Book Reviews – Page 105 – Carol's Notebook

A River in Darkness by Masaji Ishikawa

July 20, 2018July 19, 2018 by Carol2 Comments

A River in Darkness is a heart-breaking story. Ishikawa went form a childhood in Japan where he didn't fit in because he was half-Korean to North Korea where he was one of the lowest of the low. He tells his story frankly, without sentimentality, but it's full of misery, hunger, desperation. He tells of living conditions that I can't even imagine. I knew North Korea is not a good country, but we don't get to see this side of it often. We don't see how the people live, and die. We know that life in the totalitarian regime is tough, but Ishikawa let's us see the brainwashing, the untenable choices that have to be made. The corruption and domination affect every aspect of life. A River in Darkness was way out of my comfort zone, but I am definitely glad I picked it up. I got sucked into Ishikawa's story. I wish it had a happy ending, though. He does escape...

Artificial Condition by Martha Wells

July 19, 2018July 18, 2018 by Carol2 Comments

I read Artificial Condition right after I finished the first Murderbot story, All Systems Red. Now I'm anxiously waiting for #3, which comes out in August. They're short, so definitely read #1 before Artificial Condition. It'll give you the background you need on who Murderbot is, how it's free from its governor module, and how almost human it is. Once again, I like Murderbot. It's funny and snarky. This time around it's searching for the truth of what happened in its past and comes upon a helpful transport AI that likes entertainment feeds as much as Murderbot, so it helps out in many ways, including performing surgery on Murderbot to make it seem human. It's easier to maneuver through the universe if people think you're human, not a rogue killing machine. Murderbot needs to have a cover to get where it wants to go, so it signs up for employment as a bodyguard for researchers trying to recover some of their data from an...

The Word Is Murder by Anthony Horowitz

July 18, 2018October 27, 2021 by Carol6 Comments

Horowitz is just a little too clever for me. In The Word is Murder, he's inserted a fictional version of himself as the detective's sidekick. It's all very meta and distracting for me. The mystery itself is good, a woman is killed the same day she plans her own funeral. There are several secrets in her past that may have to do with the murder. She also has a famous actor son, which makes the case more interesting to the media. Horowitz the character is drawn into the case by a detective who consults for the police. Hawthorne can be a bit grating. He's supposed to be the brilliant, idiosyncratic Holmes-ish character to Horowitz. The characters and mystery are actually well-done. I like the false leads and how to some extent the slightly bumbling Horowitz encourages them. The clues are all there, but the time line falls apart a little. I think I tend to want to like Horowitz's stories more...

Dead Water by Ngaio Marsh

July 11, 2018 by Carol4 Comments

Emily Pride is an old friend/French teacher of Inspector Alleyn and she has been receiving death threats, mostly because she want to shut down a small island's tourist trade. She recently inherited the island and finds all the hoopla around the falls distasteful. She heads off to the island to take care of the situation, but once she is hurt, Alleyn shortens his own vacation and goes to the island to watch out for her. And then, of course, there's the murder, even if it's not the murder you expect. Happily Alleyn's on the scene to take over the investigation. The characters are a mixed lot. Some are bad stereotypes that tend to pop up in vintage mysteries, like the hysterical spinster and the drunk parents of the boy whose warts were "miraculously" healed. Some are more interesting, like the innkeeper's beautiful wife. We also have assorted other locals, including the doctor, the preacher and his wife, a young couple falling in love....

The Annotated Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler

July 5, 2018May 5, 2018 by Carol6 Comments

I read a lot of crime fiction and mystery stories, both modern and classic, but somehow I've skipped over Philip Marlowe. In this introduction to Marlowe, a dying millionaire hires him to handle the blackmailer of one of his two troublesome daughters, and Marlowe finds himself involved with more than extortion. Kidnapping, pornography, seduction, and murder are just a few of the complications he gets caught up in. As the annotations show, even though this is the first in the series, it's not really the first time we may have met Marlowe, although under other names. Chandler apparently often took earlier short stories he had written for pulp magazines like Black Mask, and combined and expanded them into the Marlowe novels. The Big Sleep is a complicated story, set in 1930s Los Angeles, involving blackmail and a bookstore that is a rental library for pornography. The annotations provide lots of information about the time period, about Chandler's writing, and about some of...

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie

July 2, 2018 by Carol4 Comments

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is definitely one of Agatha Christie's best, but it was a reread for me, so I knew who the killer was. And the whodunnit is what makes this such a great mystery. Hercule Poirot has "retired" to the peaceful village of King’s Abbot, keeping his former career as a detective a secret, but of course someone - Roger Ackroyd - is killed. Ackroyd was actually a friend of Poirot, one of the few who knew his work, and the niece, Flora, asks Poirot to investigate. Poirot doesn't have his Hastings here, so the part of narrator/sidekick is covered by Dr. Sheppard, Poirot's neighbor and the one who discovered the body. Poirot is his usual silly, brilliant self. I like that we meet him before he takes the case and I love that they assume he used to be a hairdresser. "Look at that moustache of his." The mystery is well-plotted with plenty of suspects and red herrings. I enjoyed...