« February 2006 | Main | April 2006 »
(originally posted on March 13, 2006)
Considering the advance hype, the blurbs, the attention, some might wonder if this debut lives up. Well, duh. It's an incredibly difficult job to balance smartass humor and heartfelt emotion, depth of character and a plot that really surprises, but Read does it -- almost line by line, actually. This is easily among the best debuts this year and one would be remiss in leaving it aside when it's released in May.
(originally posted on March 13, 2006)
Speaking of wonderful debuts, John Hart has such a lovely writing style that's full-bodied and lyrical that it almost gets in the way of this tale of twisted family ties, murder, and the slow redemption of Work Pickens from weak son to his own man -- but that's only because there are so many gems worth noting that one has to stop and marvel. What's especially exciting is that Hart is bound to improve in future books, with whatever subjects he tackles next.
(originally posted on March 13, 2006)
This is certainly one of my favorite of HCC's reissues. It's fast, it's funny, the dialogue is so snappy that twigs are falling all over the place, and Powell clearly had a grand time writing the book -- which despite the high body count is actually a pretty nifty romance. But the biggest strength is how Powell flouts the major conventions, even when it seemed many of them hadn't been invented yet. Way fun.
(originally posted on March 13, 2006)
That I hadn't read John Harvey before was a grave misstep on my part. But it's not because I thought I wouldn't like his work, because I did -- and do I ever. This book (the second to star Frank Elder) is as close as one can get to a masterclass in crime writing. The prose is poetic and spare, there's a perfect balance of action, dialogue, introspection and forward motion. In short, it's bloody fantastic and I expect DARKNESS AND LIGHT will be, too, once I get to read it this summer.
(originally posted on March 13, 2006)
This may well be the oddest mystery I've read in quite some time, for reasons I can't fully get into (let's just say that murder gets a decidedly paranormal and existentialist spin here.) But Argula -- the pseudonym of a well-published writer -- believably gets into the mindset of a menopausal, unapologetic heroine who faces the weirdness around her with understated logic and aplomb. The book shouldn't work, but it does -- and that's why it's an interesting choice as an Edgar PBO nominee.
(originally posted on February 28, 2006)
The best way to sum this book up is to quote the opening lines: "Felix Gomez went to Iraq a soldier. He came back a vampire." Then make him a PI, throw him in Denver's Rocky Flats to investigate an outbreak of nymphomania, and stir. A lot. It's great fun and impossible to describe but let's just say that it's a very different (and much more comedic) take on the vampire-PI than Charlie Huston's.
(originally posted on February 28, 2006)
What more is there to say but "wow"? I couldn't stop reading, and couldn't stop being affected by this story of how the consequences of one woman's act -- and who she gets herself involved with -- reverberates over decades before finally, the reckoning comes. MacEnulty writes beautifully without a wasted word, the characters break your heart and there's such sadness by the end - as I suspect was meant.
(originally posted on February 28, 2006)
One wouldn't have thought there was much still left to do with the locked room mystery, but Tallis (a noted psychiatrist who's written a couple of earlier novels) finds his way by using turn-of-the-century Vienna, Freudian methods and elegant styling to fashion a most memorable mystery. It's very cool and calculated, and perhaps a bit overlong but I'll certainly read the next in the series.
(originally posted on February 28, 2006)
Not that Niffenegger's novel needs my recommendation, but I'd been saving this for a time when I could read it uninterrupted and a train to DC certainly did the trick. It's wondrous, witty and infused with the right mix of humor and tragedy that all the conceits work really well. And while it's not necessarily a new way to tell a love story, it comes quite close.
