A Place Called Harmony

Set in the Texas Panhandle North of the frontier city of Dallas this is a book about homesteading and serves to remind one that half those settlers were women who not only worked beside their husbands but gave birth to and raised the next generation. The book is part romance, part adventure and just plain hard work, and pleasure to read.

Dead Wake

To my eyes luxury liners such as the Lusitania and Titanic both of which sank in different circumstances appear pretentious, ugly, graceless. They are obviously large targets for icebergs, mines, torpedoes. They were also testaments to hubris and greed. One of the mysteries of WW#2 is the fact that the Queen Mary and Elizabeth both converted as troop ships managed to make multiple Atlantic crossings unscathed.

Larson brings to the topic his usual penchant for thorough background information while making the text thoroughly readable.

Until the modern nuclear submarine a submarine was a surface vessel capable of temporary submersion. Capable of launching an attack from stealth they were instruments of torture for their crews that often proved to be their coffins. As Canada's white elephant diesel-electric subs have proven there are hundreds of things that can go wrong with them. Nuclear submarines can remain submerged indefinitely and are launched with all the fuel they'll ever need. Russia's concrete subs can rest on the bottom totally undetected.

On the other hand the grey ghosts that are the subject of this book were eminently sinkable. The story here is that of the inevitable meeting of Lusitania and U-20. The outcome is no spoiler, it is history and the loss of life served in no small measure to drag America into WW#1.

To invest the reader emotionally in the eventual outcome of the tale Larson devotes considerable attention to describing various passengers and crew members. To place the reader vicariously on board considerable attention is paid to details of daily ship-board life--the meals, the games, the feuds, the gambling.

The one mystery still unsolved. Did the Admiralty deliberately leave the Lusitania to the wolves in a deliberate attempt to force the US into the war or were they just inept?

Quicksilver

This is a child's picture book that has the verisimilitude of an actual happening in the author's life. The illustrations being an integral part of the story I'd like to know more about Joshua Allen beyond his name. This book having been loaned me by the author I will be asking her. The book is available for purchase from online booksellers.

The Raven King

Fourth book in the series by Maggie Stiefvater begins with the fortune telling gals in their parlour as a sort of backgrounder since it's been nearly two years since the book three came out. Next we meet the boys at school. Ronan the wild child who dreams things into existence, Noah the sentient presence who materializes out of thin air, and Jane Sargent--Blue who amplifies magical things. The reader may be in the dark as to what is happening here but so are the actors in our story.

The storyline here is not linear. This is a world where people are not what they seem, even greater than they seem. Where dreams are real and people and things, even forests are dreamed into existence. Where people are one with trees and the dead come back to life as more than ghosts. The perspective shifts constantly reading the 400 pages here becomes an effort. This is a world of magic, seances, hallucinations, dreams where logic ends and waking dream takes over. To enjoy this world one must embrace it and leave reality behind.

Out of Bounds

Twenty-year-old Jesse, a 5-10 geek is placed in a dorm room with twenty-four-year-old Nick, a 6-6 heavily muscled jock when Jesse gets beaten to a pulp by his former roommate after he gets the wrong signals and puts the moves on him--his gaydar obviously not working. Jesse cringes every time this goliath twitches a muscle.

Since this is a YA Gay Romance the plot would seem to be set. Do opposites attract? Can this hunk be gay and how could this bouncer be intimidated by anyone? The text is well-edited and quite readable. The sample provided moved me to spend the asking price to buy this novel.

Aside from homophobia gay romance introduces the reader to new terms and issues of compatibility. A hairy older male is termed a Bear, a boyish looking blond such as Jesse is a TWINK. When both partners have the same body parts issues of dominance involving two male egos aside to be compatible one partner is usually a bottom and the other a top. When you bounce at a gay bar you deal with the additional stress of which dance partner leads.

Although questions of physical dominance are obvious when one partner is 8 inches taller and 80 pounds heavier psycho-social issues may surprise you. If descriptions of male on male sexual intercourse offend you please look elsewhere.

The Lesser Blessed

Turns out this novel involves high-school-aged teens in a community in Northern Canada. Added to the usual themes of coming of age, raging hormones, girls, sex, and parents are issues of gasoline sniffing, drugs, alcoholism, poverty, whitey vs native.

Told from the point of view of Larry, a Dogrib, the picture painted is not pretty. The narrative is violent, depressing, drug-filled, and despondent. Children grow up fast in this environment. We read about suicide rates in Northern communities, here we hear about the culture that spawns them from the point of view of those youth.

Mightier than the Sword

Being book 5 in the Clifton Chronicles. Jane Smiley's multi-generational trilogy is so full of characters it becomes hard to keep track of them all. Archer solves this issue by regularly killing off his people. Since book 4 ended with a bang that seemingly involved his entire cast it seemed obvious that he had to come up with some sort of rescue or he'd have no one to write about.

Write what you know is a standard dictum. Given his checkered past what this author knows has become a thing I no longer feel comfortable sharing. The machinations of Bond or Wall Street hold no charms for this reader. Having run out of likeable characters to follow I've lost interest in reading further in this series. However as usual Archer leaves the reader with a cliff-hanger ending. Since I'm borrowing this series from a library and I've already read the first couple chapters of book six....

In the Unlikely Event

Miri is growing up Jewish, at least culturally Jewish in a Gentile world. Child of a single mother her grandmother, with whom they live, is not pleased to learn she's dating a goy boyfriend with an Irish name. Miri is mortified to learn that her fancy clothes are well-preserved hand-me-downs charitably donated by her Mother's acquaintance. Fortunately the original wearer is not like my cousin who greeted me at church with the declaration--you're wearing my suit.

Elizabethtown where they live has been hit by three plane crashes. This book is not easy reading. It's 402 pages seem to stretch on and on, progress seeming extremely slow. I could use a character list to keep all the people and their inter-relations straight.

End of the Innocence by John Goode

Book 4 is more than 100 pages longer than the first three combined. This is not a stand-alone book so read books 1-3 first either as Tales from Foster High or individually, first.

As the boys discover there is a vast difference between what the law allows and requires and what a small-minded closed society accepts. Mercifully for our pair high school students have short attention spans and today's sensation rapidly becomes boring history and matters settle down to a dull roar. As with any high school romance theirs has its ups and downs. What no one saw coming was the prom queen's settling for friendship. Seems she isn't the vapid air-head one might have thought, but then neither is the jock she once dated.

Having grown up poor on a rural Nova Scotia farm I have trouble identifying with kids who get a car at 16, obviously have generous allowances and/or part time jobs, and are sexually active.

My one major complaint with this book is that the point of view changes so often it is hard to keep track of who is doing the narration, Brad or Kyle.

The book takes on so much more than the coming of age story of two gay teens in a small, close-minded, bigoted North Texas Community. It also tackles the issues of involuntary outing, cyber bullying, gay suicide, conversion therapy--the so-called straight camps, and the moral argument against homosexuality. Kyle knows his Bible, chapter and verse better than I do.

The latter part of the book needs some editing for grammatical errors such as subject/verb agreement. Brad's Christmas gift of 3 quarters, a nickel and a penny adds up to more than 4 coins. Those quibbles aside once I got into this book it was difficult to put it down.

The Nest by Kennety Oppel

Ironic that I now have two novels signed out that have the title "The Nest"

Much fantasy writing is overly derivative of the master, JRR Tolkien. The present writer is one of a select few I account as being truly original. There are times in reading this book that I have to remind myself that this isn't Neil Gaiman, another of my select few.

Fantasy requires suspension of disbelief on the part of the reader. I can buy into this fantasy save for one detail. I can't believe a child old enough to be left home without a babysitter but too young to be responsible for his siblings was left home alone with an unhealthy baby.

Where Nerves End

Tucker Springs is yet another Romance Novel Series by an author named L. A. Witt. So I've become somewhat hooked on romance, gay in this instance. This one involves Jason who hooks up with single-father acupuncturist Michael. Single parents seem to be a theme running through these novels, hetero and homo, though this series is not of the cowboy genre.

I was disappointed in this read. Once more overly wordy by far and angst ridden. This pair don't know what they want. Jason's aching shoulder gets more play than their love life. Dylan, the seven-year-old boy is a cut-out figure who appears to play video games and in the final analysis comment on the affairs of the adults in his life. The kid has his priorities straight. He wants a stable home life and loving parents, their sexual orientation is immaterial to him, after all "girls are gross".

Midnight Ride

The first in yet another Cowboy Romance series by author Cat Johnson. The cover art pictures a husky model with massive shoulders and biceps. Tyler is a happy go lucky ranch hand out for good times when he runs into the widow Janie from the ranch next door. Hard to believe this hunk ran from anything but they meet up when she finds him hiding from trouble in the back of her dual-wheeled diesel truck. And so the adventure begins.

Like red tape so-called because the clerks who wrote it were paid by the word this novel is unnecessarily wordy. It may make for greater drama in these tales but the women in them seem terribly needy and insecure about themselves and their relationships. At the slightest pretext they seem to doubt themselves and the commitment of their perspective mates and lapse into an orgy of fretting and brooding. Given this lack of confidence their eventual agreements to marry these guys seem rather insincere. If a woman expects a man to account for every moment he's out of her sight before marriage what's to expect matters to be any different after?

The Creed Legacy

The prodigal has returned and despite a decade of separation the identical twins Brody and Connor still resemble two peas in a pod and Brody unabashedly helps himself to his twin's wardrobe. Since book 6 Connor and Tricia got married and a baby Creed's arrival is imminent. At issue in book 7 is the path to matrimonial bliss Brody and Carolyn will take. If a certain ennui creeps in here you're reading me correctly.

If you're familiar with the joke about what happens when you sing a country music song backwards these novels seem to follow a similar pattern:

You get your dog back=generally a stray

You get your truck back=generally brand new

You get your house back=often newly built

You get your wife back=generally newly wed though past flirtation is often the case.

The sex is always good, marriage and a baby follow, these boys are virile, and succeeding babies, to quote Davis in this outing, take nine months.

And a rodeo past is often part of these boys' history. They never seem to lack for money though I can't imagine most make a killing on the rodeo circuit.

Perhaps I should admit that the law of diminishing utility is coming into play here.

As the series winds up I predict the next Creed will arrive in under nine months.