Reads I’ve enjoyed.
Today, I feel like visiting my past life of crime.
What happens when Irene comes face-to-face with a past enemy?
Stop by Shotgun Honey to indulge a wicked sense of righteousness.
To start with a summation, I’ll say this book (by Andy Frankham-Allen) is absorbing and satisfying. Initially, I didn’t feel that this was going to be the case. At the risk of the author’s wrath, I confess it took me more than a few pages to get into this story. Not that my attention wandered; I simply didn’t find it gripping, but I quickly accepted I probably opened the pages with more than a little bias, and the fault lies with me, not the writer. Knowing the author’s style, my already active imagination worked overtime with anticipation, for I’ve been waiting for this book for more than a little while. The pace at the start was steady, but a little slower than I was expecting. However, that’s my one and only negative, and it’s a small one. I found the book increasingly absorbing.
I should say I’m going to be sharing a publisher with the author and our paths have crossed in writing circles enough to call each other friend. After reading The Seeker, we eventually wrote a book together for the series Space 1889. It says a lot of Andy’s tenacity that he talked me into co-authoring. However, if a writing acquaintance pens a book that I dislike, I simply never review it.
The Seeker is book one of a planned four in The Garden series.
Absorbing and satisfying is the only description that fits the gradual expansion that made every distraction in my life irritating. By the time I reached halfway, I’d suddenly think of Willem and wonder what was happening to him as if his life hadn’t ‘paused’ while the book lay shut, but continued between the closed pages. That felt unacceptable; I wanted to be reading.
Willem is both a businessperson and a loving uncle, with much in his life to be thankful for, including a long-standing friendship with his best mate, Jake. That’s not to say that Will’s life is without stresses and seeing Jake at long last appears to be getting serious with his latest girlfriend, Will takes a chance and follows what began as an internet romance to its logical conclusion, to meet up with the person he’s only known online. From here, what happens after Will disappears leads the reader into a clever reworking of mythology extending back to ancient Egypt. As I immersed deeper into this supernatural world that exists in the undercurrents of our own, that initial steady pace made sense. One needs fully to know and understand Will to make what happens to him all the more involving.
It’s been a while since I read a book where I loved almost all the characters, both ‘good’ and ‘bad’ and ached equally for them. There is much manipulation and secretive agendas that make the line between antagonist and victim blur, as do the lines of sexuality. Although Will is gay, this is not a homosexual novel, and it would be a tremendous pity if anyone dismissed the reading of it as anything less than it is — an engrossing narrative bringing new life to the vampire mythos that could equally interest vampire aficionados and those with no particular liking for the subject.
This is and isn’t a vampire book, just as it is and isn’t so many other things, but a satisfying blend, a commingling of old and new, the future and the past, complexities of relationships, love and hate. One is left feeling that these characters are all being moved like pawns in some great game where some fundamental rule or ‘truth’ is missing. Those who believe they are following a line of destiny are as helpless as a newly re-birthed upyr of the story. I hurt for Frederick almost as I did Willem. In this expert way, the author humanises the villains of the piece, making the reader care even when a twinge of betrayal or guilt accompanies the feelings, for Willem remains the central pivot that wreaks havoc with the emotions, both with the other characters in the story and with the person turning the pages.
Unusually, for a book in a series, I have to agree with another reviewer who commented on the truly great ending, calling it both subtle and powerful. I’d like to add another word to that: perfect. It’s the perfect end at the perfect moment. I feel content enough to leave the story for now, and let the events I’ve learned so far percolate… with anticipation.
You can check out Andy’s Amazon page where you will see The Seeker has two covers, but this is the latest:
This is going to be my last blog for a couple of weeks because I’m taking a break. I hope to get a work I’ve been editing through its first re-editing phase before the end of the week, and for those who follow my romance titles, I have a new due at the beginning of July. This is more a ‘bye for now’ than an actual blog, but I have an important date to celebrate that will be an ‘absolute pleasure’ for me. We all face milestones in our lives and I have one on the way that’s an achievement.
On that note (forgive the dubious segue), I’m taking a moment to reflect on something else that put a smile on my face in January 2013 (where has the time gone), when my Steampunk adventure — co-authored with Andy Frankham-Allen — Mundus Cerialis: Space 1889 & Beyond was called ‘an absolute pleasure to read’.
You can read the full review by going to The Traveler’s Steampunk Blog.
Stay well, stay happy, and Happy Reading!
Last week I mentioned a childhood favourite read: Snowflake by Paul Gallico. Oddly, the religious aspects of the story escaped me as a child. Whatever one’s belief this is such… I want to say gentle story, but I recall parts making me cry and the reading didn’t feel gentle at all. I was an infant and parts of the story left me feeling raw… and I adored every moment, the good and the bad. This is the full version read and accompanied by a song by Peter Gabriel.
Someone tagged me some time ago on Facebook and again this week, so having answered this once before, I’m re-posting this. The way the game works is to list ten titles that have stayed with you. They don’t have to be the ‘right’ books, and you shouldn’t think about it too long — just ten which have touched you and stayed with you. Then you nominate ten more people to play the game.
My problem was sticking to ten, and sticking to the ‘stayed with you in some way’, which isn’t necessarily the same thing as favourite books and authors.
Here, I’m including the list but with a variation on the theme adding explanations. Slight cheat — the first is two by one author, and there are a couple of trilogies.
In no particular order:
The Happy Prince/Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
The Happy Prince read as a child, and I cried my eyes out. Well, not literally and that would be gross, but yes, I sobbed. Hey, I was like nine or younger, and the first time I heard the story, someone else read it to me. It would probably still make my lips tremble. It has everything: morality, romance, heart-wrenching pain. A Picture of Dorian Gray is just one of those stories never forgotten. As is often the case, my first awareness of this tale was the old black and white film. I didn’t get to read the book until my teens, but it’s an undeniable classic.
Gormenghast (trilogy/first two books) by Mervyn Peake
Not only a story that has touched and stayed with me, it’s one of my favourites, if not ‘the’ favourite owing to the scope of imagination, the names given to the characters, but most of all the richness of the language used, something sadly lacking in most books today.
Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman
I adore this ‘other world’ below London in this urban fantasy. For Doctor Who fans, it may interest you to know that Peter Capaldi played the Angel Islington in the 1996 television series, but it is the novelisation that stayed with me. Again, I love the names given to the characters, and the idea of an ordinary man dragged into an extraordinary world, especially one beneath London.
Wraeththu (trilogy) by Storm Constantine
This is possibly the author’s most well-known and outstanding work. A futuristic fantasy of post-apocalyptic proportions told through the eyes of three characters (one per book). The story follows Wreaththu — hermaphrodite beings who are skillful with forms of magic — and their interaction with humans. Romantic, but questioning perceptions of sexuality and people’s humanity/inhumanity to each other, there’s more going on here to those with an open mind.
Snowflake by Paul Gallico
A child’s book that I’ve seen nowhere since. I last tried searching for it about five years ago, but it wasn’t available, and I think I only found one listing for it. I have no need of an actual replacement, though mine is so old and well-read, it’s now lacking a cover and is just a very thin volume of aged yellowing pages. In short, Snowflake is born, goes on many adventures, falling in love with Raindrop and then, at the dramatic conclusion, returns to the sky. It had everything for a child — adventure, romance, and even self-sacrifice. I loved (and kept) so many of my childhood books, but this is my most-loved.
Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
My first ‘adventure’ for an older reader, and I’ve chosen it because it’s linked to the one good clear memory I have of my mother. She read it to me long before I could read it myself. She must have read it, at my request, about three times before I was able to take over. I still have the little burgundy covered book she gave me. Owing to her ill health, I don’t have many memories like that so her reading Tom Sawyer is priceless.
Knowledge of Angels by Jill Paton Walsh
Only read once, but I loved this book and remember it well. Some might see it as an argument against religion, but I think more than that it illustrates what man can do to each other using religion as an excuse. I especially like the story behind the book, that everyone turned it down, so Jill Paton Walsh self-published when it was much harder to do than it is now. It won a Booker prize — before they changed the rules to disallow self-published titles.
The Incredible Shrinking Man by Richard Matheson
It was a close call between this and I Am Legend, but this just pips it for me. My first memory of the story was once again the old black and white movie. Who can forget the battle with the giant spider? Some love spiders, some hate them, some have this strange love/hate affinity with them. I think their webs are beautiful and amazing. The spider is incredible. I just don’t want to come across one unexpectedly. In short, my earliest recollections were of that chill down one’s spine at the thought of battling a giant spider. I hadn’t read the book until recently, and likely had a preconceived notion of what to expect. The book, though accurate to the film, differs vastly in that it’s more emotional. I didn’t expect to experience so many emotions, including such sadness spliced with sympathy for the main character, in what many assume is a horror story.
Nocturnes by John Connolly
I like John Connolly’s work. I’m often perplexed by how he seems to break so many ‘rules’, particularly with his Charlie Parker novels — including both first and third person viewpoints, and even telling the story omnipresently when relating something that happened in the past. Not all writers can even manage point of view changes successfully, but it seems to suit his style, his ‘voice’. I included Nocturnes because I was surprised to come across a collection of short stories with gothic influences. They are both olde-worlde and new.
I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith
Best known for writing One Hundred and One Dalmatians, and the sequel The Starlight Barking. Yes, 101 had a sequel, and I have both books. I Capture the Castle has one of the best opening sentences. As John Steinbeck’s end to Of Mice and Men is startling, the most memorable thing about Dodie Smith’s first novel for adults has always been the line that begins, “I write this sitting in the kitchen sink.”
Today, in honour of my upcoming Dark Fiction release, I’m purposely throwing the spotlight on author Chantal Noordeloos as a writer who is as in tune with my sensibilities as she is also apart from them. I understand her intentions behind her darker work, as she would no doubt understand mine. As her biography states, she’s a writer born in the Hague, lives in the Netherlands, with what strikes me as the perfect balance of family: a husband who shares the right level of unconventionality and a wily daughter as amusing as she is ingenious — a word that suits the whole Noordeloos ensemble and zeal for life. It is this love of life that may make one question why Chantal visits such dark realms in her writing: one of those cases where the question itself may supply the answer, for these tales face our darkest fears and often drive back the shadows or, at least, greet what lurks within them head-on.
Wrath begins with a first-person telling of a vicious attack on an unknown woman, but what may seem like the end of her journey turns into another beginning… with choices only the wrathful can make. This is a thought-provoking story in the second of this author’s contribution to her ‘seven deadly sins’ series.
What immediately came to mind was the amount of unpleasant research done to get the atmosphere of this nasty little tale just right. The story plays out on many levels making the reader uncomfortable, questioning morality and even what constitutes a ‘sin’. Some reading the story won’t agree, I’m sure, but it’s necessary to go deeper and consider the issues within to feel that greater sense of purpose. These layers are present from the outset. Not to give the story details away but a pre-set view of the main character forms before the truth comes to light and in this way made me question personal concepts; or, in other words, I was too quick to impress my view on the character and then surprised when I realised the actual circumstances, but this is a good thing, potentially making the reader self-aware of how ingrained preconceptions can be.
The story also highlights the plight of women around the world, how societies and even groups within societies view feminism (just another word for equality) and it does it at an emotional level that I hope will make both men and women squirm. If this story makes the reader uncomfortable, well, it should. It should also make them question. On the negative side, there were a couple of editing points, and although I found the end satisfying, it felt a little fast coming after a steady build-up. That’s why I award the story 4 out of 5 but I eagerly expect the rest of the series and these issues should be largely overlooked midst the bones of a provocative story.
If I thought my reading list the last couple of years was pitiful, this year has been atrocious, but there are a few worth mentioning.
As You Wish by Cary Elwes is a must for any fan of The Princess Bride if only for the many reminiscences and stories behind the scenes of the cast. I finally read J.K.Rowling’s The Casual Vacancy with high hopes, yet I’m unsure how I feel about this book. I can appreciate the story, but the style was a little too much tell rather than show for me. I didn’t watch the television series because I have heard they insisted on a rather more upbeat ending. Not having the series to compare to the book, all I can say is I have no reservations about the end. It’s a consistently bleak book, but not all stories need to be promising.
I read all the Dexter volumes being a fan of the series and had no problem separating the stories from the show. As many things are similar as they are different. I’m making the rare choice here in preferring the show. The series did far more with the character.
I cannot recap on this year’s reads without mentioning The Forgotten Son by Andy Frankham-Allen, the first of a series of Lethbridge-Stewart books ‘The Brigadier of Doctor Who fame’. A good opening setting for a well-loved character. I have reviewed the book and will repost that review sometime in the new year.
The Fault in Our Stars was a surprising read, far more poignant than I expected it to be while A New York Winter’s Tale left me wondering whether I’d read something incredible, audacious, or ultimately aimless and futile. I’ve such mixed feelings over the book that I really cannot decide and maybe in that the book served the writer’s intention. It’s neither a romance nor a steampunk fantasy though it put me in mind of one. The only recommendation I can make is to read the book and discard the movie that is a truly poor adaptation of a far-more-complex story.
I finally caught up on George R.R.Martin’s ‘Game of Thrones’ novels and like so many await more releases. Daughter of Ashes, by Esther Mitchell, is worth a mention for the world-building.
I didn’t know what to expect when I started reading, L.Joseph Shosty’s book Old Wine & Black Hearts. The title and the cover had me already, appealing to the Dark Fiction themes I enjoy. The contents were an odd but pleasant surprise because there’s no way to anticipate these stories. The book is divided into two sections. Old Wine contains an eclectic mix of the bizarre and disturbing. I thought the first story in the collection the weakest, but it proved to be a more gentle introduction into an unorthodox selection of unpredictable tales. A couple of favourites are Strings, which has a deeper layer and could mean different things to different people while They Burned Old Ben has a thread of dark humour that’s unsettling.
A Sincere Warning About The Entity in Your Home, by Jason Arnopp, is a short release of a semi-predictable horror story but told in a way that captured my interest. I’d never heard of the writer before, but his resume and style will have me looking up more of his work.
So I end the year on Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn…another book that has left me with mixed feelings. I don’t like books told in the first person as much as third especially when more than one viewpoint is used and perhaps owing to this for the first third of the book it didn’t really work for me. The character presented in her early diary entries was so instantly unlikable I didn’t care what had happened to her, was merely curious. Perhaps the writer in me kept me reading because I had several theories. I don’t want to give away the story so it’s easier to keep to the impression I’m left with. This is a story about two complex but unlikable people who deserved each other, which doesn’t seem like the basis for a good novel; however, it’s clever and thought-provoking. Definitely, one that when read you want to discuss. Unfortunately, it also has one of the worst sentences I’ve come across in such an acclaimed book; had I written such a sentence and not edited it out, any one of my editors would have had me walking on hot coals. I keep thinking it has to be an error, but I have a sad feeling it’s not.
As always, hoping to do better with my reading this coming year.
