JANUARY 2017 - READING LIST AND PICK OF THE MONTH

A decent month's reading to start the year. I managed to complete 11 books in the month, a couple of which were re-reads.

They were......


Robin Sloan - Mr Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore (2012) (3)

Mark J. Newman - Violence in the Blood (2016) (4)

Barbara Vine - King Solomon's Carpet (1991) (4)

Jaime Raven - The Madam (2016) (4)

Bryan Smith - 68 Kill (2013) (4.5)

Lawrence Block - Hit Man (1998) (5)


Joe R. Lansdale - Dead Aim (2013) (4)

Catriona McPherson - The Child Garden (2015) (4)

Elmore Leonard - Maximum Bob (1991) (4.5)

Charles Bukowski - South of No North (1975) (3)

Jo Nesbo - Blood on Snow (2015) (4)

Book of the month - Lawrence Block - Hit Man - second time of reading and just as enthralling as the first!

More useless trivia......

11 different authors.

5 of the 11 were new-to-me authors........  Robin Sloan, Catriona McPherson, Jaime Raven, Bryan Smith and Barbara Vine. I'd be interested in reading more from 4 of them in the future.

I'm probably done with Robin Sloan.

I must have a couple of dozen books on the shelves and device from each of Elmore Leonard, Lawrence Block and Joe R. Lansdale - all are firm favourites!

Jo Nesbo - I'm not quite convinced on him yet - Blood on Snow was my 3rd book from him.

Charles Bukowski has been enjoyed in the past with more to come in the future, but the short story collection I read had a few flat notes.

Young gun Mark J. Newman writes the short, sharp, snappy violent gangster crime books I like to read. Two down from him, with two to go!

Gender analysis - no surprises here - 9 male, 2 females


I think 6 authors hail from the US, though Charles Bukowski was actually born in Germany
3 authors are English, 1 Scottish, 1 from Norway

All 11 were fiction, 1 was a collection of short stories.




7 were published this decade - with 1 from 1970s, 3 from the 90s.

8 of the 11 books were pre-owned! 1 came from the publisher, 2 from the authors.

Favourite cover? Elmore Leonard - Maximum Bob

South of No North is my second favourite cover.









My reads were this long 304 - 51 - 358 - 330 - 258 - 310 - 104 - 294 - 298 - 192 - 188
Total page count =  2687 (890 in December)

0 < 50,
1 between 51 < 100,
3 between 101 < 200,
3 between 201 < 300,
4 between 301 < 400,
0 > 400 pages

Barbara Vine's King Solomon's Carpet was the longest @ 358.

PASCAL GARNIER - THE ESKIMO SOLUTION (2016)

Synopsis/blurb.......

A crime writer uses the modest advance on his latest novel to rent a house on the Normandy coast. 

There should be little to distract him from his work besides walks on the windswept beach, but as he begins to tell the tale of forty-something Louis – who, after dispatching his own mother, goes on to relieve others of their burdensome elderly relations – events in his own life begin to overlap with the work of his imagination.

Another read from Garnier, my fourth in total and whilst enjoyable not quite up there with the others.

Kind of a dual narrative here - or book within a book. A crime author called Louis is writing a book about his protagonist also called Louis. We spend time in the company of both.

Our author, has isolated himself from his girlfriend in the hope of making some progress on his book, but is distracted by his girlfriend's daughter, his neighbours, an impending trip to England and by his friend Christophe.

I've always been jealous of Christophe......He lives, I bluff: he's a magician, I'm a con artist; he touches, I manipulate. I can't think of him without comparing myself to him. The fact of the matter is he has always put the spotlight on my own mediocrity.

Our fictional Louis is meanwhile doing his bit for population control while similarly improving the financial situations of himself, his ex-wife and her husband and the family of a friend.

I found the writer - Louis annoying and much preferred the company of the other one, though he is hardly likeable. Maybe he was just more interesting to read about.

There is a kind of symmetry to the novel - art imitating art, as the story of our fictional Louis ends and writer Louis mimics his creation albeit somewhat accidentally.

Garnier, as ever has some fantastic turns of phrase......

His mouth flares open like an old hen's arsehole, but very little comes out....

If he was a used car, he'd be unsellable...

A quick read at about 160 pages. Enjoyable but not his best.

3.5 from 5

Pascal Garnier passed in 2010. Gallic Books have been offering his books in translation since 2012.

The Front Seat Passenger, Boxes and The Islanders have all been enjoyed previously.

Read in April, 2017
Published - 2016 (originally 2006 in French)
Page count - 160
Source - Gallic Books
Format - paperback

GERARD BRENNAN - WEE DANNY (2013)

Synopsis/blurb….

Incarcerated in a home for young offenders, Wee Danny Gibson has learned how to act in front of his teachers, his educational psychologist and the institute's supervisors. And if he continues to keep his nose clean, he could be rewarded with a day-trip to Castle Ward. But good behaviour is no easy task when his fellow inmates are determined to get in his face. Then there’s Conan 'The Barbarian' Quinlan, a gentle giant who Danny feels compelled to look out for. Friend or liability? Danny can't be sure, but he knows he needs to stay focussed on that little taste of freedom.

Wee Danny is an 18,000-word novella by the author of Wee Rockets.

It’s been a couple of years or more since I read anything from Gerard Brennan and seeing as this was a tick in all the boxes, it’s a slap upside the head for me and a reminder not to leave it so long next time around.

Wee Danny, who may or may not feature in the full length novel – Wee Rockets from Brennan (when I pull my finger out and read it, I’ll know more) - is the star of this 70 page blast.   

Here Mr Brennan had me from the start………

Miss moves as if she knows I want her. She can read my thoughts sometimes. Sends me wee signals to prove it too. Like when the pencil rolled off her desk at the start of this class. It landed right in front of me. I pushed back my chair, ready to pick it up for her but she just raised her hand, cool as fuck. And then she stepped in front of me, hunkered down so that her perfect arse almost touched the floor, and snagged the pencil. She stood and twisted in one dance-like motion and I caught a glimpse of her knickers above the waistband of her black trousers. Then she adjusted the hang of her green blouse. The patch of pink cotton and tanned lower back disappeared and took the spit from my mouth with it. It happened in seconds, but I've replayed the images of Miss's graceful retrieval over and over for the last twenty minutes.

Danny is in an institution, I don’t know why. He’s growing up, he’s getting an education. He butts heads with other boys and some of his counsellors and he regrets being confined with the restrictions on his freedoms.

I like the mental jousting Danny has with Alan, one of the therapists and with Adrian, a fellow offender both sharing a mutual antipathy for each other. Danny would happily get physical but is cute enough to assess the angles and use Adrian’s lack of control to his advantage. Street smarts.

An unlikely friendship with big lad, Conan – Conan being borderline autistic, provides comfort to them both and allows Danny to focus on someone other than self.

A trip to Castle Ward offers both friends some time away from the institution. This sniff of freedom has consequences.

Pace, characters, setting, dialogue, confrontation, action and outcome.

5 from 5

It was short but was March’s best read. Sadly with the recent closure of publisher Blasted Heath, Wee Danny appears to be currently unavailable. Hopefully this situation is only temporary and the author secures it a new home.

Gerard Brennan has his website over at Crime Scene NI. 

Catch him on Twitter - @gerardbrennan

I have lots more from him to enjoy yet – Wee Rockets, The Point, Breaking Point and Undercover all sit waiting. 

Fireproof, 

Possession, Obsession and a Diesel Compression Engine 

and Other Stories And Nothing But Time have featured on the blog previously. 

As has his contribution to the Fightcard series - JACK TUNNEY - FIGHTCARD: WELCOME TO THE OCTAGON

Read in March, 2017

Published – 2013

Page count – 71

Source – purchased copy

Format - Kindle

ELMORE LEONARD - MAXIMUM BOB (1991)

Synopsis/blurb……

Enter the world of Elmore Leonard. The setting is Palm Beach County, Florida, where someone places a live ten-foot alligator in the backyard of the bigoted, redneck judge Bob Gibbs--known to all as Maximum Bob--and his wife, Leanne, a former Weeki Wachee mermaid. Not long after that, shots are fired into the judge's house. It doesn't take much figuring to conclude that someone's out to get him and that malefactor isn't going to stop at the second try. There's a long list of suspects: Dale Crowe, who just got an outrageous sentence for a minor crime; his uncle Elvin, a killer on parole, raring to go again; Dr. Tommy Vasco, the drugged out former medical doctor; his equally bizarre friend, Hector; and Dicky Campau, who makes a living poaching alligators. And there are others.

Somehow Kathy Baker, a nifty young probation officer, has got herself in the middle of all this. She's got to avoid two seducers--the judge and a homicidal maniac--and work with a young police officer who interests her for more than professional reasons. Trying to pick out from his assortment of bad guys, sociopaths, and punks the one who's trying to kill the judge is pure entertainment, as only Elmore Leonard, with his ear for the sound and eye for the sight of lowlife, can provide.

A January re-read and another enjoyable encounter with Elmore Leonard and a strange cast of characters.

A sex-mad judge called Maximum Bob, someone who might need some self-improvement classes -offering a court reporter the opportunity to play a carnival game…”You sit on my face and I guess your weight.” His wife, Leanne frequently given to startling fugue states where she assumes the speech and mannerisms of a long dead slave girl. An attractive probation officer, Kathy Baker – someone who grabs the attention of our randy judge. A couple of criminal Crowes – a nephew, Dale – young likeable, a tad reckless but unfairly shafted by Bob; his psychopath uncle – Elvin, vicious, scheming but never less than interesting. A 10ft alligator. A disgraced doctor and his boyfriend – living the life strung out on drugs.  A young handsome cop – Gary Hammond.

In a nutshell - the judge has tired of his wife and wants her to leave and some former inhabitants of Bob’s court plot revenge on him.

Murder, drugs, an alligator, court scenes, discontent in a marriage, some romance, sexual frustration, a 135 year’s dead slave girl, a mermaid, Florida, an escort, etc etc

Madcap characters, inimitable humour, great dialogue, bizarre situations, violence and death. A bit different from a lot of the crime fiction out there.  

Really enjoyable – even if after about a dozen pages I realised I had read it before. Fortunately it was long enough ago that I couldn’t remember the outcome.

4.5 from 5

Elmore Leonard was my first introduction to the crime fiction genre after picking up a book of his which had been blurbed by Stephen King. This would have been late 80s. Prior to that my reading was firmly ensconced in the horror zone.  Leonard sadly passed in 2013. I have a lot of reasons to be grateful to him.

Read in January, 2017

Published – 1991

Page count – 298

Source – owned copy

Format - paperback

  

2016 - PICKS OF THE YEAR

A post that may have been more relevant/topical 3 and a half months ago, but my blog, my rules so there. I'm running late!

I read over 100 books of varying quality last year, about a dozen short of my target, but big deal. I'll just have to read more this year.

Scrolling back through the list there were a few highlights and contenders for my favourite book of the year.

Dietrich Kalteis - The Deadbeat Club (2015)


Nicholas Searle - The Good Liar (2015)


Garry Disher - The Heat (2015)

Max Allan Collins - Quarry's List (1976)

Malcolm Mackay - The Sudden Arrival of Violence (2014)

Douglas Skelton - Open Wounds (2016)

Robin Yocum - A Brilliant Death (2016)

Douglas Skelton - Blood City (2013)

Frederic Dard - Bird in a Cage (1961)

Nick Triplow - Frank's Wild Years (2012)

Jim Fusilli - Road to Nowhere (The Good Samaritan Book 1) (2011)

Parnell Hall - Detective (1987)

A dirty dozen - 3 from Scotland, 2 from England, 1 French, 1 Canadian, 1 Australian and 4 from the US of A.

A novel about drugs and gangs, a conman, a couple of professional heisters, a Glaswegian hitman, a couple of college kids dabbling in the disappearance of a parent, two books with a tired mid-level Scottish enforcer, a French farce with a far from comedic outcome for our protagonist, a retired has-been or never-was still breathing and raising his head out of the bottle for one last fight, a Jack Reacher loner type sticking his nose in and a PI finally investigating a case.


All great books, all recommended, all books I'd happily re-read again. And seeing as I still have to pen a few thoughts on four of them I may have to!

No overall selection for a single book of the year - they're all winning reads!    

PS - Nice to see that arranging multiple pictures on Blogger is so simple!

DECEMBER 2016 - READING LIST AND PICK OF THE MONTH

A year's reading ending with a bit of a damp squib rather than a big bang.....4 books read in the month......4.........WTF !!!!!

Minor consolation they were all very good, even if the paltry month gave me a yearly total of 108  - a dozen short of my annual 120 aim.

They were....

Parnell Hall - Detective (1987) - 5 STARS

Fingers Murphy - Everything I Tell You is a Lie (2011) - 4.5 STARS

Trace Conger - The Shadow Broker (2014) - 4.5 STARS

Jack Clark - Nobody's Angel (2013) - 4.5 STARS




Book of the month - obvious really Parnell Hall's Detective - the opener to a long series from Hall.

More useless trivia......

4 different authors.

3 of the 4 were new-to-me authors........  Jack Clark has been read before.

Gender analysis - no surprises here - all male, nada females


I think all 4 authors hail from the US,

All were fiction, all 4 were Kindle reads.

 

3 were published this decade - with 1 from 1987.

3 of the 8 books were pre-owned! 1 came from the author.

Favourite cover? Fingers Murphy - Everything I Tell You is a Lie

Nobody's Angel is my second favourite cover.

My reads were this long 239 - 128 - 299 - 224
Total page count =  890 (1419 in November)

0 < 50,
0 between 51 < 100,
1 between 101 < 200,
3 between 201 < 300,
0 between 301 < 400,
0 > 400 pages

Trace Conger's The Shadow Broker was the longest @ 299.

NOVEMBER 2016 - READING LIST AND PICK OF THE MONTH

November 2016 seems like a long time ago, but hey all the books I read were fantastic and remain fresh in my memory.....haha yeah of course they do.

Eight titles were read in the month and thus far I've reviewed one of them. Only seven behind then! (Caught up now!)

The eight were.......


Jim Fusilli - Road to Nowhere (The Samaritan Book 1) (2012) - 5 STARS

Grant Jerkins - Abnormal Man (2015) - 4 STARS

Eric Beetner - The Year I Died Seven Times Book 2 (2014) - 4.5 STARS

Jonathan Stone - Dead Letters (2014) 4.5 STARS

Nigel Bird - Beat on the Brat (and Other Stories) (2011) - 4.5 STARS

Carl Hiaasen - Razor Girl (2016) - 3 STARS

Graham Wynd - Satan's Sorority (2015) - 4.5 STARS

John Preston - A Very English Scandal (2016) - 3.5 STARS


Book of the month - Jim Fusilli - Road to Nowhere November's only 5 star read. 

4 x 4.5 stars - Graham Wynd, Jonathan Stone, Eric Beetner and Nigel Bird. 
1 x 4 star rating, Grant Jerkins
1 x 3.5 and 1 x 3 stars - another month where they all entertained me and nothing was a struggle to enjoy.

Carl Hiaasen - bottom of the class with a 3 - I enjoyed it, it just wasn't up to the standard of some of his previous books - Tourist Season and Double Whammy for example.


A bit more trivia or data........

8 different authors.

4 of the 8 were new-to-me authors........  Grant Jerkins, Jonathan Stone, Jim Fusilli  and John Preston. I have more from the first three to read.

4 authors have been read before - Nigel Bird, Eric Beetner, Graham Wynd (aka K. A. Laity) and Florida funnyman Carl Hiaasen. All will be read again in the future.

Gender analysis - no surprises here - 7 dudes, 1 lady called Graham!


I think 6 authors hail from the US, and 2 from England,

7 reads were fiction. 1 non-fiction and a trip down memory lane. John Preston's A Very English Scandal concerning itself with Liberal politician Jeremy Thorpe's high profile trial in the 70s.

1 was a hardback read, 1 a paperback, 6 were Kindle books.

All 8 were published this decade - with 2 from 2016.

5 of the 8 books were pre-owned! 3 came from the publishers.

Favourite cover? John Preston - A Very English Scandal






















Abnormal Man is my second favourite cover. Unusual to say the least.

My reads were this long 217 - 256 - 40 - 30 - 76 - 342 - 106 - 352
Total page count =  1419 (1115 in October)

2 < 50,
1 between 51 < 100,
1 between 101 < 200,
2 between 201 < 300,
2 between 301 < 400,
0 > 400 pages

John Preston's A Very English Scandal was the longest @ 352.