Category: 2018 First Reads Challenge Page 6 of 10

Finding Felix by Jo Platt: A Charming Rom Com that brought a smile to my face

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On August 30, 2018

In 2018 First Reads Challenge, 2018 Indie-Fever Challenge, Fiction, General Fiction/Literature

Finding FelixFinding Felix

by Jo Platt

Kindle Edition, 258 pg.
Canelo, 2018
Read: August 28 – 29, 2018

‘Head buried in the sand,’ she said. ‘Typical Dot.’

I frowned but didn’t feel able to challenge the statement. I knew she had a point. My tendency to refuse to confront personal challenges and consider their consequences until my nose was pressed up against them was undeniable. In my defence, it was an approach that on the whole seemed to work reasonably well. It cut down considerably on the amount of time spent worrying and stressing about things, and, nine times out of ten, a last-minute fix was just as good as a lengthy, considered and, in my opinion, tortured approach.

However, like it or not, I had to admit that this was not one of those times. This was definitely the one in ten.

This is all thanks to Ian Patrick — if he hadn’t tweeted about this book on Saturday, I wouldn’t have heard about — much less read — Jo Platt’s book (or Jo Platt, come to think of it). The term “romcom” just didn’t seem like the kind of thing I should see coming from him. So I clicked the link, read about the blurb and decided to give it a whirl. There seemed very little chance that anyone would find a dead body, kill anyone or have to defend their lives — which seemed like a good change of pace.

I’m glad I took the shot on this — as you can see from the above, Dot Riley doesn’t think things through too often. And it probably seemed like a good idea to assure her dying grandmother (Nanny Flo) that, no, she’s not single; there’s no reason to worry about her at this time — in fact, she’s dating that old friend from childhood that the whole family loved so much. But faster than you can say Norah Ephron, Nanny Flo makes a miraculous recovery — and she credits the news about Felix for saving her life. Before she realizes it, months have slipped away and it’s time for Dot’s sister’s wedding. Which, naturally, her boyfriend will be attending with her.

Dot has a couple of choices here: come up with a lame excuse for Felix’s absence; telling her family the truth, which let’s be honest, would possibly kill Nanny Flo; or . . . she could track down the man she hasn’t seen since they left for university and get him to go along with the story. Because of the genre, it’s easy to guess which she’ll go for.

She tracks him down and he agrees to go to the wedding with her. You halfway expect them to hit it off immediately, or at least think about it — but Felix doesn’t seem that interested in anything about Dot as a person; and Dot is so thrown by the ridiculousness of her request and how Felix changed (as people do) in the decade or so since she’s seen him that she isn’t really that capable of getting past any of that.

You can pretty much plot out the rest of the book for yourself — but that doesn’t mean that Platt doesn’t have a curveball or two to throw at the reader. And even the parts you do see coming are handled with such aplomb, wit and charm that you’re not sitting there rolling your eyes and saying “yeah, knew that was going to happen.” Rather, you grin and admire how she did it.

The key, obviously, to all this are the characters, in particular, Dot. Platt gives us a great group of characters — whether around for a few paragraphs or for the entire book. Dot’s a mess of a character. But in a good way — she’s tardy, she’s impulsive, she’s frequently unintentionally thoughtless, and she has an uncanny ability to ruin any encouragement she tries to give anyone by poor word choice. But she’s got a big heart and great taste in friends. Thankfully, she’s got a good sister and an equally good best friend/business partner who can keep her from mucking everything up too badly.

Felix is . . . Felix is a good character, too. I don’t think I can say much more without spoiling some of the work Platt did in revealing him. So we’ll move on to . . . Dot’s mother? She tries really, really, really hard not to meddle in her daughter’s lives. Well, she thinks she does, anyway. She loves them, and wants the best for them — and will do everything she can to make sure that her daughter’s do what they need to do get their lives to work out for the best (whether or not that’s what her daughters actually want).

Dot’s father is a hidden gem — possibly the most valuable player here. He’s funny, he’s put-upon, he’s the voice of reason (and humor) working to prevent her mother’s emotional excesses from steamrolling their daughters and their daughter’s significant others.

The relationships that Dot has with her sister and partner — and their husbands — are just great. I’d have easily enjoyed another 80-100 pages of filler conversations between any of them and Dot just to enjoy their interactions. They are cozy, fun, and honest in the way you only can be with those closest to you.

This was silly, it was earnest, it was sweet, it was fun — I laughed out loud a couple of times, and even when I didn’t do that, I appreciated the humor. If you’re willing to buy into the conceit and genre (and I know some of you who wouldn’t be), I can assure you — you’ll have a good time.

Oh, yeah, and there are no killings, attempted killings or lesser crimes committed at all. It’s good to remember that you don’t need any of that to get a good story.

—–

3.5 Stars

Hostile Takeover by Cristelle Comby: Death’s PI is on the Case in this Strong and Original UF Debut

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On August 27, 2018

In 2018 First Reads Challenge, 2018 Indie-Fever Challenge, Fiction

Hostile TakeoverHostile Takeover

by Cristelle Comby
Series: Vale Investigation, #1

Kindle Edition, 355 pg.
2018
Read: August 23 – 24, 2018

On the one hand, I’m annoyed that something about Bellamy Vale, our P. I. protagonist, is revealed in the book blurb for Hostile Takeover. On the other hand, I don’t know how I could’ve written much without slipping myself (but I appreciated the reveal when I got to it, having forgotten everything I read about the book before starting it). Bell works for Lady McDeath, the daughter of Hades. We’re not given many details of the arrangement (which I honestly enjoy — something I’ll get back to in a minute), but it involves her saying “Jump” and him leaping.

Being her emissary on Earth comes with some real benefits — namely, he survives things, events, situations that he shouldn’t. Which is a real plus for a P. I. who annoys mobsters and supernatural beings on a regular basis.

In this particular case, Lady McDeath wants Bell to investigate a couple of deaths that have been officially attributed to a wolf, but it takes Bell a few seconds to realize weren’t caused by anything from this world. The detective in charge of the investigation (naturally) isn’t wild about P. I.s in general, but has a special kind of distaste for Bell. This makes anything Bell does near the scenes, bodies, or anything else a sticky situation. Stickier yet, things that could do what was done to those bodies aren’t supposed to be in our world. While dying is off the table for Bell, he’s not impervious to pain or injury, and the state of those bodies suggests that there’s a lot of pain and injury waiting for anyone who gets between the creature and his/her/its next victim.

To help him along the way, Bell calls upon a hacker friend, Zian, who is not entirely human; a nosy, ambitious, and fierce reporter; a police detective that he’s in an on-again/off-again relationship with (currently, it’s an off); and a few other local contacts/friends who are aware that not everything is as mundane as most people think it is. Overall, this was an entertaining cast of characters — I think we need a little more to the police detective that can’t stand Bell, because right now, he’s too one-dimensional. But otherwise, this is a good group to start a series with, there’s not one of them I don’t want to see again.

Bell himself is pretty much your typical P. I. character — a loner with a tragic past, dedicated to the work he does, willing to take risks for himself (particularly since he knows no mistake is fatal) — but not willing to put others in the line of fire, he has a hero complex for sure. He’s got a decent sense of humor, a good moral code, and a loyal strike obvious to everyone. The added abilities that come from his supernatural patron are pretty neat and I don’t think I’ve seen much like it before.

You can tell that Comby has worked out a lot of behind the scenes stuff she hasn’t shared with us — exactly what drove Bell to make a deal with Lady McDeath (we get hints, and they aren’t pleasant), what he had to do in order to seal the deal, exactly what deities are active in the world (or what pantheons are), what’s the source of the rules governing interaction between the worlds, etc. Comby had to feel a lot of pressure to spill those beans and she resisted — giving us just enough to ground ourselves in this world, but not boring the reader by drowning him in world-building (also giving her time and room to work out some details to make later books easier to pull off). Recently, I’ve complained about fantasy novels withholding too much world-building so that it’s too confusing for the reader to understand what they’re reading. Comby avoided both extremes and therefore succeeded in giving us a world that intrigues, and makes you want to know more about, without feeling utterly stranded.

I had a quibble or two with the book, nothing major. I do think that the motivation for the Big Bad was too sketchy, and the reveal of their identity was tipped far too soon. Bell was just handed a lot of information without having to pound the pavement too much, which isn’t something that really commends a P. I. to me. But only guessing the identity of the Big Bad far too early bugged me while I was reading it — it’s only when I stopped to reflect on the book as a whole that the rest occurred to me. In the moment, the momentum of the storytelling and the strong voice kept me going. Also, I liked the characters enough that I was (and am) more than willing to overlook a few hiccups.

This is a solidly built and solidly entertaining entry to this series — there’s a lot she can do with Bell and the others (depending which others come along), and it’s a world that would be easy to drop new/different deities/monsters/creatures into. The characters are well-developed and the kind that you want to spend more time with so you can see them develop more — I could just watch Zian (and his dad) talk to Bell for a bit and have a good ol’ time, too. I’m definitely interested in more from this series, and I bet most UF readers who give this a chance will be waiting for book two with me.

Disclaimer: I received a copy of this novel in exchange for my honest opinion, the only impact that transaction had on my opinion was providing me something upon which to opine.

—–

3.5 Stars

Jade City by Fonda Lee: Immerse yourself in this world of Magic, Crime and Family

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On August 23, 2018

In 2018 First Reads Challenge

Jade CityJade City

by Fonda Lee
Series: The Green Bone Saga, #1

ARC, 444 pg.
Orbit, 2017

Read: August 15 – 16, 2018

So Fonda Lee has a great idea — others have employed it as well, don’t get me wrong, but the way she does it is great — instead of setting an Urban Fantasy in this world, just a version of it with some magic; you set it in a world a whole lot like this one — but you infuse the world with some sort of magic. A world where technology/science and magic co-exist. It’s enough like this world that you can get your hands around cultural mores and norms.

There’s this stone, a mineral, called jade. It looks a lot like our jade (from what I can tell, Hank Schrader, I’m not). Certain people are sensitive to it, and it enables them to channel magic, some become addicted to the mineral and what it does to them — others (“stone eyes”) are completely insensitive to it and are therefore the ideal candidates to shape it, transport it, and mine it. Only people from Kekon have this relationship with jade (not that unexpectedly, they’re also the world’s source for it).

There are other countries that want jade and what it can do to a person — military uses, primarily. But their people aren’t natively sensitive, so they’re working on ways to engineer the sensitivity. There’s a lot of money to be made controlling the Jade. Years ago — a generation or so — a group of “Green Bone” warriors drove foreign powers from Kekon and assumed control of the Jade trade. Working with the legitimate government, these Green Bones rule Kekon.

They are, for all intents and purposes, a criminal organization — or would’ve been were it not for a divergence of vision — they’re now two rival criminal organizations — with their own rules, laws, rituals, educational systems and cultures. There’s a Cold War between them — a perilous truce, with the citizens of Kekon stuck in the middle (paying tribute, currying favor, and occasionally serving as cannon fodder).

But then something shifts the balance of power — plans that have been brewing for years start to come to fruition and conflict erupts.

We focus on the Kaul family, their soldiers, their leadership, their friends and fortunes. There’s the aged warrior struggling with the weight of glory and past success in the face of the end of their life, there’s the new generation of leadership, trying to live up to the glories of the past and finding it more difficult than they expected. Some have tried to forge new paths in a new world, others are trying to recreate the past.

This is one of those that I can’t think how to describe without ruining everything — so that’s about as much as I’m going to say. The back cover blurb describes this as “The Godfather with Magic.” It’s easy to see why. It’s also incredibly easy to start casting various characters ___ is Michael (clearly), ___ is Tom, and if ____ isn’t Sonny, I’ll eat my hat. I do have real answers for those blanks, but I thought I’d better not give everything away. It is more than just The Godfather with Magic — but you can’t get away from that (unless you’re not that familiar with that particular work — and then you’re not missing a thing).

There’s magic, there’s a mob story, there’s family, love, loyalty . . . you name it, this book has it. Better yet, at the helm of this world you have Fonda Lee who does a great job building this world and populating it with people that the reader can relate to.

This is a rich world full of intrigue, danger, family and magic. It’s a fantastic piece of worldbuilding and you can tell that Lee has great plans in store for these characters, and I can tell that they have no clue what’s coming — and frankly, the readers have less of a clue. I’m looking forward to seeing just what it is.

Note that’s close to a disclaimer, yeah, I said ARC for a book that was published last year. How’d I manage that? Time travel? Well, no. I won the ARC at Indie Bookstore Day (or something like that). So, there be a couple of changes between what I read and the final product, but probably nothing major.

—–

3 Stars

The Drifter by Nicholas Petrie: A Near-Perfect Thriller Debut that You Won’t Want to Miss

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On August 20, 2018

In 2018 First Reads Challenge, Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller, Nicholas/Nick Petrie, Peter Ash

The DrifterThe Drifter

by Nicholas Petrie
Series: Peter Ash, #1

Trade Paperback, 371 pg.
G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 2015

Read: August 16 – 17, 2018

Peter pushed the truck hard toward downtown, the city roads rough with potholes, trying to get to Lake Capital begot they closed the doors for the day.

One eye on the rearview, watching for the black Ford. But it would be easy to miss in heavy traffic. And Peter’s truck would be easy to follow. Unless he was willing to rent a beige sedan, he couldn’t do anything about it.

He didn’t have a plan for Lake Capital. But the principle wasn’t complicated. It was the same principle he’d operated under for years.

Poke a stick into something and see what happened.

This approach to problem solving isn’t new — Philip Marlowe employed it, Spenser loves it, Harry Dresden has invoked it — and I’m pretty sure a certain homeless former MP has mentioned it a time or two. It may be tried and true — but that’s only because it works really well (at least in fiction). Peter Ash is one of the leading candidates for “the next Jack Reacher,” so he might as well employ it, too. It’s a very effective stick in this instance, I should add.

Now Reacher, as you probably know, was a career Army MP, the son of a career Marine officer — he’d spent his entire life living on military bases until his discharge following the Army’s downsizing after the fall of the Berlin Wall. In reaction to that kind of living, he’s taken to walking all over the US, getting to know the country. Peter Ash is a recently discharged Marine Lieutenant, with a couple of degrees in economics, who is wandering around the country a little bit. His reason for it differs from Reacher’s, since coming back to the States after tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, Peter has panic attacks anytime he’s indoors — he calls it “white static.”

This has led to him essentially living in the woods for the past few months, until he heard that his former sergeant and friend, Jimmy Johnson, has killed himself. Peter quickly came to Milwaukee to visit Jimmy’s wife, Dinah. He wasn’t around to help his friend, but maybe he can assuage his guilt by helping out with some much needed home repairs on his behalf.

He starts with the front porch — and while he’s working on it, discovers a hidden suitcase filled with money, and four bricks of plastic explosive. This seems strange, Peter hides the bricks, and gives the money to Dinah. Around the same time, a mysterious figure comes by looking for something (probably the suitcase, but he never mentions is). The two of these together gets Peter’s curiosity piqued — and he sets out to find out what his friend was up to before he died. He barely beings this before someone tries to kill him.

Peter survives, and becomes even more certain that something is going on — Jimmy was on to something just before he died. Peter has to find out what — to honor Jimmy’s memory, protect Dinah and her two sons, and maybe get a little peace for himself — maybe find some forgiveness for failing to help Jimmy.

This isn’t just guy wanders into town, finds trouble and starts hitting/shooting things and people until the problem is solved. Peter has to think, he has to investigate, he takes wrong paths, he really needs to find a shower and a way to clean a very large dog — which isn’t saying anything about the investigation, it’s just another thing he has to do along the way (still, harder problems than you might expect when you throw in his white static). There’s plenty of hitting and shooting, but it’s not the focus.

Yes, Peter is very much in the Reacher mold — but he’s different in very significant ways. The ways in which he’s not Reacher make him a fascinating character on his own. He has a sense of humor, he’s lonely, he’s a bit more self-reflective — he knows that he didn’t come back from the wars whole and intact, and is seeking to fix that. Maybe. He’s got a different kind of education, and a different way of looking at the world. The ways he’s similar to Reacher (good with weapons, devastating to hand-to-hand combat opponents, fast thinking, strategic, etc.) simply ensure that he’s fun to read about. Both of these sides together give us a Thriller protagonist that’s a sheer pleasure to read.

So Peter has “White Static”, Jimmy clearly had problems adjusting to being back home, but they’re not treated as the only ones — there are many others seen and talked about in this book. It’s not done exploitatively, it’s done to highlight the problems and the many, various ways they can be addressed successfully. Nor are they talked about in a way that suggests everyone who comes back from combat service comes back damaged. Nothing is universalized or generalized. I’m certainly not speaking from any kind of first, or even second-hand, experience here — but it appears to me that Petrie dealt with these psyches in just the right way — compassionate, understanding, and accepting.

As there is an element of mystery to the story, I’m not going to talk about the villains much. But they are just as good as the rest of the book — wide-ranging motivations, differing levels of commitment to the enterprise, they’re not all cookie-cutter types. They are not cartoonish, they are not super-villains. They are straight-from-the-headlines evil though. I could absolutely see something like this happening and it working.

I could have spent more time with just about every other supporting character — not in a “hey, you could’ve developed them better” way, but in a “I liked them and enjoyed Peter’s interactions with them” kind of way. Sure, that would’ve involved more character development, but not because they were lacking anything, it just would have worked out that way. Dinah’s an ER nurse with a lot of grit, and isn’t sure what to think of her late husband — but is dedicated to being the best mom she can to their kids. Charlie, their oldest, has learned a lot from his dad and is trying his pre-teen best to live like he should and be “the man of the house.” There’s a woman from the Veteran’s group that tried to help Jimmy who is a wonderful character, too. I could say more about her and the other supporting characters, but you should meet them yourself.

The last advantage that this one has over any of the Jack Reacher novels — and frankly, most Thrillers, is Mingus. He’s a very large dog that Ash finds living under the porch at his friend’s house (that porch led to the discovery of a lot) — he’s a bigger, nastier version of Walt Longmire’s Dog. Just as friendly, too — toward people not being threatening, anyway.

Okay, I obviously found this fantastic. The tension was high throughout; the pacing was fantastic; the actions scenes were fast, furious and believable; the story was clever and yet sensitive to current events, and the people represented by the characters; the stakes were real and believable; Peter’s code and the code(s) of those around him are wonderful to think about, examine and possibly try to adopt. They don’t get much closer to perfect than this — I’m definitely picking up the next two in the series as soon as I can, and I can’t wait to talk about them without nearly so many references to Jack Whatshisname.

—–

4 1/2 Stars

Anaconda Vice by James Stansfield: A Fast, Fun Thriller

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On August 17, 2018

In 2018 First Reads Challenge, 2018 Indie-Fever Challenge, Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

Anaconda ViceAnaconda Vice

by James Stansfield
Kindle Edition, 245 pg.
Manatee Books Ltd, 2018
Read: August 3 – 4, 2016
Retired professional wrestler (of no great fame, but some notoriety), Lucas Winter, runs out of gas on his way back from a personal appearance and finds himself in a very small, very insular town. He gets taken advantage of by a local gas station owner/mechanic, leaving him stranded for a day in a town that seems untouched by the outside world (or maybe that’s just because Winter can’t get even get one bar on his cell phone).

One apparently common problem for a professional wrestler, are small town tough guys wanting to pick a fight with you — to prove that you’re not that tough, or that they really are. Winter finds himself on the business end of one of those altercations, and defends himself well. So well, that he’s kicked out of the only dining establishment in town — even before he can finish his breakfast.

It’s not long before the entire Sheriff’s Department (all 3 deputies and the Sheriff himself) come to take Winter into custody. The man he fought with is dead, and there aren’t a whole lot of suspects.Winter finds himself embroiled in small town politics, a frame job that’s both sloppy and seemingly inescapable — in between the Scylla of impotent cops and the Charybdis a powerful and rich family. He needs to rely on his wits, his charm and a whole lotta luck to clear his name and maybe, just maybe, get out of Anaconda alive.

I wasn’t that crazy about many of the characters — well, actually, just the various family members of the dead man, at least one of them could’ve used a little more depth. The various other townspeople were great, both the people who were around for a page or two or the Law Enforcement types who were with Winter throughout the book.

Lucas Winter himself was a fun protagonist, he’s just funny enough to entertain without turning this into a comedy, and human enough to keep this from being a Jack Reacher clone.

This is a very familiar story, really. But Stansfield puts a couple of very interesting twists on it — I won’t tell you most of them, because that’d spoil the fun. One that I’ve already mentioned is our protagonist’s former life — a middling former Pro Wrestler? That right there is a stroke of genius. He can take some physical punishment — but not a Herculean amount. He can dish out the physical punishment — but not in a Jack Reacher/Evan Smoak way. He’s tenacious, he’s tough, and best of all, he’s desperate.

One teeny-tiny little gripe — if you’re going to write about an American in the middle of the US, don’t talk about kilometers out of town. Manatee Books is a British publisher, so we Yanks can forgive a “tyre” or two, or using “mobile” instead of “cell” — put come on, get lose the kilometers, please.

The book doesn’t hold a lot of surprises — but the ones that it does hold? Wow — I’m pretty sure I yelled at one point. The rest is told by someone very assured and quite skilled at his craft. I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: A familiar tune sung well is just as entertaining to listen to as a new song — same applies to stories. You tell me a story like one I’ve heard before in a way that I an appreciate, I’ll still like it today as much as I did the first time.

A thriller that’ll press all the right buttons, will throw a shock or two at you, and keep you riveted throughout it’s very fast pace — sounds like a pretty good read to me. Check Stansfield and Anaconda Vice out.

—–

3 Stars

Death and Taxes by Mark David Zaslove: The most rootin’ tootin’ shoot ’em up about accountants you’ve ever seen

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On August 16, 2018

In 2018 First Reads Challenge, 2018 Indie-Fever Challenge, Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

Death and TaxesDeath and Taxes

by Mark David Zaslove
Series: Tales of a Badass IRS Agent, #1

ARC, 219 pg.
Aperient Press, 2018

Read: August 13 – 14, 2018
I’m not sure I can go this book justice with a hand-crafted synopsis, I’ll just copy and paste from Zaslove’s site:

           Death and Taxes follows Mark Douglas, an ex-Marine turned IRS agent, who, along with auditing the weird and the profane, also spearheads weekend raids with his locked-and-loaded gang of government-sanctioned revenuers, merrily gathering back taxes in the form of cash, money order, or more often than not, the debtor’s most prized possessions.

Things turn ugly when Mark’s much-loved boss and dear friend Lila is tortured and killed over what she finds in a routine set of 1040 forms. Mark follows a trail dotted with plutonium-enriched cows, a Saudi sheik with jewel-encrusted body parts, a doddering, drug sniffing, gun-swallowing dog named The Cabbage, a self-righteous magician with a flair for safecracking, a billionaire Texan with a fetish for spicy barbecue sauce and even spicier women, and an FBI field agent whose nickname is “Tightass.” All of which lead to more and bloodier murders – and more danger for Mark.

Enlisting his IRS pals – Harry Salt, a 30-year vet with a quantum physical ability to drink more than humanly possible; Wooly Bob, who’s egg-bald on top with shaved eyebrows to match; Miguel, an inexperienced newbie with a company-issued bullhorn and a penchant for getting kicked in the jumblies – Mark hunts down the eunuch hit man Juju Klondike and the deadly Mongolian mob that hired him as only an angry IRS agent can. There will be no refunds for any of them when April 15th comes around. There will only be Death and Taxes.

This is hyper-violent (not that filled with blood and guts, really — there is some), a lot of guns, bombs, more guns. Sometimes played for comedic effect, sometimes it’s the good guys vs. the bad guys. Sometimes, it’s a little of both. It never got to the overkill point for me, probably because this felt more like a cartoon than a “realistic” thriller.* What was overkill for me was the hypersexualization of every woman under the age of sixty. I didn’t need to hear that much about every woman’s physical appearance — there are more gorgeous women with perfect (sometimes surgically enhanced) bodies in this guy’s life than an episode of Miami Vice.

But man, is this funny. There are sections — sometimes a sentence or two, sometimes several paragraphs long — that are the literary equivalent of a shot of espresso, they are so taught with action, cultural references, and humor that you just revel in them. This reminds me a lot of the John Lago Thrillers by Shane Kuhn — I think Kuhn shows more discipline in his plots and characters, but on the whole, these two are cut from the same cloth. The same energy, a similar style, similar sense of humor — and frankly, that stuff is catnip to me. I think the plot got a little convoluted, a little confusing — but it was worth working through.

Am I planning on reading Tales of a Badass IRS Agent, #2? Yeah, I will be keeping an eye out for it. This is a heckuva romp, and will entertain anyone who gives it a shot.
—
* Really, what thriller is realistic?

Disclaimer: I was provided with a copy of this novel in exchange for my honest opinion, which you see above.

—–

3 Stars

Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman: Fine’s a good word for this novel about a lonely woman.

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On August 15, 2018

In 2018 First Reads Challenge, Fiction, General Fiction/Literature

Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely FineEleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine

by Gail Honeyman

Paperback,352 pg.
Penguin Books, 2018
Read: July 31, 2018

I steeled myself as best I could, and, with teeth gritted, using only one finger I typed:

C U there E.

I sat back, feeling a bit queasy. Illiterate communication was quicker, that was true, but not by much. I’d saved myself the trouble of typing four whole characters. Still, it was part of my new credo, trying new things. I’d tried it, and I very definitely did not like it. LOL could go and take a running jump. I wasn’t made for illiteracy; it simply didn’t come naturally. Although it’s good to try new things and to keep an open mind, it’s also extremely important to stay true to who you really are. I read that in a magazine at the hairdressers.

I went into this expecting the next Where’d You Go, Bernadette — it’s “quirky,” “wacky” “hilarious” “warm and funny” “warm and uplifting”, Honeyman is the next Fredrik Backman, etc. I did not find it. I’m not sure I laughed at anything — I might have smiled at something sweet, but nothing more amusing than the above quotation. Do I think I’d have liked it more if it had been funny? Probably not. I probably wouldn’t have read it, however, if I hadn’t thought it was. This is not a bad thing, not every book has to be funny. I’m just saying I went in expecting a chuckle, a wry smile, something amusing and didn’t get that.

Instead I got a sad, but ultimately nice story about a poor, lonely, shy and socially awkward woman dealing with her personal (and repressed) demons the best she could — which really wasn’t all that well. I didn’t find her amusing, I pitied her. I felt bad for her. I got annoyed when people made fun of her. And I wanted her to figure her life out so she could be an amusing character.

Eleanor is 30, has been doing the same job as a finance clerk for a graphic design firm since she got out of university — she goes to work, talks to her “mummy” Wednesday evenings, gets a frozen pizza, some wine on Fridays and knocks off two bottles of vodka each weekend (spread throughout Saturday and Sunday so that she’s “neither drunk nor sober”), then repeats the cycle. it’s not much but it’s her life and she’s fine with that.

Her life goes in that way with very little variance for about a decade, until she’s befriended by an IT worker, Raymond, in her company. Through him, and other accidents, she meets people. She also does things like get a smartphone, go online for things non-work related, and sorta cyber-stalks a musician. Shortly before meeting Raymond, she’d attended a concert of some local bands (won tickets in a drawing at work) and became infatuated-at-first-sight with a singer — in the way that a thirteen year-old girl does when encountering NKOTB/’NSync/One Direction/insert your time-appropriate band. Eleanor’s childhood was such that she delayed this stage until now. On the one hand, I thought this was a great instigation for Eleanor’s life to change, but man, I kept cringing every time the story came back to it.

Minor, very minor, spoilers: Her social life is the best it’s ever been, things are picking up at work, but there’s this delayed adolescence thing lurking — all the while she’s having problems with mummy. Things go horribly, horribly, horribly awry — but then there’s a chance for her to put her life together again, and maybe discover what went wrong in her very bad childhood, so that she can have a better adulthood.

The characters are well-drawn, well-executed, and pretty realistic. The situations — all of them — ring true. Honeyman can write really well. I thought the story moved well, and the reveals, the twists, the heart-warming moments (and the tragic ones) were all spot-on. I just didn’t enjoy the book that much, it wasn’t bad, it wasn’t great. It, like the title character, was completely fine.

Your mileage may vary — and judging by reviews (professional and otherwise), sales, and attention this book is getting, there’s a great chance you’ll think I’m out to lunch on this. I may be.

—–

3 Stars

Pub Day Post — Boise Longpig Hunting Club by Nick Kolokowski: A Gritty, Violent Visit to Idaho

By

On August 13, 2018

In 2018 First Reads Challenge, 2018 Indie-Fever Challenge, Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller, Nick Kolakowski

Boise Longpig Hunting ClubBoise Longpig Hunting Club

by Nick Kolakowski

eARC, 320 pg.
Down & Out Books , 2018
Read: July 28, 2018
Jake Halligan is a bounty hunter — more in the Lori Anderson/JT mold, than a Stephanie Plum-type — in Boise, Idaho and the immediate environs. He’s got a kid, an interesting relationship with his daughter’s mother, and a sister that . . . well, you just have to meet her. But think Bubba Rogowski without the size and clinical diagnosis.

Jake’s a Vet, having served in some of the worst conditions Iraq has to offer. He’s smart, he’s careful — he has people he cares about, so he has to be — and he has a conscience. It doesn’t stop him from doing his job, but it can stop him from enjoying it. Early on in the novel, we find Jake after a rough week at work — and a less-than-friendly exchange with the local police — on the whole, his life is looking pretty good, even if Janine (his ex-wife, fiancé and mother of his child) made him pay a social call on some neighbors. When they get home, Jake finds a dead woman in his gun safe. This plunges Jake into a hunt for a killer — as well as an explanation. He’ll find both, and probably wish he didn’t. It’s a violent, nasty hunt full of crazy characters, drug dealers, Aryan assassins, corrupt police — and people who are even worse than them.

Along for the ride are Janine — I can’t say enough about Janine as a character. From her attitude towards a house without books, to her hidden strength and anxieties — and all points in between. Then there’s Frankie, his sister — she’s cocky, funny, and vicious — she’s the biggest gun dealer in Idaho, not even close to legal, and the law can’t touch her. The law can’t even find her. She’s surrounded by associates/employees who are almost as colorful as she is (some even more so) — and is definitely the person you want at your side (or back) in a firefight.

Which is good — because they’re going to find themselves in a few.

Kolakowski has a great way with his characters — they’re real, they’re human — and they’re larger than life in a way that you’ll absolutely buy, as well as enjoy. When the action starts, it is gripping and exciting — you’ll keep turning pages. When there’s a lull in the action, you can bask in the character moments. I’m not really sure what else can I say beyond that. This is the whole package, you get to spend time with interesting people being interesting, and when they take a break from that, it’s because fists or bullets are flying — or maybe something explodes.

My one gripe — and it’s not much of one, before we get back to me saying nice things. The ending is abrupt. I’m not sure if I can think of a well-known book/movie to compare it to. You’re just reading along, hoping that Jake, Frankie, Janine and the rest survive this mess and then before you really realize what happened, it’s over. You know who survives — and who doesn’t — and the book ends with very little wrap-up (actually the wrap up happens before the ending — that remark will make sense when you read it). Kolakowski had a story to tell and he didn’t drag out the ending, much like his protagonist would approach things, I expect. He got the job done and moved on. I would’ve preferred a little more time after the main events are over — there are things I want to know about the immediate aftermath. There aren’t loose ends left untied, I’d just like to see what they look like after they’re taken care of. You can make a strong case that this is the way to end a book — when things are done.

It’s not often that I can evaluate an author’s use of geography — I know that Robert B. Parker and Dennis Lehane have tweaked Boston, I understand that Butcher goofs re: Chicago’s neighborhoods, etc. but I don’t know that reading the books, I learn that later. It’s rare when I’ve been somewhere a book has been set — a little bit with the Mercy Thompson books (but I’m better at noting pronunciation on the audiobooks that no resident would recognize), I noted that Wesley Chu fumbled a smidge Eastern Oregon in the third Tao book, and that Marilynne Robinson’s Housekeeping was creative with the facts, etc. But by and large, this book takes place in the area I’ve lived in most of my life, so I feel that I can actually comment. — and Kolakowski nailed it. Not just the details, but he’s got the feel, he’s got the atmosphere, the attitude toward change and the out-of-state money that’s bringing the change. he’s changed business names and whatnot, but I can still recognize them — I love seeing this kind of detail brought to life. I’m trusting that his depiction of local crime is hyperbolic, however.

I’m a little worried that it’s as accurate as the rest, actually . . . but we’ll move on.

There’s a visceral feel to this novel and these characters — people in places most don’t think about showing skills, interests, and circumstances that you don’t normally associate with that area. Just a guy trying to make a decent life for his family and himself, who finds himself in dangerous situations. I couldn’t help but think of Jason Miller’s Slim in Little Egypt series while reading his. Jake’s far more capable than Slim, and is far less likely to end up on the wrong end of a beating. But there’s a very similar ethos in the books, and fans of one should grab the other right away.

I’m not going to belabor the point any more, I think it’s clear that I enjoyed the heck out of this — it’s fast, it’s energetic, it’s fun. Go grab a copy of it.

Disclaimer: This book was provided to me by the author in exchange for my honest opinion, which I greatly appreciate.

—–

4 Stars

Ways to Die in Glasgow by Jay Stringer: Three distinct and entertaining voices take you on a tour of Glasgow’s underbelly

By

On August 6, 2018

In 2018 First Reads Challenge, Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

Ways to Die in GlasgowWays to Die in Glasgow

by Jay Stringer
Series: Sam Ireland Mysteries, #1

Kindle Edition, 289
Thomas & Mercer, 2015
Read: July 21 – 22, 2018

Inside the front door of the building, I checked the directory, looking to see which floor the firm was on, only to find that they used all of it. The recession hadn’t reached this far up the street. The reception area was decorated in muted shades of black and tan. Anything that didn’t share that colour scheme was made of glass. A woman who was far too young and far too skinny greeted me. She took my name and waved me into a large waiting area.

She didn’t whisper that she was a child slave or beg for help.

She didn’t ask if I could sneak her a cheeseburger.

So we are just dropped into the action here, no background, no setup, no idea who this guy narrating things is — the very definition of in media res, and, come to think of it — we are also dropped into the very definition of coitus interruptus. In this particular case the interruptus takes the form of a couple of guys trying to kill our narrator. Somehow, Mackie (the narrator) escapes — though injured — and seeks shelter at his Uncle’s place — which turns out to have been recently tossed by persons unknown (the people that came after Mackie?), and his Uncle Rab is nowhere to be found. Mackie gets patched up by his therapist and the two head out to search for Rab.

Once that’s underway, we jump back a couple of hours in time to meet our second narrator, Sam Ireland. Sam’s a newish Private Investigator who made a little splash in the news recently and is working enough to keep going, but not enough to pay rent on the office. So the office is now her apartment. It’s her father’s firm, but he’s in a retirement home and Sam’s trying to keep it alive — with a little help from her brother. Sam’s got an appointment with a potential new client, who insists on very strange meeting times (e.g., 11:23) — it’s the law office described in the quotation above. They’d read about her in the papers and wanted to hire her for some things, but first they want a test run — they’d like her to deliver some legal papers to a local celebrity author. As Sam says “…a Glasgow celebrity. . . is one way of saying dangerous.” He’s writing true crime memoirs now, and there’s a problem with his latest book so they need to serve him with papers — but can’t find him, can Sam? For the price they’re willing to pay, yes, yes she can. The celebrity’s name? Rab Anderson.You begin to see the fun here.

It turns out that our third narrator, DI Lambert, also has a vested interest in finding Rab. But there’s the tiny little thing called a job that is interfering. There’s a suspicious death that he really wants to write off as a suicide, but the guys from the Lab won’t let him. He also has connections to our other narrators. He’s a friend of Sam’s and will occasionally bend a rule or two to help her with some information. He’d also arrested Mackie some years back on a pretty serious charge.

The novel is told bouncing back and forth through each of these narrators (sometimes the same scene is retold from a different perspective) — there’s a little bit of shifting back and forth through time to keep everyone at about the same point, but it’s easy to follow. Each of these narrators has a great and distinctive voice — you really don’t need the chapters to tell you who is “speaking” you get it within a sentence (not that I mind the help). I could easily read an entire novel from one of their perspectives — Lambert’s wouldn’t be as entertaining as either Mackie’s or Sam’s, but it’d still hold up. Bringing these three voices — from radically different backgrounds, education, age, experience, vocation — but all representing Glasgow. Mackie’s a great, great character — he’s the first we get to know in this book, and in many ways, he’s the heart. But Sam’s the star — she’s stubborn, reckless, clever, and resourceful. That doesn’t quite make up for the fact that she’s a small woman with little ability to defend herself — but she frequently has her large brother along to offset that.

One of my favorite parts of John Wick was how we’re dropped into this extensive underground world with relationships, rules, alliances and whatnot — as the film goes on we grow to understand them. Something very similar is at work in this novel — we don’t have a point of entry character, really (Sam’s close), we have nothing really to get us oriented in this reality other than what happens when the characters interact and what we learn from that. This is a rich world full of many colorful, dangerous people. It’s not long before we move beyond the hunt for Rab and dive deep into the murky waters surrounding him, Mackie and Lambert — and hope that at least someone is able to survive before Sam gets drug under as well.

That metaphor may have gotten away from me. But oh well . . .

This is a violent book — make no mistake. It’s a visceral blood bath at times — and its disturbing. But honestly? The hard scene to get through had no blood, no guns, knives or anything. It was a chapter where a father thinks about the trouble his daughter is in and what he can do to help her — it’s a couple of pages long, helps build the tension, it deepens the mystery, and just breaks your heart. Give me a dozen bloody corpses any day over that.

If there’s one thing I’ve learned from Kate McCall and Sam Ireland, it’s that daughters should not take over their father’s PI business unless they’re ready to learn a lot about their father that they didn’t want to know. It’s possible that’s true for daughters taking over any business of their father’s — I’m not sure, I should probably read more about them, but I don’t recall a lot of novels being written about daughter’s taking over for their father’s CPA firm or pizza parlor or dry cleaning business. There’s a pretty big difference between these two ladies (there are plenty of similarities, now that I think about it, too). Kate is surrounded by oddballs, eccentrics, and actors up for anything who are generally good-natured and willing to help her. Sam is surrounded by people she can’t trust, people she shouldn’t trust, a brother who has to be harassed into helping her out, a maverick cop, and a whole lot of shady characters — all of whom (except the brother and probably the cop) would be just as likely to drop her in a grave as they would be to lend her a helping hand.*

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and am definitely coming back for more from Stringer. It’s twisty, it’s violent, it’s got a lot of heart, it’ll put a smile on your face and get you to come back for more. Check out this unique look into Glasgow.

* This isn’t to knock McCall & Co. — I actually rather enjoyed the book, and plan on reading the rest of the series soon. It was just a parallel I thought of when reading this.

—–

4 Stars

Picket Town by Chris von Halle: An Age-Appropriately Creepy SF for the MG reader in your life

By

On August 1, 2018

In 2018 First Reads Challenge, 2018 Indie-Fever Challenge, Fiction, While I Was Reading 2018 Challenge, YA/MG/Children's Books

Picket TownPicket Town

by Chris von Halle

PDF, 178 pg.
Clean Reads, 2018
Read: July 31, 2018

Amanda is bored. Every day is the same — her life isn’t bad, she actually likes it. But she wants more. She’s not sure exactly what it is that she wants — but it’ll be found outside the city limits of New Pines (she calls it Picket Town). She and her friend Sam spend their days after school playing a computer RPG, eating with their families, playing the game some more and repeating the whole thing the next day.

Then something starts happening — some of the kids in town come down with some sort of bacterial infection that requires them to be hospitalized while a cure is worked on. Amanda starts to wonder if everyone is going to be okay — no matter how often she’s assured that the grown-ups have everything under control. She wants to strike out, she wants to learn something — and on the way home from school, they pass the same sign forbidding them to enter the forest that they walk by every day. But this day, this particular day she decides she’s had enough — and then she convinces Sam to come with her. They climb over the fence and explore the forest. This is the most thrilling thing they’ve ever done. Right up until the point that they find a what appears to be a flying saucer (well, a saucer that’s landed). Pretty much everything they’ve ever known ends right there. What follows is exciting, dramatic, and unexpected (well, at least for the target audience — Middle Grade — adult readers will have a pretty good chance of seeing what’s around the corner, most of the time).

I wasn’t so sure that I was going to enjoy this at the beginning, I’m not sure why, it just didn’t seem like it clicked. But it honestly didn’t take long before it reminded me of the better SF I read in grade school, and I was in it for the long haul. Although, honestly, I’m not sure any of the books I read when I was that age would’ve gone where von Halle took this. That’s a compliment, by the way, it may not look like one.

I’m not crazy about the conclusion, I have to say, as much as I liked almost everything that came before. There’s a good twist to it — and I really liked it. But the ending itself? I don’t know — it relied too much on a big info-dump, and then the reveal for Amanda and Sam could’ve been executed a little better. But I think those are quibbles, and I really don’t imagine that there’s a Fourth Grader out there that’ll say the same thing.

This isn’t a MG novel that transcends the label and that’ll appeal to adults — in other words, not everyone is J.K. Rowling. I’ll give you a moment to digest that revelation. This is a MG novel that knows its audience and that will deliver what it wants. Were I in that audience, I’d be re-reading this a few times. I’m not, so I’ll tell people to give it to someone who’ll appreciate it more.

Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book from the author in exchange for my honest opinion, given above.

—–

3 Stars

✔ Read a book with a child narrator.

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