richardderus's sixteenth 2021 thread

Uzodinma Iweala, author of Beasts of No Nation, was born on the 5th of November, 1982, in Washington D.C. His childhood was divided between Nigeria and the USA. His parents are emigrants...his mother was the Finance Minister in one of Nigeria's periodic civilian governments, and his father a doctor...and he grew up bicultural. Now a physician and the CEO of The Africa Center, he authored in 2005 the brilliant novel Beasts of No Nation, one of the best books I've ever read. Since that auspicious debut, he's written non-fiction and fiction, introductions to African literary lights' books, and founded and directs The Africa Center, NYC.

Listen to a fascinating ABC podcast with Dr. Iweala here.

I'm delighted to introduce, laddies and gentlewomen, my new spirit animal:
The Fucktopus.

**********************
In 2021, I stated a goal of posting 15 book reviews a month on my blog. This year's total of 180 (there are a lot of individual stories that don't have entries in the LT database so I didn't post them here; I need to do more to sync the data this year) reads shows it's doable, and I've done better than that in the past.

I've long Pearl Ruled books I'm not enjoying, but making notes on Goodreads & LibraryThing about why I'm abandoning the read has been less successful. I give up. I just don't care about this goal, so out it goes.




My Last Thread of 2009 Is Here:
Reviews are back-linked there.
My Last Thread of 2010 Is Here:
Reviews are back-linked there.
My Last Thread of 2011 Is Here:
Reviews are back-linked there.
My Last Thread of 2012 Is Here:
Reviews are back-linked there.
My Last Thread of 2013 Is Here:
Reviews are back-linked there.
My Last Thread of 2014 Is Here:
Reviews are back-linked there.
My Last Thread of 2015 Is Here:
Reviews are back-linked there.
My Last Thread of 2016 Is Here:
Reviews are back-linked there.
My Last Thread of 2017 Is Here:
Reviews are back-linked there.
My Last Thread of 2018 Is Here:
Reviews are back-linked there.
My Last Thread of 2019 Is Here:
Reviews are back-linked there.
My Last Thread of 2020 Is Here:
Reviews are back-linked there.

First five reviews? 1st 2021 thread..

Reviews 6 all the way through 25 can be viewed in the thread to which I have posted a link at left.

The 26th through 36th reviews occupy thread three.

37th through 44th reviews belong where they are.

Reviews 45 through 58 are listed here.

Reviews 59 through 65 present themselves in that spot.

Reviews 66 through 75 reside in this thread.

Reviews 76 through 98? Seek them before this.

Reviews 99 through 110 remain becalmèd thitherward.

Reviews 111 up to 123 actualize their potential in the linkèd thread.

Reviews 124 through 136 locatable in this locale.

Reviews 137 to 147 (inclusive)? Back up.

Reviews 148 to 155 are available here.

Reviews 156 unto 169 remain, patiently, behind.

Reviews 170 all the way to 177 are just doin' their thang.

THIS THREAD'S REVIEW LINKS

178 Murder at Greysbridge pleased, post 17.

179 Rider on the Rain squicked, post 54.

180 The Sleeping Car Murders intrigued, post 56.

181 Trap for Cinderella intrigued, post 61.

182 Power Born of Dreams succeeded, post 69.

183 Prophet Against Slavery: Benjamin Lay, A Graphic Novel impressed, post 70.

184 Under Color of Law pleased, post 85.

185 The Ghosts of Belfast slapped, post 114.

186 The Colour of Milk delighted, post 121.

187 Damnation Spring existed, post 143.

188 Sinopticon elucidated, post 160.

189 Total Creative Control delighted, post 188.

190 The Prophets thrilled, post 232.

191 Winter in Sokcho fascinated, post 261.

192 Mona Passage discomfited, post 262.

193 Planet of Clay saddened, post 273.

194 Chouette bullied, post 285.

2020's five-star or damn-near five-star reviews totaled 46. Almost half were short stories and/or series reads. While a lot of authors saw their book launches rescheduled, publishers canceled their tours, and everyone was hugely distracted by the nightmare of COVID-19 (I had it, you do not want it), no one can fault the astoundingly wonderful literature we got this year. My own annual six-stars-of-five read was Zaina Arafat's extraordinary debut novel YOU EXIST TOO MUCH (review lives here), a thirtysomething Palestinian woman telling me my life, my family, my very experience of relationships of all sorts. I cannot stress enough to you, this is the book you need to read in 2021. A sixtysomething man is here, in your email/feed, saying: This is the power. This is the glory. The writing I look for, the read I long to find, and all of it delivered in a young woman's debut novel. This is as good an omen for the Great Conjunction's power being bent to the positive outcomes as any I've seen.

In 2020, I posted over 180 reviews here. In 2021, my goals are:

to post 200 reviews on my blog

to post at least 99 three-sentence Burgoines

to complete at least 210 total reviews

Most important to me is to report on DRCs I don't care enough about to review at my usual level. I don't want to keep just leaving them unacknowledged. There are publishers who want to see a solid, positive relationship between DRCs granted and reviews posted, and I do not blame them a bit.

Ask and ye shall receive! Nathan Burgoine's Twitter account hath taught me. See >7 richardderus: below.

I stole this from PC's thread. I like these prompts!
***
1. Name any book you read at any time that was published in the year you turned 18:
Faggots by Larry Kramer
2. Name a book you have on in your TBR pile that is over 500 pages long:
The Story of China: The Epic History of a World Power from the Middle Kingdom to Mao and the China Dream by Michael Wood
3. What is the last book you read with a mostly blue cover?
Wasps' Nest by Agatha Christie
4. What is the last book you didn’t finish (and why didn’t you finish it?)
The Perfect Fascist by Victoria de Grazia; paper book of 512pp, can't hold it...hands too feeble now
5. What is the last book that scared the bejeebers out of you?
Too Much and Never Enough by Mary Trump
6. Name the book that read either this year or last year that takes place geographically closest to where you live? How close would you estimate it was?
The Trump book; set in Queens and the Hamptons, so just down the road a piece
7.What were the topics of the last two nonfiction books you read?
The last successful rebellion on US soil and caffeine
8. Name a recent book you read which could be considered a popular book?
The Only Good Indians, a horror novel that's really, really good
9. What was the last book you gave a rating of 5-stars to? And when did you read it?
Restored, a Regency-era romantic historical novel about men in their 40s seizing their second chance at luuuv
10. Name a book you read that led you to specifically to read another book (and what was the other book, and what was the connection)
Potiki, which Kerry Aluf gave me; led me to read The Uncle's Story by Witi Ihimaera
11. Name the author you have most recently become infatuated with.
P. Djeli Clark
12. What is the setting of the first novel you read this year?
Hawaii and PNW
13. What is the last book you read, fiction or nonfiction, that featured a war in some way (and what war was it)?
The Fighting Bunch; WWII
14. What was the last book you acquired or borrowed based on an LTer’s review or casual recommendation? And who was the LTer, if you care to say.
There isn't enough space for all the book-bullets y'all careless, inconsiderate-of-my-poverty fiends pepper me with
15. What the last book you read that involved the future in some way?
Mammoths of the Great Plains by Eleanor Arnason
16. Name the last book you read that featured a body of water, river, marsh, or significant rainfall?
Ancient Oceans of Central Kentucky by David Connerley Nahm
17. What is last book you read by an author from the Southern Hemisphere?
Red Heir by Lisa Henry
18. What is the last book you read that you thought had a terrible cover?
please don't ask me this
19. Who was the most recent dead author you read? And what year did they die?
Agatha Christie, 1976
20. What was the last children’s book (not YA) you read?
good goddesses, I don't remember...Goodnight Moon to my daughter?
21. What was the name of the detective or crime-solver in the most recent crime novel you read?
Poirot by Dame Ags
22. What was the shortest book of any kind you’ve read so far this year?
The World Well Lost, ~28pp
23. Name the last book that you struggled with (and what do you think was behind the struggle?)
Lon Chaney Speaks, because I really, really don't like comic books
24. What is the most recent book you added to your library here on LT?
see #23
25. Name a book you read this year that had a visual component (i.e. illustrations, photos, art, comics)
see #23
I liked Sandy's Bonus Question for the meme above, so I adopted it:

26. What is the title and year of the oldest book you have reviewed on LT in 2020? (modification in itals)
The Sittaford Mystery by Dame Aggie, 1931.

I really hadn't considered doing this until recently...tracking my Pulitzer Prize in Fiction winners read, and Booker Prize winners read might actually prove useful to me in planning my reading.

1918 HIS FAMILY - Ernest Poole **
1919 THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS - Booth Tarkington *
1921 THE AGE OF INNOCENCE - Edith Wharton *
1922 ALICE ADAMS - Booth Tarkington **
1923 ONE OF OURS - Willa Cather **
1924 THE ABLE MCLAUGHLINS - Margaret Wilson
1925 SO BIG - Edna Ferber *
1926 ARROWSMITH - Sinclair Lewis (Declined) *
1927 EARLY AUTUMN - Louis Bromfield
1928 THE BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY - Thornton Wilder *
1929 SCARLET SISTER MARY - Julia Peterkin
1930 LAUGHING BOY - Oliver Lafarge
1931 YEARS OF GRACE - Margaret Ayer Barnes
1932 THE GOOD EARTH - Pearl Buck *
1933 THE STORE - Thomas Sigismund Stribling
1934 LAMB IN HIS BOSOM - Caroline Miller
1935 NOW IN NOVEMBER - Josephine Winslow Johnson
1936 HONEY IN THE HORN - Harold L Davis
1937 GONE WITH THE WIND - Margaret Mitchell *
1938 THE LATE GEORGE APLEY - John Phillips Marquand
1939 THE YEARLING - Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings *
1940 THE GRAPES OF WRATH - John Steinbeck *
1942 IN THIS OUR LIFE - Ellen Glasgow *
1943 DRAGON'S TEETH - Upton Sinclair
1944 JOURNEY IN THE DARK - Martin Flavin
1945 A BELL FOR ADANO - John Hersey *
1947 ALL THE KING'S MEN - Robert Penn Warren *
1948 TALES OF THE SOUTH PACIFIC - James Michener
1949 GUARD OF HONOR - James Gould Cozzens
1950 THE WAY WEST - A.B. Guthrie
1951 THE TOWN - Conrad Richter
1952 THE CAINE MUTINY - Herman Wouk
1953 THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA - Ernest Hemingway *
1955 A FABLE - William Faulkner *
1956 ANDERSONVILLE - McKinlay Kantor *
1958 A DEATH IN THE FAMILY - James Agee *
1959 THE TRAVELS OF JAIMIE McPHEETERS - Robert Lewis Taylor
1960 ADVISE AND CONSENT - Allen Drury *
1961 TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD - Harper Lee *
1962 THE EDGE OF SADNESS - Edwin O'Connor
1963 THE REIVERS - William Faulkner *
1965 THE KEEPERS OF THE HOUSE - Shirley Ann Grau
1966 THE COLLECTED STORIES OF KATHERINE ANNE PORTER - Katherine Anne Porter
1967 THE FIXER - Bernard Malamud
1968 THE CONFESSIONS OF NAT TURNER - William Styron *
1969 HOUSE MADE OF DAWN - N Scott Momaday
1970 THE COLLECTED STORIES OF JEAN STAFFORD - Jean Stafford
1972 ANGLE OF REPOSE - Wallace Stegner *
1973 THE OPTIMIST'S DAUGHTER - Eudora Welty *
1975 THE KILLER ANGELS - Jeff Shaara *
1976 HUMBOLDT'S GIFT - Saul Bellow *
1978 ELBOW ROOM - James Alan McPherson
1979 THE STORIES OF JOHN CHEEVER - John Cheever *
1980 THE EXECUTIONER'S SONG - Norman Mailer *
1981 A CONFEDERACY OF DUNCES - John Kennedy Toole *
1982 RABBIT IS RICH - John Updike *
1983 THE COLOR PURPLE - Alice Walker *
1984 IRONWEED - William Kennedy *
1985 FOREIGN AFFAIRS - Alison Lurie
1986 LONESOME DOVE - Larry McMurtry *
1987 A SUMMONS TO MEMPHIS - Peter Taylor
1988 BELOVED - Toni Morrison *
1989 BREATHING LESSONS - Anne Tyler
1990 THE MAMBO KINGS PLAY SONGS OF LOVE - Oscar Hijuelos *
1991 RABBIT AT REST - John Updike *
1992 A THOUSAND ACRES - Jane Smiley *
1993 A GOOD SCENT FROM A STRANGE MOUNTAIN - Robert Olen Butler *
1994 THE SHIPPING NEWS - E Annie Proulx *
1995 THE STONE DIARIES - Carol Shields
1996 INDEPENDENCE DAY - Richard Ford
1997 MARTIN DRESSLER - Steven Millhauser
1998 AMERICAN PASTORAL - Philip Roth
1999 THE HOURS - Michael Cunningham
2000 INTERPRETER OF MALADIES - Jumpha Lahiri
2001 THE AMAZING ADVENTURES OF KAVALIER & CLAY - Michael Chabon
2002 EMPIRE FALLS - Richard Russo
2003 MIDDLESEX - Jeffrey Eugenides *
2004 THE KNOWN WORLD - Edward P. Jones
2005 GILEAD - Marilynne Robinson
2006 MARCH - Geraldine Brooks
2007 THE ROAD - Cormac McCarthy
2008 THE BRIEF WONDROUS LIFE OF OSCAR WAO - Junot Diaz *
2009 OLIVE KITTERIDGE - Elizabeth Strout
2010 TINKERS - Paul Harding**
2011 A VISIT FROM THE GOON SQUAD - Jennifer Egan
2013 ORPHAN MASTER'S SON - Adam Johnson
2014 THE GOLDFINCH - Donna Tartt
2015 ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE - Anthony Doerr **
2016 THE SYMPATHIZER - Viet Thanh Nguyen **
2017 THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD - Colson Whitehead **
2018 LESS - Andrew Sean Greer
2019 THE OVERSTORY - Richard Powers
2020 THE NICKEL BOYS - Colson Whitehead

Links are to my reviews
* Read, but not reviewed
** Owned, but not read

Every winner of the Booker Prize since its inception in 1969

1969: P. H. Newby, Something to Answer For
1970: Bernice Rubens, The Elected Member
1970: J. G. Farrell, Troubles ** (awarded in 2010 as the Lost Man Booker Prize) -
1971: V. S. Naipaul, In a Free State
1972: John Berger, G.
1973: J. G. Farrell, The Siege of Krishnapur
1974: Nadine Gordimer, The Conservationist ... and Stanley Middleton, Holiday
1975: Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, Heat and Dust
1976: David Storey, Saville
1977: Paul Scott, Staying On
1978: Iris Murdoch, The Sea, The Sea *
1979: Penelope Fitzgerald, Offshore
1980: William Golding, Rites of Passage
1981: Salman Rushdie, Midnight's Children *
1982: Thomas Keneally, Schindler's Ark
1983: J. M. Coetzee, Life & Times of Michael K
1984: Anita Brookner, Hotel du Lac *
1985: Keri Hulme, The Bone People **
1986: Kingsley Amis, The Old Devils
1987: Penelope Lively, Moon Tiger *
1988: Peter Carey, Oscar and Lucinda *
1989: Kazuo Ishiguro, The Remains of the Day *
1990: A. S. Byatt, Possession: A Romance *
1991: Ben Okri, The Famished Road
1992: Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient * ... and Barry Unsworth, Sacred Hunger
1993: Roddy Doyle, Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha
1994: James Kelman, How late it was, how late
1995: Pat Barker, The Ghost Road *
1996: Graham Swift, Last Orders
1997: Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things
1998: Ian McEwan, Amsterdam
1999: J. M. Coetzee, Disgrace
2000: Margaret Atwood, The Blind Assassin *
2001: Peter Carey, True History of the Kelly Gang *
2002: Yann Martel, Life of Pi
2003: DBC Pierre, Vernon God Little **
2004: Alan Hollinghurst, The Line of Beauty *
2005: John Banville, The Sea
2006: Kiran Desai, The Inheritance of Loss
2007: Anne Enright, The Gathering
2008: Aravind Adiga, The White Tiger
2009: Hilary Mantel, Wolf Hall
2010: Howard Jacobson, The Finkler Question *
2011: Julian Barnes, The Sense of an Ending **
2012: Hilary Mantel, Bring Up the Bodies
2013: Eleanor Catton, The Luminaries
2014: Richard Flanagan, The Narrow Road to the Deep North
2015: Marlon James, A Brief History of Seven Killings *
2016: Paul Beatty, The Sellout
2017: George Saunders, Lincoln in the Bardo
2018: Anna Burns, Milkman
2019: Margaret Atwood, The Testaments, and Bernardine Evaristo, Girl, Woman, Other
2020: Douglas Stuart, Shuggie Bain

Links are to my reviews
* Read, but not reviewed
** Owned, but not read

Author 'Nathan Burgoine posted this simple, direct method of not getting paralyzed by the prospect of having to write reviews. The Three-Sentence Review is, as he notes, very helpful and also simple to achieve. I get completely unmanned at the idea of saying something trenchant about each book I read, when there often just isn't that much to say...now I can use this structure to say what I think's important and not try to dig for more.

Think about using it yourselves!

And with this post, you are able to post without fear.

Mine! It's all mine!

Happy new one, RD.

Happy new thread!

Happy new one!

Hi RD. Thanks for keeping my thread warm while I was away. Your Thx-giving notation was also appreciated. I have a lot of catching up to do!

PS Love the topper. I must check out this author. All new to me.

Happy new thread, Richard dear!

Happy new thread, Richard!

>9 katiekrug: The Imperial Crown for First-In Scout is, indeed, all yours:

From 1962 to you.

>14 bell7: Thanks, Mary!

>13 FAMeulstee: Thank you, Anita, it's about time isn't it.

>12 SandyAMcPherson: Hi Sandy! I'm glad to see you back around the South 40 here. *smooch*

>11 figsfromthistle: Hi there, Anita, thank you!

>10 quondame: Thank you most kindly, Susan.

178 Murder at Greysbridge by Andrea Carter

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: Perfect for fans of character driven mysteries with a powerful sense of place — Being adapted for a television crime series

Summer has arrived in Inishowen and solicitor Ben O'Keeffe is greatly tempted by a job offer she's received from a law firm in America.

Yet before making any life-changing decisions there is her friend Leah's wedding to attend at the newly restored Greysbridge Hotel, with its private beach and beautiful pier. It's the perfect location, everyone agrees, but the festivities are brutally cut short when a young American, a visitor also staying at the hotel, drowns in full view of the wedding guests.

And when a second death is discovered the same evening, Ben finds herself embroiled in a real country house murder mystery, where all the guests are suspects . . .

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: Fourth in the series is a dangerous passage for a writer. The temptation is to let things get samey, or to overcomplicate things; seldom does one find the writer whose abilities include knowing what makes a series work for the long haul. I think we might have a winner in Author Andrea Carter.

Ben O'Keeffe is glad that Leah, her assistant, will have the very first wedding at Greysbridge. It's a fine old landed-gentry house that Abby and Ian Grey have brought back into their family after a profligate ancestor lost in a card game! What they needed was an event, and a locally beloved soul's wedding is perfect. Until, of course, it isn't...there are disasters piling up on the day, and the deaths of two seemingly unconnected men from different countries occur in such close time and physical proximity that the Garda gets involved.

Which means Ben's ex, Tom Molloy, returns to Inishowen. Which means her casual thing developing with new-to-Glendara Harry Dubois, the new G.P., is suddenly complicated. Which means that Ben's nosy neighbors will quickly be weighing in on which path she should choose...Phyllis the bookstore owner (who's also now a Reverend of some sect or another) and Iain the estate agent aren't likely not to share their ideas with her. Not to mention bestie/vet Maeve. Wouldn't be at all surprised if Guinness the cat doesn't weigh in soon.

What happens next is a bolt from the blue regarding her clients, the Greys...there are more secrets than just the ones we were made privy to in the last installment! And they get...intense. Add to the ordinary parent/child tensions within the Grey family the unusual way their son came to them, then top that off with a revelation or two about their business lives...that's enough for a book, but not for this book.

While the Greys are stewing, and their adopted son running, the issues surrounding the deaths of two people who are apparent strangers to each other are coming together with the odd little island community off Malin Head and directly across the North Atlantic from Greysbridge. There are so many things swirling in the waters between the locales that it becomes a bit wearing to keep track of them. And there are threads that get dropped...Harry Dubois vanishes early and reappears in Ben's thoughts and the investigation barely often enough to keep the name from requiring a bit of flipping to recall...but in the end, his presence and involvement are such worthwhile additions to the story that I'm inclined to be forgiving.

The problems I had with this read were mostly around the pace of the story. When Author Carter put all these pieces together, I think she underestimated how complex machinery needs time to spool up and find equilibrium. In this case, that meant a lot of scene-setting that wouldn't obviously pay off until later. The time we spend following Ben and Maeve around, then Ben and Tom around, is not badly spent. You won't necessarily think that as it happens, but I encourage you to sit with the situations you're seeing and let the slow accretion of facts do their work. Remember the way you learned to solve puzzles as a kid? One piece fits with another, then another after that, and finally there's a whole new pattern at the end. This story's about the best illustration of that truth as any I've read this year.

I don't know much about the Irish relationship to the UK's corner of it, or of Ireland's interest in Scottish independence, but they're clearly coming to a head as Brexit squashes the livelihoods of people too poor to matter to the Tories. And it's not really a surprise that the primary beneficiaries of the situation will be organized criminals, is it.

The actual solutions to all the crimes are plausible, and are just going to keep the local criminal classes thoroughly on the hop, so they're working to our advantage. While these books really can be read as stand-alones, since we're given more than enough information to follow along with who's who and what's what, I don't recommend it. I skipped (inadvertently) book two, Treacherous Strand, and after the spoilers for it in book three felt there was no need to or profit in my urge to go back. We have another year to wait for book five, The Body Falls, to come out.

Why does a year sound like such a long time....

Happy new one, Rdear.

>18 Ameise1: Thank you, Barbara.

Happy new thread, Richard.

Hi Richard, Happy new thread, dear friend.

Happy New Thread...

>1 richardderus: I echo your sentiments about Beasts of No Nation Read it about 7 years ago. Loved it. Still haven't gotten around to watching the movie on Netflix. Stars Idris Elba. I should remedy that.

Thanks for the podcast recommendation

>1 richardderus: I own Beasts of No Nation and have yet to read it. I really need to do that - as soon as I find my copy.

>17 richardderus: I will have to see if my local library has a copy. Thank you for the review and recommendation, Richard.

Have a wonderful week!!

Happy new one, dear fellow.

Happy New Thread, Richard. I had a perfectly lazy afternoon with the books. Yah!

Oooooh, look! A nice sparkly new thread!

>1 richardderus: Okay, I admit it's probably not my style, but your review makes me want to run out and read it. Or, you know, download it to my kindle and sit in a comfy chair with a cup of coffee at my elbow and read it. No running involved.

Hope the start of your week was a good one!

>26 Storeetllr: Thanks, Mary! I think you'd appreciate what Dr. Iweala achieved, even if it makes you a little bit uncomfortable.

>25 msf59: Thanks, Mark, I'm really glad you had the chance to get in a lazy day. Lots of excitement chez vous, so it must've been welcome.

>24 PaulCranswick: Thank you most kindly, PC.

>23 alcottacre: It's worth going on a search for, Stasia. Such a tremendously powerful read.

The series is four books old, so they might even have them...or be able to ILL them. *smooch*

>27 richardderus: My local library does not have anything by Andrea Carter so I am going to have to look further afield for them.

>22 mahsdad: Thanks, Jeff! May I just say the film's almost as good as the book...really, really well done. Enjoy the podcast, he's got a lovely manner and is very, very eloquent.

>21 johnsimpson: Thank you, John!

>20 Helenliz: Hi Helen! Thanks for the good wishes.

Happy new one!

Thanks, Jim!

>27 richardderus: Books like that don't make me uncomfortable, per se. Some infuriate me, some make me terribly sad and/or depressed. It's just that these days I seem not to have the mental focus for books that aren't light, easy reads and have to gear myself up to it.

Hi RD, and happy new thread!

>17 richardderus: Skipping the review… I loved the first in the series and don’t want to know anything else about it.

(*sigh* Again?)

Happy new thread Richard! ;0)

>34 humouress: Heh. Yes, again.

>33 karenmarie: Hey Horrible, happy Tuesday. Yes, leave the series alone until you get to them. Four so far, and the fifth a year from now.

>32 Storeetllr: The gears must be coaxed into the power alignment, I totally understand. Otherwise there's just nothing to meet the demand and down goes the read. I got there with a couple books recently.

Morning, BIgDaddy! Happy new one! I have not read Beasts of No Nation, so I'm adding it to The List. Like Karen, I skipped your review - you already hit me with the first book in the series and I have not read it yet so want to avoid spoilers for the series.

'Morning, Rdear! Happy Tuesday to you.

Coffee, reading for a bit, then off to Aunt Ann's to stay with her overnight after her second kaphoplastykyphoplasty. She has 6 fractured vertebrae, and this procedure injects cement in the vertebrae. She had 3 done the first time, 3 done last Friday. *shudder* I told her her back now has an interesting tattoo.

*smooch*

>37 karenmarie: I think it's wonderful what modern medicine can do to extend our useful lives. That, I admit, sounds grim to me; but I'm not the one who needs it done. Hugs to you and Aunt Ann for your slumber party!

*smooch*

Missed me. *smooch*

>39 Crazymamie: ...and you are...?

*smooch*

>36 Crazymamie: Très practical, as always. No need to know what happens three books down the line, is there. But the series has that sense-of-place that makes a series mystery work.

Beasts of No Nation is extraordinary. I loved it, in that appalled-and-horrified way the story elicits. I suspect it'll hit you right, too.

Happy new thread, Richard!

I was able to dodge Murder at Greysbridge but Beasts of No Nation is harder ....

>41 swynn: Hi Steve, thanks for the well-wishes...yeah, you'd be utterly indifferent to the Inishowen series, I'll wager. But you absolutely should imbibe Beasts of No Nation. No question. Soonest!

>37 karenmarie: My mom had that procedure after a fall many years ago. It was rather amazing how quickly she recovered, and how soon her terrible back pain resolved itself.

Happy New Thread!

>44 SilverWolf28: Thanks, Silver.

>43 laytonwoman3rd: Oh, it's more common than I thought, then. I still think it's amazing.

>45 richardderus: Older women, particularly, are prone to compression fractures of the vertebrae, and I think this has been a pretty standard procedure for stabilizing them. It was in-and-out surgery for an 85 year old woman; no overnight stay, and just a couple days relative inactivity for recovery. Mom drove 50 miles home from my house on day 4 after the procedure.

>46 laytonwoman3rd: ...!!... Wondrous times indeed.

((Hugs)) and **smooches**, Richard. Happy new thread!

>48 alcottacre: Thanks, Stasia!

Happy new one, Richard!

>50 jessibud2: Thank you, Shelley!

Morning, BigDaddy! How is Wednesday treating you so far?

>52 Crazymamie: Hey there, Mamie! Wednesday hasn't had much of a look-in on me so far. It's been quiet, which is just fine by me; it's been uneventful, see above; nothing's going to convince me that the Virginia governor's race was in any way god news, but it's not apocalyptic. If Murphy in NJ loses, then it will be time to start the armed insurrection.

179 Rider on the Rain by Sébastien Japrisot

Rating: 3.5* of five

The Publisher Says: When a young woman takes justice into her own hands after a horrific attack on the French Riviera, she thinks she has got away with it. But a mysterious stranger at a wedding has other ideas...

The bus never stops in Le Cap-des-Pins. Not in autumn, when the small Riviera resort is deserted. Except today, when a man with a red bag and a disconcerting stare steps out into the rain.

His arrival will throw the life of young housewife Mellie Mau into disarray. After surviving a horrific attack, she has a dark secret to hide. But a stranger at a wedding, the enigmatic American Harry Dobbs, is determined to get the truth out of her, leading her into a game of cat and mouse with dangerous consequences...

A cool, stylish and twisty thriller from cult French noir writer Sébastien Japrisot.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: CONTENT WARNING FOR SEXUAL VIOLENCE—STIGMATIZING MENTAL ILLNESS

This is a more or less unusual project...it's a novelization of a film script that Author Japrisot wrote for a wildly successful French film. The DNA of the script is still here, in the copious dialogue tags; quite a few stage directions have survived the trip to novella-ization, too. What also shows is the very, very dated sexual politics of the day...far more horrifying than in the older Japrisot novel reviewed below.

Consider that Charles Bronson plays the male lead in the film. That the film was made in 1969, and came out in 1970. I don't think I need to get too deeply into the, um, action.

So with that warning in place, to the plot. Again its film-script DNA is on display. It is taut; it is not in the least bit deep. Its surfaces are glossy and its politics aren't particularly liberal. It has a lovely woman being abused by damned near everyone who spends even a few seconds onscreen. Americans are violent, nasty brutes; Italians are shouty abusive men; French people are supine and ineffectual.

Author Japrisot wasn't any kind of a patriot....

What's on offer here is a deeply angry story of revenge and of the toll an abusive world can extract. It's never going to be easy to read something written over fifty years ago by a bitter, outraged man without coming away from the experience a little less sure that the world's a good place filled with kind people. But in this story, the woman who exacts a condign revenge on that world is allowed a degree of freedom that would've been unthinkable even a decade earlier. Look at Janet Leigh's character in Psycho....

While it isn't an easy read, due to subject matter, it is formally interesting for its far-from-usual direct lifting of script elements in novelizing the work. It has all of Author Japrisot's strengths, the terse and pointed language and the stunningly easy to visualize settings. Because it's not a simple story, in the sense of having great resonance with dark and ugly parts of human psyches, I don't think it'll appeal to all audiences. Because it's novella length, I don't think it'll necessarily fit well into today's crime-fiction universe...the crime trend is towards bloat as much as the rest of literature is. But it's a bracing, bitter draft of revenge fantasy and devictimized womanhood.

Only not in a salubrious way.

>54 richardderus: I probably won't seek out the book, but I see my library has the film. Maybe this weekend ...

180 The Sleeping Car Murders by Sébastien Japrisot

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: A beautiful young woman lies sprawled on her berth in the sleeping car of the night train from Marseilles to Paris. She is not in the embrace of sleep, or even in the arms of one of her many lovers. She is dead. And the unpleasant task of finding her killer is handed to an overworked, crime-weary police detective named Pierre Emile Grazziano, nicknamed Grazzi, who would rather play hide-and-seek with his little son than cat and mouse with a diabolically cunning, savage murderer.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: This is the first published crime novel from the late monadnock of French thriller writers, seeing the light of day in 1962...sixty years ago! I'd expected to be eye-rollingly impatient with the sexual politics...I was...and to find the motive for the title crime absurd...I sort-of did...and generally to find the read a pleasant time capsule but not one I could recommend.

Wrong on that score.

What Author Japrisot, ably served by Translator Price, achieved was a smartly paced and charmingly observed crime novel. I want to be clear, though, that the attitude towards women and their sexuality isn't within 21st-century best practices. I don't have a positive thing to say about that, and no, I don't want to shrug it off by saying "it's of its time." I think the way to frame the attitudes that makes me least irritably impatient is to think of this as a cautionary tale...a dead, or at least dying, set of stupid and wrong-headed ways of seeing people that has very directly contributed to terrible crimes.

What sticks with me the most is the sheer, idiotic nihilism of the crimes committed, and for such idiotic reasons. There are no excuses, of course, but the reason someone deprives another person of life...the one and only thing that can't be made good or replaced when it's taken...should always at least make some twisted kind of sense. Here, though, there is nothing, not a grain of a comprehensible motive. Like those thrill-killing boys, Leopold and Loeb.

I was utterly unable to put this debut crime novel, first published in 1962, down. It's not like a modern crime novel. There's no bloat; there's very little dialogue. The whole story's narrated, in a kind of distancing tactic, a lot like the voiceover narration of Double Indemnity, albeit it isn't the same narrator. Just the strategy, the way of telling that makes it feel like showing. And, in the end, the framing device works very, very well for the final summation of the crime.

Japrisot wasn't a hugely productive writer, having written a dozen fiction works of different lengths between 1950 and 1999. He translated works by Salinger, among others, into French; he worked in the advertising industry; he was, in short, a jobbing writer with a gift for economical storytelling. His strength lay in constructing the angle of repose for his story; he knew the slightest shift in perspective would destroy the equilibrium that a work of fiction relies on. When the shift inevitably occurs, the entire story flows out of its resting state and becomes something entirely other, a new resting state that doesn't resemble the constructed story but is all the same colors and most of the same shapes.

It is a pure pleasure to read this level of craftsmanship. By all means procure it and enjoy it for all its afternoon-filling worth.

>55 swynn: It's maybe not the best story, fifty-plus years on, to focus on; try >56 richardderus:. Still not great, gender-politics-wise, but more palatable.

Happy Wednesday, Richard. I am out of commission for a few days, so I am getting extra reading time in. I also picked up a copy of Lydia Davis' translation of Swann's Way. Beautiful edition. I appreciate the heads-up.

>58 msf59: That's probably all to the good, the pace you've been keeping...still, better always to make the decision yourself not have your body make it for you.

Enjoy Swann and his divagations.

Hi RD! Happy Wednesday to you.

>43 laytonwoman3rd: Good to know, Linda! Aunt Ann’s off to a convalescent home tomorrow (should have been there IMMEDIATELY after the procedures but better late than ever).

181 Trap for Cinderella by Sébastien Japrisot, tr. Helen Weaver

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: From the author of A Very Long Engagement, comes an ingenious psychological thriller.

A young woman wakes in a hospital room. What happened to her and why is a mystery. Is she victim or murderer?

The young woman has been badly injured in a fire and has amnesia. But what happened to her? Is she Mi, Micky or Michèle, or Do, Dominique? As she struggles to rebuild her identity, she starts to recall the crime that was committed and the house on the French Riviera. She remembers the rich heiress and the faithful friend – but which is she?

I RECEIVED THIS DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.
STRONG CONTENT WARNING FOR ENCAVMAPHOBIA

My Review: As ever with this author, do not expect the usual, simple setting down of sentences to form beautiful images and sanguine characters, but the unsettling reversals of point of view and the sheer variety of events as told by people with different viewpoints.

Even when those people are in the same body. And no, there are no external markers of the changes. You have to work for your pleasures!

Pleasures there are, and aplenty, in this twisty tale of utterly unreliable narrators. Mi, Michèle, or Do, Domenica, or whoever she might be, is unreliable because her trauma...caught in a fire, either the perpetrartix or the intended victim of it, makes little difference after simply being trapped in a fire...has robbed her of her memory. Those around her are, to put it mildly, motivated by pecuniary gain and thus aren't entirely to be trusted. The doctor is no help to her in recovering her true self. But the more questions the narrator asks, the more she realizes that it's very, very possible that she simply does not want the answers to those questions.

What's wrong with simply...existing. Allowing the tidal wave of love and sympathy to sustain her. Whether or not she "deserves" it.

The concept of merit, of being worthy, of having one's just deserts, is a huge issue in this story. While there is no way that such a tale would be possible in the twenty-first century, when a simple DNA test would establish instantly and once and for all who she was, the way the plastic surgeon worked miracles for her is the primary obstacle to believability in this psychological horror story. I have seen a truly badly burned person and let me assure you they would not be passable in social settings. For the amnesia plot to work, however, there is a need to suspend this level of disbelief.

The sense of dread, of not knowing where one is in the life one is living, is a palpable horror. The idea of surviving a fire is traumatic enough...but to then realize that everyone around one is lying by omission, or directly...? How can that possibly be anything but a waking nightmare?

It is at this Rebecca-meets-Gaslight level that the book works best. Let go of the practical knowledge you possess as a 21st-century reader and travel back to 1963 (when the book first appeared in French) to allow this fearsome reality to submerge your sense of the firmess of your own foundations. Be there with Michèle...Domenica...whatever her name is.

Be there. That might very well be the epitaph of each of the people who die in this book, especially the ones sentenced to prison for crimes they might have, or did, commit. The crimes that, in the end, meant nothing...caused nothing that had not already happened. And isn't that just the awful way of crime? It's really, in the end, pointless.

Agonizing pain for pointless goals. How very, very noir.

>60 karenmarie: Happy Humpday, Horrible...I'm very glad Aunt Ann is in the rehab now. Yes, she should've been discharged directly there. But as you say, better late than too late.

>60 karenmarie: Yes, a convalescent home sounds right for a woman with multiple fractures repaired more or less at once. I assume it makes a difference in which area the fractures occur. My mother's was in the thoracic region. I'm sure cervical or lumbar would be more troublesome. I hope Auntie is soon feeling a lot more comfortable.

>60 karenmarie: Good!
Sounds a little bit like MiL. Discharged from hospital to home when she couldn't get up from the toilet on her own. You do wonder sometimes what someone was thinking that it seemed like a sensible idea.
Hope Auntie Ann is back on her pins soon and turning cartwheels 'cross the floor (maybe not though).

>61 richardderus: ENCAVMAPHOBIA - had to look that one up. As phobias go, its a pretty reasonable one. :)

>65 mahsdad: Oh! I bet that's what someone on Goodreads was talking about. I didn't realize it was that abstruse a word. I guess because I've had it so long.

>64 Helenliz:, >63 laytonwoman3rd: :-) We're all pleased that Aunt Ann's in the proper place to get the healing help she needs.

>56 richardderus: The chances of my finding anything by Japrisot at my local library are about the same as a snowball in hades. Still, I appreciate the reviews and recommendations, Richard.

((Hugs)) and **smooches**

Happy Thursday, Richard dear!

I hope all is well at your place.
All is nice and quiet here, enough books to read, so I am content.

182 POWER BORN OF DREAMS: My Story is Palestine by Mohammed Sabaaneh

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Publisher Says: What does freedom look like from inside an Israeli prison?

A bird perches on the cell window and offers a deal: “You bring the pencil, and I will bring the stories,” stories of family, of community, of Gaza, of the West Bank, of Jerusalem, of Palestine. The two collect threads of memory and intergenerational trauma from ongoing settler-colonialism. Helping us to see that the prison is much larger than a building, far wider than a cell; it stretches through towns and villages, past military checkpoints and borders. But hope and solidarity can stretch farther, deeper, once strength is drawn of stories and power is born of dreams. Translating headlines into authentic lived experiences, these stories come to life in the striking linocut artwork of Mohammad Sabaaneh, helping us to see Palestinians not as political symbols, but as people.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: The author/artist, whose lived experience this graphic novel is born out of, made a beautiful work of art out of suffering.

The linocuts used to create the illustrations are truly brutal, absolutely unsparingly blocky and confining, and that is the essence of the story he is telling us in his words and images. It's my worst nightmare, claustrophobia, made in art. There's nothing worse than the feeling of being TRAPPED, of having no agency in the workings of your own world...you exist that way, you don't live. In the beginning of the book, you're not told what happened to bring the author/artist into an Israeli prison. We're just...in there. We are, like him, forced to experience imprisonment, though we're unaware of why and presumably he is...there's a line that a guard shouts at him about wanting to become a martyr, so I can deduce from that there is a violent act in the man's past. Or the planning of one, or just the suspicion of the planning of one...societies that exist inside a conflict paradigm are noticeably more paranoid than ones that don't.

The flights of the bird the author/artist creates to make the stories of others come alive are beautifully imagined. The linocut technique carries through the sense of enclosure, of stasis within a field; the bird's flights aren't escapes but reminders of the nature of imprisonment, confinement. It is this essential feature of the story that I found least convincing, though. I wasn't sold on the narrative device providing an urgently needed contrast to the overall looming, enclosed tone of the book.

The awful entanglement of the body in the emotional and mental space of imprisonment, confinement, comes through more clearly than ever as the author presents us with the stories of other Palestinians, those not imprisoned with him, as they navigate the awfulness of never being allowed a sense of Home or even of safety in this place they, and their ancestors before them, once were masters of their own fates within.

The entire experience of this artwork, this passionately lived experience of being disempowered, unhomed, dehumanized for wanting what someone else has simply...taken...as their right, their just compensation for a world that you didn't agree with or agree to be identified with's abuse of them...there is no right? There is no Right? Who says? Why do you say there's no solution, because you don't want the one the other side wants? Then when will stories like this one ever cease? Can they ever become history, when they aren't even acknowledged as History?

This Yuletide, pick up a piece of Art, a fragment of story, that you really don't know how much you don't know about. A book like this, with its personal tales as well as a more scholarly, factual end-story, will give you the personal perspective of people you don't know or know about.

Then realize: The issues in this book are not solely Over There. They apply right here on your doorstep. So take a moment to recognize and realize that everything you possess, everything you take for granted, has a cost. And not solely to you.

183 PROPHET AGAINST SLAVERY: Benjamin Lay, A Graphic Novel by David Lester

Rating: 5* of five

The Publisher Says: The revolutionary life of an 18th-century dwarf activist who was among the first to fight against slavery and animal cruelty.

Prophet Against Slavery is an action-packed chronicle of the remarkable and radical Benjamin Lay, based on the award-winning biography by Marcus Rediker that sparked the Quaker community to re-embrace Lay after 280 years of disownment. Graphic novelist David Lester brings the full scope of Lay’s activism and ideas to life.

Born in 1682 to a humble Quaker family in Essex, England, Lay was a forceful and prescient visionary. Understanding the fundamental evil that slavery represented, he would unflinchingly use guerrilla theatre tactics and direct action to shame slave owners and traders in his community. The prejudice that Lay suffered as a dwarf and a hunchback, as well as his devout faith, informed his passion for human and animal liberation. Exhibiting stamina, fortitude, and integrity in the face of the cruelties practiced against what he called his “fellow creatures,” he was often a lonely voice that spoke truth to power.

Lester’s beautiful imagery and storytelling, accompanied by afterwords from Rediker and Paul Buhle, capture the radicalism, the humor, and the humanity of this truly modern figure. A testament to the impact each of us can make, Prophet Against Slavery brings Lay’s prophetic vision to a new generation of young activists who today echo his call of 300 years ago: “No justice, no peace!”

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: In today's world, Benjamin Lay would be a firebrand and a demanding moral force. IMAGINE how he came across in the slave-owning times of the early eighteenth century. A dwarf...an iconoclast...an uncompromising, flinty, arrogantly sure of himself and his rightness, public speaker with a real gift for propaganda.

He would be literally inescapable in this media landscape.

We are the poorer for the absence of someone like him, taking on the horrors of international capitalism. The export of jobs has meant the export of problems like labor relations and environmental regulations, which no one can ever convince me was serendipity. Author and Artist Lester (The Listener and The Gruesome Acts of Capitalism are some of the other titles he's created) clearly understands the value of theater and public perception in the winning of the culture wars:

He's got the entire subject of the Quaker dwarf with an outsider's grasp of the social and moral corruption around him in the economical monochrome of these spreads. Things *are* black-and-white when one reduces them to lines drawn in the sand. Using the palette he chose makes the starkness of Benjamin Lay's moral universe simply part of the experience of learning about him.

It is unsurprising that, in this twenty-first century of information overload, we're needing to learn about Benjamin Lay. His brand of vegan, animal-rights activism, his uncompromising adherence to his moral understanding of the world, reminds me of Greta Thunberg. Only louder. While he had less command of the broader public's attention than she does, he used his voice, his mind's single focus on The Greatest Good, and his unique viewpoint as she has. His unswerving opposition to slavery was so broad in its intellectual base that he refused to ride horses or eat slaughtered animals. In the eighteenth century.

After the Confederacy won the US Civil War in the courts, and gifted us with the Jim Crow laws and the voter suppression laws that they're succeeding in re-installing, the life of a man like Lay would've been deeply threatening to their agenda. A shining moral example? And one who took it to the extremes that Lay did...throwing fake blood on slave owners?! writing angry screeds filled with passion and yet based on reason?! blasphemy to the Capitalist Elite!...well, best to bury him again.

They did; it worked. I'd never heard of him before I was granted this graphic novel's DRC by Beacon Press, that monadnock of Unitarian probity in publishing. The graphic-novel format has never been my favorite among publishing choices. I'd say that, despite this one's five-star rating, it still isn't. I've also given the full five stars to Nationalist Love, and the same reason obtains here: The only effective tool to use in bringing this story to a broad audience is the one used here. There's no way most people would pick up an all-text biography of Benjamin Lay, eighteenth-century dwarf; marry it to this format, they're more likely give it a shot.

What Lay accomplished, in practical terms, was to change the hearts and minds of younger people...which is what the Ruling Elite did in the 1970s and 1980s with rampant consumerism and cheap, disposable goods. This long-buried story will make the effectiveness of that trick very obvious. Ray Bradbury, a true autodidact, famously said, "You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them." The books by and about Benjamin Lay aren't widely read today, and there's a good reason for that: Their message is still resonant, and still damaging to the System's actions and inactions.

Before anyone says it to me, let me say now that I am no Benjamin Lay. I'm a meat-eating cheap-goods-buying 21st-century consumer. That does not make me insensible to the man's message; it merely means that my inner struggle, to reconcile the way I live with the way I understand the world, is apparently endless. It's never a comfortable place to be. I exist because modern exploitive capitalism created medicines that prevent me from dying. I eat because of factory farming and cheap electricity. I am not naked because the supply chain includes vast quantities of cotton goods. The chemical industry has gifted me power, shoes, soaps and shampoos and tooth-cleaning goop.

I am the problem Benjamin Lay railed against: I exist inside a system that requires others to be outside its benefits in order to function. He chose the morally superior course of opting out. He chose a lifetime of rejection and excoriation and outrage heaped upon him, in the name of standing up to be counted for his beliefs. I admit: I lack that courage.

That does not impair my ability to see his message and know its rightness. It makes me more willing to shout and point and wave my arms at this simple, beautiful expression of a simple, beautiful soul's purpose on this Earth. We can all aspire to be celebrated Home as was Benjamin Lay.

>68 FAMeulstee: Thank you, Anita, the same to you...I'm pretty early up, since I need to get some stuff accomplished. It's touch and go whether I get going or go back to bed since the coffee's taking an age to get itself sorted.

>67 alcottacre: I doubt the stories Japrisot yells would be pleasurable for you to read...very nihilistic and pessimistic. Sending the hugs and the smooches back to you!

‘Morning, RDear, and happy Thursday to you.

>62 richardderus: Yes, better late than never.

>63 laytonwoman3rd: She had cervical AND lumbar vertebrae fractures. I’ll probably check in with her tomorrow. She’s supposed to get checked in 11-ish today. Thank you for the good wishes, Linda.

>64 Helenliz: Thanks, Helen. She’ll be 82 next month so I’m not sure cartwheels are in the picture, but I appreciate your good wishes. I could go on and on about folks being rushed out of hospitals. In 2002 Bill had open heart surgery on Thursday and they sent him home on Monday. I had Jenna on a Tuesday via c-section, and they sent us home on Friday. Both of Aunt Ann’s procedures were out patient. Money over medicine.

>69 richardderus: and >70 richardderus: I appreciate your reviews, RD, but I conducted a study in 2019. I tried a graphic novel suggested by @jnwelch, innocuous, sweet, and was shuddering by the end of it because there were no words. And now I don’t know what to do with the GN I do have on my shelves, The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace and Babbage: The (Mostly) True Story of the First Computer by Sydney Padua. I opened it one day and although there were words, just didn't grok it. But it looks impressive there between American Lion and Undaunted Courage.

*smooch* from your own Horrible

Thursday *smooch*.

>72 karenmarie: I really enjoyed the Lovelace and Babbage book, but then I grew up in the crisp pencil lines of graphic serial storytelling.

If it's not your cuppa, so be it.

>74 magicians_nephew:, >72 karenmarie: I'm still on the quest to figure out *why* people like comic books. I accept, after a long rear-guard battle against my inability to believe a grown-up needs picture books, that they do...but WHY?

Nationalist Love broke that barrier for me. Here was a story so simple, so almost asininely reductive, that it wouldn't make a "Complete Stories" volume from Library of America. Pair it with the flat, beastly, awfully bright art, and that same story carries meaning, offers insights into the idiotically simple words.

Both of the GNs I've reviewed here offer a similar expansion on the meanings of their words. In the case of Benjamin Lay, I think the likelihood of anyone not already interested in 18th Quaker history would ever bother to find out who he is, and a GN will ensnare a few more people who really need to know that Greta Thunberg isn't a sport, a rarity.

>73 katiekrug: *smooch*

>69 richardderus: >70 richardderus: Adding both of those to the BlackHole. My local library has gotten better at carrying graphic novels, but still does not have either of those yet. I live in hope.

((Hugs) and **smooches** for today, RD. I hope it is a good one!

>76 alcottacre: Well, give them time, Stasia, these two were only published Tuesday! And the Palestinian one will need to be requested, I'm pretty sure. Considering where you are, they both might need to be requested.

Dropping off smooches before you've whizzed off to start yet another thread.

Sweet Thursday, Richard. Excellent review of Prophet Against Slavery. As you know I am huge fan of GNs and this one sounds incredible. Sh*t!! My library system doesn't have a copy yet.

>79 msf59: Thanks, Mark! As I said to Stasia, these only came out on Tuesday, so it might be a while before they get to y'all's libraries. And it might be necessary to request 'em before they get bought.

>78 MickyFine: Hi Micky! *smooch*

It is always a treat to open your thread. I love your words. I have started using Repulsicans in my own speaking and think often of your pithy comments about the state of things in this country. Thanks for participating in LT.

>77 richardderus: More than likely. More's the pity.

>82 alcottacre: Yeah, but facts is facts...Texas is no hotbed of liberalism.

>81 benitastrnad: Why, thank you, Benita! That's a lovely compliment indeed. I'm glad I added an epithet to your arsenal of nastiness aimed at the Gross Old Psychos.

'Morning, RDear, and happy Friday to you!

I've taken your advice and found the Lydia Davis translation of Swann's Way at the Library and picked it up yesterday. It gave me a chance to chat with the Librarians, which is always fun. I'll be starting it soon.

I call 'em the Gang of Psychos. Repulsicans is a good'un, too.

*smooch*

184 Under Color of Law by Aaron Philip Clark

Rating: 3.5* of five

The Publisher Says: The murder of a police recruit pins a Black LAPD detective in a deadly web where race, corruption, violence, and cover-ups intersect in this relevant, razor-sharp novel of suspense.

Black rookie cop Trevor “Finn” Finnegan aspires to become a top-ranking officer in the Los Angeles Police Department and fix a broken department. A fast-track promotion to detective in the coveted Robbery-Homicide Division puts him closer to achieving his goal.

Four years later, calls for police accountability rule the headlines. The city is teeming with protests for racial justice. When the body of a murdered Black academy recruit is found in the Angeles National Forest, Finn is tasked to investigate.

As pressure mounts to solve the crime and avoid a PR nightmare, Finn scours the underbelly of a volatile city where power, violence, and race intersect. But it’s Finn’s past experience as a beat cop that may hold the key to solving the recruit’s murder. The price? The end of Finn’s career…or his life.

I RECEIVED THIS AS PART OF THE FIRST READS SELECTIONS THROUGH AMAZON PRIME.

My Review: I was in a weird position in September 2021. I got my monthly free-because-you-have-Prime offerings from Amazon and, where I usually have no problem picking between two or three of the stories, I was *stuck* between two I really, really wanted to read...the situation was so bad and the deadline to make my choice was looming so I asked my bookish friends to choose between them for me.

A dark and twisty psychological thriller set in Nebraska lost out to this law'n'order-floutin' procedural thriller, though not by much. Either of them would've been fine by me. This story's victory was perfect, I figured, since its publication was set for 1 October and I was #Spooktobering with mysteries and thrillers instead of ghosts and werewolves and the like. And now, mirabile dictu, it's #Noirvember when the review comes out!

It really shows that this author is also a screenwriter. His first pages are a lights-and-sirens, pursuit-copter assisted chase that whipped past as fast as it would've on screen. The major notes in the symphony the author's prepared for us are clear; the problem he's decided to write about couldn't be more timely. What isn't ordinary is the PoV of a cop, a Black cop, on police brutality. On the department's culture, on what it means to try to be a Good Cop, a good Black man, and a decent human being in a system that has little room for any of those identities.

Trevor "Finn" Finnegan stepped off the straight and narrow early in his career at LAPD. What he did is not a mystery; but you should find out from his story. The results of his ethical compromise are simple: He climbed the ladder faster than a Black man should've and is roundly resented by all for it. He has a toxic relationship to his "high yellow" father (and hasn't it been an age since I've heard that term!), an ex-LAPD officer, that was always going to be fraught but never got better. Neither knew how to make it so...his mother's early death didn't help. The men aren't going to be besties, but they have a basic world-view compatibility: No one gives you nothing, just decide how much you'll pay for it.

But what Finn decides to pay is a price that doesn't make for good reading...or living. What happens as a result of this price, this devil's bargain, is devastating. It changes everything. I think it's a change for the better, but that's by no means sure....

Why this is only getting a 3.5-star rating from me comes down to the ghastly sexual politics. There's a pair of women with whom horndog Trevor is involved, in a weird off-kilter way, and his actions do not speak well of him. In relation to one of the women, he all but throws her privileged whiteness in her face while enacting, apparently unironically, male privilege in its most extreme form. He then imagines the other woman in his life will condone, forgive, and accept his bad behavior...and Author Clark's construct of her makes that not improbable. Ugh.

My revolted reservations aside, the writing is deft, it fails to fall into speechification as it sometimes hints at doing, and the plot is one I feel strongly needs to be told. Good people doing bad things for what they tell themselves are noble aims is an evergreen because it's not just relatable it's instructive. I'll read the next book in what promises to be a very interesting series.

>84 karenmarie: Hiya Horrible, happy Friday back at'cha! I'm glad you are leaving the tedious toils of Moncrieff Scott's deeply dull prose. I also hope you're going to love it as a reading experience.

Gang of Psychos is good...Gross Old Pedophiles fits...if only the Democraps weren't equally awful.

Gross Old Pedofiles is a good one, too. I personally don't think the Demo...crats... are as awful. At a bare minimum their intentions are good even if they sabotage themselves and are too nice to go for the jugular when they're in power, and I don't think the Gross Old Pedofiles care one single whit about people as opposed to white male power and business.

crap and double crap, another duplicate. New rule: post something fun to replace duplicates.

>85 richardderus: Well, crap. Usually I just pick one of those freebies for "someday" and then forget it's in my "library." That one sounds like I may have to bump it up a bit.

>89 swynn: Heh. Gotcha!

>88 karenmarie: Cutey-patootie-saurus!

>87 karenmarie: I see fairly little evidence that the Blue side is less beholden to Big Bidniss than the Red side. And when did that color change happen? Was it Ray-gun and his fucking red ties?

Just swinging by to say happy Friday, Richard! None of your recent reads are calling out to me, but I hope your weekend is full of fabulous books. *smooch*

>91 bell7: Annoyingly, not so much...the one I've just finished pissed me off, the one I'm about to finish is plodding to a close, and there's a story collection that...hasn't been a joy so far.

Maybe it'll change....

*smooch* at least I can talk about GBBO starting today!

Happy Friday, RD! I hope you read something better soon!

>88 karenmarie: The real cause of dinosaurs becoming extinct?

>92 richardderus: Nope; you'll still have to use spoiler tags for me. Last This year we got GBBO in January/ February.

>94 humouress: *SIGH* Very bloody well.

>93 alcottacre: It's not looking very good...though I did finally write up my review of a book I read in October that I really, really liked a lot. That helped me get over my grump.

>95 richardderus: Hey, not my fault. I'd watch it live, if I could.

>96 humouress: There's this excellent new thing called "streaming video" and, if one is willing to spend some spondulix, this *other* excellent new thing called a "VPN" that allows one to experience the gloire that is live television in countries not one's own!

>88 karenmarie: Great idea!
And love what you chose, although I wouldn't this to appear in my yard!

>98 SandyAMcPherson: Oh, I'd totally have that on my lawn, Sandy. And my neighbors would *loathe* me!

>99 richardderus: *I* OTOH, have neighbours whom we like. This is one of the best neighbourhoods I've ever lived in (as an adult, anyway).

>100 SandyAMcPherson: ...so no flamingo-pecked T. rex statues in your future...so sad....

So...#GBBO thoughts:
Wow. This one is a cruel, cruel week. Caramel?! I loved Giuseppe's response to caramel "doesn't like to be too hot or too cool or too wet or too dry...it's like an Italian wife" heh. Laura will have words. Loud ones I wager...and then he blew star baker with the hazelnut-too-prominent tart! His domed dealio was just beautiful, just that...glue...glaze!
Jürgen got star baker because he didn't *fail* unlike Giuseppe. He didn't win, he didn't fail. And his showstopper was so completely bewildering I think they were intimidated into saying "yeah okay, it's good" and moved along. (Tired of the "back in the tent" gag, though.)
Chigs did a great job, for someone who *just* started baking! And he really listens when they give him feedback.
Crystelle...such a promising set of skills and just not enough time management skill to make them shine. She should've been star baker but her Kit-Kats were sloppy, her tart was stunning but there was that dome disaster...oh poor thing! I was as anxious as the rest of 'em!
Lizzie's going next week. Prediction.
And George leaving? Quel surprise.

>95 richardderus: That helped me get over my grump.

Thank goodness for small miracles :)

((Hugs)) and **smooches,** RD. I hope you have a wonderful weekend!

>103 alcottacre: Thanks, Stasia, may all your hopes come true. *smooch*

>104 richardderus: Thanks, RD. I am taking part of the reading marathon over the weekend for the first time in forever and am hoping to plow through several library books :)

>105 alcottacre: Good luck in getting the stack down! It's such a great feeling, isn't it. Accomplishment plus entertainment...win/win.

My dad showed me this video this morning and it's really interesting: https://youtu.be/D2t4u_tEefM

>107 SilverWolf28: I'll watch it later, and report back. It looks fascinating, thank you for sharing it with me.

>108 richardderus: You're welcome. It's fascinating and infuriating.

>102 richardderus: - They were basically Twix bars, not KitKats (points out the lover of both). George had to go and it was obvious mid-way through the technical. No recovery from two really bad bakes. I kind of hated this week, probably because I'm not a huge caramel fan, and I thought the show-stopper domes were a dumb requirement. I agree with your prediction about Lizzie. Jurgen deserved to win, but it was a pretty low bar, so a dissatisfying episode all around.

Saturday smooch!

Happy Saturday, Richard. I was considering joining my birding buddies this morning but I am still not at a 100%, so rather not take a chance. I am storing up my energy, so I can travel into the city tomorrow to visit with Joe. We are long overdue. It looks like it will be me and books today.

'Morning, RDear! Happy Saturday to you.

>85 richardderus: Even though I voted for this one to help you decide, I'll pass. Harry Bosch he's not, and I don't need the sexual politics. Excellent review, as always. Ya almost got me. *smile*

>99 richardderus: It doesn't surprise me at all that you'd have T. rex and plastic Phoenicopteriformes in your yard.

*smooch*

>97 richardderus: And in English?

Currently number one son is sitting his IB exams and seems to be spending more time on Netflix. We also have subscriptions to the Disney Channel, HBO Go, Amazon and goodness knows what else - just because now all the series we used to watch on cable (we still have that, too) have started migrating away. Not that I watch as much as I used to so we could get rid of most of them. We do get BBC First on cable for my GBBO and Strictly fixes ... when the series eventually get to Asia. I suspect the kids have some kind of VPN ... must check it out ... *wanders off*

*returns to add* >102 richardderus: >110 katiekrug: Ta.

185 The Ghosts of Belfast by Stuart Neville

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Publisher Says: Sooner or later, everybody pays.

Gerry Fegan, a former paramilitary contract killer, is haunted by the ghosts of the 12 people he has slaughtered. Every night, on the point of losing his mind, he drowns their screams in drink. His solution is to kill those who engineered their deaths.

From the greedy politicians to the corrupt security forces, the street thugs to the complacent bystanders who let it happen, all are called to account. But when Fegan's vendetta threatens to derail a hard-won truce and destabilise the government, old comrades and enemies alike want him dead.

Winner of the 2009 Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Best Thriller.

My Review: First, read this:

“Hate's a terrible thing. It's a wasteful, stupid emotion. You can hate someone with all your heart, but it'll never do them a bit of harm. The only person it hurts is you. You can spend your days hating, letting it eat away at you, and the person you hate will go on living just the same. So what's the point?”

That's the logical, and irrefutable, argument against hate. But there's no chance humans will give up hating. It's an addictive drug, a high that can only be bested by the Absolute Assurance that YOU ARE RIGHT, They are Wrong, and therefore they deserve _____. Ireland's been in the toils of both, Hate and Rightness, for centuries. They've made it the basis for their identity as a nation. It ain't goin' nowhere.

That grim prognostication delivered, the story we're told in this (debut!) novel is based around a single person's efforts to mitigate the toll Hate takes on society as a whole. That he's chosen, um, a counter-productive solution to the problem is...kind of the core of the read. The way there's no out for a person whose persona is warped by war, by violent and utterly anti-social normative training, whose core is eaten out to nothingness by hatred. That is who such a one will be always. And Gerry Fegan is a stone-cold killer, a person whose life is without the sense of remorse that a normal person would have for depriving others of their entire futures.

Which is why they haunt him. Their ghosts won't let him sleep, or think, or be normal.

Discussions of Gerry's ghosts' reality are circular. Real? Imaginary? Guilt phantasms? Doesn't matter. Gerry is the person he's been made into. The ghosts demand something be done to balance the scales of their lost futures. And Gerry being their instrument means that something will be murderous.

This is a huge problem for the world. Men and women like Gerry exist all over the globe, and they represent a ticking time-bomb of violence and chaos in every place they exist. Conflicts based on such idiotic things as religion and ethnicity and national identity are going to sink any "peace process" that ever gets past the hot-air stage. People like these need their Hate-hit to feel good. Feeling good, about yourself, about your superior place in the world, is fundamental to humans' ability to thrive. In far too many cases, that represents itself as Hate for Others. Nothing effective has ever been done about that...can anything effective ever be done about it? Don't look at Ireland. It's a pink-skinned Rwanda.

And this novel, this brilliant noir tale of revenge if not exactly redemption, brings that to its...conclusion is the wrong word. "Stopping place" in the sense of "the buck stops here" is permaybehaps closer. The man Gerry, expiating his sins, commits others...but do they count as sins? They're balancing scales, not to say that the choice of method is one I approve of. But he's made some attempt to redress the vile acts he's committed. By committing others.

The Mahatma was correct. The world continues to ignore him, and the cycle of violence continues to spiral ever downward into chaos.

Finally, let me say that this book's the first in a series called "Jack Lennon Investigations." This will bumfuzzle most readers. "Who the hell's Jack Lennon?" I hear you ask. Well...don't worry your pretty little head about it is my response. Read Collusion and don't fuss. It's well worth your eyeblinks, just as this delight of a violent, nihilistic noir read is.

>113 humouress: You're very.

Netflix is a great way to defuse the stress of having to sit that beast of an exam. He'll do fine. And yes, ask him about the VPN. The response *might* be in English, though don't count on it.

>112 karenmarie: If I had a yard, you know I would! In a heartbeat. How else would anyone know where I lived?

I really, really don't think it's a book you should read. The violence wouldn't really ruffle you, but the motives would.

Saturday *smooch*

>111 msf59: I know that's the wise course, but of course you're bummed about having to make the choice. So sorry! I hope your healing will do a turbocharged version so you can get back to normal life soonest.

Have a great time at your meet-up! That should be a terrific time, and one of y'all remember to take pictures.

>110 katiekrug: Oh yeah...they kinda flow together (heh) in my mind. It was, in my opinion, just a trap for poor George to make the stupid globes a requirement, like Prue tried to do with the sticky toffee puddings that *had* to be served with crême anglaise was for Freya. He was always going to self-destruct on caramel anyway...fiddly damned stuff and we all know what a flapmeister he is! And as to your last point: 100%

If you like tree-books, and would like to save a few bucks on them, https://www.goodwillbooks.com/ is offering 10% off any order over $10 through Sunday the 7th. Use code "FALLBACK" at checkout. Remember that standard shipping is free! And it's Goodwill, they do good stuff in this world.

>117 richardderus: Thanks for the mention, RD. I will have to check that out!

>70 richardderus: I love that bottom image, the house/trees in the top half are so cool. Glad it worked out for ya as a reading experience as well!

'Morning, RDear. Happy Sunday to you.

la la la... skipping >117 richardderus: la la la...

*smooch* from your own Horrible

186 The Colour of Milk by Nell Leyshon

Rating: 5* of five

The Publisher Says: Mary is a sharp-tongued farm girl, and she will do anything to learn to read and write. But as she does so through four seasons of one extraordinary year, she discovers that nothing comes for free. Told by a narrator whose urgent, unforgettable voice will break your heart, The Colour of Milk is an astonishing novel.

I CHECKED THIS EBOOK OUT OF MY LOCAL LIBRARY. SUPPORT YOUR LIBRARIES, FOLKS! THEY NEED US TO USE THEIR SERVICES!

ALL SPOILERS...ALL THE TIME...SPOILERS BELOW! THE PHOBIC ARE WARNED OFF!

My Review: First, read this:

this is my book and i am writing it by my own hand.

in this year of lord eighteen hundred and thirty one i am reached the age of fifteen and i am sitting by my window and i can see many things. i can see birds and they fill the sky with their cries. i can see the trees and i can see the leaves.

and each leaf has veins which run down it.

and the bark of each tree has cracks.

i am not very tall and my hair is the colour of milk.

my name is mary and i have learned to spell it. m. a. r. y. that is how you letter it.

I am utterly besotted with this book. My bookish friend Katie is the one who gets the blame, I mean credit!, for convincing me to try the read. It is short, and it has something I can't describe to you adequately that rings me like a bell. I think, I guess, it's a sense of the passionate urgency Mary feels in learning her letters...like that act, that piece of knowledge, will transform her, will make everything Different. If nothing else, it will give her a leg up on her noxious sister Beatrice.

Her life, Mary's, is about what you expect a woman's life to be at that time and in that class. It is nasty, brutish, and turns out to be short. It is simple, and it is without ornament. It is, in short, a titanic waste of the brain of a clever woman like Mary. As her story begins, she is sold by her father to the local vicar as a caretaking maid-of-all-work for the vicar's housekeeper. His wife is terminally ill, and there's no one whose job it is...no child, no sibling...to muck in and do the labor of cleaning the invalid, her bedding, keeping her as entertained as possible; the housekeeper needs the extra hands. The vicar? Men did not (and do not, by and large) do that sort of work.

Mary's waspish, direct honesty isn't easy. Not for her...it leads those around her to anger, more often than not...and not for the world she lives in. Making honest observations about the facts of life is not a fast way to make squads of pals. Mary's sisters don't much like her, her mother can't be arsed to care about much that isn't making her husband the drunken shit as happy as possible, and Mary's grandfather (her father's father) is crippled by an accident so despite his pleasure in her company he isn't much help to Mary in navigating the world.

What happens as Mary assumes her duties in the vicar's household is the oldest story in the world. She's raped. She isn't, however, going to put up with that, and that's what makes this story a five-star read for me. Mary serves up her revenge and takes her punishment with her eyes open, her chin up, and her heart unburdened by regret.

I fell in love with Mary from page one. If you read the above quote, which is from the beginning of the book, and do not feel the appeal, are not vibrating with the language's power, then skip the read. It won't get better...the story's really simple, it's unsurprising, and it's only half the point. The other half is the storytelling, the sense of being there with Mary. We're hearing a voice that shouldn't have reached us from a person who didn't matter when she was alive so she wouldn't have been allowed to leave a record after her death.

And that's why I love it, instead of merely thinking it was an interesting, not always successful, stylistic experiment. (How does Mary know how to spell some of the complicated words she uses, eg "hierarchy"?) The effort to bring an unpolished and unmediated voice to life is doomed to artificiality, of course, since this is fiction and not a research project. But the mannerisms were successful in breathing life into a character whose essential reality overcame, for this testy old reader, the inevitable awareness of the story as construct, as artifact.

So I'll shout my thanks westward to my friend in New Jersey...the same one who warbled me into reading The Mercy Seat!...whose recommendation of the story was sufficiently enthusiastic as to make my read necessary. Thank goodness my library had an ebook available. I would've been much the poorer for not having Mary along for the ride into the rest of my reading life.

A story, a character, a book like this is a treasure. Get it, if you can.

>121 richardderus: - Oh, you sneak! I didn't know you had read it. I'm glad you loved it so much. xx

>120 karenmarie: *chuckle* I just *bet* you're skipping...right over to goodwillbooks.com to use FALLBACK to get 10% off your order!

*smooch* you tsundoku-haver, you

>119 LovingLit: I like that house as well, Megan, it's like a lot of farmhouses that got built here in the Northeast during early colonization days. The art is really good in that book.

>118 alcottacre: *smooch*

>122 katiekrug: A little surprise for your Sunday mornin' there, Miss Katie ma'am. It's always nice to find out someone loved a read you got them to do.

It's such a simple tale. It's such an oft-told tale. It's a beauty, because it's got something extra, a little trick up its sleeve, that thing that makes a story taller in the saddle. The risk is how many people will be put off by it. They will find it a gimmick, but I found the storytelling an enhancement of an otherwise unremarkable story a young woman writing about her unhappy, unjust, and in the end short life of work, abuse, work, abuse, rape, punishment lifted to its next, finer level. It's about Mary's indomitable will, her absolute uncompromising need for More. I resonate to that story. The other, I don't.

I think you've nailed what I liked about it, too.

>125 katiekrug: It's not obvious that this story would resonate with me...lots of Reasons Why...but it's a perfect marriage of style and substance, of story and telling. The stakes are unremarkable. The events aren't new, fresh, or even seen from an excitingly different perspective.

The sum is greater than the parts. The gestalt ist Wundervoll. Author/Playwright Leyshon hit it outta the park.

Hiya.
I reviewed The Serpent's Tale both here and on Goodreads.
Then I saw that you had a review on G-R from back in 2011!

I pretty much agreed (3½-stars) and 'meh'.
I'm quite behind on discovering Ariana Franklin. She was an excellent novelist and I'm looking forward to The Death Maze (UK title), A Murderous Procession next. I hope Book 4 regains the panache that Grave Goods provided. I have deliberately avoided reading any reviews (I'm so suggestible...)

(Having trouble with the touchstones this morning, but looks fixed now)

>121 richardderus: Added to the BlackHole.

I have no idea if Karen used the 10% off, but I did :)

Happy Sunday, Richard! I hope you have a great day!

>128 alcottacre: Happy Sunday! I'm glad you used (admitted to, anyway) the discount. I like supporting Goodwill with my purchases of things I can not get (or afford) in Kindle editions.

*smooch*

>127 SandyAMcPherson: I'm glad you agreed with me that the read wasn't All That...we'll see how you feel about #4. Her early death deprived us!

Happy cold clear (so far) Sunday, Richard!

>114 richardderus: You got me with this bb.

So I went to put it on my Wish List, and this is what is on the page.


It defaulted to The Twelve, so I had to manually add it to my Wish List.

I know there's a way to fix errors like this, but I don't have time right now to figure it out, and I'll doubtless forget about it if I let it go, so I'm mentioning it in case someone else wants to fix it.

>121 richardderus: Another bb! Your aim is true, Mr. Derus!

>129 richardderus: I used ABE Books quite a bit and will opt to buy books through Better World Books or Goodwill just because of their charitable businesses. I also buy books - and other stuff - at my daughter's Hope's Closet shop when I visit my mother because it supports the Women's Shelter in Longview.

>131 alcottacre: Admirable!

>130 Storeetllr: I'm pretty sure my aim on those two is guided by my unshakeable conviction they're the best books they can be. That means they're the best reads they can be, as well.

I quit fixing stuff like that when someone ran around behind me UNfixing it because...I really don't know what the excuse was anymore, but the reality was they simply didn't like me so objected to everything I did and criticized everything I said.

I stick to this group. "We don't care who's right" is libertarian trash's reason for not taking sides...which only ever helps bullies and shitty people.

>132 richardderus: Yikes! I didn't mean to bring up unpleasant memories for you.

>133 Storeetllr: You're not to blame, the people who shoved the memories in in the first place are.

>121 richardderus: I used up my last hold at LAPL for this. Well, I'll have more tomorrow, but still.

>135 quondame: It will take you no time at all to read, though, and you'll either love it or hate it so it won't be a waste of eyeblinks.

>121 richardderus: Nell Leyshon liked and retweeted my review...
Nell Leyshon
@NellLeyshon
2hrs
Such a lovely, lively review. Thank you so much.
***
I'm so pleased!

>137 richardderus: Lovely! Congratulations!

Happy Sunday, Richard. I had a great Meet Up today with Joe and yes, photos were taken. A gorgeous fall day in Chicagoland. I hope to make it to NY one of these days and we can have are very own Meet Up. 🤞

>139 msf59: Oh, I really hope you can! Coming in May, before The Season, would probably save you a packet. Since we're a whopping 15min from JFK, it's always easy to get here, too.

I'll go looking for photeaux soon.

>138 quondame: Thanks! I was really chuffed...she's a lovely person and I'm glad she was pleased with my review.

>137 richardderus: How nice she let you know she liked your review, Richard dear.
Happy start of the week, I hope the books treat you well.

>137 richardderus: - Woot!

187 Damnation Spring by Ash Davidson

Rating: 3* of five

The Publisher Says:A stunning novel about love, work, and marriage that asks how far one family and one community will go to protect their future.

Colleen and Rich Gundersen are raising their young son, Chub, on the rugged California coast. It’s 1977, and life in this Pacific Northwest logging town isn’t what it used to be. For generations, the community has lived and breathed timber; now that way of life is threatened.

Colleen is an amateur midwife. Rich is a tree-topper. It’s a dangerous job that requires him to scale trees hundreds of feet tall—a job that both his father and grandfather died doing. Colleen and Rich want a better life for their son—and they take steps to assure their future. Rich secretly spends their savings on a swath of ancient Redwoods. Colleen, desperate to have a second baby, challenges the logging company’s use of herbicides that she believes are responsible for the many miscarriages in the community—including her own. Colleen and Rich find themselves on opposite sides of a budding conflict that threatens the very thing they are trying to protect: their family.

Told in prose as clear as a spring-fed creek, Damnation Spring is an intimate, compassionate portrait of a family whose bonds are tested and a community clinging to a vanishing way of life. An extraordinary story of the transcendent, enduring power of love—between husband and wife, mother and child, and longtime neighbors. An essential novel for our times.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: First, read this:

"Ask any of these guys. You won’t find a guy that loves the woods more than a logger. You scratch a logger, you better believe you’ll find an ‘enviro-mentalist’ underneath. But the difference between us and these people is we live here. We hunt. We fish. We camp out. They’ll go back where they came from, but we’ll wake up right here tomorrow. This is home. Timber puts food on our tables, clothes on our kids’ backs. You know, a redwood tree is a hard thing to kill. You cut it down, it sends up a shoot. Even fire doesn’t kill it. Those big pumpkins up in the grove, they’re old. Ready to keel over and rot. You might as well set a pile of money on fire and make us watch."
–and–
“The real timber’s gone,” Lark said. “What’s left, ten percent, including the parks? Two thousand years to grow a forest, a hundred years to fall it. No plague like man.”

There isn't a lot to argue with in this novel. The positions are made clear as glass, the townsfolk of the story are innocent of any wrongdoing except not wanting change and the corporate interests are extracting value from the land, the timber, and the people with no slightest regard for the costs.

This ain't rocket science. You know whose side you're on from the jump.

What price innocence...the townies aren't idiots, it's clear that their corporate masters pay them pittances to do dangerous jobs. They love those jobs, they love the life it affords them. So why the hell should they bitch if someone else lives fancier than they do? Ain't like they'd want to live like those folks do, even if they had all the money those folks have. So keep the trees fallin' and the pennies rollin' in.

The personal costs? Well, omelets ain't ever come out of whole eggs, have they. That's the way life is. Except...when you step in front of a woman who wants kids, you'd better be *well*armored*indeed*. Colleen wants babies. She's miscarried eight times! Her sister's had healthy ones, and with a man you'd have to be kind to describe as "grossly unfit." It clearly ain't her body....

And here's my problem: The pace of the novel is, to put it politely, magisterial. The language is limpidly clear, if a bit less than inspiringly lyrical. But the gender politics are awful. The conflict between husband and wife over her screaming NEED to mother a brood, her apostasy to community values (and with a man she has a history with! that gets what feels to me like a pretty insignificant amount of play) because her uterus hasn't popped out healthy babies, squicked me out. I hate it when women in stories play the Mother Card and get away with amazingly nasty shit (see my outraged shout about Gone Girl), unlike Colleen. But basically I don't care about Motherhood. It isn't necessary for you to reproduce yourselves, straight people, the planet's already working itself into a fever to get rid of us. So using it, as Author Davidson does here, as a reason for Colleen to do something that (objectively) is good but will end the way of life these people want to live, shouldn't be framed as "she did it for her babies to be born."

Listen, I don't think what mega-corporations do to the world is laudable, and they do it for the vilest, most selfish reasons. I'm right there with you on the "make it stop" front. But don't play "Sacred Motherhood" on your cards or you'll lose any serious argument for them to be held accountable. NOT being a mother is the responsible choice for all women. The only people who are carryin' on about having more babies are the white supremacists, and we need a lot fewer of them stat.

On balance, three stars was what I could muster, and I felt pretty questionable about that last half-star. The book's set in 1977. We already knew the cost of overpopulation then. The "Zero Population Growth" movement was organized in 1968. It's still a damned good idea. But Sacred Motherhood is used as a primary motivator to positive action in this story, and that sits wrong with me.

The ending wasn't particularly satisfying, after all we've been through; but there not being anything dramatically wrong with the structure or the writing (apart from there being too much of it) I couldn't bring myself to downgrade it. But it wasn't an easy decision. Three...that is, on Amazon's debased scale, a bad rating. I think it's a perfectly fine rating, a perfectly fine read got a perfectly fine rating, and I didn't beat it up beyond its just deserts. That will have to do.

>142 katiekrug: I know, right?!

>141 FAMeulstee: I was very happy she said something nice, Anita. Others...haven't.

Thanks for the week's wishes! So far so good.

>143 richardderus: Yes, 3 is on balance, a good rating. 2 is bad. I've read plenty of sequels of books I rate at 3, although that's mostly what I consider popcorn or potato chip books.

I have several books in that Jack Lennon series by Stuart Neville so it looks like I should move them up in the series queue. I also agree with you about Serpent's Tale. It wasn't Ariana Franklin's best in that series. But it was a favorite series of mine.

>146 benitastrnad: I think you're going to enjoy the Nevilles, Benita. Very enjoyable characterization and atmosphere.

>145 quondame: It's a fine rating...better than average (2.5 is the midpoint so I'll call it average) but not WOW!

It's a perfectly fine book. I'll never re-read it or seek out another by her.

Good review of Damnation Spring, Richard. I liked it more than you, but really can't disagree with your grievances. Maybe I set my sights a bit lower, as I was reading it.

>148 msf59: Thanks, Mark. I understand what appeals to people about the story, I just don't find it as appealing as y'all do. Chacun à son goût.

>137 richardderus: Wonderful, Richard!

>143 richardderus: Skipping that one. Too many other books to read a 3-star one.

I hope you have a wonderful week, RD!

>143 richardderus: mmm. That sounds like a no to me. Motherhood is something I deliberately passed up, so I'm not sure I get it as motivation.

‘Morning, RDear! Happy Tuesday to you. I unintentionally skipped over visiting your thread yesterday. No excuse. 😣

>123 richardderus: Nope. I Stayed Strong. I’ve already acquired 268 books this year, with 2 books pre-ordered on Amazon and 98 on my this-year-only wish list. I may be a tsundoku-haver, but I do not like piles of books not shelved and shelf space is at a premium. Not to say I won’t acquire many more books this year, however.

>128 alcottacre: Nope. So far, nope.

>129 richardderus: On my honor as a former Camp Fire Girl and current President of the FoL, nope.

>137 richardderus: Congrats.

>143 richardderus: Well, no. Sacred motherhood. *shudder* I wanted a child and have a child, but just no.

Wow. I'm slipping. I had to edit to add

*smooch* from your own Horrible

>152 karenmarie: Happy Tuesday, Horrible! We Shall Overlook your solecism. *sniff*

Waste of a good coupon...but hey, your shelves your rules. *smooch*

>152 karenmarie:, >151 Helenliz: I just think the Motherhood Card needs to die. The Simpsons made fun of it (when I watched it that is) with some regular character saying, "But the children! Will no one think of the children?" every time anything bad happened. (Was it Maude Flanders, maybe? Can't recall.) A nasty little dig at that Momderhead Tipper Gore and her censor-the-rap-lyrics crusade. (Horrible stuff, rap. But censoring things *I* don't like worries me.)

But it rolls along, crushing opposition under its Sacred Unquestionable Motherhood rollers, an untouchable high-status unopposable Natural Right and Good. This book uses that mindset. I object.

>151 Helenliz: Hi Helen!

>150 alcottacre: Hey Stasia! Yep, no need to read. I shall expend my utmost effort to obtain A Good Week.

The only correct answer to this test question is "(e) all of the above" yet the teacher failed to offer it! Dereliction of duty!
Source: https://www.theroot.com/calif-high-school-in-trouble-after-test-asks-which-gro-1...

Guarantees 1 point for all test-takers. No wrong answers to this question.

>155 weird_O: That's true, isn't it. A point can be the difference between a c+ and a b-.

Happy Wednesday, Richard dear!

My weekly greetings a day early, as I leave for a two night stay Rotterdam in a few hours. Last time I went there was early 2020, so I decided to accompany Frank this time. He went a few times in between the lockdowns.

>154 richardderus: *snort*.
Hoping Wednesday decides to treat you well.

>154 richardderus: Thank you, Helen, and the same to you. I'm pretty sure it's Wednesday...I spent yesterday sure it was Sunday, so I think something went wonko somewhere!

>153 richardderus: ...AAARRRGH it's happened again! I will spend the rest of today sure it's THURSDAY!!!

*smooch* for a fun trip to Rotterdam

188 Sinopticon 2021: A Celebration of Chinese Science Fiction by Xueting Christine Ni

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Publisher Says: A stunning collection of the best in Chinese Science Fiction, from Award-Winning legends to up-and-coming talent, all translated here into English for the first time.

This celebration of Chinese Science Fiction — thirteen stories, all translated for the first time into English — represents a unique exploration of the nation’s speculative fiction from the late 20th Century onwards, curated and translated by critically acclaimed writer and essayist Xueting Christine Ni.

From the renowned Jiang Bo’s ‘Starship: Library' to Regina Kanyu Wang’s ‘The Tide of Moon City, and Anna Wu’s ‘Meisje met de Parel', this is a collection for all fans of great fiction.

Award winners, bestsellers, screenwriters, playwrights, philosophers, university lecturers and computer programmers, these thirteen writers represent the breadth of Chinese SF, from new to old: Gu Shi, Han Song, Hao Jingfang, Nian Yu, Wang Jinkang, Zhao Haihong, Tang Fei, Ma Boyong, Anna Wu, A Que, Bao Shu, Regina Kanyu Wang and Jiang Bo.

THE PUBLISHER OFFERED ME A DRC. THANK YOU.

My Review: China's gargantuan economy, and its borning confidence in its increasing influence translating to wider power, is on display in its "kehuan" (science fiction) writers' concerns. This collection, admirably balanced between unpublished-in-the-West and still-gaining-followers-here writers, does what I suppose we all need: Introduces us to the Chinese view of the world, and its future, without the burden of Geopolitical Maneuvering landing on it.

One thing the editor says in her introduction struck me forcibly: Chinese fiction doesn't tend to have happy endings. Well, having read this collection, I can attest to the truth of that. I've said many times and in many places that adulthood is the time of life when there are no unmixed emotions. By that measure, Chinese kehuan/science fiction is very adult. I can think of no story, or character in a story, here that has unmixed or unmitigated happiness or success in present life or anticipation of future life. It simply is not part of the cultural furniture, it would seem; if you're particularly sensitive to this, as in you really, really need hopeful, positive futures, you're in the wrong space.

The payoff to this is that the stories feel...probable. Unlike Western SF, with its doom/gloom/dystopia or happy-bunnies-everywhere dichotomy, these mixed-up emotional cores feel like the real world to me...even when they're speculating wildly. I find it relatable to have a range of emotions that's confined to the, um, downbeat end but not focused on absolute chaos and dissolution of structures. Reality tends towards messy muddling through. So do most of these stories.

Please see the story-by-story notes and ratings at Expendable Mudge Muses Aloud.

>160 richardderus: Well, you got me again...

>161 drneutron: ::nail buff::

My aim is true.

'Morning, RDear, and happy Wednesday. Yes, it is Wednesday. I checked the icon on my computer.

>160 richardderus: If someone gave me a copy of this book I'd take it, but otherwise, I'll pass.

*smooch*

>162 richardderus: Funnily enough, I was just reading your review and responding above as you were in my thread letting me know you posted the review... Great minds and all that!

Morning, Richard. Happy Wednesday. I had a great time with my birding buddies yesterday. We hit the trails for over two hours. It felt so good to be out in the fresh air and I had very little discomfort. I left my camera in the truck though. I am not fully recovered but moving in the right direction.

>165 msf59: Forgetting the camera's not a hangin' offense, but it must've been irritating as all get-out. I'm glad everything's trending the proper direction, Birddude.

>164 drneutron: I think it's the SciFiPhenomenon...those of us susceptible to its charms just *vibe* on its presence.

>163 karenmarie: So, it's for sure Wednesday...I will try to remember. I make no promises, mind you.

You'd never read it if you were given it! Still less pay for it. *smooch*

Unfair! I might dip into it... permaybehaps, to use a Richard-ism.

>167 karenmarie: ...use of conditional is noted...

>160 richardderus: >161 drneutron: >162 richardderus: A two-with-one-BB.

>169 Storeetllr: Aha! I am spared the trip to your thread to lure you into the fold. The last story, "Starship: Library," has You written all over it! It's the five-star standout story, as well.

>160 richardderus: Got me too.

>160 richardderus: Count me in among the gotten too. I have been trying, somewhat ineffectually, over the past few years to enlarge my science fiction reading.

((Hugs)) and **smooches** for today, RD! I hope it is a great one.

>172 alcottacre:, >171 swynn: Wow! My aim is true! Heh.

>172 alcottacre: *smooch* It's been okay so far. I'll take it!

Happy Wednesdaying, BigDaddy! I got nothing, but I wanted to share it with you. *smooch*

>170 richardderus: Well, if you won't come over to my thread, I guess I will say on yours that I just finished a fun little sci-fi mystery thriller: Lock In by John Scalzi. It's not perfect - Scalzi's stuff seldom is - but it is intriguing & fun - Scalzi's stuff often is - and I'm not sure but I think you might enjoy it too. (It's sort of like Fugitive Telemetry except not on a space station and the narrator is not a bot-human construct but a robot that's driven by a person. Anyway, I'm looking forward to the sequel and hoping it turns into a series.)

ETA I might have to buy Sinopticon because it's not available from the library and after that rave review I think I need it.

ETAA that I can get it from Audible and wondering if you think it would be as good on audio.

>160 richardderus: Hmm maybe for the Asian authors challenge. I do have mixed feelings about the happy resolutions of western F&SF. If I feel the losses are insubstantial or if they get walked back I find it less than satisfying, but I get bummed when a character I've invested in gets left in the fire.

>175 Storeetllr: I've read Lock In, but there is no record of it. Hmm. Maybe I just imagined it? Nope, couldn't happen.

>176 quondame: It'll deffo fit in the Asian authors challenge! It's thirteen stories, thirteen authors...should give you a huge East Asian bolus.

>176 quondame:, >175 Storeetllr: I was pretty sure I'd read Lock In as well...again, no evidence. I'm not the world's biggest Scalzi fan but I do love the way the story just...flows...without my having to do a lot of thinking. There are moods where that's exactly what I want.

>175 Storeetllr: I haven't been by today? Hm...maybe I just lurked through...anyway, I'll come by directly.

NO on the Audible! The idea of what they could do to mess it up brings me out in hives!

>174 Crazymamie: *smooch* No matter why, your being here makes it a brighter, happier day.

Just catching up, my dear!

>178 ronincats: Me too. Catching up.

Road trip tomorrow. Several hours off the estate and buzzing along the byways of the Keystone State. Ye haaa... Planning on a safe and pleasant excursion.

>176 quondame: >177 richardderus: I do that all the time - think I've read a book but haven't. I also do the opposite, read a book but don't remember it until I start reading it again. If not for LT, where I've been recording my reading since 2006, I'd have no idea what I've read or not - in the past 15 years at least. (Lock In isn't a hugely memorable book. It's fun, almost a cozy, if a thriller can be that, but not quite, and yes, you don't have to do a huge amount of thinking while reading it (although I had to stop and relisten to a couple parts that talked about computer coding). I've been needing books like that more and more over the past five years.

Morning, BigDaddy!

>177 richardderus: What a lovely thing to say. Thank you.

I used to read a lot of Sci-fi short stories in the magazines - subscribed to F&SF and Asimov's Magazine and (briefly) Astounding/Analog. As a kid it was fun to find something with my name on it in the mailbox every month.

But I seem to have misplaced my short story reading gene. Perhaps this collection of Chinese stories will help me find it.

I think Sci-fi, even of the darkest note, always has some flavor of optimism in it. We got this far somehow, right?

>182 magicians_nephew: One is frequently stumped to come up with a "how" and even more frequently stumped in a search for a "why."

Try the stories...from the library, if you can source it there...they need to have it in their collection, for sure.

>181 Crazymamie: *smooch* Happy Thurs!

>180 Storeetllr: Huh! The last five years...now, what existential crisis occurred at that point to cause such a deep psychic wound? Hm. Must ponder.

I'm still sure I read the darn thing, I've gone and looked at the book description and I think I know why I don't remember it: IT DESCRIBES HELL!!

>179 weird_O: Have a wunderbar time away, Bill! Show pictures of the book haul. (Don't front, there's gonna be a book haul.)

>178 ronincats: Hiya Roni! *smooch*

Happy Thursday *smooches*

Sweet Thursday, Richard. Cold & damp. Perfect day to hang with the books. I will get my Jackson fix in, tomorrow morning. I miss the little guy.

>186 msf59: Hey there, Birddude. It's cooler than it's been here, too. We're not damp so far, which works fine for me! You'll get your fix soon, Grandpa. Hold on!

>185 bell7: *smooch* Happy one, Mary!

189 Total Creative Control by Joanna Chambers and Sally Malcolm

Real Rating: 4.76* of five

The Publisher Says: Sunshine PA, meet Grumpy Boss ...

When fanfic writer Aaron Page landed a temp job with the creator of hit TV show, Leeches, it was only meant to last a week. Three years later, Aaron’s still there ...

It could be because he loves the creative challenge. It could be because he’s a huge Leeches fanboy. It’s definitely not because of Lewis Hunter, his extremely demanding, staggeringly rude ... and breathtakingly gorgeous boss.

Is it?

Lewis Hunter grew up the hard way and fought for everything he’s got. His priority is the show, and personal relationships come a distant second. Besides, who needs romance when you have a steady stream of hot men hopping in and out of your bed?

His only meaningful relationship is with Aaron, his chief confidante and indispensable assistant. And no matter how appealing he finds Aaron’s cute boy-next-door charms, Lewis would never risk their professional partnership just to scratch an itch.

But when Lewis finds himself trapped at a hilariously awful corporate retreat, Aaron is his only friend and ally. As the professional lines between them begin to blur, their simmering attraction starts to sizzle...

...And they’re both about to get burned.

I WAS OFFERED A DRC AND ACCEPTED WITH UNSEEMLY GLEE.

My Review: Hello! Are you new around here? I kind of doubt it, but one never can be certain...so let me offer a greeting and an invitation to poke around, look over the goods, see what interests you. One thing you'll notice fairly quickly is that I like the books that feature people like me, which is to say men who sex up men while loving every minute of it; older men who have the good fortune to find younger men who enjoy their company; and who (lucky fictional bastards!) get second chances at The One(s) Who Got Away.

Authors Joanna Chambers and Sally Malcolm have each appeared on the pages of the blog on previous occasions, their respective ouevres coming in for no little praise on their own merits. (Still slightly shocked that BBC Scotland hasn't made Enlightenment into a limited series, Author Chambers...get your People onto it! David Tennant ain't gettin' any younger!) I am, in short, inclined to look upon these creatives' creations without undue harshness, permaybehaps even a Vaseline-smeared lens of hazy happiness.

When I am not being assaulted by w-bombs. (Two were allowable; they deepened the...foulness...of a revolting character; four others, NO; net deduction = 24 stars.) (What do you mean, there aren't 24 stars? It's my review and I'll...oh, very well you boring commonsensical internal voice.)

The fun of watching, that is reading, this story was evident from the get-go. The insta-luuuv between the characters being sublimated into a working relationship for ages was nicely explained away by Aaron's dirty little secret: He writes fanfic in Lewis's show's universe! Well, as a reason for him to stay shtumm about his feelings, that one does a lot. He can't give up his literal dream, or his literal dreamboat, now can he. Plus Lewis clearly senses Aaron's abilities as a writer, as a fellow creative story-teller, and no one who's ever had a whole business riding on their shoulders can ever resist a true Lieutenant Colonel showing up when you need 'em. (Not to mention the man's a fount of excellent story ideas, and can keep the fan-service pipeline flowing both ways.)

There's a lot of fun in reading these words, just as words. This is exactly as one would expect from the two authors involved in creating the story.

Charlie was one of those almost-but-not-quite-good-looking men. Everything about him was just a little average. A little medium. On the two or three occasions he'd come into the office to see Lewis, he'd always seemed to Aaron to be trying to make up for that somehow, with his overbearing manner and his ridiculously pretentious outfits.
–and–
...Lewis yelped, "Wave!" and they both stumbled backwards as the surf splashed up over their ankles, soaking the ends of their rolled-up jeans. Lewis lost his balance as he scrambled up the beach, Aaron grabbed him, and suddenly they were both clinging to each other, laughing.
And then, just as suddenly, they weren't laughing.
They were simply standing there in the moonlight, clutching each other's arms, gazing at each other. Lewis looked dishevelled and windblown, undone in a way that transformed him from idol into someone more real, more tangible, his dark hair blowing across his forehead, and his eyes the deep blue of the twilight sky. He swallowed visibly, lips parting, chest rising and falling. Breathing hard. His fingers tightened on Aaron's arms, drawing him closer.

And we'll leave that there...*evil chuckle*

What a pleasure, then, to have this as a week-ending read. I wasn't expecting it to be awful, or painful; I was expecting it to be somehow less than the sum of the authors' different powers, a watering-down of what I've come to expect. I just love being wrong! Their different ways of approaching a story came together beautifully, and made this a better story than I'd even let myself hope that it was going to be. I'm also pleased that the process of working together worked well for them so we're going to get a book two and even a book three! I predict book two will be about Owen. (That was, if y'all were wondering, a stonking great hint.)

The genuinely surprising thing in this read...and let's not front, there's next to nothing surprising in romances...is that it takes its milieu seriously. The world of Fandom is presented without an arched eyebrow or a barely concealed sneer. The existence of AO3 is very much part of what drives the plot. The kind of characters in the fannish con-world are spot on and mostly treated kindly. (I, like Lewis, am unable to endure long moments of speech emitted by up-talkers.) The end of the story is a fan-person's wet dream. It is a pleasure to see the sub- go Culture.

I am well and truly pleased, Authors each and both, and I thank you for making me the offer of a DRC for review.

Goals in post >3 richardderus: amended. I'm going to make 190 reviews before I know it; and I've got plenty scheduled. So I raised it to 210. Happy days!

>189 richardderus: That's awesome! Turns out I may be lucky to crack 100 books this year, much less actually review most of them...

>188 richardderus: I love the glee with which you've described that book.
>189 richardderus: 210?! In awe.

Glad your latest was an excellent read, and congratulations for blowing right by your goal of 190 reviews for the year. May you get to 210!

I'm baaack. Without photos. Ergo, no book haul.

>193 weird_O: ::side-eye:: Who are you, and what have you done with Bill?

>192 bell7: Thank you, Mary! I'm pretty confident...I think it's doable and can even be done barring absolute karmic crash-and-burn-level disaster.

>191 Helenliz: Heh...it was a gleeful read. I was completely charmed, and that's such a rare occurrence.

>191 Helenliz:, >190 drneutron: Remembering that I'm unemployed...disabled...largely housebound...and uninterested in TV consumption, it's a lot more explainable how I can reach such heights. I'm far down from the days when finishing a book a day was normal, so that feels like a loss to me despite 210 being a far far far higher bar than most ever attempt still less achieve.

Morning, BigDaddy! Hooray for a book that makes one full of glee. And look at you rocking out the reviews - most impressive. Your new goal staggers me, but I believe in you, so I will be here to pat your back and dance the happy when you have made it happen. *smooch*

>195 Crazymamie: Howdy there, Miss Mamie ma'am, and a scrumptious Friday to you. Thanks re: the new goal, I really think it's doable but could be a challenge to get all the way up to. Makes it a challenge.

GBBO thoughts and feelings
It was incredibly, incredibly sad to see Lizzie go; she really did herself proud this week, but she absolutely wasn't up to the Bake-Off standard. She did her absolute best! She wasn't good enough, but she did her amazing, absolute best. It was *heartbreaking* to see her pull out all the stops and still come up short.
Crystelle, unless she utterly shines in every single challenge next week, is going. It's possible, she did a creditable job in 2/3 of the challenges (those snausages! *gaak*), but it's got to be 3/3 and, frankly, I don't see it in her.
Chigs!! My delightful husband did it so well this week...all the challenges with the boxes ticked (but no more) until that showstopper triumph! Solid work, then BAM he drops an ace. Unless the pressure gets to him he's set for the final.
Jürgen and Giuseppe will go through. Unless one of them seriously screws up. It would have to be an epic James's-showstopper fail, though. Giuseppe's gluten-free black forest gâteau wasn't perfect but if someone served it to you, you'd eat it.
What a week it was.

Congrats on reaching and surpassing your goal. I'm in awe. xx

>197 richardderus: - Have marked so I can return later to read it.

ETA: Your last line has me... intrigued? Concerned? Guess I'll find out in a few hours!

Hi Richard! Lots of free-time or not, you're definitely rocking the book numbers this year!

>194 richardderus: Bill? Bill? Ohhhhh, that Bill.

He's outside.

At the back of the car.

Under the books.

The ones that fell out of the car when he opened the tailgate.

I'm sorry. No photos please.

It's probably just as well his wife isn't here to see this. She warned him. Repeatedly.

* sigh *

>200 weird_O: *That* big a haul! Wow. I can probably get it from GoogleEarth, then.

>199 The_Hibernator: Hi Rachel! Happy to see you around and about, and I'll have to come find your thread to catch up on the doins.

>198 katiekrug: Both. You'll see. It's deffo a "Both" week.

>188 richardderus: It's so delightful to be happily mistaken and find a book that could have been written to please you. Finding one that accepts fandom as a just a way of living is the rarest of rare. Not enough writers are happily engaged with their own fannish selves.

>202 quondame: That's almost the same thought process that went into writing the book! Chambers is a fan herself and really *gets* how that world works. I loved the fact that ComicCon loomed large in the fictional show's future, and there was a "Meet the Writers" panel for the fanfics set in that universe.

Just...spot on!

No wishes but good ones today, Richard dear, I don't want you to mix up the days again ;-)

>204 FAMeulstee: *waitwaitwait*

...if Anita's here, it must be Thursday...but she was here on Wednesday because she went to somewheredam on Thursday...so that means it's...

...Friday, yeah, well I sorta knew that but you showed up and...oh it's all so confusing...

>205 richardderus: Okay, I'll stay away until it IS Thursday again ;-)

>206 FAMeulstee: Don't you dare!

>188 richardderus: Not for me, I do not think. Having read romances so much when I was younger, I pretty much stay away from them - in any variety - these days.

Have a wonderful weekend, RD! ((Hugs)) and **smooches**

>208 alcottacre: Thank you, Stasia, you have a good one too. I'm pretty sure you'd enjoy the humor of the story...but don't go nuts, buying it's probably not worth the $5.

*smooch*

>197 richardderus: - As usual, I completely agree. I would add I LOVED Lizzie's showstopper cake. It looked like a Muppet. And all those "sausages" looked completely revolting. They would have even if they'd been perfectly made. The sample Prue and Paul tasted outside the tent made me gag just from the looks of 'em. I am not a fan of "free-from" week, though I did enjoy Noel and Matt's "free from comedy" bit :)

PS: Chigs is *my* husband.

>210 katiekrug: I absolutely agree with all your points, especially the last spoilered one...inspired!

As to your PS:

I think not.

>211 richardderus: One of my all-time favorite movies!

Happy Saturday, Richard. I had some quality Jackson time yesterday. Yah! A friend and I are going to see Dune on the big screen this afternoon. I never did read the book though. I also plan on starting Swann's Way today.

>212 msf59: Happy Saturday indeed, Grandpa! I'm glad you've had a Jackson fix.

Your taste in movies is impeccable, since you love Raging Bull...and I really hope you'll be very glad you went to see Dune on the big screen. Now, onward and upward through the budding grove of Proust!

I bought this book last night on a whim...99¢ is affordable even for me!...and finished it this morning at 4.25am.

Literally could not stop reading it. Yes, I'm sleepy today...second pot of Lavazza dark roast is slidin' down real smooth...and no, I wouldn't go back and close it up any earlier.


56 Days by Catherine Ryan Howard at AmaSmile: https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B08YRYN8XY

>214 richardderus: - SOLD! One-clicked it.

>215 katiekrug: I really don't think you'll regret it for an instant. I was surprised how powerful the pull to continue was.

ALSO ON SALE TODAY! The Maltese Falcon is $1.99 for early Black Friday at Ammy: https://smile.amazon.com/Maltese-Falcon-Dashiell-Hammett-ebook/dp/B004G5ZU32/

>214 richardderus: >215 katiekrug: First time for a one-click for me. Richard, you are bad for my resolution toward restraint.

>217 Storeetllr: *preens* I really don't feel concerned that you'll dislike the read, Mary, though I am a bit worried about your potential walking-into-things-while-reading injuries.

>218 richardderus: Hah! These days, I'm likely to walk into things while just, you know, walking, so I'm pretty careful about not reading unless I'm sitting.

>214 richardderus: Is there any chance I will regret dropping the 99¢?

>220 quondame:, no, you only ever regret the book not read.

(In myn defense I'be been drinkgin with friends after a remarkabyl busy day and may not be making an ounc of sense. But in vino veritas & all that.)

>221 Helenliz: *clink*

>220 quondame: I seriously doubt you'd regret it. I don't really think you're going to love it...more of a middlin' read, the motivations aren't ones I think you'd resonate with.

But regret? Not likely.

>219 Storeetllr: Very sensible. I wish I'd done that...*rubs bloody toenails*

>221 Helenliz: Sounds like a good time! Thanks.

>222 richardderus: For sure, the wrong motivations are a staple of story telling.

>223 quondame: *chuckle*

Hoping the tornadoes are staying well away from you?

>225 bell7: Maybe not well away but not down my street. So far. What a wild outburst! Gusts, deluges, sunshine; gusts, deluges, sunshine...like being back in Texas!

Merger accomplished.

Happy weekend, RD! ((Hugs)) and **smooches** I hope the Lavazza coffee did its job :)

>154 richardderus: well, it just is funny. So whaddarya gonna do?

I have lately decided (perhaps in a divisive move that will only entrench the divisions already evident in society) to unfollow several people whose views are of the types you'd expect from those groups. I just can't stand to have them in my head any more than I need to (which is not at all). So. That's that.

>197 richardderus: you get the GBBO? I am not even sure we get that, and Britain is our motherland. We do have a similar series with NZ contestants, but NZ just doesn't have the numbers (or the willingness) to participate in such contests, so we generally get a lower quality of output ;)

>160 richardderus: Hmm. Something I'll keep an eye out for.

>151 Helenliz: >152 karenmarie: I don't get Sacred Motherhood as pushed by TV and films (fiction) as a motive. Having decided to forego having children and then flipped when I met the next generation of our family and thought it wasn't so awful after all; I mean, I get 'protect the children' but not 'lives must be ended so I can produce a child of my own'.

>229 LovingLit: Quite so*. Bake Off season 10 (2019) is currently re-running on BBC Player now*. They do alternate series with the Great Australian Bake Off with Matt Moran and Maggie Beer (who looks startlingly similar to Prue Leith). Same idea but, intriguingly, different styles - both the competition and the bakes that the competitors produce.

Appreciating the continued spoiler tags *sigh*

ETA: * = for Singapore

>230 humouress: Netflix gives us Zumbo's desserts-baking show from Aus and it's weird what they get themselves up to in the oven. Just...whut

>230 humouress:, >229 LovingLit: Sacred Motherhood is an evergreen. Like the Woman-in-Jeopardy films on the lady-directed cable channels...the *huge* prevalence of violence-against-women plots in thrillers/mysteries, the sheer numbing awfulness of that imagery, the disgusting crimes that act like fridging does in male-oriented media does...it's revolting to me, and I decline to participate.

>229 LovingLit: Well...there *are* over 225MM Netflix subscribers and that's what, 20x Aotearoa's population? So it makes sense that we get things y'all don't. Plus aren't Kiwis more competitive in outdoorsy ways?

Leaving behind those who simply don't mesh with one's world-view is often emotionally unpleasant, but it's usually a good idea. It lowers one's friction levels.

>228 alcottacre: Hiya Stasia! It'll be a one-pot Lavazza day today...and I'm about 1/2 done with excellent results.

190 The Prophets by Robert Jones, Jr.

NOMINATED FOR A 2021 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD! Winners to be announced on 17 November 2021.

Rating: 5* of five

The Publisher Says: A novel about the forbidden union between two enslaved young men on a Deep South plantation, the refuge they find in each other, and a betrayal that threatens their existence.

Isaiah was Samuel’s and Samuel was Isaiah’s. That was the way it was since the beginning, and the way it was to be until the end. In the barn they tended to the animals, but also to each other, transforming the hollowed-out shed into a place of human refuge, a source of intimacy and hope in a world ruled by vicious masters. But when an older man—a fellow slave—seeks to gain favor by preaching the master’s gospel on the plantation, the enslaved begin to turn on their own. Isaiah and Samuel’s love, which was once so simple, is seen as sinful and a clear danger to the plantation’s harmony.

With a lyricism reminiscent of Toni Morrison, Robert Jones, Jr. fiercely summons the voices of slaver and the enslaved alike to tell the story of these two men; from Amos the preacher to the calculating slave-master himself to the long line of women that surround them, women who have carried the soul of the plantation on their shoulders. As tensions build and the weight of centuries—of ancestors and future generations to come—culminate in a climactic reckoning, The Prophets masterfully reveals the pain and suffering of inheritance, but is also shot through with hope, beauty, and truth, portraying the enormous, heroic power of love.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: First, read this:

To survive this place, you had to want to die. That was the way of the world as remade by toubab, and Samuel's list of grievances was long: They pushed people into the mud and then called them filthy. They forbade people from accessing any knowledge of the world and then called them simple. They worked people until their empty hands were twisted, bleeding, and could do no more, then called them lazy. They forced people to eat innards from troughs and then called them uncivilized. They kidnapped babies and shattered families and then called them incapable of love. They raped and lynched and cut up people into parts, and then called the pieces savage. They stepped on people’s throats with all their might and asked why the people couldn’t breathe. And then, when people made an attempt to break the foot, or cut it off one, they screamed “CHAOS!” and claimed that mass murder was the only way to restore order.
–and–
This is why Isaiah and Samuel didn't care, why they clung to each other even when it was offensive to the people who had once shown them a kindness: it had to be known. And why would this be offensive? How could they hate the tiny bursts of light that shot through Isaiah's body every time he saw Samuel? Didn't everybody want somebody to glow like that? Even if it could only last for never, it had to be known. That way, it could be mourned by somebody, thus remembered—and maybe, someday, repeated.

You know, from reading those quotes, whether this book is for you or not. This is the prose voice; this is the storyteller's means of talking to you about the world Isaiah and Samuel are within. If it's not for you, then it's not.

But the National Book Award for Fiction thinks it worthy of inclusion on the 2021 list...and I hope, in spite of very serious competition, that the 2021 judges will choose this most American of stories, this beautifully told paean to love's power to transcend mere earthly potency, for the prize.

As I've read this book, and that's twice now, I've been transported by the power of debut novelist Jones's clarity and singleness of purpose. I know that writing about about enslaved people's love for each other is always going to be seen as a political statement. It is inevitable that choosing to tell of the love between two men is going to be seen as a political statement. To do both is, well, it *is* a political statement; but the statement in this book is, "Love Is Love." Isaiah loves Samuel, Samuel loves Isaiah, and these two men are WRONG and BAD and WICKED for this.

How that can be is not something I see in the story; it's not in these pages; and it's the reason I want the book to receive the National Book Award. I'm too old to hope that people will learn not to hate. They love it so, it's such a glorious high, that they aren't going to give it up. But I am not beyond hoping that the unconverted will resonate to the simple, deep joy of Samuel and Isaiah as they navigate a world that hates them for being, on many levels and in many, many places.

"A curse. A curse upon you and all of your progeny. May you writhe in ever-pain. May you never find satisfaction. May your children eat themselves alive."

But it was too late and the curse held no meaning because it was redundant.

That could very well be the most profound thing I've ever read....

I'd recommend to you a read like this under any circumstances, a read that challenges you to make the assumptions you live by fit the facts and not the other way around. I'd recommend it to you because it's about battling the addiction to Being Right. I'd urge it on you because it's beautifully written and deeply, emotionally wrought from the stuff that we get just from being alive.

But most of all, I do recommend this read to you because it's so satisfying to see the story of gay men's love as it has been seen, felt, internalized by the people around them...in many different ways, for many different reasons. The Samuel and Isaiah story is something these two men did not hide, and that is what I think matters the most. The narrative is not solely theirs, so the narrators are not solely them. How very important that facet of the story is to this old reader...how necessary its message of accepting the burden of being alive and in love places on some of us, far far more than others.

Check your privilege, straight people of all skin colors and ethnicities.

When the ancient gods of Africa address you, Readers, you need to listen. They chose Robert Jones, Junior, to deliver their message. I think you're wise to heed it.

>232 richardderus: Great review, Richard dear, I added The Prophets to the neverending reading list.
The Dutch translation is available at the library :-)

>233 FAMeulstee: I'm glad I got you with that book-bullet, Anita. I think you'll really enjoy the read...assuming the translation holds up!

>234 richardderus: Looking at the translators, I expect at least a good translation.

"You only regret the books you haven't read."

Profound, dude.

and so true

Morning, BigDaddy!

>215 katiekrug: Ditto.

>233 FAMeulstee: What she said, except that I won't be needing the Dutch translation.

Your thread is a dangerous place. I mean, I am already reading The Wardrobe Mistress, which I picked up as a BB over on Katie's thread. I would complain, but you are almost always right. *smooch*

Totally agree with You and Katie's comments concerning the GBBO.

>237 Crazymamie: Thanks, Mamie, and a happy, snappy one to you too.

I'd be more empathetic to y'all's plight if it wasn't 99¢...and if I hadn't been so sucked in and delighted. It's not likely to be a wasted buck.

I'm so glad you're going to read The Prophets! I was so deeply moved by it.

The GBBO season isn't shaping up to be my favorite-ever one, but I'm perfectly happy with the Final I see taking shape. I, like Katie, want to be free from free-from week ever. again. but other than that, it's been okay.

>236 magicians_nephew: Ain't it?

>235 FAMeulstee: That's a relief. I hope they shine bright on this one.

>232 richardderus: - And straight onto the list it goes. Wonderful review, RD. xx

>232 richardderus: Well dang. That's just irresistible.

>240 swynn: Oh yay! It's a great way to get your head around how much homophobia there is among Black folks.

>239 katiekrug: Thanks, Katie, I'm pretty sure you'll enjoy the read.

>232 richardderus: "A curse. A curse upon you and all of your progeny. May you writhe in ever-pain. May you never find satisfaction. May your children eat themselves alive."

But it was too late and the curse held no meaning because it was redundant.

That could very well be the most profound thing I've ever read....

Oh, my, yes. I had to read it a three times. Beautiful writing!

>242 Storeetllr: I know exactly what you mean, Mary. It took me a couple times, too...the sheer "...oh..." followed by the "jesusGAWD that's awful!" and then the bleak realization of its truth...

Well, happier reads ahead! For both of us!

>221 Helenliz: >222 richardderus: >236 magicians_nephew: Well, I have certainly regretted time lost to some reads. It happens, but I keep reading and, from time to time, trying something off my beaten path.

>232 richardderus: Ouch!

>244 quondame: *chuckle* My aim is true.

Dropping off snow-covered smooches.

>246 MickyFine: ...wait...did anyone else just hear a moose thunder through...? What's all this igloo-makin' stuff doin' on my floor?!

Oh. Hi Micky!

>247 richardderus: It's winter, I've switched over to riding a polar bear. :P

>248 MickyFine: Wise of you! Feeding your mount means one less predator hangin' around the seal-guts outside the igloo.

>232 richardderus: "When the ancient gods of Africa address you, Readers, you need to listen. They chose Robert Jones, Junior, to deliver their message. I think you're wise to heed it." You sure got my attention on that on that one, RD. The Prophets came out in January. I wonder where it was hiding?

>250 msf59: I've kept my review back for #Booksgiving, but the National Book Award for Fiction brought it out a little early. I think it's an amazing read, one of those that either demands you experience it or brushes past you without so much as a glance.

Hiya RD, I'm about 70+ posts unread here... and blissfully going to act as though I did... I tried to read Olive Kitteridge this past week. There was a lot of 4 and more starring going on with that book. I'd never read any Lizzie Strout either.

Well, that didn't work out. I was brutally honest about my experience (on the book review page, ). So what I'm doing here is to say, this was Pulitzer prize winner. And my record for disliking every Pulitzer award for fiction remains unbroken. What I want to ask: why are the fiction awards so frequently drenched in misery? Or are these just my unlucky selections?

Other than that, I had a great time reading Word Nerd the last two nights. Aimed at the younger end of the YA genre. Took me a few chapters to become engrossed and then it was really interesting. Will write a review after the coffee has effectively hit my circulatory system.

Morning, BigDaddy!

>253 Crazymamie: Happy to see you, Mamie my dear. I hope all's well? *smooch*

>252 SandyAMcPherson: Soul Sibling! We neither of us liked Olive Kitteridge! La Strout didn't gaff me through the gills until Oh William! appeared. And that was reluctant, I must say, I bobbed and weaved like a champ. In the end, I had to admit I liked the read.

Pulitzers often seem to go to books I wouldn't give shelf-room to, oddly enough. Gone with the Wind, Gilead...so many that I simply despise and/or detest. It's not like I always agree with the Booker people, or the Costa/Whitbread people. But my hit rate is higher there, and I usually really like the Giller prize winners.

>232 richardderus: Shock of shocks - my local library actually has that one! I will have to put it in my December TBR. Thanks for the review and recommendation, RD.

((Hugs)) and **smooches** for today

>255 alcottacre: Hi Stasia! *smooch*

I think libraries regard National Book Award nominations as clues, and buy the ones that best fit their user base's interests. I myownself am a bit amazed that the story of two gay Black boys got past them.

>256 richardderus: I cannot tell you how shocked I am, Richard. I am taking it as a hopeful sign.

>254 richardderus: (Re, >252 SandyAMcPherson:), Found your review on Goodreads, when I was scrolling through the reviews there, tonight. Ha. Yes, your GR comments were like-minded indeed.

It is a still bit of an anxious thing for me, when I castigate a book well-loved by members in this group. I know by now that even if there's disagreement with my review, I won't be "lashed with a wet noodle", as the saying goes. Also might be that I stifle commentary when I low-ball a book rating.

>254 richardderus: The Gillers, that reminds me I saw an in-person interview with this year's Giller prize winner, Omar El Akkad at the Vancouver Writers Fest. He was talking about his book What Strange Paradise. It was prior to the Giller being awarded.

>254 richardderus: Didn't like Olive Kitteridge either, Richard dear. Agree on the two ther Pulitzer winnens, I would add A Visit from the Goon Squad.
With 13 Booker winners read, and 9 Pulitzer winners, my average ratings for the Booker are a little over 1/2 a star more.

191 Winter in Sokcho by Élisa Shua Dusapin (tr. Aneesa Abbas Higgins

Rating: 4.75* of five

The Publisher Says: It’s winter in Sokcho, a tourist town on the border between South and North Korea. The cold slows everything down. Bodies are red and raw, the fish turn venomous, beyond the beach guns point out from the North’s watchtowers.

A young French Korean woman works as a receptionist in a run-down guesthouse. One evening, an unexpected guest arrives: a French graphic novelist determined to find inspiration in this desolate landscape.

The two form an uneasy relationship. When she agrees to accompany him on his trips to discover an ‘authentic’ Korea, they visit snowy mountaintops and dramatic waterfalls. But he takes no interest in the Sokcho she knows: the gaudy neon lights, the scars of war, the fish market where her mother works. She is pulled into his drawings but troubled by his vision of her – until she strikes upon a way to finally be seen.

I CHECKED THIS BOOK OUT OF MY LOCAL LIBRARY. USE THOSE LIBRARIES! THEY NEED US, AND WE NEED THEM.

My Review: I can't say too much, because there isn't one helluva lot of book here.

He’d never understand what Sokcho was like. You had to be born here, live through the winters. The smells, the octopus. The isolation.
–and–
A rubber-gloved hand pointed us in the right direction.

Too much of everything. Too big, too cold, too empty. The clatter of our shoes on the marble slabs rang out.
–and–
Oozing winter and fish, Sokcho waited. That was Sokcho, always waiting, for tourists, boats, men, spring.

This is the most Duras thing I've read that wasn't set in France. This is what Impressionism looks like in words. This is the way you take a simple, even banal, story of a young woman whose life is in neutral and chunk it into first gear without using the clutch.

You can feel a good, faithful translation. It fits and it means something you won't ever find anywhere else. This is a good, faitful translation by that metric. I haven't read the French but, should it ever swim across my bow, I will grab it and gobble it down to see how the flavor of fugu feels in French.

Mother and daughter at daggers drawn, sisters locked in battle, no one is getting a leg up on anyone else in this bitter little pill. It's always the family that makes you feel the worst when they could choose to give you their best. It's certainly true that South Korean culture is the epicenter of the plastic surgery world. The pressure to "look perfect" whatever that means there is powerful, and it's astonishing to me how high the percentage of South Koreans who've had serious work done is. It's no surprise that Jun-Oh, the narrator's boyfriend, is caught up in it...it makes sense, in that world, and her categorical refusal to give in to the not-subtle pressures he puts on her, her mother puts on her, and her mother's sister puts on her to "fix her flaws" is proof to me that this is someone I'd like to spend more time with.

Food is a huge part of this read...you'll read words in Korean that aren't translated, eg tteok, and it's on you to go figure out what the heck they are, or not if you don't care. I like that in a book. I will figure out what a tteok is (a rice cake made with steamed flour made of various grains, including glutinous or non-glutinous rice) and why it would smell of cold oil (some meal-base versions, not desserts, are fried) if I decide it means something to me. In a nutshell, the plot is nothing; in reality, it is Everything...how we mistreat our intimates without really giving it a thought; how we form alliances and attachments that never ever get to the surface of our lives (poor old Park!); how completely we fail to find our world's gifts until they make the gravity double and the body sink into a slough of despond with their absence.

Most of all, though, reading this beautiful book is an exercise in allowing words to do their work in you. You are not there, you more than likely have never been there, but through the magic of fiction here you are:

All night long the town was entombed in frost. The temperature fell to minus twenty-seven degrees, the first time it had happened in years. Curled up under the covers, I blew on my hands and rubbed them between my thighs. Outside, against the onslaught of ice, the waves struggled to resist, moving ever more slowly and heavily, cracking as they collapsed in defeat on the shoreline. I bundled myself up in my overcoat, the only way I could find sleep.
–and–
The rain hammered down, the sea rising beneath it in spikes like the spines of a sea urchin.
–and–
‘What I mean is you may have had your wars, I’m sure there are scars on your beaches, but that’s all in the past. Our beaches are still waiting for the end of a war that’s been going on for so long people have stopped believing it’s real. They build hotels, put up neon signs, but it’s all fake, we’re on a knife-edge, it could all give way any moment. We’re living in limbo. In a winter that never ends.’

Don't miss the chance to read this book. It is a FINALIST for the 2021 Best Translated Literature category at the National Book Awards! The winner will be announced this evening.

192 Mona Passage by Thomas Bardenwerper

Rating: 3.5* of five

The Publisher Says: Mona Passage is the story of two neighbors in San Juan, Puerto Rico: Galán Betances, a Cuban emigrant, and Pat McAllister, a young Coast Guard officer. During long evenings spent together talking on their Calle Luna rooftop, a deep friendship develops based on shared traumas and a common desire to heal. When Galán learns that his sister, Gabriela, is going to be committed to a mental health facility in Cuba, he plans her escape to Puerto Rico. Pat, whose Coast Guard cutter patrols the Mona Passage for drug traffickers and migrants, warns Galán that such a journey will be treacherous--perhaps fatal. Aware of the dangers but determined for Gabriela to live a full life, Galán hands over all the money he has to a Dominican smuggler based out of a San Juan nightclub, and Gabriela begins her terrifying journey.

Knowing that his cutter may be all that separates Galán and Gabriela—and haunted by the human suffering he has witnessed at sea—Pat must decide. Will he remain true to his oath, as his older brother had done in Iraq? Or will he risk his own future—and perhaps his freedom—for his closest friend?

On a moonless night, two armed vessels converge in the Mona Passage, and three lives change forever.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: The stakes in this story could not possibly be higher. Two men, friends who have that certain connection that feels more like family, are set onto a collision course by the Large External Force that is Law.

You don't get more universal than that.

What makes this read stand out is the way it happens...the way Author Bardenwerper created it. He was Pat, he knows Pat's job...he knows what it means to be bound by Law to go against convictions you simply can't ignore. And, as is ever and always the case, no good deed goes unpunished.

Multiple times and in innumerable ways. There can only be so much good luck in the world, it seems, and some people burn through their tiny bit in no time at all. This story is about many of those people; this read is for those myriads of us who know, love, are those people. The decisions of people we'll never meet cost us precious resources, time or money or access. And we'll often never know how those souls are responsible for the landscape we are required to walk. And I think, as lessons I've been forced to learn myownself go, this one's the best one to revisit. As I read Pat's story, I felt so clearly the pitfalls, the disasters to come. The secret of the read is that I kept reading, kept my eyeballs on the page, as it unfolded. I cared about Galán, and Gabriela. I wanted them to be reunited, despite the many, many burdens that meant Galán would be shouldering. And Gabriela, well, we need our families, we need our people near us more when it's hardest for them to be there.

The main story here, though, is about the Wrongness of the World. It's so simple on a personal level...so very complicated as soon as higher authority gets hold of the narrative. It shows that Author Bardenwerper knows Pat's job...it shows that he's got the keys to a roman à clef in this novel. But most of all, it shows that he really, truly wrote from his heart, gave his full and complete self to creating this novel. It was a surprise to me to care this much about his characters. They weren't particularly well drawn, though that is not for want of trying. Whatever craft lacunae there are, are not there because the author is not working hard to fill them. It takes time and luck to fill out the weak spots in one's writing, and the world gives little of either to anyone.

Happily, Syracuse University Press has given Author Bardenwerper a leg up through their Veterans Writing Award, a program instituted to bring us the often-impossible-to-locate words of the actual people who do the hard, thankless work that being in the military requires. It is not a group of people we can afford to ignore. Our various military branches have many jobs, and some leave more traces behind than others. We're better able to learn about their world, and the world we all live in, now that this series exists.

This particular novel, Mona Passage, is a good way to enter that world and be present, be attentive, as its costs become prices paid by real people.

>260 FAMeulstee: It's funny how the Prizes are somehow imbued with a personality...the Costas are for books I associate with readers that were once called yuppies; the James Tait Black is for people I associate with Subaru station wagons with snow tires...and there's something 20-year-old Jeep Cherokee with a pissing Calvin sticker about the Pulitzer.

>259 Familyhistorian: El Akkad is an interesting and worthy writer, though I'm not mad about his books. They clearly touch something in people though less so in me.

>258 SandyAMcPherson: Most people here are civil in their disagreements with one's opinion. If they are mortally offended by your stance on something, they simply stop coming to (or commenting on) your thread. A few bad actors over the years have taken personal animus to an extreme, but that issue appears to have abated somewhat.

>257 alcottacre: It's a possibly hopeful sign, as I read it, since it could mean that the librarians are waking up to the fact that if They make you censor things *you* don't like, how long before They make you censor things you *do* like.

Censorship is a blunt tool. It's only good for bludgeoning.

Great review of Winter in Sokcho, Richard. Thanks for the reminder about tonight's National Book Awards ceremony!

>261 richardderus: >262 richardderus: Adding both of those to the BlackHole. Thanks for the reviews and recommendations, RD!

>263 richardderus: I always check to see if my local library has a book before I go farther afield. I agree that libraries need as much support as we can give them.

((Hugs) and **smooches**

>263 richardderus: I'll have to go down as 'reader who was once called a yuppy' then Richard, as the Costa prize is probably the one most attuned to my reading tastes. I've heard of the James Tait Black Mémorial prize but haven't ever followed it, so I looked up a list of winners. I've read quite a few of the older winners, but a lot of the newer winners have passed me by completely. But then I have never had any desire to own a Jeep Cherokee or any other type of SUV.

The mere *title* of this piece gave me heebiejeebies: Why I'm Getting Rid of Books.

*shudder*

>267 richardderus: The statement "the very presence of my books has become suffocating" gave me pause. Clearly not one of us!

>268 alcottacre: CLEARLY!

>266 SandDune: *chuckle* Are you sure you're Welsh? Lots and lots of all-terrain equipment there....

I think the prize personalities observation is more general, more about the overall profile of those readers, than any specific one reader.

>265 alcottacre: I am entirely sure you always check the library first, Stasia, or you'd be living under an overpass on the Trans-Texas Corridor! No one I know could afford a reading habit like yours (or mine) on purchase basis.

I hope you'll enjoy them both.

>264 kidzdoc: Thanks, Darryl! I appreciate the kind words. You'll probably remember the Awards ceremony before I do...my sieve/memory isn't grabbing things like that too well anymore.

>269 richardderus: you'd be living under an overpass on the Trans-Texas Corridor! No one I know could afford a reading habit like yours (or mine) on purchase basis.

So very true! Since I am retired and have no income at all now, I have cut down on purchasing games to buy books, lol.

>267 richardderus: Um, yeah. I skimmed a bit. " I find it extremely difficult to attach sentimental value to objects" Twaddle. That person is bereft of healthy emotion. Every damned thing in my possession has some sort of connection that would be very hard for me to break. Discard this worn-out emery board? But, but...it has my DNA on it....

>267 richardderus: They are clearly deluded.

193 Planet of Clay by Samar Yazbek

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: An ode to fantasy and beauty in the midst of war-torn Damascus

Rima, a young girl from Damascus, longs to walk, to be free to follow the will of her feet, but instead is perpetually constrained. She finds refuge in a fantasy world full of colored crayons, secret planets, and The Little Prince, reciting passages of the Qur’an like a mantra as everything and everyone around her is blown to bits. Since Rima hardly ever speaks, people think she’s crazy, but she is no fool—the madness is in the battered city around her.

One day while taking a bus through Damascus, a soldier opens fire and her mother is killed. Rima, wounded, is taken to a military hospital before her brother leads her to the besieged area of Ghouta—where, between bombings, she writes her story.

In Planet of Clay, Samar Yazbek offers a surreal depiction of the horrors taking place in Syria, in vivid and poetic language and with a sharp eye for detail and beauty.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: First, read this:

We needed to take two buses to reach {my mother's job} from our house, which was at the end of Jaramana Camp in southern Damascus. I am happy for you if you haven't heard of it.
–and–
Personally, I turn over the coffee tray and make it into a desk, then I pick up the blue pen which I found among the stacks of paper, and I begin. You must not set off before the sound has started. Don't stop unless you are faint from exhaustion, but it must be from exhaustion and not fear. If all this isn't done properly, I mean using the blue pen to play with words on a blank page, then my instructions will fail, the blank page won't like you, and the roar of the aeroplanes won't disappear.

The rational response to an irrational world, one filled with mortal danger, will always be different for a small child. When a small child is required to make the world make sense when it simply doesn't, such as in a war zone, there will arise adaptive responses that are in the long run maladaptive. And add in the probability of the person being neurodivergent from the get-go...well, what are the odds of that person reaching adulthood? Still less unscathed.

Rima's mother knows her daughter isn't the usual sort of child. She's got "her brains in her feet," meaning a mania for walking, walking, always walking if she can stay on her feet...in other words, a need to escape...and on one of her very first outings, so to speak, a group of well-meaning adults stop her and ask her all sorts of urgent questions...what's your name, where's your mother...that she simply can't process fast enough to answer. Thus is an elective mute created.

So now Rima's mother is living in a war zone with a manic, elective mute daughter. She does what any mother would do...she makes the medical rounds, seeking answers. Getting none, she does the thing mothers have done since the beginning of time: She improvises. She gets some rope and ties Rima to her wrist when she has to go out and, when the girl's too much of a woman for that to be safe, she ties her to their bed.

That sounds horrific to a Western person who's safe inside a house every night, with only police drones and cop cars to worry about. But think of this: How safe is a young woman on the streets here in your fat-and-happy country? You'll always teach her to be aware of the threat posed by Them. (You'll be filling in that space with the people you dislike the most, of course, but I assure you she's safer from Them than from the nice, entitled, self-satisfied boys in her school.) For someone with fewer resources than the poorest person in this country of ours, the solution fits the need admirably.

What it doesn't, can't do is prepare Rima for one of the personal calamities that even the mildest "police action" or "guerrilla war" engenders: The loss of a parent. In this case, an only parent...her father's never even been a presence for his absence to be felt. What this means is her world is effectively over. And yet her life goes on, in her mother's permanent absence and her brother's disappearance into the guerrillas' ranks.

What makes this such a perfect read for this moment is the Belarus-vs-Poland manufactured refugee crisis permeating the news cycle right now. It's a necessary and salutary reminder that the world's not in good shape, plague aside; the people, living breathing people, who are caught between two sets of disgusting racist piece-of-shit countries and who will continue to die of exposure as the world idly watches it happen, aren't going to get what they need any more than Rima did.

Mirabile dictu, Rima's brother shows up! He finds her! And they begin the refugee's eternal dance, the homeless and placeless and stateless state of being, of non-personhood. Of course to Rima it's not that way...she simply does. She lives. She is in touch with something utterly invaluable for a refugee: Her self. It is clear to her who she is, she is Rima and she reads, she sings the Qu'ran's sutras, she draws. It is a saving grace. What it isn't is easy for a storyteller to sell. She is simultaneously simple and sophisticated, ignorant and wise and way over her head.

Let me show you:

You will understand that I don't have enough time to explain to you about forgetting. Later, you can throw away whatever pages you want to. What matters to me is {the old caretaking woman} who wanted to understand how I knew how to use tartil in reciting the Qu'ran. Really, it was difficult to explain to her, because my tongue was stopped, and like {her} I don't understand much of what surrounds me.
–and–
I am a story, I too will disappear (or maybe I am with you now as you read my scattered words) like the Cheshire Cat did in the story of Alice.

That is some very sophisticated abstract thought for someone with the neurodivergence Rima has displayed...in the circumstances of her upbringing, I'd be impressed with that level of eloquent abstraction in a neurotypical young adult.

All in all, though, as a work of fiction, I was compelled by the story, by the character, by the narrative's timeliness and timelessness. I'm very impressed as this is the first work I've read by Author Yazbek. It is, as she has Rima say of her own storytelling, one of those "circular stories with intersecting centers which are only completed by retellings and new details."

The problem is reassembling my heart after the story ends....

This is a very special, very timely yet a timeless read...there is no realistic chance the subject matter will lose its relevance. It is a FINALIST for the 2021 Best Translated Literature category at the National Book Awards! The winner will be announced this evening.

>272 Helenliz: Clearly. Severely.

>271 laytonwoman3rd: I think I was too appalled to skim...I wasn't at all sure I'd be able to believe my eyes. Turns out I couldn't.

>270 alcottacre: Games...books...books...games...oh dear....

Am I the only person who thinks that copyediting is a necessity in marketing emails? Two books I'd be mildly interested in reading flew away when I read the come-ons:
In 1938, wealthy American newlyweds Stella and Nicky travel to Vienna for their honeymoon — but as World War II breaks out...
...not in 1938 it didn't...
or this egregious idiocy:
Dublin, 1912: James enlists to fight in World War I...
In 1912! Wow! Two and a half years early. (AUGUST 1914.)

Hard pass on both.

THEN this idiocy smacked me in the teeth:
"...education minister Jean-Michel Blanquer lambasted Petit Robert's revision: "Inclusive writing is not the future of the French language . . . Our students, who are consolidating their basic knowledge, cannot have that as a reference."

from: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/nov/17/french-dictionary-wokeism-gender-i...

Apparently the dickhead's name was predictive.

>273 richardderus: - I'll be keeping my eye out for this one.

And just - WOW - to the book marketing fails.

Trying so hard to avoid book bullets . You got me with The Prophets and Winter in Sokcho Thanks :)

>273 richardderus: Adding that one to the BlackHole.

>274 richardderus: Trust me when I say that books are cheaper than games :)

>275 richardderus: Holy cow!

Winter in Sokcho is the WINNER OF THE 2021 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FOR TRANSLATION! Watch the ceremony here. Big, big YAY for a well-deserved win!
***
>278 alcottacre:, >276 katiekrug: I know, right?! I mean...you don't *know* what date something happened until you've looked it up! Your company's name's on it...no flyin' by the seat of your memory.

>278 alcottacre:, >277 figsfromthistle: My aim is true. ::nailbuff::

>276 katiekrug: It's one I expect you'll really like, Katie. The narrative voice is a little uneven, but the story makes it worthwhile.

>275 richardderus: Definitely! I mean I got annoyed the other day because someone described a Welsh terrier incorrectly….

Happy Thursday, Richard dear!

>275 richardderus: That is plain wrong, all of them.

>275 richardderus: To be honest, RD, those dates would probably have not registered with me (yes, I do know they're wrong). Not having been around at the time - unlike some other people ;0)

'Morning, RDear, and happy Thursday to you! Yes, she's back.

Line in the sand, I've abandoned the Proust because ... well... heart attack... and am reading a book friend Rhoda sent to me called The Ruin by Dervla McTiernan, start of an Irish Detective series. I may attempt a bit of The Code Breaker this afternoon, but won't push my reading enthusiasm if I don't feel really inclined.

*smooch* from your own Horrible

The Code Breaker takes a while to get airborne but it's a terrific read.

194 Chouette by Claire Oshetsky

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: An exhilarating, provocative novel of motherhood in extremis

Tiny is pregnant. Her husband is delighted. “You think this baby is going to be like you, but it’s not like you at all,” she warns him. “This baby is an owl-baby.”

When Chouette is born small and broken-winged, Tiny works around the clock to meet her daughter’s needs. Left on her own to care for a child who seems more predatory bird than baby, Tiny vows to raise Chouette to be her authentic self. Even in those times when Chouette’s behaviors grow violent and strange, Tiny’s loving commitment to her daughter is unwavering. When she discovers that her husband is on an obsessive and increasingly dangerous quest to find a “cure” for their daughter, Tiny must decide whether Chouette should be raised to fit in or to be herself—and learn what it truly means to be a mother.

Arresting, darkly funny, and unsettling, Chouette is a brilliant exploration of ambition, sacrifice, perceptions of ability, and the ferocity of motherly love.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: You can't find my interest in the Cult of Mother with a scanning electron microscope. I dislike the smugness of Mothers who define themselves by the fruits of their uterus. I am routinely revolted and infuriated by the seemingly inevitable bad, lazy, underinvolved fathers these Noble Mothers are saddled with. (Who chose him? Could it just possibly be you, your behavior, your expectations are at fault, Mother?)

Why in the hell did I ask for, then read this book?!

Because we're not on the rails leading to Vaginaville by way of Labor Creek, that's why. This book posits a half-owl, half-human baby born of lesbian bestiality committed in a dream. (Not a spoiler, that's literally the first page of the read.)

I dream I’m making tender love with an owl. The next morning I see talon marks across my chest that trace the path of my owl-lover’s embrace. Two weeks later I learn that I’m pregnant.

You may wonder: How could such a thing come to pass between woman and owl?

I, too, am astounded, because my owl-lover was a woman.
* * *
As for you, owl-baby, let’s lay out the facts. Your owlness is with you from the very beginning. It’s there when a first cell becomes two, four, eight. It’s there when you sleep too much, and crawl too late, and when you bite when you aren’t supposed to bite, and shriek when you aren’t supposed to shriek; and on the day that you are born—on the day when I first look down on your pinched-red, tiny-clawed, outraged little body lying naked and intubated in a box—I won’t have the slightest idea about who you are, or what I will become.

But there you will be, and you will be of me.

Right there, that voice makes my readar ping like it's locked onto an approaching asteroid. This? This is weird trip and I am here to take it.

What doesn't make me coo with delight is the rather stark presentation of her husband and his family. I did, however, get many evil-hearted chuckles at their expense:

My mother-in-law sees right over me. She is six feet tall and never looks down. She looks out toward the horizon instead, with an expression on her face as if she is thinking the same thought all the time, and that thought has something to do with the pioneer spirit.

Still, the way Author Oshetsky treats the poor bewildered father of this owl-baby is the reason I don't give this book five stars, why I won't be mentioning it for my annual six-stars-of-five "this book...it merged itself into me"; women get to whinge about the male writers treating them as cardboard cutouts, so I have done the same.

Chouette's birth, her entry into a world not meant or designed for her, is a trauma; her mother is the only one who champions her. Naturally enough; she's got the owl-baby she expected. No one around her took her seriously when she told them, "this baby is half-owl," because who in their right mind would? Then...Chouette.

From that point on, the beautiful language...the beautiful Satanic Second Person language...goes into the full monty crazytime of a human woman raising an owl-baby, a creature she simply isn't like, but she keeps slugging. She does what mothers across the globe have always done: She learns, adapts, improvises. She makes do and she feeds, raises her child, meeting her owl-baby's needs for raw meat, for training in how to catch prey; she tussles with her owl-baby to accomplish the simplest of daily tasks.

In the teeth of a word-gale of opposition and resistance from her dog-person husband ("When it comes to our little girl, can't is a dirty word"). And I don't mean "man who likes dogs," I mean she thinks her husband...all of the rest of us not her and Chouette, in fact...are like dogs.

She does not intend a compliment in it.

The rest of the narrative is a rehash of The Yellow Wallpaper meets Gaslight. The horrors build in frequency as the reviled dog-person father succeeds in making his Charlotte into a dog-baby. Then comes the day the dog-family meets Charlotte...and she reverts to Chouette. Violently. Horribly. The dog-person father comes to a bloody end; Chouette and mother go on the lam; but, as it inevitably must, Time has her way with us:

She is strong. She is monstrously individual. She is sister to the Titans. She is Ozymandias before the fall. She is the bird of omen, dark and foul; she is blood-wed; she is Strix; she is harbinger of war and bringer of death and slaughterer of armies, oh, my Polyphonte!—

She is the girl I raised her to be.

And that she is. This bizarre extended metaphorical trip through the awful, consuming process of being a mother ends as it must...in defeat, in triumph, in the hollowness of being finally ready...for the task, the life, just ended. The awful emptiness of realizing: Now it's just me I worry about, care for, be with. Now it's not You, it's just me.

All the stars I've rated this book are for that single, cruel, agonizing, slow-moving catastrophe of a realization.

>285 richardderus: - Not my sort of thing, but I do love the first paragraph of your review :)

>284 magicians_nephew:, >283 karenmarie: It's a subject and a topic that needs a lot of attention from us, the non-scientists.

>283 karenmarie: *smooch* My belovèd friend is better when she's visiting again! I am so so so relieved.

Proust isn't post-heart-attack reading in anyone's book! It won't fly away. And an Irish detective series is pretty much the best respite from stress I can conjure.

another *smooch*

>282 humouress: ...eh...? what's that you're mumbling, little girl? speak up! or face me when you're speaking to me! I swaNEE you thoughtless younguns.

>281 FAMeulstee: Happy Thursday! I'm glad I'm not the only one getting exercised about this, this utter travesty.

>280 SandDune: Heh. Well...when you know someone's just wrong....

>286 katiekrug:
Thank you most kindly! It was a heartfelt snort of derision. But it regularly gets me into trouble with Mothers.

Well, Richard, I've lurked a time or two but have either timed out or (more likely) had nothing to say beyond a hello.
Now though, I find that I WANT Planet of Clay, and I thank you. Maybe soon.

>275 richardderus: What a world! I'm accustomed to reading bullets or reviews by people who haven't read the book, but I didn't think any of my former high school students were writing book marketing.

And from a conversation way far above ---- I congratulate myself on choosing to be born at a time when it's possible to rebuild bone mass lost to osteoporosis. Except for the pandemic, the main reason that my mama is confined to the house is a spine full of compression fractures. After a bad one five years ago, the doc x-rayed her and couldn't tell which was the new one because of the great number of them. I'm convinced that osteoporosis is what kept three great-aunts bedridden for most of my life. (I'm not sure why I think you'd want to know this.)

Stay warm and read!

>289 LizzieD: Hi Peggy! Glad to see you here. And YAY for Planet of Clay! I hope, and honestly expect, that it'll work its magic on you.

Your former students wouldn't *dare* let idiotic errors like that through...they'd see your minatory glare in their mind's eye and go check the facts!

I totally understand what you mean about osteoporosis. My other-mother, Irene, had it; she was headed for bed when Fosamax was introduced and she got 15 more good years out of that wonder drug. It thrills and delights me that we're not subject to our grandparents' level of medical care.

Happy Thursday's reads to you!

>285 richardderus: That's certainly a powerful opener. Someday-swamp'd.

>291 swynn: Oh good! You'll most likely get immersed in it, I predict. Such a beautiful use of language.
***
https://www.goodwillbooks.com/ is having a great sale until tomorrow, the 19th.
Buy three or more items, get 15% off (and always free standard shipping) by using code: EARLYBIRD at checkout.

>285 richardderus: What a trippy-ass premise. Wow! And I certainly love that cover.

Sweet Thursday, Richard. Cold & windy here and I am happy indoors.

>293 msf59: Hey Mark! I wish it was a bit colder here, but we're at least within hailing distance of normal...about 3° warmer than normal. Poor Katie, ~25mi away, is much warmer.

I love the North Atlantic.

Read Chouette! It's really worth a library borrow.

>285 richardderus: You already hit me with that BB on Shelley's thread :)

>292 richardderus: I have already been over there and purchased 3 new-to-me books for the Asian Book Challenge in 2022.

>295 alcottacre: #sorrynotsorry on both, Stasia. Finally edging toward parity on all the squillions of book-bullets you've riddled me with over the years!

GBBO thinkings:
Crystelle? Whut
Jürgen really did crash and burn, to be fair. He should've been safe, however, because of his winning sablé Breton tart. Shouldn't that outweigh the "boring" showstopper, I wonder; but really the flavor and the presentation got that. Still, that and the slices Haul Pollywood was underwhelmed by despite Prue's pleasure in them...he would've been safe absent the "gotta have a girl" pressure from somewhere.
If they had to boot someone not Crystelle for demographic reasons, honesty *deep breath* Chigs needed to be the one. Terrible tart...those awful showstopper apples.
But instead it was Pooh-bear! Not at all fair, reasonable. I am Pissed!

Ricardo--I am hopelessly behind on your churning thread of irreverence and joy. Love you!

Morning, Bigdaddy!

>191 Helenliz: A direct hit! Excellent review.

>275 richardderus: Crazy making. And so stupid it boggles the mind.

>297 richardderus: Not reading this until after we have watched it tonight.

Hiya. Couldn't resist being post #300...

(even though I have nothing to write about. Need to drink my coffee)

>300 SandyAMcPherson: Hi Sandy! Happy 300th! (Post, that is.)

>299 Crazymamie: No; definitely wait until you've watched the show. DEFINITELY.

Thanks, re: Sokcho. I know you'll be very interested in it...and appreciate why it won a National Book Award.

>298 Berly: *smooch* I'm glad you came by! There'll be a new one either later today or certainly by tomorrow.

'Morning, RDear. I hope you have a mah-vel-us Friday.

Coffee-ing, putzing. That's my day so far.

*smooch* from your own Horrible

>302 karenmarie: That's how it should be, Horrible...coffeeing, putzing, this-ing and thats-ing. *smooch*

Happy Friday, my friend! Have a lovely weekend!

>304 Storeetllr: I love that image! Thanks, Mary, stay Cthool to you too!
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The new thread is Operational.