Category: Stu’s Reviews

Genre: Book
Grade: A-
Notable People: Paul Doiron

Title: Stay Hidden
Review: A woman journalist is shot to death by a deer hunter on very remote island off the coast of Maine…..and so it begins. Maine game warden (now Detective Inspector) Mike Bowditch is sent there, on his own, for his very first detective case….and it’s a doozy….Bowditch is about all things “Down East”…and Doiron really knows the terrain. The portrait of this isolated island that time has left behind is potent, imaginative and meticulous. Doiron’s writing is beyond reproach and his character development with Bowditch, and his surrounding folks, has been wonderful. I highly recommend this series from the beginning…great evolution.

Genre: Book
Grade: A-
Notable People: Jeanette Walls

Title: The Glass Castle
Review: Wow…Wow…Wow…this is a very painful book to read…took me a long time as had to read it in short segments. Walls tells her own obviously true story of growing up in the Arizona Desert and the coal mining country of West Virginia in her parents ‘voluntary abject poverty…with what may be the two most subtly neglectful parents I have encountered. Bright, capable….and 100% self-absorbed people, unable and unwilling to care for their four children. The book starts with a three-year-old Walls being badly burned cooking herself hot dogs on a gas stove, standing on a chair to reach…and gets progressively worse from there. I wanted to really beat these two people. If you choose to handle this, the book is exceptionally well written, and full of childhood resilience…..these kids are absolutely amazing….just needed some kind of parent…or maybe not.

Genre: Book

Grade: A-

Notable People: Steve Martin

Title: An Object f Beauty

Review: Yes…this is THE Steve Martin…..who writes the same way he does comedy, acting and banjo playing….in short- satisfying bursts (the chapters in this book are a wonderful- for- bedtime reading 2-5 pages long). In actuality this is the third of his written works I have read, and he is quite the writer…… evocatively descriptive , historically accurate and with an eye for characters and detail. This book centers around Lacey, the object of the narrator’s eternal desire (Clearly Martin himself) who is totally unattainable to another human being, as she pursues her rising star ad manipulate her way in the NYC art world. I was transfixed by this character , and wanted her myself….even while loathing her as one of the most shallow and self-serving people ever articulated …a veritable carnal queen. The book is set in the NY and international art world from the mid-80s through 2010….and frames it all in a dizzying array of detail, while touching on the semantic events of: the 90s economic boom, 9/11 and the 207 collapse of the economy. If you have any interest in the world of art….this is quite the primer. I savored all of this book and looked forward to my daily little chapters. Martin is a genuine artist.

Genre: Book

Grade: A

Notable People: Jo Walton

Title: Half a Crown

Review: Need winter reading? The third in Walton’s “Small Change” trilogy only goes a step further from the first two. Brilliantly written, tension filled and wildly fanciful, the book is a thriller set inside an alternate history in which Britain made peace Hitler and the US did not become involved in The War. The British government has become Fascist and authoritarian. Peter Carmichael, formerly a police inspector at Scotland Yard, is ironically(and being forced to) now head the secret police called “The Watch” where he deals with political intrigue by those jealous of his position and tries to safeguard his teenage ward while keeping secret his illicit activities helping Jews and dissidents who wish to flee the country. The book jumps forward to 1960 from where the last one left off in 1949, and the level of government tyranny has increased dramatically, after Hitler and his Japanese cronies crushed the US and Russia by atomizing Miami and Moscow. Walton has a great touch for bringing back wonderful characters from the proceeding books in a subtle- almost cameo, way. This is a book it is really hard to put down. Too, too good.

Genre: Book

Grade: A

Notable People: Jo Walton

Title: Ha’Penny

Review: The second in Walton’s brilliant trilogy set in 1949 post war Britain, where Nazi Germany and Britain have an uneasy “peace with honor”, and Europe is controlled by the Nazi marauders. . Inspector Carmichael is back, investigating a possible terrorist threat to murder Hitler and his imaginary British Prime Minister colleague. The book rotates chapters between Carmichael and an actress playing a gender bending Hamlet, who unwittingly becomes involved in the conspiracy to change the rapidly Fascist oriented world. This is an amazing piece of revisionist history..…exceptionally written, and beyond complex. Can’t wait until book
three.

Genre: Book

Grade: A

Notable People: Tony Dunbar

Title: Tubby Meets Katrina

Review: The seventh installment in Dunbar’s’ delightful Big Easy Lawyer Tubby Dubonnet series…this one in must do reading in my book. Dunbar is always good and Tubby is a wonderful character…plus the sense in the books of N’Awlins is as good as any I’ve read. But this….this is the best understated account of the aftermath of Katrina I’ve yet seen. The overwhelming chaos, the sense of loss, the world run amok…..all framed within a little mystery story. Gripping and unforgettable. Go get it!