Challenge Complete: The Eclectic Reader

January 1, 2015 – December 31, 2015

I first joined Book'd Out for the The Eclectic Reader Challenge for the 2014 round, but this is the fourth year for this comfort-zone challenging reader event. The goal is to push us out of that comfort zone by reading up to 12 books during the year from 12 different categories. I have now completed the twelve categories. See below for my full reading list.

1. Retellings (of fairytales, legends, or myths): Briar Rose by Jane Yolen [Sleeping Beauty] (9/14/15)
2. Set in a country that begins with "S" (Spain, Sweden, etc.): The Abominable Man by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö [Sweden] (5/29/15)
3. PI Crime (featuring a private investigator): Call for Michael Shayne by Brett Halliday (4/22/15)
4. Published before you were born (1969 for me): The Golden Slipper & Other Problems for Violet Strange by Anna Katharine Green [1915] (1/26/15)
5. Contemporary Romance: Major Pettigrew's Last Stand by Helen Simonson (11/4/15)
6. Fiction for Foodies: Death Dines Out by Theodora Du Bois [death by limes!] (9/30/15)
7. Microhistory (nonfiction): The Poisoner's Handbook by Deborah Blum (3/22/15)
8. Science Fiction (set in space): The Mote in God's Eye by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle (4/12/15)
9. Sports (fiction or nonfiction): The Lack of the Irish by Ralph McInerny [football] (7/11/15)
10. Featuring Diversity: Swing Low, Sweet Harriet by George Baxt [features first gay detective--Pharoah Love--who is also African American] (9/13/15)
11.  Epistolary Fiction: Some of Your Blood by Theodor Sturgeon (2/13/15)
12. Middle Grade/YA Adventure: The Giver by Lois Lowry (9/4/15)

 

Major Pettigrew's Last Stand: Mini-Review

From the back of the book: In the small village of Edgecombe St. Mary in the English countrside lives Major Ernest Pettigrew (retired), the unlikely hero of Helen Simonson's wondrous debut. Wry, courtly, opinionated, and completely endearing, the Major leads a quiet life valuing the proper things that Englishmen have lived by for generations: honor, duty, decorum, and a properly brewed cup of tea. But, then his brother's death sparks an unexpected friendship with Mrs. Jasmina Ali, the Pakistani shopkeeper from the village. Drawn together by their shared love of literature and the loss of their spouses, the Major and Mrs. Ali soon find their friendship blossoming into something more. But, village society insists on embracing him as the quintessential local and regarding her as the permanent foreigner. Can their relationship survive the risks one takes when pursuing happiness in the face of culture and tradition?

Helen Simonson's debut novel is about much more than just the love story between a widower and a widow. When Major Pettigrew's brother dies, he begins a journey of discovery about himself. He fears that his son and the younger generation are waiting impatiently to elbow him aside. But he discovers that he's not an old dog past his best days--witness his romance with Mrs. Ali and his ability to rescue a man bent on suicide. But he also discovers that he has harbored bitterness since his father's death--over a set of matched shooting rifles--and that his life will improve if can just let that bitterness go. He discovers that he has courage beyond that required of him when he was in the service--the courage to face his neighbors and his family to claim happiness in his twilight years.

Major Pettigrew's Last Stand is a compelling story that reminds us that it's never too late for love nor is it ever too late to learn and change and grow as a person. ★★★ and a half.

Death Dines Out: Review

Death Dines Out by Theodora Du Bois (1939) features medical investigator Jeffrey McNeill and is narrated by his lovely young wife Anne. Jeffrey and Anne are invited to a dinner party at the home of one of their wealthy neighbors, Clancy Harrison. All the ingredients for a lovely evening are on hand--from the usually delightful guests to the fine food and drink always found a party planned by Clancy's wife Mary. But tension rather than laughter fills the air around the table. Earlier that day, Harrison had words with his nephew and his nephew's fiancee regarding the former's failure of an important medical exam. Harrison has threatened to cut off his nephew's allowance--which would force Bill Frick to leave medical school. Anne is also the focus of negative emotions. David Proust has been flirting with and openly pursuing her and David's wife Nona believes Anne to be seducing her husband.

When Anne is stricken with odd breathing and muscular symptoms during dinner--resulting in a need for her husband's professional skills--and then when that excitement dies down their host is found dead beneath the dining room table, it is unclear if Anne or Clancy was the intended target. The police are ready to fasten on Bill and/or Jane-Lee (fiancee), especially when they learn that Harrison had talked of changing his will to cut his nephew out. Anne is quite sure that their young friends are innocent and Jeffrey will have to use all his investigative skills to find the clues that will prove whether she's right.

Jeffrey is a very active medical investigator. Not only does he doing the scientific bits to narrow down the cause of Anne's symptom's and Harrison's death, but he also dons a disguise so he can make off with the garbage cans of various suspects. He roots around through garbage heaps, catches frogs to use as guinea pigs, and interviews possible murders. 

It took me a while to warm up to Jeffrey and Anne. In the beginning chapter, he seems very dismissive towards her--even chastising her over burnt toast--and Anne seems more than unusually scatterbrained. But as the story progresses their relationship settles down to one of affection and verbal banter. This isn't the first of the McNeill series, but that false-start makes it seem like it.

However, the mystery itself is a good one. Clues are laid on early and the astute reader has ample opportunity to figure out the killer even before Jeffrey does. I managed the who and how, but the clues as to motive managed to slide by me and kept me wondering until the end. Overall, a very solid and enjoyable read. ★★★ and a half.

For more information on Theodora Du Bois and her series, please check out The Passing Tramp for a guest post by Lisa Kucharski. Lisa has done her detective work and provides a good summary of Du Bois and her work.

Briar Rose: Review

Briar Rose by Jane Yolen is dark re-telling of the story of Sleeping Beauty. Ever since she can remember, Rebecca Berlin's grandma--called Gemma because one of Becca's sister's couldn't say "grandma"--has told her family the story of Sleeping Beauty. But Gemma's version is much darker than the standard versions with no one but Briar Rose waking from the hundred year's sleep and several of Becca's friends no longer want to hear it when they all are young. But Becca always loved the story and Gemma always told her that she was the only one who understood.

So it's no surprise that when Gemma is close to death she makes Becca promise to find her castle and her prince. And then, once she is gone, the family finds a box of papers, photographs, and odd keepsakes among Gemma's things. The more Becca digs into the materials the more she realizes how little they knew about the woman they called Gemma. And the more connections she makes between what she learns and the Briar Rose story her grandma used to tell. She works through the story with Stan, a friend and fellow journalist, until it becomes clear that she will have to make a trip to Poland to make sense of the clues she's found. The clues lead her to one of the horrific extermination camps of the Holocaust. Chelmo--a place of which it is said no woman ever made it out alive.

This was a reread for me. I first read it back at the end of high school when I had recently discovered Jane Yolen. I thought it a terrific and haunting use of the classic fairy tale to represent one woman's negotiation of the terrible experiences she endured during the Holocaust. By masking the events in a fairy tale she told to her daughter and then to her daughter's daughters, by using this particular story to entertain children she was able to bring joy out darkness. She was able to emphasize the very specific happy ending--hers with her family in America--that came out of all grief and loss of the second World War. As the dust jacket flap tells us: "This is a tale of life and death, of love and hate, despair and faith. A tale of castles and thorns and sharp barbed wire." It is a tale of a beautiful princess saved by one brave prince and loved by another even braver and the way love can grow out of the harshest, thorniest soil. I gave it ★★★★★ in high school. I have no changes to make in that rating now. 

Swing Low, Sweet Harriet: Review

Swing Low, Sweet Harriet (1967) is the second entry in George Baxt's series with Pharoah Love and Seth Piro. It's an over-the-top, campy detective novel based in the world of former vaudevillians, long-forgotten silent film stars, and over-the-hill 30s-era musical crooners and hoofers. The cast of crazies includes Sam Wyndham--former cameraman and current chief of a Film Society hosting a memorial to the era, Sweet Harriet Dimple, Flora and Fauna--the Fleur Sisters, Madeleine Cartier, and "Miss Breast Stroke of 1928" Zelma Wave. All of these beauties from the past are hoping for a comeback in the 1960s film and/or television world, but the stars seem to be aligned against them.

The sordid past keeps popping up to haunt them--all of the ladies were involved in the old unsolved murder of their producer and famous movie mogul Barclay Mill. That old scandal comes up when Seth is hired by Madeleine to ghost write her autobiography. It comes up again when Peter and Robert, the Adonis-like twin true crime writers from the West Coast, come to research the crime and, incidentally, look into their ancestry which appears to be related to the case as well. But somebody killed Barclay Mill back in 1932 and they're willing to kill again to keep the secrets buried.

Pharoah Love is the most annoying detective ever. Sure, he's an important figure on the detective fiction landscape--not just the first gay detective, but a gay African American detective. But my opinion of him has nothing to do with his sexual preferences. I don't care if he likes men or women or both or aliens from another planet or all of them in one grand orgy--why can't the man say one complete sentence without using "cat"??!! Everybody, absolutely everybody is a "cat"--"Seth cat," "detective cat," "murderer cat," strangler cat," "twin cats," "baby cat," and so on ad nauseum. Seriously--I'm a barely from the 60s girl (1969 model)--did people really talk this way? All. The. Time? 

And, honestly, I don't see that he does much in the way of detecting here. Most of what he accomplishes is off-stage. He contacts his pals in various places for the low-down on various characters and that's about it. Seth does most of the "detecting" through virtue of his interviews for the book he's supposed to be writing.

Primarily what we have here is a great big, chaotic, campy mess. Lots of big spectacle--which I suppose is a nice send-up of the Busby-era musical spectaculars--but not much in the way of detective entertainment. We have Sweet Harriet (who's most definitely NOT, by the way and that's no spoiler--you know that from the moment you meet her)...anyway, as I was saying: We have Sweet Harriet tap dancing her way down the streets of New York and in and out of all kinds of places. We have out-of-date stars running around in out-of-date glamorous outfits demanding that everyone give them the recognition they're due. We have these luscious ladies of the cinema getting thoroughly hammered and screeching at each other in public places or trying to throttle Pharoah or yelling at the top of their lungs in their hotel rooms at people who aren't there. We have the mystery "child" with the annoying speech impediment (which serves no plot purpose that I can see...it's there purely for annoyance value). And, of course, we have Pharaoh (see paragraph above).

"Get them inside," the attorney pleaded with the policewomen. "It's turning into a three-ring circus."

If anyone has reached this point of the novel (next to last page) and hasn't already felt like they were in the middle of the third ring, then they haven't been paying sufficient attention. It's a three-ring circus that's missing its ring master. That's what it is.

Of course, there are those who disagree with me, so your mileage may vary. The book has an average rating of 3.86 stars on Goodreads and I found this bit in The Independent's obituary for George Baxt back in 2013:

[on A Queer Kind of Death] The book was instantly acclaimed. "I didn't know how outrageous that book was. It really shocked the pants off everyone," Baxt said. The second book featuring Pharoah Love, Swing Low, Sweet Harriet (1967), was considered even better, with Busby Berkeley musicals among the targets of the author's satire. 

Personally, I give it ★ and a half--rounded to 2 stars on Goodreads. The very best part of this book from my point of view? The cover with art by Nicky Zann--it was one of the primary reasons I picked this book up at the Red Cross Book Fair last year.

The Giver: Review

One of my reading challenges requires that we read a book that we were supposed to read in high school, but didn't. I'm afraid that I was one of those goody-two-shoes, nerdy book-lovers who read all the books I was supposed to in high school. Even when I was hating it (Moby Dick...I'm looking at you). So, instead, I chose a book that has often been assigned in the local high schools that I've never read--The Giver by Lois Lowry.

Lowry's story follows Jonas as he attends the annual Ceremony when children who are twelve (and now adults!) find out what their life's work assignment will be. His friends receive such familiar assignments as Caretaker for the Old and Assistant Director of Recreation and Instructor of Sixes. But Jonas is skipped and his assignment is saved for the very end because his assignment is out of the ordinary. He has been chosen to be the new Receiver--the Elder who holds all of the memories for the community. This is Jonas's journey--to experience every memory from the times before and the times before that and to learn the wisdom of memory which will help him guide his community. But Jonas will also discover the darker side of the community that has seemed to be so peaceful.

"The life where nothing was ever unexpected. Or inconvenient. Or unusual. The life without color, pain or past."

The Giver presents what at first seems to be a perfect, Utopian society. There is no disease, no war, no poverty, no overpopulation. But it is also a society under strict regulation. The community is governed by The Elders who decide everything for the settlement--everything from names to life partners to the jobs assigned. There are strict rules for interaction with others and the worst offense seems to be rudeness--which covers such things as being late, expressing inappropriate emotion, and using imprecise language. All people look the same--no, they're not clones, but everybody has the same "color" eyes, the same "color" hair and they wear the same "color" clothes. I use quotation marks because I''m not sure you can say they have "color" in a society that has no concept of what color means. I'm not quite sure how the world of the Giver looks--but I imagine it as a world of black and white. Very bland.

Behind the perfect, safe facade, their lurks a different kind of evil, however. There is the whole concept of being released. Everyone has been taught that those who are released--whether that is the child who doesn't quite fit in or the person who repeatedly breaks the rules or the older person who no longer can be cared for...those people are sent to Elsewhere. It all sounds so gentle and innocuous. But Jonas, our hero, soon learns that being "released" isn't the pleasant journey he has always imagined. 

“The community of the Giver had achieved at such great price. A community without danger or pain. But also, a community without music, color or art. And books.” 

The Giver shows us what the possible costs of Utopia could be. It may be possible to get rid of war and conflict, pain and sorrow. But would that world be worth it if we also gave up joy and love and the power of choice? Humans may not always make the right choices--in fact, it seems like we don't quite a lot of the time, but would we really want to give up our freedoms and individuality in exchange for safety and a "perfect" world?

Since this book was published in 1993, it has been one of the most controversial books in U. S schools. The most common reason that parents want it pulled from reading lists and libraries is not language or violence or sex--it is because it is deemed "inappropriate for the age group". In other words, not suitable for children. Certainly there are concepts which might disturb certain children, but I think we are becoming a society which is inordinately afraid of allowing ourselves to face difficult subjects. Colleges--the very institutions that are supposed to produce critical thinkers--are being asked to provide "trigger warning" because (gasp!) there might be subject matter that will offend or disturb. How very appropriate that this book is about a world where everything that might offend or disturb or cause conflict has been removed from society.  I don't think I'd want to live in the world of The Giver--that's why it's important to read about what those worlds are like so we can attempt to make our world a better place.   

★★★★ for a thought-provoking read. The ending is a bit ambiguous--firming that up and a bit more character development would have earned it a full five stars.

The Lack of the Irish: Review

The University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana is gearing up for a highly anticipated football game. Baylor University, the country's preeminent Protestant college, will meet the Catholic football powerhouse for the first time. Game day, most ironically, falls on Reformation Day--the day recognizing the historic moment when Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the door of the Schlosskirche (castle church) in Wittenberg in 1517.  Off the field, scholars prepare a theological conference featuring participants from the rival schools that will address Catholic and Protestant history. And a female pastor (who seems to be a bit of a loose cannon) plans to protest the game as some sort of statement about Protestantism's superiority over Catholicism. She hopes to stir up a religious fervor to eclipse the football fanaticism. 

Sparks seem to be flying everywhere. Even the campus event coordinator is stirring up trouble--she seems to believe it her duty to throw as many obstacles in the path of conference directors as possible. When she is found strangled shortly before the big day, there seems to be no shortage of candidates for the role of murderer. Roger (a professor) and Philip (a private eye) Knight use their various skills to help search for the killer. But there are no definite clues until Notre Dame's famed, brilliant, and troubled quarterback mysteriously disappears and evidence links him to the crime. But did he do it....or does he just know who did? 

The Lack of the Irish is a fairly solid mystery offering from the late Ralph McInerny. Very light, cozy feel with the academic setting and most of the mystery-solving provided by the professor half of the brothers Knight rather than the private eye. Interesting characters and a realistic motive for the culprit. Not really in the fair-play tradition...either that or I was asleep at the wheel when it came to noticing clues, but it was a fun, quick read and I do enjoy Professor Knight and his brother.  ★★★

The Abominable Man: Review

The Abominable Man (1971) is the seventh novel in the Martin Beck mystery series by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö. It shows Beck facing one of the greatest challenges in his career--challenges calling for quick detective work and professional challenges when his investigation reveals evidence of corruption all the way through some of the highest levels of the force. 

It all begins with the horrific murder of a chief inspector in his hospital room--murdered by bayonet. And it soon becomes apparent that the person responsible has a personal hatred of not only Chief Inspector Nyman but the police in general. As Beck and his team work against the clock to find the madman before he can drastically reduce the number of officers on the force, they find a link to Nyman's reputation for brutal, strong-arm police tactics. Tactics he perfected as a sadistic instructor in the armed forces and used over a forty-year career. Could the madman be someone falsely arrested and abused while in custody? Or perhaps he's a rogue cop who suffered under a harsh Inspector and is looking for revenge. 

Beck and his colleagues finally run the culprit to earth, but the final stand-off with an expert marksman will raise the police body count to at least five and Beck will have to resort to a drastic plan in order to stop the killer before he can claim more lives. The man will be caught--but at what cost? And how much blame rests with a police force which harbored corrupt officers and turned a blind eye to reports of misconduct?

This installment of the Beck series is a hard-hitting novel on a number of levels. It opens with Nyman's very brutal death, but soon turns into a commentary on the method of police work that had its roots in a sadistic drill-sergeant style of instruction and enforcement. Although the reader can't condone the murders, one can still understand the motive. When those who are called upon to serve and protect cause so much harm in one person's life, it isn't hard to understand when that person reaches the end of their endurance. 

Definitely not a puzzle mystery and not entirely a police procedural--although we do watch Beck and his men hard at work gathering the evidence and searching the records for clues to the killer's identity. This works best as a social commentary on the state of the police force in the early 1970s and makes for an absorbing read. But it is also an action-packed police drama--moving quickly from the first murder to the final scene. Sjöwall and Wahlöö are experts at setting the scene and placing the reader right in the middle of the action. ★★★★ for a perfectly paced, police thriller.

This fulfills the "Set Anywhere But US/England" square on the Silver Vintage Bingo card.

Call for Michael Shayne: Review

On the night of June 8, Arthur Devlin, a quiet and unassuming insurance man, went to a bon voyage party. His bon voyage party--as he prepared to leave on a two-week Caribbean cruise. A number of his friends got together to wish him well and to drink to his health and good travels. They all had a great many drinks. When Art wakes up on the morning of June 20th, he finds himself in a room he has never seen before, in a set of clothes that he would never have picked out for himself, and no memory whatsoever of the past twelve days. Further investigation reveals a beauty of a goose egg on his head.

As he tries to gather his thoughts and sort out his last memory (that would be of the party), he notices another man in the room. But he can't ask him any questions....because that man is quite dead. With blood on his unfamiliar clothes and a blackjack nearby, it looks like Art may have lost control as well as his memory. Then there's the strange woman named Marge who calls the room, addresses him as "Joey, Darling," and wants to know if he got the money off of "that louse, Skid." When Art hesitates over his answers, she asks, "Did you kill him?" Well, that's what he wants to know.

He gets out of the hotel as quick as he can and heads home. He calls up his friend and doctor to come help him--hoping that if he really did kill a man during his black-out period that he won't be held responsible for what he did during a bout of amnesia. Dr. Thompson, while he wants to believe his friend, can't quite make his knowledge of amnesia fit the story Art has to tell. He suggest that Art go away for a bit and let it all blow over--after all who would connect a mild-mannered insurance man with a murder in that dive of a hotel? But Art is determined to get to the bottom of it all. He remembers a red-headed private detective who once said, "Murder is my business" and asks Mike Shayne to find out what really happened during those twelve days. But will he like what Shayne discovers?

Call for Michael Shayne is another trip into the private eye world for me. I don't make these trips often, but the Shayne series by Brett Halliday is always enjoyable. This was another fun romp and it's always good to watch Shayne one-up that annoying Miami Beach Chief of Police, Peter Painter. You'd think that Painter would learn that Shayne generally delivers the goods--and it's never the solution that the Chief has selected. This is a fast-paced story that I easily finished in a couple of hours. Halliday's descriptions of the Miami area are deft and transport the reader direct from 2015 to the beach city of the late 1940s/early 50s. My one disappointment with the book was that I spotted the main villain right off--others with a fair amount of detective fiction under their belt will probably do so as well. But Halliday had a second surprise lined up that made the ride worthwhile.  ★★★ for a solid afternoon's entertainment.

First published in 1949, this fulfills the "Author with same first or last initial as you" (or in this case both initials) square on the Golden Vintage Bingo card.

The Mote in God's Eye: Review

The Mote in God's Eye by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle has been on my personal Mount TBR for almost twenty years. Back in the days when I was all about SF, my BFF sent me the sequel (The Gripping Hand) for my birthday and I hurried out and supplied myself with the first book. And then never got around to reading them. Till now. I've mentioned this a few times here on the Block....I really believe that for some books there is a window of opportunity for optimum reading moment. I must have passed it for Mote. Robert Heinlein called Mote "possibly the finest science fiction [he had] ever read." At the moment, I just can't see it.

Niven & Pournelle started with a tremendous idea: Mankind's first contact with an alien species. They then promptly take that idea and bloat it into a long, drawn-out story (nearly 500 pages!) of build-up to a "secret" that the aliens are hiding from the humans....that anyone who has paid any attention at all to the construction of Motie society should have been able to figure out shortly after second contact. Let me explain that...

So...Captain Roderick Blaine of the spaceship MacArthur (of the Empire of Man's Imperial Navy) has just rescued a Senator's daughter cum anthropologist and picked up a greedy trader from the recently retaken planet New Chicago. Sally Fowler is an honored guest; the trader is a "guest" retained at the Emperor's pleasure. On their way back to civilization, they run into an alien probe ship from the Coalsack Nebula. The view of the area from nearby Imperial colonies makes the nebula look like a hooded man with red giant star for an eye and and a yellow dwarf star embedded in it (like a "mote" in the eye of God). The encounter ends with an adult Motie and two "miniatures" taken aboard the MacArthur and the alien probe ship apparently sent by the Motie on auto-pilot for a return trip home.

The humans face a dilemma--will the Moties interpret the incident as an attack? Will mankind be able to send a diplomatic group out the Mote to make peaceful contact with the aliens? The rest of the book revolves around that mission. When the MacArthur (and accompanying warship Lenin) finally do make real contact (the second contact mentioned above), they discover that Motie society is divided into very strict castes: Mediators, Masters, Engineers, etc. Each caste has been adapted to its particularly task--Engineers don't have wasted brain space for speech. They spend their lives taking equipment apart and putting it back together (in better form) OR changing it entirely into something new. Mediators are supremely adapted for speaking and resolving conflicts among castes and helping all castes to work together for the race's good. And so on.

As mentioned, the authors had a great idea. They came up with a pretty interesting alien race. But the human characters that they sent on the mission weren't that interesting at all. Very flat, very stereotypical: the macho, hero-type Captain; the damsel-in-distress, rescued by said hero--supposedly an intelligent anthropologist and yet falls for the hero with very little cause [he barely speaks to her throughout the whole book]; the Scottish engineer [yes, really]; the blind-to-all-danger chief scientist; and so on. Niven & Pournelle then took these stock characters and sent them through a very bloated build-up to the real action--meeting the Motie society in the second encounter. Honestly--it took for-freaking-ever to get to that point. Slow-moving story plus stock characters plus enough scientific jargon to make the average reader's eyes cross. And I say this as a SF-lover and as someone who has read Robert Forward's very hard science fiction (Dragon's Egg and Starquake) and loved them. I had to gloss over huge chunks in order to move on.  The final problem was the aliens' "secret." As noted, it wasn't. Surely to goodness one of those bright humans should have picked up on it before the final scenes. Making that "secret" the entire crux of the matter made for a pretty flat finale. 

Kudos to Niven and Pournelle for building an interesting alien race. I wish the story would have taken us to them more quickly and given us more time to learn about them. Less time on the MacArthur would have managed that quite nicely. I agree that the work is ground-breaking in its take on first contact and give Niven and Pournelle all three stars for that. Better human characters and plot pacing would have garnered more. ★★★

[And...apologies to Paula, I don't think I'll be going on to The Gripping Hand.]

The Poisoner's Handbook

Contrary to expectations from the title, this is not a how-to book on the disposal of all those extra, annoying, moneyed people (who have willed you their goodies) in your life. The Poisoner's Handbook: Murder & the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York by Deborah Blum is a detailed examination of the development of forensic science and the growing importance of the chief medical examiner in the early twentieth century. Until Charles Norris took over the position, corruption ran rampant in the coroner's offices--obvious violent deaths were often written up as "heart failure" or "natural causes" or even multiple choice causes of death such as death due to "either assault or diabetes" or "diabetes, tuberculosis or nervous indigestion." Norris, with the help of toxicologist Alexander Gettler, set about cleaning up New York's forensic examination system as well as making trailblazing discoveries within the science itself--from the development of a new scale to determine alcoholic intoxication (based on brain saturation) to more and more precise tests for various poisons in the body. Gettler very often had to create a test where none existed before.

The basic premise is a very interesting one. The book is divided up into chapters based on various poisons with each poison characterized through a newsworthy event featuring the potent substance. Not limited to murders--though there are plenty of those here--we also have the systemic poisoning of the drinking crowd of the Roaring Twenties (and 30s) by none other than the government Prohibition enforcers. Prohibition did nothing to make "moral" men and women out of persistent tipplers. Those who craved the buzz of alcohol were willing to drink absolutely anything--no matter what toxic substance the regulators insisted be added to any liquid containing alcohol. Bootleggers made their money out of people who were quite literally dying for drinks. Also included is the famous case of the "Radium Girls"--women who earned their living painting watch dials with luminous paint containing radium. Women who began dying because they sharpened the points of their brushes with their tongues.

The stories of murder and other deaths by poison were intriguing. My main complaint about the book is that there are only so many times I needed to be told how Gettler ran his tests. Once you've read about how he gathered up all the major organs in the body, pulverized bits of them in various substances, and distilled the resulting ooze in order to measure the amount of thallium, arsenic, cyanide, [insert your favorite poison here], you really don't need to be told the process again. Honest, I'm not the most scientific person in the world, but I got it the first time. It would have been far more interesting to have had greater detail on each of the cases and about the relationship between Norris and Gettler...and they with with their forensic team than to have spent so much of the book on chemistry lectures. At ★★★ and a half, it is still a fascinating book. It revealed a lot of details about the effects of Prohibition that I had not previously heard.

Some of Your Blood: Review

Anthony Boucher says (on the front cover of my edition): "...his first straight crime novel. Plausible and fascinating...one of the season's most absorbing."

I hate to disagree with Anthony Boucher, but a straight crime novel is not how I would describe Theodore Sturgeon's Some of Your Blood. Is there crime in it? Sure--although you won't really know it until the end. But there is nothing "straight" about this twisted story of the sociopathic psyche of "George Smith." This book really lives in that borderland of psychological horror.

Told in epistolary fashion--through letters between two Army psychiatrists, the written life story of "George," and written reports of testing and sessions with this troubled man--Some of Your Blood reveals the disturbing story of a young man raised in a rural community. The son of the town drunk, George receives little education and less affection at home. He must survive days without food and he seeks solace in the woods in order to escape the beatings that will come whenever his father is drunk. During his time in the woods, he teaches himself to hunt all sorts of animals. When he's older, he resorts to stealing food from a local store (with a conveniently easy to open basement door) to make sure they have something to eat. But it isn't long before he's caught and sent to a troubled children's home--more like an orphanage than a prison.

Amazingly enough, George enjoys his time in the children's home--he has a clean bed, a small space to call his own, three meals a day, and instructors who care enough to fill in his spotty education. When both his mother and father die, his aunt (his mother's sister) comes to ask him to live with her and his uncle. He has some difficulties with his uncle and once again takes to the woods and hunting and one day he meets Anna, an equally unloved and lonely neighbor. They become close and he eventually makes her pregnant....and he decides to enlist in the Army. With its regulated ways, the Army makes him feel as safe as he did at the children's home. Until the day he has to help unload a plane of wounded and dying soldiers. He can't run to the woods this time. So, instead, he writes a letter to Anna which upsets the censors when they get hold of it. The censors give it to his commanding officer, who in turn questions George about it. He attacks the man and is sent home to a psychiatric hospital....that's where our story begins and ends.

Phil Outerbridge, the doctor in charge of his case, asks George to write out his life story. The details George gives him makes Dr. Phil sure that there is an underlying secret that has driven George's behavior. The rest of the book is spent in the doctor's efforts to discover the secret and to decide  how best to treat his patient.

This is a very shocking, very disturbing novel. There is one portion of the Boucher quote that I agree with--this is a very plausible story of a damaged man. It is all too easy to imagine the circumstances which could have resulted in this man and his story. It doesn't stretch the imagination too much to understand how a man who grew up in the environment presented us could have behaved in the ways in which George did. The lack of real human contact and the lack of love and compassion can be very damaging, and it certainly has damaged George Smith.

The book ends with the narrator turning to us, the readers, and asking us how we would like it end. Shall we end it compassionately--allowing George to receive successful treatment and be sent home to find some happiness with his Anna? Or is George's condition too far gone and the treatment will fail? Sturgeon makes us confront (within ourselves and through our power to choose George's fate) the very issues that have laid the foundation of George's psyche.  ★★★ and a half (rounded to four on Goodreads).

The Golden Slipper & Other Problems for Violet Strange: Review

The Golden Slipper & Other Problems for Violet Strange (1915) is a collection of stories by Anna Katharine Green featuring an early edition of that familiar figure, the "girl detective." Violet Strange is a pretty young debutante with a wealthy father and the spare time to secretly investigate various matters within her social sphere. As becomes a young lady of her station, she is almost always pulled reluctantly into the situation--particularly if there is any bloodshed or violence involved. But the man who introduces her to these problems manages to appeal to her sense of justice and sympathetic interest...or to her need of money. He's not entirely sure why she, a child of fortune, should desire money enough to take on "uncongenial work," but I suspect it is because she wants a sense of independence that having access to your own funds gives. She is free to spend it on what she likes--or to use it support just causes if that is her wont.

I found myself liking the stories which were primarily pure puzzle far more than those with a Gothic or highly emotional bent ("The House of Clocks" and the second half of "Missing: Page Thirteen") and the ones where Miss Strange was less centrally involved were also less satisfying. Overall, a good collection of stories from the early 20th and a nice peek at an early female detective. ★★★  and 1/2.

A Brief Synopsis of Each "Problem":

"The Golden Slipper"  Miss Strange proves who is behind a series of high society thefts.  It would seem to be one of group of friends known as "The Inseparables"--with suspicion focused on one of the young ladies in particular.  Miss Strange uses her own jewels as bait to catch a sneak thief.

"The Second Bullet" In this story, Miss Strange sets out to discover proof of a second bullet--proof that will remove the stigma of suicide from a man's death and allow his widow to collect much needed insurance money.

"An Intangible Clue" This story involves Miss Strange in a "sordid" murder case--something she never intended to be part of.  But...without her observations in the needlewoman's home, the perpetrator would never have been caught.

"The Grotto Spectre" Miss Strange is called upon by a man who once represented one of society's grand families and who is now shunned because of his ill-chosen marriage (to a woman who led him into the clutches of gambling) and the rumors that he caused her death (though cleared at the inquest). He, however, suspects that his father may be responsible and asks Miss Strange to settle his suspicions once and for all.

"The Dreaming Lady" This time Miss Strange stipulates that her next case must not contain any kind of horror or death. Her conditions are met when Mrs. Quintard, sister of a well-known financier, is in desperate need of someone to find a missing will.

"The House of Clocks" A strange (no pun intended) Gothic piece. There really isn't much of puzzle for Miss Strange to unravel. It is all told to her by the faithful servant of an evil step-mother....


"The Doctor, His Wife, and the Clock" Miss Strange is given a bundle of papers describing an unsolved murder from before her interest in puzzles began. Her job? To find an entry to the home of a doctor who had lived beside the murdered man. Her real involvement in the resolution? Minimal--it is her employer who really solve this one. It would seem that Miss Strange's career as a sleuth is petering out....

"Missing: Page Thirteen" Miss Strange decides to take just one more case--at the instigation of Robert Upjohn (the man involved in the "Grotto" mystery). This time, she is busy tracking down a missing scientific formula relating to explosives [aren't they always?]. She quickly solves the mystery of the missing page and is then made privy to another, older secret.

"Violet's Own" This is not really a problem--except that it is Violet Strange's telling of the initial problem that set her on her course for earning money as an investigator. And it proved my thoughts on her motives to be right--she did, indeed, want money (not of her father) that she could spend as she chose.


This counts for the "Have to Borrow" square on the Golden Vintage Bingo card [read from Project Gutenberg]. I am also offering it up as an entry for Rich Westwood's monthly challenge. Each month he posts a publication date for review entries at his Past Offences blog--January's date is 1915.

 

The Eclectic Reader Challenge

January 1, 2015 – December 31, 2015

I first joined Book'd Out for the The Eclectic Reader Challenge last year, but this is the fourth year for this comfort-zone challenging reader event. The goal is to push us out of that comfort zone by reading up to 12 books during the year from 12 different categories. For full details on the challenge and to join up, click on the Challenge link above.

Here are the categories for 2015 and my tentative book plans for each one:

1. Retellings (of fairytales, legends, or myths): Briar Rose by Jane Yolen [Sleeping Beauty] (9/14/15) 
2. Set in a country that begins with "S" (Spain, Sweden, etc.): The Abominable Man by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö [Sweden] (5/29/15)
3. PI Crime (featuring a private investigator): Call for Michael Shayne by Brett Halliday (4/22/15)
4. Published before you were born (1969 for me): The Golden Slipper & Other Problems for Violet Strange by Anna Katharine Green [1915] (1/26/15)
5. Contemporary Romance: Major Pettigrew's Last Stand by Helen Simonson (11/4/15)
6. Fiction for Foodies: Death Dines Out by Theodora Du Bois [death by limes!] (9/30/15)
7. Microhistory (nonfiction): The Poisoner's Handbook by Deborah Blum (3/22/15)
8. Science Fiction (set in space): The Mote in God's Eye by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle (4/12/15)
9. Sports (fiction or nonfiction): The Lack of the Irish by Ralph McInerny [football] (7/11/15)
10. Featuring Diversity: Swing Low, Sweet Harriet by George Baxt [features first gay detective--Pharoah Love--who is also African American] (9/13/15)
11.  Epistolary Fiction: Some of Your Blood by Theodor Sturgeon (2/13/15)
12. Middle Grade/YA Adventure: The Giver by Lois Lowry (9/4/15)

Challenge Complete: Eclectic Reader

Another Reading Challenge bites the dust. This time it is The Eclectic Reader Challenge hosted by Book'd Out. Her goal was to push us outside our comfort zone by reading up to 12 books during the year from 12 different categories. I just completed my last one [True Crime] and my challenge is complete!

Categories

1. Award Winning: The Laughing Policeman by Maj Sjöwall & Per Wahlöö (6/8/14)
2. True Crime (Non Fiction): American Eve: Evelyn Nesbit, Stanford White The Birth of the 'It' Girl, and the 'Crime of the Century' by Paula Uruburu (11/11/14)
3. Romantic Comedy: Undead & Unpopular by MaryJanice Davidson (6/17/14)
4. Alternate History Fiction: The Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick (2/27/14)
5. Graphic Novel: Harlan Ellison's 7 Against Chaos by Harlan Ellison (3/17/14)
6. Cosy Mystery Fiction: A Tale of Two Biddies by Kylie Logan (3/21/14)
7. Gothic Fiction: A Long Fatal Love Chase by Louisa May Alcott (7/3/14)
8. War/Military Fiction: John Smith: Last Known Survivor of the Microsoft Wars by Roland Hughes (3/17/14)
9. Anthology: Dangerous Visions #3 by Harlan Ellison, ed (1/11/14)
10. Medical Thriller Fiction: 12.21 by Dustin Thomason (6/6/14)
11. Travel (Non Fiction): The Kingdom by the Sea by Paul Theroux (1/20/14)
12. Published in 2014: The Wonder Chamber by Mary Mallory [pub. Jan 2014] (1/15/14) 

American Eve: Review

American Eve: Evelyn Nesbit, Stanford White The Birth of the 'It' Girl, and the 'Crime of the Century' by Paula Uruburu (2008) tells the story of [Florence] Evelyn Nesbit who was a beautiful, popluar chorus girl, artist's model, and budding actress at turn of the century (19th to 20th) whose long-term liaison with renowned architect Stanford White led to her identification as "The Girl on the Red Velvet Swing" as well as her involvement in one of the early 20th Century's most notorious murder trials. She rose from humble beginnings in Philadelphia to a model whose face and figure were used in newspaper and magazine advertisements, on postcards and calendars. Her celebrity hit before she was 18 years old. Once she started in the chorus, she found herself the object of many men's fantasies and the recipient of the attentions of "Stage Door Johnnies." Among her admirers were several millionaires, but she ignored them until Stanford White came along. He showered presents on her and her family and introduced her to a side life she only dreamed of. Then he seduced her. But his support--both financially and in the theatre world continued and she kept in touch with him.

When Harry Kendall Thaw, son of the very wealthy Thaw family of Philadelphia family, became interested in Evelyn, she had no idea that he had another agenda in mind other than making her his own through marriage. He had heard of White's association with her and he hated White with a passion. Thaw had no compunction about using the beautiful young woman to wreak havoc on the evil man he believed White to be. He married Evelyn in April of 1905 and just over a year later he took her to the Madison Square Garden rooftop theatre--the playground of her former lover--and shot White to death. White thought he was a hero for revenging his wife's innocence. Given his treatment of her and his behavior leading up to the murder, I'd say he was a bit crazy.

*************
I have to say that I was disappointed in this. When I was looking for a true crime novel to read to fulfill a couple of challenges, the name Stanford White caught my eye. In 2012, I read a book of White's letters to his family and my comment at the end of that review was that "I think I would have been far more intrigued by one of the books which covered this high-profile murder than I was by the collection of letters." And here one of those books is. And I remain fairly un-intrigued. For all the billing on the cover about the "Crime of the Century"--less than one-third of the book is devoted to writing about the crime, trial, and aftermath (very brief info on the aftermath) combined. The rest of the book takes a very long and rambling (particularly for a non-fiction book) trip through Evelyn's early life and journey to become Thaw's wife. Uruburu is repetitive in descriptions and, most noticeably in the first half, given to writing sentences in which it sounds like she's producing the most adjectives with the most of syllables possible. Throwing $10 words around as my relatives used to say. All to no purpose.  

She gives us a fair overview of the time period and attempts to represent Evelyn as a young woman misrepresented by history. But she never made Evelyn a real person to me and she never made me really care about her story. I was horrified by what she went through--but horrified on principal and because the events were, indeed, horrifying. Not because I made any real connection with Evelyn Nesbit as a person. ★★

A Long Fatal Love Chase: Review

The grandmother of stalker stories with roots in obsession. A Long Fatal Love Chase is a story about the dark side of love and a passionate persistence that drives a man to hound the woman he claims to adore to her death. Louisa May Alcott originally wrote the story for magazine serialization under the name of A. M. Barnard and it wasn't published as a complete novel until 1995 because the tale was considered too sensational to be published during Alcott's lifetime.

The impetuous, head-strong young Rosamond Vivian has felt like a captive in her grandfather's house since her parents died. His indifference makes her believe that he does not care for her at all and she longs to escape to a life of freedom and adventure. But she despairs of ever fulfilling her dream. Then, a stranger who resembles Mephistopheles himself comes to her remote island home and she finds herself spellbound and ready to confide in the mysterious Philip Tempest. She tells him that she would "do anything get out of [her] prison." And he takes her at his word. He wins her hand from the grandfather in a game of cards and promises to marry her when he takes her away.

She spends a short glorious time enjoying her new found freedom and learns to love her dark, brooding husband. But all is not as it seems--and soon Tempest destroys her idyllic illusions and she finds that she now lives in the midst of lies, cruelty, and unbearable heartbreak. What she discovers about the man who swears to love her makes her flee from him. She hides under assumed names--in France, Italy, and Germany. She takes refuge in the homes of friends and even in a nunnery, but wherever she goes he pursues her until finally he must follow her to grave if he is to continue his pursuit.

Alcott's story is quite advanced for her time. She writes about an independent and spirited heroine whose story wrestles with such themes as women's right  to be free, strong female friendships, the dynamics of abusive and twisted relationships, divorce, bigamy, murder, and celibacy. While on some levels, Rosamond is the classic Gothic heroine swept away by the handsome, brooding mysterious man, she is no shrinking violet. It isn't unusual for the heroine to discover that the brooding man is really Prince Charming in disguise and everyone lives happily every after. Not so here. Tempest is really quite nasty and he doesn't mind what anguish he causes as long as he can bend his spirited love to his will--the very fire of spirit and independence that first draws him to her is the flame he must quench if he really will possess her again.  It really is amazing that Alcott wrote such a dark tale at a young age--a story so different from the well-known Little Women.

A Long Fatal Love Chase lacks a bit of polish and there are portions that seem somewhat over-the-top with melodrama--perhaps if the story had been published as a novel in Alcott's lifetime it would have been edited. As it stands, the work is a good examination of the obsessive nature and the bargains we all make for our freedom and independence. A good, solid story.  ★★★