Hominid by John C. Boland

Reviewed by Jeanne

Archaeologist David Isaacs is more than a little surprised to get a call from his one-time mentor Noel Sprague. They had parted on somewhat less than cordial terms, especially since Sprague had married the woman Isaacs loved.  He finds Sprague hasn’t changed: he’s still a bit of a bully, behaving as if the others are at best marginally competent.  However, Isaacs needs the job.  He ran into some trouble on a previous dig and is in need of a bit of redemption and Sprague needs someone with experience in underwater archaeology. 

Isaacs arrives on the Chesapeake Bay Island and learns that they’ve uncovered three Colonial era lead coffins which were buried on the far end of the island, away from the settlement.  The reasons seem vague, some talk of witchcraft or curses but there are no records to explain.  Burials of that type are definitely an anomaly for the time period, making this an exceedingly rare find.  Before the coffins can even be exhumed, one of the archaeologists dies in what seems at first to be an accident but soon is revealed to be murder. Someone seems bent on keeping the contents of the coffins a secret, but a shadowy organization is equally determined to unlock the mystery, though perhaps not for public consumption.

I saw this book reviewed in Mystery Scene Magazine and was intrigued enough to read it myself.  As I recall, the reviewer there compared Hominid to books by Preston and Child but the author I thought of was Michael Crichton. Both write thrillers grounded in science and make the science fascinating in the bargain. Boland even appends a good list of references at the end to back up some of the plot elements. In fact, I’d argue that they use the thriller format to promote an interest in science; in the case of Hominid, it’s genetics and human evolution.  Both writers have a common weakness as well, and that is that their characters tend to be more cardboard than humanoid.  But flat characters never stopped me from zipping through a Crichton book, and certainly didn’t impede progress on Hominid. These aren’t authors we read for scintillating insights into the human condition but for ideas, science and action.  Boland has all that down pat.  Just when you think he’s going for one thing, the plot twists and you find yourself contemplating something else entirely.  There is a bit of repetition—characters refer to a study with mice several times—but it’s not overly annoying and doesn’t slow the pace of the book.

Catching up with Nevermore: Fiction

The Postmistress by Sarah Blake is a novel set during WWII.  The title character is Iris James, postmistress in Cape Cod, but the story winds back and forth between the US and England in 1940 and delves into the lives of three very different women.  The book had mixed reviews from club members.  Some praised it highly for the wonderful story, fine characters, and strong plot, but others felt that errors in geography and history detracted so much that the book was unreadable.  This didn’t seem to be a disagreement that was going to resolve itself, and it’s a testimony to the book that both sides felt so passionately about it.

Along with the previously discussed Child Who by Simon Lelic and Defending Jacob by William Landay, another book about murder and juveniles was tossed into the mix:  We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver.  In a series of letters to her estranged husband, Eva tries to come to grips with what their teenage son has done and struggles to understand how he became the person he is.  The book was made into a movie of the same title. Our reviewers pointed out that one particularly interesting aspect is the different ways the situation was handled by Lelic (British) and the two American authors.

Fifty Shades of Grey, the highly popular novel by E.L. James was mentioned, along with the comment that it wasn’t that  The consensus seemed to be that the marketing plan was genius. racy.

Hominid by John Boland is a thriller with a scientific bent.  Archaeologists are excavating an unusual lead casket dating from colonial times when one of them is murdered.  Apparently some secrets are indeed meant to be kept buried. Our readers enjoyed it.

While Dodie Smith may be better known worldwide for her book 101 Dalmatians, another of her novels has an avid following.  I Capture the Castle is the story of Cassandra and her family who are living in a ruin of a castle.  Her father is a famous author, but after writing a single book has been unable to produce another.  They’re behind in their rent, food is running low and their prospects seem quite dim. Then the new landlord arrives, a young American and his brother and Cassandra’s sister Rose thinks she sees a way out of their troubles.  Our reviewer found it charming.

The Bonesetter’s Daughter by Amy Tan revisits some of the themes she introduced in The Joy Luck Club. The story shifts back and forth from modern San Francisco to rural China several decades earlier.  Ruth is a ghostwriter by trade, telling other peoples’ stories; the trouble is, she can’t tell her own. Ruth’s mother, LuLing, is suffering from Alzheimer ’s disease but has a diary in which she has written about her childhood in China and in it Ruth discovers secrets that span three generations.  Our reviewer thought it was very well-written and evocative, with complex mother-daughter relationships.

File M for Murder by Miranda James

Reviewed by Jeanne

File M for Murder by Miranda James is the third of the “Cat in the Stacks” mysteries.  The narrator is Charlie Harris, an archivist librarian who works at a small college in Mississippi and volunteers at his local public library.  He has an enormous Maine Coon cat named Diesel whom he walks on a leash.  Charlie is a widower, living in an old house left to him by a deceased aunt.  He has two adult children, a son and a daughter, with whom he is attempting to reconnect following their mother’s lengthy illness and death.  Charlie is a laid back, mild mannered person, but not a wimp; he’s a large man whose ease comes from an inner assurance he can handle a situation. 

As the story opens, Charlie is delighted to find that his daughter Laura will be staying with him for the fall semester while filling in for a drama professor at the college.  Also in town is Connor Lawton, a visiting playwright, who is serving as author in residence for the summer and who happens to be an ex-boyfriend of Laura’s.  He’s considered a genius by some but an obnoxious twit by most.  Since Laura is the drama coach for the student actors, she and Connor run into each other frequently, and Connor makes no secret that he wants to resume their relationship.  Also in town is an actress carrying a major torch for Connor and who sees Laura as “the other woman.”  Given his talent for annoying people, it’s no surprise when Connor ends up dead.  Charlie’s too nice a guy to feel relieved that he’s gone, but it’s soon apparent that Connor dead can cause just as much trouble as Connor alive: the police think Laura is the murderer.

This is a pleasant, easy going series with a librarian and an adorable cat.  It’s set in the South.  What’s not to like?  Okay, if you want a blood and guts mystery with car chases, this isn’t going to be your glass of iced tea.  The plot was interesting and James plays fair with the reader, giving enough clues that the mystery can be solved if one is so inclined.  The setting is realistic enough, using some nice details without laying it on with a trowel. Charlie himself is a real sweetheart, very gentle and kind, even when he thinks he’s losing his temper.  In the first book I stopped and wondered a few times if this was really the way a guy would think.  Then I found out that “Miranda” is really Dean James, so either this is really the way some guys think or Dean is playing head games by writing a guy the way a woman would write a guy.  That would seem to be way too much trouble for me and besides, it makes me slightly dizzy.  Besides, Mr. James seems like way too nice a guy to be game playing like that.

This is a pleasant series that I’ll keep reading and I know a couple of folk to whom I’ll be recommending it. The books don’t need to be read in order, but the first two are Murder Past Due and Classified as Murder. Book four is due out in early 2013.

Porch Lights by Dorothea Benton Frank

Reviewed by Doris

Jackie McMullen is an Army nurse who has done three tours in Afghanistan and seen horrors that stream through her nightmares every night. Her blessings are her husband Jimmy and son Charlie who idolizes his New York firefighter dad. Then the worst horror of all happens—Jimmy McMullen is killed when a burning roof collapses on him. Jackie and Charlie are devastated and Charlie goes from being happy and full of life to severely depressed. Haunted by her own depression and sense of overwhelming loss, Jackie decides they need to go back to her family on Sullivan’s Island for the summer.

Annie Britt is Jackie’s mom and she has been praying for her family to come home. Annie is funny, determined to have her way, and terrified her child and grandchild will not recover from the loss of their beloved Jimmy.  She hopes that by leaving  the porch light on and making the summer perfect, Jackie and Charlie will stay where they belong—with her, her estranged husband Buster, and her  friend Deb.  She knows getting Jackie to stay will take a small miracle because Annie’s and Jackie’s relationship has never been easy, but more than life itself, Annie loves Jackie and Charlie and knows they need family and Sullivan’s Island to heal.

Porch Light is touching, funny, warm, and sweet. Frank uses family at the core of all her books and this one is the same. Jackie has some growing up to do and she needs to see her mother with new eyes.  Annie needs a new perspective on her daughter and Frank weaves their story together with real skill. Told in alternating voices and chapters, Annie and Jackie both amuse and annoy you as they learn new things about each other and come to common ground. Charlie just takes your heart. Then there’s Buster, Jackie’s dad and Annie’s husband, who moved out eleven years ago because he’d had enough of Annie’s pretensions and need to control. Throw in Deb whose heart is broken by a loss and you have a family that has weathered life’s worst and survived stronger and happier together.

Frank introduces some intriguing Low country history through Porch Lights. Annie has a fascination with Edgar Allan Poe who lived on Sullivan’s Island for a time, even setting his story “The Gold Bug” on an island like Sullivan’s. Annie tells Charlie about Poe and about the pirates who roamed the shores of North and South Carolina and may have left behind treasure.  Using Poe’s “The Gold Bug”as the framework for Charlie’s adventures, Frank weaves facts and speculation into the fabric of the summer so her readers are as enchanted as Charlie.

If you are looking for a strong plot Porch Lights will disappoint you. It is more a laying out of thought and feelings than an action page turner.  All about family bonds, the resilience of the heart, and healing, you can identify with these characters. While the romance parts are predictable they are not the core of the book so who cares? Sullivan’s Island is almost a character in the story so if you cannot get to the beach this summer, you can read Dorothea Benton Frank and feel the sun on your face.

Murder in the 11th House by Mitchell Scott Lewis

Reviewed by Jeanne

Sometimes I pick up a book because it has an intriguing title, like I Still Miss My Man, But My Aim Is Getting Better.  Sometimes it’s because I’ve heard so much about an author.  Sometimes it’s because of the exotic locale.  Sometimes it’s because there’s a cat on the cover.

This time it was because the premise sounded so good:  a detective who solves cases based on astrological charts.  Oh, I’d read the occasional tea leaf mystery or ghostly intervention but this one seemed to be a relatively serious book done by a professional astrologer --and one who specializes in economic astrology at that.

David Lowell is an extremely wealthy man who earned his money by investing according to the stars.  He has a network of experts to handle most situations, a car with an amazing sensory component, and strong opinions on things from politics to the proper way to drink beer. He’s also a martial arts enthusiast.  Lowell’s  lawyer daughter, Melinda, calls on her father to help her out with a difficult case.  She has a client accused of murdering a judge.  Jonny is a bartender with a chip on her shoulder and an abrasive manner which doesn’t endear her to a lot of people.  It certainly didn’t endear her to the judge, and Jonny responded with a widely reported threat.  Even though there’s a lot of circumstantial evidence, Melinda feels Jonny is innocent.  She just needs some way to prove it, and she thinks her father’s unorthodox methods might be just the way to do it. 

If you think astrology is a lot of hooey, then this won’t be a book you’ll enjoy in the least.  Lowell uses his charts to do everything from picking a stock to picking a suspect.  If on the other hand, you don’t think astrology is any farther out than the latest economic theories, you may well enjoy this.  Lowell is sort of a cross between a couple of mystery heroes:  his lecturing and fastidiousness reminds me of Nero Wolfe, while his leaps into action are more Jack Reacher.  Author  Lewis likes to ride his own hobbyhorses, so to speak, and one of the subplots involves the evils of lottery tickets. He also has a few interesting observations via his characters on current events. Agree or not, he gives his readers something to think about. I like that in a book.

While the book would have benefited from a bit more editorial intervention to smooth out some of the clunky writing, I still had fun reading it. I particularly liked the way that Lowell tries to explain astrology.  Most light mysteries with “themes” leave me wondering just how much the author really knows about the subject since some of the explanations sound as if the author had just looked up the answer on Wikipedia. You will have no doubt that Lewis knows his astrology, and that he sees it as a science like weather forecasting or earthquake prediction.

A second book in the series, Death in the 12th House, is scheduled for November, 2012.  Aging rockers are meeting untimely ends, so David Lowell is called in to see if the astrological stars can solve the rock star murders. I'm sure it's not a coincidence that Michael Scott Lewis is also a musician who has some insider cred.

If you’re intrigued, Lewis has his own website where you can read some of his writing about astrology, predictions, and watch videos of interviews.  The site is www.mitchastro.com.

Turkish Delight!

Jud's recent travels to Turkey were highlighted in the Nevermore Book Club.  He shared photos of the amazing architecture as well as natural wonders of the area.  There is also a thriving arts community.  The decorative tiles were just incredible!  There are a number of domed buildings in the area; in fact, the dome is nearly ubiquitous.

That region of the world has had a long and illustrious history. Until World War I, it was a part of the Ottoman Empire. After the war, former army officer Mustafa Kemal led a fight for Turkish independence. Adopting the surname Ataturk, he transformed the region into a modern country.  He reformed practically every aspect of the new nation, including the legal system, education, status of women, and the separation of church and state.  He is still revered today as the Father of Modern Turkey, much as George Washington is regarded in the USA.

Jud had just read Birds Without Wings, a novel by Louis de Bernieres who also wrote Corelli's Violin.  This story is set in a small village in Anatolia during the Great War, when the region is being transformed by invading forces and later by the transformation of this part of the Ottoman Empire into a part of the Turkish nation. The villagers lived comfortably and happily with each other, despite being of diverse ethnic and religious backgrounds.  De Bernieres portrays the sweep of history through the lives of some very ordinary people who find their world turned upside down.  Booklist called it "a wonderfully rich and timely epic."  Jud enjoyed the book as well.  Coincidentally, he actually passed near the site of the village during his tour of Turkey.

Blaize Clement’s Cat Sitter Mysteries

Reviewed by Jeanne

It’s no secret that I like light mysteries, preferably with cats and not just the real cats at my house who try to sit on the book as I read.  There are any number of these books, though some are just teases:  the artist slaps a cat on the cover and no cat appears in the book.  I’ve concluded that often a cat (or a dog, let’s be non-speciesist) is the artistic shorthand for “relatively non-violent, not a lot of explicit sex and not too much cursing.” Sadly, sometimes it’s also shorthand for “bland and formulaic.” Too many series books nowadays feature first person narration from a feisty if somewhat ditzy heroine,  who always finds herself involved in mystery, with a man or men she’s attracted to but either they don’t notice her or she’s trying to convince herself she’s not interested, attempts at snappy dialog, intriguing location, and some sort of quirky profession.

I’d heard good things about the Dixie (“no relation to Ernest”) Hemingway series, so I decided to give one a try.  Dixie is a former deputy who left the force after her husband and three year old daughter were killed in a traffic accident.  Her grief made her unstable as an officer, so she’s working as a pet sitter while she tries to get her life back together.  She lives with her firefighter brother Michael and his partner, Paco, in their late grandparents’ home on Siesta Key.

I didn’t think this sounded particularly promising.  In fact, it sounded a lot like all the things I just said I didn’t like but I decided to read the first book anyway. Why?  Because every now and then I’ll find an unexpected gem and that makes it worth all the digging. 

I’m happy to report this was one of those times.  Clement has a feel for both characterization and pacing.  Dixie has her problems, but she’s also a tough, decent woman who has a strong sense of justice for the underdog (or undercat, as the case may be.)  While animals always figure into the plots, they aren’t excuses to get sentimental.  Dixie treats them as individuals and with respect, even the ones who aren’t exactly lovable. There are funny lines, but they aren’t forced and there’s no attempt to draw attention to them.  One of my favorite lines is “Since I love chocolate second only to crisp fried bacon, the devil could leave a trail of it and I’d probably eat my way straight to hell.”  I can relate. Also, Clement never lets the plot drag but moves things along at a brisk pace.  Even when there’s a bit of down time to enjoy hot coffee and crisp bacon, she manages to keep the story from dragging and there’s no sense that the author is stalling or padding the book—that’s a pet peeve of mine, and no pun is intended.

Siesta Key is wonderfully depicted. It’s a small island off the Florida coast, just about eight miles long. Snowbirds and tourists swell the ranks in winter, but the small number of permanent residents give the place a small-town feel.  After a couple of books, I was ready to visit there myself, have some of those extra crispy hash browns, coffee, and eggs at the diner even though I don’t really like eggs, and maybe meet some of the retired circus people who live on Siesta Key.  I certainly wouldn’t mind meeting Detective Guidry in his hand-made Italian suits or lawyer Ethan with his lovely manners and dark good looks.  There’s a bit of judicious cursing and the occasional risqué comment, but nothing too off color. Some of the murders are brutal but Clement doesn’t sensationalize.  In short, these aren’t  fluffy sweet cozy books; they have a bit of grit and sand in there.

Unfortunately, Blaize Clement passed away July 20, 2011 after, as her son John put it, “a year-long disagreement with cancer,” which makes me think that Blaize was a lot like Dixie.  I’m sorry we lost her so young.  The good news is that her son is going to continue the series, at least for a book or two.

The books don’t have to be read in order but if you are one of those who prefers to read ‘em that way then here’s the list:

1.       Curiosity Killed the Cat Sitter

2.       Duplicity Dogged the Dachshund (Note: if animal deaths bother you, be warned that some do occur in this book.)

3.       Even Cat Sitters Get the Blues

4.       Cat Sitter on a Hot Tin Roof

5.       Raining Cat Sitters and Dogs

6.       Cat Sitter Among the Pigeons

7.       Cat Sitter’s Pajamas

8.       Cat Sitter’s Cradle by Blaize and John Clement (2013)

To keep up with news, events and a countdown to the next book's publication date, visit the website:  http://www.dixiehemingway.com