New to Me Authors for October to December of 2012

For the fourth quarter of 2012 My New To Me Authors were few in number. From October through December I read the books of four new authors.

They are:

            1.) The Rule Book by Rob Kitchin;

            2.) In Search of Klingsor by Jorge Volpi;

            3.) The Truth Can Get You Killed by Mark Richard Zubro,

            and,

            4.) Murder in a Cold Climate by Scott Young.

The books had four different settings and time periods with The Rule Book in Ireland in the last 5 years, In Search of Klingsor in the United States and Germany before, during and shortly after World War II, The Truth Can Get You Killed in Chicago in the late 1990’s and Murder in a Cold Climate in the North West Territories of Canada in the mid-1980’s.

 

Of the group my favourite was Murder in a Cold Climate.

Kerrie Smith at her blog, Mysteries in Paradise, has been collecting quarterly lists of New to Me Authors. It is a good means of encouraging the reading of new authors.

 

More Bill's Best of 2012 (Non-Fiction and Most Interesting)

On Wednesday I put up a post on my favourite fiction reads of 2012. All were crime fiction. Today I set out my favourite non-fiction books and a personal category I have titled Most Interesting. The latter category includes fiction and non-fiction.

NON-FICTION

1.) Bush Dweller – Essays in Memory of Father James Gray, OSB edited by Donald Ward (Part I and Part II) – The book is a collection of essays on the relationships Benedictine monk, Father James Gray, developed with Canadians near and far during the 30 years he lived as a solitary at St. Peter’s Abbey in Muenster, Saskatchewan. While living alone he formed deep friendships with many people. 21 contributed essays. In our restless, often frantic, world the essays remind us of the benefits of time spent over cups of tea considering our spiritual lives.

2.) Becoming Justice Blackmun by Linda Greenhouse  – Harry Blackmun was a reserved Minnesota lawyer who happened to be a childhood friend of American Supreme Court Justice, Warren Burger. When nominated to the Supreme Court he was expected to be a solidly conservative justice. Instead, he proved independent and gradually became a strong liberal member of the court.

3.) Hitler’s Empire - How the Nazis Ruled Europe by Mark Mazower – Most of my reading of World War II has been on the battles or the leading figures of the great conflict. In Hitler’s Empire I learned how the Nazis governed their vast territories. More specifically it was frightening to read how they were radically transforming the Slavic lands to the East of Germany. The Nazi ethnic cleansing was dramatic.

MOST INTERESTING

1.) One-L by Scott Turow (Guest post and my post) – For the first time as a blogger I had both a guest blogger and a dual review of a book. My son, Michael, and I both wrote about Turow’s book on 1^st year law at Harvard in the mid-1970’s. We went on to reflect how our respective experiences in 1^st year law compared with Turow.

2.) The Invention of Murder – How the Victorians Revelled in Death and Detection and Created Modern Crime by Judith Flanders (Part I and Part II)– An intriguing look at how Victorian England enjoyed murder cases. The rise of modern newspapers was significantly aided by graphic accounts of murders and trials of those accused. The stage was dominated by re-creations of famous cases. The book also examines the origins of crime fiction. Some of the earliest mystery books were inspired by real life cases. Murder became major entertainment in the 1800’s.

3.) Murder in a Cold Climate by Scott Young – In a prolific career as a writer, Young, ventured into mystery fiction with Murder in a Cold Climate. Set in the NWT in the mid-1980’s his sleuth Inspector, Matthew “Matteesie” Kitogitak, is the first Inuit inspector to be a member of the RCMP. Matessiee feels personally challenged to find a killer who shots a friend of Matteesie in front of him on a plane while the friend is being airlifted to a hospital. The murderer flees from the plane on a snowmobile - a Canadian winter appropriate means of flight. Young was also my "Y" post for the Alphabet in Crime Fiction hosted by Kerrie Smith at Mysteries in Paradise.

I had a good year reading in 2012 but lost ground on the TBR piles. They dare not grow in 2013 or I will have no room left on my home office desk.

Bill's Best of 2012 (Fiction)

For the past 13 years I have listed my best of the year. The choices reflect the year when the books were read by me. They are not always the year the book was published.

My headings reflect my mix of reading, fiction and non-fiction, and an arbitrary personal category, most interesting, for books that I liked beyond the traditional categories. This year all of the fiction read was mystery fiction. This post will set out my fiction picks. On Friday I will have my other picks.

During the year I read 57 books which is an average reading year for me.

FICTION–

1.) The Suspect by L.R. Wright – The first book in the Karl Alberg series set in Sechelt on the Sunshine Coast of British Columbia was my favourite fiction of 2012. Written in 1985 the book opens with 80 year old George Wilcox reflecting on his murder of his fellow elderly neighbour, Carlyle Burke, and deciding not to confess and see if the RCMP can find the evidence to charge and convict him. I have also read the second book in the series, Sleep While I Sing, and am looking forward to reading more mysteries involving Alberg.

2.) Kaleidoscope by Gail Bowen – The 13^th book in the Joanne Kilbourn Shreeve series written by Saskatchewan author, Bowen, sees Joanne retiring but not to a quiet life of ease with paraplegic lawyer husband, Zack Shreeve. After their garage is bombed they move into a condo owned by a wealthy Regina developer. When he is killed Joanne delves into the complexities of property development, municipal politics and urban Indian issues as she searches out the killer. It is Bowen’s 4th book on to make Bill’s Best. The earlier books were Burying Ariel in 2000, The Endless Knot in 2007, The Brutal Heart in 2008.

3.) Trackers by Deon Meyer – A brilliant South African thriller that features at least 26 different types of tracking. Set in Capetown Lemmer is a professional tracker while Milla Strachan, a 40 year old housewife, leaving a loveless marriage is an amateur tracker. Meyer also provided some interesting answers to questions concerning the book and his writing.

3.) Blessed Are the Dead by Malla Nunn – Another book set in South Africa. In the early 1950’s Detective Sergeant Emmanuel Cooper and his African Detective Constable Samuel Shabalala are called from Durban into the countryside on the edge of the Drakensberg Mountains to investigate the death of a young woman. It is a vivid exploration of life in apartheid South Africa and an excellent mystery.

Kerrie Smith at her excellent blog, Mysteries in Paradise, is compiling a collection of 2012 Best lists. Please take a virtual trip down to Australia. There are lots of interesting lists.

The Black Box by Michael Connelly

57. - 689.) The Black Box by Michael Connelly – It is a brilliant title involving a play on the black boxes used on airplanes that are often the source for an explanation of an airplane disaster. Harry Bosch, recounting a former partner Frankie Sheehan, says:

Frankie said it was the same with a murder scene or a murder case. There will be one thing that brings it all together and makes sense of things. You find it and you’re gold. It’s like finding the black box.”

In 1992 Bosch is called into investigating homicides that took place during the riots in South Central Los Angeles after four L.A. police officers are found not guilty of assaulting Rodney King. The body count overwhelms the police.

Bosch is directed to an alley where there is a young white woman shot through the eye. Members of the California National Guard have found the body. To his frustration Bosch has no time for more than a cursory inspection of the crime scene, some photos and quick conversations with the Guardsmen before being called to another homicide. He does manage to find the ejected shell casing.

The victim, Anneke Jespersen, is a Danish freelance photo journalist covering the riots. Memorably she is dubbed Snow White.

When the riot ends other detectives are unsuccessful in solving the murder.

Twenty years later, a forensic review of evidence in open cases determines that the gun used to kill Jesperson was used in two other murders. Bosch in the Open-Unsolved Unit is given another chance to find the killer.

He travels to San Quentin to interview Rufus Coleman who has been convicted of a different murder with the same gun. Skilfully leveraging two letters to the Parole Board, one supporting and the other opposing, Bosch learns from Coleman the name of the gang member who gave Coleman the gun. However, Trumont Storey is dead.

Still Bosch has a thread to the murder. He starts a gun walk looking to find and trace the gun.

At the O-U Unit Lieutenant Cliff O’Toole has just taken over commnd. He is an officious officer focused on statistics clearing crimes. With Bosch practising the principle, everybody matters, rather than statistical police work there is immediate friction. With Bosch’s insolence to superiors ingrained he is soon in trouble. The Professional Standards Bureau, the former Internal Affairs, begins investigating a complaint arising from Bosch’s trip to San Quentin.

At home Maddie is 16. Bosch has a good relationship with his daughter but, because of his obsessive work habits, continues to struggle with managing his time so he can be a full time parent. He is finding it a challenge dealing with Maddie’s determination, as a young woman, to have more control over her life.

Connelly smoothly draws the reader through the investigation and Bosch’s personal life. Bosch conducts his usual tenacious investigation.

In his last book, The Drop, I lamented the one dimensional character of the bad guy. It is not a problem in this book.

I do regret the way in which Connelly chose to end The Black Box. It has too much the flavour of Hollywood for me. From earlier books I know he could have written a better conclusion. I would be glad to exchange emails with readers of the book with regard to my further thoughts on the ending.

The ending turned a great book into a good book for me. (Dec. 30/12)

****

Happy New Year around the world to readers and fellow bloggers! May all the crimes you encounter in 2013 be between the pages or on the screen!

****

My other reviews of Connelly are:

Connelly, Michael – (2000) - Void Moon; (2001) - A Darkness More than Night; (2001) - The Concrete Blonde (Third best fiction of 2001); (2002) - Blood Work (The Best); (2002) - City of Bones; (2003) - Lost Light; (2004) - The Narrows; (2005) - The Closers (Tied for 3rd best fiction of 2005); (2005) - The Lincoln Lawyer; (2007) - Echo Park; (2007) - The Overlook; (2008) - The Brass Verdict; (2009) – The Scarecrow; (2009) – Nine Dragons; (2011) - The Reversal; (2011) - The Fifth Witness; (2012) - The Drop; (2012) - Black Echo; (2012) - Harry Bosch: The First 20 Years; Hardcover

 

Nelson DeMille on War and Returning to Vietnam

The Wall at the Vietnam Memorial

In my last post I put up a review of Up Country by Nelson DeMille. It is an excellent book. It was a book I connected with and which made me reflect on war and its impact.

My connection with Paul Brenner started with his age and background. He was 18 in 1968 when he first went to Vietnam as an infantry soldier. He had grown up in South Boston in a working class family. I am slightly younger and grew up on our family farm.

Opening the book at the Wall of the Vietnam Memorial in Washington D.C. to highlight the name of a soldier killed flooded Brenner with remembrances.

During his return to Vietnam Brenner returns to the 1968 battlefields of his youth. Powerful, disturbing, haunting memories are evoked by the A Shau Valley and the Khe Sanh camp.

I can remember as a teenager reading the stories and seeing the pictures of those ferocious brutal battles. DeMille’s recounting had a greater impact than any news story or photo. DeMille brings forth the visceral experience of teenage boys fighting for their lives in a distant land.

In Anthem for a Doomed Youth there are the poems of men who fought in the Great War, World War I, which was the first major conflict of the 20^th Century. While I have not read comparable poems for Vietnam the prose of DeMille has the same emotional impact.

For Americans of my generation the Vietnam War was their war. Had my grandfather not left the United States a century ago it could have been my personal war.

I knew a Canadian who served in Vietnam with the American military. A few years later I saw him experience a flashback that was frightening in its intensity.

Brenner encounters Vietnamese veterans, both former allies and enemies. He deeply regrets the continuing cruel treatment of South Vietnamese Army veterans by the Communist victors.

Generally there is mutual respect between Brenner and former adversaries. Yet there remains strong buried animosity. With the right trigger each side is ready to take up the battle again 30 years later.

Colonel Mang is an incorruptible dedicated police officer who fought the Americans. In his persistence and dedication to country he is far more like Brenner than either character would admit to publicly. Neither will settle for easy answers that suit the respective establishments of communist Vietnam and capitalist America.

All reflect on the losses. While America lost over 58,000 the wars from 1954 through 1975 cost 3,000,000 Vietnamese lives.

Returning to Vietnam appears to help Brenner dealing with the memories of his time at war. After reading the book I have some understanding on why going back aids many veterans.

In the post-WW I quartet of mystery series I have read, and about which written a collective post, - the Rennie Airth series with Inspector Madden and the Charles Todd series of Inspector Rutledge and Hamish McLeod and the Charles Todd series with nurse Bess Crawford and the Jacqueline Winspear series with Maisie Dobbs - the impact of the war continued long after they came home. In Up Country DeMille shows how, for a later 20^th Century generation, the war equally never ends in the minds of its veterans.

Up Country by Nelson DeMille

Up Country by Nelson DeMille (2002) – Paul Brenner has been shoved into retirement from the Army’s Criminal Investigation Division (C.I.D.) after the case that formed DeMille’s earlier book, The General’s Daughter. Drifting in his life Brenner is called to a meeting at the Wall, the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, on which are carved the names of the 58,000 Americans who died during the war.

His former commander, Colonel Karl Hellmann, calls upon him to undertake a mission to Vietnam. It has been 30 years since Brenner was sent to Vietnam in 1968 as an infantryman with the 1^st Calvary Division. Four years later he had served a second tour of duty in Vietnam. During his first tour Brenner had been caught up in the battles of the Tet Offensive.

Hellmann wants Brenner to investigate an incident set out in a letter a North Vietnamese soldier had sent to his brother. The letter writer recounted witnessing in Hue, during the Tet Offensive, an American Army captain murder an American Lieutenant. Hellmann wants Brenner to track down the witness and interview him about the event and see if he can identify the Captain. A reluctant Brenner decides to return to the land which has defined his adult life.

Brenner leaves behind a developing relationship with his former CID partner, Cynthia Sunhill.

On his arrival in Ho Chi Minh City, the former Saigon, Brenner finds that Colonel Mang, ostensibly of the Vietnamese Immigration Police, has doubts about Brenner’s claim that he is a veteran returning to his battlefields.

In Ho Chi Minh City Brenner finds a frantic culture embracing Western materialism while still governed by the Communist Party.

While there Brenner acquires an aide and traveling companion, the beautiful Susan Weber.

Trying to maintain his cover story Brenner and Weber leave Ho Chi Minh City. Brenner finds himself drawn into a relationship with Weber who is almost 20 years younger. After a life of short term relationships Brenner falls hard for her.

Brenner and Weber go to the A Shau Valley and the plateau on which the Khe Sanh camp was located and Quang Tri. In each location Brenner re-lives his battle experiences. In my next post on Friday I will discuss DeMille’s exploration of war.

Gradually Weber becomes a true partner in the investigation. She is clever and far better at dealing with the Vietnamese people. Brenner comes to rely on her.

As he pursues the investigation Brenner finds he has been misled by his superiors in Washington. Further complicating the investigation are international diplomatic and business intrigues that will be affected by the results of the search.

Brenner is a dangerous investigator as he is determined to seek out the truth no matter the consequences. The journey of the present equally takes Brenner deep into his past.

The book at 702 pages is a grand historical saga wrapped around an excellent mystery.

I have not found DeMille a reliable read. On this war which was also the author’s war (he was an Army Lieutenant in Vietnam) I found DeMille brilliant. DeMille may not be Brenner but the character he created is alive on the pages.

It was a book where I was drawn forward both wanting to find out what was going to happen next in the story and to learn more about Brenner. There comes a moment for me at the end of a very good book when I pause and say that was special. I had that moment this afternoon. (Dec. 27/12)

Christmas Time in Saskatchewan

Photo by Larry Sorensen

Christmas time in rural Saskatchewan always starts with the weather. We know it will be cold with snow. This year we are in the midst of a deep freeze with about 60 cm (2 feet) of snow in the yard.

When I left for the office this morning it was -31C. When I departed for home this afternoon it was up to -22C but the weatherman assured us, and I agree, it felt like -29C.

There was a creak to the opening of the van door that told my older son, Jonathan, that it was very cold!

While cold the hoar frost on the trees is beautiful. The photo with this post was taken in Melfort four days ago.

My younger son, Michael, came by the office later today with the last presents to be wrapped and they are all under the tree.

The Canadian Armed Forces have the furthest north base in the world at Alert on Ellsmere Island and each Christmas they advise us when Santa has left the North Pole. Alert is about 3662 km or 2276 miles north of Melfort.

To accompany Santa across the vast spaces of Canada he will be accompanied by Canadian fighter jets. The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation has the story at http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/story/2012/12/21/pol-santa-rcaf-pilot-flight.html.

In Melfort tonight Sharon, Jonathan, Michael and I will be going to midnight Mass and opening one or maybe more presents depending on the negotiations. With two lawyers in the family and a third in law school there are ample negotiators.

Merry Christmas to all!

 

 

The Brass Verdict by Michael Connelly

50. – 460.) The Brass Verdict by Michael Connelly – A master of crime fiction brings together his lawyer character, Mickey Haller, with his detective character, Harry Bosch. Haller is recovering from rehab for prescription drug addiction when friend and colleague, Jerry Vincent, is murdered. He has named Haller as his successor and he inherits a franchise case, the defence of movie mogul, Walter Elliott, to double murder charges (wife and lover). Bosch is designated to investigate Vincent’s murder. The story focuses on Haller’s defence. Bosch’s investigation weaves around the defence. Haller learns Vincent had a “magic bullet” – evidence or a theory that will devastate the prosecution. Haller finds the bullet. Connelly gives enough evidence and confirmation when Haller has found it but I did not figure out the bullet. While interesting the story is slower moving than most Connelly mysteries. As the trial is about to begin the story takes off as twists starting occurring that I never saw coming. The trial provides a vivid demonstration of how to effectively present demonstrative expert evidence. The twists continue through to the end of the book. As usual Connelly works in some personal history that keeps me hooked on the characters. If the first 2/3 of the book had been as good as the final 1/3 it would have been a great book. (I learned abit of police jargon – the brass verdict is the street solution to solving/avenging a murder.) Hardcover as always. (Dec. 6/08)