Ancestor
by Scott Sigler
Michigan born and bred Scott Sigler has carved a niche in the scientific bio-thriller genre. over the past two decades or so. All of his work that I've read so far explicitly or at least generally eschews the supernatural.
Sigler's stories can usually be scientifically explained. That doesn't make any of his stories less thrilling or horrifying. If you dislike authors who make up contradictory rules as they go along and hand wave away inconsistencies by yelling "Magic!!", you might like Sigler's style.
Several respected authors have repeated possibly apocryphal quotes from older authors and screenwriters that there are only a small number of stories from which all writers draw. I don't know about that. I do know that human beings are angered and frightened by death. We can't solve death.
We are occasionally frustrated that although we can create life in our own image, provided we find a willing fertile partner of the opposite sex, doing so is a messy, chaotic and oft thankless process that may not deliver what was expected. The other parent's genes along with various haphazard experiences impact and mold the child in unplanned ways. We can't create life to exact specifications from scratch.
What if we could create a quick breeding flying creature that eats mosquitoes, breathes carbon and exhales oxygen. That might reduce the dangers of global warming. Or perhaps we could create a mammal that could provide organ donor matches for every human who needed one? What would it be like to have, however tenuously, the power of God (or evolution) to create? That's the theme in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. And that same theme is echoed in Ancestor. This story has some characters seen in the Infected series.
Neon Prey
by John Sandford
This is another installment in the Lucas Davenport series. It is very similar to a previous book in that series, Golden Prey , reviewed here. The Cliff Notes version of this series is that Lucas Davenport, an independently wealthy and politically connected US Marshal decides which cases to take. Davenport usually chases the most dangerous and violent felons.
Lucas is often assisted in his cases by the salt and pepper team of US Marshals Rae Givens and Bob Matees. Rae and Bob are good (platonic) friends with each other. They are more down to earth with more street experience than Lucas. They often good naturedly point out flaws in some of Lucas' plans. But there's nobody that Lucas would rather have watching his back when it goes down hard.
In this installment a scary and racist Louisiana based loan shark collector, enforcer,and hitman named Clayton Deese is tasked by his affable boss, lawyer, loan shark, and businessman Roger Smith to put a highly specific hurting on someone who owes Roger money. This time, Roger doesn't want the victim dead.
Roger still has hopes of recovering his money. The problem is that the victim has not only refused to pay his debts but has also publicly told Roger to commit unpleasant and impossible acts of auto-copulation. Roger can't let that go. Other debtors might decide not to pay. Other criminals could conclude that a weak Roger can be chased from the business or even forcibly, painfully and permanently "retired". So Roger orders Clayton to make an example so that everyone can see what happens when you **** with Roger. It's nothing Clayton hasn't done before. Clayton's only concern is that he's not supposed to kill his target. He would much prefer to do that.
The Institute
by Stephen King
I don't think that Stephen King has lost too much speed off his fastball. There are certain repeated themes, phrases and subplots that are recognizable in The Institute from several of King's other works as well as a few deliberate callbacks to creations or adaptations that King liked, or in the case of Kubrick's The Shining, did not like at all.
King remains a master at quickly creating realistic characters with minimal description who nonetheless feel as if you've known them for years. So you care when good or more often, bad things happen to them. At a little over 500 pages in hardcover this is not a short investment in time but because King is such a compelling storyteller I think most readers will feel that time flies past while reading.
King is really good at writing from a child's perspective. Although this story is not new, I think King fans will enjoy his take on it.
Well, what's it about? I don't want to talk too much about that. In some respects it's a mashup of King's previous novels Firestarter and Dead Zone, with a little Dan Simmons' Carrion Comfort thrown in with a hefty base of J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series--that is Harry Potter if an even more sadistic Dolores Umbridge was in charge of everything. Might be some Nurse Ratched elements as well.
Twelve year old Luke Ellis is a certifiable genius whose intelligence is off the charts. Even by gifted standards, he's an anomaly. But that's not his most unusual trait. No, Luke has telekinesis. His telekinesis is weak but it's noticeable. When Luke concentrates or is under severe emotional strain, he can move things with his mind. His parents know about this but just accept it as part of his gifts. They are more surprised to learn just how smart their son is.
Talon of God
by Wesley Snipes and Ray Norman
I had mixed feelings about this book. It started out one way and then immediately went another. At some points it was something less than a book and more like a screenplay. The good part about the book is that it has a particular point of view and strongly argues for that.
The bad news is that a great deal of the book is not interesting plot development or even fun mindless action but rather pages and pages and pages of theodicy-that is arguing for the existence of an all powerful all good God even though the world is crammed full of evils, big and small, random and deliberate, human and otherwise.
While I don't mind going down the rabbit hole that these questions pose and debating them with people I know and respect that really wasn't what I was expecting or hoping for from this book. I was expecting, and briefly got, a superhero that was very reminiscent of Snipes' best known film role, Blade.
Unlike Blade, however this hero is something of a goody two shoes, whose abilities are not primarily martial, but rather moral and emotional. This paladin is more interested in faith, forgiveness and love than in smiting evil. He's not quite a pacifist , not running around with a broadsword, but he's pretty close.
In Chicago there's a new drug that just hit the streets. The young attractive doctor Lauryn Jefferson sees the impact of this drug first hand when a heretofore friendly homeless man is injected with the drug and starts to turn into something not of this world.
However, even though she doesn't know how she did it, with the help of the mysterious sword armed man, known only as Talon, Lauryn is able to heal the homeless man and bring him back to himself.
Guilty Minds
by Joseph Finder
This thriller novel was a good comfort read. I knew what to expect and it delivered. Joseph Finder is an author whom I'm starting to really appreciate, as previously detailed here and here. This is a later installment in a series, but it stands on its own. You don't need to have read the previous books to enjoy this one.
There are bits and pieces of back story doled out at certain places in the novel but Finder never allows this to interfere with the plot. There aren't pages and pages detailed what happened in prior books. The story is written in first person which is often, but not necessarily a hint that the storyteller survives. This story kept the reader up in the air about things as long as possible. So that was good. This book was just under 400 pages and a pretty quick read.
The only time I thought the story pace slowed was in a few places where Finder demonstrated that he had done his research and then some on the relevant laws, technologies, and tactics which apply in the legal netherworld which he describes. All of that is important for a sense of realism but once or twice I caught myself wanting to get back to the next piece of excitement in the story.
Nick Heller is a Boston based private investigator/intelligence operative. He also happens to be former Special Forces. Nick makes a decent living helping people find the truth of matters, or occasionally helping people hide legal things they'd rather not have made public.
There is a slight chance that Nick might be working thru some guilt engendered by some of his actions during his military service or perhaps family guilt caused by having an amoral father imprisoned for white collar crimes. I'd have to read the other books in the series to see if that's truly the case.
Seduction of the Innocent
by Max Allan Collins
There is always tension among those who want unfettered free speech, those who would urge us to use free speech "responsibly", and those who dismiss the very idea of free speech as a cis-gendered, sexist, heteronormative. capitalist, bourgeois, patriarchal, white supremacist con and imposition on the true expressions of people's feelings and thoughts.
I tend towards allowing more free speech than less. However, I would agree that there are some themes, thoughts, and pictures that probably aren't suitable for children. That's how I was raised.
Though it appears rather silly from a 2019 POV where a few keystrokes on your internet linked computer can retrieve any sort of filth, at one point in American history we had Senate hearings on the dangers of comic books and horror magazines.
Some people thought that these publications were contributing to juvenile delinquency. Because of the Senate hearings some publications began having problems with distributors and/or went out of business. Those that remained agreed to enforce self-regulation (censorship). This code included but was not limited to:
- Crimes shall never be presented in such a way as to create sympathy for the criminal, to promote distrust of the forces of law and justice, or to inspire others with a desire to imitate criminals.
- If crime is depicted it shall be as a sordid and unpleasant activity.
- Policemen, judges, government officials, and respected institutions shall never be presented in such a way as to create disrespect for established authority.
- Criminals shall not be presented so as to be rendered glamorous or to occupy a position which creates a desire for emulation.
- In every instance good shall triumph over evil and the criminal punished for his misdeeds.
- Scenes of excessive violence shall be prohibited. Scenes of brutal torture, excessive and unnecessary knife and gunplay, physical agony, the gory and gruesome crime shall be eliminated. No comic magazine shall use the words "horror" or "terror" in its title.
Golden Prey
by John Sandford
This is an installment in a series. If I had known that before I made the decision to purchase it, I may not have bought the book. I usually like to start at the beginning. However, in this case, having read the book I'm glad I did purchase it. Ironically, after getting a strong sense of deja vu while reading the book, I later discovered that I have a few other books in this series. Go figure.
This book was just under 400 pages in hardcover but these days that's short for a novel. I didn't think the story dragged at any point though there were certainly some characters I enjoyed reading about more than others. This book is not lightweight in any pejorative sense of the word. But it is good reading if you are stuck somewhere without anything intellectually stimulating. So if you must spend a few hours in an airport, an auto dealership, a hospital lounge or somewhere similar you could do worse than to have this book by your side.
One of my cousins got me started watching some of the true crime shows on the cable network Investigation Discovery. This book was like one of those shows put in print. And I very much mean that as a compliment. Lucas Davenport is a former Minnesota cop who saved the life and political career of some national bigshots, including a former first lady who is running for President. He's also wealthy. Cashing in some chips, and still protected and watched over by aforementioned political big shots, Lucas has transferred from the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Investigation to the US Marshals service.
Unusually, in deference to his good deeds and his intelligence, Lucas has been granted the authority to choose his own cases. He also doesn't really have to report to the local US Marshal chief.
Goodbye Homeboy
by Steve Mariotti with Debra Devi
I am always intrigued to find that a person talented in one field is also just as skilled in another. The musician Debra Devi's new book demonstrates that Devi should be just as well known as an author as a musician. I also had a strong sense of six degrees of separation reading this book as the other author and primary subject, Steve Mariotti, is a Michigan native and University of Michigan graduate.
This book is a memoir of a white teacher who helped mostly Black and Latino impoverished students better themselves and improve their lives. Some people will immediately dismiss it on those grounds alone. That would be a mistake, I think. The story is real. This memoir is a good example of how one person can make a difference. It makes the argument that teachers need higher salaries and better social/workplace support.
As mentioned Mariotti is from Michigan and in his younger days (I have no idea of his politics now) was evidently something of a libertarian. The book features amusing stories about Mariotti's meetings--really more run-ins-- with Objectivist philosopher, author and Libertarian inspiration Ayn Rand. For my money Rand was a horrible person both on a personal level and a philosophical one. In her later days she wasn't that different from a cult leader. When Mariotti shared his ideas or activism with Rand, Rand insulted him and dismissed him from her presence. Rand went out of her way to write nasty letters to Mariotti calling him a loser and ordering him to never darken her door again.
I found this darkly amusing only because at the time of Mariotti's interaction with her, Rand was at an advanced age and was certainly not, to put it mildly, any sort of beauty. Rand was a narcissist who apparently found it important to use precious time to attempt to crush a young man's ego. Some people.
Button Man
Andrew Gross
I thought that this book was a bait and switch. A button man is of course an older term for mobster, or specifically a hitman/enforcer/bodyguard. As the fictional Willie Cicci told us "The boss says to push a button on a guy, I push a button". Later, as the term button man fell out of use, someone who had his "button" was someone who was a full and formal member of an Italian-American organized crime family. This book's title and intro made me think this book would be about early organized crime.
Well it was and wasn't. What this book really is a fictionalized hagiography to the author's deceased grandfather, a Jewish garment district business owner and later tycoon.
Organized crime makes many people think of the Italian-American variety, the Mafia. Up until at least the 1940s organized crime was just as much a Jewish-American venture. In fact arguably the Jewish syndicate was more powerful.
Gangsters like Dutch Schultz, Arnold Rothstein, Bugsy Siegel, Gurrah Shapiro, Little Augie Orgen, Meyer Lansky, and Lepke Buchalter were just as infamous and as violent as their Italian-American counterparts. Hollywood has tended to downplay this.
Some Jewish creatives believe that an overemphasis on Italian-American macho criminality has left the Jewish-American image too closely identified with the brainy, sarcastic nebbish, as typified by Woody Allen. These writers want to remind us that for better or worse Jews could be tough guys as well. Meyer Lansky was a hoodlum but he also violently broke up Nazi meetings in New York and beyond. I don't know that Gross feels that way but in his afterword he references as inspirations some writers who do.
This story follows the life choices of Morris Rabishevsky (Raab) and his brothers. The Rabishevksy brothers grow up in horrible poverty on New York's Lower East Side at the turn of the century. Their father dies early; another brother dies in an accident.
Invisible: The Forgotten Story of the Black Woman Lawyer Who Took Down America's Most Powerful Mobster
by Stephen L. Carter
People have always seen the African-American elite or upper middle class differently. People who think everything is fair use this class to support their belief that nothing needs to change. Racist are often threatened or angered by this class's existence and may single them out for degradation or violence.
White Americans began many race pogroms because they were upset that a Black person had the unmitigated audacity to compete with whites economically or be better off than any white person. Some nationalist or more left leaning types think that a black upper class makes mass progress more difficult. There are many more gradations of these arguments, which vary by time and place.
Author and Yale law professor Stephen Carter wrote this biography of his paternal grandmother, Eunice Hunton Carter, in part because of his annoyance at responses to HBO's Boardwalk Empire's depiction of a black woman prosecutor in 1930s New York City. Some viewers mocked the idea of a black woman prosecutor, viewing it as hyperbolic political correctness. Untrue. Eunice Carter really was a prosecutor who worked for Special Prosecutor Thomas Dewey during his 1930s racketbuster days. She was the only member of Dewey's team who wasn't a white man. Eunice Carter, initially shunted away to taking complaints about streetwalkers and brothels, was the first to realize that the Mob, directed by the most powerful boss, Lucky Luciano, had taken over the prostitution business. Eunice Carter conceived the legal strategy that saw Luciano convicted and sentenced to a thirty to fifty year prison sentence.
Known Devil
by Justin Gustanis
Although this is the third in a series, I didn't know that before starting the book. I don't think it made all that much difference. It's old hat nowadays to imagine a world in which magic and monsters exist side by side with all of the prosaic concerns and institutions of the real world. This story does imagine that and mixes in some timely political parodies as well, even though the book was written well before the current President was elected. The book's prose is, well you will have to decide this for yourself. This is how it opens and it's pretty consistent.
"I've never had a lot of of use for elves. I'n my experience they're lazy and dumb--nothing like those drones in the stories who supposedly work for the Fat Guy up north. I don't like elves, and elves with guns I like even less. And when those guns are pointed at me--well it's like that Mafia guy on TV used to say: fahgettaaboudit"
Stan Markowski is a detective in the Scranton PD's Occult Crimes Unit. His partner Karl Renfer (there are A LOT on tongue in cheek references to other horror movies and novels)is a vampire. Their job is to keep the peace between humans and supernaturals or supes, as well as prevent the more dangerous supes from acting up. Problems arise when the detectives learn that there is a new drug on the streets, one that gets supes addicted to it and willing to commit all sorts of crimes to get the drug Slide. Experts previously thought that with one or two exceptions, supes were immune to addiction.
The Fix
by David Baldacci
This is another installment in the Amos Decker detective series. Decker is a detective on semi-permanent loan to the FBI. He is a former college football player who is fighting a desperate battle against the scale. Decker suffered major injuries, including brain injury, in the college game that ended his career and any chance at NFL stardom. Worse, years later, Decker's wife and daughter were murdered. However these two tragedies deeply impacted his life. Decker sees emotions and events in color. He also has a photographic memory for everything he sees and near total inability to forget anything, ever, including his family's murder scene. This event left Decker with a fierce desire to see justice done whatever the cost.
Although Decker may see emotions in color, he sees things morally in stark black and white. Either a job is done or it is not. Someone is guilty or they are not. Decker's highest loyalty is to the truth, not to his friends, his bosses, the FBI, or even justice. Decker may have been made mildly autistic so by his brain injury all those years ago, as he lacks awareness of social cues that most people, even extremely shy people, take for granted. Decker may suddenly stop talking and get up and walk out of the room. Nonetheless his heart is in the right place. He just gets obsessed with loose ends and finding the truth. He rarely means to offend someone and will apologize if he becomes aware that he has.
Going to attend a meeting at FBI headquarters, Amos Decker witnesses a man named Walter Dabney shoot and kill a woman named Anne Berkshire before turning the weapon on himself. Dabney is a defense and intelligence consultant. Berkshire is a schoolteacher. The case becomes federal because of Dabney's links to the federal government.
The Border
by Don Winslow
In The Border Winslow concludes the story that he started in The Power of the Dog and The Cartel and which he also referenced in The Force and Savages. As with those previous stories there are a number of ultra realistic depictions of extreme depraved violence.
So if you can't handle those pictures rattling around your head this isn't the book for you. I have seen interviews where the author has addressed concerns (his own and those of others) that by telling what he sees as a true to life story he's also engaging in violence porn. That could be.
As with certain scenes in George R.R. Martin's A Dance With Dragons, Winslow has created some vivid violence sequences that occasionally caused me to put the book down and reflect on the world's evil. And I have a pretty high tolerance for that sort of stuff.
Nevertheless there is very little that Winslow has imagined in this book that hasn't occurred in real life. In fact he adapts a few real life incidents. There are devils and demons who walk this planet and live long, happy and remunerative, albeit utterly malevolent, lives. It is an open sociological and historical question as to why with a few notable exceptions American organized crime groups did not routinely liquidate the families of any disobedient employees, clients or victims and avoided murdering police officers, judges, politicians and other high profile "civilians" who got on the local Mob boss's last nerves.
Organized crime in Mexico and Guatemala has no such compunctions. Does the difference have something to do with the violence of the pre-Colombian Mayan and Aztec societies? Is it caused by the even more extreme violence of the Spanish conquests? Is it caused by the repeated US interventions? I can't answer those questions.
Though some Latin American countries are more violent than the United States, they might be equal in terms of corruption. South of the border the corruption might be more direct and in your face. American corruption could be more difficult to eliminate because much of it is legal.
What The Night Knows
by Dean Koontz
I used to be a huge Dean Koontz fan. I picked up this 2010 book in a clearance sale. I liked the plot description and theme. But after reading it I was let down. Now bad Koontz is better than most other writers. However I thought that here one of the typical Koontz formulas (a decent man with a horrible secret must protect his beautiful wife and perfect kids from evil with the help of a loyal dog) ran out of gas. This softcover book was over four hundred and fifty pages. When I read a novel that length I expect something either meaty or epic. This wasn't the case.
It's been a while since I read Koontz so I'd have to go back and check his earlier works but I don't seem to remember his writing being so heavily weighted towards prose and away from dialogue. There's very little dialogue in this book. So the story feels very heavy to me, but not in a good way. YMMV. There is a disappointing literal deux ex machina ending. If we continue after death in some form that could be really wonderful news for those among us who are kind, helpful,and decent people. The flip side is that evil doers could continue their maleficent works.
John Calvino is a thirty-something homicide detective haunted by his family's murders two decades ago. Although John killed the perpetrator, John has never been able to forget the last words of the rapist-murderer, Alton Blackwood. When a young man named Billy Lucas commits atrocities and murders that clearly seem patterned after Blackwood's crimes, John is worried enough to visit Billy in a mental institution even though it's not his case. Billy is mostly uncommunicative but shares some private chilling information with John that Billy simply could not have known.
Drake
by Peter McLean
This book is the first in a series. It's similar to works by Simon Green, Mike Carey, Jim Butcher and other authors who imagine a grimy seedy noirish world in which magic works. Drake is an old school detective/adventure novel despite the magical overlay. It's told in first person, which often, though not always, makes you think that the narrator will probably survive, no matter how crazy things get. Although the protagonists in these types of stories tend to be men of questionable morals, McLean stretches that convention to the breaking point. YMMV with this. It helps that most of the people who are the protagonist's enemies are far worse than he is. It also helps that the hero is trying to turn over a new leaf.
Don Drake is a magician with a big talent for summoning things. By things I mostly mean demons. Hell is real, along with some other dimensions. With the help of his Burned Man fetish, a wood statue which binds and channels an archdemon of the same name, Drake is able to conjure up all sorts of things. Unfortunately, Drake has proven inept at monetizing this skill. He's also shown a remarkable lack of morals. Drake mostly used this power to send demons to frighten, steal from or even kill people for a fee. Drake manages to sleep at night and justify this to himself by always making sure that the people these demons hurt are always bad people who are guaranteed to go to Hell anyway.
Drake never has any money because he's a gambler. Tricked or seduced into a game with the demon Wormwood, Drake loses more than he can pay. Although Wormwood is a demon he operates more like a Mafia boss. As far as he's concerned Drake is in his debt for as long as Wormwood says so. Wormwood has some jobs for Drake to do, jobs which all involve eliminating Wormwood's human competition-magical or gangsters. After some initial reluctance, which Wormwood promptly has beaten out of Drake, Drake gets with the program.
Man Eater
by Gar Anthony Haywood
This book is seemingly written deliberately to be very similar to Get Shorty by Elmore Leonard, screwcap films by Preston Sturges, It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World, and perhaps most of all to Everybody Smokes in Hell by John Ridley. As many of the #metoo, Sony hack and related allegations and revelations have shown Hollywood can be an amoral, even immoral cutthroat environment where everyone is out to get over on everybody else and maybe get laid in the process.
Like the stories referenced, Man Eater posits that the streets and their twisted tenets of respect, honor and vengeance really aren't all that different from Hollywood. The stakes are higher in the streets perhaps but it's really the same game.
Ronnie Deal is a mid level project executive for a Hollywood studio. She has a secret past which she doesn't share with anyone, least of all her insincere female boss and a male peer who's trying to prevent Ronnie from moving up the ladder by any means necessary. Ronnie is also stunningly attractive, something which she cynically uses when she thinks it's necessary.
Having been temporarily embarrassed and outmaneuvered by her aforementioned male rival, causing her to lose a movie deal, Ronnie travels to a bar after work to stew over the insults and general sexism of the world. She's in no mood then, to watch quietly as a intimidating muscular man named Neon Polk starts to harass and assault a tiny woman named Antsy Carruth. Surprising herself with her aggression and fearlessness, Ronnie decides to strike one for the sisterhood by sucker punching Neon upside the head with a beer bottle and doing a Texas two step on his face. Both women flee.
November Road
by Lou Berney
You may or may not believe that Lee Harvey Oswald was the lone gunman who murdered JFK and Officer Tippit before being murdered in turn by Jack Ruby. It is a fact that powerful mob bosses Carlos Marcello of New Orleans and Santo Trafficante Jr. of Tampa both despised JFK and his brother, Attorney General RFK. In 1962 and 1963 each boss made impassioned predictions (really threats) to their associates that JFK was going to be murdered soon and implied that they and/or their friends would have something to do with it.
Lee Harvey Oswald and Jack Ruby had tenuous connections to both southern Mob bosses. Ruby was also a low level flunky to the Chicago Outfit fronted by noted psychopath and JFK hater Sam Giancana. All three Mafia leaders were involved with the Cuban exile movement and CIA abortive attempts to murder Castro and invade Cuba. So there's a lot of smoke there. November Road asks the reader to imagine that there's not only smoke but also fire.
Frank Guidry is a loyal (well loyal to money and himself) lieutenant of New Orleans mob boss Carlos Marcello. Frank doesn't handle murder or any heavy work. Frank is a fixer and arranger. He greases the corruption wheels to get things done. Frank and Carlos go back. But Frank's first loyalty is to Frank. When an old friend pops up begging for Frank to hide him from Carlos' executioners, Frank offers help but promptly leaks his friend's location. Hey, people might have seen them together; Frank doesn't want any misunderstandings with the notoriously exacting and unforgiving Carlos. Frank wants to live, dammit! He may only have a life of empty hedonism but Frank believes that's better than the alternative.
However when another mob associate turns up very dead, Frank searches for some common denominators. The common thread is Dallas.
Gods of Thrones
by A. Ron Hubbard and Anthony LeDonne
This is a short (under 200 pages) fascinating book that in part examines the religions of the world created by George R.R. Martin in his series A Song of Ice and Fire and adapted for HBO television by Benioff and Weiss as Game of Thrones. The authors do a deep dive into Westerosi cultures to look at the mores and morals that animate them and how they relate or do not to our own.
This book is emphatically not just about religion. The authors devote text to comparative philosophy, and psychology, time travel, the Hero's Journey, Jung, Freud, Nietzsche, and all of the other things that make human cultures tick and continue to reproduce themselves.
The authors explore or debunk fan theories and make a few snarky pleas to GRRM to finish the series. This book assumes that you are caught up with either the televised adaptations or the books. The first of two planned volumes, this book starts with the religion/worldview of everyone's favorite morose Northerners, the Starks. It talks about how animism and pantheism work in their world and ours, Greek tree spirits, and Tolkien's Ents. Next up is the Religion of R'hllor and its links to real world religions such as Zoroastrianism. The authors use Greek and Roman myths to examine Tywin Lannister's parental morality, wonder if Roose Bolton is really a vampire, and critique Robb Stark's leadership style.
Imperium In Imperio
by Sutton E. Griggs
Sutton Griggs was a black man born in Reconstruction era Texas. He later became an author, publisher and minister, among other professions. Griggs was a great proponent of activism for Black Americans. Griggs was an example of deeds being as important as faith. He helped build and maintain social institutions for Black Americans during the worst time for Black Americans outside of slavery.
From the very first time that enslaved Africans arrived in this country there have always been different, occasionally conflicting ideas about how to best obtain freedom or even what freedom is. People of course change their minds depending on their life experiences. A traumatic experience as a youth can set the adult on a different path than he or she otherwise might have been.
Growing up at a time when racist atrocities against Black Americans were literally unchecked Griggs used that environment to produce a novel that is by turns didactic and descriptive if not always entertaining in the modern sense. Griggs was a supporter of DuBois and thus perhaps a believer in the "Talented tenth" and integrationist models. However in this novel Griggs seems to be working out his own skepticism about the limits of those models and their ability to solve the needs of Black Americans. Griggs calls back to earlier more specifically Black nationalist writers such as David Walker. Griggs also eerily anticipates upcoming Pan-Africanist nationalist activists such as Marcus Garvey, who would come on the scene just a few short years after this novel, as well as later folks like Elijah Muhammad.
The novel is really more of a short story or even novella. It's just under 100 pages. It's occasionally dense reading. Griggs really liked prepositional phrases, a weakness I share.
Elevation
by Stephen King
This is a very short novel that might more properly be called a short story or novella. It's something that could be read in a few days or even a few hours. It's a mug's game trying to determine authorial intent or meaning but this is probably the third King book in a row where King seems to be going out of his way to emphasize how important it is to be nice to each other as well as pointing out the fact that life is short. So take that for what you will. It's set in Castle Rock, Maine. There are some tongue in cheek references to other King works.
This is not, repeat not a horror novel. There are no things that go bump in the night, sadistic demons who appear as clowns, malign eyes growing on characters' chests (or other body parts) or psychopathic child killers who serve other dimensional entities. So if you're looking for those things you won't find them here. On the other hand if you have been wary of reading King because of his general propensity to write scary stories or for that matter long stories then this could be an enjoyable venture into the short end of the pool. The story is occasionally a bit didactic but I tend to think that most people of King's age have earned the right to share whatever wisdom they've gained over the years.
It's also worth noting that (1) quality writing is quality writing regardless of the subject and (2) over the years King has written quite a few stories that either lacked supernatural elements or had them in only very modest amounts. So this isn't his first time at the rodeo.
Scott Carey is a divorced web designer. He makes a good living for himself and is able to work from home for the most part. His life hasn't been great, but it hasn't been that bad either. Scott has one big problem however.
