The Shooting at Chateau Rock

Bruno, Chief of Police #13

The Shooting at Chateau Rock

Martin Walker

Bruno is still busy in his kitchen and enjoying others' culinary efforts and in this outing, #13, coaching tennis.

A wealthy old man dies under suspicious circumstances but it's hard to determine cause of death when the body has been cremated and the ashes scattered. So Bruno is looking for possible motivating factors for murder rather than heart attack.

Yes, these are murder mysteries but Bruno's social life occupies the greater part of the story. Given his taste in wines and gourmet foods it would seem he has an excellent salary.

When international intrigue get involved justice gets short shrift to political expediency. This begins to sound more like a Le Carré spy thriller.

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Brothers Three

Brothers Three

C.W. James

Three orphaned brothers struggle to protect what is theirs, their ranch, against the elements and those who would wrest it from them.

Allen is the eldest and at 17 their leader in the absence of their Uncle and legal guardian whom the lure of gold has off who knows where.

Paul is the quiet cerebral reader.

Chet is the athletic impulsive younger brother.

The text needs a good editor.

This may be an Western Action Adventure Novel but the trio are either accident prone or lurch from disaster to disaster. This is a young adult novel at best with a rather simplistic plot. It ends with a shoot-out that leaves a great deal unfinished. Will there be a sequel?

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Walking with Sam: A Father, a Son, and Five Hundred Miles Across Spain

Walking with Sam: A Father, a Son, and Five Hundred Miles Across Spain

Andrew McCarthy

In the first place Andrew is divorced from Sam's Mother.

This is a picaresque novel in which nineteen-year-old Sam joins his middle-aged (58) father on Andrew's Second Camino de Santiago Pilgrimage in Northern Spain. The memoir is told from Andrew's point of view. Hearing about it from Sam would be revealing. In part Andrew hopes to establish an adult relationship with his child on this walk.

The Bruce Trail has end to enders as does the Appalachian Trail and now the Trans Canada Trail and Pacific Ridge Trail. Chaucer's Pilgrims in Canterbury Tales go from pub to pub about 6 miles apart. The hikers on the afore-mentioned trails go backpacking in more primitive conditions. The Camino is a religious pilgrimage in part supported by monasteries and churches along the way. Since the trail has some forty daily sections and sufficient pilgrims an entire industry has developed in supplying their needs and wants. Memorabilia being only a part of the business. Rather than stay in the dormitories provided Andrew stays at commercial inns. What kind of marks he leaves behind as he rests his elevated dogs against the walls....

Sam's is obviously not a religious pilgrimage. His language is X-Rated. The pair compare Andrew's druggy past and Sam's present encounters. Sam smokes. Modern day urban teens lack the kind of chores their country cousins had to get out of bed early to perform. Rather than lay abed until 10 AM it would make sense to me to get up early and walk in the cool of the day and take a siesta during the heat of the day as the locals do. Mad dogs and Englishmen stay out in the noon day sun. When I travelled by RV I often left before dawn to beat the heat, city traffic, and winds that often developed later in the day. Early to bed and early to rise. Bad habits are hard to break.

As the pair wind down their travels they meet more and more fellow pilgrims including one who taxis from rest stop to rest stop. Bikers seem to think the pathway is theirs and fail to ride nearby roads. Sam blunders into those roadways plugged into music and oblivious to danger.

The final days are marked by day hikers and tourists. Overworked attendants churlish and rude. The final arrival is anti-climatic most of the rites of passage no longer possible due to overuse. Attendance at the Cathedral is overbooked.

Sam is a bit of a klutz whose school experience was marked by learning difficulties. He is late to bed and slow to rise and has a nicotine habit. As much as I'd have liked to have heard about the pilgrimage from Sam's perspective his authoring them seems unlikely.

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Home to Big Stone Gap

Big Stone Gap #4

Home to Big Stone Gap

Adriana Trigiani

I bought the first book in this series probably after reading a review in the Saturday Star back in 2000 when it came out in mass market paperback. I was taken by the author's unique turn of phrase and read book 2 when it too arrived a year later and bought book 3 in 2002 but didn't read it until this year. I'd had a surfeit of the author's machinations.

It wasn't until ten years later that I discovered Romances about the same time I discovered e-books. And it wasn't until just now that I discovered this author is a major contributor to the genre having written series totalling over 30 books.

In audiobook format these books are an excellent cure for insomnia.

As the title suggests Ava and Jack have returned home to the Blue Ridge after witnessing their 18-yr-old daughter's marriage in Italy. Ava in particular is struck by the silence that ensues from being an empty nester. Her daughter had occupied a great deal of space in her life that is now void even though the worry continues.

Were these women in Trinity, NFLD the dunking chair for gossiping wives would have been in full use. We get recipes including ingredients and method for several repasts somewhat lost on the audiobook. We get a Christmas Reunion that includes her paramour and the story slowly grinds to a close. Ava runs a pharmacy.

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The Body in the Castle Well

Bruno, Chief of Police #12

The Body in the Castle Well

Martin Walker

Bruno's personalized approach to policing still holds here but he doesn't seem to be able to prevent his clients from killing one another. In this case a visiting doctoral student in French Art is the victim found in the well. While he sifts through the suspects Bruno continues to go for rides on Hector accompanied by his Basset Balzac and indulge in epicurean delights. Not sure I'm interested in trying Pate de Foie Gras and truffles nor do I favour caviar and given the price just as well. Cooking with duck fat?

The author has done a great deal of research. The political machinations of Vichy France, of which this region was a part, get quite an airing. And since the victim was researching art history we learn that the Nazis were not the first regime to engage in art thievery. Seems Napoleon was an art collector as well and he didn't buy it. It's one thing that old masters employed their students in finishing the mundane backgrounds of their famous works but there's an entire industry in art forgery. Authenticating the provenience of a work of art calls for experts in the field.

The victim here comes from money.

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The Overlook

Harry Bosch #13

The Overlook

Michael Connelly

When a nuclear medicine specialist is found murdered, execution style Harry is called in to investigate but it quickly becomes an ABC affair when cesium is found missing. Not one of his better cases.Titled after the lookout where the body is found.

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The Closers

Harry Bosch #11

The Closers

Michael Connelly

Harry is back on the job and working on cold cases with his old partner. Examining Cold Cases often reveals shoddy police work or officers who take the easy pathway.

This outing is a police procedural that reminds me of Dragnet without the crime solved in half an hour. Virtually nothing of a personal nature enters the story.

Unlike Harry's other cases this one doesn't emphasize psychological profiling and motivation but instead concentrates on the nitty gritty of record keeping and paperwork involved in police work. The kind of paperwork that sees offenders walking free before the arresting cop has finished the paperwork involved. In particular he talks about the murderbook that records chronology and all the minutia of the investigation. In this case after 17 years the box containing the physical evidence had been accidentally or deliberately lost.

There is the innuendo that Deputy Chief Irving is somehow implicated in covering up police corruption here. The case was conducted by the book but the actual perpetrator was never identified though possibly buried in all the details.

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Habitant Poems

Habitant Poems

William Henry Drummond

Author immigrated to Montreal with his parents and 3 younger brothers at age 11 and soon after became family head when his father died. Went back to school and became a doctor serving in the Eastern Townships and Cobalt Ontario where his brothers invested in Silver.

His use of French-Canadian patois is probably not politically correct in modern parlance, even misappropriation. Helps if you know French when you read these works and as with reading Welsh's Trainspotting makes more sense if you read it aloud phonetically.

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Milk Glass Moon

Big Stone Gap #3

Milk Glass Moon

Adriana Trigiani

Book 3 of the series.

Flower child faces raising a teenage daughter.

The author's unique outlook most evident in book 1. Of her co-worker she says he has a body that makes Levis sing, pity he's gay. What she says about gossips she doesn't like is even more colourful.

The pair spend a great deal of time in earnest conversation. Seeing the gal through her first infatuation with an 18-yr-old Italian hunk at age 13 is Ava's first major trial.

Attempting to plan and run another's life for them is fraught with disappointments, but they're the ones who have to live those lives and the consequences of their decisions.

The book ends with a wedding and Ava and Jack returning to the Holler. We can only hope there's an HEA.

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The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder

The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder

David Grann

If you've read the Bounty Trilogy then you have an inkling of what's in store. The difference here is the shipwreck and its aftermath which smacks of Lord of the Flies.

The Wager was a member of a squadron of British Naval Ships that put out from Portsmouth for South America, rounded the Horn, and headed North along the coast of Chile.

The author provides a great deal of commentary on the British Navy in general including the press gangs that helped man the ships and life aboard a British Man of War in particular.

The tale is told from the perspective of Byron a young Midshipman, Officer In Training, aboard the ship. The passage around the Southern Tip of South America, Tierra Del Fuego, is perilous at any time but here was made at the worst possible time of year. The voyage was made before the dangers of Vitamin C deficiency were understood and an outbreak of Scurvy occurred at the peak of the storms that beset the squadron. The most simple preventative cure was the drinking of lime juice which served to label sailors as limeys, the use of tar to prevent rot on board labelled sailors Tars.

Marooned on an island in Southern Winter the thieves and murderers who made up the crew came back to haunt those in authority. Giving a starving man 600 lashes for stealing food sounds barbaric. The fate of John Byron's dog sounds equally cruel. Can cannibalism be far behind?

When this gets to the Admiralty and a Court Martial is launched the entire lurid affair is white-washed for the sake of the Admiralty, the Navy, and political expediency.

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Like You've Nothing Left to Prove

Breakaway #2

Like You've Nothing Left to Prove

E.L. Massey

Book 2 begins as the next chapter in book 1 on Christmas Eve in Eli's childhood bedroom.

It's a sad commentary on sport that fighting is a necessary hockey skill. Youngblood's father takes him out to the barn for lessons. It's no coincidence that Marty MacSorley was part of every Gretzky trade and it wasn't for his hockey skills.

As the book progresses the pair's commitment to each other deepens with the acceptance of Alex's team. Being a famous NHL team captain complicates life for them as does Eli's health. As the book ends we are introduced to a gay draft choice who comes with a multilingual fellow player. Their story comprises book 3.

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Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

Blade Runner

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

Philip K. Dick

So Windows still won't save a question mark. For the record, I've not seen the movie but this is an audio version. With little background must admit I was at sea, so to speak, here.

These days robots assemble cares and as I recently read provide elder care and drive cars. This tale is about a guy assigned to hunt down humanoid robots and kill them. Aside from being dated I found it a bit too high concept to carry me along.

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The Narrows

Harry Bosch #10

The Narrows

Michael Connelly

Harry is retired, sort of. He is drawn into the case of a former colleague who dies under mysterious circumstance. The FBI, the federal bureau of intimidation does not play well with other agencies. Apparent particularly in the wake of 9/11. The arrogance of its people is off-putting. Harry is drawn back to Las Vegas for this one.

Some sleuths come back from the dead, Harry is going back on the job. There are at least 16 more volumes in the series to come.

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Pneumadectomy

After Dinner Conversation Short Story Series

Pneumadectomy: After Dinner Conversation Short Story Series

Harris Coverley

The concept that one's spiritual being or soul is held in any single part of one's body is strange to me. Just as the heart is not the centre of love the soul imbues one's entire being. We've read about artists selling their souls to the devil and psychotics lacking one or at least a conscience but surgically removing the soul as this high concept short suggests doesn't seem possible.

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Down and Dirty Birding

Down and Dirty Birding: From the Sublime to the Ridiculous, Here's All the Outrageous but True Stuff You've Ever Wanted to Know About North American Birds

Joey Slinger

Too many so-called naturalists are consumers, not preservers. The ultimate insanity is the lister or so-called twitcher who will travel 1000's of miles to clap binos on a rare bird sighting, tick it off his/her list and head home again moments later.

Loss of habitat, pollution, and global warming are all causing a drop in bird numbers. Alas lake front users would love to see fewer Canada Geese. Monarch Butterflies for example face a double threat: loss of milkweed, the plant they use for their larva due to weed control and failure to preserve the forest in Mexico where the entire population overwinters. Barn owls are in decline due to the loss of old barns, barn board decor hasn't helped. Widespread efforts to decrease insect populations have led to a decrease in songbirds. The cutting of dead trees nearly wiped out Blue Birds.

Birding 101:

Your birdguides are in a carry bag at your side, your binos are attached to a comfortable strap around your neck. If you spot a bird you keep your eyes on it, grab your binos and insert them between you and the bird, focus.

There's a reason why stars twinkle. Anything distant enough to need a scope to see it will be viewed through heat waves, if you don't believe me, ask any sniper--if you dare.

Slinger's dope on birding is spot on though his language and style are like to offend you maiden auntie.

Talk mating habits. Feeding her to encourage copulation is an age-old tradition in the avian world. Insects take it a step further the female praying mantis removes his head and then eats the rest of him right down to the pubes. Female arachnids do the same hence the black widow. The seahorse broods the family in his belly.

Pigeons produce milk (?) though fed as vomitous it doesn't sound appealing.

I've been to though not necessarily birded at 4 of Slinger's Hot Spots. Camped at Point Pelee in Season. The shuttle leaves for the Point at 4:00 AM just as it does from the Campground in Grand Canyon to meet the sunrise so birders can see who has collapsed on the beach after crossing Lake Erie at night. That other famous site gives you views of soaring birds from above.

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