Sprintered Silence: Outstanding Mystery Set in Little-Known World of Irish Travelers

Sprintered Silence by Susan Furlong
Reviewed by Stephen Terrell

Susan Furlong has expertly crafted a wonderful mystery that propels the reader into an entirely new part of Americana that few know exists -- The Irish Travelers who live an isolated existence in the mountains of Appalachian Tennessee and other parts of the South. 

The Travelers really exist. They do, as their name implies, travel, following the seasons doing handiwork throughout the United States. They are a closed society, untrusting of the "settled" outside world. In their world, Susan Furlong finds a textured canvass against which to place her richly woven characters. 

Brynn Callahan is caught between the world of the Travelers and the settled world. She has returned scarred both inside and out from her experience in retrieving bodies in Iraq. Her only true companion is Wilco, her search dog who was left deaf and crippled from the same explosion that severely injured Brynn. When the body of a Traveler woman is found by Brynn and Wilco in the woods near the Traveler settlement of Bone Gap, it sets in motion a series of events that will tear at Brynn, her family and the entire Traveler community.

This is a marvelous first book in what hopefully will be a long and successful series. MUST READ for any mystery fan.

* Susan Furlong is a member of Speed City Sisters in Crime and the author of 12 mysteries.

Book Review: Northwest Angle -- Another Cork O'Connor Mystery by William Kent Krueger

Northwest Angle by William Kent Krueger
Reviewed by Stephen Terrell

I'm a fan of the Cork O'Connor mystery series, and Northwest Angle is no exception. 

This eleventh book in the series starts with a derecho -- a horrific storm of straight line winds that occasionally sweeps across the prairies. In this case, it sweeps across Lake of the Woods on the US / Canada border, scattering the O'Connor family that is vacationing on the lake. When Cork's daughter Jenny finds herself on one of the thousands of islands in the Lake, she discovers a young woman's body and not far away an infant hidden in a covered hole.

The discovery kicks off the mystery that includes the infant, a mysterious Indian smuggler, a blind Indian wiseman, a reclusive religious group and a cast of quirky characters found on this isolated area that is the northernmost point of the contiguous 48 states. 

As with all of William Kent Krueger's books, it is well written, well paced, filled with tension and plot twists. The characters digress into discussions of religion and philosophy a little too much for my taste, and there is one death that seems a bit out of character and more of a plot point to simply the ending. But this is well worth picking up for a cozy ready on a brisk fall evening.

Book Review: Perfidia by James Ellroy

Book Review:  Perfidia by James Ellroy

Reviewed by Stephen Terrell

Recently on this blog, author and playwright Crystal Rhoades reviewed Face of the Enemy by Jo Anne Dobson and Beverly Graves Myers. The novel was set in New York City in the days following the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Perfidia by James Ellroy is set in Los Angeles during the same time frame.  But that is where the similarities end. It is as from Face of the Enemy in style and tone as New York is from L.A. -- maybe further.

Ellroy is most known for the L.A. Quartet, a series of novels of violence and corruption set in post-WW II Los Angeles. Those novels – “The Black Dahlia,” “The Big Nowhere,” “L.A. Confidential” and “White Jazz” -- became the basis for the movie blockbuster L.A. Confidential, one of the best police movies ever made.  In Perfidia, we meet many of the characters that populate the L.A. Quartet novels.

Ellroy’s style is unique. He writes in staccato sentences, with many phrases repeated throughout the story to capture the inner thoughts and demons of the characters – and these characters have demons a-plenty.  Those offended by vulgarity, profanity and racial epithets should probably steer clear. Even considering the time frame that Ellroy captures, the wave of references to Chinks, Japs, Wetbacks, and a variety of vile names for blacks,  homosexuals and Jews liberally pepper each page.

The novel opens the day before the attack on Pearl Harbor when corrupt Detective Dudley Smith and Japanese crime technologist Hideo Ashida, the only  Japanese employee of the LAPD, investigate what appears to be the ritual suicide of the four members of the Watanabe family. But Ashida finds evidence that the family was murdered.

The next day, Pearl Harbor is attacked and Los Angeles devolves into a fearsome place for the Japanese community (including Ashida). Japanese citizens are brutally rounded up and jailed by the L.A. Police.  But for some, it is a time of opportunity.

As with the other Ellroy novels, the reader is dragged into a world of violence, corruption, theft, beatings, shootings, greed, drugs and sex. The Watanabe murders lead to uncovering plots to exploit the war and coming Japanese internment for enormous financial gain, “fifth column” subversives and nazis, planted evidence and coerced confessions.

Ellroy also mixes in real life characters to give the novel a sense of authenticity. And he doesn’t treat them with kid gloves. Bette Davis is portrayed as a self-centered hard-edged, promiscuous woman who sleeps with Dudley Smith, among others. Jack Webb of Dragnet fame is portrayed as a cop-wannabe hanging around like a puppy waiting to be thrown a bone. Carey Grant and Barbara Stanwyck are dismissed as "homos." Real-life iconic L.A. Police Chief William Parker is portrayed as a drunk and religious zealot.

This novel isn’t for the faint of heart. For my taste, the constant dark view of a world without any redeeming grace wears on me. The last third of the book seems to drag, and the more I read, the more I felt I needed to wash my hands every time I put it down.

Nonetheless, Perfidia offers a raw glimpse as a very different time in America, a time that I hope we never relive. Maybe we need to read it to be reminded of the evil that lurks when we lose our moral compass.

Book Review: Face of the Enemy

Face of the Enemy

Reviewed by Crystal V. Rhodes

I like the old black and white, fast talking film noir mystery movies of the 1930s and 40s that I’ve occasionally run across on TV.  I like the sense of urgency, and the sense of style they convey, but rarely have I found a book that captured the feeling of that film genre, that is until I read Face of the Enemy, by Jo Anne Dobson and Beverly Graves Myers.

Set in December 1941, shortly after Japan bombed Pear Harbor, Face of the Enemy sheds light on America’s racial paranoia during that period of time, especially its bigotry toward people of Japanese descent.  Even more interesting is the fact that this novel doesn’t take place on the West Coast where there were mass government incarcerations of people of Japanese ancestry. Instead, Face of the Enemy takes place on the East Coast, in the glitzy art world of New York City.

When the murdered body of an art dealer is discovered in his gallery, the authorities suspect artists, Masako Fumi, an avant-garde Japanese immigrant, married to a university professor, who is American and who is gravely ill.  Although there are other suspects and even a lead detective who is skeptical about her guilt, the FBI is anxious to turn the talented artist’s case into a political coup, especially since she’s the estranged daughter of a high official in the Japanese government.  It seems that Masako’s only hope for redemption is her husband’s nurse, an unassuming Southern bell named Louise Hunter, who fervently believes in the woman’s innocence and vows to help her.

The twists and turns in Face of the Enemy are a mystery lover’s delight.  The characters are vivid and the dialogue is snappy.  As for the story line, it contains historic references about an era about which I knew little.  Face of the Enemy wasn’t merely entertaining, but educational as well.   

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C.V. Rhodes is a member of the Speed City Sisters in Crime chapter and co-author, with L. Barnett Evans, of the Grandmothers, Incorporated cozy mystery series.  Visit their website at www.grandmothersinc.com

REVIEW: An Unsuitable Job for a Woman by P.D. James is a Most Suitable Mystery

An Unsuitable Job for a Woman (Cordelia Gray, #1) 
by P.D. James 

Reviewed by Stephen Terrell

This is one of the most enjoyable English murder mystery novels that I have read. Written in the early 1970s, Cordelia Gray seems a predecessor and maybe inspiration for Kinsey Milhone, the heroine of Sue Grafton's alphabet books and Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum, heroine of the "1 for the Money" series. 

The book opens with a young and a bit naive Cordelia pushing into her bosses office to find him dead, a victim of his own hand. He has left her a detective agency deeply in debt, a failing car, and an absence of clients. So when a wealthy scientist at Cambridge summons her to look into the apparent suicide of his son, she jumps on the opportunity. But her investigation soon leads her to conclude that the death was not a suicide at all.

The book is well paced -- something often missing in British novels. The plot is well constructed and the characters are fascinating. If you're looking for a cozy mystery to curl up with next to a fire, or something to enjoy at the beach, you won't go wrong with An Unsuitable Job for a Woman.

BOOK REVIEW: In Time and Fog and Fire by Award-Winning Author Rhys Bowen

A Time of Fog and Fire by Rhys Bowen

Reviewed by S. Ashley Couts

       A published writer once told me the best way to engage an audience is to create a great character, put her in a situation and keep throwing rocks at her. That is exactly what occurs in  Rhys Bowen’s  In Time of Fog and Fire.  Molly Murphy Sullivan, a turn of the century former detective, wife and young mother living in New York city is barraged with obstacles. Following intuition and a cryptic message sent in her husband’s letter she bundles her toddler, tucks a few necessities into a carpet bag, folds her frocks into a steamer trunk then heads into the unknown. Will she even find her husband who is on a secret mission for President Roosevelt?

       To tell the truth before reading this book, I was not a fan of historical fiction I prefer contemporary works by the likes of Sue Grafton or Janet Evanovich. But Bowen hooked me right off the bat with two liberated female characters. These two women living together, wearing manly clothing, bravely defying the norm-- Suffragists marching for cause are portrayed as gentle, kind, literate and great, good. She weaves in a visit with Mark Twain, takes us to the Opera where Caruso is appearing and winds us through China town eventually dropping us into the horror of out of control fires.

        Molly is brave and yet, a bit naïve I suppose having littler knowledge of the world beyond New York or her home across the sea. Plunked into the middle of a disaster, she must scramble to survive. As a writer, I admired the way Bowen wound plot and characters through real life historic events name dropping along the way thus revealing not only attention to detail but careful research. I was spurred to head for my computer and text books to look up the San Francisco earth quake—a disaster that left her characters bereft of resources. And while the subject was lush-- the opera, New York City at the turn of the century--the Golden Gates by the sea, the harbors with ships coming and going from the orient, the soldiers with their brass she did not go overboard with description simply etching it deftly into the story so, I could almost feel the snow, the pain, the salt and the moist curl of the fog as well as the loss.

In the end, I am not sure if I’d fallen in love with historical fiction. But, I definitely want to know more. I need to find out if Molly can solve the next crime now that she’s just found she’s pregnant again. She how she hooked me.   

*New York Times bestselling author Rhys Bowen will join the Speed City Sisters in Crime on February 25.  She will speak and meet fans at a Tea from 2 p.m - 4 p.m. at the College Park Neighborhood Clubhouse, then hold a book signing at Barnes and Noble next to Keystone at the Crossing from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. The public is welcome.

REVIEW: 12 Clues of Christmas by Rhys Bowen

The Twelve Clues of Christmas By Rhys Bowen

Reviewed by B.K.Hart

The Twelve Clues of Christmas by New York Times bestselling author Rhys Bowen is a very cleverly done mystery and delightful addition to the “Her Royal Spyness” series.  It is an entertaining mix of mystery and humor.

This is the sixth book in “Her Royal Spyness Series” by Rhys Bowen.  Lady Georgiana Rannoch, Her Royal Spyness, gets caught up in a Christmas mystery when the folks in the quaint village of Tiddleton-under-Lovey get caught up in the Lovey curse and begin dropping like flies.

It’s Great Britain in the 1930’s (the novel includes a guest appearance by the late great, Noel Coward).  The story is sprinkled with a bit of Muncie, Indiana flavor with the inclusion of Americans who pay to stay at the manor for the Christmas holiday.

I found myself laughing aloud at some of the antics, from the groping unwanted hands under the dinner table, to the unraveling of her best gowns, and snoring maids found in the Lady’s bed. At times, the humor made me feel like I wasn’t paying close enough attention to what was actually going on in the story.

This is a must read for anyone who loves cozy mysteries.

*New York Times bestselling author Rhys Bowen will join the Speed City Sisters in Crime on February 25.  She will speak and meet fans at a Tea from 2 p.m - 4 p.m. at the College Park Neighborhood Clubhouse, then hold a book signing at Barnes and Noble next to Keystone at the Crossing from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. 

Book Review: The Poacher's Son

The Poacher’s Son by Paul Doiron (Minotaur, 2010)

Reviewed by Cheryl Shore

        

         I haven’t been a big fan of series in the last decade. I usually gravitate toward stand-alones that offer something unique in the crime fiction or suspense genres. But reading The Poacher’s Son has changed that trend, at least for the moment. After reading this debut novel, I’m well on my way through the rest of the series featuring game warden Mike Bowditch.  

         The Poacher’s Son is a novel of familial suspense, my label for a genre that doesn’t exactly exist.  Protagonist Mike Bowditch learns about two murders, and one of the victims is a police officer. The number-one suspect is his father, Jack. We learn about Mike’s childhood with his father, and it’s a rough one. We learn about Mike’s attempt to connect with his father during his adolescence, and how that experiment ended in failure. Warden Mike Bowditch admits that his father is an unsavory character who doesn’t hesitate to break the law. But he also knows that Jack Bowditch is too smart to kill a cop. 

         The emotional tug to vindicate his father is strong and leads him into trouble with his superiors, and his girlfriend, Sarah. Still, Mike is driven to unravel the mystery of the cop-killing, finding a web of circumstances that hits closer to home and is far more complex than he could have imagined. When he realizes the magnitude of his personal danger, he’s all alone in the Maine wilderness. His survival depends on quick thinking, and his ability to reframe the situation by letting go of his preconceptions and emotional biases. I found The Poacher’s Son to be a page turner. If you start it, I don’t think you’ll want to put it down.    

    

Book Review: Drinking Gourd

Drinking Gourd by Barbara Hambly

Reviewed by Chrystal V. Rhodes

“Here, without a protector, he was nothing.  Worse than nothing, he was worth at least a thousand dollars to anyone who could convince a buyer that he was property--and most buyers these days didn’t take much convincing.”

It’s 1839 in the state of Mississippi, and these are the thoughts of a free man of color named Benjamin January, the protagonist in the historical mystery novel, Drinking Gourd by Barbara Hambly.  This is the ninth book in her series featuring January, but this my first time reading Ms. Hambly’s work

In Drinking Gourd, January--a musician and a trained medical doctor-- is traveling the south working with the All-American Zoological Society’s Traveling Circus and Exhibition of Philosophical Curiosities.  Economic necessity has forced him to take a job with the traveling circus, in order to support his pregnant wife and his child back in New Orleans.  There’s not a lot of work for a black physician during these perilous times, so he’s glad to have a job.  However, January finds that his medical expertise is sorely needed when he is summoned by members of the Underground Railroad in Vicksburg, Mississippi to help one of their wounded “conductors”.  When another “conductor” in the clandestine group of abolitionists is murdered, and an associate of January’s is blamed for the deed, he finds himself racing against time to find the real killer before the names of everyone involved in the Underground movement are revealed, including his own identity.

It is a perilous undertaking for a black man in Mississippi.  To avoid suspicion and in order to stay alive, January, the learned physician who speaks French and Latin, has to pretend that he is an uneducated slave.  In his investigation, if he does uncover evidence that could exonerate the “conductor” as an innocent man, January can’t testify in court.  The law in Mississippi forbids a black man from testifying in court.  Despite these challenges, Hambly manages to weave an intricate tale of intrigue,   introducing an array of colorful as well as unsavory characters.  In fact, there are so many that at times I got lost as to who was who.  Yet, in Drinking Gourd Hambly has created a unique protagonist in Benjamin January, conveying the legitimate fears and precarious position of a free black man in the Deep South during slavery.   

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C.V. Rhodes is a member of the Speed City Sisters in Crime chapter and co-author, with L. Barnett Evans, of the Grandmothers, Incorporated cozy mystery series.  Visit their website at www.grandmothersinc.com

Review: Talking Detective Fiction by P.D. James

If you are a a fan of mysteries, whether the classic English manor mysteries written by Agatha Christie and Dorothy Salyers, or the American hard-boiled detectives created by Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler, or the modern works of Michael Connelley and Hank Phillippi Ryan, you owe it to yourself to read Talking About Detective Fiction by P.D. James.

If you do not know, P.D. James is one of those classic English mystery writers. Born in 1920, she did not begin her writing career until she was in her 40s, and only then to support her family after her husband's death. 

In this book, drawn from a series of university lectures she did, she traces the development of the modern detective story from Sherlock Holmes to the 21st Century.  With a simply delightful style, James gives her insight into the history of the genre, her evaluation of some of the leading mystery authors of the past 100 years, and how each contributed (or didn't contribute) to the genre. She details the elements of the classic mysteries and gives her astute observations on the authors that have expanded the genre by bending these classic elements to fit their own style. She concludes with her thoughts on the future of the genre, which she believes will always find a place in popular literature. 

This is an entertaining and enlightening book that is a MUST for any mystery fan.

-- Stephen M. Terrell

Book Review: Trent's Last Case by E.C. Bently

Trent's Last Case by E.C. Bently (1913)
Reviewed by Stephen Terrell

No less an expert on mysteries than classic mystery author Dorothy L. Sayers calls Trent's Last Case the "first modern detective story." She views it as the first book to move away from the infallible deductive detective character (e.g. Sherlock Holmes), to a more human detective capable of making devastatingly erroneous conclusions even after uncovering the facts.

The storytelling is a little out of style. There is little action other than conversations with suspects -- and nearly half the book takes place in extended conversations with the purported participants after Trent has in his own mind solved the crime. But the plot is well crafted and still stands up to time.

Anyone with an interest in classical mysteries should read this book both for its entertainment value and for its place in the history of the genre.