Tag: series

Curse of the Pogo Stick

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Cotterill, Colin. Curse of the Pogo Stick. New York: Soho, 2008.

Reason read: to continue the series started in May in honor of Laos Rocket Day.

Here’s what we know about Dr. Siri Paiboun. He is a 73 year old coroner in the village of Vientiane, Laos. He has two loyal sidekicks, Nurse Dtui (now three months pregnant) and helper Mr. Geung. When we last left Dr. Siri he had proposed to Madame Daeng and she accepted so now he has a girlfriend to add to the mix. He is still plagued by the spirit of a thousand-year-old shaman, Yeh Ming and it’s this spirit that gets Siri into his trouble this time. He is kidnapped by a group of women Hmong villagers thinking Yeh Ming can exorcise the head tribesman’s daughter. She appears to be pregnant with twins by a demon. The title of the book comes from the Hmong belief that a pogo stick, sent in a relief package, was the root of evil.
Meanwhile Nurse Dtui and Phosy search for the Lizard, a woman hellbent on killing Dr. Siri.
One of the best things about Cotterill’s writing (besides the humor) is that way he subtly reminds the readers where they are at in the saga. Like a television series voice over recap “previously on Badge of Justice…” before the new episode. In this case, Siri’s best friend was found to be a traitor in the last installment. When Madame Daeng & Nurse Dtui pay him a visit in Curse his new role in the story makes sense.

Line I liked, “It was rather sad that his last memory on earth might have been how to encourage bulls to increase their semen count” (p 37).

Book trivia: This is another  really short book. Expect to finish it in a weekend.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Laos” (p 128).

July on Deck

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July. Summertime. Lots of music (starting with you guessed it, Phish). Lots of running (hopefully all outdoors). Lots of travel, lots of play. Plenty of reading:

  • Milk in My Coffee by Eric Jerome Dickey (in honor of National Cow Appreciation Day on the 14th. I kid you not.)
  • Disco for the Departed by Colin Cotterill (#3 – to continue the series started in May in honor of Rocket Day)
  • The Last Battle by Cornelius Ryan (#3 – to continue the series started in June for D-Day)
  • Cranford (AB) by Elizabeth Gaskell (in honor of Swan Upping. If you don’t know about this day, check it out. It’s fascinating. Or you can wait for my review when I’ll explain the practice.)
  • Black Faces, White Faces by Jane Gardam (in honor of Gardam’s birth month)

As an aside, I have read the last two Cotterills in a day each, so I know I need to add at least one or two more books to the list. I’m off to the great unknown for vacation so when I get back I’ll probably have to revisit this list.

Also, I should note that I won another Early Review book from LibraryThing, but since its not here yet I won’t promise to read it. 😉

 

Remembering February

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So, February was a weird month. Being sick and injured didn’t help except that both ailments gave me more time to read. Turning 47 turned out to be not a big deal. Just another number in the grand scheme of things. The groundhog didn’t see his shadow either so there are less numbers in winter… And speaking of numbers – here are the books:

  1. A.D.: After the Deluge by Josh Neufeld
  2. Beautiful Place to Die by Philip Craig
  3. If You Lived Here You’d Be Home By Now by Sandra Loh
  4. Rocksburg Railroad Murders by K.C. Constantine
  5. As She Crawled Across the Table by Jonathan Lethem (AB)
  6. Thirty Nine Steps by John Buchan
  7. Her First American by Lore Segal
  8. Down Where the Moon was Small or And I Shall Sleep…Down Where the Moon was Small by Richard Llewellyn
  9. Path to Power by Robert Caro – finishing TODAY!
  10. Strength in What Remains by Tracy Kidder (AB)
  11. Tom Brown’s School Days by Thomas Hughes (DNF)
  12. Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie  (AB) – will finish in March
  13. The Art of Dying by Patricia Weenolsen

For Fun:

  1. Solitude of Prime Numbers by Paolo Giordano
  2. Center of the World by Jacqueline Sheehan
  3. The Ultimate Treadmill Workout by David Siik

For LibraryThing’s Early Review program:

  1. Liar by Rob Roberge

I also spent some time revisiting the Challenge list. Because of all the missed individual titles I wanted to redo the schedule. That took up a great deal of my time!

And I Shall Sleep…

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Llewellyn, Richard. And I Shall Sleep…Down Where the Moon Was Small. New York: Doubleday & Company, 1966.

Reason read: to finish the series incorrectly started in December in honor of Patagonia.

Like Llewellyn’s first two novels, And I Shall Sleep… starts off with Huw and his mother’s little blue cloth, the one she “wore about her hair when cleaning” (p 1). This will become significant later, as you might have guessed.
And I Shall Sleep is the third and final book in the Huw Morgan series. When we join back up with Huw, he and his small group of Patagonians have made a new settlement in the Andes mountains. Previously Huw’s love, Lal, had decided to stay behind but early in And I Shall Sleep she changes her mind and joins Huw in the mountains. While this may seem like a good thing for Huw (since he was so infatuated with her in Up, Into the Singing Mountain), his attraction to an evasive Indio girl complicates the relationship. It doesn’t help that Huw is becoming more and more sympathetic to the Indio plight (“they were denied a land where their fathers had ridden” p 122), Interestingly enough, this new girl, Liliutro, is half sister to Lal. [Semi-spoiler alert: the inside flap reveals that mysterious Lili is able to lure Huw away from Lal so the whole time Huw and Lal are seemingly happy together I wondered when his betrayal would begin…and then when it did I regretted waiting for it.]
On the professional side, Huw’s trading company is getting bigger and bigger. He is able to travel to America and meet Henry Ford. As a businessman he grows more and more successful.

As an aside: towards the end of And I Shall Sleep I was starting to dislike Huw a great deal. There is this one curious scene where Huw has just slept with a married woman and she announces she is going to tell her husband. The next day the husband comes to Huw to inform him I know what you did and oh, by the way, you should call the police because I put my hands around her neck….”Heard it go. Told you. I’m finished” (p 308).
And then there’s the scene with the puma…and that’s all I’m going to say about that.

Quote I like: right from the beginning, the very first sentence grabbed me, “Dearly touched a heart can be with proof of love from an absent one” (p 1). This set the whole stage for me.
Other quote I liked, “A pity it takes so long to reach good sense” (p 99).

Book trivia: And I Shall Sleep… is sometimes called simply Down Where the Moon Was Small.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter simply and predictably called “Patagonia” (p 174). Note: both titles are indexed in Book Lust To Go.

Always a Body to Trade

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Constantine, K.C. Always a Body to Trade. Boston: David R. Godine Publisher, 1983.

Reason read: January is national mystery month.

Someone has killed a nameless woman. Brutally shot her right in the face. It’s up to Chief of Police Mario Balzic to solve her murder only he has two problems: not much to go on in the way of clues, witnesses or suspects and a new mayor who is a little too eager, a little too young and more than a little too green to understand how crimes are solved. He wants this case put to bed yesterday.
The title of the book comes from the idea that in the ways of crime there is one rule: always have a body to trade; meaning there is an accomplice on who to rat if you get caught.

My only “issue” with Always a Body… was that I found it hard to believe the some of the things Balzic would say and do as being professional. I can’t see the chief of police readily admitting to a deputy warden that he had been drinking the night before and probably too much so. Another huge red flag was the fact that Balzic never followed up on leads. He always took them at face value…which made the ending completely predictable.

Like most mysteries, Always a Body… was laden with characters. I tracked 31 people before I gave up.

Author fact: According the back flap of Always a Body To Trade Constantine “belongs to the world Mario Balzic works in.”

Book trivia: Here is another irksome thing: Always a Body to Trade is part of a series. It’s actually the 6th book and the very first book, The Rocksburg Railroad Murders, is on my list. I’ve read them out of order…again.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “I Love A Mystery” (p 121)

Flashman and the Angel of the Lord

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Fraser, George MacDonald. Flashman and the Angel of the Lord. New York: Alfred A Knopf, 1995.

Reason read: this continues the series started last April in honor of Fraser’s birth month.

If you have been keeping track, the Flashman papers are now in the years 1858 to 1859. Flashman is thirty six years old and back in America where old enemies remember him and new enemies are out to blackmail him. He’s not back by choice, though. Someone from his past had an old score to settle. So here’s Harry, knee deep in the conflicts of slavery…again. This time he’s working with “the angel of the Lord,” John Brown of Harper’s Ferry fame. Yes, THAT John Brown.
Interestingly enough, Fraser decided to scale back the sex scenes for this particular installment. In addition to not having many opportunities to shag the lady next door, Flashman appears to be growing up some. To some he doesn’t appear to be as cowardly or as shallow…He still tries to get out of getting out of the October 1859 raid on Harper’s Ferry but as usual, is unsuccessful.

For some reason I decided to keep track of the aliases of Flashman this time around:

  • Bully Waterman
  • Grattan Nugent-Hare
  • Beauchamp Millward Comber
  • Joshua

A line that made me laugh: “It’s a shame those books on etiquette don’t have a chapter to cover encounters with murderous lunatics whom you’d hoped never to meet again” (p 38).

Book trivia: this is the tenth Flashy book and penultimate Fraser book on my list. Are you keeping track?

Author fact: What haven’t I told you about George MacDonald Fraser? Have I mentioned he died in January of 2008? Well he did.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “George MacDonald Fraser: Too Good To Miss” (p 93).

Pawn in Frankincense

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Dunnett, Dorothy. Pawn in Frankincense. New York: Random House, 1997.

Reason read: to continue the series started in August in honor of Dunnett’s birth month. This is book #4.

When we last left Francis Crawford of Lymond in The Disorderly Knights the year was 1552 and Francis had just uncovered and defeated a spy within the ranks of the Knights of St. John of Malta, Graham “Gabriel” Malett. Francis also had fathered a son, Khaireddin. It’s this son, hidden away somewhere within the Ottoman empire, that presents Lymond with his next challenge. For Khaireddin is being held as a political pawn in a very dangerous game. While Francis had defeated his enemy Graham, he also had to reluctantly let him go to ensure the safety of his missing son.
Some of Dunnett’s best characters return for the plot of Pawn but it’s the addition of Marthe that is intriguing. Marthe, a girl much like Francis in attitude and appearance adds sex appeal and a feisty fire to the plot. You later find out later she is his sister. Duh. Could have seen that coming. Another character I liked seeing return is Phillipa. She turns out to be a little spitfire herself.
Of course there are the intricate twists and turns you have come to expect from a Dunnett book. The chase across seas and deserts is pretty intense and as always, Dunnett does a fabulous job describing the people and places. The “live” chess game is intense.

Only quote to grab me, “With children, you have no private life” (p 293). Not very profound, but I liked it.

Book trivia: Pawn in Frankincense is book #4 in the Lymond series. I said that already. The other thing I would like to add is that you can definitely tell the Lymond series was written by a woman. There is so much attention given to clothing: fabric, style and fit.

Author fact: “In 1992, Queen Elizabeth appointed [Dunnett] an Officer of the Order of the British Empire.” I wonder what one gets out of that besides an impressive title?

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Digging Up the Past Through History” (p 90).

Flashman and the Dragon

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Fraser, George MacDonald. Flashman and the Dragon. New York: Alfred A Knopf, 1986.

Reason read: this is the eighth book in the Flashman series. Hard to believe I started this in April in honor of Fraser’s birth month!

To bring all you historians up to speed: So far in the series Flashman has seen action in four military campaigns: the First Afghan War, Crimea, the Indian Mutiny and the Sioux War of 1879. With Flashman and the Dragon Harry gets himself involved in the Taiping Rebellion. Another worthy note: for this particular installment of papers, George MacDonald Fraser himself acts as editor, admitting he confines his corrections to spelling, while “checking the accuracy of Flashman’s narrative and inserting footnotes wherever necessary.”
Fans of Flashman’s sexual conquests will not be disappointed. As usual, Harry works his charms on a number of different women, the most important being the favored Imperial Yi Concubine, Lady Yehonala (who later became Empress Tzu-hsi). She ends up saving his life (much like my favorite tart, Szu-Zhan, from earlier in the story). “Get ’em weeping, and you’re halfway to climbing all over them” (p 11).

A small word of warning for the faint of heart: there is a lot of detailed violence and torture in this Flashman installment. It’s almost as if Fraser was getting bored with Flashman as just a cowardly womanizer. The action needed to be ramped up a little.

Book trivia: The cover to Flashman and the Dragon is interesting. A nearly naked woman holding a fan is cradled in the arms of a gentleman (not Flashy). The man’s face is partially obscured by the woman’s fan.

Author fact: Fraser has also written a series of short stories, The General Danced at Dawn and McAuslan in the Rough.

BookLust Twist: Are you tired of me saying, “from Book Lust in the chapter called “George MacDonald Fraser: Too Good To Miss” (p 93)”? We only have three more after this one.

The Book Lust Mistakes

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I have (so far) spent ten years with Book Lust and over that course of time I found numerous oddities. I don’t know what made me do it, but here is a list of all the errors or weird things I discovered:

Within the Table of Contents:

  1. The chapter “Eric Kraft: Too Good To Miss” (p 140) is completely missing from the TOC.

Within the text:

  1. The title Moving On does not include an author (page 203). Larry McMurtry’s name doesn’t appear on the page at all.

Within the Index (these are the book, short story and poem titles not included in the index but are mentioned in Book Lust somewhere):

  1. “Ado”
  2. Alice, Let’s Eat
  3. American Practical Navigator
  4. American Fried
  5. The Achieve Of, the Mastery Of, the Thing
  6. “At the Rialto”
  7. “Blind Heron”
  8. “Blue Garden”
  9. Bonny’s Boy
  10. Burn Marks
  11. Bonobo: the Forgotten Ape
  12. “By a Swimming Pool…”
  13. A Bridge Too Far
  14. “Brown Wasps”
  15. Caged Owl
  16. Caddie Woodlawn
  17. Choose Your Own Adventure
  18. A Child’s Life
  19. The Citadel
  20. Casket and the Sword
  21. Crime Novels: American Noir of the 1950s
  22. “Corn-pone Opinions”
  23. Collected Fictions
  24. Cruddy
  25. Crazy Creek
  26. “Days of Pie and Coffee”
  27. “Devil Baby at Hull House”
  28. “Crack Up”
  29. “Dear Derrida”
  30. Dog Next Door
  31. Dream Gold
  32. “Drug Store in Winter”
  33. End and the Beginning
  34. “Ethics of Living Jim Crow”
  35. Ethel and Ernest
  36. Eva Luna
  37. “Exorcist of Notre-Dame”
  38. Freedom at Midnight
  39. Fredericksburg to Meridan
  40. “Forgetfulness”
  41. “Funeral II”
  42. “Golden Retrievals”
  43. “Golden Angel Pancake House”
  44. Ginger Pie
  45. Good Times are Killing Me
  46. Green Eyes
  47. “Goodbye, Place I Lived Nearly 23 Years”
  48. Hitty
  49. “House of Blue Light”
  50. In Between Sheets
  51. In the Gloaming
  52. “Introduction to Poetry”
  53. Julius Knipl, Real Estate Photographer
  54. Jew of New York
  55. Jimmy Corrigan: the Smartest Kid…
  56. Kid From Tomkinsville
  57. “Law of Acceleration”
  58. Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
  59. “Letters from a Birmingham Jail”
  60. Little White Horse
  61. M16
  62. Maus
  63. Maus II
  64. Moffats
  65. Minnow on the Say
  66. Old Yeller
  67. Only Bread, Only Light
  68. Now Read This
  69. Now Read This II
  70. Pendragon Cycle
  71. Red River to Appomattox
  72. Saturdays
  73. Sea is Blue
  74. “Sex Ex Machina”
  75. Second Common Reader
  76. “Stickeen”
  77. “Strip Poker”
  78. Terre des Hommes
  79. Third Helpings
  80. “Tortures”
  81. “Try to Praise the Mutilated World”
  82. “True Love”
  83. Tumbling
  84. War Babies
  85. “Two Tramps in Mud Time”
  86. Wait for Marcy
  87. Ulysseys
  88. Wetware
  89. Wheels Within Wheels
  90. “Workshop”
  91. Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet

Within the Index (these are the authors not included in the index):

  1. Lynda Barry
  2. Eleanor Cameron
  3. A.J. Cronin
  4. Gardener Dozois
  5. Kristin Waterford Duisberg (note: last name was missing – indexed under Kristin Waterford)
  6. Eleanor Estes
  7. Rachel Field
  8. Robert Frost
  9. Phoebe Gloeckner
  10. Slavomir Rawicz
  11. Keith Robertson
  12. Art Spiegelman

Pagination errors in index:

  1. Asimov, Isaac
  2. The Brothers K
  3. Death Comes for the Archbishop
  4. Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood
  5. Paul Eddy
  6. Educating Esme
  7. Grand Sophy
  8. Robert Heinlein
  9. The Hobbit
  10. I Don’t Know How She Does It
  11. In the Fall
  12. Inflating a Dog
  13. Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
  14. Kazuo Ishiguro
  15. Lord of the Rings
  16. Alice McDermott
  17. Moo
  18. Larry McMurtry
  19. Midnight’s Children
  20. Alice Munro
  21. Pride and Prejudice
  22. Remains of the Day
  23. Salman Rushdie
  24. That Eye, the Sky
  25. The Trial
  26. Timbuktu
  27. Vietnam
  28. Winter’s Heart
  29. Dean Young

Title Errors:

  1. Shockwave Runner should be Shockwave Rider
  2. The Eye, That Sky should be That Eye, the Sky
  3. Too Late Boyhood Blues should be Too Late American Boyhood Blues
  4. Twelve Days of Christmas should be Hillary Knight’s Twelve Days of Christmas

Interesting omission: The name of the series has been indexed but not the individual titles within the series. The only reason why I bring this up is because Pearl does list the individual titles in the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

  1. The Pendragon Cycle:
    1. Taliesin
    2. Merlin
    3. Arthur
    4. Pendragon
    5. Grail
  2. The Complete Sherlock Holmes:
    1. A Study in Scarlet
    2. Sign of Four
    3. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
    4. Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes
    5. Return of Sherlock Holmes
    6. Hound of the Baskervilles
    7. Valley of Fear
    8. Last Bow
    9. Case Book of Sherlock Holmes
  3. Irish R.M.:
    1. Some Experiences of an Irish R.M.
    2. Further Experiences of an Irish R.M.
    3. In Mr. Knox’s Country
  4. Sea of Fertility:
    1. Spring Snow
    2. Runaway Horses
    3. Temple of Dawn
    4. Decay of the Angel

Interesting oversight in reverse. This time the individual titles are indexed but not the name of the series:

  1. The Years of Lyndon Johnson

Of course, this is not a comprehensive list. I am not done with Book Lust (not in the least) so there is a possibility other mistakes will crop up. I just felt like posting this now. If there are any additions in the future I will be sure to mark them.

Royal Flash

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Fraser, George MacDonald. Royal Flash: From the Flashman Papers, 1842-3 and 1847. New York: Alfred A Knopf, 1970.

Even though I didn’t remember the plot of Flashman, the first book in Fraser’s series, one detail came rushing back to me immediately when I started Royal Flash – Harry Flashman is definitely not short on ego. He’s the same despicable cad he was in the first book. Within the first few pages of Royal Flash he describes himself as handsome, beloved, admired, and respected. And, like the first few pages of Flashman he winds up in the bed of a beautiful woman almost immediately. But, having said all that, he’s still a coward, albeit a clever one at that. He says brazenly, “The world was my oyster, and if it wasn’t my sword that had opened it, no one was any the wiser” (p 4). This time Flashy has got himself in deep. As payback for an earlier embarrassment Harry is forced to pretend he is Prince Carl Gustaf while the real royalty gets over a bout of the clap. Only, here’s the twist: he takes over for Carl on the eve of his wedding and has to marry the Irma, the frosty Duchess of Strackenz. He is assured the marriage is not binding due to his different religious faith (and the fact he is already married). True to Fraser style, all is not as it seems and Flashman finds himself in one pickle after another.

Couldn’t help myself lines I like, “Royalty – I have Bersonin’s solemn word for it – never claw at their arses to assist thought” (p 113).

Reason read: George MacDonald Fraser was born in the month of April.

Book trivia: this is the second book in the Flashman series. I read Flashman a long time ago (Oct 20, 2009) and had to review my blog to remember what I read.

Author fact: I have heard it said that Harry Flashman is George MacDonald Fraser in disguise. A womanizing coward? Yikes.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter “George MacDonald Fraser: Too Good To Miss” (p 93).

Herb ‘n’ Lorna

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Kraft, Eric. Herb ‘n’ Lorna. New York: Amazon Encore, 2010.

I like beginnings that come out of nowhere and give the reader a resounding slap. Picture this: it’s the preface and our hero, Peter Leroy, gets a boner at his grandmother’s funeral. It’s worse than that because he’s not hunkered down in a pew. While up in front of fellow mourners, delivering the eulogy, he has to find a way to shift his painfully positioned penis without anyone noticing. Talk about uncomfortable! Sounds like one of those dreams when you are standing in front of the class naked, trying to recite the Gettysburg address. If I were a boy I would be cringing to read all this in such detail; instead I’m a giggling girl.
Kraft is well…crafty when it comes to Herb ‘n’ Lorna. It’s the cleverly told biography of the title’s namesakes told from the point of view of their grandson, Peter. He fills in the gaps with an “interview” with an old friend of his grandmother’s. Herb and Lorna were not your average grandparents and their life together was far from ordinary despite outward appearances to the contrary. Herb was a salesman with a passion for tinkering. He liked gadgets and he liked inventing. Lorna was an artist, skilled at carving. Independent of the other they both became involved in the creation of “course works”, little trinkets depicting erotic sex acts disguised as charms or jewelry or buttons or pocket watches. For example, Lorna carved buttons which subsequently were secreted into Red Cross care packages; sent to “cheer” the troops during the war. Herb upon receiving one such button, took these course goods a step further and gave them movement through mechanical engineering. They both picked up the trade from an uncle. They both used this secret work as a means to make extra money. How they got away with living parallel lives without the other finding out seemed a little unbelievable at times.
What makes Herb ‘n’ Lorna such a joy to read is the characters themselves. They are complicated and endearing and their relationship sticks with you long after the last page is read. And I agree with the author, read the preface!

Reason read: I guess there are two reasons for reading Herb ‘n’ Lorna. Eric Kraft was born in the month of February, so that’s reason #1. Reason #2: Herb ‘n’ Lorna is cataloged as a romance at the Monson Free Library. Valentine’s Day = romance = Herb ‘n’ Lorna. I would go a step further and almost call it erotica. It certainly is naughty! 😉

Lines I liked: Oddly enough, even though I loved the book I never thought to quote anything from it.

Book trivia: There was a lot of inner debate about in what order I should be reading Kraft’s “voluminous fiction.” There is the way Pearl recommends: in the order the stories were written and published first (beginning with Little Follies. Then there is the order I chose: in order of the saga. The entire saga (according to Kraft) is first introduced in Herb ‘n’ Lorna. According to Kraft’s website, there is no wrong order and in fact you can start with any book you want.

Author fact: Eric Kraft’s website is as interesting as his writing. You can visit it here. There is a whole section dedicated to Peter Leroy.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called ” Eric Kraft: Too Good to Miss” (p 141).

War Within and Without

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Lindbergh, Anne Morrow. War Within and Without: Diaries and Letters of Anne Morrow Lindbergh 1939-1944. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1980.

This is the last book in Anne Morrow Lindbergh’s series of diaries and letters. War Within and Without covers 1939 – 1944. In the beginning, the Lindberghs have just left France for America. The emphasis of War Within is World War II, of course, and the not so obvious private war the Lindberghs waged with public opinion concerning Charles’s views of Germany and the U.S involvement in the war. After spending nearly three years in Europe (England and France, mostly) the family returns to America where controversy over the political views of her husband continue to be criticized. All of this worries Anne very much as her husband is very vocal on these subjects. In view of the war, she has described this last book as coming full circle. World War I was raging when she was just seven years old. Underlying Anne’s very public life is the home life she struggled to keep private. Charles is “away” a great deal and Anne must entertain guests such as Antoine de Saint-Exupery on her own. She alludes to questioning what makes a good marriage. It leads one to believe there are hints of trouble with Charles. Anne does her best to convince the reader (herself, since it was her diary?) everything is fine. All the while she is crumbling under the pressure of being a good mother, writer, housekeeper, member of society, and of course, wife.

Telling quotes: “Both wars cracked open the worlds from which they erupted” (p xiii), “It is the striving after perfection that makes one an artist” (p 29), “Must get back to life after these days living in a world of the mind alone” (p 36), and “Then Monday he went off again and I have had a long week, tired from it, angry at myself, realizing I am doing too much and none of it well” (p 391).

Reason read: This is the last book I will read in honor of January being Journal Month. Finally!

Author fact: Lindbergh received six different honorary degrees from various institutions.

Book trivia: There is one grainy photo of Anne where credit is given to Charles. It makes me wonder who took the others. They seem “professional” compared to the intimacy of the one taken by Charles.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Journals and Letters: We Are All Voyeurs at Heart” (p 131).

Leopard Hunts in Darkness

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Smith, Wilbur. The Leopard Hunts in Darkness. New York: Doubleday & Company, 1984.

This is the penultimate book in the Ballantyne series. The book opens, as all the others do, with a snapshot of the landscape. This time we follow a bull elephant and his desperate escape from hunters. It’s a savage start to Leopard, but very typical of Smith and very telling of the rest of the story, for it’s all about poachers. The story then follows Craig Mellow out of Africa and into the urban jungle of New York City. At the end of Angels Weep Mellow has just found out his book, Flight of the Falcon has been accepted for publication. Unlike other Ballantyne books in the series, Leopard does not start with a date. The reader is not grounded in the era until later. Of course, in order to make the story go back to Africa, Mellow returns to his homeland to revitalize his country and start a nature preserve with photographer, Sally-Anne. Typical of all Smith/Ballantyne books there is savage violence, passionate love scenes and gorgeous landscapes to draw every kind of reader in.

Just a funny side note: the cover of The Leopard Hunts in Darkness depicts a man holding out a gun at arm’s length, a woman holding a Nikon up to her eye, and a man who looks suspiciously like Elvis reflected in the lens of the camera. The gun-toting gentleman looks a little like Treat Williams!

Reason read: This finishes the series I started in January in honor of Rhodesia’s Shangani Day. In a way I am a little disappointed to be leaving Wilbur Smith’s world.

Author fact: Smith looks a little like the guy on the cover of The Leopard Hunts in Darkness which is to say Wilbur Smith looks a little like Treat Williams!

Book trivia: The Leopard Hunts in Darkness is Smith’s 17th book. Interesting to note, this isn’t the last book in the series. It ends with The Triumph of the Sun, which I am not reading.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Zipping Through Zimbabwe/Roaming Rhodesia” (p 268).

Angels Weep

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Smith, Wilbur. The Angels Weep. New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1982.

We begin The Angels Weep in the year 1895. Right away we join Zouga Ballantyne and his son, Ralph as they search for treasure (what else is new?). The other same old-same old themes are sex, violence and prejudice all leading to another war. The characters are older (Ralph now has a son, Jonathan or Jon-Jon), but their ambitions and attitudes are the same. Even Robyn Ballantyne is the same. She is so desperate to understand malaria that she stops taking quinine pills and infects herself with the virus in order to further her research. As with Falcon Flies and Men of Men, whites are still mistreating blacks and the power struggles continue. It is on this struggle that Smith centers his conflict. He masterfully shows both sides and when one side betrays the other you find yourself asking, “how could they?!” while your rational side is asking, “how could they NOT?!” Friend betrays friend. Years of companionship are wiped away in a single gunshot. Part II of the book takes us 80 years into the future when we meet Ralph’s great grandson and other heirs. Craig Mellow becomes a prominent figure in the end. There is a nice little twist that made me think the series should have ended here. It brings everything full circle.

Line I liked, “There could never be love where there had been blood” (p 98).

Reason read: This is the penultimate book in the Ballantyne series I started in January in honor of Rhodesia’s Shangani Day.

Book trivia: It isn’t necessary to read the other Ballantyne books (Falcon Flies and Men of Men) in order to pick up The Angels Weep, but it helps. Smith does a great job filling in from book to book, but to get the big picture you need to read the series in order.

Author fact: According to the back flap of The Angels Weep Smith took a sabbatical year with his wife and traveled all over the place.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called, “Zipping Through Zimbabwe/Roaming Rhodesia” (p 269).

Georges’ Wife

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Jolly, Elizabeth. The Vera Wright Trilogy: the Georges’ Wife. New York: Persea Books, 2010.

This is the last book in the Vera Wright trilogy. Vera has had a second daughter, Rachel, and this time the father is Mr. George, a professor. Once again, Vera has to keep the identity of the baby’s father a secret because their relationship is clandestine. Although, it is not with a married man this time. Vera has gotten herself romantically entangled with someone she is keeping house for. His spinster sister would not approve of their relationship (although there are times when Vera is convinced the sister already knows). As with the other Vera Wright books, Miss Wright is lonely and alone. Sad line: “To be his and not just on the edge of him and not just now and then” (p 418) suggests that she would like to have an open and honest relationship with Rachel’s father. She goes on to say, “I am accustomed to the idea of being alone, but her words cause an extra emptiness, that of being removed from belonging to a family” (p 426). How sad is that? As with the other Wright books in the series, The Georges’ Wife jumps around. In one chapter Vera’s children are small enough to show off to Miss Georges’s guests and the next they have grown up to both become surgeons. Spoiler alert: all Vera’ life she has been an outsider and incredibly lonely. Even at the very end of the trilogy she has not found true companionship. Mr. George, suffering from Alzheimer’s, doesn’t recognize the word ‘couple’ to describe his relationship with Vera.

Reason read: This is the last book in the Vera Wright Trilogy that I started in honor of Jolley.

Author fact: Jolley died in 2007. The Vera Wright Trilogy is considered autobiographical in nature.

Book trivia: Georges’ Wife is the last book of the Vera Wright trilogy. I said that already. The other piece of trivia is that The Georges’ Wife was only published in Australia. I was able to find it in a three-in-one volume.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Australia, Land of Oz: fiction” (p 30). Again, the only reason for Jolley to be included in this chapter is her notoriety as an author after moving to Australia. There is nothing about Australia in the first two books of the trilogy. At the very end of Thew Georges’ Wife Vera and Mr. George move to Australia.