Tag: Top 5 Tuesday

The Annotated Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler

I love The Big Sleep–it was my first Chandler novel, it’s the one I’ve read the most often. And the idea of learning more about it, getting background, digging into to some of the scholarship, etc. sounds great (which is why I ordered it months before it came out in 2018). But I haven’t been able to bring myself to read it–there’s part of me that doesn’t want to know that much about it (and I almost never say that kind of thing). I’m also a little afraid that it’s going to flip a switch and I’m going to spend months digging into Chandler scholarship in general.

The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins

I don’t know that intimidated is the best word, but I needed a fifth book. I’m more apprehensive about dipping back into that world. Also, apathetic. But sure…let’s go with intimidated.

The Will in Its Theological Relations by John L. Girardeau

550 pages of a critique of Jonathan Edwards and a restatement of the classic Reformed position on the freedom and bondage of the will in dense 19th Century language. Yeah, that’s easy to see why I’m intimidated.

Stiletto by Daniel O’Malley

The Rook is such a good novel, but after seeing some not-as-good reviews, I’ve been putting it off since it was published. I just don’t want anything to tarnish The Rook in my mind.

I should add that I haven’t seen bad reviews for Stiletto, just people who didn’t like it as much as I’d hoped. Which makes it different than the other books by O’Malley.

Flynn’s World by Gregory Mcdonald

Similarly, I just don’t know if I can muster up the courage to read this one. The Fletch novels that Mcdonald wrote in his later years were good enough, but they were missing something. I’m afraid that this would be the same way–that it came so many years after the Fletch books, makes me even more intimidated by it. The initial Flynn books are probably in my all-time favorite stack. I just don’t want to see it be tarnished.

But there’s a chance I’m missing out on something really good.

The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett

This Fantasy-Mystery hybrid (with a decent amount of other-worldly science thrown in) was my first five-star read of the year, and it’s one I’m still thinking about. The world was great, the characters were complex and well-executed, the story and atmosphere were stunning. I could go on and on about this one, but am going to force myself to be pithy here.

My full take on the book can be found here.

The Olympian Affair by Jim Butcher

Yes, part of the appeal of this novel was that we finally got something new in this series after years of silence. But I’d have had a blast with this no matter when it was released. Butcher very carefully gave his fans more of just about everything they enjoyed in the first book without duplicating it in any sense. He also deepened and expanded our knowledge and understanding of this world, its magic and politics, and all of the major characters (white hats, gray hats, and black hats). At least two of the new characters had better be back. There’s a character death that I’ll eventually forgive Butcher for, but I’m not there yet. This one just ticked every box for me.

The Mercy Chair by M.W. Craven

This is the darkest M.W. Craven novel–well, I haven’t read his second book yet, so I should qualify this as the darkest Poe and Tilly novel. And that’s no mean feat. The two are called in to help investigate the death of a cult leader and end up discovering much more–murders that no one realized had happened, torture sessions disguised as education/treatment, some twisted emotional and spiritual abuse–and more. Both Poe and Tilly are at there best here–and the rest of regular characters are as well. This will stick with readers for a while.

Smoke Kings by Jahmal Mayfield

Speaking of dark…Smoke Kings tells the story of a group of friends who decide to take social justice into their own hands and become vigilantes acting out against those who’ve benefited from lynchings or other racially-motivated crimes their families participated in decades ago. Internal and external pressures start to overwhelm the group and then things get deadly. There’s a whole lot of evil done in the name of righteousness here (by people that others would deny were anything but righteous). The number of heroes–or at least people who were actually accomplishing good things–are far outweighed by those using others. If you’re not disturbed as you’re gripped by this, you’ve missed something.

Christa Comes Out of Her Shell by Abbi Waxman

The first 87 pages of this book might have been my favorite 87 pages this year. The rest of them were pretty good, too. The central premise was a little out there, but Waxman pulled it off–and the rest of the book was so good you didn’t mind anyway. I laughed, I was moved, my heart was warmed—all the typical reactions to Abbi Waxman. I loved being in this world, surrounded by Waxman’s words and I cannot wait for the next excuse I have to do it again.

My full take on the book can be found here.

Robert B. Parker’s Bye Bye Baby by Ace Atkins

The fiftieth Spenser novel is also the last one in Ace Atkins’ run. It’s hard for me to separate my thoughts and feelings about this book from my thoughts and feelings about that run. This wasn’t his best Spenser novel, but it was better than his worst (which really wasn’t that bad). In this book Spenser acts as a bodyguard for a libral minority congressperson and investigates the threats behind her. It’s an entertaining time with some characters I’ve spent decades with.

My full take on the book can be found here.

Don’t Know Tough by Elic Cranor

This was a hard, grim read. In brief, an idealistic, young High School Football coach brings a troubled, angry, and violent player into his home to help him escape home and get back on the right track. And well, you know what they say about the road paved with good intentions. As difficult as the material was, Cranor’s skill with writing, rich characterization, and dynamite prose made this a sheer pleasure to read—while putting you through the emotional wringer.

My full take on the book can be found here.

Reconstruction by Mick Herron

An MI6 accountant is brought in to negotiate with a young man who has taken some hostages in a nursery school (2 children and 3 adults). But how did all of these characters get to this point? Why are they here? What’s going to happen after they get out of the school? This novel examines all these things—putting the pieces of the puzzle together so that by the end (and I’m talking the end), the reader is able to put all the pieces together and can construct a pretty clear understanding. This is one of the best structured and written novels I’ve read in a long time.

My full take on the book can be found here.

The Kaiju Preservation Society by John Scalzi

The previous two books on this list were pretty heavy and intense reads. This is anything but. This popcorn movie in a handy book form. It’s about a food delivery app driver who joins up with a group who travels to a parallel dimension to study and protect Kaiju. There are tense and action-filled moments, but given the premise—how heavy can it be? It’s filled with a catchy, irreverent narrative; snappy dialogue; and a first-person narrator you click with almost instantly (or not at all)—it just took me a few pages to know that I was going to find nothing but joy in these pages.

My full take on the book can be found here.

Adult Assembly Required by Abbi Waxman

If the last three years have taught me anything (and it’s likely that it hasn’t, but for the sake of argument, let’s say it did), it’s that Abbi Waxman will make me laugh, warm my heart, maybe even get me misty—while telling a story full of great and quirky characters, with dialogue as good as you’ll find anywhere. That’s what you get here in this story about a young woman who came to LA to get a fresh start on life. But before that start, things have to get a little worse for her—thankfully, she finds herself among a great group of (mostly) women who decide to become her friends.

My full take on the book can be found here.