Category: Stu’s Reviews

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.

Genre:  Novel   

Grade  A-

Notable People:   T. Coraghessan Boyle

Title: Talk Talk

Review:  Boyle’s books are dark and almost always verging on masterful. Psychologically daunting characters mixed up in fate clearly out of their control…and often not all that likeable…but seemingly real. Beautiful young deaf woman and her video game savant boyfriend have their identities stolen by a slick, black-belt con man aspiring to the high life…a true portrait of sociopathy. Police don’t do shit- so they chase this guy from one coast to the other. Pretty mesmerizing read…..short and hard to put  down…very quirky at the end. Not his best work…but awful good. If you don’t know Boyle- you should

Genre:  Novel       

Grade  A-

Notable People:   CJ Box

Title: Badlands

Review:  Frigid winter in North Dakota, a young autistic boy who witnesses a major drug killing and winds up with the booty, , the baddest drug gang in America, a young woman who is the Sheriff’s new Chief Investigator trying to fend off the hostility of the local law enforcement good ol’ boys club, dirty cops, meth heads…..and decapitations left and right….good formula for a new series from Box, who is the author of the wonderful Joe Pickett: Wyoming Game Warden series. Cassie Dewell is his first shot at a female lead character and he does it really well. Compelling story, good characters, gear portrait of the barren wasteland. Box is at the top of his game.

Genre:  Novel

Grade  B/B+

Notable People:   Paul Doiron

Title: The Poacher’s Son

Review:  First novel  in the series about a Maine Game Warden, takes place in remote Maine, and is a surprisingly complex yarn, about fathers and sons, the great north woods, and the lasting strengths of the ties that bind us…..and of course, murder and mayhem.  I had trouble at the start of this one and almost put it down. Doiron’s writing felt stiff to me and not quite the quality of the “mystery” people I’ve been reading lately (CJ Box, Philip Kerr, Archer)…but I have to admit- he seemed to get better and find a groove as the book wore on. Not a great writer- but maybe getting better….and a very strong sense of this place in the very remote part of Maine…..and that, serves him, and us, well. I’m going to give another one a try.

Genre:  Novel             

Grade  A

Notable People:   Pete Hamill

Title: River North

Review:  Brilliant! Hamill is my vote for least appreciated American writer of the 20^th century. More known as a newspaper columnist and drinking buddy of Norman Mailer, he amassed a really great body of work up until his death several years ago. His books are pure New York- written from the very strong perspective of the Irish immigrant. This one takes place during the Depression and centers on the life of Dr. Jim Delaney in Greenwich Village at a time when there’s was a  great sense of shared community amongst the Manhattan immigrants. A sweeping story of love, grief, poverty and tumultuous times, it stretched from the trenches of France during the first world war to the burgeoning mob in little Italy to the last great period of the Tammany Hall politicos that ran the city with an iron fist for centuries. Sweet, tender, full of angst and unknowns, it is a masterful piece of fiction- livened by many historically accurate characters. Hamill goes down swinging…a great book.  

Genre:  Novel

Grade  A-

Notable People:   Linda Castillo

Title:  After the Storm

Review:  The second in this series about small town police chief Kate Burkholder. I was mixed on the first one, but this one really captivated. Pretty unique setting in Amish country in northeast Ohio, so many familiarities for those of us who live around that country an culture. Castillo really gets under the uniqueness of the Amish and their uneasy relationship with the “Englishers”…and she knows Pennsylvania Dutch to boot. The stories are tensely written yarns with pretty interesting characters. Great sense of the place she writes about (especially for a British resident). This is a quick and fine summer read.