IN SOLITARY - Book review

 

Garry Kilworth’s debut novel In Solitary was published in 1977. Since then he has produced novels in a broad number of genres, among them science fiction, fantasy, and history.

Earth has been under the domination of aliens for centuries. The Soal are uncompromising, their laws stating: ‘No member of the Human Race born a native of the Planet Earth may have contact with any other such native by any medium, natural or otherwise, after the age of 170 months [just over 14 years-of-age] except for the performance of mating. No member of the Human Race under 170 months of age born a native of the Planet Earth may have contact with any male member of the same race. The penalty for disobedience of the Soal Law is death’ (p6). Hence, the males are effectively ‘in solitary’ all their life (save for the rare mating events).

The Soal resemble birds with pointed beak-like faces and a web of elastic skin joining the upper and lower limbs; fine hair-like feathers cover their bodies. They’re about a metre tall – ‘more like flying foxes than birds’ (p8).

The book begins with Tangiia – a native Polynesian – embarking to sea on a mating journey in the Oceania area near Ostraylea. Apparently the earthquake of 2083 Old Time had altered the physical relationship between Brytan and Yurop. Apart from the first chapter, the novel is in the first-person, related by another human, Cave, who is serving the Soal in Brytan – until he is banished to live among the mud people… Here, Cave meets a female, Stella, who is quite formidable. They live in tall towers – mushrooms – and barely subsist. Eventually, these two join forces with others, including Tangiia – all the while evading Soal patrols for, clearly, if they were caught congregating, they would be killed.

Of them all, Tangiia is the romantic: ‘She is what makes it so beautiful. Man was made to have woman by his side, otherwise there are just empty holes in our chests where our hearts should be’ (p70).

Kilworth has created an original scenario and populated it with humans and aliens who exhibit all the usual traits – anger, deceit, violence, hate and love. And close to the end, after a rebellion against the Soal, a twist in the tale is revealed.

At 139 pages, it is a short book, but packed with fascinating descriptions of an unusual environment and traumatic events.

THE INFORMATION OFFICER - Book review

 

This is the third book by Mark Mills – each one different in place and time. The Information Officer was published in 2009. It’s set in Malta in 1942 during the second great siege (the first being against the Turks in 1565). [The book brought back memories of the time my wife Jen and I lived in Rabat in 1974-75].

There are two maps – one of the Maltese islands with significant places shown; and a second of the Grand Harbour – which will prove helpful if you’re unfamiliar with Malta.

It begins (mistakenly in my opinion) in London, May 1951 with a viewpoint by a restaurant’s maître d’ with the hint of a spoiler. The real story begins in Malta, April 1942 when a young woman is murdered.

Major Max Chadwick is the Information Officer in Malta, responsible for reporting to the populace with suitable material to maintain morale. Max has a number of friends, among them Freddie, the medic who works out of Mtarfa hospital [I worked there in the 1970s; it’s now a school and apartments]; Elliott, an American serviceman; and Ralph, a cavalier pilot.

When Max is told that there have been three young women murdered yet the authorities seem to be hushing it up, he decides to do some private investigating himself. Digging around for clues is not easy for an amateur, granted, and it is made more difficult by the wartime conditions, notably the constant air raids.

The submarine base on Manoel Island, the Tenth Submarine Flotilla, was one of several targets for Italian and German bombers; inevitably, the airfields were prime targets too: Ta’ Qali, Hal Far and Luqa; and of course the many quaysides and docks of the Grand Harbour and its inlets. [Jen learned to drive in Malta and took her driving-test on the old airfield at Ta’ Qali].

Mills quickly immerses the reader in the place and period. ‘It was typical of many Maltese homes in that the unassuming façade gave no indication of the treasures that lay behind it’ (p21). [When living there we’d seen many examples of this.] He also has a fine turn of phrase: I liked his ‘bewilderment of bastions’ when describing Valletta.

‘…he accompanied her and her mangy dog to the Blessing of the Animals at the church of Santa Maria Vittoriosa’ (p130). [We’d seen these ceremonies in Malta and Spain].

‘… he’d been forced to crash-land in a field – a near-impossible thing to do on Malta without hitting a stone wall’ (p191). [Not much has changed with this overbuilt island].

‘The Point de Vue Hotel stood on the south side of the Saqqija, the leafy square separating Mdina and Rabat’ (p230). The hotel ‘took a direct hit during an afternoon raid, killing six’ (p230). [We enjoyed a splendid meal here].

He mentions the megalithic temples of Hagar Qim and Mnajdra (p243) and on the same page on Dingli Cliffs the primary Radio Direction Finding station is found there; [even now, though the spying is somewhat more sophisticated].

He conveys the absolute terror of living through intense bombing day after day. ‘The ground beneath him had bucked like a living thing, and all around him the air had rung to the tune of flying splinters, a lethal symphony of rock and metal overlaid by more obvious notes: the whistle and shriek of falling bombs, the thump and crump of explosions, the staccato bark of the Bofors firing back blind, and the screams of the diving Stukas’ (p43).

Intermittently, we are privy to the male murderer’s thoughts, jotted down in his notebook, though he remains faceless; a man without empathy, a thoroughly unpleasant specimen. The mystery of his identity is maintained almost to the end.

It was obvious that Mills did a lot of research for the story and highlights two of the many books he consulted: Malta Magnificent by Francis Gerard and Fortress Malta by James Holland. ‘Twice the tonnage of bombs dropped on London during the worst twelve months of the Blitz had rained down on their heads in the last two months alone’ (p61).

There are a couple of interesting choices of character names he has used:

Chadwick lakes are formed behind a number of dams constructed by Sir Osbert Chadwick, a British engineer, in the late 19th century.

Mabel Edeline Strickland was the editor of The Times of Malta before and during the war. Mills’s book The Savage Garden has a main character called Adam Strickland…

If you have any interest in wartime skulduggery or Malta, you should find the book a fascinating read.

I’d also recommend Malta: Blitzed but not Beaten by Philip Vella. And of course Nicholas Monsarrat’s The Kappillan of Malta.

Editorial comment.

Two characters go to see a film at the Rabat Plaza (p229). Jen and I often went to the Adelphi cinema in Rabat (sometimes twice a week!); according to the Old Cinemas in Malta Facebook group, Rabat has only ever had two cinemas – the Adelphi and the Astoria.

THE NIGHT OF KADAR - Book review

 

Garry Kilworth’s second novel The Night of Kadar was published in 1978.

It’s a fascinating novel based on the generation starship concept. It begins in the vast spaceship that had been travelling for a thousand years and is finally nearing its inhabitable planetary destination. Embryos are activated in their tanks and grown rapidly, while being educated. Unfortunately, the ship’s designers did not plan for a subtle minute alien incursion that sabotages the intelligence units irreparably; ‘One of their manipulative interests was ecology – a natural area of study for a static race’ (p177).

The ship lands on an island in a sea of quicksand. The enigma of their purpose remains a mystery, doubtless lost in the wiped tapes. ‘We, the ship’s people. Born of a machine; an engine. But what is a planet, the planet Earth, if not an engine, a large beautiful engine that turns in space, and manufactures life?’ (p93).

The main character is Othman, who was born at the age of thirty Earthyears. Others emerge from the ship, including a pre-programmed wife Silandi. It seems that about half of the complement of settlers were born mentally impaired, referred to as morons; this was due to the malfunction in the circuitry. Inevitably, conflict between individuals arises, causing tension and even rebellion…

The ship automatically constructs tools and machines from its own huge carcass.

The senders, the people who launched the ship were of the Islamic faith; however, no Koran is supplied and their knowledge is bereft of any religion. As time goes by, they recall a childhood they never lived but was imprinted: these ‘false memory’ interludes are detailed in Arabic settings, coloured by the author’s time living and working in the Middle East. ‘She knew these questions could only remain questions. Earth could only be the somewhere of her simulated childhood – a place she had never physically touched’ (p86).

Othman becomes their natural leader and is determined to search for their destiny, their reason for being on this planet. To that end, he enforces the construction of a bridge across the expanse of quicksand to the mainland beyond. This is not always a popular decision, as the number of the island’s trees is depleted: ‘Man is an artist at destruction, even though his intentions may seem pure. Ten, a hundred, a thousand years to grow a tree, and ten minutes to bring it to the ground’ (p41).

The book’s title is from the Koran: ‘Better is the Night of Kadar (Glory) than a thousand months…’ ‘On the night of Kadar, the night he died, he would like to go to those stars, perhaps become one of them’ (p159).

Kilworth’s prose is always good and often eloquent: ‘the crisp salt of their bodies mingling as the wetness flows from their skin, the iron in their blood forming tight wires to jerking muscles, the smell of oxygen burning, circuit fusing in their veins as they reach out to touch the innumerable corners of the universe’ (p99).

Some later scenes are quite horrific. For this planet is no Garden of Eden. And yet they are survivors and they grow as the generations move on. Quite an imaginative feat, this book.

Editorial comment:

When writing, Kilworth could not have imagined that mentioning computer tapes (p3) would be obsolete so quickly.

One of my pet annoyances: ‘Othman first thought privately to himself…’ (p124) ‘thought privately to himself’ is obsolete.

BATMAN SON OF THE DEMON - Book review

This 78-page graphic novel was published in 1987. Written by Mike W Barr and illustrated by Jerry Bingham.

A terrorist attack on the Gotham chemical plant is underway. Two hostages have been taken. This is a job for Batman. There’s an intense fight, and Batman is wounded. He recovers consciousness in the Bat-cave – with Talia Al Ghul in attendance. A madman called Qayin needs to be stopped – and Talia’s father R’As Al Ghul has personal reasons to get involved.

The Al Ghuls and Batman join forces and all mayhem is let loose. Talia is a previous love interest of Bruce Wayne; she knows his secret. Their relationship becomes strengthened as they begin to track down Qayin and his men.

There are a few amusing if familiar asides, for instance: Bruce insists on donning his costume even though still recovering from a bullet wound. Talia says, ‘You can be most exasperating at times.’ And Alfred simply says, ‘Indeed.’ (p16).

Bingham’s artwork is clean, slick and fast-paced with plenty of action – and explosions! This is good storytelling in pictures.

A fine addition to any Batman fan’s collection. 

LEO THE AFRICAN - Book review

Amin Maalouf’s Leo the African was published in 1986 and translated into English by Peter Sluglett in 1988. This paperback copy was published in 1994.  The book is based on the true-life story of Hasan al-Wazzan, the sixteenth century traveller and writer who came to be known as Leo Africanus. It is told in the first person, and covers his first forty years.

He begins his narration when he was born – not as absurd as it first appears: we’re privy to second-hand details from his father and mother about their time in Granada in the late fourteen hundreds. His mother Salma befriends a Jewish pedlar-clairvoyant and healer, Gaudy Sarah, and ‘began to read my palm like the crumpled page of an open book’ (p6). Sarah’s prediction – and her elixir of orgeat syrup – result in Salma’s pregnancy (with Hasan).  Sarah also ‘doubled, when necessary, as midwife, masseuse, hairdresser and plucker of unwanted hair’ (p8).

The days of Islamic Andalusia are numbered. ‘And did not Andalusia flourish in the days when the vizier Abd al-Rahman used to say jokingly: “O you who cry ‘Hasten to the prayer!’ You would do better to cry: “Hasten to the bottle!” The Muslims only became weak when silence, fear and conformity darkened their spirits”.’ (p38).

The Arabs were evicted from Spain in 1492, among them the ineffectual ruler Boabdil, who lingered on the last ridge that afforded him a view of Granada – a place the Castilians thereafter called ‘The Moor’s last sigh’. It was said that the fallen sultan had shed tears there, of shame and remorse. ‘You weep like a woman for the kingdom you did not defend like a man’ (p57). At this time of expulsion of his family, Hasan was three years old. After eight centuries, no more would the voice of the muezzin be heard to call the faithful to prayer.

Hasan grew up in Fez, alongside Jews and Christians as well as Muslims. It is during this time that he learned about the philosophy of life and death: ‘… thank God for having made us this gift of death, so that life is to have meaning; of night, that day is to have meaning; silence, that speech is to have meaning; illness, that health is to have meaning; war, that peace is to have meaning…’ (p103)

Hasan’s friend Harun the Ferret got a job as a porter: ‘Three hundred men, simple, poor, almost all of the illiterate, but who had nevertheless managed to become the most respected, most fraternal and best organised of all the guilds of the city’ (p108). This guild takes care of its members; ‘when any of their number dies, they take over the responsibility for his family, help his widow to find a news husband and take care of his children until they are of an age to have a professions. The son of one is the son of all’ (p108).

The families would hang on the walls of their adopted homes the keys of their homes they left behind, hoping one day to return to Granada. Hasan was a quick learner and soon became successful in trading.

One of the most powerful men in Fez was the Zarwali, an ex-bandit and murderer who ‘had built the largest palace in the city, the largest, that is, after that of the ruler, a piece of elementary common sense for anyone who wanted to make sure that his head remained attached to his body’ (p131).

Harun the Ferret had learned about Zarwali’s past and his behaviour. Zarwali was ‘always convinced that his wives are trying to betray him, particularly the youngest and most beautiful ones. A denunciation, a slander, an insinuation on the part of one of her rivals is enough for the poor unfortunate to be strangled. The Zarwali’s eunuchs then make the crime look like an accident, a drowning, a fatal fall, an acute tonsillitis…’ (p137). Hasan and the Zarwali will clash – and there will be dire repercussions…

There are several amusing and even apt sayings scattered about the book, for example: ‘Destiny is more changeable than the skin of a chameleon, as one of the poets of Denia used to say’ (p57); and ‘If anyone tells you that avarice is the daughter of necessity, tell him that he is mistaken. It is taxation which has begotten avarice!’ (p154); and ‘I had become very susceptible to magic and superstitions… This is probably the fate of rich and powerful men: aware that their wealth owes less to their merits than to luck, they begin to court the latter like a mistress and venerate it like an idol’ (p196); and, finally, ‘in the face of adversity, women bend and men break…’ (p250).

Hasan ventures to Egypt and witnesses the Ottoman conquest there; he is abducted and becomes a prisoner in Renaissance Rome under the Medicis, and yet remarkably finds himself being a confidant of the Pope, and converts briefly to Christianity, and ultimately witnesses the horrendous sack of Rome in 1527.

The book possibly suffers from too much barely digestible religion and politics, yet these were the driving forces that impelled Hasan to wander.

The smells, the colours and the feeling for the period are well-conveyed and indeed instructive for anyone interested in these historic times. 

Chap O'Keefe rides again!

Way back in 2014 I interviewed a stalwart of comic and genre fiction, Keith Chapman. He was an editor and contributor to various fiction publications in London in the 1960s before moving to New Zealand and spending nearly 35 years in newspaper and magazine journalism. He returned to fiction writing in earnest in 1992, using the pen-name Chap O'Keefe, writing westerns, and also edited the Black Horse Extra online magazine. Recently he has concentrated on bringing out his quite considerable back-list in e-book format, rather than producing new fiction.

Chap O'Keefe, his wife, adult children and grandchildren live in Auckland, New Zealand. The family home was high on a North Shore hillside overlooking Hellyer's Creek and the sparkling Waitemata Harbour, but 8 years ago for medical reasons they moved to a small unit in a retirement village.

Black Horse extra online magazine appeared quarterly for six years from March 2006. It promoted the western genre and the work of authors published by the (now defunct) Robert Hale company’s Black Horse Western hardback novels. You can still read each issue of this magazine here

Black Horse Extra (blackhorsewesterns.com)

Keith’s writing history is covered in two lengthy blog items, featuring among other legendary characters for magazines devoted to Sexton Blake, Edgar Wallace, and Leslie Charteris’s The Saint:

WRITEALOT: Blog Guest - Keith Chapman aka Chap O'Keefe (nik-writealot.blogspot.com) -

WRITEALOT: Blog Guest - Keith Chapman - part 2 (nik-writealot.blogspot.com)

Some of Keith’s re-issued westerns as e-books can be found on Amazon and other platforms:

Rebel and the Heiress

Frontier Brides

Blast to Oblivion

A Gunfight Too Many

Gunsmoke Night (his first book written as Chap O’Keefe)

This is my review of Blast to Oblivion

Inspired by Conan Doyle’s The Valley of Fear, this twenty-first Black Horse Western by Chap O’Keefe starts with a bang – a shotgun killing in Denver.

Ex Pinkerton Joshua Dillard was hired by the deceased’s sister, Flora, to investigate the murder. She suspected that her brother’s wife was concealing something – particularly as she had moved away with her male secretary Joseph Darcy to the mining town of Silverville. When Dillard arrives there, he meets up with an unusual character with the monicker of Poverty Joe, who happens to be instrumental in saving Dillard from some desperadoes. Dillard interviewed the ungrieving widow but couldn’t find any evidence to link her with her husband’s death. Besides the unwelcome attentions of the desperadoes led by Cord Skann, Dillard also has to contend with the duplicitous Marshal Broadstreet.

This is an enjoyable yarn and it’s clear that the author has written about Joshua Dillard a number of times (this is his seventh appearance, in fact); the character fits like a well-worn glove. Subtle evidence of research crops up from time to time, too. ‘An English lady traveller in the district had recorded that bad temper and profanity in the presence of women was widespread.’ I could be wrong, but this may be alluding to Fanny Trollope’s classic ‘Domestic Manners of the Americans’.

The action-packed story is laced with humour as well as gunplay. The twist at the end is neat and it’s satisfying for both the reader – and especially for Dillard – that Flora is a woman of her word.

***

‘Told in Pictures’ is an article written by Keith and featured in the prestigious Illustrators Quarterly (2013), lavishly illustrated with covers from Combat Picture Library, Edgar Wallace Mystery Magazine and The Sexton Blake Library, among others.

THE BURNING BRIDE - Book review

Margaret Lawrence’s final book in her Hannah Trevor historical trilogy, The Burning Bride, was published in 1998. I have been remiss in not reading it until now. 

This tale takes place between 6 November and 24 December 1786.

Widow midwife Hannah Trevor has always been an independent soul, even when wed to her unsavoury husband. So, even though she is pregnant by Daniel Josselyn, Major of the Continental Army, and a landowner, she is not committed to the betrothal. Yet, as circumstances begin to crush them all, she relents: ‘If marriage be a bond, I am ready to bear it. If love be a fire, I am already burnt’ (p269).

Daniel had once been the friend of Hamilton Siwall, but that was a long while back. 

Siwall is a land merchant, moneylender, magistrate and member of the General Court. When he tries debtors, he often acquires the offender’s land in settlement, continually extending his power and prestige. It seems that Siwall is keen to lay blame on Daniel for the slightest perceived infraction, and it is not long before the opportunity presents itself.

Marcus Tapp is the High Sheriff of the county and a creature of Magistrate Siwall. ‘Tapp’s eyes scanned the yard, missing nothing…Strange eyes, they were, so pale they seemed in daylight to have no colour at all, glass eyes that the world passed through without effect, to be recorded by the raw ends of his nerves’ (p23).

At this time there is a big issue regarding taxation among the townspeople of Rufford, Maine: ‘Tax upon tax had been laid on them, debts from a war that set rich men free to get richer, but ground out all hope from the labouring poor’ (p2). There are too many debtors; often the prison is bursting at the seams.

‘Rich men elected other rich men and they scratched one another’s backs like sleek cats and did not understand why poor men resented them, and any who resisted the growth of their power was labelled as traitors and fools. So it would be under governors and presidents, as it had been under kings and popes and caesars’ (p235). Anarchy does not seem too far off…

Another of Siwall’s creatures is the town’s local doctor, Samuel Clinch; he is a drunkard and a misogynist: ‘These country midwives are no more skilled than a witch with a broomstick, with their pawings and strokings! What does a woman know of such matters? Can she spell, sir? Can she read and write and cipher Latin like a man? No, she cannot! Women are soft for our pleasures, but they ain’t got the brains of a sheep where Science and babies is concerned!’ (p128). As implied, he is not averse to taking payment for his doctoring of female patients with pleasures of the flesh. Until, that is, he is found murdered in the forest. A mystery surrounds the violent death.

For different reasons, both Siwall and Tapp soon accuse Daniel of the murder, though there is little conclusive proof.

Hannah is kept busy with her midwife role. ‘It was always there at a borning, the spectre of dying, the other side of the treacherous coin of hope’ (p335). Yet, in reality, she would prefer to spend her time quilting and finally preparing for her wedding to Daniel. Several quilt patterns are named throughout the book: Bridges Burning, China Dish, Cross and Crown, Cradle in the Wilderness, Flame in the Forest, and Star of the Forest. Instead, she finds herself puzzling over the unpleasant doctor’s murder. That is, when she is not laying out the men who’d been sentenced to death by the loathed magistrate.

‘This is her work in the world, to reconcile living and dying. To wash away fear and shame and loneliness with a touch the dead must somehow feel where they stand watching, invisible, behind their window of clouded glass’ (p244).

Again, we meet Hannah’s deaf mute daughter Jennet, always depicted with compassion and eloquence. As before, Lawrence’s prose and imagery suck you into the story, and into the period:

‘A woodpecker rattled in the crown of an oak tree, and a flock of kinglets chattered as they flew from one tree to another, their scarlet crowns a flash of fire against the heavy hung branches. And now and then a limb creaked with the weight of slowly melting ice, and a burden of wet snow fell with a plop to the ground…’ (p398)

Here you will find poignancy, cruelty, anger, despair, injustice, love, hate, suspense, and tension aplenty.

A fitting end to an engrossing historical series. 

BLOOD RED ROSES - Book review

 

Blood Red Roses is the second book in Margaret Lawrence’s trilogy about Hannah Trevor. I read the first – Hearts and Bones – in 1999. I found Hannah, her main character, very compelling, and the storytelling was excellent. I obtained the two sequels as soon as they were published in paperback. And yet for some unfathomable reason I’ve only now got round to reading them – a matter of some two dozen years later! In mitigation, I have acquired several hundred books still to be read… Unfortunately, I recall little about the first book after such a lapse of time, save that I recall admiring it greatly. (Since that time, beginning in 2008, I have attempted to write brief reviews of the books I’ve read, if only to remind me what they were about, for it is unlikely I will re-read a book when I have so many lingering on the shelves unread).

‘Lucy Hannah Trevor turned thirty-eight years old on that foggy St Valentine’s Day of the year 1786. She had the ripeness of a woman who had borne four children and the unconscious sensuality of one who thinks she has long since cured herself of needing men for more than idle conversation’ (p11, Heart and Bones).

Hannah is a midwife in the town of Rufford, Maine. Three of her children died and her fourth, Jennet is a loving deaf mute, now aged eight. ‘She had listened in vain for the birth cry, and when her aunt laid the girl-child on her belly, Hannah was sure she had given birth to the dead. Even when her hands found the warm, slippery shape of a living baby there, it seemed to her an alien gift that had nothing to do with her own body nor with anyone else in the world – and was more precious, being only itself’ (p47).

Her husband James had abandoned her while she was pregnant with Jennet, leaving gambling debts, and was presumed dead. Hannah’s secret lover was Daniel Joselyn – Jennet’s father.

The three books are written from the omniscient point of view. However, each book begins and ends with an extract from Hannah’s journals in the first person: 1) 14 February 1786 and 22 February 1786; 2) 12 July 1786 and 12 September 1786; 3) 6 November 1786 and 24 December 1786. So the three novels barely cover ten months of the same year – though event-filled months indeed!

A recurring theme is the making of quilts, which Hannah endeavours to accomplish when she is not in conflict with officialdom and some thoroughly unpleasant individuals. And the three books tend to follow a pattern, too.

Each book begins with a prologue. 1) How he killed her; 2) How she made God weep; 3) How he killed the ghost of shame. None of the individuals are either Hannah or Daniel; at this point they are anonymous.

The penultimate chapter headings are relevant: 1) The breaking of hearts and bones; 2) Blood and roses; 3) The refiner’s fire. Each echoes the titles of the relevant books. The book title Blood Red Roses is from a children’s dance.

Interspersed are chapters relating to legal proceedings investigating the murders – they’re all murder mysteries besides being historical novels: ‘Piecing the Evidence’.

When they first met, Daniel’s wife was living in England. Hannah wanted him merely to give her a child; she did not seek love. Yet inevitably love followed – on both sides: ‘His life turned always upon the sight of her – even more intently since the winter, for now he knew her heart better. As she went upon her nursing visits, Hannah was a bright fleck of colour – her hooded red cloak against the winter snow, and in summer, a plain linen bodice and a homespun skirt that might have been dyed in the same pot of cochineal as the cloak’ (p27).

Midwife Hannah was independent, and did not stand for any nonsense. ‘It was no matter of dying; surely Molly’s case was, the midwife judged, more messy than desperate, the girl cried for a nurse if she suffered a hangnail. Hannah could witness, and besides, men always got liverish, and histrionic at bornings’ (p44).

Many of the characters are neatly described. ‘Andrew Tyrell held a long-handled glass to one eye and peered through it. He had spent much of his life poring over badly-printed books and now, at five-and-forty, he could not see more than a yard beyond his nose without a lens’ (p52). And: ‘He was a tall man and heavyset, with a long, lugubrious countenance and grey eyes set deep in his skull, like musket balls in a bore’ (p177). And: ‘Honoria Siwal eyed Hannah down a nose so long and thin it might have served a heron for a beak’ (p217).

And the author’s descriptions of Jennet’s travails are beautifully done: ‘But when there was music, Jennet Trevor seemed to see it in the very air, and something that had slept in her since before she was born awoke and climbed the blank walls of her silence, demanding to be heard’ (p87). And: ‘Hannah could feel the pounding of her daughter’s heart like a fist, slamming, slamming, slamming at the invisible door that locked her out of the world’ (p89). Jennet ‘did not wake from her drugged sleep till near six that evening, but in the clock of her bones it was morning still’ (p278).

This period – like many before and after – was a time where women were considered chattels, second-class citizens, if considered at all. ‘Known and unknown, seen and disregarded. All women are nobody. Poor women are nothing at all’ (p161). [Have times really changed? Women have had to fight for recognition for centuries and now a certain vociferous minority want to eliminate the definition of ‘woman’. Really?] ‘Nothing. I am nothing human. I am a weed to be torn from the world’ (p170).

The murder mystery is resolved.

The times were perilous, violent and in many instances unjust; that’s history for you. Certainly, if anyone is ‘offended’ by factual historical events, then these splendid novels are not for them. For the majority who enter Hannah’s world they will feel they are almost there, and will be moved by her gripping tale.

The final book is The Burning Bride, which I have begun and will review next.

Promotion by Rough Edges Press

 

£0.99/$0.99 e-book For 1 week only – starting on 6 September!

From Rough Edges Press

CATALYST

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A fast-paced thriller with plenty of threats and sexy suspense…

A catalyst is a person who precipitates events. That’s Catherine Vibrissae. Orphan, chemist, model, and crusading cat.

Seeking revenge against Loup Dante, the Head of Ananke—and the man responsible for the takeover of her father’s company—Cat will stop at nothing to uncover his wicked agenda. A trained chemist and an accomplished climber, she is not averse to breaking and entering. So, when she crosses paths with an attorney for the bloodless organization and uncovers a mysterious product called Catananche, Cat risks injury and death to learn more.

Ranging from South England to the North-east, from Wales to Barcelona, Cat’s quest for vengeance is implacable. But will she be able to escape the clutches of an unexpected and whip-wielding enemy?

The first in the Cat’s Crusade series, Catalyst follows a strong female character with a thirst for action.

BATMAN KNIGHTFALL - Book review

 

Dennis O’Neil’s novel Batman Knightfall was published in 1994 and was mainly adapted from a story arc serialised in the following DC comics, many of which he edited: Batman, Batman: Shadow of the Bat, Detective Comics, Legends of the Dark Knight, and Robin; with additional material from Batman: Venom, Batman: Sword of Azrael, and Batman: Vengeance of Bane – all published between 1991 to 1994. I read the series at the time but have only now got round to this book. (My TBR pile is enormous!)

Way back then O’Neil and his other editors wondered, after the release of the Batman Returns movie, that there was a risk of saturation, scaring off potential readers. Also, there was a feeling that in the time of Eastwood, Schwartzenegger et al piling high corpses maybe Batman was an anachronism, even passé – especially as the caped hero would never kill. They decided to test the concept with the Knightfall story arc. The readership response was conclusive: they wanted a ‘Batman who was avenging and compassionate. The Batman archetype is the creature of darkness who serves the common good, the devil on an angel’s mission’ (p349).

The familiar characters in the comics are here; firstly, Commissioner Gordon: ‘… sometimes he despised himself for his reliance on the masked vigilante, but he knew that without Batman, his job would be impossible. Gotham City hadn’t had an honest government since the Civil War… Batman was necessary – a necessary evil… if Batman’s a devil, he’s my devil. I’ve made a pact with him and I’ll keep it. Until he steps over the line. Until he kills someone. And then? The day that happens it’ll be the end for both of us, and probably for the city, too’ (p11).

There are appropriate dark moments in the tale, but there’s also banter and wit: it’s become a cliché almost that after Gordon’s meeting with Batman the Dark Knight would tends to vanish. ‘I’ve finally figured out how you do that. You’re one of those ninjas, aren’t you? You learned it in Japan.’

Batman said, ‘Correspondence course. It was either ninja or air-conditioning repair, and I already had a black suit.’ (p24).

At this time, Tim Drake is the third incarnation of Robin. The first, Dick Grayson, naturally grew older and became crime-fighter Nightwing. Jason Todd, the second, was killed by The Joker. The Drake family lives close to Wayne Manor, which is handy. Tim is still a novice Robin, but a fast learner.

At the beginning, the criminal psychopath Bane crosses paths with Batman and escapes. Bane realises that if he wants to control Gotham, he must first get rid of the Dark Knight. So he embarks on his strategy, diverting Batman to numerous crime scenes, to fight felons; and eventually he even releases several terrible criminals from Arkham Asylum. Finally, Batman confronts Bane and in his worn-out frazzled state is no match and his back is broken. Bane contemptuously dumps Batman in the street.

Alfred and Tim find Batman and take him to the Cave and thence to hospital, pretending that Bruce Wayne had a serious RTA. Bruce is worried, however; although he has apprehended several escapees from Arkham, there are others still on the loose, more than the police department can handle. He informs Tim that a substitute Batman is needed – and selects Jean Paul Valley, who had previously been a costumed avenger, Azrael. (Clearly, Nightwing was otherwise occupied).

In their own ways, both Bane and Valley are psychologically damaged. Bane’s back-story makes grim reading (pp19-32), but sheds some light on the warped violent character. At an early age Valley had been brainwashed by his religious father to follow the Ancient Order of St Dumas and train to be an assassin. Yet in an earlier adventure, Azrael was instrumental in saving Batman’s life.  

Talking of psychos, we meet The Joker only briefly; he is one of the escapees: The bright red lips slashed across his white skin curled upward into a smile. ‘Of course, hurting people really isn’t done in the best circles.’ His lips curled down. And up again. ‘So I’ll do it in a straight line.’ (p51).

While taking weeks to recover, Bruce is determined to fight crime from his bed. ‘Sometimes there’s a clue to the present in the past,’ Bruce observed. ‘The story of your life,’ Alfred replied dryly (p223). Obsessed with combatting crime, Bruce pushes Alfred to the point where his faithful manservant finally has enough and with regret leaves his employer…

A number of questions are raised and answered about the Dark Knight, not least what drives his soul. Also on display is the power of redemption. O'Neil's Afterword is enlightening too.

If you are a fan of Batman, then this should be in your collection. Just don’t take 29 years to get round to reading it. Mea culpa…

Editorial comment:

The substitute Batman drove the batmobile into the rear of a school bus – in an attempt to prevent the children being killed. Yet a short while later, Robin is following the batmobile and ‘noticed the damaged rear end and wondered…’ (p284). But of course it was the front end of the vehicle that sustained damage. Blame the editor…

HANNAH - Book review

 

Paul-Loup Sulitzer’s saga Hannah was published in 1988 – translated by Christine Donougher. This is one of those sprawling novels that cover many years, taking the heroine from childhood to old age; a book to get lost in and enjoy. It’s narrated from an omniscient point-of-view.

It begins in Poland in 1882. Hannah is a seven-year-old Jew. While playing in the fields with her brother Yasha and a friend Taddeuz, a young Polish Catholic, she learns of the attack by Cossacks on her village. Then the pogrom reaches them; Hannah hides but her brother is burned to death and Taddeuz betrays her by running away.

She was a precocious child and her father Reb Nathan taught her to read and talked of the wonders of the universe. ‘There was between the two of them an extraordinary closeness that she would know with no other man’ (p5). ‘He would declare: Nothing in the world is more mysterious than a little girl’ (p5). Her father was killed in the raid.

The drayman Mendel Visoker was twenty-four when he discovered Hannah alone in the fields and took her home. She was traumatised, but did not cry. A phrase Mendel uses is: ‘One of two things is possible…’ which Hannah hijacks several times in the narrative, to comic effect.

The years passed and Hannah continued her learning in several languages, borrowing books from Mendel when he visited. She would always be of diminutive stature and had enchanting grey eyes. When she was fourteen Mendel agreed to take her to a relative of the village rabbi in Warsaw as Hannah was plainly stifled in the little village. She stayed in the Klotz household; the woman Dobbe was the power in the marriage, Pinchos was ‘only a suggestion of a husband’. There are many amusing and colourful character descriptions in the book; this one stands out: ‘The couple were nearly sixty and had never had any children. In fact, they had not spoken to each other for some thirty-odd years, united in one of those silent bonds of well-maintained hatred that only a perfect marriage can achieve’ (p77). ‘She was truly colossal, as tall as Mendel, and the look she shot him would have terrified a lesser man. Her small keen eyes were tucked away beneath heavy eyelids that fell, like the rest of her face, in folds’ (p77). However, Dobbe is no match for the wilful Hannah.

While working in the Klotz shop, Hannah sets about improving things and strikes a deal with Dobbe to earn a percentage of the takings. Eventually, she strikes out on her own, achieving considerable success – until she is attacked and robbed. Mendel learns of this and metes out his own revenge but is then on the run and arrested, sent to Siberia. Hannah is given his boat-ticket to Australia, where she is taken in by the Mackenna family. ‘… this sudden immersion in a real family came as something new and surprising; she had not experienced the same since she was seven… Their average height alone was impressive… She felt like a fox terrier invited to share a meal with an assembly of St Bernards’ (p206).

Hannah was a quick study and soon turned her hand to developing scented cream lotions. She scoured much of Australia for the ingredients and quickly understood commerce: ‘she knew that the less cream she included in each pot the more highly priced – and prized – the contents would be’ (p284). All the time she desired to find and reunite with her childhood love, Taddeuz…

‘She was not going to remain in Australia for twenty years, and she was already getting old, nearly eighteen. Taddeuz would not wait half a century for her, nor would Mendel, in the event he had not already escaped…’ (p292).

By the turn of the century, Hannah is a rich and successful woman, head of a cosmetics empire with establishments in London, Paris and Vienna. And yet she seems unfulfilled unless she can find Taddeuz…

This is a completely engrossing novel with a wonderful and memorable heroine in Hannah and plenty of other fascinating characters, not least Mendel, her protector who possesses an unrequited love for her.

The book ends on a reasonably high note; however, there appears to be a sequel, The Empress, dubbed Hannah Tome 2, but it is hard to come by. I’m quite content to leave Hannah at the end of this book.

Apparently, Sulitzer used a ghost writer for many of his books: Loup Durand. I don’t know if Durand wrote this one.

Sulitzer is a French financier, and was a self-made millionaire by the age of seventeen.

It has been postulated that Hannah’s story is a fictional account of Helena Rubinstein. True, both originally came from Poland, and both took the cosmetics and fashion industries by storm at the start of the twentieth century. Quite a number of authors have used real larger-than-life people as templates for their fiction. Whatever the story behind the book, that should not detract from a well-told and affecting tale.

 

 

 

A COLD DAY FOR MURDER - Book review

Although Dana Stabenow had science fiction books published prior to this, A Cold Day for Murder (1992) was her debut crime novel – which happened to win an Edgar Award from the Crime Writers of America. There followed over twenty Kate Shugak Investigation crime books.

It’s set in Alaska. Kate is an Aleut investigator who has recently survived having her throat cut by a paedophile (now deceased). She previously had an affair with Jack Morgan, Anchorage’s DA. None of this we experience directly, as it’s flashback – much of it in nightmare form. In effect, there’s a lot of back-story presented, as if we’re diving in to another chapter in the series; still, it’s neatly done.  

After that brutal experience, it had taken her some time to recover from the trauma: ‘For fourteen months she had said nothing, had blunted every effort by every friend she had to get at the hurt, had pushed back the reckoning, and now here he was, Jack Morgan, her nemesis, her fate, the man who had hired her to deal every day of her working life with hurt, terrified defenceless children, who had loved her and asked, no, demanded that she love him in return, who had taken her rejection of himself, his job, his love and his world without apparent objection…’ (p116).

Jack calls upon her to find a missing National Park Ranger; and also seek the detective who had been sent earlier to find the ranger… Kate knows The Park, it’s her home turf, even if she abandoned it to get education and a career.

Kate has a slightly awkward number of relatives in the town of Niniltna; colourful, cranky, difficult and not particularly likeable... Perhaps too much emphasis was placed on the local colour in the text. However, Kate is an engaging character, plucky and stubborn. Sadly, for me, the arrival at the solution seemed rushed and a bit contrived. As the character is sustained over so many books, I suspect any perceived shortcomings noted here have been rectified in subsequent outings.

What sets this book apart from many other crime novels, and very possibly earned the award, is the local knowledge and feeling for Alaska.

If you like crime series, then you might want to consider diving in here and make up your own mind.

Editorial comment:

My copy (2013) oddly has a back cover blurb that doesn’t relate to the story at all. Oops, Head of Zeus… The blurb on Amazon is correct, however!