Huntress Moon - Alexandra Sokoloff

   2014; 364 pages.  Book 1 (out of 6) in the series “The Huntress”.  New Author? : Yes.  Genre : Vigilante Justice; Crime-Mystery; FBI Thriller.  Overall Rating : 9*/10.

 

    It’s a terrible thing to watch one of your coworkers die.  Just ask FBI special agent Michael Roarke.  While on a stakeout, he witnessed a fellow agent Kevin Greer get run over by a full-sized truck as he stepped out into the street.

 

    Oh well, accidents happen when you’re in the FBI.  Agent Greer got careless while he was focused on the stakeout.  Hmm.  Or did he?

 

    Now that Roarke thinks about it, Greer started out into the street, then stopped and turned around to face a pedestrian on the sidewalk: a pretty female with blonde hair, dressed all in black, and wearing a turtleneck sweater.  Roarke thinks he recalls it looking like she said something to get Greer’s attention which caused him to pause.  In the street.  Which was a fatal mistake on his part.

 

    The woman disappeared after the collision.  Was she a factor in Greer’s death?  Is it even worth investigating?  It’ll most likely turn out to be a waste of time, but Roarke feels duty-bound to look into it.

 

    But without the blonde's name or a motive, how do you go about doing that?

 

What’s To Like...

      The FBI takes a dim view of any of its agents perishing in the line of duty, and an Investigative Team is quickly formed with Roarke heading it up.  Clues are frustratingly sparse to begin with.  It could be a revenge killing, although Greer’s service record is clean.  Or maybe it was a mob hit, since Greer had been working undercover, but would Organized Crime hire a hitman that’s a hitwoman?  Perhaps it was the work of a serial killer, but if so, where are the bodies of previous victims?  Maybe it was just an accident, and Roarke is reading too much into a chance encounter by Greer as he started to cross the street.

 

    It’s not really a spoiler to reveal that that last possibility is quickly ruled out.   This wasn’t an accident; it wouldn’t be much of a tale if it were, and the storyline in Huntress Moon follows the two main characters – Roarke and the perpetrator.  So this isn’t really a whodunit; it’s more of a “whydunit”, and a “what’s-the-killer-going-to-do-next” scenario.

 

    I liked the settings: Portland, Salt Lake City, and several stops along the California west coast, culminating with a visit to Blythe, California, a middle-of-nowhere city, at least when I used to pass through it in my college days.  The title references a rare alternate name for the astronomical phenomenon called a “Blue Moon”.

 

    I thought the storytelling was great.  We get to watch Roarke’s (and the rest of his team’s) deductive reasoning skills in action, squeezing the maximum of various hypotheses out of a minimum of hard evidence.  It was also fun to watch things unfold from the killer’s viewpoint as she carries out her carefully laid plans.  Nonetheless, Alexandra Sokoloff’s writing skills are sufficient to keep the reader (and the FBI) guessing as how the victims are, and were, selected and what motivates her to kill them.

 

    The ending is both surprising and exciting.  Hunter and huntress finally meet up, mutual respect is shown, and a bad situation is rectified.  All the plotlines are not tied up, but this is a rare case where that’s a plus, as I’m sure they will be further addressed in the next book in the series, Blood Moon.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.4/5 based on 8,300 ratings and 1,568 reviews.

    Goodreads: 4.13/5 based on 7,422 ratings and 728 reviews.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Unsub (n.) : unidentified subject (cop slang).

Others: Mediagenic (adj.).

 

Excerpts...

    Sister Frances struck him as fair, if blunt.  She was also absolutely convinced of what she was saying.

    “This ‘brand of hate’ . . . was there anything political about it?”

    She frowned.  “A dash, I suppose.  He called himself an eco-anarchist.”

    Only in Portland, Roarke thought.  He raised an eyebrow and Sister Frances gave him the Cliff’s Notes version without his having to ask.  “Eco-anarchism, also known green anarchism, anarcho-primitivism, anarcho-naturism, anti-civilization anarchism . . . I could go on.”  (loc. 2016)

 

    He held up a hand between them, and forced his voice steady.  “Estancia aqui.  Te escondes.” Stay here.  Stay hidden.  He had no idea what would go down before he could get this girl to any kind of safety, but she didn’t look like she was about to move anywhere anytime soon, and for the moment, that was a good thing.

    And then, because he had to know, he asked, “¿Qué paso?”  What happened?

    She looked out at the body of her attacker with huge, dark eyes.  “Santa Muerte,” she whispered.  (loc. 4618, and it took me forever to figure out how to make that upside-down question mark.)

 

Kindle Details…

    Huntress Moon sells for $4.99 at Amazon.  The other five books in the series will run you either $3.99 or $4.99, mostly the latter.  Alexandra Sokoloff offers several other e-books at Amazon, in the $2.99-$4.99 range, and mostly Thrillers.  She also has authored three non-fiction books featuring tips about Screenwriting, which also go for $2.99-$4.99.

 

“A Bat’s got to do what a Bat’s got to do.”  (loc. 3416)

    The quibbles are minor.  I counted only 14 cusswords in the first 25% of Huntress Moon, although five of those were f-bombs.

 

    I spotted only a couple of typos: Later/later; Milvia/Marias; mantle/mantel, but overall, I’d say whoever did the editing did a good job.

 

    Be aware that, as with almost any law enforcement agency story, acronyms abound.  Some I knew, some I didn’t.  Some were explained; some weren’t.  Here’s a partial list of them: VICAP, BAU, MP report, CHP, DIY, COBOL, CI, BOLO, BFD, OPPLA, MILF.  Some of those are well-known, others were quite esoteric to me.

 

    But enough of the quibbling.  It’s always a joy to come across an author who knows how to write a page-turning thriller, and that was the case here.  The pacing was brisk, the “police procedural” portions were convincing, and I appreciated the inclusion of a couple of red herrings to keep me, and the FBI, on our toes.

 

    9 Stars.  When Roarke and his team were examining the “serial killer” angle, a femme fatale named Aileen Wuornos is mentioned.  I had never heard of her, but it turns out she was real and one of a very small group of American female serial killers.  Wikipedia has a page devoted to her; it is quite enlightening, and the link is here.

Hounded - Kevin Hearne

   2011; 289 pages.  Book 1 (out of 10) in the “Iron Druid Chronicles” series.  New Author? : Yes.  Genres: Urban Fantasy; Mythology; Action-Adventure.  Overall Rating: 9½*/10.

 

    Say hello to Atticus O’Sullivan.  He runs a modest occult bookstore in Tempe, Arizona, where he has a side business of selling herbal concoctions at his store, mostly to the same customers who come to his place seeking metaphysical tomes.

 

    Atticus seems like nice young fellow, but he’s hiding a couple of secrets.  First, Atticus is his alias; his real name is Siodhachan O Suileabhain, a fine ancient Celtic appellation.  Yeah, try saying that one ten times real fast.  And although Atticus looks young, he’s actually more than 2,000 years old.  He’s the last living Druid.

 

    He’s made some powerful enemies over the centuries, some of them deities.  The main one is Aenghus Og , the Celtic god of love (among other things) who’s been chasing Atticus for several hundred years now.  Being an occult bookseller is just Atticus’s latest undercover disguise.

 

    Atticus has just been told by the Morrigan (who?) that Aenghus Og has seen through his disguise, and is on his way to kill him.  It’s time for Atticus to flee once more.

 

    Too bad he’s tired of running away.

 

What’s To Like...

    Hounded is the opening book in a 10-volume urban fantasy series called The Iron Druid Chronicles, and is told in the first-person POV, Atticus's.  I presume this is a completed series since Book 10 was published in 2018, and Kevin Hearne's more recent novels are in a different series.  Our protagonist is a modern-day Druid, and we follow his adventures, which mostly consist of magical creatures sent to either kill Atticus, hoodwink him into a trap, or contrive things to where he owes favors to some person, deity, or magical creature.

 

    The tale is set in and around Tempe, Arizona, home to my alma mater, Arizona State University and where I lived for many years.  So the numerous local references resonated with me, and include: Scottsdale Memorial Hospital, Newman Center, the Arizona Republic newspaper, Papago Park, Mill and University Avenues, the Superstition Mountains, and the landmark Irish pub, Rula Bula.  They’re all real, although that last one has since gone out of business.

 

    Magical creatures abound in the story, among them the Fae, an Iron Elemental, the Morrigan, the Tuatha De Danann, Fir Bolgs, demons, the Zoryas, and a slew of Wiccan witches.  Also, some animals, including wolfhounds and stags, are telepathic.

 

    The action starts right away, with Atticus getting mugged by a gang of fairies on page 4.  The supporting characters were a fascinating bunch; Atticus’s bestie is a magic-infused dog named Oberon, and his two lawyers, both extremely competent, are a vampire and a werewolf.  My favorite not-the-protagonist was the widow MacDonagh, Atticus's neighbor, and witness to several strange happenings.  I liked Hieronymus Bosch and former Arizona Diamondback pitcher Randy Johnson getting nods, and I enjoyed learning how to go about paying off favors to vampires: in wineglass quantities of your blood!  

 

    Everything builds to a gory, twisty, and exciting showdown.  Both combatants have tricks up their sleeve.  The final chapter and Epilogue tie up a couple secondary plotlines.  The Acknowledgments section (page 291) and the Wikipedia article about Kevin Hearne (the link is here), are worthwhile reads.  Hounded is both a standalone story and part of a series.

 

Kewlest New Word…

    Sybarite (n.): a person who is self-indulgent in their fondness for sensuous luxury.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon: 4.5*/5, based on 8,943 ratings and 1,663 reviews.

    Goodreads: 4.09*/5, based on 86,257 ratings and 7,468 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    “Ah, so this is just some vague augury,” I said.

    “No, the augury was quite specific,” the Morrigan replied.  “A mortal doom gathers about you here, and you must fly if you wish to avoid it.”

    “See?  There you go again.  You get this way every year around Samhain,” I said.  “If it isn’t Thor coming to get me, it’s one of the Olympians.  Remember that story last year?  Apollo was offended by my association with the Arizona State Sun Devils—"  (pg. 10)

 

    I would never, ever tire in battle.  I suffered no fatigue at all.  And if I needed it, I could whip up a binding or two against my enemies or summon up a temporary burst of strength that would allow me to wrestle a bear.

    It had been a long, long time since I had felt the need to summon so much power.  But then again, I hadn’t been in a scrap like this since I’d waded into the mosh pit at a Pantera concert.  (pg. 312)

 A nonaggression treaty signed in blood?  Something about that struck me as oxymoronic.  (pg. 285)

    I don’t really have anything major to quibble about in Hounded, hence the high rating.  The cussing is fairly light; I noted just 14 instances in the first 20% of the book, although three of those were f-bombs.

 

    I read Hounded in the paperback format, after being reminded that it was on my TBR shelf by the Kindle format being temporarily discounted a few weeks ago.  Here’s hoping that more e-books in the series are put on sale in the near future.

 

    That’s about it for the nitpicking.  I found Hounded to be well-written, appropriately witty, and with a captivating storyline that kept me turning the pages.  Full disclosure: I’m all about reading any book with Druids in it.

 

    9½ Stars.  One last thing.  In the Acknowledgments section the author gives a nod of appreciation to the Society for Creative Anachronism.  These are the people who like to dress up in medieval fashion and reenact things like jousting tournaments.  They are the reason the Renaissance Fair exists.

 

    My first experience with SCA was many decades ago, when I came across two knights in armor beating the crap out of each other in a swordfight on the lawn of the ASU Hayden Library.  Lords and ladies-in-waiting were watching the combat.  What makes this memorable is that I was under the influence of a hallucinogen at the time.  It was quite the trip.

Daisy's Gambit - Scott Baron

   2018; 342 pages.  Book 3 (out of 5) in the series “The Clockwork Chimera”.  New Author? : No.  Genre : Space Opera; Alien Invasion Sci-Fi.  Overall Rating : 7½*/10.

 

    Arise, ye Earthlings and Chithiids!  And arise ye Cyborgs and even ye AI units!  You have nothing to lose but your chains!

 

    Well, you also have your lives to lose, since you’ll be going up against the dreaded Ra’az Hok, the destroyers of Earth and enslavers of the Chithiid.  Their technology is superior and their forces are far more powerful than anything we good guys can muster.

 

    But they have one weakness: their home planet is many light years away, and their communications and supply lines between there and planet Earth are vulnerable.  They’re aware of that and they’re in the process of developing a super-fast warp drive.  That project is just about completed.

 

    So despite the long odds of success, now is the time to revolt.  And we just might be victorious if our war plan goes perfectly.

 

    In other words, we’re doomed.

 

What’s To Like...

    Daisy’s Gambit is the third book in Scott Baron’s “Clockwork Chimera” series.  As given below, the author offers the complete series as a 5-book bundle for a very reasonable price, and occasionally discounts it.  I recommend investing in the bundle, since I think this is a series where a lot is lost if you don’t read the books in order.

 

    The action starts immediately, literally in the first sentence, and is a logical follow-up to previous book, wherein the seeds of revolt were first sown.  Now it’s time for the four subjugated races—Chithiids, Cyborgs, Humans, and Artificial Intelligences—to join forces and learn to trust each other.  This is no small task, given that there are some amongst them who are still loyal to the Ra’az Hok.

 

    I liked that the personnel at the good guys' moon base still play a key role in the storyline, even though the settings in Daisy's Gambit are exclusively at various locations on Earth.  The key players include Freya, the juvenile AI that Daisy discovered during her lunar sojourn, and who is imbued with equal amounts of learning ability and naivete.

 

    The ending is laced with exciting fight scenes and resolves the main storyline of attacking the Ra’az communication hubs and warp drive research facility.  Some good guys perish, a deus ex machina pops up to save the day, Daisy and Vince are reunited, and all the surviving Terrans now await the enemy’s inevitable counterpunch.  Things close with a teaser for the next book, Chasing Daisy.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.6/5 based on 478 ratings and 36 reviews.

    Goodreads: 4.38/5 based on 397 ratings and 35 reviews.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Shemagh (n.) : a headcloth commonly worn in the desert (google-image it).

 

Excerpts...

    “Enter the code 011235813.  The base is on a swivel, and once unlocked, the mechanism will allow you to slide it aside to descend into the facility.  You are ready with the specs on which explosives and detonators to gather, yes?”

    “Yeah, we have all the info, but hang on.  Isn’t that code a bit obvious?”

    “Not to those who do not follow mathematics,” he replied.  (loc. 12018)

 

    “My sword’s a bit of a psychopath,” she said with a grim chuckle as she pulled the blade free from the alien’s chest.  She watched as the last drops absorbed into the surface, leaving the pristine white blade as good as new once again.

    “You like that thing a bit too much,” Sarah quipped.  “You’re not going to be one of those douches who names their sword, are you?”

    “I wasn’t going to,” Daisy joked back.  “But now that you mention it, I think I shall hereafter call it Stabby McStabberton.”

    “Oh God, you’re ridiculous.”

    “Don’t listen to her, Stabby.”  (loc. 13736)

 

Kindle Details…

    Daisy’s Gambit is priced at $3.99 at Amazon right now.  The other four books in the series are all in the $0.99-$3.99 price range, and there is a 5-book bundle, containing the entire series, for only $7.99, which is the format I’m reading.

 

“Who would have thought an artificially intelligent dishwasher would ever fly a warship?”  (loc. 13198)

    There are some nits to pick.  There were 20 cusswords in the first 10% of the book, which is about normal for this series, and Daisy and Vince celebrate their reacquaintance with appropriate ardor.

 

    Once again, not all of the plotlines are resolved.  Something or someone is butchering the wild bears in Colorado, but who-or-what did it is never revealed.  Ditto for the helpful-but-unseen counter-sniper in Rome.  Inquiring minds want to know the answers to these mysteries, and presumably both of them get addressed in the remaining two books in the series.

 

    There are a couple of the kind of spellchecker typos that usually arise in Indie author books, such as berg/burg, world/word, and tell-tale/telltale.  But these were rare enough to not be a distraction.

 

    For me, the main issue was the Planning-to-Doing Ratio.  A lot more pages were devoted to the former than to the latter.  But if the “Intrigue” half of the genre “Action-Intrigue” is your preferred cup of tea, you will thoroughly enjoy Daisy’s Gambit.  This kind of plan-vs-do ratio holds true for the middle book(s) of many series.  I remember thinking the same thing about The Two Towers in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy.

 

    Overall, Daisy’s Gambit still had enough wit, character-development, and world-building to keep my interest.  After all, overthrowing evil galactic powers takes careful planning, and that’s what is going on here.

 

    7½ Stars.  We'll close with one last nod to the clever password 011235813 cited in the first excerpt, above.  As a math nerd, I greatly appreciated it.

Dodger - Terry Pratchett

   2012; 353 pages.  New Author? : No.  Genres : Action-Intrigue; Historical Fiction; British Literature; Humor.  Overall Rating : 7*/10.

 

    Sooner or later, you pay for every good deed you do in life.  Dodger just learned that the hard way.

 

    He had just popped out of the sewers when a pretty young girl jumped out of a passing carriage and tried to run away.  Two thugs followed her out of the carriage, chased her down, and started beating the damsel.

 

    Dodger may be young, but life on the streets has toughened him, so he pounced on the assailants, drove them off, and rescued the young lady.  But there are no secrets in the rookeries of London.  Now powerful people are offering lots of money for information about the escaped girl.

 

    And for information about the whereabouts of the brazen young lad who helped her flee.

 

What’s To Like...

    Dodger is one of the few Terry Pratchett novels that is not part of the Discworld series, nor even set there.  The story takes place in Victorian-era England and there’s not a single fantasy creature to be found.  Dodger is the street name of the protagonist, a 17-year-old tosher, which, if you’ve never heard of that term (and I hadn’t) means a person who scavenges in the underground sewers.  It’s a historically real profession; Wikipedia has a page about it here.

 

    Terry Pratchett infuses the text with a bunch of 19^th-century English terms, some of which are listed below, plus at least one example of Cockney rhyming slang, here involving the name “Richard”.  One of the main side characters, Solomon Cohen, is Jewish, so a number of Yiddish expressions also crop up.  The characters are a nice blend of real and fictional people, and Pratchett lets you know which are which in the "Author’s Acknowledgments" section in the back of the book.  All of this, plus Pratchett’s writing skills, created a fantastic “feel” for the early 1800s London setting, both above ground and below.

 

    The storyline is straightforward.  After being rescued by our heroic street urchin, the damsel in distress is taken in by a well-to-do family for safekeeping while recovering from her wounds.  A second fortuitous circumstance adds to Dodger being hailed as a hero in both high and low social circles, and he is forced to learn the ways of fraternizing with those of the upper class.  At the same time, Dodger has to contend with thugs of evil intent, while also learning how to go about courting the rescued damsel.

 

    Footnotes, always a Pratchett delight, are occasionally used, albeit sparingly.  The text is divided into 16 chapters, something the author rarely resorts to.  The tone of the story is darker than Pratchett’s Discworld novels (at one point a miscarriage is alluded to); it would have been awkward to try to fit this tale into that series.  But the author’s trademark wit and attention to details are still delightfully and abundantly present.

 

    I liked the references to subjects like Boadicea, Spinoza, angels, and metaphysics.  The inclusion of “The Lady of the Sewers”, aka Cloacina, aka “the goddess of the sewers” was a clever touch.  It was fun to learn the differences between a snakesman, a waterman, a tosher, and a mudlark.  And I hope to never run afoul of Argos Panoptes.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

    Firkytoodle (v.) : to canoodle, cuddle, fondle amorously.

    Others: Toshing (n.); Bubele (n., Yiddish), Shonky Shop (n.); Rookeries (n., plural), Schmutter (n., Yiddish); Growler (n.); Percys (n., plural); Mogadored (v., British), Hey-ho-rumbelow (n., phrase); Waterman (n.), and many more.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.5/5 based on 3,317 ratings and 1,215 reviews.

    Goodreads: 3.94/5 based on 26,049 ratings and 3,101 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    Dodger wasn’t a thief; not at all.  He was. . . well, he was good at finding things.  After all, sometimes things fell off carts and carriages, didn’t they?  He had never stuck his hand into somebody else’s pocket.  Well, apart from one or two occasions when it was so blatantly open that something was bound to fall out, in which case Dodger would nimbly grab it before it hit the ground.  That wasn’t stealing: that was keeping the place tidy, and after all, it only happened what?  Once or twice a week?  (pg. 15)

 

    Dodger had once asked Solomon why he had chosen to come to England, and Solomon had said, “Mmm, well, my dear, it seems to me that in the pinch most governments settle for shooting their people, but in England they have to ask permission first.  Also, people don’t much mind what you’re doing as long as you’re not making too much noise.  Mmm, I like that in a country.”  (pg. 118)

 

If you wanted to be a successful urchin you needed to study how to urch.  (pg. 78)

     The cussing is sparse in Dodger, only 9 instances in the first 20% of the book.  All of those were what I’d call “mild profanity”, and none were f-bombs.

    Sadly, despite Terry Pratchett being one of my all-time favorite authors, there are some nits to pick here.

 

    Everything builds towards good-vs-evil showdown, but alas, things went down way too conveniently in the climax.  For all of their fearsome reputation, the baddies get vanquished way too easily.  Nevertheless, the final chapter is a heartwarming Epilogue, where we get to see how Dodger’s life subsequently unfolds.

 

    An even bigger issue involves the philosophical asides throughout the storyline itself.  Dodger frequently stops to contemplate his lifestyle vis-a-vis that of the various upper crust folks he encounters.  The first couple times he does this, his musings are rather enlightening.  But by the hundredth time he ruminates, you just want to ask him to stop obsessing and think about something else.

 

    Summing up, Dodger is a one-off novel, which conceivably could have been developed into a series, but never was.  I think that’s for the best.  Terry Pratchett is at his best when penning lighthearted fantasy novels.  He certainly has enough skills to also write dark historical fiction, but it won’t be his finest hour.  If you want to see him shine, pick up any of his early Discworld novels.

 

    7 Stars.  Here’s my favorite new Victorian era slang phrase gleaned from reading Dodger: “Tuppence more and up goes the donkey.”  It’s in the Acknowledgment section, and Terry Pratchett laments that he couldn’t find a way to work it into the story.  Google it for enlightenment.

Stargazer - Anne Hillerman

   2021; 320 pages.  Book 24 (out of 25) in the “Leaphorn, Chee & Manuelito” series.  New Author? : No.  Genre : Native American Literature; Murder-Mystery; Astronomy.  Overall Rating : 7*/10.

 

    It was going to be an easy investigation.  The facts were clear-cut.  Maya and Steve are divorced; the latter wants to give it one more try; Maya says no.

 

    Steve gets distraught, drives out into the desert and shoots himself in the head with his own gun.  The firearm is recovered outside the open driver’s-side window, which makes sense since Steve was left-handed.  It’s an obvious suicide, as any detective can tell.  Then things get a bit weird.

 

    While the cops are at police headquarters, wrapping up the paperwork on case, Maya shows up, confesses to shooting Steve, and refuses to give any further details about it.  Officer Bernadette “Bernie” Manuelito, who years ago was Maya’s roommate, is asked to take a closer look at the case.

 

    Then things get even weirder.

 

What’s To Like...

    Although the cover calls this a “Leaphorn, Chee & Manuelito” novel, the latter does all the investigating here.  Leaphorn is now a retired cop, and Chee is busy with a dual role of being both Bernie’s husband and boss. 

 

    As is true of any Hillerman novel, whether it be by Tony or Anne, Stargazer is both a murder-mystery and a study of Native American culture.  But here, as alluded to by the title, a healthy dose of astronomy is added, includ9ng both the technological goings-on at a New Mexico site called the Very Large Array  radio telescope (“VLA”), and what the various star formations such as the Big Dipper, North Star and Milky Way are called in Navajo, and why.

 

    Anne Hillerman utilizes a lot of Navajo vocabulary in the story, but the English equivalent is always given the first time a Native American word is used, and there’s a handy and comprehensive Navajo/English glossary in the back in case you forget.  The Author’s Note, also in the back, is well worth your reading time, especially if you want to know what’s real and what’s fictional in the storyline.  And at one point, Joe Leaphorn gives Bernie some practical tips on how to tell if a person is lying, which I found quite enlightening.

 

    There’s never a dull moment in Officer Manuelito’s workday.  When she isn’t trying to determine why Maya would give a voluntary but false confession, Bernie also has to figure out who beat up and tied up Bee, why is some stranger named Ginger Simons trying to get in touch with her, and the identity of a toddler found dead in the same house as Bee.  Lastly and not leastly, Bernie is assigned to bring in the charming Melvin Shorty on an FTA charge, which provides a bit of comic relief, as exemplified by one of the excerpts below.

 

    The ending is tense, but I didn’t find it particularly exciting.  I’m proud to say I had the perpetrator pegged from the beginning, which is a rarity for me.  But that just meant when perp and cop ended up alone together (is that an oxymoron?), I could pretty much predict what was about to go down and the outcome.  The last two chapters tie up a couple loose ends, including Leaphorn’s fear of flying and why Bernie can’t remember who Ginger is.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.6/5 based on 7,376 ratings and 438 reviews.

    Goodreads: 4.19/5 based on 7,189 ratings and 725 reviews.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

    Bilagáana (n.) : white man; Caucasian; Anglo (Navajo)

    Others:  a slew of Navajo words in the text, all covered in the book’s glossary.

 

Excerpts...

    “Mr. Shorty, the courts don’t care about excuses.  You’ve got to go to jail now.”

    He put his hands in the pockets of his overalls.  “Call me Mel.  Officer Bernadette Manuelito, my wife made some pumpkin pancakes before she left for her job, and there are three of them left.  They sure are good.  Could you use one?”

    She shook her head.  “We need to leave for Shiprock.”

    “What’s the hurry?  You sound like a white person.”  (loc. 685)

 

    Even though Window Rock was in Arizona, the Navajo Nation’s capital city received what they called local news from Albuquerque’s television stations.  Most of the stories concerned fresh crime and ongoing investigations, which, as a veteran cop, he found riveting.  The reporters ignored the Navajo Nation unless there was an election, a pandemic, an environmental disaster, a winning high school sports team, or perhaps a Sasquatch sighting up in the Lukachukai Mountains.  (loc. 2752)

 

Kindle Details…

    Stargazer sells for $8.49 at Amazon right now.  Books 1-18 in the series, written by Anne’s father, Tony Hillerman, are in the $6.99-$13.49 range.  Anne Hillerman took over writing the series when her father passed away; Books 19-25 are by her and are in the $6.99-$14.99 price range.  Book 26, The Way of the Bear, is due out sometime this fall.

 

“You and I seem to go together like flies on a cow pie.”  (loc. 947)

    Stargazer is admirably sparse in profanity; I noted just one “ass” in the entire book.  I am always impressed by authors who use their literary skills to set the tone of a story instead of resorting to excessive profanity.

 

    There is an underlying examination of the abuse of women throughout the storyline, which apparently occurs all too frequently in Native American society.  A couple reviewers took exception to the inclusion of this topic, but I will trust Anne Hillerman’s assertion that it is a major problem on reservations, and am happy she turns the spotlight on it.

 

    My biggest issue with Stargazer was the plethora of irrelevant storylines.  I kept waiting for the Bee and Ginger and Melvin and Leaphorn’s fear-of-flying tangents to tie into the main plot thread in some clever fashion.  But they never did.  Which made them feel like just potholes in the path of the investigation.

 

    This doesn’t mean Stargazer is a poor book.  On at least three counts—Astronomy, Women’s Rights, and Native American culture—it is a noteworthy effort.  And the Murder-Mystery aspect, isn’t bad either; it just wanders off a bit too much for my reading tastes.

 

    7 Stars.  My favorite Navajo expression in Stargazer was the oft-used Yá’át’ééh, which the glossary notes can mean “hello” or “it is good”, and yes it takes four accent marks and two apostrophes to spell that precisely.  I learned the word many years ago from an Apache friend, and it comprises 50% of my Native American vocabulary.  The other half is an Apache insult that is said to be the worst slam you can give to a Native American, and is guaranteed to start a fight in any bar.  We’ll refrain from detailing it here.

The King's Deception - Steve Berry

   2013; 624 pages (and including a 140-page bonus novella).  Book 8 (out of 18) in the “Cotton Malone” series.  New Author? : No.  Genres : Thriller; Action-Intrigue; Historical Thriller.  Overall Rating: 8½*/10.

 

    Way back in January, 1547 the English king, Henry VIII, on his deathbed, reveals to his final wife Katherine Parr, that he was a stash of fabulous riches hidden nearby.  More than 450 years have since passed, and nary a trace of that fortune has ever been found.

 

    Several months ago, a British secret agent was pushed to his death onto subway railway tracks.  Security cameras show a teenager at the scene of the crime, holding a flash drive that he pickpocketed from the agent.  MI6 desperately wants that kid taken into their custody, along with that flash drive.

 

    A couple weeks ago, Cotton Malone’s ex-wife disclosed to him that he’s not the biological father of their son, Gary.  It’s done a number on his head.  It did the same to Gary when she told him as well.

 

    The Scottish government is finalizing details to release the convicted Libyan airplane bomber, Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, from prison for humanitarian reasons.  Megrahi has very little time to live, due to terminal cancer. The American government has found out, is outraged, and wants someone to talk Scotland out of this release.

 

    Somehow, Steve Berry is going to tie all four of these plot threads together into a Cotton Malone action-thriller.  And maybe throw a bit of crossdressing in, just to spice things up.

 

What’s To Like...

    The King’s Deception follows the tried-and-true Steve Berry thriller formula: a bunch of good guys and bad guys, plenty of plot threads, and an interesting historical setting tied into the present-day mayhem.  The “teams” of white-hats and black-hats get shuffled around here, with some of them changing hat colors along the way.  We know Cotton Malone will come out on top, of course, the fun is figuring out how he’s going to accomplish this.

 

    The book’s title references the codename of a ongoing covert CIA operation in England.  The intrigue starts immediately with Henry VIII's confession, and the action kicks in shortly thereafter in the first chapter.  Most of the story takes place in the greater London area, including nearby Windsor Castle, which brought back pleasant memories of my touring the grounds in the wind and rain there some years back..

 

    The storyline builds to a suitably exciting climax as the various characters, which have been scattered about for most of the story, are all brought together via some fortuitous timing (another Steve Berry trademark).  All the plotlines get tied up; the good guys prevail, the bad guys are vanquished, and some secrets are successfully kept secret.  A heartwarming epilogue closes things out.

 

    My paperback version included a 140-page novella called The Tudor Plot, which takes place seven years before the events in The King’s Deception, and features a bit of an alternate timeline involved none other than King Arthur, which is definitely not the norm for a Steve Berry tale.  There’s also an informative “Writers Note” in the very back, wherein the author lets you know which parts of the historical portions are factual and which are fiction.  We history buffs love that kind of stuff.

 

Excerpts...

    A few hours ago she’d been dispatched to the Inns of Court precisely at the same time Blake Antrim had been present.  Everything had been coordinated, timed with precision.

    Which wasn’t so shocking.

    After all, she was dealing with the Secret Intelligence Service.

    In Middle Hall she’d thought herself a knight or a rook on the chessboard.  Now she carried the distinct feel of a pawn.

    Which made her suspicious.

    Of everyone.  (pg. 166)

 

    “What did Thomas Mathews want with you?”

    “So you know the good knight.”

    “He and I have met.  In a past life.”

    “He told me you were an ex-agent.  CIA?”

    Malone shook his head.  “Justice Department.  An international investigative unit, for twelve years.”

    “Now retired.”

    “That’s what I keep telling myself.  Unfortunately, I don’t seem to be listening.  What’s Mathews’ interest here?”

    “He wants me dead.”

    “Me too,” Ian said.  (pg. 237)

 

Ratings…
    Amazon: 4.4*/5, based on 3,965 ratings and 1,078 reviews.

    Goodreads: 3.99/5, based on 13,987 ratings and 1,211 reviews.

 

“[Stephanie Nelle] said you were once her best agent.”  “I pay her to tell people that.”  (pg. 448)

    The nitpicking is minor.  Cussing is sparse: just 5 instances in the first 40% of the book (185 pages), and those were of the “mild” variety.  I don’t recall any “adult situations” cropping up.  I only caught one typo: sight/site on page 246.

    If you’re not a history buff, the amount of details about the Tudors' long reign as the monarchs of England might get a bit tedious.  And trying to keep track of who's turning into a turncoat for and against whom can be a bit of a challenge.

 

    That’s all I can come up with to gripe about.  Overall, I enjoyed The King’s Deception, for its quick pacing and abundance of both action and intrigue.  This is the tenth Steve Berry book I’ve read, and as usual, was an exciting and informative read.

 

    8½ Stars.  FWIW, there is a brief scene-change early in the book, where we get to travel to Brussels, Belgium in order to be introduced to one of the main characters.  He mentions seeing a famous statue called the Manneken Pis.  I had the opportunity to see it on a business trip years ago.  The statue certainly has a unique pose, and if you're ever in Brussels, be sure to go see it.