The Obsidian Chamber - Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child

   2016; 408 pages.  New Authors? : No & No.  Book 16 (out of 20) in the Pendergast series.  Genres : Suspense; Thriller.  Overall Rating: 5½*/10.

 

    The spacious mansion is eerily silent, and that suits Constance Greene just fine.  The butler Proctor, and the housekeeper Mrs. Trask, have both taken temporary leave from their duties.  Mrs. Trask is attending to a sick relative, Proctor left with no explanation, although his departure seems to have been a hasty and unplanned one.

 

    Of course, the owner of the mansion, who also serves as Constance’s guardian, the FBI special agent Aloysius Pendergast, is also missing and presumed dead.  He was swept out to sea while working on a case with Constance a couple weeks ago and undoubtedly drowned.  The FBI conducted an intensive search, but it came up empty, finding neither a dead nor alive Pendergast.

 

    Constance now wanders the mansion halls alone until Proctor and Mrs. Trask return.  She’s in no danger, the estate’s security system is incredibly thorough, and besides no visitors ever come calling.

 

    So it’s quite the shock when some secret admirer starts to woo her, leaving strange gifts for her like a book of love poetry, a feather, a bottle of champagne, and romantic notes.  How in the world did he get past all the security?  Outside of the servants, only Aloysius could do that, and he’s dead.  Even if somehow he survived, romancing just isn't something he would ever do.

 

    So if he’s not the mystery suitor, who else could it be?

 

What’s To Like...

    There are multiple storylines in The Obsidian Chamber to keep you turning the pages.  We start out with Proctor’s abrupt departure, with frequent cutaways to the wooing of Constance.  The equally important plot thread, Pendergast’s whereabouts, is then initiated.  It's not a spoiler to reveal that, since Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child have dubbed this the “Pendergast series” and there’s four more books after this one, which wouldn't work if Aloysius is a corpse.  After that, the last main plotline is introduced: the FBI’s investigation into the Pendergast's demise.

 

    As always, the action and plot twists begin immediately, here with a protracted, 68-page chase that starts at Pendergast’s mansion in Harlem and spans several continents.  I liked that its first stop was the fine city of Teterboro, New Jersey.  My company used to have an important customer there, and I once had to drive the New York and New Jersey thoroughfares to call on them, capped by a timely slam into the New York City 5 o’clock rush hour traffic.  It was quite the hair-raising experience.

 

    Preston & Child never skimp on a variety of exotic settings for these stories.  Here we mostly travel up and down the North American east coast, with brief stops in Europe, and southern Africa.  We are also treated to some Latin classical literature (the poems of Catullus), Afrikaans dialogue (quick, name any other book you’ve read that used that language), and conversational French, including several cusswords plus the esoteric insult “del glouton souduiant!”, for which I was unable to find a precise translation, but it will definitely land you in a fight.

 

    I liked the brief music reference to three extremely obscure, but real, classical composers: Ignaz Brull, whom I've actually listened to, Adolf von Henselt, and Friedrich Kiel.  The book’s title is first referenced at about 60%-Kindle, and plays an important role in the tale.  I finally learned what the initials in the protagonist’s name, A.X.L. Pendergast, stand for, although I’m sure that information was given in earlier books as well.

 

    The ending is so-so at best.  It accomplishes its basic task – Pendergast successfully rescues Constance, which of course was the obvious culmination.  I didn’t find it particularly exciting or twisty.  All the major characters live to see another day, and I was disappointed in how the fate of the main baddie was resolved.  Didn’t any of the good guys ever watch those Austin Powers movies?  Don’t they know what to do when you capture your main adversary?

 

Ratings…
    Amazon: 4.5*/5, based on 2,561 ratings.

    Goodreads: 3.97*/5, based on 14,884 ratings and 1,378 reviews

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Palapa (n.): an open-sided dwelling with a thatched roof made of palm leaves.

Others: Cilice (n.); Incunabula (n.).

 

Excerpts...

    “Mr. Longstreet, these men are clearly not stupid.”

    At this, Longstreet unfolded himself from his chair in a sort of easygoing way, then strolled to the front of the room.  “I’m sorry to be blunt, Agent Spann, but I believe this plan of yours will pretty much guarantee Pendergast’s death.”

    Spann stared at Longstreet.  “I respectfully disagree.  This is classic, exhaustively researched and tested SOP.”

    “Which is exactly why it will fail.”  (loc. 1497)

 

    The feeling of surrealness overwhelmed her again, seeing him sitting in a leather wing chair, smiling in domestic content as he removed a bottle of champagne from a silver ice bucket and poured two glasses, offering one to her.

    “Nineteen ninety-five Clos d’Ambonnay, by Krug,” said Diogenes, raising his glass and touching the rim to hers.

    “Good champagne is wasted on me.”

    “Only until you develop your taste.”  (loc. 3000)

 

DeJesus was a reliable man, but about as intelligent as a side of beef.  (loc. 1211)

    The writing is as always superb, but the storytelling is another matter.

 

    For starters, that opening chase scene is entertainingly quick-paced, but the timing involved in each stage of it is incredibly far-fetched.  I’d forgive that if it was important to the storyline, but it isn't.  Proctor is removed to a half-a-world-away locale, apparently for no other reason than to get him out of the house.

 

    The same letdown arises with the leadership of the FBI probe.  The guy officially in charge, Agent Spann, gets upstaged by a higher-up, Agent Longstreet.  I expected to see some departmental infighting throw spanners into the works, but no, Spann just fades into oblivion and Longstreet performs investigative miracles.

 

    I was shocked when Proctor, alone and in the wilds of a foreign country, brutally stabs one of the locals there, not once but twice, and based on no more than a suspicion that he’s legitimately withholding confidential customer information.  Really?  I expect the bad guys to engage in aggravated assaults, and they do, but not one of the heroes.

 

    Also, it must be nice to have both the FBI computer-geek team and Aloysius’s personal hacker buddy available and capable of tracking down shady business dealings and the whereabouts of anyone, at any place or time, no matter how encrypted that data might be.

 

    Lastly, there’s the matter of the main storyline itself, which in this series usually involves saving the world, solving a murder, stopping a monster, or capturing a psychopath.  Here, Pendergast is stalking his ward Constance, who *willingly* took off with someone else.  You couldn’t even make a kidnapping charge stick against the baddie, and any information about his misdeeds would never be allowed into a trial.

 

    Still, let’s keep things in perspective.  The Obsidian Chamber is the thirteenth book I’ve read in this series, and the first one that failed to thrill me.  It kind of felt like Preston & Child “mailed this one in”, but hey, they’re still batting 12-for-13, and that’s impressive.  The high Goodreads and Amazon ratings notwithstanding, it appears a lot of other reviewers were likewise disappointed in this book.  The big question is whether this was just an anomaly, or marks the beginning in the decline of the quality of this series.  We shall see.  The next book, City of Endless Night, is on my TBR shelf.

 

    5½ Stars.  One last vocabulary tidbit.  Around 40%-Kindle a nautical term comes up referring to a part of a ship’s deck: gunwale.  It’s not the first time I’ve come across it in a novel, but it’s not a word I’d ever used in conversation.  Mentally, I’ve always pronounced it “gun-whale”, but it turns out it rhymes with “tunnel”.  Funnily enough, when it crops up again a short time later, it is respelled, phonetically and incorrectly, as “gunnel”.  I'm now left wondering how many other words that I'm mispronouncing because I only run into them when reading.

Reaper Man - Terry Pratchett

   1991; 353 pages.  New Author? : No.  Book 11 (out of 41) in the “Discworld” series; Book 2 (out of 5) in the “Death” sub-series.  Laurels: 126^th in The Big Read (the top 200 books all-time in the UK).  Genres: Satire; Humorous Fantasy.  Overall Rating : 9½*/10.

 

    You know him.  The Grim Reaper.  Death personified.  Black robe, black hood, nasty-looking scythe.  He’s been around forever.  You don't want to meet up with him.  They say death and taxes are the only two sure things in life.

 

    But maybe the only certainty is taxes.  Because somehow, DEATH has just been forcibly retired.  Apparently his superiors, whoever they may be, are alarmed about his recent behavior.  Lately, DEATH has started to contemplate things.  Existential stuff.  Life and whatnot.  He’s developed a personality.  That interferes with his job performance.  Plus there have been other irregularities.  It’s time to replace him someone less irregular.  A new Grim Reaper.

 

    So see ya later, DEATH.  Time to ship you out to pasture.  Have fun finding out how other species – such as mortals – live out their brief lives.  Good luck on finding another job somewhere.

 

    Like on Discworld.

 

What’s To Like...

    Reaper Man is another fantastic novel in Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series, which placed fourteen of its books in the “Top 200” of something called The Big Read, a survey carried out in 2003 by the BBC to determine the best-loved novel of all time.  Reaper Man finished at #126, and is a brilliant blend of satire, humor, and keen insight into the deeper subject of our mortality.

 

    As usual, there are a bunch of storylines to follow.  DEATH does indeed find a job on Discworld, as a hired hand on a farm, where his ability to swing a scythe is a significant asset.  We also follow the afterlife misadventures of the wizard Windle Poons, who was so looking forward to experiencing reincarnation and investigate the mysterious proliferation of snow globes and shopping baskets. Then there are all those rocks and other inanimate objects that suddenly fly up from the ground and float in the air. Add in some pesky cusswords that breed, and you have just the right amount of plotlines to keep you turning the pages.

 

    Windle Poons and DEATH are the main protagonists, and this may be the story that introduces a character called The Death of Rats, and his lesser-known “mini-me” cohort, The Death of Fleas.  The wizards of the Unseen University play a major role here, which means lots of witty dialogue and plenty of magical bumbling.  I was also happy to see my favorite Discworld being, The Librarian, have a sizable role.  Oook!

 

    It was fun to watch DEATH experience his first hangover, and enlightening to learn how One-Man-Bucket got his name.  I liked Mrs. Cake, a true clairvoyant, but who can only “see” ten seconds into the future.  The talking mayflies were neat, albeit short-lived, and things like hemogoblins, anti-crimes, and autocondimentors just added to the zaniness.  Now if I could only get someone to teach me how to do the “Morris dance”.

 

    The ending was poignant, thought-provoking, and left a bit of a lump in my throat, which is rare for a Discworld tale.  All the major plotlines are tied up, although some of the secondary ones carry over into further installments.  Once again there are lots of hilarious footnotes and zero chapter divisions, which is the norm for Discworld books.  Reaper Man is both a standalone novel and part of a 41-book series.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Apposite (adj.): apt in the circumstance, or in relation to something.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon: 4.7*/5, based on 2,151 ratings.

    Goodreads: 4.24*/5, based on 92,504 ratings and 2,997 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    Something wonderful, if you took the long view, was about to happen.

    If you took the short or medium view, something horrible was about to happen.

    It’s like the difference between seeing a beautiful new star in the winter sky and actually being close to the supernova.  It’s the difference between the beauty of morning dew on a cobweb and actually being a fly.  (pg. 35)

 

    The wizards said that, as followers of the light of wisdom, they owed allegiance to no mortal man.

    The Patrician said that this may well be true but they owed a city tax of two hundred dollars per head per annum, payable quarterly.

    The wizards said that the University stood on magical ground and was therefore exempt from taxation and anyway you couldn’t put a tax on knowledge.

    The Patrician said you could.  It was two hundred dollars per capita; if per capita was a problem, de-capita could be arranged.

    The wizards said that the University had never paid taxes to the civil authority.

    The Patrician said he was not proposing to remain civil for long.  (pg. 82)

 

“Tell someone you’re dead and they look at you as if they’ve seen a ghost.”  (pg. 125)

    Finding something to quibble about in a Discworld novel is always a tough task, but here goes.

 

    There’s a small amount of cussing in Reaper Man (only 8 instances in the first half of the book), and even then it’s limited to the milder epithets, including the cleverly polytheistic adjective: “godsdamn”.

 

    There are a couple of literary plugs for Terry Pratchett’s book The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents, which is amazingly prescient, since it came out in 2001, ten years after Reaper Man was published.  But I read the HarperTorch edition, which came out in 2002, and I suspect they made the sly insertions.

 

    Finally, there were a couple of typos, which is rare for a published book: on/an, anymore/any more, and a weird “Δ60” notation on page 122.  I’m guessing that’s some sort of esoteric shorthand in publishing lingo.

 

    So much for nitpicking.  IMHO, Reaper Man is one of the top books in Terry Pratchett's superlative Discworld series, and is comedic fantasy at its finest.  I highly recommend it, and the entire series for that matter, to any and all.

 

    9½ Stars.  One last note.  There is a bit of a love story in Reaper Man, which is a rare occurrence in a Discworld novel.  It was partly responsible for the lump in my throat at the end of the book, and demonstrates just how versatile of a writer Terry Pratchett was.

Babylon - Paul Kriwaczek

   2010; 283 pages.  Full Title: Babylon: Mesopotamia and the Birth of Civilisation (sic).  New Author? : Yes.  Genres : Mesopotamia; History; Ancient History; Non-Fiction.  Overall Rating : 9½*/10.

 

   Without a doubt, my favorite class in 7^th grade was History, more specifically, World History, Part One.  The details are hazy, it’s been a few decades, but I do remember learning bits and pieces about a place called Mesopotamia, aka “The Cradle of Civilization”, the land in Asia between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.  Here’s what I recall.

 

    First there were the Sumerians.  Who got conquered by the Akkadians.  Who got conquered by the Babylonians, followed by the Assyrians.  Or maybe vice versa. Or maybe both.  Then the Persians conquered everybody.  Then Alexander the Great kicked the Persians' butts, and that was the end of the Mesopotamian empires.

 

    They wrote on clay tablets in something called cuneiform, a strange writing consisting of grooves.  One of the kings was named Hammurabi, who wrote some famous laws.  “An eye for an eye” and all that.  They built terraced pyramid-like things called ziggurats.  A king named Nebuchadnezzar figures in there somewhere, and they liked to use a “bas-relief” style in their architecture.  Don’t ask me why I remember that last bit.

 

    That’s about it, which is kind of embarrassing since I consider myself a history buff, with emphasis on the ancient stuff.  That's why I decided to read Paul Kriwaczek’s book, Babylon.

 

What’s To Like...

    The book is divided into ten chapters, the first of which gives an introductory overview.  Chapter 2 is devoted to “Before 4000 BC”, with each subsequent chapter moving straightforwardly up the timeline, culminating with chapter 10, dealing with “After 700 BC”.   Paul Kriwaczek considers the Persian conquest to be the end of the story.  To me the “European” triumph by Alexander the Great seems a more logical stopping point, but hey, that’s splitting hairs.

 

    The writing style is what I call “scholarly”, with long sentences and big words, and I liked that.  The text is written mostly in English, but sometimes in American, kind of like somebody made half an effort to accommodate us Yanks.  So you have an extra “u” in “colours”, but the “z” spelling of “recognize”.  Weirdly, it’s “civilization” throughout the text EXCEPT for the cover page (see above) where it’s “civilisation”.  Go figure.

 

    Paul Kriwaczek mostly presents what we know about each era based on the available archaeological evidence.  He points out that we’ve barely scratched the surface in this regard: most of the known archaeological sites have not yet been excavated, and only fraction of the million or so cuneiform documents have been studied and translated.  It is a tremendous asset that we can decipher cuneiform, but apparently many of the glyphs can have multiple meanings, which muddies the translating.

 

    Cuneiform tablets have one major advantage over writing on papyrus: the latter disintegrates with time when it’s buried in desert sands, but clay tablets don’t degrade at all.  So there are a surprising number of cuneiform documents still around (albeit, often in pieces), with all sorts of topics to read about, such as:

    Chemistry: how to artificially make lapis lazuli

    Mathematics: how to calculate in a base-60 numbering system (wowza!)

    Agriculture: the best way to grow crops (kind of a Farmer’s Almanac)

    Baking: recipes for making pastries

    Beer: some Babylonian drinking songs (really!)

 

    Babylon added depth to my Mesopotamian history knowledge.  For instance, Sumer and Akkad both had a much more profound and long-lasting impact on the area's culture than I thought.  They had a well-developed sewage-disposal system early on, told elaborate stories on vases, and believed the entire world floated on a huge freshwater lake.  Now I can’t wait to teach my drinking buddies some Babylonian booze songs.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.4/5 based on 365 ratings.

    Goodreads: 3.94/5 based on 1,421 ratings and 166 reviews

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Numinous (adj.) : having a strong religious or spiritual quality.

Others: Fossicking (v.); Caesura (n.); Dirigiste (adj.); Laissez-Passer (n.); Chowkidar (n.); Entrepot (n.); Clowder (n.).

 

Excerpts...

    This elite class could not appear in society while stone technology was still the mainstream.  Stone is an egalitarian material.  Even the special varieties needed for tool-making are found widely distributed, and by long tradition going back to the beginning of the genus Homo, each household made its own tools.  There were always, no doubt, specialists who excelled at the manufacture of particular items, but in the main, making stone tools was seen as a private, domestic activity.

    The introduction of metal-working changed all that.  (loc. 2023)

 

    Though fallacious, the belief in omens tells us something important about the Babylonians’ outlook.  They saw the world as based on laws and rules: if this occurs, then that is likely to follow.  To them events did not take place, as some religious believers hold even now, because God or the gods arbitrarily decreed from moment to moment that they should.  Babylonians did not think, as even modern Kabbalists do, that the world only exists from day to day by a miracle.  Rather they noted that there was an underlying order and logic to the universe, which careful observation had the power to disclose.  Today we call that science.  (loc. 3435)

 

Kindle Details…

    Babylon sells for $11.99 at Amazon.  Paul Kriwaczek has three other e-books books, two of which are also history-oriented, the third being about how to make a film documentary.  These range in price from $6.99 to $63.99.  That high-end price is for the documentary book.

 

When, perhaps sooner, perhaps later, our civilization finally lies dying in the gutter, some of us will still be looking, as the ancient Mesopotamians taught us to do, at the stars.  (loc. 4879, and the closing sentence of the book)

    My quibbles mostly concern some technical shortcomings in the e-book version.

 

    There’s a detailed index in the back of the book, but since there aren’t any links or page numbers, it’s totally useless.  There’s also a list of 20 photographic illustrations, which sadly were not included in the e-book version.  Last and least, I didn’t expect to find any cusswords in a book about history and archaeology, so the one exception here: the f-bomb, took me by surprise.

 

    Other reviewers were not so enamored.  The full title of this book: Babylon: Mesopotamia and the Birth of Civilisation should be noted.  One person was shocked that the book doesn't mention the (titular) city of Babylon until halfway through.

 

    More creditably, several reviewers didn’t like the author's tie-ins of ancient history to current world affairs.  True, those can be distracting if used too often or in a preachy tone.  But here, I felt they were done effectively, giving the readers food for thought.  See below.

 

    Overall, Babylon was both an entertaining and enlightening read for me: just the right length, just the right depth, just the right balance of archaeology and history.  Perhaps this will spur me to read some other history books that and languishing on my Kindle and TBR shelf.

 

    9½ Stars.  One example of a modern-day tie-in:  At the very beginning, the author points out that both Saddam Hussein and George W. Bush claimed that God had personally spoken to them about going to war in the region; Hussein when he decided to invade Kuwait, Bush when he decided to invade Iraq.  Direct quotes are given for both proclamations.  It worked out better for Dubya.  Deities are a fickle lot.

A Symphony of Echoes - Jodi Taylor

   2013; 364 pages.  Book 2 (out of 12) in the series “The Chronicles of St. Mary’s”.  New Author? : No.  Genres: Time Travel; Paranormal Fantasy; Historical Fiction.  Overall Rating : 9*/10.

 

    You could call it a “going-away trip”.  If you’re an agent at the Institute of Historical Research, headquartered in St. Mary’s Priory in Rushford England, and you somehow survive enough missions to earn your retirement, you get to choose your final assignment: its date, its destination, and its event.

 

    That may sound strange, but agents of St. Mary’s are what you and I would call time-travelers.  They don’t like that term, they’d prefer to be known as historians, observers and note-takers if you will.  Or, in more classy verbiage, “investigators of historical events in contemporary time”.

 

    Kalinda “Kal” Black is retiring from St. Mary’s.  For her final sortie, she’s chosen London in 1888, and more specifically, the Whitechapel neighborhood there.  If that sounds vaguely familiar, it’s the time and place where/when Jack the Ripper was plying his gruesome trade.

 

    Kal would like to go there, strictly as an observer (you don’t want to mess with the actual events, History doesn’t like cleaning up temporal paradoxes caused by meddling time-travelers), to see if she can identify the madman.  She’ll be dressed in the attire of the time, and speak like a native.  It won’t be humanly possible for anyone to know she’s from the future.

 

    But Kal, what if Jack the Ripper isn’t human?

 

What’s To Like...

    A Symphony of Echoes is the second book in Jodi Taylor’s “The Chronicles of St. Mary’s” series, featuring their History Department’s Chief Operations Officer, Dr. Madeleine “Max” Maxwell, as our chrono-hopping protagonist.

 

    If you read time-travel books for their history tie-ins, you’ll love this storyline.  Max embarks upon no less than six time-jumps, including the abovementioned Jack-the-Ripper quest.  We won’t give details of the other five, that would spoil things, except to say one of them is a jump forward, into the future, which hitherto was a department no-no.  Too many ways for things to go wrong.

 

    In addition to the time-traveling agendas, there are a bunch of plot threads to deal with.  To wit: a.) Jack the Ripper proves to be a more formidable foe than expected; b.) Max’s lover and coworker, Leon Farrell, goes missing in action; c.) the Ultimate Evildoer from the first book, Clive Ronan, continues his skullduggery against St. Mary’s; d.) a Shakespearean play has inexplicably been altered; e.) some sort of glitch in the time-hopping mechanism dumps Max and her squad a year off-target on one of the missions.

 

    The book is written in English, not American, so some words have different spellings, such as fulfil, paralysing, chequebook, three-storey, and draught.  There are also some British terms that may sound strange to us Yanks, such as a clothes peg, bollocking, and a type of furniture bench called a settle.  I also had to look up what it means to wear or carry something “Dick Whittington style” (it means “over the shoulder”).  It's always fun to learn new words and terms in a foreign language.

 

    The trips to the past seemed well-researched, especially the final one.  I laughed at the toilet options in the Middle Ages: an outdoor privy, a community midden, and/or indoor buckets that need to be emptied frequently.  Also, one has to recognize that the English language is always evolving.  If you’re want to “blend in” with the locals from centuries ago, you must learn to speak the time-appropriate lingo, although the phrase “the arse of success” is probably good at all times.

 

    The title reference is given on page 222.  The book is written in the first-person POV – Max’s – and I suspect that will be true throughout the series.  There are a ton of characters to meet and greet; that’s no surprise when there are six different missions to six different times and places.  For the most part, you just have to keep track of St. Mary’s personnel, and there’s a handy Cast of Characters at the start of the book, which Jodi Taylor hilariously labels “Dramatis Thingummy”.

 

    The ending is good.  I guessed some of it before it happened, but it was still fun to watch my predictions be confirmed.  All is well in History’s timeline once more, and most of the main characters, both good and evil, live to skirmish another day, which is not true for some of the secondary characters.  I liked the teaser for what I presume is the opening mission in Book 3.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Whiffy (adj.) : having an unpleasant smell.

Others: Bolshie (adj.); Settles (n., plural).

 

Ratings…
    Amazon: 4.6*/5, based on 1,866 ratings.

    Goodreads: 4.13*/5, based on 15,093 ratings and 1,321 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    “Dr. Maxwell, why are you wearing a red snake in my office?”

    “Sorry, sir.  Whose office should I be wearing it in?”

    There was a bit of silence.

    “I understand the medical profession has washed its hands of you.”

    “Yes indeed, sir.  They’ve declared me perfect and there’s no more they can do for me.  I’ve been released.”

    “I prefer the word unleashed.”  (pg. 45)

 

    In the Middle Ages, the Church was the most powerful institution in the western world.  In England, the struggle between church and kings would take centuries to resolve.  Interestingly, in the end neither institution came out on top.  Today, each is as powerless as the other.  As people power emerged, we invented politicians.  We’re not bright.  (pg. 137)

 

“What the hell am I going to do with seventeen dodos?”  (pg. 154)

    The quibbles are negligible.  There’s a small amount of cussing (9 instances in the first 20%), mostly of the 4- or 5-lettered variety.  There’s also one roll-in-the-hay, but it’s tastefully done. 

 

    There’s only a couple typos, but they’re glaring.  One character is “Pinkie” in the text, but “Pinky” in the Thingummy.  Ditto for the guy who’s “Dr. Knox” in the text, but “Dr. Know” in the Thingummy.  And when counting off a group of baddies (page 141), two of them, with different names, get listed as “the fourth knight”.  There also was one though/through typo.

 

    You should be aware that A Symphony of Echoes is a series of six episodes by what is labeled on the book’s front cover as “the disaster-magnets of St. Mary’s as they hurtle around History”. It does not have the typical structure of one overarching storyline.  Also, not all the plot threads get tied up.  The origin of the Jack-the-Ripper entity feels like fodder for a future episode, and Ronan, the chief bad guy, shows a remarkable talent for getting away.  I’m predicting he’ll be around for the duration of the series.

 

    But all these quibbles are trivial.  Overall, A Symphony of Echoes is a great blend of time-travel, historical fiction, and action-intrigue, replete with wit, and with just a smattering of romance that will please the female readers without causing heartburn for the male ones.

 

    9 Stars.  I have a couple more e-books of the series on my Kindle, plus a ten-book paperback bundle given to me last Christmas that resides on my TBR shelf.  So I’m nicely set up to get more deeply immersed in the antics of these temporal historians.

Bone Box - Faye Kellerman

   2017; 481 pages.  New Author? : Yes. Book 24 (out of 26) in the Peter Decker and Rina Lazarus series. Genres : Police Procedural; Serial Killers; Crime Thriller.  Overall Rating : 5½*/10.

 

    It’s a perfect day to be out hiking in upstate New York.  Rina Decker is thoroughly enjoying it, even if there’s no one along to chitchat with, and apparently the newly-opened Bogat Trail was not well-known to other local hikers yet.

 

    It’s autumn, the best time of year to take some nature photos, and Rina’s brought her camera.  Everything is lush and green, the trees are colorful, and there’s one particularly stately oak tree off-trail in the distance, just begging to be photographed.

 

   Wandering off the trail is a little risky:  you could get lost, but Rina’s done it before, and she's carrying a compass for just such a venture.  So it’s off across the woodland, enjoying Mother Nature, and at one point accidentally stepping on a twig sticking out of the ground and snapping it off.  Well now, isn’t that cute, the twig looks like skeletal hand trying to free itself.

 

    Uh-oh.  Upon closer observation, that twig is a skeletal hand.  Don’t touch anything, Rina, you don’t want to disturb the crime scene.  And call your husband immediately, since he's a member of the local police department.

 

What’s To Like...

    Bone Box was my introduction to a long-running police procedural series by Faye Kellerman featuring the husband/wife team of (police detective) Peter Decker and his (private investigator) wife Rina.  This is the book 24 in the 26-book series, so I’ve missed most of the backstory, although I gather they used to live in Los Angeles, and at some point moved to upstate New York to escape the hustle and bustle of city life.

 

    Despite Rina literally stumbling across the first body, most of the focus is on Peter and his intern detective partner, Tyler McAdams as they try to identify the remains that are years-old, and discover who did the dirty deed(s).  This is a police procedural, my favorite crime-mystery sub-genre, and so not surprisingly Peter, Tyler, and the reader spend a large amount of time interviewing any and all those who may have known the victims.

 

    I liked the writing style: it’s witty and fast-moving, full of interesting and well-developed characters.  One of those happens to be transgender, with a spouse who’s also transgender, both of whom are beginning the process of getting a sex-change.  Sound improbable?  Well maybe, but I remember a 1970s article in our local newspaper, The New Times, which chronicled just such a circumstance.

 

    There are a bunch of recurring characters in the storyline: old friends, kids and step-kids, former police coworkers, et al.  I struggled to keep track of them, yet that didn’t negatively impact my grasping of the storyline.

    I liked the literary nod to Stephen King, and the musical nod to Jane Monheit (who?).  I was astounded to learn that Akron, Ohio is reputed to be “The Methamphetamine Capital of the Country”, and if there was a tie-in to the titular “Bone Box”, I missed it.  There’s a small amount of cussing, not a lot, and that impressed me.  I like it when an author can keep you turning the pages without having to resort to excessive use of profanity.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Hinky (adj.) : (of a person) dishonest or suspect.

Others: Orthogonal (adj.).

 

Ratings…
Amazon: 4.4*/5, based on 1,111 ratings.

Goodreads: 3.98*/5, based on 6,964 ratings and 636 reviews.

 

Things that Sound Dirty but Aren’t…

    “I know you’re not the problem.  But, at present, you’re the only scapegoat I have.  Put some clothes on and let’s get out of here.” (loc. 1161)

 

Kindle Details…

    Bone Box sells for $4.99 at Amazon,  The other 25 books in this series cost anywhere from $4.99 to $9.99.  Faye Kellerman has also written some standalone novels, all in the crime-mystery genre, and which range in price from $2.99 to $11.49.

Excerpts...

    “I’m just trying to get a feel for Delilah.  Were the two of you close?”

    Natalie took a tissue and blew her nose.  “She could be secretive.”

    “About what?” McAdams said.

    “If I knew that, I wouldn’t have said she was secretive.”

    Decker smiled.  “What do you think she was secretive about?”

    “Anything she didn’t want to talk about, which upon reflection, was probably a long list.”  (loc. 1567)

 

    “Thanks for coming down.”

    “Like I had a choice?  Why am I here?”

    “I’m asking for your help.”

    “What help?  I can’t help you.”

    “You don’t even know what I’m asking for.”

    “It can’t be good.  You don’t drag a person down to the police station just to get help.  So either arrest me for something or I’m going home.”

    “You want me to arrest you?”

    “Well, no.  I don’t want you to arrest me.  I didn’t do anything arrestable.  I don’t even know if that’s a word.”  (loc. 5637)

 

“I’m old.  I don’t have time to be patient.”  (loc. 4812 )

    Sadly, there’s a lot to quibble about in Bone Box.  We’ll try not to get long-winded about these.

 

    There are way too many WTF’s.  Some examples: Decker leaves Rina alone at their house, despite knowing there's a psychopath stalking her.  Predictable things ensue, but the day is saved by a well-armed good guy showing up at just the right and most improbable moment.  At another point, a key witness who just happens to be hiding out in Decker’s former stomping ground of Los Angeles is quickly located, despite her having changed her name and assumed a new identity.  Such coincidences might be okay in an action-thriller, but not in a police procedural.

 

    The bad guys seem incredibly chatty during interviews, and easily talked out of wanting a lawyer to be present during the questioning.  They're easily persuaded to rat out each other, even when Decker lacks enough evidence to arrest them for something.

    The storyline meanders too much.  The original victim is a transgender male, and I thought the plotline might extensively explore this angle.  But he/she quickly fades into the background as other bodies and near-misses turn up, all female, all young, all straight, and all assumed to be of more interest to the readers than someone looking to get a sex-change.

 

    The biggest problem is the ending.  There isn’t any.  Decker finally figures out who did what to who, and why, but both he and the perps know that he lacks enough proof to convict the them.  This is normally addressed with a few more chapters where the baddies succumb to some clever ploys the protagonists, but here, the story just ends with everything still unresolved.  Talk about a major letdown.

 

    5½ Stars.  In reading the Amazon reviews, I’m not the only one to find the ending to be disappointing.  So maybe Bone Box is just one of the weaker books in this series.  Maybe Faye Kellerman was burnt out when she wrote it.  Maybe that’s why it was discounted at Amazon.  Maybe the earlier books are much better.  We’ll see.  I not ready to give up on such an acclaimed author after just one book.

Game 7, 1986 - Ron Darling

   2016; 226 pages.  Full Title: Game 7, 1986 – Failure and Triumph in the Biggest Game of My Life.  New Author? : Yes.  Genres : Sports; Non-Fiction; Autobiography; Baseball.  Overall Rating : 8*/10.

 

    The 1986 World Series was a baseball fan’s delight.  The Boston Red Sox, a team stocked with veteran players, were trying to erase “The Curse” (aka “the curse of the Bambino”) that had plagued the organization for more than sixty years.  Wikipedia has a page about it; the link is here.

 

    Their opponent, the New York Mets, were a cocky bunch of youngsters trying to win it all for just the second time in franchise history, seventeen years after the “Miracle Mets” in 1969.

 

    What everyone who follows baseball remembers about this series is when Red Sox first-baseman Bill Buckner muffed an easy grounder that would’ve given the Red Sox the championship.  Alas, the ball dribbled through his legs into right field and the Mets rallied to win the game.

 

    What most people forget is that that happened in Game *6*, and although the Mets won, it just meant they’d evened the series at three games apiece.  There was still Game 7 to be played, for all the marbles, a chance for redemption for Buckner and the Red Sox, a chance to complete the miracle comeback for the Mets.

 

    The starting pitcher for the Mets in the series finale was Ron Darling.  This book is his story of that game.

 

What’s To Like...

    Game 7, 1986 was published in 2016 to commemorate the 30^th anniversary of the Mets’ 1986 championship year.  The book is divided into 11 chapters, plus an introduction, with the themes of each section being:

    Introduction: Overview

    Ch. 1: A rainout of Game 7.

    Ch. 2: Growing up a Red Sox fan.

    Ch. 3: The Red Sox batting order.

    Ch. 4: Darling’s the starting pitcher.  First inning.

    Ch. 5: Interlude.  Drug and Booze and After-Hours Partying.

    Ch. 6: Second inning.  Boston leads 3-0.

    Ch. 7: Third and fourth innings.  Darling pulled from game.

    Ch. 8: Fifth inning.  The lonely walk to the clubhouse in mid-game.

    Ch. 9: Sixth and seventh innings.

    Ch. 10: Eighth and ninth innings.  Mets rally to win 8-5.

    Ch. 11: After-game celebration and ticker-tape parade.

 

    The book gives a nice “feel” for what it’s like to be a major league baseball player:  the highs, the lows, the pressure to produce, the camaraderie, and the obsessive analyzing of the opposing team’s roster to gain some edge, no matter how small.  Darling acknowledges that drug-usage was commonplace: cocaine was a favorite, and there was a jar of uppers in the locker room if you knew where to look for it.  Yet this is not a “tell all” book.  He claims to have never witnessed any actual usage, and he doesn’t name names.  That’s his story and he’s sticking with it.

 

     He does a lot of name-dropping, and I thought that was a big plus, since it brought back many childhood sports memories for me.  Richie Allen, Mel Stottlemyre, Gary “Kid” Carter, Dennis “Oil Can” Boyd”, Mickey Mantle, Whitey Ford, Carl “Yaz” Yastrzemski, and many, many more.  He gives detailed analysis of a couple players he especially admired: Keith Hernandez and Lenny Dykstra, and a somewhat less-than-glowing analysis of Darryl Strawberry.

 

    I learned a lot of fascinating things about Ron Darling as well.  He received a death threat after he was named the starting pitcher of Game 7, which meant added stress and dealing with security personnel.  He went to Yale, which is hardly a baseball powerhouse.  Players routinely receive “provocative mail” from admiring female fans.  And he once got arrested and thrown in jail, during the season, for sucker-punching a bouncer at a bar.

 

    The final chapter serves as an effective ending to the book.  There’s the aforementioned celebrating, but there’s also a “savoring the moment” aspect.  The Mets have never won another championship, although they’ve come close, losing in the World Series twice: in 2000 (to the Yankees) and in 2015 (to the Royals).   Ron Darling closes in poignant fashion by looking back on the past 30 years, and musing about “what if” scenarios.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Solipsistic (adj.) : of or characterized by the theory that only the self exists, or can be proved to exist.

Others: Balletic (adj.).

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.5/5 based on 101 ratings.

    Goodreads: 3.68/5 based on 379 ratings and 55 reviews

 

Excerpts...

    When you’re young and stupid and on top of your game, you find ways of convincing yourself you’ll always be young and stupid and on top of your game.  You stick your chest out, you strut, because you’ve been conditioned to stick your chest out, to strut.  You move without thinking, make a lot of decisions you’d like to take back, tell yourself the baseball part can be switched to autopilot while you and your teammates find a bunch of new ways to enjoy the ride.  (pg. 1)

 

    Lenny [Dykstra] was the strangest, most interesting teammate I ever had.  He used to give off this manic Hunter S. Thompson vibe—without the hallucinogens.  You never knew exactly where he was coming from, and the thing of it is, Lenny himself never seemed to know exactly where he was coming from.  He was a bundle of frenetic energy, a freak of human nature.  He moved about the field, the clubhouse, the team bus like a windup toy on tilt.  (pg. 183)

 

I worried.  And then I worried some more.  And then I worried that I was worrying.  (pg. 69)

    There’s not much to quibble about in Game 7, 1986.  As you’d expect in any book about life in a baseball locker room, there is some cussing, although I didn’t find it excessive.

 

    I have nothing but admiration for the author writing about a game where, as the starting pitcher, he was less than phenomenal.  Yes, the Mets staged an exciting comeback, but it is telling that Ron Darling still carries some pain with him about his subpar performance.

 

    In the end, the worst I can say is that it has to be incredibly difficult to write 200+ pages about one baseball game, no matter how important that game was.  Hats off to Ron Darling, along with NY Times bestselling collaborator Daniel Paisner, for doing a creditable job of making the book interesting and enlightening from start to finish.

 

    8 Stars.  Add 1 star If you happen to be nutso about the New York Mets.  Add another star if you paint your face, wear a weird team-colors wig, and wave a giant Styrofoam hand while attending MLB games in your area on a regular basis.