Barry B The lace reader

***As endorsed by the Daily Express***

Do not be put off by the company this book keeps, or by the dreadfully written blurb. It's not disposable crap about the supernatural. It's a very readable, but thoughtful, novel of women and lives torn apart by male violence. Several of the characters are broken, but there's hope.

I really enjoyed reading this one. I also learned something of the geography and history of Salem and its coastline: a town we all 'know' and which is a distinct character of the book.

Recommended.

First line:

My name is Towner Whiney. No, that's not exactly true. My real first name is Sophya. Never believe me. I lie all the time.

Last line:

The words I say back to her are the same words she said to me that day so long ago: The spell is broken. You are free.

Wakling C 2011 What I did

Shock news: the Daily Mail is not always wrong. There's a Mail quote on my paperback copy of this book which I found really off putting, but this book just goes to show that you shouldn't judge a book by the company it keeps on the cover.

I loved this novel, sweetly narrated by a six year old who gets his long words mixed  up, doesn't understand what's scaring the adults and talks in metaphor that they fail to notice. Much like the Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time, the reader has to work for the truth behind the narration, and I found this so much fun.

On reflection I'm not sure what I feel about how the author creates plot tension towards the end. While reading I was gripped (confession: I fall into novels hard). Afterwards it felt like the actions of Dad weren't in keeping with what we knew about him. I'll say no more, because I'd hate to ruin the story for others.

First line:

This is the first bit and shall I tell you why? Okay I will. It is to make you read the rest.

Morgan R 2001 Altered carbon

This is a tough and nasty read, but I've read it multiple times.

The fighting is dirty, and I usually skip those passages. The torture is horrific, and I always skip past that. The sex is explicit: some in the good way (merge9 -yes please); some in the bad way (abuse of sex workers). The plot is convoluted and I'm not sure I could describe it.

What did I like? Our anti hero,  Kovacs. We learn in flashbacks that he entered  the military to escpe a tough childhood, we learn just how tough the fighting was - never his fight, never his body - and we learn how hundreds of years and light years distance don't distance you from your demons. Also, despite the body count, he seems to be basically decent. Maybe I'm just an optimist?

Also, I really like the world(s) Morgan creates. It is perfectly constructed. I believe. Has someone fan-ficed the Quellist philosophy into a quasi Little Book of Calm? Make it personal.

First line:

Two hours before dawn I sat in the peeling kitchen and smoked one of Sarah's cigarettes, listening to the maelstrom and waiting.

Last line:

 The doors were waiting at the top, the needlecast beyond. Still trying to laugh, I went through.

Davies DK 2011 True things about me

From the beginning the author plays with the reader's feelings. On the one hand, here's a silly and self obsessed girl who over emotes about a casual fuck. Woman, get a grip and move on. On the other hand, the sense of developing menace makes you worry for the frivolous and vulnerable girl and hope that with her family and friends she finds the strength to stop the descent which is overwhelming her.

Ths is Bridget Jones without the laughs. But the charming bastard who turns her life upside down is less charming and much more bastard than Darcy. Much more bastard.

He took me down the steps into the car park, and led me to a dark area. I could smell damp concrete, oil, exhaust fumes. He backed me up against a pillar. Take your underwear off, he said, and grinned, showing his teeth.

It's a tale of domestic violence. There are strongly written consensual sex scenes, and there are strongly written non-consensual scenes that are hard to read. It's a compelling book. Saying I enjoyed it seems like the wrong word. But I am glad I read it. I won't read it again.

First line:

I pressed the buzzer for the next claimant.

Last line:

So I left him in the bedroom.

Bateman, C 1995 Divorcing Jack

This is how to write a crime novel. Set your book somewhere vivid. Create a flawed protagonist who has enough virtues that the reader cares. Have interesting times happen to your hero, and lay the clues to the mystery so your reader always wants to read just one more chapter.

Bateman works this formula wonderfully. I thoroughly enjoyed spending a couple of days in Belfast with a disreputable journalist.

If anyone out there's writing Bateman fan-fic I'd be equally happy to spend more time with the Mrs, who takes no shit. Mess with her; she melts your record collection. And, in my opinion, she's well within her rights to do so. Unfaithful husbands have lessons to learn.

First line: I was upstairs with a girl I shouldn't have been upstairs with when my wife whispered in my ear, "you have 24 hours to move out".

Last line: "No", she said.

Butcher, J 2011 Ghost story

Confession: I gave up on this one. I did read to page 466 (of 611), so I suppose I could have powered through, but by then I couldn't remember who the characters were, I didn't care, and it was convenient to take it back to the library.

If you like the Dresden Files series, this is another one. You'll probably like it. But, for me, too long, over complicated, bit dull.

The last few books I've read have been 600 page marathons. I think I need a few quickies.

First line:

Life is hard. Dying's easy.

last line (yes, I peeked!)

There is much work to be done

I'm guessing that means there's another sequel coming soon?

Paretsky S 1998 Bloodshot

Tough detective VI is tough. She adored her mum: Italian, loving, but tough.  She remembers her neighbour: flighty, but tough. She leans on her Dr friend Lotty: caring, but tough. She meets an elderly lady: unfulfilled, but tough. Tough women are tough. In a tough town. That's the theme of the book. It's one note, over 399 pages. Possibly, if there'd been less authorial focus on being tough, the book could be a little shorter. That wouldn't be a bad thing. 

Do you think I may be mistaken? I'm not:

"She hung up on my incoherent protest. I smiled a little - gruff to the end. I hoped I was that tough forty years ahead."

The plot? Who's the daddy? Why is that woman murdered? It takes a while to find out, and you have to be TOUGH to take the pace. 

I thought I remembered liking the VI Warshawski series. I misremembered.

First line: 

I had forgotten the smell. Even with the South Works on strike and Wisconsin Steel padlocked and rusting away, a pungent mix of chemicals streamed in through the engine vents.

last line:

 I knelt next to her chair and put my arms around her. 'Till death do us part, kid'.

Mailman, E 2007 The Witch's Trinity

This is a book of desperation. Desperate cold, desperate hunger, the fears and superstitions of early 16th  century Germany. You'd have to be so brave to bear the trials of the elderly narrator, Güde. As a reader you fully understand why the village has become so cruel, and you fear that, in their world, you would be so cruel too. Cold, hungry and frightened: you'd want to punish someone.

So, a book to be read with seriousness. Chapters are headed with the Malleus Maleficarum, to remind readers that the cruelties are not fiction. We should remember, and I believe fictional representations of a dark time are as good a way to do that as any other. Or, maybe I just like good stories, well told.

First line:

It was a winter to make bitter all souls. So cold the birds froze mid call and our little fire couldn't keep ice from burrowing into bed with us. The fleas froze in the straw beds, bodies swollen with chilled blood. We were hungry.

Last line (at least: this is where the book would have ended if I'd been the editor)

I kissed my son goodly on each cheek and put him from me. I was too distressed to bear his distress as well. I walked away from the square but I did not send my steps home. I knew home had gone up in smoke like Künne, like Fronika.

A cut at that point makes sense to me. It maintains the mood of the novel and you're left to imagine for yourself how - if - Güde can get by. But author and editor didn't ask my advice, and so they carry on for a couple more chapters, a couple of years into the future. For me, this brought forced optimism to a dark tale. Read on still further (at least in the paperback edition I read) and there's a very clunky family history from the author determined to share in her ancestor's tribulations. Trust me. Get to the line where I make the cut, and then ... stop reading.

Grisham J, 2004, The Last Juror

We're in Mississippi in the early 70s. The protagonist is a hippie with enough family money to buy the local newspaper (lucky boy) and enough commercial acumen to turn this into profit. He's also Not A Racist,  developing an unconvincing close friendship with a middle aged Black woman who likes to feed him and tell him stories.

There's a murder, there's a trial, there are legal shenanigans: it's a John Grisham. You know what you're getting.

You'll keep on turning the pages though. If you think death is the wages of sin you'll be fine with how the plot turns out. If you'd rather a more subtle legal system, with a more nuanced view of the world, you're probably better reading something Swedish.

Word of warning: do not read before dinner. You'll eat everything in the house after reading about Miss Callie's carefully tended veg garden and her amazing three-hour lunches. Or is that just me?

First line:

After decades of patient mismanagement and loving neglect, the Ford County Times went bankrupt in 1970.

Last line:

Eventually, slowly, with great agony, I began the last obituary.

Heinlein R, 1951, The Puppet Masters

Ooo, but Heinlein has some dodgy ideas about sex. He truly is a dirty pleasure, and you always need a good wash after reading anything he's written. But he's a first person plotter who gallops at a story and I find I can forget about the dodgy until after the story's done. Turn off your thinking, and thrill to the action.

So: what happens? Alien slugs invade and control the people of Earth.  The people of Earth - rugged individualists from the US of A - heroically fight back. The people of Earth from other countries are pathetic walkovers, and collaborators.

RH likes naked. He particularly likes naked redheads (female variety). Sadly, despite our Viking ancestry ticking the redhead box, our English fear of nudity means we're an early casualty in the alien war...

I wonder: can you tell anything about Heinlein's politics yet? Or his sexual politics?

DOWN WITH COMMUNISM. AND GET YOUR TITS OUT, LOVE.

First line

Were they truly intelligent? By themselves, that is? I don't know, and I don't know how we can ever find out. I'm not a lab man; I'm an operator.

Last line

Death and Destruction!

Harris C, 2012, Deadlocked

Vampires and werewolves and fairies in the Deep South. Why not?

Made the mistake of reading this in book form rather than on kindle. This allowed Himself to see what trivial crap I fill my mind with at bedtime. I think I lost some respect. But hey. People are people and stories are stories, even if the protagonists are undead. And while Himself is laughing at me for reading about myths, he isn't noticing that it's really a straight romance novel. If he knew that he'd really lose respect for me...

First line:

It was as hot as the six shades of hell even this late in the evening, and I'd had a busy day at work.

Last line:

That was going to be a delicate conversation. 'Sure Sam', I said, very quietly. 'Another day'. 

The plot? Everyone is in love with the heroine, she dithers. Isn't that the plot of all romances?

Note: there are a dozen or so books in this series. I reckon I've read about half of them, in no particular order. Continuity isn't necessary. Neither are your critical faculties.

Glynn, A. 2001 Limitless

I fell asleep ten minutes into the film, but the premise intrigued so I got the book.

Big Pharma Are Bad. Why aren't the good drugs fair trade?

Remember the first time you saw The Matrix, and when you left the cinema the buzz was all would you take the red pill, or the blue? And also, coooool coat? This novel tries to build up  that buzz. If you could take a drug that made you smart and successful, would you? If it damaged you, would you still take it? If it damaged others?

The protagonist is a wastrel, and the drugs make a difference. I feel much the same about nice coffee. But it takes him till nearly the end of the book to think about securing his supply by becoming a kitchen chemist. Unlike me: I know where the coffee is and I'm not afraid to brew it.

First line

It's getting late. I don't have too sharp a sense of time any more, but I know it must be after eleven, and maybe even getting on for midnight. I'm reluctant to look at my watch though - because that will only remind me of how little time I have left.

Last line

Then I look at the keyboard once more and, wishing the command had a wider, smarter application - wishing it could somehow mean what it says - press 'save'.

Webster, J. 1915 Dear Enemy

Sequel to Dear Daddy Long Legs. I was so desperate to read this as a kid I stole it from the library. This was a wrong thing to do, but I was only allowed four books a week and that just wasn't nearly enough. And it was 30 years ago. They've probably written off the loss by now.

Here, Sally McB turns her college educated mind to running an orphanage. This, she appreciates, is important to get right:

the future health and happiness of a hundred humn beings lie in my hands, to say nothing of their three or four hundred children and thousand grand children. The thing's geometrically progressive.

First line:

Your letter is here. I have read it twice, and with amazement. Do I understand that Jervis has given you, for a Christmas present, the making over of the John Grier Home into a model institution, and that you have chosen me to disburse the money?

Last line: Nope. It gives away the ending.

Webster, J. 1912 Dear Daddy Long Legs

There's something about an epistolary novel. I think I'd have been nine or ten the first time I read this book. I know I got it from the library, and read it in one night. Thirty years later, this was another one-night book. Charming, and sweet, it's as good as I remember.

This is a fairy tale, an orphan made good story. She gets her education and her man. What's not to love?

There's some proto feminism in here too. I loved this thought, tucked away in Judy's description of college learning:

Don't you think I'd make an admirable voter if I had my rights? I was twenty-one last week. This is an awfully wasteful country to throw away such an honest, educated, conscientious, intelligent citizen as I would be. 

First line:

 The first Wednesday in every month was a Perfectly Awful Day - a day to be awaited with dread, endured with courage and forgotten with haste.

Last line:

This is the first love letter I ever wrote. Isn't it funny that I know how?