Tag: Fiction

Second Confession

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Stout, Rex. Second Confession. G.K. Hall and Co., 1992.

Reason read: to continue the series started in November of 2024. I am now a year into the Nero Wolfe series.

It all starts when a father wants to hire Nero Wolfe to confirm or deny his daughter’s fiancé is not a Communist. James Sperling believes his daughter’s suitor needs to be investigated before they marry. At first Nero is reluctant to take the case for he knows Sperling has connections to the mafia. That is the least of his troubles when the man in question is found murdered and all evidence points to Nero. [Stout likes vehicular homicide and it is Wolfe’s vehicle with the blood evidence.]
It is rare that Nero Wolfe leaves his brownstone in New York City as the country makes him nervous, yet, in Second Confession Wolfe finds himself in Chappaqua, just above White Plains, New York. Another variance of this Nero Wolfe mystery is a different set of law enforcement running interference. Despite these differences, fear not! Archie is his old sarcastic witty self.

As an aside, I truly enjoy learning more about the highly entertaining Archie Goodwin. This time we learn he has gone to high school in Ohio.

Lines I liked, “I wouldn’t go to the extreme of calling him a cheap filthy little worm, but he is in fact a shabby creature” (p 93) and “There are numerous layers of honesty, and the deepest should not have a monopoly” (p 276).

Author fact: Rex Stout served as chairman of the war writer’s board.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe: Too Good To Miss” (p 209).

Avalon

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Lawhead, Stephen R. Avalon: the Return of King Arthur. Avon, 1999.

Reason read: King Arthur was born in December…supposedly.

The is a classic tale of the struggle between good and evil. Cast as the power hungry antagonist is Prime Minister Thomas Waring. When the last King of England committed suicide Waring was under the impression he would lead England from his seat in government. Out of nowhere along comes James Stuart, an apparent nobody with all the credentials to prove it is he who is actually next in line for the throne. All of the characters you expect from King Arthur’s time are represented in modern day Britain. Ancient enemies are present with a modern day twist.
My favorite parts were when James experiences fiosachd, a kind of mental time travel where he can see his surroundings in a medieval light. Sights and sounds shimmer into his mind like a memory but appear before him as real as his own skin. Modern day dissolves to reveal a time before time.
My least favorite part was the relationship with Jenny. She rebuffs James and seems to fancy another until she does a surprising 180.

Confessional: I went back and forth about whether or not Avalon was part of the Pendragon series. In the end I decided it wasn’t because I couldn’t care enough if it was or wasn’t.

Book trivia: Avalon is the LAST book in the Pendragon Cycle series (according to Lawhead’s website). Once again, I have read these books out of order.

Author fact: several of Lawhead’s books have been made into television series for 2025.

Music: “Auld Lang Syne,” “Bowl of Punch Reel,” Gerry Rafferty, “Crown Him with Many Crowns,” “Amazing Grace,” “We Rest on Thee,” “Wedding March,” “O Worship the King,” “Blest Be the Tie That Binds,” “Scotland the Brave,” and “Be Thou My Vision.”

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “King Arthur” (p 136). What Pearl does not tell you is that at the time of the publication of Book Lust, Avalon was the last book in the Pendragon Cycle series.

Breakdown, Recovery and the Outdoors

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Bremicker, Christopher G. Breakdown, Recovery and the Outdoors. Running Wild Press, 2025.

Christopher Bremicker tells a believable story about Mike Reynolds, a Vietnam veteran struggling with schizo-affective disorder and posttraumatic stress disorder in equal measure. [As an aside, I met a veteran who refused to call PSTD a “disorder.” He said he was living with posttraumatic stress. Period. It was not a disorder. I have never forgotten his plea for normalcy.] Mike Reynold’s days are filled with self-medicating with alcohol and the outdoors. Alcohol numbed his feelings while homelessness staved off his claustrophobia. Hunting and fishing kept his demons at bay and his days normal. The emotions Mike experienced are so raw and believable that I was grateful for Bremicker’s disclaimer that he did not serve in Vietnam although I suspect there are elements of autobiography in Breakdown to make it so realistic: the relapse after five years of sobriety, for example. In Bremicker’s acknowledgements he mentions alcoholism and mental illness.
Short chapters move Mike’s story along at a fast pace even though it is a relatively simple story: hunting, recovery, relationships. You find yourself rooting for Mike, even if you don’t know him very well.
I noticed Breakdown was a little repetitious here and there (he mentions being proud to be a veteran but hated his appearance a few times).
Only annoyance: Andy, Alan, Anne, Bill Gillette, Bunk Knudson, Cinder, Corky Fowler, Dave, Dick “Smithy” Smith, Dick Anderson, Emma, Grace, Gunderson, Geiger, Gary Nicholson, Hagman, Jake, Jason, Jack, Jim, Jonas, Joanne, Jeff Huchinson, Lewis, Lou Johnson, Lucas, Muhammed, Myron Nelson, Nancy, Penny, Powers, Rob, Ryan, Sam, Santiago, Sheila, Steve, Sasha, Teller, Tim, Vicky, Weaver, Wetzel, Whitman, Willy, and Wade. Did I really need to know all these names? It was like a science fiction novel with a bunch of characters who mean nothing to the plot. Yet, at the same time who knew Mike had a brother named Tim? He didn’t factor into Mike’s recovery at all.

Author fact: the very first words of Breakdown, Recovery and the Outdoors are “I did not serve in Vietnam” (unpaged).

Book trivia: Loose pages make for difficult reading. They kept falling out so I ended up throwing them away after I read them.

Natalie connection: every time Mike or Vicky had a drink I thought of the 10,000 Maniacs song, “Don’t Talk,” a song about being in a relationship with an alcoholic.

Vampires of Chicago

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Cymry, Wynneth C. The Vampires of Chicago: A Subversive Satire, Gothic Fantasy Action Thriller. Lunatica Libri, 2025.

Reason read: for the Early Review Program from LibraryThing.

This turns everything you thought you knew about vampires on its head. Did you know vampires sing at a certain frequency to heal a wounded friend? Or that they have to sleep in cathedrals? Or that they can be afraid of blood? Vampires can eat garlic! You will learn about the Sybilline oath: not to kill, maim, torment or forswear. This is the story about a battle between vampires and the church where priests try to use the vampires to achieve immortality. The Covenant of Blood is strong. Be prepared for a variety of surgeries.
My first reaction after reading Vampires of Chicago was that I wished the character development could have been stronger. I did not know them well enough to care. I wasn’t dismayed when Aaron was pronounced dead. Nor did I cheer when he was revived. Same for Leander. He is dead. No, he is not. Maybe this is where the satire comes in?
My second reaction after reading Vampires of Chicago was that I felt as though I had been dropped into the middle of a situation and had to catch up to the plot.
All in all, it was a fun read.

If I had a dollar for every mention of a sehreb, sehrebim, sehrebimi, and sehrebimo I could buy myself a latte and donut. It is the only weapon the vampires and priests seem to use.

Music: “Agnus Dei” (I have to admit I love the Michael Smith version of this song).

Speaker for the Dead

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Card, Orson Scott. Speaker for the Dead. Macmillan Audio, 2006.

Reason read: to continue the series started in October in honor of Science Fiction Month.

As a small child, Andrew “Ender” Wiggin saved planet Earth from war with the Buggers. Now as an earthly yet ageless thirty five year old adult, Ender is faced with a second alien invasion with the piggies. War seems to be inevitable. Ender has transformed himself into a Speaker for the Dead and must reconcile his horrible past as Ender Wiggin the Xenocide. Not many know he is one and the same. It is a dance of identity to come to terms with the past.
I found it interesting to learn that in order for Speaker for the Dead to work Ender’s Game had to be a full blown novel. The sequel actually birthed the first book’s existence.
As an aside, I do not know how Speaker for the Dead can be pigeon holed into the genre of science fiction when it carries themes of philosophy, religion, family, psychology, religion, socio-economics, ethics, ecology, genetics, mysticism, hatred, and science.
I applaud any book that makes the reader feel something whether intended or not. If the author can be clever enough to hide personal feelings while promoting an unfavorable view, more power to him or her. Speaker for the Dead made me laugh and cry, hate and love, all at the same time.
The best part of Speaker for the Dead was Ender’s conversation with the Bishop about death – how another culture could see death as the greatest honor.

Line I liked, “I think, said Ender, that you should not plant anymore humans” (p 415).

Author fact: to look at Orson Scott Card’s list of books is impressive. I am only reading seven Ender books for the Challenge.

Book trivia: Speaker for the Dead is an indirect sequel to Ender’s Game. You can get by without reading Ender, but why would you want to?

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror” (p 213).

Your Blues Ain’t Like Mine

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Campbell, Bebe Moore. Your Blues Ain’t Like Mine.

Reason read: Campbell died in the month of November. Read in her memory.

Who was the first person to say the truth hurts? Never is this more true than within the pages of Your Blues Ain’t Like Mine. The premise of Campbell’s 1950s story could have been ripped from the headlines of yesteryear or buried in the back pages of yesterday’s online paper. Armstrong Todd is a smart fifteen year old who knows a little French. Being from Chicago, he does not realize life in rural Mississippi is racially divided and prejudicial hate runs deep. One slip of the tongue in the direction of a white woman ends up costing him his life. Never mind that it was an accident; the teen was not speaking to Lily. Never mind that the white woman did not understand what Armstrong had actually said in her direction. Suddenly, justice for a black teenager in southern Mississippi becomes a political fire starter around the topic of desegregating schools. Campbell doesn’t contain the perspective to just one side of the color story. Lily, the “offended” (and extremely ignorant) white woman, is a poor young mother with an abusive husband. She only understands debilitating poverty, a screaming newborn, a whiney toddler, and the urgent need to keep on her husband’s good side. She desperately walks a fine line of taking care of her starving family while scrambling for the little pleasures in life like a new tube of ruby red lipstick.
Beyond civil rights Campbell makes interesting connections between the lines of color. Women can be abused, regardless of race. A fist can bruise or split open any color of skin. Along those same lines, Campbell points out that women of any color use sex as a weapon to get what they want. Lila and Delotha are no different when it comes to using their bodies to manipulate their men.
Your Blues Ain’t Like Mine spans generations. Moore guides the pace through political and pop culture cues like which president is in office and what songs are playing on the radio. Occasionally, a historical event will make an appearance like the Kent State University shootings.

Line I liked, “She never danced when her husband was at home” (p 70). I have said it before and I will say it again, domestic abuse is color bland. Abuse is abuse is abuse.

Author fact: I am the same age as Campbell when she died. Can you imagine the stories she would be telling had she lived on?

Book trivia: this could have been a movie.

Setlist: B.B. King, Beatles’ “Yesterday,” Blind Jake’s “Sharpen My Pencil,” the Dells, Dianna Ross, Dinah Washington, Elvis Presley’s “Hound Dog,” Frank Sinatra, Hank Williams, James Brown’s “Please, Please, Please,” Loretta Lynn, Louis Jordan, Marvin Gaye, Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” Muddy Waters, “No Good Man Blues,” “Oh, Mary, Don’t You Weep,” Patsy Cline’s “Blue,” “Rock of Ages,” Sam Cooke, Smokey Robinson, the Temptations, “We Shall Overcome,” Willie Nelson, and Willie Horton.

Miss Merchant connection: Natalie taught her fans the hymn “Oh, Mary, Don’t You Weep” back in 2000. Hard to believe that was twenty five years ago.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “African American Fiction: She Say” (p 12).

Mammoth Book of Twentieth Century Ghost Stories

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Haining, Peter, ed. The Mammoth Book of Twentieth Century Ghost Stories. Carroll and Graf Publishers, 1998.

Reason read: November 1st is Day of the Dead in Mexico. Read in honor of ghosts everywhere.

The stories:
The Golden Era –

  • “The Third Person” by Henry James – two spinster women live together in a haunted house.
  • “The Presence By the Fire” by H.G. Wells – a man mourns the loss of his wife.
  • “How It Happened” by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle – a man crashes his brand new car.
  • “Ghostly Duel” by Jack London – published in the Oakland Aegis and renamed “Who Believes in Ghosts?”
  • “The Hand” by Theodore Dreiser
  • “The Ghost of Down Hill” by Edgar Wallace – Wallace’s short stories were made into movies.
  • “Honeysuckle Cottage” by P.G. Wodehouse – no one is who they say they are in this haunted house.
  • “The Old Dark House” by J.B. Priestly
  • “Sophy Mason Comes Back” by E.M. Delafield – Dorothy Sayers was a fan of Delafield.
  • “In a Glass Darkly” by Agatha Christie – a man saves a woman from murder…or does he?
    Two: the Phantom Army –
  • “The Bowman” by Arthur Machen – is this story really fiction when there have been eye witness accounts of the World War I phenomenon?
  • “The Other Side of the Medal” by Stella Gibbons – another version of the Bowmen story.
  • “Three Lines of Old French” by Abraham Merritt – Haining said this could be a benchmark ghost story.
  • “The Lusitania Waits” by Alfred Noyes – Noyes was an English poet who, like John Mayer, did not wait to graduate college before becoming famous.
  • “Vengeance is Mine” by Algernon Blackwood – a chance encounter with a stranger changes a mild-mannered man’s life.
  • “We are the Dead” by Henry Kuttner – from the pulp magazine called Weird Tales.
  • “The Escort” by Daphne du Maurier
  • “The Elf in Algiers” by John Steinbeck
  • “The Mirror in Toom 22” by James Hadley Case – written while Case was serving in the Royal Air Force.
  • “Is there Life Beyond the Gravy?” by Stevie Smith
    Three: The Modern Tradition –
  • “Sloane Square” by Pamela Hansford Johnson – a ghostly subway ride.
  • “The Leaf-Sweeper” by Muriel Spark – one of my favorites about a man who confronts his living ghost.
  • “At the Chalet Lartrec” by Winston Graham – a story about time spent in an isolated mountain hotel.
  • “The Love of a Good Woman” by William Trern – mild-mannered salesman murders his wife for the sake of a mistress.
  • “The Haunting of Shawley Rectory” by Ruth Rendell – does history repeat itself?
  • “Voices From the Coalbin” by Mary Higgins Clark – a woman slowly goes insane thanks to childhood traumas.
  • “A Good Sound Marriage” by Fay Weldon – a pregnant woman has a heart to heart with her ghost of a grandmother.
  • “A Self-Possessed Woman” by Julian Barnes
  • A Programmed Christmas Carol” by John Mortimer – published in the London Daily Mail in 1994.
  • “A Figment in Time” by Peter Haining

My favorite observations: the spinsters in “The Third Person” were happy to have a man in the house, even if he was a ghost and in “A Programmed Christmas Carol” a descendant of Scrooge’s is living in the world of Apple computers and paternity leave.

Line I liked, “James Rodman had a congenital horror of matrimony” (p 147), “Rage pertained to savage days” (p 263), “The dangerous thing is for a woman to wait too long, so she end with nothing” (p 445)and “Curiously, too, I thought that although a lot of people die naked, I could not find a single story of a nude phantom” (p 480).

Author Editor fact: Haining has over 200 works to his credit. I am only reading The Mammoth Book of Twentieth Century Ghost Stories for the Challenge.

Music: “Good-bye to Tipperary,” “The Holly and the Ivy,” “Lillibullero,” “The Rogue’s March,”

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the very obvious chapter called “Ghost Stories” (p 99).

Killer Smile

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Scottoline, Lisa. Killer Smile. Read by Kate Burton. Harper Collins, 2004.

Reason read: I forgot to finish the series started in December of last year in honor of Pennsylvania becoming a state. Somehow I let this one fall off the list.

Mary DiNunzio works for Benny Rosato’s law firm as an associate. Mary’s latest pro bono case is on behalf of the estate of an Italian-American interned in Montana during World War I. Amadeo Brandolini committed suicide during his internment and the family wants to sue the government for reparations. DiNunzio’s mission is to sort out the legalities of Brandolini’s estate, but ends up righting a long-forgotten carriage of misjustice. What starts as a simple estate case turns complicated when people start dying; people who had dared to talk to Miss DiNunzio.
For comic relief, DiNunzio’s boss keeps sending Mary on dates with impossible men. I appreciated how Scottoline wove this side story into the bigger plot.

As an aside, Mary DiNunzio sometimes annoyed me. Lawyers are supposed to be somewhat smart. I found it irksome that Mary did not know where to find Montana on a map, she did not know what an engineer does for a living, could not identify a marlin, and she had no idea what quantum physics was. I’ll forgive her for not knowing the difference between a bow and stern of a boat. but am I making an assumption that lawyers are supposed to be savvy and book smart?
Prophetic vision: in my copy of Killer Smile there are a series of book club questions. One of them is “Do you feel safe in your country?” Killer Smile was written in 2004. Let’s ask that same question twenty one years later.

Author fact: Did I already mention that Scottoline was a trial lawyer? I am pretty sure that I did. She graduated from law school in 1981. The other fact is that Scottoline is really funny in her interviews.
Narrator fact: Kate Burton is really good!

Book trivia: Scottoline was encouraged to bring the story of Italian-Americans interned in Montana after learning the history of her grandparents’ experiences. She even shares photographs of their alien registration cards. Scottoline wanted to bring that lesser known history to light.
Killer Smile is Scottoline’s eleventh book.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Big Ten Country: The Literary Midwest: Pennsylvania” (p 25). Pearl mentioned this was one of her favorites.

Those Who Hunt the Night

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Hambly, Barbara. Those Who Hunt the Night. Ballantine Books, 1988.

Reason read: Bram Stoker, the ultimate vampire storyteller was born in November. Read in his honor. Hambly mentions Bram Stoker and his novel.

Hambly has come up with an interesting concept for Those Who Hunt the Night. Someone is killing vampires while they sleep in their coffins. It is as simple as lifting the lid to expose the sleepers to broad daylight. Each vampire is helpless to escape the bright sun’s devastation, and if that doesn’t work, a quick wooden stake to the heart should finish them off. When in doubt, maybe a little exposure to something silver would work. With four of his fellow vampires dead, Don Simon Xavier Christien Morado de la Cadena-Ysidro has no choice but solicit the help of mere mortal Professor James Asher with an offer he can’t afford to refuse. Solve the mystery of the murders and Asher’s wife will stay alive. It’s blackmail, but what can the professor do? What Asher discovers is a variety of vampires who can grow tolerant of silver and daylight, at least partially. This means the serial killer of vampires could be one of their own. In addition to a thrilling murder mystery, Hambly manages to add a little romance to Those Who Hunt the Night.
Trivia: Don Asher rides a brand of motorcycle that was manufactured just down the road from me. I drive by the now defunct factory every single day.

As an aside, if I ever had the chance to meet a vampire and could ask him questions my very first question would be do you have a high tolerance for pain? Maybe I would ask about the incineration process when exposed to light (but that might be too sensitive a topic?).

As another aside, does Hambly contradict vampire lore? In another book vampires avoided drinking the blood of people who were ill, drug addicts, or on certain medications. They did not want to taint their own bloodstreams. In Hambly’s version, the vampires drank the blood of those affected by the Plague. In fact, the Black Plague threatened to live on through the activities of vampires.

Line I could relate to the most, “…he had long grown used to her habit of sleeping with books” (p 216). When Kisa leaves for a business trip I too cover his side of the bed with stacks and stacks of books.

Author fact: Hambly sounds like someone who was never satisfied with staying in one place. She described herself as a high school teacher, model, waitress, technical editor, clerk at a liquor store, karate instructor, and author. I am also reading A Free Man of Color for the Challenge.

Book trivia: I have to admit, the vampire on the cover of Those Who Hunt the Night is somewhat of a joke. He looks like he is wearing an odd-fitting wig and his canine teeth are much too long. In every vampire movie I have ever seen the vampire’s teeth are not visible with the mouth closed. The fangs are only revealed when he or she opens their mouth.

Music: “Till We Meet Again,” Salieri, and Tchaikovsky.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror” (p 213).

Adventures and Misadventures of Maqroll

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Mutis, Alvaro. The Adventures and Misadventures of Maqroll. Translated by Edith Grossman. Harper Collins, 1990.

Reason read: the eruption of the Nevado del Ruiz volcano in Columbia occurred in November of 1985. The Adventures and Misadventures of Maqroll did not take place in Columbia, but Alvaro Mutis was born in Columbia.

Maqroll the Gaviero’s life is told in a series of four novellas:

  • Amirbar (92 pages) – the time Maqroll spent mining for gold until his mining partner went crazy.
  • Tramp Steamer’s Last Port of Call (59 pages) – the love affair between a tramp steamer captain and a woman named Warda. As an aside, I want to be Warda when I grow up…or at least have her style.
  • Abdul Bashur, Dreamer of Ships (105 pages) – this story includes a scam involving imitation Turkish rugs.
  • Triptych on Sea and Land (111 pages) – “Appointment in Bergen,” A True History of the Encounters and complicities of Maqroll the Gaviero and the painter Alejandro Obregon,” and “Jamil.”

It’s as if Maqroll is in the back corner of a dimly lit bar whispering his secrets. His companions share these adventures with us. The adventures take the reader all over the world.

Lines I liked, “My companion’s words held a conviction he could not fully express” (p 30), “This is how we forget: Our affairs, no matter how close to us, are made strange through the mimetic, deceptive, constant working of a precarious present” (p 111), “Human beings, I thought, change so little, and are so much what they are, that these had been only one love story since the beginning of time, endlessly repeated, never losing it’s terrible simplicity or it’s irremediable sorrow” (p 151).

Music: “El Relicano,” “Espana Cani,”

Author fact: Mutis is from Columbia.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Hail, Columbia!” (p 90).

The Siege

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Kadare, Ismail. The Siege. Translated by David Bellos. Canongate, 1970.

Reason read: Albania declared independence in November of 1912. They celebrate on the 29th. Read in honor of the day.

Kadare used his knowledge of the 1475 siege in Albania to write The Siege. It is not a factual nonfiction; not of actual events, but rather a retelling of war in general yet horrible terms; what any siege would sound, look, smell and even taste like. Using an army chronicler named Melva Celebi to tell the tale from the Turks’ (attackers) side of the siege, he described the actions of the janissaries, tumbrels, doctor, poet, astrologer, sultan, dervishes, architect, engineer, sappers, and wives. The alternating yet brief chapters were told from the perspective of the Albanians as they defended their citadel. Occasionally, the wives or prostitutes spoke of their perception of war.
Back to the plot: the attackers tried to breach the citadel walls with little success. First, a flurry of man to man combat. When that failed, their next move was to try to dig a tunnel up under the citadel. That also failed. Next the attackers tried to shut off the citadel’s main source of water. [As an aside, I thought using a thirsty horse to find the aqueduct was clever but cruel.] It was this tactic I found most disturbing. In order to know if the lack of water was affecting the besieged, the attackers needed a live Albanian to dissect to analyze his organs. This victim would signal if the enemy was weakened by dehydration. Not wanting to wait for the lack of water to take effect, the attackers then tried a new cannon which backfired (pun totally intended). The Turks’ final assault was to release diseased animals into the castle in hopes of poisoning the Albanians. Each attack was more frenzied than the one before while the besieged practiced stoic resilience.
In The Siege Kadare captured the utter gruesomeness of war: the chaos of men and horses screaming in pain, the slipperiness of blood and gore, the din of weaponry booming, the choking smoke, and stench of death everywhere. There is one striking scene when the chronicle and astrologer are observing a dead man’s face reflected in a shiny pool of oil, soon to be incinerated by the encroaching flames. This image will stay with me for a very long time. Kadare also describes the strategy of war: rations are running low. The attackers know they need another battle to lessen their numbers by 3-4 thousand men as a way to stretch supplies.

Line I liked, “Crows don’t pick out each other’s eyes” (p 236).

Author fact: Kadare was also a poet. He died when he was 88 years old.

Book trivia: The Siege was first titled The Drums of Rain but was changed to The Castle. The English translation is The Siege. It was the least unsatisfactory name for the English version.
And speaking of translation, I would love to know how they say willy-nilly in Albania.

Music: “Te Deum.”

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Albania” (p 12). Just a note about the index for this book. There is a different book with the same title. Both books are under the same indexing, but they should have separate entries.

Trouble in Triplicate

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Stout, Rex, Trouble in Triplicate. Viking Press, 1949.

Reason read: to continue the series started last year in honor of Stout’s birth month.

Trouble in Triplicate is actually three short novellas:

  • Before I Die – Dazy Perrit, king of the black market, has come to Nero Wolfe to help him with his daughters. One is blackmailing him and the other has a nervous tic Perrit thinks Wolfe can cure.
  • Help Wanted, Male – Wolfe hires a body double when his life is threatened while he works a murder case.
  • Instead of Evidence – It is not everyday that a man shows up on your doorstep and announces that he is about to die and proceeds to name his future killer. This is a mystery all about identity.

New things I learned about Archie Goodwin: he is from Ohio. He is an ankle man. He has a strange prejudice against people with the name Eugene.

Lines I liked, “He paid us a visit the day he stopped a bullet” (p 3), “If you are typing to can’t talk” (p 160), and “He sounded next door to hysterical” (p 185).

As an aside, Stout mentioned Billy Sunday in “Before I Die” and I had to wrack my brain. Where had I heard that name before? From the lyrics of Ramble On Rose by the Grateful Dead.

Author fact: Stout moved to Paris in order to write full time.

Book trivia: you get three stories for the price of one in Trouble in Triplicate and the stories are not tied together in any way.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter obviously called “Res Stout’s Nero Wolfe: Too Good To Miss” (p 226).

Johnny Got His Gun

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Trumbo, Dalton. Johnny Got His Gun. Narrated by William Dufris. Tantor Media, 2008.
Trumbo, Dalton. Johnny Got His Gun. Bantam Books, 1970.

Reason read: Armistice Day is celebrated on November 11th. Read in honor of that day.

I hope you read the copy of Johnny Got His Gun with the foreword by a mother, Cindy Sheehan, who lost her son to war. Her anger is palpable in every sentence she wrote. Her foreword throbs with an abundance of seething words. She ends with the largest question in the human lexicon – why?
Joe. What a brilliant name for a character. Just your average Joe. Joe is every man. Joe is the average man. Joe is your son. Your brother. Your father or uncle. Your husband or boyfriend. Joe could be your world. Told in flashbacks of better days, Joe was your typical teenager before World War I; he grew up with a good friend, he liked to go fishing, he had good parents, he had a best girl. Then everything changed when adulthood set in. Joe lost his best girl to his best friend. Later he left behind a perfect girl when he shipped off to fight the good fight in World War I. Did want to fight? Maybe. Did he want to become a “piece of meat” with no arms, legs, eyes, ears, or tongue? Unable to move anything but his head, unable to see, hear, or speak? Most definitely not. Joe’s incremental realization of the loss of his limbs, sight, hearing, sense of smell was terrible. Even when he wants someone to end his life he cannot get relief. As an audio book it was even more devastatingly painful to hear. I do not think I would have been able to finish it if I had to read it only in print.

Confessional: I was upset when critics would call Joe “a hunk of meat” until I learned that’s what he thought about himself. He said it first.

Author fact: While not officially banned many schools found it too disturbing to have on their shelves. Trumbo did not mind the threat of banning Johnny Got His Gun. He and his publishers decided to delay a reprinting during World War II.

Book trivia: Johnny Got His Gun won a National Book Award. Metallica used clips from the movie based on the book in one of their songs.

Audio trivia: Read by William Dufris, the narration was amazing.

Music: “After the Ball is Over.”

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter “Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror” (p 213). At first I thought Johnny Got His Gun would be in the fiction section of the World War I chapter, but horror is the perfect place for this book.

Ender’s Game

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Card, Orson Scott. Ender’s Game. Read by Stefan Rudnicki and Harlan Ellison. Macmillan Audio, 2004.

Reason read: October is Science Fiction Month.

Planet Earth is prepping for a galaxy war against the Buggers. The last skirmish was eighty years ago and Earth barely survived. Recruiting this time around has to be aggressive and highly tactical. Andrew “Ender” Wiggin, born in a society of limiting offspring: only two children per family, is known as an extra or Third. As a Third Ender must leave planet Earth at six years old for a boarding school where he trains to be a soldier. He leads an army of other children and it is here that he proves to be a natural-born leader and a prodigy at winning battles. So the saga begins.
Back home, the proverbial power struggle between good and evil begins. While Ender grows into a tactical fighter, his brother Peter demonstrates increasing violent tendencies every day. Their sister, ironically named Valentine (the symbol of love) as the token female, stands in the middle of the two brothers.
One of the most fascinating elements of Ender’s Game is that Card challenges the assumption about reality and what is “normal.”

Author fact: the idea for Ender came when Card was sixteen years old. He was fascinated by the idea of a Battle Room.

Book Audio trivia: listening to the audio was a treat because Orson Scott Card explained his process for writing Ender’s Game. I had no idea the book was meant to be read aloud. Also, when Card first presented Ender’s Game he was told it was fantasy. He needed to change some details, bring in aliens to make it science fiction.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror” (p 213).

Collector of Worlds

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Troyanov, Iliya. Collector of Worlds: a Novel of Sir Richard Francis Burton. Translated by William Hobson. Ecco, 2010.

Reason read: Sir Richard Burton died in October. Read in his memory.

The fictional account of Sir Richard Francis Burton reads like a cinematic masterpiece. Burton’s personality comes alive. He was obsessed with disguises and liked to pose as a Muslim. One of his aliases was Mirza Abdullah from Persia. Against all odds, to survive Burton needed to blend in as a native. He was described a difficult and mysterious yet brilliant. He was a master of various languages. His concubine, Kundalini, wanted to marry him. She told him stories during sex. Troyanov takes three of Burton’s best known periods of life: as a British officer in India, Burton’s pilgrimage to Mecca, and everyone’s favorite game – where does the Nile originate? By fictionalizing Burton’s life Troyanov was able to make sweeping statements about nineteenth century culture in colonized countries. The varying literary writing styles help to separate Burton’s adventures.

Quote I loved, “She left behind a smile as small as the folded-down corner of a page in a book” (p 57). Here is another that, strangely enough, reminds me of my childhood, “Richard Francis Burton died early in the morning before you could tell a black thread from a white” (p 444). Here’s the weird parallel – when I was really young my sister had a poster of two horses, one white and one black. We would sleep together on Christmas Eve and were not allowed to get up on Christmas morning until we could see both horses distinctly.

Author fact: There are a few ways to spell Troyanov’s name. For LibraryThing, I have substituted a J where there is a Y. I am reading three of his books for the Challenge.

Book trivia: not all the foreign words are included in the glossary. I couldn’t find abbasids, bubukhanna, bazzaz, kaaba, or devadusi.

Music: “For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow.”

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Star Trekkers” (p 221).