfectly natural if, at the end of reading, or re-reading The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, you are of two minds about it all.

in one of my more wakeful moments, my eyes fell upon my hand. Now the hand of Henry Jekyll (as you have often remarked) was professional in shape and size; it was large, firm, white and comely. But the hand which I now saw, clearly enough, in the yellow light of a mid-London morning, lying half shut on the bedclothes, was lean, corded, knuckly, of a dusky pallor and thickly shaded with a swart growth of hair. It was the hand of Edward Hyde.

Review posted – 7/07/23

Publication date – 4/3/23 – of this volume – J/H was first published in 1886

I received an ARE of The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde from Gravelight Press in return for a fair review, and a printout of my special formula. Thanks, folks,

This review is cross-posted on Goodreads. Stop by and say Hi!

=============================EXTRA STUFF

It was definitely a fun experience for me to trot down memory lane for a re-look, and a better look at J/H. Keeten’s smart intro definitely helps. You might also check out some of the links below for more. Gravelight promises a slew of horror classics, one new one every six months or so. Upcoming are The Picture of Dorian Gray and Frankenstein, complete with Keeten’s insightful introductions. Nifty collection material for horror afficionados, and ideal gifts for Halloween. No, I do not get a commission!

Links to Keeten’s personal, FB, and Instagram pages

I have written one prior review for a book intro’d by Jeffrey Keeten
—– Exhumed: 13 Tales Too Terrifying to Stay Dead – edited by David Yurkovich

Songs/Music
—–The Who – Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde
—–Bear McCreary – The Skye Boat Song or Sing Me a Song of a Lad That is Gone – the theme song of the TV series Outlander sets a Stevenson poem to music

Items of Interest
—–British Library – ‘Man is not truly one, but truly two’: duality in Robert Louis Stevenson’s Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Greg Buzzwell
—–Wiki – Adaptations of Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde – There is a wonderful catalog here of J/H productions from 1887 to the present
—–Northwestern Now – Your Memory is like the Telephone Game by Maria Paul
—–Britannica – Robert Louis Stevenson
—–Interesting Literature – The Surprising Truth behind Jekyll and Hyde by Daniel Evers
—–Dark Worlds Quarterly – Classic Monsters in Comics: Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde offers a fun look at comic treatments over the ages
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What me worry? – from above article

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Filed under classics, Fiction, Horror, Literary Fiction

Tagged as Fiction, horror, Mystery, Suspense, Thriller

June 30, 2023 · 12:01 am

The Red Queen by Juan Gómez-Jurado

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The weight on her chest lightens, her breathing slows. The ‘monkeys inside her head screech a little less loudly. That’s what is so brilliant about certainties, even fleeting ones. They offer us respite.

Police Inspector Jon Guttierez of the Bilbao PD, 43, is a large person, a weightlifter who lives with his mother. He ran into a spot of trouble recently when he attempted to plant evidence on a well-known drug dealer, only to be filmed in the act, said film going viral. Oopsy. He stands to lose a lot more than just his badge. When what to his wondering eyes should appear but a get-out-of-jail-free card, in the form of a mysterious personage known as Mentor. But Mentor has a tough, if unusual ask. He wants Jon to persuade someone to return to work. Someone who really, really does not want back in.

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Juan Gómez-Jurado – image from Zenda

Antonia Scott (her father the British ambassador, her mother a Spaniard) spends three minutes of every day contemplating suicide. (Whatever works for ya, dear.) Her comatose beloved husband has been in a hospital bed for three years. She has been by his side throughout, clearly feeling some responsibility for his condition. (Antonia’s struggle is reminiscent of how JGJ felt when his father was dying during the writing of the book.) Antonia has regular chats with her English grandmother, who encourages her to put her particular set of skills to good use, instead of letting them go to waste. She has some superpowers, but also some limitations, one being a need for a certain medication when she is overwhelmed.

The inspiration for Antonia and Jon inevitably stems from Don Quixote and Sancho Panza. Antonia is that idealistic being, she does not hesitate to face the windmills, because she believes in a better world. Jon, on the other hand, is that pragmatist who has a dreamer hidden inside of him. – from the Hindustani interview

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Vicky Luengo plays Antonia Scott in the Prime series – image from InStyle

Jon clearly succeeds in drawing Antonia out, or we wouldn’t have a book. And he becomes her partner. Not spoilers. It appears that Antonia is quite special indeed, with a mental capacity well beyond the norm. She had been a member of an elite international police organization, Red Queen, a network across Europe, one unit per country, each led by a Mentor. They exist outside the usual police structures, relying on the local constabulary for on-scene access and intel. Each unit uses a person with special gifts to help solve major crimes. Red Queens are selected for having a set of particular characteristics, which Antonia has. Uber-smart, amazing memory, analytical capacity just this side of a super-computer. (very Lisbeth Salander) But will she be smart enough to foil a criminal mastermind who has already murdered one child of the uber-rich, and has kidnapped another?

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Hovik Keuchkerian plays Jon Guttierez in the Prime series – image from his Twitter profile

Alvaro Trueba, a teenager, has been dead several days, drained of blood, and laid out with bizarre religious iconography that is clear to the particularly perceptive. The kidnapper calls himself Ezekiel. The house in which his body was found, in a gated community, was one of several owned by his one-percenter parents.

Antonia and Jon must contend with the Abduction and Extortion Unit. (AEU), led by Captain Jose Luis Parra. Far too often, police stories have a dickish supervisor, tacking to political winds at every breeze, and getting in the way of actual investigators. Parra serves that role here, although as someone in a parallel, instead of superior role. He is not a totally incompetent team leader. Still, very dickish.

Just because we’re a unit created to avoid competition and secrets being kept between different police forces doesn’t mean we don’t repeat the same old mistakes.

Carlos Ortiz is the wealthiest man in the world. When his daughter, Carla, is kidnapped, he receives a call. His next call is to Red Queen, and Jon and Antonia are brought in, seeing the obvious connections between the cases.

The story is told in the 3rd person, primarily following Antonia and Jon as they track down leads in pursuit of the baddie. Once Carla is taken hostage, we flip back and forth between the investigation and her experience. There are occasional sidebar chapters in which we get a closer look at some of the supporting characters.

Red Queen is a particularly fun thriller to read. JGJ has a wonderfully droll (snotty?) sense of humor which permeates. Do not expect rolling on the floor hysterics, but you will smile and titter a lot. Jon gets all he knows about children from Modern Family reruns or When his sandwich arrives, Jon confirms that the hospital follows tradition: the grill they use must never be cleaned. Because she is fluent in many languages, Antonia often brings in obscure words or expressions from diverse cultures (aboriginal, South Ghanaian, and others) when that word is particularly descriptive of a situation. This is a wonderful bit, speaking to the limits of communication in a single language. There is also some intel on the ancient, unseen, infrastructure of Madrid, a nifty Dan-Brownish touch.

The supporting cast is also a plus. Corrupt security guards, a feisty nonagenarian granny, a tattoo artist who delights in disrespecting tourist customers, the testosterone-poisoned Captain Parra, an oily reporter, a mad scientist (I am not crazy; my reality is just different from yours.), and an evil baddie. The portrayal of criminal motivation and history was thin, but hopefully later volumes will flesh those out a bit more.

I was hesitant at first to read this one, as it is the opener of a trilogy. Would there be resolution at the end or a cliffhanger? The answer is yes. There are some things that remain to be resolved, but there is enough of an ending here to make it a viable stand-alone read. Every adventure requires a first step.

There are twists and turns aplenty, which always helps. And questions to be answered. Will Carla escape? Will Antonia and Jon uncover who is behind these crimes? Will the usual competitive misery from other forces interfere with the investigation? What is it the kidnappers want and why are those demands not being met? Will Antonia completely fall apart before they can complete their mission? (We’re all mad here)

You will want to know as you flip-flip-flip-flip through these pages. Red Queen is a good beginning at which to begin. I would urge you to go on till you come to the end, then stop. But of course, that will not be possible for most of us. We only received an English-language translation of Reisa Rosa in 2023. It was originally released in Spain in 2018. There are three books in the series. For those fluent in Spanish there will be no waiting, but for those of us who do not speak Spanish, let the panting begin for volumes two (Loba Negra or Black Wolf, due 3/12/24 from Minotaur) and three (Rey Blanco or White King, presumably a year later) in English translation. The trilogy has been a huge international hit. Prime has optioned the series for a Spanish-language production. In the video interview linked below, we learn that primary shooting has completed for at least five episodes. I would guess a probable release in late 2023 or in 2024. I wouldn’t wait, though. Red Queen is a perfect summer read, whatever color roses you might prefer.

A spasm of pure fear convulses Antonia’s body. Fear and loathing. Because she finally understands—with piercing, icy clarity—what has been going on from the very start.

Review posted – June 30, 2023

Publication date – March 14, 2023 – (English translation)
It was first published in Spanish on November 8, 2018

I received an ARE of Red Queen from Minotaur Books in return for a fair review, and releasing my hostage. Thanks, folks.

This review is cross-posted on Goodreads. Stop by and say Hi!

=======================================EXTRA STUFF

Links to Gomez-Jurado’s personal, FB, and Twitter pages

Profile– from EAE Business School

Juan Gómez-Jurado was born in Madrid in 1977. His interest in literature led him to pursue a career in Information Science. No one at TVE, Canal Plus, La Voz de Galicia or COPE Radio Station —where he has worked— could have imagined what he would become in time. It wasn’t until 2006, when he published his novel, God’s Spy, that his talent became known, not only in Spain, but all across the globe.
Since then, he hasn’t stopped writing. Contract with God, The Traitor’s Emblem, The Legend of the Thief, The Patient, Scar… Year after year, his books keep on coming out. No time to rest. And his success keeps on rising and he keeps on breaking records. The trilogy made up of Red Queen, Black Wolf and White King, was the first to have all three books among the best-selling books in Spain simultaneously. In fact, Red Queen has been the most read book in Spain for two years in a row now, which translates into more than two million copies sold.

Interviews
—–Murder by the Book – Live from Madrid: Juan Gomez-Jurado Presents, “The Red Queen” Hosted by Sara DiVello – video – 35:08 – almost all of this is about his writing process, with bits about this book here and there
—–Hindustan Times – Interview: Juan Gomez-Jurado, author, Red Queen by Arunima Mazumdar

Item of Interest from the author
—–Crime Reads – Excerpt – Jon trying to persuade Antonia to return to work

Items of Interest
—–Gutenberg – Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
—–Gutenberg – Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll
—–Gutenberg – Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
—–Bookroo – quotes from Alice in Wonderland

The epigraph of the novel is a quote from Through the Looking Glass, the book title having been taken from that. So, it seemed fitting to sprinkle throughout the review quotes from that and from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. I used the Bookroo site above for that.

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Filed under Fiction, Mystery, Suspense, Thriller, Thriller

Tagged as crime, Fiction, Mystery, police, spain, Suspense, Thriller

June 23, 2023 · 12:01 pm

Sisters of the Lost Nation by Nick Medina

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The spirit of a chief, you see, is a powerful thing. The skull became a head again when it was lifted from the grave . . . resurrected.”
“Resurrected?” she echoed.
“Alive again,” he said, his voice measured and grievously low, prolonging every word. “But not like it was before. Not like the old chief. It’s angry now that it’s been ripped from its rest. And ravenous. Hungry for revenge. It’ll eat anyone it encounters. It’ll tear flesh from bone.”
“How?” she said.
“It rolls, gathering mud and moss on its decaying flesh.”

Black bark to her sides and ash beneath her feet, she smelled the earthy odors of dirt, mud, burnt wood, and something so vile her stomach turned. It was the same smell the wind had wafted her way on the nights she’d been chased. Only the odor was stronger now. Inescapable.

Seventeen-year-old Anna Horn is terrified of two things. The first a magical, carnivorous head that gets around by rolling, and is possessed of a set of very nasty teeth. She believes it is determined to eat her. This is the result of a tale her Uncle Ray had told her ten years ago. Her terror about the rolling head permeates, as she fears its arrival every time there is a rustle in the bushes, the main difference in her experience of it being that she can flee faster at seventeen than she could at seven. The second is that she will never see her sister again. Fifteen-year-old Grace has joined the growing list of Native women gone missing.

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Nick Medina – image from Transatlantic Agency

Anna is in the throes of that perennial challenge of the teen-years, (for some of us, this challenge can go on for decades) figuring out who she is. She is way more mature than most of us were at that age, for sure. She does not exactly dress to impress, favoring her father’s old clothes, and sporting a very unfashionable short haircut. She loves the stories of her tribe, the fictional Takodas, to the point of wanting to start a historical preservation society, to save Takoda history, myths, and traditions for future generations. The considerate and kind classmates at her mostly white school completely understand and support her efforts at self-discovery. As if. They make her school experience a living hell, taking it further than unkind words. Grace is a very different sort, desperate to fit in, wanting attention, focusing on her looks and pleasing others in order to grease the way to hanging with the cool kids. Acquiring a cell phone is the key to her potential rise, and she will do whatever she can to get the money for one.

The story flips back and forth in time, moving forward from Anna’s Day 1 in showing how events came to be, and from the day of Grace’s disappearance, showing the investigation and results. Chapters are labeled in reference to days since Anna’s story begins. Grace does not go missing until well along in those days. Chapters looking at the search for Grace are also labeled with the number of hours since her disappearance.

Medina wanted to highlight the epidemic of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (WWIMG) that has been devastating Native communities for a long time. He shows the all-too-familiar problems residents of tribal lands face when someone goes missing, a viper’s nest of overlapping legal jurisdictions, inadequate police funding, and official indifference among them, not to mention racism. Speaking of which Medina portrays people of all shades as less then admirable. Even the Native manager of the casino assigns Native workers based on their skin color. Fox Ballard, nephew of the tribal leader, is young, handsome, flashy, sculpted, and not at all to be trusted.

Medina pays attention, as well to the impact of modernization on traditional values. The Takoda nation has been significantly changed by the opening of a casino on the reservation. The most obvious contrast is that of Anna (traditional) vs Grace (modern). The new road offers up a steady supply of splatted frogs, a pretty clear image of the cost of replacing treasured values with treasure. Income from the casino is making its way to all the people on the rez, although it is also clear that some Takoda are more equal than others.

As explained in the Author’s note that follows the book, the inspiration for the carnivorous rolling head came from actual Wintu and Cheyenne legends. It reminded me of the relentless ungulate in Stephen Graham Jones’s The Only Good Indians, except that the elk in Jones’s tale is seeking revenge, while the head, though our only real look at it is through Anna’s terrified eyes, seems a more open opportunity attacker. Frankly, scary as it seems to her, it cannot hold a candle to Graham’s hoofed-slasher. It may have been scary to Anna as a character, but did not cause me any lost sleep as a reader.

I did feel at times that this book read more like a YA story than a fully adult one, an observation, not a black mark. The greatest strength of the novel is Medina’s portrayal of his lead, Anna. It is in seeing her social challenges, following her passions, tracking her investigative efforts, admiring her bravery, and rooting for her to mature to a point where she is comfortable in her own skin, that we come to care about her. That alone makes this a good read. The added payload, about the core issue of the book, Missing and Murdred Indigenous Women, about the impact of modernization on traditional values, about gender identity, and about the impact of story on our lives, gives it a far greater heft.

This is Medina’s first novel. He refers to it as a “thriller with mythological horror.” It is an impressive beginning to what we hope is a long and productive career.

She said Frog exemplified transformation. He entered life in one form and left it in another. From egg to tadpole, to tadpole with legs, to amphibian with tail, to tailless frog, he was never the same. He began life in water, only emerging once he was his true self. He symbolized change, rebirth, and renewal, and his spirit could bring rain.
Anna stared down at the ill-fated frog. The reservation was transforming. The asphalt beneath her feet was evidence of that. And yet the very symbol of change had become a victim of it. The absurdity didn’t escape her.

Review posted – 6/23/23

Publication date – 4/18/23

I received an ARE of book name from publisher in return for a fair review. Thanks, folks. Can you get that thing to stop chasing me? And thanks to NetGalley for facilitating.

This review is cross-posted on Goodreads. Stop by and say Hi!

=======================================EXTRA STUFF

Links to the author’s personal, Instagram, and Twitter pages

PROFILE – from The Transatlantic Agency

A Chicago native, Nick Medina is an author and college professor of public speaking and multicultural communication…Nick’s first short story was published in 2009 and he has since had dozens more published by West Pigeon Press, Dark Highlands, and UnEarthed Press, in addition to outlets in the U.S. and the U.K., such as Midwest Literary Magazine, The Washington Pastime, The Absent Willow Review and Underground Voices.

Interviews
—–Paulsemel.com – Exclusive Interview: “Sisters Of The Lost Nation” Author Nick Medina – e-mail interview
—–#Poured Over – The B&N Podcast – Nick Medina on Sisters of the Lost Nation – by Marie Cummings – video – 48:04
—–Murder by the Book – Special Prelaunch Q&A: Nick Medina Presents “Sister of the Lost Nation” by Sara DiVello – video – 33:31
—–FanFiAddict – Author Interview: Nick Medina (Sisters of the Lost Nation) by Cassidee Lanstra

Items of Interest from the author
—–Tor.Com – Excerpt
—–CrimeReads.com – EXPLORING SOCIAL ISSUES THROUGH HORROR

Items of Interest
—–Medina said that his initial inspiration for the novel was from an AP article published in the Chicago Tribune. Here is the article as published by AP – #NotInvisible: Why are Native American women vanishing? by Sharon Cohen
—–CBC – MMIWG cases continued at same rate even after national inquiry began, data shows
—– First People: American Indian Legends – The Rolling Head – A Cheyenne Legend

For horror grounded in the Native experience, I can recommend
—–Stephen Graham Jones – Mongrels
—–Stephen Graham Jones – The Only Good Indians
—–Stephen Graham Jones – My Heart is a Chainsaw
—–Stephen Graham Jones – Don’t Fear the Reaper
—–Cherie Dimaline – Empire of Wild

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Filed under Fantasy, Fiction, Horror, Mystery, Native Americans, Suspense, Thriller

Tagged as coming-of-age, fantasy, Fiction, horror, indigenous, lgbtq, magical-realism, Mystery, mythology, native-american, Suspense

March 31, 2023 · 12:01 am

The Angel Maker by Alex North

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Our experiences and fears collect in the backs of our minds like dry kindling…

…there is really no such thing as long ago

After writing eleven stand-alone mystery/thriller novels, author Steve Mosby shifted course to horror, birthing his nom de doom, Alex North. The Angel Maker is his third under that name. The first, The Whisper Man, was a spine-tingler of the highest order. His second, 2020 – The Shadows, took on lucid-dreaming, bound to garish murders. The Angel Maker returns us to a contemporary setting brought into being by crimes committed a generation ago. It revolves around a spooky book, around one seriously messed-up family, around a young woman, and around a central philosophical theory that fuels a psycho-serial killer.

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Alex North – image from Hull Noir

Thirty-something Katie Shaw is a caring teacher with a three-and-a-half-year-old daughter, and a shaky marriage to her childhood sweetheart. Her brother, Chris, a couple years younger, has been out of touch for quite a while. Katie had finally reported him to the police after he’d stolen money from her bag during a family event. Drug addiction can do that to a person. But then, if you were 15 when some seemingly random psycho tries to kill you on your own street and literally tear your face off, it can have lifelong repercussions. So, Chris has issues. But he is out now, of jail, of rehab, has been for a while, even has a partner and a life. Which is why Katie is confused when her mother tells her that Chris has gone missing. And the hunt is on, as Katie goes all Miss Marple, trying to track down her little brother.

Professor Alan Hobbes, seventy-something, is getting his affairs in order as he expects to die on October 4, 2017, the present of the novel. He lives, or rather lived in a very large house, one with some decidedly spooky elements.

…at the far end of the room, an archway.
He stared at that for a moment. It clearly led away into some deeper chamber of the house, but the blackness there was impenetrable. [Detective] Laurence [Page] could hear the faintest rush of air emerging from it, and the sound reminded him of something breathing.

This in addition to a section of the upstairs floor that burned decades back, but was never repaired. (The UK title of the book is The Half Burnt House.)

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Tartini’s Dream by Louis Leopold Boilly – image from Wikipedia – this appears in a lecture Hobbes is giving

Why did Chris disappear? How did Hobbes foresee his own end? And what does all this have to do with notorious child-killer (and possible seer) Jack Lock, who died in prison in 1956? What was Lock writing in his book all those years ago, and why is some rich guy looking to get it? Edward Leland is clearly a nogoodnik, rich, angry, sociopathic, employer of bad people. And he wants that book, whatever it takes.

So, we have our hero, Katie, who is the primary page-getter here. (19 chapters of 50) We follow along as she tries to track down her brother as the threat levels against both her and Chris keep ratcheting up. Oh, and the guy who had tried to kill Chris all those years ago? Out of jail.

When I first started planning and writing The Angel Maker, all I really knew was that I wanted… the characters [to] be searching for a rare and forbidden text. Some of them would end up doing so for innocent reasons, of course, but there would be others who genuinely coveted the dark knowledge they imagined it contained…I settled on the journal of a fictional serial killer called Jack Lock, an item that would be valuable in and of itself to certain damaged people. But I also wanted it to contain some kind of secret knowledge, which raised further questions. What else might drive people to seek this book out?…in the end, I went with an idea that has haunted me more than a little for many years now, and which engages with a number of the themes that have always interested me. Nature versus nurture. The influence of the past on the present. How much control any of us really have. – from the Crimereads interview

North flogs this theme throughout, which is a strength, giving the book more heft than relying solely on a scary story. Here we have a scary philosophical theory. Leads one to wonder, with a shudder, just how many people might hew to this perspective.

Detectives Laurence Page and Caroline Pettifer offer some entertaining banter, but serve mostly as a way of connecting parts of the story. Laurence offers some echoing of parental issues as well.

The story is definitely engaging. Katie is a good egg, and is easy to root for. North provides her with the handicap of an unsupportive, disbelieving husband, which was cause for a bit of eye-rolling. It is such a trope these days. Maybe always has been.

Dangling fantasy items are tossed in, but seem gratuitous. Katie’s daughter reporting that the moon comes to talk to her, for example. There are a few more otherworldly gewgaws added here and there, but they serve, mostly, as window-dressing.

There are elements that permeate. The first is, obviously, the quest for the magical book. Second is Katie’s quest to find her brother. Parent/child relationships are important, particularly when parents display a clear preference for one child over another. Siblings have issues with each other as well. (Don’t we all?) Thematically, the book is about free choice. Are we really free, or is everything laid out, reducing us to actors reading lines? Do events in our past define our options moving forward? And if the future is set, where lies personal responsibility? North has some fun counterpointing characters named Lock and Hobbes, standing in for the immutability of determined events vs the ability of people to effect change via personal decision-making, reflecting their well-known namesakes from Western philosophical history.

The story dips back from the present (2017), with scenes set in the 1950s, ‘70s, 80s, and 90s, offering explanations for what is going on today. Some might find it a bit tough to follow. I did not have a problem. There are fifty chapters in this 336-page book. So, it is easy to read this one in small chunks if that is your style.

There probably are no books that can foretell the future. But, the odds are that by the time you finish reading The Angel Maker, I predict, you will be quivery and exhausted. You are free to read this book, or to pass, a matter of personal choice. But if one believes in God, a god who knows all that has happened, all that is happening, and all that is to come, then the decision was made long before you were ever offered the choice. Are you still responsible for that decision? And if you veer from what is written in God’s plan, are you not defying the Almighty? Read it or not. The choice is up to you?

“If you could see the future,” Sam asked her, “would you want to?”

Review posted – March 31, 2023

Publication date – February 28, 2023

I received an ARE of The Angel Maker from Celadon in return for a fair review and agreeing not to dig up those things in my yard. Thanks, folks, and thanks to NetGalley for facilitating.

This review has been cross-posted on Goodreads. Stop by and say Hi!

=======================================EXTRA STUFF

My reviews of other books by North
—–20219 – The Whisper Man
—–2020 – The Shadows

Songs/Music
—–Cher – If I Could Turn Back Time
—–Jim Croce – Time in a Bottle
—–La Stravaganza – Violin Sonata in G Minor—the Devil’s Trill

Item of Interest from the author
—–Crimereads – Alex North on the Pleasure of Fictional Forbidden Texts

It’s a familiar and recurring motif in fiction: the search for a work of art that may or may not exist. One that is difficult to find. One that is rare because it’s awful, and which is sought after for both reasons. The idea speaks to a human desire to face the forbidden simply because it is forbidden. To be a member of the select few that have gone through an ordeal that others have not. To be let in on a secret even if learning it will ultimately destroy you.

Item of Interest
—–Wiki – Laplace’s Demon
—–CRAM – Hard Determinism and John Locke’s Theory of Human Philosophy

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Filed under Fiction, Horror, Mystery, Suspense, Thriller, Thriller

Tagged as horror, Suspense, Thriller

March 3, 2023 · 12:01 am

Don’t Fear the Reaper by Stephen Graham Jones

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Dark Mill South’s Reunion Tour began on December 12th, 2019, a Thursday. Thirty-six hours and twenty bodies later, on Friday the 13th, it would be over.

…souls are like livers: they regenerate and regenerate, until you’ve finally poisoned them enough that the only thing they can do is kill you…

First, while I suppose it is possible to read Don’t Fear the Reaper as a stand-alone, I would not advise it. It is the second entry in The Lake Witch Trilogy. I mean, would you read The Two Towers without having first read The Fellowship of the Ring? Sure, Jones fills in enough details here that you could get by, maybe. But why would you want to? There is too much from the first book that you should know before heading into this one. So, if you have not yet read book #1, My Heart is a Chainsaw, settle back in your favorite reading spot, have a go at that one first, then head back here.

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Stephen Graham Jones – image from The Big Thrill

Well, it had been a quiet week in Proofrock, Idaho, “the little town that time forgot and the decades cannot improve.” But it somehow makes itself the Cabot Cove of slasherdom. A chapter walks us through the place’s dodgy past, which culminated in the Independence Day Massacre of Book #1, four years before Book #2 picks up.

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Michael Myers of Halloween – image from Vulture

Jennifer Daniels, Jennifer, not Jade, Jennifer, the kick-ass final girl last time, is out of jail, but only if she can keep from destroying any more government property (as if). It just so happens that there is an epically murderous killer also just out of jail, but not from having been released. Dark Mill South is not a typical name for a killer, for anyone really. But then his killings are not usual either, offering, in addition to severe personal carnage, the placing of bodies facing north. He is supposedly seeking revenge for the hanging of thirty-eight Dakota men in 1862. And, in a nod no doubt, to urban legends, DMS is short one hand, while being plus one hook. A very large, burly person as well, up past 6’5” Jason Voorhees, giving him the BMOC title for slashers. Whoo-hoo! And unlike the main killer of book #1, DMS is an actual flesh-and-blood (lots of blood) monstrosity, not an ageless spook. He can be killed.

He wasn’t meant to make it as far as he does in the book. The way I initially conceived him, he was gonna be this big bad killer who comes to town, and then within a matter of minutes, he gets put down. But then I built him too bad. He couldn’t be put down easily. – from The Big Thrill interview

Even wildlife gets involved in this one. Not the first time of course. Jones did present a vengeful ungulate in The Only Good Indians, and unhappy ursines were a presence in My Heart is a Chainsaw.

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Jason Voorhees of Friday the 13th – image from Vulture

It will give Jade, no, Jennifer, Jennifer, sheesh, the opportunity to go all Final Girl again, but she would rather not, thanks. Who will she identify as the FG this time?

Her fingernails aren’t painted black, and her boots are the dress-ones her lawyer bought for her. The heels are conservative, there are no aggressive lugs on the soles, and the threads are the same dark brown color as the fake, purply-brown leather.

She has gone mainstream, even has long, healthy (Indian) hair now, and a passel of credits from community college correspondence courses. She is back in town after five years of dealing with the justice system from the wrong side of the bars. It is ten degrees, and there is a nasty winter storm making it tough to get around, effectively isolating Proofrock, and it’s unwelcome visitor. The local population will be compressed into a smaller piece of town, as survivors congregate where they might gain some security.

The bodies start piling up in short order, a range of unpleasantries foisted upon them, the local constabulary, per usual in slasher tales, offering a somewhat less than totally effective level of protection to the community.

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Jigsaw – of Saw – Image from IGN

At age 17, Jade (yes, she was Jade then) offered us a tutorial on slasher norms. And saw how what was happening in her town fit the slasher-film norms (maybe should be ab-norms?) Her encyclopedic knowledge of the genre gave her an edge, allowed her to predict the future by looking at what had been produced in the cinematic past. This was done in chapters titled Slasher 101. That has been much reduced here. Although there are a few essay chapters in which a student writes to her teacher about similar subject matter, replicating the Jade-Holmes connection. Additional intel is presented through several characters who share Jennifer’s encyclopedic knowledge of the genre.

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Freddie Krueger of Nightmare on Elm Street – image from Vulture

As with its predecessor, DFtR is an homage to the slasher film genre, particularly the product of the late 20th century golden age. I thought about keeping track of the films named, but it was soon clear that this was a fool’s errand. Like Lieutenant Dunbar says in Dances with Wolves, when Kicking Bird asks how many white men will be coming, they are like the stars. I enjoy slasher films as much as most of you, but am not a maven, by any stretch. One can enjoy this book without being familiar with ALLLLL of the gazillion films that are mentioned, but it did detract from the fun of reading this to feel as if the slasher film experts were passing notes behind my back, and that I was missing the significance of this or that flick nod. Sure, some explanations are offered, but the book would have to be twice as long to explain all of the references, in addition to the dead weight it would have added to the forward progress of the story.

There was almost no weight to be added for this novel.

Never planned on My Heart is a Chainsaw being the first installment of a trilogy, nope. But then in revisions, Joe Monti, my editor at Saga, said… what if everybody wasn’t dead at the end?
I hemmed and hawed, didn’t want to leave anyone standing, but gave it a shot anyway. And it worked, was amazing. And it meant Chainsaw felt like it wanted to now open up to a trilogy, which I think is the most natural form for a slasher to take. – from The Lineup interview

But Jones did not roll out bed knowing how to structure, to write a trilogy, so he studied some of his favorite film series, Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings, to see how it is done. He also corralled a novel into his self-study class and learned a lot, particularly on handling multiple character POVs.

I wrote Don’t Fear The Reaper right at the end of rereading Larry McMurtry’s Lonesome Dove. And that’s in parts, and each part introduces a new character and then it goes into everything else. And it cycles through all their heads. So that’s what I tried to do in Don’t Fear the Reaper—-and following that model was really productive. I don’t think I could have written Don’t Fear the Reaper if I hadn’t just come out of Lonesome Dove. – from the Paste Magazine interview

Part of that cycling includes a peek inside the squirrelly brain of DMS, who, at one point, is in pursuit of two females and relishing the thought of skinning them both alive in a creative way.

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Leather Face – of Texas Chainsaw Massacre – image from Texas Monthly

There is some other pretty weird material in this one that might take up residence in your nightmares, substances that may or may not be real, that may be or may become human, or humanoid, or some sort of living creature. Thankfully, we do not see things through their eyes. (do they even have eyes?)

Many horror products, films, movies, TV shows, et al, get by with a simple surfacy fright-fest, counting bodies and maybe indulging in creative ways of killing, but the better ones add a layer. Jones looks at things from a Native American perspective, as well as that of a serious slasher-movie fan. Not only is Jennifer a Native American final girl (well, she was in the prior book anyway. We do not know straight away if she will be forced to reprise the role this time.) The Jason-esque killer is a Native American as well. Inclusion all around. As noted above, the literary references SGJ favors are to slasher films, but he is not above tossing in more classical literary references. I particularly enjoyed:

In the summer of 2015 a rough beast slouched out of the shadows and into the waking nightmares of an unsuspecting world. His name was Dark Mill South, but that wasn’t the only name he went by.

Jones is offering here a reference to a world famous poem by William Butler Yeats, The Second Coming, which ends with an end-times image (what rough beast, its hour come round at last, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?) of a nightmare realized. (You can read the poem in EXTRA STUFF) It will certainly be end-times for many residents of Proofrock.

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Ghostface – of Scream – image from Variety

One of the underlying elements of the slasher story is that it is a bubble inside which some form of justice will be meted out.

Now in 2023, I think the reason we’ve been into slashers the last few years….I think the 24-hour news cycle has greatly contributed to that, and also the election in 2016 that resulted in the news feeding us daily images, hourly images of people doing terrible things at podiums, at rallies, and then walking away unscathed. And what the slasher gives us is the ability to engage for two hours, for six hours, whatever, a world that is brutally fair. A world where if you do something wrong, you’re getting your head chopped off. That sense of fairness is so alluring to us – from the Paste interview

Maybe not so alluring for the collateral victims who clog up the streets, buildings, and waterways, but there is usually some justifiable revenge taking place. Bullies get comeuppance, which is always satisfying.

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Pinhead – of Hellraiser – image from Wired

While Jade/Jennifer does not get our total attention this time ‘round, she remains our primary POV in a town where, really, not all the women are strong, only some of the men are good-looking, and a fair number of the children are, well, different. She is a great lead, having proven her mettle in Book #1, an outsider, that weird kid, charged with challenging a mortal assault on the residents of her town, her superpower her scary knowledge of slasher canon, and a hefty reservoir of guts. Rooting for Jade/Jennifer is as easy as falling off a log, but hopefully without the dire consequences such an event might have in Indian Lake. You will love her to pieces. There are plenty of twists and surprises to keep you in the story. There is creepiness to make you look around your home just to make sure everything is ok. There is a semi’s worth of blood and gore, a bit more tutorial on the genre, and the action is relentless. Once you begin this series one thing is certain. You are sure to get hooked.

slashers never really die. They just go to sleep for a few years. But they’re always counting the days until round two.

Review posted – 3/3/23

Publication date – 2/7/23

I received an ARE of Don’t Fear the Reaper from Gallery / Saga Press in return for a fair review. Thanks, folks, and thanks to NetGalley for facilitating.

This review has been cross-posted on GoodReads

=======================================EXTRA STUFF

Links to the author’s personal, Twitter and FB pages

Interviews
—–The Big Thrill – Between the Lines: Stephen Graham Jones by April Snellings
—–Esquire – How Stephen Graham Jones Is Reinventing the Slasher By Neil Mcrobert
—–Gizmodo – Horror Author Stephen Graham Jones on His Latest Chiller, Don’t Fear the Reaper by Cheryl Eddy
—–The Lineup – Cut to the Heart: An Interview with Stephen Graham Jones/a> by Mackenzie Kiera
—–Litreactor – Stephen Graham Jones on Trilogies, Deaths, Slashers, and Dog Nipples by Gabino Iglesias
—-* Paste Magazine – Stephen Graham Jones Talks Final Girls, Middle Books, and Don’t Fear the Reaper by Lacy Baugher Milas – This is primo material

Paste Magazine: So, the title Don’t Fear The Reaper —which is one of my favorite songs, by the way—I’m assuming that must come from Blue Oyster Cult.
Stephen Graham Jones: Well, it does come from Blue Oyster Cult, but really it’s that—in Halloween, Jamie Lee Curtis and her friend are riding in her friend’s Monte Carlo, and they’re listening to (Don’t Fear) The Reaper, and then in 1996 with Scream, a cover of Don’t Fear) The Reaper is playing over Billy and Sid, and so it seemed like that was a kind of momentum. I had no choice but to call it Don’t Fear The Reaper, I was going to honor my heroes. Stephen Graham Jones on Writing, the Pantheon of Horror, and Clowns by Leah Schnelbach – nada on Reaper

If you want even more interviews with SGJ, I posted a bunch in my review of My Heart is a Chainsaw. There are plenty more contemporary (2023) interviews to be had if you feel the urge.

Songs/Music
—–Blue Oyster Cult – Don’t Fear the Reaper
—–Largehearted boy – Stephen Graham Jones’s Playlist for His Novel “Don’t Fear the Reaper”

My reviews of (sadly, only three) previous books by Jones
—–2021 – My Heart is a Chainsaw – on Coot’s Reviews
—–2020 – The Only Good Indians
—–2016 – Mongrels

Items of Interest
—–Pop Culture – Horror Movie Characters – includes stats on them
—–William Butler Yeats – The Second Coming

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Tagged as Fiction, horror, indigenous, Mystery, Suspense

February 3, 2023 · 12:01 am

The Hunter by Jennifer Herrera

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Maude’s voice was far away, the way the chime of a bell can feel distant even if it’s right in front of you. “You’re too late,” she said to me, to no one. “Every last one of them is dead.”

“Every gift comes at a price.”

NYPD detective Leigh O’Donnell is on double-secret suspension. Her prospects of returning to her job are about as real as Dean Wormer ever authorizing the return of Delta Tau Chi. On top of that, she is newly separated from her (boss) husband, the person who suspended her. He could not understand why she would pull her gun on a fellow officer, allowing a caught suspect to escape. Thankfully, her brother, Ronan (Ro), gets in touch. Seems that back home in Copper Falls, Ohio, there had been a very suspicious triple death. And they would love it if an actual NYC detective could pop by for a look-see. Leigh takes the opportunity to skip town for a while, bringing along her four-year-old daughter, Simone.

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Jennifer Herrera – image from her site

Who says you can’t go home again? Oh, Thomas Wolfe, in his novel of that name. Ok. Fine, whatever. Well, Leigh gives it a go anyway, taking the opportunity to introduce Simone to Leigh’s uncles, to Ro, and to the town in which she had grown up. It will come as no shock that author Jennifer Herrera spent much of her childhood in a small Ohio town.

For the first five years of my life, I lived in a trailer park, which, while not economically diverse, was diverse in just about every other way. So when my family moved to a small town in rural Ohio, I wasn’t prepared for how alien I would feel there. Everyone was related. They all looked alike. They went to the same church. They held the same beliefs. If you’re not from there, it’s unbelievable. But those places still exist.

When I was a kid, all I knew was that I didn’t fit in and wanted to get out. When I got older, I started to wonder what it was about this community that made them so afraid of letting the outside world in. – from The Book Club Kit

Herrera comes up with a few possibilities about that, most of them less than complimentary to the residents of her fictionalized version. This is a place with secrets. Pretty tough to make any progress finding out the truth when you are struggling upstream against a torrent of lies.

The first-person story-telling is mostly linear with some flashbacks. Added to the presenting mystery of what happened to these three young men are Leigh’s personal struggles. She wants to save her endangered marriage. She wants to resurrect her career as a detective. But she also wants to get a better handle on who she really is. For better or worse, this Podunk town is a part of her, even if she had left it years before, intending never to return. She has loving family here, in addition to painful memories. This was once a true home for her. Could it ever be that for her again? It would be great for her daughter to have a larger family tree than the few branches Leigh can offer her in NY. So, Leigh is engaging in a journey of self-discovery. But it is also a quest. You can tick off the Campbellian stages, as our hero does battle with dark forces and descends to the equivalent of hell, fending off monsters in order to reach her goal. One of her uncles even thinks of her as a classic Irish hero of legend, Fionn MacCumhaill – aka Finn McCool. The uncles serve multiple roles, connection to and intel on locals, child care for Simone, a warm, familial homey element, and comic relief.

Imagery abounds. Herrera clearly enjoys playing with archetypal images. Snakes put in appearances. There is an apple orchard that, when paired with the snakes, certainly gives one an image of a corrupted Eden. A house tucked away out of sight makes one wonder if there might be someone inside preparing to cook children. A flock of birds massing to protect one damaged member has got to mean something, right?

Shrines figure large. There are said to be shrines in the caves under the waterfall, likely remnants of indigenous people who were driven out by colonizers. The people of the town seriously want to keep their town the way it is, preserved in amber, a sort of shrine to their past, to themselves. Herrera includes a fun reference to a relevant Twilight Zone episode to bolster the image. The title of the book comes in for some use. Early on a character refers to detective Leigh as a hunter. An archetypal native personage figures large. There is even a sly reference to hunter green.

There are peculiarities that grab our attention and demand exploration. For example, threes abound here. Maud had three brothers who perished together a lifetime ago. There were the multiple deaths seven years back of three young men of eighteen. The latest mortal hat trick included men in their twenties, contemporaries of the prior three. Interestingly, the last two trifectas all turned up in the pool at the bottom of the same waterfall. Curious, no? And Leigh’s mother had three brothers, the uncles of this tale. What’s up with all the treys?

Obviously, poking through all this imagery stuff, looking for connections that may or may not be real, digging down into rabbit holes as they appear (What is that rabbit late for, and where is he going?) is great fun. But, pleasurable as that is, the book would not succeed if we did not feel a connection to the lead. Not to worry. Leigh has her issues, but she is definitely relatable.

On the down side, I found it a bit tough to accept that Leigh would do what she did in NYC for the reason that is offered.

The supporting cast is a mixed crew. Some stand out, like the elderly, mysterious Maud. Onetime bf and now reporter, Mason Vogel, is a confusing foil for Leigh. Her brother, Ronan, is a likeable partner. The uncles are fun. Most stand back, as supporting characters do. Means to an end, whether advancing the plot or offering atmospherics. The notion of history, both the immediate and personal history of individuals, and the larger, longer cultural history of a place, and its hold on the present, for good or ill, is palpable. The procedural elements are well done, and the explanations make a dark sort of sense. The lead is someone we can pull for. The Hunter is a fun read, an engaging mystery that will keep you well-entertained, and keep your gray cells firing for the duration.

…most of the businesses in town—the grocery store, the antiques market, the candy shop—they’re all owned by the same seven families. The Wagners are the majority share, sure, but this town? It’s all one big family business.”
“That’s insane.”
“Not really. I’m sure it’s like that in a lot of places. See, those seven families have never left. Some individuals left, sure, but most of them stayed. People give their houses to their kids or their grandkids. Sometimes nephews and nieces. But it’s rare for them to sell to outsiders. Especially the houses close to the center of town. There are ordinances forbidding new construction. We don’t get many new people here.”

Review posted – 2/3/23

Publication date – 1/10/23

I received an eARE of The Hunter from Putnam in return for a fair review. Thanks, folks, and thanks to NetGalley for facilitating.

This review has been cross-posted on GoodReads

=======================================EXTRA STUFF

Links to the author’s personal, Instagram, and Twitter pages

Interviews
—–Oh! Murder – Interview: Jennifer Herrera, The Hunter
—–The Mystery of Writing – The Hunter: Debut Thriller

Items of Interest from the author
—–Book Club Kit
—–Crimereads – MEN ARE THE MOST LIKELY VICTIMS OF HOMICIDE. WHY DO CRIME WRITERS KILL SO MANY WOMEN?

Items of Interest
—–Wiki on Thomas Wolfe’s novel, You Can’t Go Home Again

“You can’t go back home to your family, back home to your childhood … back home to a young man’s dreams of glory and of fame … back home to places in the country, back home to the old forms and systems of things which once seemed everlasting, but which are changing all the time – back home to the escapes of Time and Memory.”

—–Discovering Ireland – Fionn MacCumhaill – aka Finn McCool of Irish legends
—–Twilight Zone Fandom – The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine
—–ProWritingAid – Deep Dive: Joseph Campbell’s “Hero’s Journey”
—–Wiki on Animal House

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Tagged as crime, Fiction, procedural, Suspense, Thriller

January 27, 2023 · 12:01 am

The House in the Pines by Ana Reyes

book cover

An ancient poplar loomed at the entrance to the abandoned road, its rounded mass of huddled gray limbs reminding her of a brain. She passed beneath its lobes, twigs branching like arteries overhead as she entered the forest.

Deep in these woods, there is a house that’s easy to miss.
Most people, in fact, would take one look and insist it’s not there. And they wouldn’t be wrong, not completely. What they would see are a house’s remains, a crumbling foundation crawling with weeds. A house long since abandoned. But look closely at the ground here, at this concrete scarred by sun and ice. This is where the fireplace goes. If you look deeply enough, a spark will ignite. And if you blow on it, that spark will bloom into a blaze, a warm light in this cold dark forest.

Maya Edwards is 25, not well off, ½ Guatemalan, ¼ Irish, ¼ Italian, with no career drive after getting her degree from Boston University. She is from Pittsfield, MA, where her mother still lives. Her father died before she was born. Not the only significant death in her life. When she was 18, her bff, Aubrey, died a mysterious death, at the hands, she believes, of a man they had both dated. But, despite her being present when it happened, there are no viable clues with which to make a case, and folks thought her nuts for even trying. Today Maya has a life, just moved in with her boyfriend, is about to meet his parents, when she sees a video on Youtube. A young woman, in a diner with her bf, suddenly keels over dead. A close look at her table partner reveals the same man who had killed her friend. She is terrified that he might continue to kill women and may become back to Pittsfield to clean up loose ends.

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Ana Reyes – image from her site

Maya keeps having dreams about a cabin in the woods, a welcoming abode, with a warm blaze in the fireplace, the burning pine logs adding their scent to the room, the log walls offering shelter from a strong wind. It is cozy, feels like home. But there is danger there as well. Frank is there in the dreams, always there. She struggles to understand the sounds she hears, but realizes they are coming from Frank, who appears suddenly behind her, and she wakes, drenched in sweat. So, what’s up with that?

The central mystery (well, there are two, the first one is whether Frank actually killed those two women, and if so how, and) what is the deal with the strange house in the woods that haunts her dreams, the House in the Pines of the title.

Maya is not the most reliable of narrators. She is going through withdrawal from Klonopin. It was prescribed to help her sleep, but the scrip can no longer be filled and she is trying to go cold turkey. She has used alcohol liberally to help her both sleep and drown out the darkness that troubles her. Is she imagining things? Are the drugs and alcohol causing her to hallucinate? Is the stress of white-knuckle withdrawal impairing her ability to reason?

I was living in Louisiana, working toward my MFA in fiction, and, like Maya,…had suddenly quit Klonopin after several years of taking it nightly for sleep. The doctor who had prescribed it back in LA never said anything about addiction, while my new Baton Rouge doctor treated me like an addict when I asked her for it. She cut me off cold turkey, and I went through protracted withdrawal syndrome, the symptoms of which inform Maya’s experience in the book. Writing about benzodiazepine withdrawal—albeit from her perspective—helped me through it. – from the Book Club Kit

The story flips back and forth between the present day and seven years prior. We get to see her friendship with Aubrey, and how Frank had come between them. We see how her current troubles with withdrawal and her determination to look into the Frank situation may be interfering with her current serious relationship.

Maya does her Miss Marple thing to try to find out what really happened to Aubrey, to find out how Frank killed her, and one more thing. During the few weeks in which she dated Frank, there were multiple episodes in which she lost hours of time. Did Frank drug her? There is peril aplenty, as we take Maya’s word that Frank is a killer, so all her activity might be putting her in mortal peril. If only the cops had taken her seriously, but you know the cops in such almost stories never do.

Pliny the Elder said Home is where the heart is, but how can a place that feels so home-like also be so terrifying? This reflects some events and concerns in Reyes’s life.

The inspiration was mostly subconscious. I was living alone in a new city, cut off from any place I’d call home, when I wrote the first draft. This lonely feeling inspired one of the book’s major themes, which is the universal yearning to return to a place and time of belonging. That theme shaped the story and helped me build the titular house in the pines. – from the Book Club Kit

Reyes incorporated several elements of her life into the book. In addition to struggles with addiction, both Maya and Ana are half Guatemalan. Both were raised in Pittsfield, MA. The book took seven years to write, and the gap between Aubrey’s death and Maya’s return to the scene of the crime is seven years.

In order to solve the mysteries, Maya must figure out the imagery in an incomplete book her father had been writing when he died in Guatemala. The references take one a bit afield, but if you dig into them, you will be rewarded. I posted some info in EXTRA STUFF.

Maya’s father’s book points to an important truth about the danger she’s in. For me this was a metaphor for inherited trauma. Like so many people with roots in colonized places, the violence of the past has a way of showing up in the present in unexpected and highly personal ways. This is true for Maya in a very literal sense. To save herself, she must understand a story written before she was born. – from the Book Club Kit

There are some fairy-tale-like references in here, but I am not sure they are much more than added in passing. One can see certainly see Frank as a seductive wolf, a la Little Red Riding Hood. A musical group dresses as the fairy godmothers, lending one to consider Sleeping Beauty, which is further reinforced by Maya’s several episodes of lost time, and, ironically, her difficulties with sleep. Woods, per se, have always been a source of fear in Western lore.

So, is it any good? Yep. Ana is certainly flawed enough for us to gain some sympathy, although she cashes in some of those chits with occasional foolish decisions. Secondary characters are a mixed lot. Her boyfriend is thinly drawn. Mom has more to her. Her teen bud, Aubrey, even more. Frank is an interesting mix of loser and menace. The strongest bits for me were a visit to Guatemala and the depiction of the attractiveness of the house. I will not give away the explanation for it all, but, while it may have a basis in the real world, I found it a stretch to buy completely. Still, righteous, if damaged, seeker of truth digging into the mysterious, while imperiled by a dark force, with little support from anyone, with a fascinating bit of other-worldliness at its core. I enjoyed my stay in the cabin. Page-turner material.

The image is both comforting and really sinister at the same time once we learn more about it.
Exactly. That’s definitely what I was going for, that dark side of nostalgia. – from the Salon interview

Review posted – 01/27/23

Publication date – 01/03/23

I received an ARE of The House in the Pines from Dutton in return for a fair review, and another log on the fire. Thanks, folks, and thanks to NetGalley for facilitating.

This review has been cross-posted on GoodReads

=======================================EXTRA STUFF

Links to the author’s personal, FB, Instagram, and Twitter pages

The House in the Woods Was a Reese’s book club selection for January 2023

Interviews
—–NY Times – Teaching Writing to Retirees Helped Ana Reyes Stay Focused by Elisabeth Egan
—–Salon – “House in the Pines” thriller author on the “dark side of nostalgia” with a narrator no one believes
—–Writer’s Digest – Ana Reyes: On Working The Writing Muscles by Robert Lee Brewer
—–Professional Book Nerds – Talking The House in the Pines with Author Ana Reyes by Joe Skelley – audio – 40:00

Items of Interest
—–Book Club Kit
—–Gnosis.org – The Hymn of the Pearl – The Acts of Thomas

Songs/Music
—– Emily Portman – Two Sisters – referenced in Chapter 5, although by a different performer
—–Bobby Darin – Dream Lover – playing at the Blue Moon Diner in Chapter 10
—–Mano Negra – El Senor Matanza – noted in Chapter 11 as Maya’s new favorite band
—– Nine Inch Nails – The Downward Spiral – mentioned in Chapter 17
—– The Foo Fighters – There is Nothing Left to Lose – mentioned in Chapter 17
—–Lenny Kravitz – Mama Said – mentioned in Chapter 17

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Tagged as crime, Fiction, Mystery, read, Suspense, Thriller

January 20, 2023 · 12:01 am

Blaze me a Sun by Christoffer Carson

book cover

I raped a woman in a car. It’s near Tiarp Farm. A brief silence followed. Then: I’m going to do it again. Bye.

Monstrousness was always sleeping right beneath the surface, just out of sight.

1986 – A terrible crime in an out-of-the-way place. A young woman is brutally raped and murdered in her own car. It might have gotten a bit more national attention had there not been another crime that night, the murder of Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme. The attention would have been merited, as the killer taunted the police with a phone call, boasting of his deed and promising more of the same. He will become known as Tiarp Man. The case falls to Sven Jörgensson. It will consume him.

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Christoffer Carlsson– image from Ahlander Agency

Blaze Me a Sun has a frame structure. It opens in 2019, with a writer looking into the famous crimes that had taken place in Halland County, in southern Sweden. He is a local, who has been away for a long time, but felt a need to return home. Those who knew him as a kid call him Moth. The primary story is the one that Moth researches and tells. Then we go back to Moth for the final fifth (or so) of the novel.

The book is divided into multiple periods. The first (inside the frame) is 1986, when the first crimes take place. Next is 1988 when the national police take over the investigation. In 1991, there are more violent crimes. Is it the same person? 2019 is when Moth is up front as our narrator, at the beginning and end of the novel.

I was reminded of the true-crime format, in which the host/narrator walks you through all the details of one or multiple crimes, then offers the reveal at the end. But the first-person perspective of the frame is replaced in the core here by a third-person-omniscient perspective. At the back end of the story, the narrator takes center stage again, leading us through his further inquiries.

Mostly, we follow Sven as he looks into several murders and one near-killing. As with the Palme murder, finding the perpetrator is a fraught, frustrating job. Evidence is scarce and the struggle to identify the perpetrator wears down the patience of both Sven and his superiors over time. He is an intrepid detective, someone who takes his responsibility to the victims and their families to heart. He thinks of them every day, even long after he is no longer on the case, even after he is retired. Sven is an easy character to pull for, mostly. A white knight on a worthy quest, but there is tarnish on that armor as well. Sven is far from purely benign.

Even heroes can make mistakes. The dream of a spotless past is, after all, only a dream. No one makes it through unmarked. We have to learn to live with it. If we can.

One element that struck me was that we come to think of the victims by their first names, as Sven does. It gives them a bit of extra presence that enhances our feel for Sven’s struggles, his determination to see justice done.

Even Sven’s son, Vidar, as an adult, gets caught up in the complications, the reverberations of the case. Families are a major focus of the book. The crimes have both immediate and long-term impact on the people who must survive the horrific loss of a loved one. Single crimes echo through time to generate multiple waves of misery and destruction. People come to learn things about those to whom they are the closest. You can see why some folks might be jarred learning those things. The truth doesn’t just hurt, it can break your psychic bones, change your direction in life, make you into a different person than you were. Sven’s relationship with Vidar is both loving and strained, a source of tension that carries through the story.

Carlsson links the Tiarp Man murders to the Palme assassination thematically, rather than concretely.

When the prime minister was shot and the shooter was never more than a shadow heading up the stairs into the dim light of David Bagares Gata, it unleashed something. Distaste. A rage that no one could quite control.
From opinion pages and kitchen tables came an indignant clamor over police and politics, criminality and immigrants, the wretched creature that had become Sweden and one’s own reflection in the mirror. It was clear now. The country could have come through anything unscathed—anything but this. The youthful boy with his smiling eyes, a mother-in-law’s dream who turned out to be a murdering monster up there in the north: Maybe that’s us.
Of course this sort of thing leaves its mark on you. Of course it marks a country. How could it not?

Tiarp Man personified that for this part of Sweden. Things that remained unresolved for far too long. A sense of community comfort that was forever disrupted.

There is no real magical realism at work in this book, but Carlsson does offer up an omen in the form of a local superstition.

As spring arrived, the village came to life. Everything seemed to shimmer, and the colors grew so vivid. Sweet days awaited.
The first white wagtail sighting also brought a moment of uncertainty. We learned to be very cautious. If you saw the bird from the back, which you almost always did, it meant happiness and good fortune. But on those rare instances in which you first happened to catch sight of it from the front, and got a good look at the black spot on its tiny breast, it was a bad omen: Misfortune and sorrow lay ahead.

Carlsson knows a bit about police work and crime. Mom was the Swedish equivalent of a 911 dispatcher. And the author’s day job is putting his Criminology PhD to use as a college professor, and writer of professional papers on criminology. His father was an auto mechanic, a job he hands off to Moth’s father in the book. Carlsson is from the area in which these crimes take place. I suppose only those who know the area can opine on whether he presented it accurately.

Criminology taught me the rough brutal truths about crime: it’s dirty, bloody, messy, painful, raw, costs a lot, and, sometimes, it’s beyond meaning in any reasonable sense of that term. – From Crimereads article

I had only two real issues with the book. There is a gap between some of the crimes that is not really explained, and an authorial disinclination to go into the killer’s motivations. If you are ok with that, then this one should satisfy. It enhances a procedural mystery with a look at family, questioning how well we really know those closest to us, and the limits of what one might do for loved ones. It adds a take on the sense of the place and the times. Best of all, there are some excellent twists.

The one she asks for light is also the one who will bring darkness. Like the face of Janus.

Review posted – 01/20/23

Publication date – 01/03/23 – (English translation) – It was originally published in Swedish in 2021

I received a digital ARE of Blaze Me a Sun from Hogarth in return for a fair review. Tack, gott folk, and thanks to NetGalley for facilitating.

This review has been cross-posted on GoodReads. Stop by and say Hi!

=======================================EXTRA STUFF

Links to the author’s Instagram and Twitter pages

Blaze Me A Sun is Carlsson’s ninth book and American debut.

Interview
—–Penguin Random House – Book Club Kit – there is an excellent interview in this
—–Booktopia – An award-winning crime writer’s advice for aspiring authors. by Anastasia Hadjidemetri – from 2017

Songs/Music
—–Sting – Russians – noted in chapter 23

Items of Interest
—–Wikipedia – Assassination of Olof Palme
—–Oregon State University – frame structure in novels

Items of Interest from the author
—–Google Scholar – Carlsson’s criminology writings
—–Crimereads – 1/11/2023 – With the Dead

Could the worst of crimes be devoid of meaning? Strange things happen all the time, every day, and we don’t think too much of them because they don’t affect us that deeply. They are just “coincidences” or something else, depending on what you believe in. Criminology taught me the rough brutal truths about crime: it’s dirty, bloody, messy, painful, raw, costs a lot, and, sometimes, it’s beyond meaning in any reasonable sense of that term.

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Tagged as crime, Mystery, Noir, Suspense, sweden, Thriller