Book Review: The Book of Doors

 By Gareth Brown

• Pub Date: 2024

• Genre: Fantasy, magical realism

• Where I bought this book: Enchanted Novelties, Harrison, Ohio. 

• Why I bought this book: The story's concept is intriguing 

• Bookmark used: Volumes Bookstore, Chicago    

 *****

    One of the many problems with incorporating the idea of time travel into your novel is that it is inherently inconsistent. You cannot get around the fact that travel into the past is impossible. You can ignore that and claim that your characters are unable to change their present, because if that is so, what's the point? And you can ignore the idea of a djinn particle -- which allows for items to exist in a time loop, never having been invented. 

    So, you just fudge it, and let things happen without explaining them. It may cause confusion, but hey, it's just a novel, right? Don't take it too seriously.

    But in The Book of Doors, Brown wants to be taken seriously. He wants to explore the ideas of existence, of love and hate, of goodness and evil. But he leaves several big, gaping holes in his story -- such as the existence of different versions of the same person living in the same time dimension, with nothing untoward happening.

     He suffers from the flaws of many debut novels -- wanting to cram too much into the story and the writing, and not knowing when to quit.

    It's not a flawless read, but it's okay for something to sit down with on a cold winter's night.

    Here's the concept: Cassie, an unexceptional young woman who loves books, has moved to New York City and taken a job in a bookstore. She lives with a roommate, Izzy, who is far more outgoing and gregarious. One fateful evening, Mr. Webber, an older man she has befriended, dies in the store and leaves her a mysterious book.

    It's the Book of Doors, and among its scribbled texts and sketched images is a note explaining that using it means "any door is every door." Mr. Webber's added note says she  should "enjoy the places it takes you to and the friends you find there."

    But of course there is more to the book, and Cassie gets caught up in a whirlwind that threatens not only her life, and Izzy's life, but the lives of the people she meets, and, indeed, the very existence of time and space itself.

    She'll discover, through the friends and foes she meets -- including the Librarian and the Bookseller -- the enormity of what she had gotten herself into. It's truly an overwhelming adventure, not only for Cassie, Izzy, and their band of others, but for the reader. It's also a but gruesome at times.

    The characters are a mélange of the nice, the creepy, and the tropes. One, known only as "the woman," is macabre beyond measure. Another, an evil sort who gets tossed into the Old West, returns decades later as a cliche, and I half-expected him to declare himself the rootinest, tootinest cowboy in the west.

    It'll carry you along, fer sure, but only if you squint hard and don't ask too many questions.

Book Review: Greenland

 By David Santos Donaldson

• Pub Date: 2021

• Genre: Literary fiction, magical realism

• Where I bought this book: Roebling Books & Coffee, Covington, Ky. 

• Why I bought this book: I liked the cover art (by Devan Shimoyama)

• Bookmark used: Roebling Books & Coffee   

 ****** 

   The esteemed Edwardian-era author E.M. Forster wrote about shaking off the shackles of his time and place. His novels and essays revolved around humanism and man's place in the world.

    In this debut novel, Donaldson attempts to go further, wandering through time, space, and thoughts. His protagonist and budding Forster fictional biography, Kipling Starling, tackles issues of accepting oneself and asserting your color, your culture, and your sexuality in a world that isn't sure it wants to have you around.

    It starts with Kip explaining his novel-within-a-novel -- an examination of the three years that Forster, a conscientious objector, lived in Alexandria, Egypt, as a Red Cross volunteer during World War I. There, he met and fell in love with Mohammed el Adl, a tram conductor.

    Kip, under pressure from himself and his publisher to rewrite the novel in three weeks, locks himself in the basement of an apartment he shares with his lover, Ben. In doing so, he imagines himself taking on the persona of Mohammed -- both are young, gay Black men, and each has fallen in love with an older, more established white man. Even the settings pair the two men -- in 1919, Mohammed spent six months in an isolated prison cell.

    From there, the themes evolve as Mohammed speaks through Kip's novel, and Kip tells his own biography and evolution as a writer and gay man.     

    Kip is having an identity crisis and unable to define or accept himself. He says he is British because he was born and raised in "a perfectly Victorian house" -- and not British because his parents are of Caribbean and Indian heritages. He is named after one of the foremost racist and colonialist intellectuals of all time, the promoter and defender of the white man's burden. 

Take up the White Man's burden--

        And reap his old reward,

The blame of  those ye better,

        The hate of those ye guard--

     Kip is also aware that in his upbringing -- not unlike the times of Forster and Muhammed -- "if displays of desire were out of the question, homosexuality was unmentionable."

    Kip has additional problems. His closest friend, Carmen, a Spanish woman open about her need to express and flaunt her sensuous nature, is dismissive of men, gay, straight or both, who fail to do the same, in favor of being comfortable. She puts Kip and Ben into that category. Kip's literary hero was a closeted gay man who published his only book addressing the issue of his homosexuality posthumously. 

    And in his writings, and in Forster's love affairs, Kip sees himself as many characters, but always the object of affection -- the exploited Mohammed, and the potential lover of Mohammed -- through the aura of time.

    It all gets complicated, and you have to pay attention to the blending of dimensions, characters, and actions. There's a sense of magical realism here, even while Kip expresses his desire to be grounded in the reality of the present.

Book Review: American Mermaid

 By Julia Langbein

• Pub Date: 2023

• Genre: Fantasy

• Where I bought this book: The Bookshelf, Cincinnati 

• Why I bought this book: Hey, I like the idea of mermaids  

 *****

    This debut novel is an uneven book, wonderful in some places, confusing and unfocused in others. At one point, I found myself identifying with a character who was "still struggling to follow" what is going on.

    The author has a varied biography that includes a doctorate in history, a stretch as a standup comedienne, and a food, art, comic book and blog writer. It might explain her wobbly style.

    Langbein loves her metaphors and similes, offering us the good, (a restaurant in a "faux Teutonic Tudor hut ... [that] looks like something Hitler build for Donald Duck"), the bad (people singing along in a room with speakers on a high ceiling as "Whitney Houston's lush vibrato pours down into the bad coffee of our voices like heavy cream"), and the ugly (an oyster dish that was "filling my mouth with the taste of original Pringles and jizz.")

    Even the author of the book's blurb seemed to have trouble capturing the essence of the tale, claiming "Hollywood insists she convert her fierce, androgynous protagonist into a teen sex object in a clamshell bra." The studio writers wanted to make a lot of changes, but that wasn't one of them.

    And that brings up that root of the novel's structure: It a novel about a novel being turned into a bad movie, and the plots merge and separate and merge again on nonparallel tracks.

    The basic story is that English teacher Penelope Schleeman's debut novel, American Mermaid, becomes a best seller, and Hollywood wants to make it a major motion picture. The advances allow Schleeman to quit her teaching job (which she claims to love), and move to Los Angeles to become a consultant on the script.

    So the book intertwines stories of Schleeman's life, chapters from her book, and the behind the scenes drama of writing a movie. There are other characters, some from real-life, others no doubt based on real-life people, and others who are solely from Langbein's imaginations. Some of the characters from the book's book mirror those of Langbein's novel, others are from Schleeman's past life as a teacher and others from her new life as a movie person. Some come out of nowhere, and disappear as quickly. Their purposes are obscure.

    Somewhere in American Mermaid is a good story warning about the power of billionaires, global warming, and the impact it may have on mermaids. But it's hard to find amidst the wandering subplots and fusion of characters. It's all very confusing, and Langbein's writing ultimately fails to carry it along. 

Book Review: The Weaver and the Witch Queen

 By Genevieve Gornichec

• Pub Date: 2023

• Genre: Magical Fiction, Historical Fantasy, Historical Fiction

• Where I bought this book: Barnes & Noble, Florence, Ky. 

• Why I bought this book: I enjoyed her debut novel

 *****

  

    Gornichec's second novel is not so much re-written mythology, but re-written -- or perhaps invented -- history. She calls it historical fantasy, inspired by medieval Icelandic sagas.

    And it's a decent book about those tribal times, when life was hard and bloody, cold and violent, and ruled by vicious and power hungry illusory kings.

    It's a decent read about Gunnhild, a young girl who doesn't admire the Viking lifestyle and who  dreams not of marriage and family, but adventure. She and two friends, sisters Oddny and Signy, take an oath to become blood sisters, intertwining their lives and futures.

    Gunnhild gets her early wish when a seeress/witch called Heid bids her to follow, and becomes her teacher and mentor. A decade later, Gunnhild strikes out on her own, a witch who still has a lot to learn.

    We don't see her training, but her life as she emerges and seeks to catch up with her blood sisters. The story is quite violent. The job and lifestyle of the Vikings and their leaders are to raid farmers and villagers, taking what they can, killing whoever tries to stops them. Gunnhild isn't sure how she fits in.

    Those Viking leaders -- from families of wealth from raiding -- hire more raiders, called the hird. They demand payoffs and loyalty from those who don't want to be raided and killed or enslaved, thus rising in the royal hierarchy to become  hersirs, jarls, princes, and kings. Sounds like a protection racket, but it happened all over Europe during these times.

    Gunnhild steps into this life, with her own wants and desires, friends and enemies. There's a lot of drama, backstabbing, and witchery. There's some romance, which comes with its own drama.

    So it's a nasty story, although it has some high points. It abounds with strong women and others who seek an alterative life. They guide and help each other, yet bicker and betray when it suits them. They pray to the gods and goddesses, who rarely play a major role in their story. 

    Bonuses include an Author's Note that explains her background and the foundations of Norse history. It includes a list of characters and terms, which are helpful in keeping track of who is who and what is what, and how people are related. I appreciated all those touches, and a map would have been nice.

    Overall, it's a well told tale. The writing is consistently strong. The action mostly moves along, although it tends to get bogged down in the drama and the romance.

    I suspect we haven't seen the last of Gornichec or her characters. Perhaps this will become a multi-part series, with more drama and romance and intrigue. Although I would prefer she go back to writing about the ancient gods and goddesses.

Book Review: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

 By Susanna Clarke

• Pub Date: 2004

• Genre: Magical Fiction, Fantasy, Historical Fiction

• Where I bought this book: Roebling Books & Coffee, Newport, Ky. 

• Why I bought this book: I was enchanted with her other work, Piranesi  

 ********

 

   An imaginative, expressive and tantalizing labyrinth of a novel, harmed only by its somewhat excessive length.

    Still, I was enthralled by its writing, its originality, its sense of magic, and the vibes it gives off of being an old, even ancient, work of art.

    Set mostly in early 19th Century England, a time of lords and ladies and excessive privilege amidst the belief of Rule Britannia, it showcases a time when Great Britain ruled the world with its dominance and might -- and was determined to return literal magical powers to the island.

    To do so, the country recruits the two magicians of the title, who have determinedly different ideas about the proper use of magic. Mr Norrell, a bookish and crotchety old man, sees magic as a calling that should be limited to those who venerate it. Indeed, in his reverence for the use and history of magic, he sees himself as its gatekeeper.

    But under pressure from the country's nobility, he agrees to take on a young student, Jonathan Strange, a gentle soul who has some liberal -- and to Mr Norrell, decidedly appalling -- ideas for magic's use and place in society.

    Clarke's narrator is a regal lady, of high repute, who will not be trifled with. She knows all, and will deign to tell you in her own sweet time. She will not be rushed, nor forced to use some of those new fangled words of English. She will shew you what is going on, when and how she chuses to. She writes of mediaeval times, Her words are rare, exquisite and precise.

    She writes of a doctor and his family on a summer tour of Venice, Italy.

They were excessively pleased with the Campo Santa Maria Formosa. They thought the façades of the houses very magnificent -- they could not praise them highly enough. But the sad decay, which building, bridges and church all displayed, seem to charm them even more. They were Englishmen, and, to them, the decline of other nations was the most natural thing in the world. They belonged to a race blessed with so sensitive an appreciation of it own talents (and so doubtful an opinion of any body else's) that they would not have been at all surprised to learn that the Venetians themselves had been entirely ignorant of the merits of their own city -- until the Englishmen had come to tell them it was delightful.

    Oh, and the feuds between the two men are devilish and dramatic. Mini spoiler alert warning:. At one point, one of the duo publishes a three-volume history of magic. The other uses his powers to buy up all the copies and make them disappear.

    The tale itself winds through the Napoleonic Wars, the Battle of Waterloo, and the tale of an ancient king from the North of England returning to claim his domain. Oh, and there are Faeries. Lots of Faeries. Good Faeries, bad Faeries, sneaky Faeries, and many, many more.

    At times, it's a bit overwhelming. The story gets muddled and a tad repetitive. You find yourself wishing she'd wrap it up, as the night continues on into morning, but she will not be rushed. Any resolution seems far off.

    But as with Clarke's novel Piranesi, it is how the story is told that is the true work of art.

Book Review: The Ministry of Time

 By Kaliane Bradley

• Pub Date: 2024

• Genre: Fantasy, time travel

• Where I bought this book: Roebling Books, Newport, Ky. 

• Why I bought this book: The idea of time -- and time travel -- fascinates me  

 *****

    I love the concept of this book -- bringing people from the past into the present -- but its execution was, shall we say, a bit disjointed.

    It has a lot going for it. The writing is decent, with flashes of brilliance. The characters for the most part are diverse and well rounded. Their biographical backgrounds -- and more than one is actually taken from the pages of history -- are compelling.

    Our hero and narrator, who is not named for the bulk of the novel, is an Asian Englishwoman working in the British civil service. She was born in Cambodia and lived through the Khmer Rouge takeover and genocide, survived and moved with her family to the UK and now lives in London. As the book begins, she finds her new job is part of a time travel experiment. Various people from other eras of the British Empire will be brought into the 21st Century. She will be a bridge to help them acclimate to the current time.

    The newcomers will be called expats, rather than refugees, the latter being considered an unflattering term. Our hero, a refugee herself and currently an expert on languages, has mixed feeling about the issue.

    The book never delves into how the theorical impossibility of time travel is overcome. It simply posits that it was found sometime in the future, and the British appropriated the discovery to the current time and place. Precautions are taken to ensure the past is not changed; they are simply bringing people from previous times into the present. "Removing them from the past ought not to impact the future."

    Still, the book is written on various timelines, which can be confusing.

    Anyway, let's start with the good parts: The writing is stunning at times,  including lines like these:

            * "Ideas have to cause problems before they cause solutions."

            * "My mother ... had witnessed the sort of horrors that changed the way screams sounded."

            * "The wind shook me like a beetle in a matchbox." -- A line I so want to believe is a reference to Melanie's song, Alexander Beetle.

     The book explores the themes of people out of their elements and trying to fit in, often comparing it to the experiences of immigrants and refugees. How they are treated -- as a curiosity, savage, naive or incompetent -- is a constant element.

    There's a story in there that explains what happened, but it's so tangled it's sometime hard to decipher. The author throws in a romance and potential crimes of the past and future. As we move into the climax, it attains the elements of a thriller, as good guys and bad guys (and who are all these people?) battle to take control of whatever needs to be taken control of.

    Yet within that, that actions sometimes grinds to a halt and we are subjected to philosophical meanderings about what it all means.

    So go ahead and enjoy the writing and the story. Just don't try to hard to understand it all.

Book Review: The Cloisters

 By Katy Hays

• Pub Date: 2022

• Genre: Fantasy

• Where I bought this book: The Book Loft, Columbus, Ohio 

• Why I bought this book: I grew up blocks from The Cloisters in New York City  

 ******

 

   It's not often my old neighborhood in New York is highlighted in a novel. Even in maps, Manhattan gets chopped off somewhere uptown from Harlem, like it's not worth the effort to draw the streets of Inwood.

    But The Cloisters are two subway stops from where I grew up on 207th Street. Not that I went there a lot; I think the only time I've been was on a field trip during my elementary school days.

   Still, there's a lot to be said for seeing familiar places and streets in a novel. And it's a decent overall story. Not mind-blowing, but with an array of incongruous yet curiously well matched characters, it's well plotted and well told. 

    Our narrator -- who is either unreliable or unknowing -- is Ann Stilwell from Walla Walla, Wash. She's a smart if unsophisticated art history major, coming to New York for a summer internship at the world renowned Metropolitan Museum of Art on Fifth Avenue in Midtown. But there's a mix up and her job is now unavailable.

    Serendipitously though, she is rescued by Patrick, the dashing curator of the Cloisters, who says he can use her talents at the relatively obscure medieval museum uptown near 190th Street. There, she meets Rachel, a young, cultured, and worldly researcher, and Leo, the gardener with a discerning knowledge of the plants and herbs grown at the museum and a side gig as a punk rock musician.

    In the rarified air of the museum, we discover a lot is going on. Secretive stuff, which involves tarot cards and divination, late night unannounced meetings, and the questionable provenance of artifacts some employees are buying and selling on the side.

    The story centers on the relationships between the main characters, a complicated web of intrigue and personal histories. In between we have Ann's journey of discovering the city's diverse neighborhoods, and her telling the history of the Cloisters, the Renaissance period, and Medieval art. 

    Sometime, it's difficult to follow the rationales of the characters, and several times you find yourself thinking things will not end well. We wonder if they are devious, diabolical, brilliant, or some combination. 

    As a murder mystery (yes, there is one) and police procedural, the story is not very good. As a potential romance, it's mundane. Where it hits its peaks is as an art tutorial, tour guide, and language explainer. Here, the writer finds her niche, with compelling writing and deep insights. 

Book Review: The God of Endings

 By Jacqueline Holland

• Pub Date: 2023

• Genre: Fantasy

• Where I bought this book: Bookmatters, Milford, Ohio 

• Why I bought this book: It is a debut novel, and stories of immortality intrigue me   

 ******

         We give immortality to our gods, because they are perfect. We grant immortality to our book characters, because they are not.

    Collette LeSange is far from perfect. And she assuredly does not like her immortality. She did not ask for it, and her years on earth -- full of pain and loss, despair, failed hope, and taunts from the gods -- have not been friendly. She isn't living, she thinks, just existing.

    And as modern society grows around her, she's finding it harder to hide -- and to eat. Because Collette is a vampire, she must feed on blood, which gets more difficult to find as her years mount up.

    Holland's debut novel tells us how Collette gained immortality, her life over the next 150 or so years, and the fears that engulf her and remain constant companions.

    It's an audacious tale, full of adventure and sadness. It's a life writ large, and as much as Colette tries, she find it impossible to ignore the larger world. All too often, we find that her attempts to exude compassion and kindness rarely end well. 

    Collette grew up the daughter of a gravestone carver in the America of the early 19th Century, before her grandfather chose immortality for her -- a sore spot with her. She soon made it to Europe, where she met and was kept by others of her kind. But angry gods and angry mortals decried what they saw as her wickedness, so she was forced to wander alone and live apart from the vremenie -- those who live short lives -- for most of her days.

    Now, in the early 1980s, she is living and working in America as the owner of and only teacher at an elite pre-school. She senses the gods -- Czerobog* and Belobog, the former the god of darkness, destruction, and woe; the latter the god of light, life, and good fortune (the pair also may be just two faces of one god) -- have something planned for her. 

    In successive chapters, Holland alternates between Collette's history and struggles through the years and her current saga, which includes her growing relationship with a young artistic student with a troubled family life.

    The book has a few problems: Parts of it are overwritten, both stylistically and in the telling. Over-description is rampant, and some of the storylines could have been parsed or omitted.

    But it's a wide-ranging epic, and the ageless protagonist allows Holland to tell a tale over centuries of human history through the eyes of a single women, who is caring and strong, if also confused and lonely. It's overall a good read, depressing at times, but with a texture of hope that threads its way through some of the worst actions of humanity.

___________________________________

    *He's also called the God of Endings, hence the title.

Book Review: The Fragile Threads of Power

  By V.E. Schwab

• Pub Date: 2023

• Genre: Fantasy

• Where I bought this book: The Book Loft, Columbus, Ohio 

• Why I bought this book: Well, I've read the first three novels, so may as well keep going  

 ******

    Some great characters return in this book, the fourth in the Shades of Magic series, and the first in a new series, tentatively titled the Threads of Magic*. There's Lila Bard, the angry Antari**, a messy, unsubtle whirlwind; Alucard Emery, a wealthy lord, wannabe pirate, and consort to the king, and Kell Maresh, once cocky and now uneasy, an Antari who has lost his magic.

    They are joined by a series of new magicians: Tes, a young girl who can see the threads of magic and fix broken ones; Kosika, another young girl, who finds herself the queen of White London; and Queen Nadiya Loreni, wife of the new King Rhy Maresh, a magician and scientist.***

    The locations continue to excel: There's Red London, ruled by the Maresh family -- it's the powerful London with raucous neighborhoods full of taverns and marketplaces, but it's people worry it is losing its magic; dystopian Black London, closed up after destroying its magic centuries ago; and White London, trying to make a comeback after a devastating battle with the utmost evil. We also see the return of the Ferase Stras, which you must somehow find before boarding the ship of magical stuff and paying the proper price before getting what you may need.

    So we have a bevy of cunning characters, imaginative places for them to roam, and adventurous stories about royalty and magic and betrayal, urchins and bullies, love and life and death. All of the needed background is explained in the new series, but reading the previous three is well worth your time.

    This is good stuff. The overall story is compelling; the tales and anecdotes are gripping, and we are glad to be along for the ride. Even when the books top 600 pages, they are satisfying and surprisingly quick reads.

    The only flaws I find are the scenes of the battles of magic, which sometimes get a bit overdone and confusing. But rest assured, you can rip through them and stay in touch with the stories.

    -------------------------

* When I picked up the first book, I did not know it was part of a series.

** A most powerful magician in this world.

*** After all, what is science but magic with an explanation?

Book Review: Glory

  By Noviolet Bulawayo

• Pub Date: 2022

• Where I bought this book: The Book Loft, Columbus, Ohio 

• Why I bought this book: I like fables 

 ******

     I really, really wanted to like to book. Tholukuthi, I wanted to like this book. But it took my slogging through some 325 repetitive pages, with too many words, tholukuthi, and a writing style that carried around too many blending ideas and voices, before I found it.

    It's difficult to say it was worth it. But two parts of the book -- one in which Destiny finds her mother's past of being a victim of violence linked with her own similar history, and a second in the final 70 pages, which featured the hope of butterflies and some extraordinary writing -- made me rethink all the thoughts I had while reading it.

    It's a tale of Zimbabwe, an African country that suffered colonialism and white minority rule before a revolution threw out the white overlords but brought in a murderous, native dictatorship. The persecution and disappearances of the population continued, with the government of Black nationalist  Robert Mugabe becoming increasingly more vicious and corrupt over his 40-year dictatorship.

    This fable shows the country as literal animals -- Mugabe is the Old Horse, whose presence strikes fear and loyalty among the population of goats and chickens and cats and all manner of insects. His army of Defenders are brutal dogs that attack and kill without warning or remorse. The majority animals are poor but loyal to the ruler, wearing his image on their clothing and waving the proper flag of the Country Country.

    All of this mimics the history of the land in the south of Africa, which during colonialism was called Rhodesia -- named after the rich English lord who invaded and declared the area part of Britain. If that's not the most colonial thing ever, I'm not sure what is. After World War II, the rulers declared independence from Britain, and, looking to neighboring South Africa, set up an apartheid-like state.

    The book begins with Old Horse celebrating his 40 years of power, and moves on to the coup that tossed him out and took over his rule. But it is a verbose story, told through a multitude of conflicting and confusing voices. It's often unclear what the animals represent -- someone from the Seat of Power, the Resistance, the Dissidents, the Sisters of the Disappeared, or just random citizens.

    The writing includes repetitive words, phrases, entire sentences. Some chapters, tholukuthi, include long-winded descriptions that go on and on and on and on and on. And there is the use of tholukuthi, a word of African origin that means -- seemingly, whatever the author wants it to mean. It's an interjection, a hallelujah!, a "really, really," an "and so," a "you'll find that," and is used so many times it means all of them, and none of them.

    Bulawayo even uses a social media style to tell the tale. But even there, the streams of Twitter feeds are as disembodied, annoying, and incomprehensible as the real ones.

    When one overdoes a stylistic point, it loses its magic.

    That's what happens here. In the later quarter of the book, the tone changes, becomes more personal, and focuses on a single family of animals, including Destiny and her mother, Simiso. This is where I started enjoying the book, and eagerly read the pages. But the writing still overwhelms the ideas and actions. The repetition and overwriting stand out and get in the way of the story.

    When she writes about the genocide that occurred, it's hard to read -- because it's true. I stuck through the book until the end, and I'm glad I did. It struck a chord in me. It touched me. It taught me something.

    It also showed me what this book could have been.

Book Review: Gwendy's Magic Feather

  By Richard Chizmar

• Pub Date: 2019

• Where I bought this book: Household Books,  Cincinnati. 

• Why I bought this book: I found this really cool, locally owned bookstore in my hometown, and felt I had to buy something. This was it.

 ******

    So, I had read the first and third installments of this trilogy because Stephen King co-wrote those two. Both were good stories, well told. 

    My review of Gwendy's Button Box is here, and Gwendy's Final Task is here.

    I really did not intend to read this middle chapter, because it wasn't essential, and I was unfamiliar with the author. But when I found it in this well-curated bookstore that was part of an under-served neighborhood near mine, well, I had to support it.

    It's nice. Well written. It fits in well to the overall story. It fleshes out the details of Gwendy Peterson, the girl we met as a young teen-ager when a strange man gives her this mysterious, other-worldly button box, who is now a young U.S. Congresswoman from Maine. The button box gives rewards, can cause real pain -- up to and including Armageddon -- and has a strange pull on those who watch over it.

    It's a King creation, through and through. But as King notes in his forward, Chizmar saved the first book from oblivion, and wrote a large role in the third. On his own in the second, Chizmar does a workman-like job, giving Wendy another opportunity to do well. 

    Gwendy becomes what we expected in book one. She's the same person, only older and wiser. But the writing and story have the same flaws as the other two books: Some long-winded, drawn out, unnecessarily long scenes, lots of tropes, and filler (see, it's not just King who does all that). 

    But overall, it's a decent read.

Book Review: The Curator

  By Owen King

• Pub Date: 2023 

• Where I bought this book: The Novel Neighbor, Webster Groves, Mo. 

• Why I bought this book: I liked King's work in Sleeping Beauties

********

    King has written the rare novel -- one that is multi-layered, complicated, yet eminently comprehensive and readable.

    It has a weird setting in distant time and place but one that's vaguely familiar -- reminiscent of Victorian England, with a few Dickensian characters thrown in for good measure.

    They live in a city on a sea that sounds much like many places in our world.* The land has its succession of kings and wars, its poverty and wealth, and its exploitation of both. There's revolution in the air amidst the magic. And there's those odd cats.

    But while the when and where is left unnamed, we know it's not in our area of the universe. The first sign is the description of a solar system with a sun and 11 planets. The second is the double moon.

Callisto sometimes expressed concern
about the presentation of cats in the book

    The novel is long, and takes a while to get going. But once it does, it's a fast moving page turner. We learn there's been some type of uprising of the poor against the rich; the government has been overthrown but is hanging on up north; a temporary group has taken power and is trying to keep things running, but people's daily lives have changed little.

       The story focuses on several people caught up in the aftermath, who are trying to keep up as strange, fantastical things happen around them. They are unclear about what is happening, and so are we. It's either magical, led by a secretive unknown group, or simply the will of the omniscient cats.

"And when we die, if we've been decent, and if we've been good to the little ones here" -- the man gestured at the cats languidly picking their way over the rocky ground -- "there's a Big One, the Grand Mother. She comes long an picks us up by our scruff, like we were her own young ones. ... She takes us to where it's soft an warm an the milk runs forever an She protects us."

    Near the tail-end of the book, King pens an explanation, such as it is, for much of what has happened. It's not all encompassing, but it helps. It explains who the characters are and what they represent. It also explains the power and authority of the cats.

    Well, for the most part. But they are still cats, and still inscrutable.

_________________________________

    *King gives a wonderfully detailed description of the city, and the book has some fine illustrations by Kathleen Jennings, but alas, no map. I've said this before and I'll say it again here -- every book could be made better with a map.

Book Review: The Lives of Puppets

 By TJ Klune

• Pub Date: 2023

• Where I bought this book: The Book Loft, Columbus, Ohio 

• Why I bought this book: I liked two of his earlier books

**** 

  

    Unfortunately, Klune missed the mark with his latest offering.

   

    Not that he didn't give it his all. It contains a good heart, some unique characters, and a touch of lyrical writing. But there's not enough of that -- instead he writes too long, with too many words, and too many superfluous anecdotes -- for an overall story that's essentially pointless. Yes, it has a moral -- that we should all be kind, loving and forgiving, look beyond someone's past, and see into their hearts.

    And, boyo, does he hammer home this point, over and over and over. Both figuratively and literally.

    It's a rather simple story, sort of a robot rewrite of the tale of Pinocchio, set in an unknown future time. Geppetto is in there in as the android Giovanni Lawson, whose past is not as kind and thoughtful as he appears to be in the present. The Authority (yes, it is capitalized so you know it's evil) uses an emblem of a fox and a cat. There's even a Blue Fairy, who may be the good guys.

    Indeed, cultural references are in all the characters. There's Rambo, a Roomba with the personality of your annoying kid brother. There's Nurse Ratched, who isn't quite as nasty as the original. She can be pleasant, but must point out she is Engaging Empathy Protocol every freaking time. A paragraph or two later, when she returns to normal, she must note she is Disengaging Empathy Protocol, again in all caps. 

    To avoid a spoiler alert, I don't want to say too much about Hap -- nicknamed the Hysterically Angry Puppet -- who is an integral and multi-layered character that comes along later. 

    Oh yes. There's Victor. First identified as a son of Gio, he's the only non-android in the book. I'm guessing he's supposed to be the protagonist, but he's a weak and unlikeable one, lonely and melancholy, and often morose or depressed.

    So the book goes on. It include a few tropes (Vegas is the capital of this evil empire), and some sequences that must be read with a good eye-roll. If you like this sort of thing, you'll like the book. 

Book Review: Cursed Bunny

 By Bora Chung

• Translated by: Anton Hur

• Pub Date: 2017 in Korean; 2021 in English

• Where I bought this book: Downbound Books, Cincinnati, Ohio  

• Why I bought this book: The bunny on the cover told me to, and that it was shortlisted for an International Book Prize

******

    

    Short stories are not just truncated novels but have a flow and a texture all their own.

    In the hands of Chung, short stories take on the aura of fables, using allegories that shock and horrify, and rise to the status of a legend devolving into fantasy.

    She writes about absurd ghosts and lives lived brutally, about children and capitalism, and about war, peace, and the aftermath -- which brings us back to those spirits that can haunt us. 

    These tales are seemingly simple, told with little fuss and a minimalist style. They have few characters, none more than needed, and often are nameless, with only enough detail to tell the tale without shame or scorn. 

    But, oh, do they hold power over your mind and thoughts. There's also some nods to the misogyny rampant in the culture, and a feminist take. In The Embodiment, an unmarried, pregnant woman is told -- by her doctor, no less -- to get a father or the child will not grow properly. The woman responds by going out on seon dates set up by a matchmaker for the specific purpose of finding a man to marry her. 

    The opening tale, The Head, begins with a woman seeing a head rising from her toilet, calling out for "mother." It is created from her excretions. The title story, which reads like an old fashioned fairy tale, is about a man who creates "cursed fetishes" -- in this case a lamp shaped like a bunny. A second, similarly told story, Scars, is about a man who finds riches in the most evil places.

    The stories are tough to read, and reach into places that most would rather avoid. But Chung's style belies their nature -- her basic, matter-of-fact narratives let the tales stand as the epitome of how to write a short story.

Book Review: The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet

 By Becky Chambers

• Pub Date: 2014

• Where I bought this book: Downbound Books, Cincinnati 

• Why I bought this book: My daughter highly recommends this writer

*******

   About halfway through reading this book, I had emergency gall bladder surgery. I tell you this because while drifting in and out of consciousness during recovery, I starting having some wild and colorful hallucinations, feeling that I was traveling through other dimensions of time and space. 

    It made me sort of leery about returning to the book, but also more appreciative of the images and descriptions in Chambers' writing.

    It's actually a fun book, an exploration of the foibles and frustrations of humans -- and to a larger extent, all sentient beings. It puts them together on a spaceship, The Wayfarer, tasked with punching wormholes to facilitate interspace travel. 

    It forces everyone -- humans, lizard-like beings, and assorted blobs and lobster-like and artificial intelligent beings -- together so that we rethink culture and thoughts and mores and idiosyncrasies.

    But like in all good worlds, love and appreciation of tea is a constant.

    The chapters and adventures are like episodic television, as the crew sets out on a mission to build new pathways through sometime hostile space frontiers, meeting and greeting other worlds and species. It's got science, excitement, danger, and hope for the future.

TWIB: 13th Ed.

     So, I visited the Book Loft in Columbus today -- and while the two-hour drive took closer to four hours because of a massive delay on Interstate 71 (I have no idea why; traffic just stopped for an hour) -- it was an enjoyable experience. A late lunch with my daughter at Fourth & State, a vegan cafe downtown, and then on to add to The TBR Stack.

The latest haul, ready to be read

    

        The Light Pirate, by Lily Brooks-Dalton: I have no idea what it's about, but my first daughter told me to "but it and read it next." Also, the title is fantastic, and the author's first book, Good Morning, Midnight, was a good read (and another compelling title).

    Babel, by R.F. Kuang: I have seen this title all over the place. So I grabbed it in the store, and after reading the description -- about languages, learning, and imperialism -- I could not put it back.

    How It Went, by Wendell Berry: When Kentucky's greatest living author -- and perhaps its finest living person -- puts out a new volume of stories about Port William, Ky., you just have to give it a go. Berry, after all, taught this Kentucky immigrant everything I've learned about the state.

    The Other Black Girl, by Zakiya Dalila Harris: What it's like when two Black woman work in the same office, as told by a Black woman. I think I'll learn something from this.

    Tread of Angels, by Rebecca Roanhorse: Read this description from the book flap: "High in the remote mountains, the town of Goetia is booming as prospectors from near and far come to mine the powerful new element Divinity. Divinity  is the remains of the body of the rebel Abaddon, who fell to Earth during Heaven's War, and it powers the world's most inventive and innovative technologies, ushering in a new age of progress. However, only the descendants of those who rebelled, called the Fallen, possess the ability to see the rich lodes of the precious element. That makes them a necessary evil among the good and righteous people called the Elect, and Goetia a town segregated by ancestry and class."  Yep, me too.

    Galatea, by Madeline Miller: It's short, but it's the first book in a while from Miller, the goddess of reinterpreting the perspectives of the Greek legends.

Book Review: Fairy Tale

 

•  Author: Stephen King

• Where I bought this book: Carmichael's Bookstore, Louisville, Ky. 

• Why I bought this book: I've read every one of King's books. I ain't gonna stop now.

*********

    

   Fairy Tale is a shining example of the genius that is Stephen King.

    It's got a great story, with wonderful characters, and it's well told. What's not to like? I'd say this is among the Top 10 novels King has written.     

    It highlights the strengths of a King story, while playing down the tropes and flaws. But they are there. Indeed, as King seems to be drifting away from horror and into the realm of fantasy and thrillers, he has heightened his tendency to over-describe and overwrite.

    I first noticed this in 11/22/63, the story of the JFK assassination, when Jake Epping/George Amberson chases Oswald through Dallas in chapters that seem never-ending. In the latter part of Fairy Tale, when the action gets fast and furious, King's penchant for extraneous details slows things down.

      But so what? By this time we are so wrapped up in Charlie Reade's adventures with his dog, Radar, in Lilimar, that we easily speed through to the ending. But here's the thing -- we like Charlie, and his dog, and what he is doing, and we really don't want it to end. Because with King, we know it could have a happy or a sad ending.

    And because we have come this far, we know Charlie. We like him. Like many a King character, he's a normal teenager in a regular middle-of-America place (there's even a crazy old man in a weird house on the edge of town). Charlie has an unremarkable life -- his mother died young; his father struggles with alcoholism, and Charlie finds solace in football and his friends.

    But remember that old guy, name of Howard Bowditch? Well, Charlie somehow meets up with him, and they grew to like each other. Bowditch tells Charlie something remarkable about that shed in the back yard; Charlie looks into it, and the adventure begins.

    He enters a different world, one of hope but exacerbation. He senses its history, and how it seems to be  falling apart. He meets people he's never known before -- could never have known before -- but knows whom to trust and whom to help. It's a remarkable journey.

    When we first meet Charlie, the teller of this tale, he speaks in the voice of a young man. We watch him grow up as we hear him age through his words. Such is the power of Charlie's story and the mystical voice that King gives him.

Book Review: Piranesi

 

•  Author: Susanna Clarke

• Where I bought this book: A Room of One's Own, Madison, Wisc. 

• Why I bought this book: I was looking for a title by a similarly named author, and came across this instead.

*********

        Yes, there is a story in here, and it's a wonderful one, so it's worth your while to get to it.

    But what keeps you going in this magical place are the descriptions. The fantastical, detailed discoveries behind every door, in every chamber and hall, filled with statues that delight and compel and charm. 

    Yes, Piranesi's wanderings are fun to follow. His attempts to divine the origins and implications of where he is keep the tale from his journals moving along.

    It's a remarkably strange place, even for a fantasy book. It could be a world inside a building, or a building that it a world. We don't know. We explore its ramifications with Piranesi, as he speaks to us through those writings.

    Piranesi is all but alone in the world. There is someone else, named The Other. There is evidence of other people who are or have been there, but it's all speculation, based on snippets of writings he has found.  

 One sentence puzzles me: The world was constantly speaking to Ancient Man. I do not understand why this sentence is in the past tense. The World still speaks to me every day.

    Indeed, the pleasure of this book is not the story of who Piranesi is and where he is, but the place itself, and the secrets it hides. Sometimes, the story actually gets in the way of the pleasure of reading this remarkable book.

    Yes, the secrets are revealed. It is well worth waiting for.