Category: Books

Genre: Novel

Grade: A-

Notable People: Ivan Doig

Title: Ride with me Mariah Montana

Review: This is the third in Doig’s Montana Trilogy, written in the 80s and 90s and focused on almost 100 years in the life of a Montana family. This one cones absolutely full circle in which Jick MacAskill is now in retirement age and engaged in celebrating the 100th anniversary of Montana’s’ statehood, by traveling all over the state (and I mean all over) with his eccentric daughter and her former husband as they cover the centennial for the newspaper through words and pictures. The book started so slow I thought about cashing in by page 25, but stuck with it..….for major reward. Slow, slow…..but beautiful. a love song to Montana and every nook and cranny of it. Doig is self-effacing to the max and writes with great fondness for his characters. I spent two weeks finishing this book an came to savor it’s slowness. Heed for it to end. and by the way, it’s a well written story that reaches back 50 years and ends up looking to the future.

Genre: Novel

Grade: A-

Notable People: James Lee Burke

Title: Heartwood

Review: Burke is 80 and still going strong- writing the long running and excellent Dave Robicheaux series as well as the two western series –set in Montana and Texas. This is the Texas series- featuring lawyer Billy Bob Holland, an aging former Texas Ranger, with a closet full of skeletons (one who speaks with him hourly), an oil rigging- country musician son, a tough- as- nails, take no prisoners lady private investigator…and a boatload of moral crisis. The protagonists in Burke’ s books never get off easy…..more like go to hell and back…..but they sure do try to do the right thing. As usual, this one is filled with odd and imaginative characters, and the pulls of wealth and lust…tinged with an underlying religious symbolism and one overloaded religious fanatic (who is quite likeable). These books are exceedingly well written, confident, have that same love of place that Burke has for the Louisiana Bayou….and spin a very good story. Burke is a master.

Genre: Novel

Grade: B/B+

Notable People: Linda Castillo

Title: Breaking Silence

Review: This is the third in Castillo’s Kate Burkholder series (and 3rd I’ve read and reviewed)- which centers on a lapsed Amish police chief who comes back (from the Sodom and Gomorrah of Columbus) to the fictional town of Painter’s Mill in the real Holmes County, Ohio- in the heart of Ohio Amish country. Kate is a very interesting and complex character, the books are quite engaging and Castillo writes well. If you’ve lived in Ohio and/or are familiar with the Amish culture- there is a lot here to like……and the same even if you haven’t/are not. That said, I found this one a bit too farfetched for my tastes. How many serial or quite multiple murders can there be in Holmes County? Despite that, I still think this is a find for serial readers of any stripe, and the culture she explores is quite interesting and thought provoking

Genre:  Novel       

Grade:  A-

Notable People:  Pete Hamill

Title:  The Guns of Heaven

Review: The late Pete Hamill was simply one of the great American writes of the 20^th century. I have been reading his catalog over the last five years and yet to not be bowled over. You have to like stories that invoke the grittier side of life in the very big city (NYC), which is his passion, the way it once was in Woody Allen’s films…..kind of like a love song written to the Apple. Like many of his books, the protagonist on this one, sounds and acts a lot like the real life Hamill, who was ,by all accounts, a hard drinking, adventurous tough guy. He danced with the stars for years as a beloved columnist (with Jimmy Breslin and Norman Mailer) for the NY Post and later the Daily News. Hamill is also a devoted Irishman, which plays a key role in his work- especially this one; set in early 80’s Belfast and New York- it’s about being Irish in the latter half of 20^th century, both in Ireland and in New York. The IRA of the time is very prominent, and acts of crazy violence are right around the corner. This is a book with a an awful lot to like: the protagonist is a macho but humble hero, the characters are flawed but vivid, the setting is lovingly depicted and the story is deceptively alluring. The book was short for my taste, but could be read in one rainy day or a day at the beach. Good, good stuff.

Genre:  Novel

Grade:  B+

Notable People:  Carl Hiassen

Title:  Native Tongue

Review:  Inept burglars, elderly gun toting radical environmentalists, sexually depraved dolphins, hermetic former governors living in the woods…..this is pure Hiassen….the man loves the Florida Keys and his wild yarns…pretty funny throughout with some kind for warped story to boot. I thought this one did not have the charisma of the previous ones I’ve read, but quite entertaining. I found it slow going, but improved as it went.

 

 

Genre:  Novel      

Grade:  A-

Notable People:  David Handler

Title:  Phantom Angel

Review:  Handler is a pretty funny mystery writer in the Elmore Leonard tradition. I’ve read a bunch of his work in a series he does set on Cape Cod (Trooper Des Mitri) , but this is a new one featuring boy-wonder PI  Benji Golden, heir to his late fathers’ detective agency (Golden Detectives!). Benji’ s mother, who now runs the agency, is a former Times Square pole dancer and he is surrounded  by equally luminous characters. Benji looks 16 and tries to affect his best Sam Spade as pursues murder and mayhem in the midst of the Broadway theater scene. Handler is actually quite q good writer and the stories are very intriguing –mixing in real known people along with his creations. This a quick and satisfying summer read.  

Genre:  Novel                                           

Grade:  A

Notable People:  Daniel Woodrell

Title:  Winter’s Bone

Review:  I finally got around to reading this ten year old novel, that created quite stir when it came out. A harsh and gripping tale of life in the hollows of the Ozark mountains……bleakly and beautifully told. The heroine, 16 year old Ree Dolly, is forced to try and find her disappeared father in the back woods and deep gorges of the mountains- either that or lose the home he has put up as bail collateral….the tiny mountain cabin that she presides over for her two teen age brothers and far gone mentally ill mother. Danger and heartache lurk around every bend, but the courageous young woman refuses to flinch or bend. Slight, mountain humor is sprinkled throughout, which reduces the tension a bit, and the use of colloquial language makes it bearable. Tough story, exceedingly well written and told throughout out. Had to read it slowly- as it haunts.

Genre:  Novel

Grade:  A-

Notable People:  Anne Tyler

Title:  Saint Maybe

Review:  set in Baltimore, during the 1960s at the start of the book, as are many of Tyler’s novels (“The Accidental Tourist”, and was a follow up to her Pulitzer Prize winning “Breathing Lessons”. This warm and beautiful book was recommended to me by one of my Blog followers and friends (Dan P.)…..a great recommendation. Tyler is a superb writer with a great sense for characters and their connections to one another. This is a story of a family that suffers multiple tragedies but finds its way forward in spite of the losses. Guilt, regret and remorse are fended off by hope, faith and family ties. Ian, the reluctant main character, is a burdened young (and then older) man, who somehow keeps going, finding ways to find shelter from the storm, while raising three orphaned nieces and nephews and caring for two shell shocked parents he feels responsible for. I had trouble at the start getting interested in this book, but very glad I persevered. I found it to be greatly uplifting at the end.

Genre:  Novel 

Grade:  B+

Notable People:   Pascal Mercier

Title: Night Train to Lisbon

Review:  after months of reading mysteries and femme fatale/noir novels- I felt guilty and that I needed something challenging and heady. Found this skimming through shelves at local library and…..mission for heady accomplished. Staid and hermetic middle aged man living in Bern, Switzerland and teaching esoteric languages at a small private school….has a chance encounter with a woman ready to jump of a bridge, who hands him a piece of unknown writing from a provocative Lisbon man. Our hero quits his job and goes off to Lisbon to investigate and re-create the life and times of the mysterious dead writer- Amadeus Prado. This book is DEEP…I found ten pages at a time were max for me (it’s a long 500 pager) . But I found myself more and more drawn  into this bizarre search for meaning that Gregorius undertakes…the totally immersed search to understand fully another person and connect with them beyond the grave. Very intricately written and very well translated from the German. You gotta have time to read this one.

Genre:  Novel  

Grade:  A-

Notable People:   Carl Hiaasen

Title: Skinny Dip

Review:  Been meaning to read Hiassen for years- as he is an icon in the Keys, where we go every late winter. A huge fan of John D. Macdonald (and his legendary Travis McGee), he has clearly styled his writings after the great master, and seems to get in a Macdonald kudo in every book (along with a Neil Young). A murder mystery, more or less, but extremely funny and biting resembling  MacDonald’s characteristic social commentary about the screwing of Florida. This one involves a woman tossed off a cruise ship by her scumbag husband , which is amazingly connected to a scheme to rip off, and ultimately destroy, the Everglades. Wonderful characters, great sense of the place, and good whodunit. I’m going to be on the chase for a lot more Hiassen.