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May
27. Sway by Zachary Lazar
I was intrigued by the cover, I know! I'm ALWAYS suckered in by covers, right? But this book was in the fiction section and had The Rolling Stone on the cover. I had to pick up and see what it was about. Here's the description from goodreads:
Three dramatic and emblematic stories intertwine in Zachary Lazar's extraordinary new novel, SWAY--the early days of the Rolling Stones, including the romantic triangle of Brian Jones, Anita Pallenberg, and Keith Richards; the life of avant-garde filmmaker Kenneth Anger; and the community of Charles Manson and his followers. Lazar illuminates an hour in American history when rapture found its roots in idolatrous figures and led to unprovoked and inexplicable violence. Connecting all the stories in this novel is Bobby Beausoleil, a beautiful California boy who appeared in an Anger film and eventually joined the Manson "family." With great artistry, Lazar weaves scenes from these real lives together into a true but heightened reality, making superstars human, giving demons reality, and restoring mythic events to the scale of daily life.
The jacket cover had a much better desciption.
I really wanted to like this book. Honest. I mean, the Rolling Stones, Manson Family, 1960s... what's not to like? But the whole time I was reading it I kept thinking about how the book, while you can tell the author did tons of research, was still just fiction. And not only that, but if you think about it it's fanfiction. Rolling Stones/Manson family fanfiction? Really?
And all the parts (of which were many. most, even.) with Kenneth Anger made me really hate the book. I didn't like him. I dunno if that's what the author was going for or not, but he just seemed like a parasite. And all the homosexual stuff was just way too often. I mean, "we get it, he wanted to suck off all the guys. That's great. Can we move on? Because I'm moving on." Is all I'm saying.
The idea behind the story is fascinating, I think, but the book just doesn't work. It's too slow, or too gay, or too forcing with the occult hooha all the damn time. And the ending was disappointing all, "wow. that was intense. but we lived through it and now we're all old and not even friends anymore. oh well."
So if you see this book around, read the jacket cover cos you'll be all, "hmm. that's interesting." but then put the book down and walk away.
26. Family Bible by Melissa Delbridge
This is a memoir written by a lady who grew up in Tuscaloosa, AL in the '60s. It is fantastic. I laughed (out loud in the breakroom in front of my coworker. i kept apologizing cos she was trying to read a book while i was being a chucklehead.), I cried, and I loved every bit of this book.
The author talks about her family and growing up in Alabama during the Civil Rights movement. And while she's generous with the humor, she does not sugarcoat ANYthing. She's brutally honest... even about herself. And I gotta say that took some major guts.
The book is pretty short, but I can't say that it's sweet cos it does have some bite to it. It's my favorite book I've read so far this year, and I'll be recommending it to everyone. I know that I'll be reading this one again. It was hilarious, brutal, and beautiful.
25. Detective Story by Imre Kertész
This is what the book says it's about: (i stole this from the goodreads site, but it's also what's on the jacket cover of the book so no spoilers here.)
As readers, we are accustomed to reading stories of war and injustice from the victims’ point of view, sympathizing with their plight. In Detective Story, the tables have been turned, leaving us in the mind of a monster, as Nobel Laureate Imre Kertész plunges us into a story of the worst kind, told by a man living outside morality.
Now in prison, Antonio Martens is a torturer for the secret police of a recently defunct dictatorship. He requests and is given writing materials in his cell, and what he has to recount is his involvement in the surveillance, torture, and assassination of Federigo and Enrique Salinas, a prominent father and son whose principled but passive opposition to the regime left them vulnerable to the secret police. Preying on young Enrique’s aimless life, the secret police began to position him as a subversive and then targeted his father. Once this plan was set into motion, any means were justified to reach the regime’s chosen end—the destruction of an entire liberal class.
Inside Martens’s mind, we inhabit the rationalizing world of evil and see firsthand the inherent danger of inertia during times of crisis. A slim, explosive novel of justice railroaded by malevolence, Detective Story is a warning cry for our time. Okay, so Martens is telling the story, and you know he's in prison so you know that whatever government he was working for is no longer in charge (or maybe it is and he was imprisoned as a scapegoat, i guess, could be another way to look at it; the book doesn't say.) But the cover made it sound like Martens is this evil killer-torturer guy, and maybe he is? But he never talks about what he did. And I would expect a killer-torturer Evil Sicko to brag about what he's done, or at least describe the torture and get pleaseure out of talking about it. But he doesn't talk specifically about it the torture (unless I missed something?) and he's never braggy about it or even sounds like he's glad it happened.
See, Martens was a police man. and then wherever this is goes under dictatorship or martial law or something and he's recruited to The Corps. And he's with these two other guys and they have the Interrogation Unit. So it's not like he was in this from the beginning. And so I don't get the whole Martens = evil thing. Because he's telling the story, maybe he's lying? I don't know, but I didn't feel that he was evil. I felt more like, if he was a policeman and then kinda forced to join this Interrogation group that tortures people, that maybe he's more coward than evil.
The cover made this sound like it was going to kill your mind with evil and torture and kind of in a "this could happen to you! beware!" kind of way. And if the book had actually been about that? It would've been pretty good. It just did not come across that way at all. It could be that it was 'lost in translation' somehow? But the guy who translated the book into English has won awards for his work as a translator, so i don't know.
And I know that the author is supposed to be this awesome Nobel Prize winning author, and that's awesome, but this book is just not that good. But I do feel bad slamming it for some reason.
24. Sacred by Dennis Lehane
Book three of the Kenzie/Gennaro series. And since I've already read book four, Gone, Baby, Gone all that's left is book five. I'm kinda sad though cos that's the last book in the series. I'm not sure if he plans on writing any more of those. So I'm trying to hold off reading the last one. This is the one with the billionaire Trevor Stone and his daughter, Desiree. They're pretty much evil.
Have I mentioned that I love this series?
23. Darkness, Take My Hand by Dennis Lehane
This is book 2 of the Kenzie/Gennaro series. This time they deal with a serial killer.
I love these books.
April
22. A Drink Before the War by Dennis Lehane
This guy is my new favorite author.
This is the first book in the Kenzie/Gennaro series. Basically the two P.I.s get involved in a case that leads to gang warfare. What I like most about his books (remember Gone, Baby, Gone? yeah, apparently i started with the 4th book. oops.) is that they seem kinda likely. The endings especially seem more realistic. There's not a "happy" ending where everything is all nice and tidy. It's messy. Plus, I love how sarcastic the characters are. No matter what is going on Patrick or Angie is being sarcastic. Glib even.
21. I, Tania by Brian Joseph Davis
This is by far the most creative thing I've ever read (okay wait, first House of Leaves, and then I, Tania. They are so different from each other but both so clever you wish you'd written them.) Also, this is my favorite book so far this year. While I was reading this I was thinking about the author, and I kinda thought that the author was probably not so much a writer but an artist who was writing. When I looked up the author on the Internet I found that I was right, he is an artist. I can't really explain how I knew that from his writing. It just seemed obvious.
How to describe this book. Here's what it says on Amazon:
America lies in ruins during an age of decline, despair, and death. The year is 1975 and a radical far-left group has kidnapped a young woman from one of America's richest families. Using the memoir format just enough to spin off into a crazed, bawdy, and seditious charge through pop culture and politics, this is a highly fictionalized true story of the rise and fall of the Symbianese Liberation Army, as it never happened.
So basically it's supposed to be Patty Hearst as her SLA personality, Tania, writing a memoir. That does not describe at all the hilarity of this book. There's not really a plot going on here, it's more like one over-educated joke after another. The chapters are very short and some of the chapters could be taken and made into novels on their own. I'm not describing this well. My favorite chapter was the one that was just a critique of the movie The Bad News Bears as a social commentary. The review is called It Takes a Bear to Defeat a Pig: A People's Reveiw of The Bad News Bears. I also loved all the quotes. Mr. Davis steals dialogue straight from Airplane!, The Wizard of Oz, and Monty Python and the Holy Grail (who doesn't quote that one?)
Check it out for yourself. You can read an excerpt here. This book is so clever it's almost too clever. Almost. I enjoyed it so much it gets 0 Cansecos.
20. Remember Me? by Sophie Kinsella
ChickLit. The main chica, Lexi, gets amnesia. When she wakes up from her accident she thinks it's 2004 and that she still has a crappy job. But really it's 2007 and she's the bitch boss from hell and is married to a rich handsome guy. Wacky hijinks ensue. It was cute, and it made me laugh a lot. Judicious use of the fuck word.
I haven't read any of her other books (the Shopoholic series, mainly because it's called the Shopoholic series). But I did enjoy this book, so maybe I'll give her other ones a chance.
19. Strange Blood by Lindsay Jayne Ashford
This is the second in her Dr. Rhys crime novel series. It was pretty good. Again, it was a nice change of pace from the same old American backdrop (it takes place in England). It was about a serial killer who has a thing for the Wizard of Oz, so that was kinda cool. There was a bit about Patrick in this one where he screws up and I gotta say, that was disappointing in a James Patterson Women's Murder Club Let's Add Drama For Drama's Sake kinda thing. I hate that.
March
18. Frozen by Lindsay Jayne Ashford
I stumbled across this author by accident. Actually, I started out reading Strange Blood and realized that I was reading the second book first. So the next day I went back to the 'brary and found that we actually had the first book as well! This is (I'm pretty sure) the first book in the Dr. Megan Rhys series, and if it's not the first then it at least comes before Strange Blood.
This is a standard crime novel/mystery/whodunit. Dr. Rhys is a behavioral psychologist and teacher and sometimes helps the police by profiling. The main difference between this crime novel and the other crime schlock I read is that it takes place in England. This meant I had to learn some new vocabulary. Even though the police are mostly the same as here, and everything's really the same, it's just called different things sometimes. For the first couple of chapters I had to look up a few words. But it wasn't like I didn't know what she was talkng about. I used my context clues. Like when she used the word punter. I knew she wasn't talking about an american football player. I could tell it was their word for john (like a dude with a hooker). Also, I could tell who the SOCOs were (the equivalent to our CSI or whatever you want to call the forensic team), I just didn't know what the letters SOCO stood for. Cos I kept thinking of Southern Comfort. So, across the pond SOCO stands for Scene Of Crime Officer. Although they aren't actually officers like a police officer. They are civilians who work the crime scene like over here.
S'anyway, aside from a few new vocab words the book read just like a regular whodunit. It was good. I didn't know whodunit until the end. I kept guessing, and I did guess that guy, but then there were other guys, and I guessed them too and had forgotten all about him.
Basically the story is there's prostitutes being killed. I know right? England with it's Jack the Ripper thing. And Dr. Rhys helps out. And of course, the killer comes after her. Because that's what killers do in books they go after the smart girl. It was the same in Cornwell's Scarpetta series.
I'd recommend this to anyone who likes mysteries especially if you're in a mood to change venue (read: sick of New York, Chicago, Boston, and San Francisco)
17. Sizzle and Burn by Jayne Ann Krentz
Right. So this is the third book in the Arcane Society series (Second Sight was first, White Lies was second.), and out of the three it's actually the better book. I say that because at least in this one she waits about 100 pages before the characters have the hott sexxx. And I also liked that the characters' parasenses were things I've heard of (hearing things, seeing things) and neither one was this unexplained "hunter" like in the other books. In this book the two sexxxers work together to not only have the sexxx, but to also find a serial killer AND to stop the bad guys (Nightshade, a bad guy psychic organization who's out to make a super drug. i know.), and it seemed like the book went on for 50 pages too much. But like I say, it was better than the first two.
16. A Murmuration of Starlings by Jake Adam York
This is a fantastic book of poetry! His other book of poems, Murder Ballads was very good, but this one was great. The poems all centered around the civil rights movement. I loved how Mr. York used music in his poetry. These poems were beautiful and chilling at the same time. They were just perfect. Okay, enough gushing.
15. Second Sight by Amanda Quick
This is the first book in the Arcane Society series. If you'll recall, the second book (which I've already read) was White Lies by Jayne Ann Krentz. Why she wrote the first one under the name Amanda Quick and then wrote the next two books in the SAME SERIES under a DIFFERENT NAME is beyond me. What kind of sense does this make?
None.
Exactly, thank you.
This book was awful. It took place in Victorian England (hate), and the characters have sex by page 20 (porn), and it, like White Lies, didn't explain (enough for me) the whole "hunter" class of psychic blah-blah. Honestly? This book is crap. There's Xena fanfic out there that's WAY better than this.
14. Innocence by David Hosp
This novel is more of a legal thriller than a courtroom drama. I enjoyed the book immensely up until the very end. I liked all the characters. All of them. I especially liked Lissa, the assistant, because she cussed so much. It was funny. The story is about a lawyer, Finn, who ends up representing a guy who's been in jail for 15 years for a crime he did not commit. There's a gang involved as well as dirty cops. So there you go.
13. The Good Rat by Jimmy Breslin
Ah, back to the sweet nonfiction. This is a true crime book, also it's about the mafia. What's not to like? In this book Mr. Breslin tells the story of Burt Kaplan and how he ratted out two killer cops who worked for the mob.
I liked the book and I also liked the way it was written. I will say that it was a bit hard to follow in some parts. The chronology was confusing. Maybe it's just me though. Apparently Mr. Breslin was a newspaper reporter back in the day and he (from what i can tell) had the mafia beat. (heh). I'm not sure how that works really, a reporter who writes about mob guys? in the paper? and he doesn't get "whacked"? I... who knows. Anyway, that's how he knows all his stuff I guess, cos he used to hang where the gangsters would hang. He acts like he's the scribe for the mob. hee.
I liked how it was written (despite the confusing timeline) because the author sometimes refers to himself in a stream-of-conciousness kind of way is the best I can describe it. A bit like Capote in In Cold Blood not that i'm actually comparing the two. Um, so yeah, good book.
12. White Lies by Jayne Ann Krentz
Okay, this was a little "decomp" book for me between Lincoln bios. Heh.
Jayne Ann Krentz has written approximately 900 romance books under the names, Jayne Bentley, Jayne Castle, Jayne Taylor, Stephanie James, Amanda Glass, and Amanda Quick.
Jan! Did you know she was Amanda Quick?! i didn't. although, it's not like she hides it. Apparently I've just not paid attention.
Anyway, I picked this book out because it sounded a lot like Kay Hooper's Bishop/SCU series of psychic detectives. But, you know how I am about those, right? I think I've become a little too hypercritical of them... as though I think that they should be good. When in fact, they've been going downhill since the second series. Anyway, this book compared to those books, sucks. It's more of a... not romanctic love story... more like a hott sexxx story. These people and their sexxxing after knowing each other for two days. Who does this? Plus, the main girl character, Clare, is a "human lie-detector", that's her psychic ability. And the book tells of how she's learned that while everyone lies, that doesn't mean everyone is bad, but still with the heinous trust issues, yeah? But then she meets this other guy and while both of them (of course) have been burned by previous relationships (of course) they hop in the sack by day two. Oy, this fiction stuff will rot your brain.
That said, this is part of a series, and I'm going to give another one of her books in this series a try. And I promise, if it sucks just as much as this one, I'll not keep doing this to myself again. Hee.
There aren't enough Cansecos in the world for this one.
11. Stealing Lincoln's Body by Thomas J. Craughwell
How do you pronounce that last name? crafwell? crah-well? I dunno.
In continuing with my Lincoln fetish. Heh. fetish. This was a great book. It was short, which is so rare in Lincoln books. It's not really so much about Lincoln though, it's about a heist to steal the dead president's body back in the 1870s. The fellows who were going to steal the body were doing so to hold it for ransom. What did they want? One of their buddies released from jail and $200,000. I know, the plan itself is even more, "really? they thought that would work?"
This book gives a short history on counterfeiting, which apparently was a HUGE DEAL back then. The author tells how half the currency at that time was fake. So the book is mostly about that and there's a lot about the criminal history of Chicago and Irish immigrants. It was very interesting. I had no idea that counterfeiting had been that big of a deal.
Like I say, the book was short (maybe 250 pages or so, the last 30 or so pages were bibliography and index) but it was riveting and as with any Lincoln book, there were a ton of names. But I love the specificity (is that a word?) of this book, and the author sticks with it. It's JUST about the heist (what led up to it, the heist itself, the aftermath), it doesn't wander all over the place. A great read.
February
10. Lincoln: A Foreigner's Quest by Jan Morris
Yes, I am a bit obsessed with Abraham Lincoln at the moment. I did not like this book very much. Ms. Morris is a British author and she writes this book as a sort of quest to find out how she ultimately feels about the glory (i guess) that is given to Abraham Lincoln. On the one hand it's interesting to see a foreigner's take on such a huge part of American history, but on the other hand Ms. Morris is kinda bitchy at the beginning of the book, and towards the end when she seems a bit charmed by Lincoln it's as though the whole journey for her was an annoyance in that she still doesn't know what to think about Lincoln.
And it's not that I don't understand her humor, I do, it just... doesn't work in this book. She's pretty insulting at the beginning, when she talks about being in Kentucky (or perhaps it was Indiana) and one of the locals approached her and talked to her. She made a big deal about it like the guy was there to ruin her day or something. When in fact, the very fact that the local came up and talked to her, gave her a story for her book that went on to prove the very point she was making in the book about southern people and the way they talk to anyone/everyone.
The only good thing about the book is that it gives a general overview of Lincoln's life without getting too detailed in any one part. But at the same time, as books about Abraham Lincoln go, this one is unnecessary. I give it five stinky, arrogant Cansecos.
9. Blood on the Moon: The Assassination of Abraham Lincoln by Edward Steers Jr.
This was a good book. It was daunting (to me) because it seemed that on every page there were 1,500 names. After a while it became easier to glean through the names and remember which ones were important and which ones were able to be forgotten without losing what was going on. The great thing about this book (besides the fact that Mr. Steers Jr. has a footnote for everything) is that it really is just about the assassination. We're not forced to relearn all about Lincoln's past, there's not a ton of stuff about the Civil War, it's really JUST about the assassination.
He does touch on some of the conspiracy theories about how Booth wasn't really killed and that Dr. Samuel Mudd was an innocent bystander kinda deal. He basically calls shenanigans on both of them.
I think what amazed me most was how the Union army/governemt was able to catch all the conspirators as quickly as they did. It seemed that most of it was luck, and I can't help but think that God was all, "Psst, check over there." even the one guy (john Surrat Jr.) who got away (for a short while)... he made it as far as Italy. I know! he became a Papal Zouave (um, lookitup), and while doing that, in Italy, he was recognized? really? He was caught, escaped to Egypt, and then caught again. That is remarkable. What, only to me? Fine.
Like I say, this book is great and it covers a very specific moment in history. So if you're interested in this moment and you don't want to have to muck through a bunch of "twice told tales" about Lincoln growing up in a log cabin, or Gettysburg, or the U.S. Civil War (not that those aren't great subjects, mind) then this is the book for you. WARNING: if you read this book on purpose, for entertainment or your own personal edification and NOT because you have to write a report of some kind, just know that your friends will make fun of you, nerd.
Oh! But! The best part of this book was the cover! On it Lincoln looks like a psycho (he's got this Crazy Eye) and Booth looks like My Name is Earl. Every time I got the book out to read I was all, "*sigh* Can SOMEone straighten Crazy Eye's tie? We're taking a portrait over here!"
8. Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell
I really enjoyed this book. Sarah Vowell tells about her travels to all the historic spots dealing with the assassinations of three presidents: Lincoln, Garfield, and McKinley. I know, it sounds boring and gross. It's not. It's The Awesome. Her descriptions and the way she tells the history keeps you reading. I think I liked this book better than her other one, The Partly Cloudy Patriot. Don't get me wrong, they're both great books. I just liked this one better.
7. I Live For This!: Baseball's Last True Believer by Bill Plaschke with Tommy Lasorda
Okay, if you're looking for a biography of Tommy Lasorda, just know that this isn't really that kind of book. This book is about Tommy Lasorda, yes, but it's not a typical baseball biography where they tell you all about growing up poor and making it to the Bigs and living the Baseball Life. Well, that stuff is in there, but not much. Mostly this books talked about what Tommy Lasorda does now and they've mixed in a few stories of when he was the manager of the Dodgers. Personally I was looking forward to reading about some late '70s early '80s baseball, you know, his heyday as a Dodger manager. There was just not a lot of that in here.
What is in here is the motivational speech circuit that Lasorda does today. This book tells you all about how he gives great speeches to ANY organization (some he does for free), and how he donates tons of money to charity. That is awesome. It really is. But also? For MOST of a book? It's meh. So, he's a great motivational speaker... he inspires ALL kinds of people, baseball players, firemen, people with heart problems, olympic athletes, fantastic. Personally, I want to hear more about his Championships and Fernandomania and junk like that. Maybe there's already too many books on those things and they wanted to write kind of a "where are they now?" kinda book, and that's cool. It's just, I wish I had been warned. So now, baseball book fans, I'm warning you. This book completely paints Lasorda as a saint and it gets redundant.
Don't get me wrong, I LOVE Tommy Lasorda. I think he was a great manager. He knows so much about baseball it's not even funny. Tommy Lasorda is beyond baseball. Everyone knows who Tommy Lasorda is, even people who don't know a thing about baseball. Case in point, I just called Laura (NOT a sportsfan of any kind. She rooted for Tom Petty at the last Super Bowl) and asked her if she knew who Tommy Lasorda was. She was all, "Kind of, but not really."
"Could you pick him out of a line-up?"
"I dunno. You say Tommy Lasorda and I keep thinking of that commercial with Robert Loggia."
"heh. That's a GREAT commercial!"
"I know!"
"Okay, well, do you know what Tommy Lasorda did? His job?"
"Is this important?"
"It's for the fiddy. So no, but I'm trying to make a point about how EVERYONE has heard of Tommy Lasorda."
"Okay, I'm gonna say he's either an actor or a sport... coach of some kind."
skknt! I wish you could've heard her say "sport coach" because it was like she had never said the two words before.
"Perfect!" I crowed, "You said coach! You didn't even say player that's a huge deal!"
"It is?"
"Yes, it is. You said coach. That's enough to make my point, plus he was in those Slim Fast commercials in the '80s so maybe that's why you had 'actor' in your head. You're the bomb, thanks!"
So see? Tommy Lasorda is bigger than baseball. I believe that. He's amazing. He's charasmatic. He's got moxie. But this book? It's on the boring side. Sorry.
6. 7th Heaven by James Patterson and Maxine Paetro
Like tons of people I enjoy the Women's Murder Club book series (i like the show too, but the books are better.), and I was excited when this one came out because it said it was the "MOST TERRIFYING CASE EVER". Well, it wasn't really. To me, anyway. But then again I still feel burned by the whole "Jill thing". (JP, you bastard.)
I did like this book though. I loved the bad guys in this because as with any True Crime fan, I have a couple of my "faves" that I like to read up on, and Leopold and Loeb just happens to be one of those cases. So when I started reading about these intelligent serial killer students I was excited because I couldn't WAIT for Boxer to catch those bastards. The Leopold and Loeb case is only mentioned VERY briefly by Boxer's boy friend, Joe. So I was a wee bit disappointed in that. But then again, maybe Patterson is all, "People are going to see the similarities in these characters with L&L, so why beat a dead horse?" Speaking of Dead Horse Beating and Joe, WHY THE HELL CAN'T WE JUST HAVE A REGULAR MYSTERY SOLVED AND THEN EVERYONE GETS TO GO HOME HAPPY? No, we've got to have extra bullshit drama. It SLAYS me that Lindsey and Joe FINALLY get to have a REAL relationship, and now? NOW? Lindsey's getting all hot for Conklin? really? Are you serious? I understand being attracted to someone, really I do. That's human nature. But COME the hell ON. For once, ONCE, I'd like to read about a character who ISN'T FORCED TO BE ALL SELF-DESTRUCTIVE IN THE NAME OF UNNECESSARY DRAMA.
5. Mister B. Gone by Clive Barker
I've never read any of Clive Barker's stuff, and I think I've only seen one of his movies. (I've never seen any of the Hellraiser franchise, but I did see the first Candyman movie. It's the only scary movie I've ever watched at an actual "sleepover". Oh, the cliches I've lived. Oh, wait, I just IMDB-ed him and I'll also admit to seeing Lord of Illusions, at the theater no less. My friend Nola had a huge tv crush on Scott Bakula at the time, and that's the ONLY reason we sat through that piece of shit.) Anyway, Barker has written tons of stuff, and I'm always surprised by how much he's written every time I'm putting away books at the library. Still it was never enough for me to want to actually read any of his books.
Then, a couple of weeks ago a patron returned his latest book, Mister B. Gone (and are you also thinking of Mr. B. Natural? because you know I am.) and the patron said that it was SO SCARY that she couldn't read past the first page. Now this patron, she reads a lot. She usually reads only good stuff, and she's made several reccomendations lately all of which have been good. So she says this book is terrifying... I gotta believe her. But I got curious. So I thought I would read the first page to see if it was, in fact, terrifying.
It wasn't. In fact, it was kinda corny. It was insisting that you should burn the book because the evil within the book was so evil that it should be burned immediately without reading the book because EVIL! Like I said, corn. So I read the whole thing because it's not very long and it's easy to read. The narrator is a demon, and he's telling his story and begging you to burn the book to put him out of his misery because he's been bound to the book. It's a neat idea, but the parts (and there are MANY) where he pauses to beg/insist/threaten you to burn the book become SO TIRESOME AND BORING that it kinda ruins the book. Really.
I did like the book though. I really liked the story. I just wish there had been more time spent on the story instead of all those pleas and threats to burn the book. Do you see how annoying it is for me to keep mentioning that the demon wants you to burn the book? Yeah, well multiply that times 20 and that's what it's like to read the book. Like I say, the story is great. It's about this demon and the invention of well, the invention that will bring about the End of the World. I don't want to give too much away because even though I could see what was coming I was happy about the invention and the story. Seriously, I LOVED the story.
It never got scary, and I told the patron that she should give it another go, because I don't think she'd get scared reading it. Annoyed maybe, but scared? Nah.
January
4. The Partly Cloudy Patriot by Sarah Vowell
Ah, the first nonfiction of the year.
I have a feeling that this will influence the rest of the nonfiction I read this year... or at least the next 6 months. Ms. Vowell is a fan of American history. I've never really been a big fan and in fact, in college I took the least amount of American History allowed and then proceeded to take class after class of British history to the point of the professor asking me if I was a history major. Of course I wasn't. I was just a nerd in history nerd heaven.
I think the reason I'm not fond of my own country's history is that I feel the need to apologize to the world for our history. I feel guilty about it. But I shouldn't. My family wasn't a wealthy land-owning family with slaves. I come from poor people, like, Pennsylvania Dutch and all that. What shame should I have? I dunno, still American history always leaves a bad taste in my mouth. But after reading this book I feel like I should get reacquainted with my country's history. And actually I started doing that earlier in the month when I was going through the old local newspaper clippings, and reading up on the women's suffrage movement. And when I think of Women's Rights I never think about it being American history, but I guess really, it totally is.
Anyway, this is a neat book, and it's short and sweet.
3. Blood Dreams by Kay Hooper
Okay, we all know I'm a sucker for Hooper's SCU/Bishop series. And I was SO EXCITED when I found out a new one was coming out. This one, however, was SO DISAPPOINTING. And sure it's the same formulaic doodah that she always writes: Psychic investigator needs to solve a mystery and fall in love BOTH AT THE SAME TIME. But this time it's like she didn't even try to make the love story interesting NOR the solving of the crime. The love story was all, "Why did you leave for ten years?"
"I just left. I had things..."
"Why did you come back?"
"my sister needed me."
"Was that the only reason?"
"I don't...Look, I'm busy trying to solve a crime."
"So am I. Let me help you with your psychic dreams...like how we used to do."
"No! It's too dangerous! I've gotta go."
And on and on over and over. and the crime solving was also more of the same,
"Have we solved the crime yet?"
"No, we need more clues. Anyone?"
"We'll have to wait for him to slip up and make a mistake."
"There's been another murder."
"Let's investigate."
"Any of you psychics getting anything? no? Then I guess we could sit around and talk about how we haven't got any clues and how we'll have to wait for him to make a mistake."
This book ended in such a way that really it wasn't an ending and she's leaving it WAY THE HELL open I guess for the next book. Which I say I won't read, but you know I totally will. But if it sucks like this one I will swear off her books for good just like I did with Cornwell's Scarpetta series back in 2005.
2. The Cove by Catherine Coulter
I needed to start a new series and this was recommended by my library pal, Jan. This is the first book in Ms. Coulter's FBI Thriller series. The only thing I'm a little leary of is that Ms. Coulter's other books are romances. And I'm not talking mere love stories here. I'm talking about books with titles like The Countess, The Wild Baron, and The Wyndham Legacycomplete with terrible cover art. I know, don't judge a book by it's terrible cover art and all.
(I know I'm spoiled with good design because I know LBC and she's so great at it that it's just not even fair to the rest of the world. And when I see shitty book covers (daily at the 'brary) I get so mad at the injustice of it (even if it's probably a shitty book too) because still, someone wrote that book. They took time to write it. They probably even love the characters they created. That book they've written...it's like a part of them that they're giving to the rest of the world. And then some publishing company puts a cheap, shitty cover on it. I wonder if the authors ever get a choice. and if they do... then imagine all the shit they turn down! And I think, "Damn, do NONE of these authors have a pal like LBC?" It's sad for them and it's sad for us; for until they do get their own LBC we're all stuck with the shitty cover art with the raised metallic letters. feh)
This book wasn't much of an "FBI Thriller" as it was an Action Love Story. It was about a lady who's blamed for killing her horrible, abusive father. She's "on the lam" as they say, and the FBI is after her as is a doctor from a mental institution that she escaped from. She wasn't really crazy...they just...try to make her think she's crazy. She runs off and ends up in Oregon (I think) at her aunt's house in The Cove which is a creepy little town where everything is picture-perfect.
The Handsome FBI Agent finds her in The Cove and immediately he's all, "Don't worry I believe you You didn't kill anyone No you aren't crazy I love you." And then the action follows all, "My dead father called me on the phone! I'm not crazy!" and people in The Cove start dying. There's a lot of junk that goes on in this book and it really got redundant. It should have been about 75 to 100 pages less than it was. I'm going to try the other books in the series because Jan told me that the first two books are kinda meh, but that it really gets good in the third one. This one gets 4 Cansecos.
1. Gone, Baby, Gone by Dennis Lehane
This is the first Dennis Lehane book I've read, and I think I'll read a couple more. The main characters in this book are two P.I.s a male and female. Apparently in the book before this one they "hooked up" as they say. So I was a little behind in parts because they would talk about a murder that had happened in the first book. I'm not sure what the first book is called. I'll find out at the library.
This was a really good book though. Even if I was missing some of the stuff because I hadn't read the previous one. It's about a little girl who is kidnapped, and about the P.I.s and cops who try to find her. It's a very good whodunit. You won't guess who did it. I didn't, anyway. But maybe you're smarter than me. Of course you are.
Anyway, it's a page turner, and I thought the ending was well done. It's a happy ending, but it's not a happy ending. I would recommend this to anyone who likes mysteries.
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