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Book Reviews
Mary’s Guide To Books
* Not good
** Okay
*** Good
**** Very Good
***** Excellent
A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. LeGuin **** YA LEG
This first book of the Earthsea series features the early life of Ged, a wizard who may become the most powerful wizard of Earthsea. Earthsea is a world of islands where the people from one place rarely go to another island or even another village on the same island. Ged is born in Gont, a place known for goatherds and wizards, and he learns his first spells from his aunt. When his village comes under attack, Ged saves everyone by weaving a spell to hide them from the enemy. He later goes to train with the wizard Ogion, but his impatience leads him to a school for wizards on the isle of Roke. At Roke, Ged unleashes a terrible shadow monster who seeks to destroy him. LeGuin writes with great eloquence and meaning, delving into human foibles and the great battle of good versus evil. This fantasy novel is for everyone.
The Hypnotist by Lars Kepler **** M KEP
Prepare yourself for an action-packed Scandinavian mystery that will keep you guessing. Erik Maria Bark used to be a hypnotist, using his skill in group therapy sessions for the abused. His wife, Simone, works at an art gallery and is constantly worrying that Erik is having an affair, and his teenage son, Benjamin, has a rare disorder that prevents his blood from coagulating. The story starts with three gruesome murders and one near fatal mutilation, all members of the same family. The survivor is a teenage boy named Joseph Ek. Joona Linna, a determined detective, requests that Erik hypnotize Joseph to try to get a description of the culprit. Linna suspects that whoever attacked the family might go after the older sister who was not home at the time. Erik is hesitant to use hypnosis since he promised ten years ago never to use it again, but Linna convinces him of the necessity of saving the older sister. From that point, the story takes an unexpected turn. Most of the book is not about the first murders but about the consequences of Erik’s hypnosis and the reasons why he gave up hypnosis in the first place. The characters are so psychologically abnormal that one wonders whether there is something wrong with Sweden. If you are not troubled by highly graphic scenes, then pick this up for its complex plotting and intriguing mystery. Lars Kepler is the pseudonym of a husband and wife writing team from Sweden. This is the first Linna mystery to be published in the United States.
The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern ***** FIC MOR
This magical story takes place in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries when two men agree to a challenge. Prospero the Enchanter, real name Hector Bowen, is a world famous illusionist, but his secret is that he uses real magic for his illusions. When his young daughter, Celia, is left in his dressing room, he decides to train her in the ways of magic. Alexander, the man in gray, visits Prospero, and they decide on a challenge: Alexander’s student against Prospero’s daughter. Alexander adopts a young boy named Marco and trains him in his own methods of magic. The two children are told that they will be playing a game against an opponent, but their masters leave out the details. When they are grown, the venue for their challenge is selected, the Night Circus. The Night Circus is the creation of a group of individuals, headed by Chandresh Lefevre, an eccentric man with brilliant ideas. The circus is open only from sunset to sunrise, and everything in it is black and white. Reading the descriptions of the magical displays in the circus is enough to make this story enjoyable, but we also get to see the relationships of the two players and how they cope with being bonded to a game they don’t fully understand. As one of the most enjoyable books I have read in a long time, I would recommend this book to anyone.
Beatrice and Virgil by Yann Martel *** FIC MAR
Martel’s Life of Pi was one of my favorite books, but Beatrice and Virgil does not live up to the magical, hopeful tone in the previous book. A writer named Henry has written a bestselling book, and he hopes to write a book about the Holocaust in which one part is fiction and the other is nonfiction. His publishers shoot down his manuscript as unmarketable, which causes Henry to give up creative writing. He and his wife move to another country and make a new life. One day, Henry receives a package from a man living in the same town. The package contains a story by Flaubert with abundant animal cruelty and a scene from a play in which two characters, Beatrice and Virgil, talk about pears. Henry decides to visit the man, who turns out to be a taxidermist. This quiet and often rude taxidermist seeks Henry’s help to finish a play he has been writing for thirty years. As Henry hears more about the play, he begins to suspect that it is about the Holocaust. From the details about Henry, it seems like the story is about Martel. The plot is lacking in this short novel that comes across as bizarre and depressing. Martel’s writing is as polished and smooth as ever, but it seems like he did not know quite what to do for the novel after Life of Pi.
Wicked Autumn by G.M. Malliet *** M MAL
In the small English village of Nether Monkslip, one woman pretty much runs the town, Wanda Batton-Smythe. She has her sights set on the Harvest Fayre, which means that she’s driving everyone crazy. Sometimes her comments about other people go a little too far, criticizing their contributions, bullying them into donating items, etc. It seems that she’s made enough enemies that when she dies during the Harvest Fayre, the police don’t know whom to suspect most. Fortunately for Nether Monkslip, their new vicar, Max Tudor, is a former MI5 agent, and he starts sleuthing to help the police find the killer. This cozy mystery, though set in current day England, is reminiscent of an Agatha Christie mystery. The cast of characters is long, but Malliet has no trouble keeping all of the various personalities in line. Pick this up if you enjoy a good puzzle.
Lethal by Sandra Brown **** FIC BRO
Anyone who has read a thriller by Sandra Brown will know pretty much what to expect from her latest. Honor Gillette and her four-year-old daughter Emily live alone in the bayou, which makes them vulnerable to the suspected mass murderer Lee Coburn. Coburn searches their house, telling Honor that he won’t hurt her or Emily as long as she cooperates. When he doesn’t find what he’s looking for, he reveals to Honor that her late husband’s death was not an accident and that Eddie may have had information that would be valuable. Though Honor doesn’t know what that might be or where to find it, she and Emily run off with Coburn to evade the authorities (who may or may not be crooked) and attempt to find the truth about her husband’s death. The shadowy underworld is all-pervasive in this heart-thumping thriller with a sexy side-plot. Pick this up if you like thrillers where you never know whom to trust.
The Good Thief’s Guide to Venice by Chris Ewan **** M EWA
After several months of serious writing in a new city, Venice, expert thief Charlie Howard has an unexpected visitor in the middle of the night, a beautiful cat burglar who steals his first edition signed copy of The Maltese Falcon. She leaves behind the card of a local bookshop. Victoria, Charlie’s editor and friend, goes with him to the book shop, but they see no sign of the purloined book. Later that night, Charlie breaks his vow to stop being a thief and breaks into the shop. He finds a cell phone and a note to call a certain phone number. The cat burglar, Graziella, offers him a deal, his book in exchange for a favor. He is to take a briefcase and return it to a vault in the grand home of a count – without opening the briefcase. As you might be able to guess, this favor sets off a chain of events that put Charlie’s life in danger more than once. Charlie and Victoria have become quite the duo in this fun mystery series that seems to get better with each installment.
Never Knowing by Chevy Stevens *** FIC STE
When Sara Gallagher decides to find her birth mother, she doesn’t realize what kind of nightmare she’s creating. Sara’s mother, Julia, wants nothing to do with her and tells her nothing of the family history she longs to know. As a mother herself, Sara wants her six-year-old daughter, Ally, to know her medical history at least. Sara’s fiancé, Evan, wants her to drop it, but Sara’s obsessive nature won’t allow it. Sara hires a private detective who tells her that her birth mother is really the only surviving victim from the Campsite Killer, a serial killer who rapes and then kills his victims. It takes only a moment’s calculation to realize that she is probably the daughter of the Campsite Killer. Once the media gets wind of the story, Sara’s life is never the same, especially once Dad starts calling. The narrative style of Sara telling her therapist what has happened is not as intrusive as it could have been. This intense thriller has a few twists to keep the action going.
Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand by Helen Simonson ***** FIC SIM
At the start of this delightful novel, Major Pettigrew, a 68-year-old widower living in a small English town, finds out that his younger brother has died. The first person he sees after hearing the news is the local shopkeeper, Mrs. Ali, a widow herself. Though the two people have known each other for many years, they suddenly find that they have a lot in common, a fact the rest of the village finds difficult to understand since Mrs. Ali is Pakistani. Meanwhile, the Major’s son, Roger, shows up at his uncle’s funeral several hours late with a beautiful American woman named Sandy, declaring that they are moving in together. His sister-in-law, Marjorie, seems unwilling to part with her husband’s hunting rifle, one of a pair that their father passed down to them. The Major had always assumed that the pair would be reunited in the event of one of them dying, but now his family insists on selling both guns to get a better price. Mrs. Ali finds out that her nephew had a child out of wedlock, and she attempts to reunite him with the woman he still loves, in spite of objections from his parents. Through it all, the Major and Mrs. Ali support each other, their friendship growing into something more. Simonson’s first novel is a winner with entertaining characters, humorous dialogue, and a surprisingly deep look at class and race in modern society.
Jane and the Canterbury Tale by Stephanie Barron **** M BAR
In this latest Jane Austen Mystery, Jane is staying with her brother Edward at his estate in Kent when a most unusual murder occurs. Adelaide Fiske, a widow, has just married Captain Andrew MacCallister at a neighboring estate, but the next morning, the body of her first husband is found. Though Curzon Fiske was reported dead two years earlier, after abandoning his wife in England, his murder occurred after Adelaide’s second marriage. A gun belonging to James Wildman, Adelaide’s cousin, is found in the nearby cemetery, and a note is found on the body from the person who arranged to meet him that night. As magistrate, Edward must investigate, and he enlists Jane’s help. As a side plot, Edward’s oldest daughter Fanny is smitten with Julian Thane, Adelaide’s brother, but she might not like what she learns in the course of the investigation. Barron’s research and eloquent prose add to the complex murder mystery she has created. One hopes that this will not be the final Jane Austen Mystery.
Mary VanSwol
October 2011