Sumner Island by Michael Cormier

I got a copy of Sumner Island by Michael Cormier as an early reviewer's copy. It's a first novel, and honestly, it wasn't too bad. I thought I was getting a spooky ghost story, but what I got was more like a cross between Somewhere in Time and The Sixth Sense. In fact, I spent the majority of the first part of the novel trying to convince myself it wasn't a retread. Luckily, it picked up towards the end and I got absorbed into the story along the way.

Mitch Lambert is a history professor who, while writing the biography of Maria Boudreau, falls in love with the long-dead heiress. His book increases interest in Maria, and soon people are seeing her ghost walking the island where she was murdered. Mitch believes the man who was accused of her murder was innocent, and is determined to discover the real killer when a psychic comes to the island to have a seance. Along the way, Mitch begins to see things he shouldn't, a sort of time-travel thing, and plays detective. Will he solve the mystery? What do you do when you love someone who has been dead for years?

It wasn't bad, it wasn't mind-blowing. I felt like the ending was a bit of a let down, too neatly tied up I guess. I can't say for sure, but I think I would have enjoyed it more if I had gotten what I was expecting - a haunted house story. Instead I got a supernatural romance thriller, which was a good read, just not what I was looking for. Go into with the right frame of mind and I think you would enjoy it.

Rating: 3 1/2 Purrs

Perfume: The Story of a Murder by Patrick Suskind

I bought this book because I heard about the movie and it sounded very interesting. I ended up reading it very quickly, as it was very, very engrossing. Of course, it is a story about a serial killer, which if you know me makes complete sense as to why I would really enjoy it .

Perfume is about Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, a child born in the filth of 18th-century Paris. He has no scent of his own, but he has an amazing nose and files every scent away in his head. He decides to apprentice to a perfumer so he can learn to capture scent. Specifically, the scents of certain young girls. Funny how those young girls mostly have red hair, are beautiful, and are virgins.

It's a creepy subject, but the character is just as good as Hannibal Lecter, except instead of cannibalism, this guy just wants to keep your smell around, which you know actually seems a wee bit creepier.

The book was beautifully written, with some very vivid imagery. The movie totally did the book justice, and honestly I wasn't sure if it would be able to do so. I liked them both, quite a bit.

Rating: 4 1/2 Purrs

Recent Acquisitions to the Library

My most recent haul from Half-Price Books.

• Severance Package by Duane Swierczynski
  
• The Illustrated Man by Ray Bradbury
  
• Just After Sunset by Stephen King
  
• Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by JK Rowling
  
• Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by JK Rowling
  
• Underworld by Don DeLillo
  
• Clandestine by James Ellroy
  
• The Bedroom Secrets of the Master Chefs: A Novel by Irvine Welsh
  
• Bright Lights, Big City by Jay McInerney
  
• The Mystery of Edwin Drood and Other Stories by Charles Dickens
  
• A Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeleine L'Engle
  
• Transformations by Anne Sexton
  
• Filmmakers Series - Fellini's Films by Burke
  
• The Monster of Florence by Douglas Preston
  
• The Penultimate Truth by Philip K. Dick
  
• Death Is a Lonely Business by Ray Bradbury
  
• Metamorphosis and Other Stories by Franz Kafka
  
• Sweetheart by Chelsea Cain
  
• Next by Michael Crichton
  

Ghostwalk by Rebecca Stott

I picked up Ghostwalk by Rebecca Stott expecting one type of book and finding, on the whole, another. I thought I would be reading a mystery, but instead I found a complex weaving of mystery, history, romance, and thriller all in one package. Ghostwalk was excellent.

Ghostwalk starts off with the death of Elizabeth Vogelsang. Elizabeth died under slightly mysterious circumstances while writing a biography of Isaac Newton. Enter Lydia Brooke, hired by Elizabeth's son Cameron to come in and finish the biography. Lydia and Cameron have a history together, and when Lydia returns to Cambridge, their romance is rekindled, despite the fact that Cameron is married with children. Lydia begins picking through the mostly written biography and in turn ends up getting drawn in to the mystery surrounding two separate series of murders - a group of Cambridge scholars that Elizabeth discovered when researching Isaac Newton's biography and a group of Cambridge-affiliated researchers that have drawn the wrath of a radical animal rights group. Are these two groups of murders actually connected in some way? Lydia begins to think so, and begins to feel haunted by the ghost of (possibly) Newton. While she follows Elizabeth's research, Lydia realizes that Elizabeth might have uncovered a conspiracy that someone might be willing to kill for. Will Lydia be able to finish the book? Who is the ghostly figure that haunts her? How are the two sets of murders tied to Newton, if they are at all, and will Lydia be next?

This book is a great mystery; it successfully intertwines the current and historical time lines so that you feel much like Lydia does. On one side, you have this wandering, flowing narrative, and on the other, you are inundated with historical facts about Newton, Cambridge, alchemy, glass making, and more. It’s difficult to do, and I never felt overwhelmed with either side. You are captured in a dreamlike state, so much so that I longed to travel and walk where she walked, to see what Elizabeth saw, and know Newton to the extent that these main characters did. It literally felt like I was reading a walking dream and those types of books end up way high on my list of best. Mostly because I think reading should take you away, bring you into a place where your imagination can fly, and help you discover new things about the world and yourself, leaving you in a better place than when you started (even if that place is a sad one). Ghostwalk is one of those. I’m sure some will find things that could be improved, but really, it was perfect to me.

Rating: 5 Purrs. I’ll put this one up there with The Virgin Suicides and The Lovely Bones for the way the words worked in my head.

Stiff: The Curious Lives of Cadavers by Mary Roach

I wasn’t so sure I could believe the hype surrounding this book. I wondered how someone can write about what happens to cadavers when you donate them to science, make it funny, sometimes laugh out loud funny, and yet still be totally respectful of the dead. Somehow, Mary Roach is able to be all of that and more.

Stiff was hilarious. Mary Roach is matter of fact from the start, using her unique and funny voice to explain all the different ways your body can be used if you donate it to science. You might think your body would end up in some Gross Anatomy class, and it might, but there are plenty of other ways your cadaver can be used. Think car crash experiments. Think military gear tests, especially bombs and how they affect the body. Think practice sessions for plastic surgeons. Think the body farm, where forensic scientists see how well and how long, and generally how you decay. Before all of that though, she includes a chapter on the history of cadavers and medical science, including body snatchers and their place in this weird sphere.

Stiff seems like it might be just a wry take on what happens to you after you are dead, but really Roach includes an amazing amount of detail in such a small book. It can become a bit heavy, but just when you think you can’t take any more, Roach digresses into some odd fact or makes some kind of comment that makes you laugh. The important thing is, she never “speaks ill of the dead;” in fact, her tone can sometimes be almost reverent. She always makes sure you understand the purpose behind using the cadavers in experiments; she wants you to know what they want to learn, and how cadavers have played an unsung role in more than just medical history.

I really enjoyed this book. In fact, I think it’s probably one of my new favorites. It really is an amazing combination – funny, serious, informative. I'm definitely going to pick up Spook, her book on the afterlife, and Bonk, or everything you always wanted to know about sex.

Rating: 5 Purrs for someone who can write,

“It’s just that there are other ways to spend your time as a cadaver. Get involved with science. Be an art exhibit. Become part of a tree. Some options for you to think about.
Death. It doesn’t have to be boring.”

The Cabinet of Curiosities by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child

I first picked up a Preston and Child book because I really liked the movie Relic and I was curious about the source material. The book was substantially more robust, as you would expect, and different enough that the story was surprising. The Cabinet of Curiosities is the third story by Preston & Child to feature the mysterious Agent Pendergast and have a ton of interesting historical info on museums, natural history, and New York history.

In The Cabinet of Curiosities, construction workers at a new building site uncover a ghastly collection of bodies, all mutilated in the same fashion. Enter Agent Pendergast, the tall, pale agent involved with the earlier Relic and Reliquary novels who seems to be extra rich, full of endless facts, and borderline sexy (maybe that’s just me). Pendergast investigates with the help of Nora Kelly, an archeologist at the New York Museum of Natural History, much to the chagrin of her bosses and the building’s developer, who has the mayor pretty much in his pocket. Things heat up when the city is plagued by new killings that mimic the bodies found at the construction site, and Kelly’s boyfriend, William Smithback Jr., Times reporter, starts throwing out clues in the press. Is the serial killer just mimicking the19th century scientist who was looking for the secret to immortality or is the killer that same scientist become immortal.

I really liked the story here.  Why I like most about Preston’s & Child’s books (at least those that I have read) is the crazy amount of detail that is included about whatever the main storyline is – Relic and the whole DNA sequencing bit, this one with urban archeology.  The incredible detail about the museum and the mechanics of how it works is so interesting to my Art History, museum studies brain. Plus, I find the tall, pale, spooky Pendergast sexy in a weird sort of way. It’s probably the oversized brain he seems to have and his interest in the weird and spooky cases. It’s probably a hold over from my Spooky Mulder crush days. (Okay, so I still have a Spooky Mulder crush. I’ll admit it.) The story seems long at points but the tightly woven climax is page-turning.

What I didn’t like – Nora Kelly actually falling for the slime bag Smithback. I didn’t find much of value in his character but hey, maybe it’s my Pendergast crush talking.

Overall, if you like Michael Crichton books and his ability to turn future science into interesting stories, but like a little horror/sci-fi thrown in, you might check these guys out.

Rating: 4 Purrs, and not just because of Agent Pendergast

The Executioner Always Chops Twice: Ghastly Blunders on the Scaffold by Geoffrey Abbott

I picked this book up from my paperback book club and I think this might be the very first time I was disappointed. The Executioner Always Chops Twice seemed like it might be a quirky list of mishaps and goofs, but instead it was a pretty dry collection of whoopsies and gore.

Geoffrey Abbott knows his stuff  - he is a former Yeoman Warder at the Tower of London. The problem is he reports in such a way that it becomes almost tedious to finish them all. There’s a ton of stories in here (I think 80 to 90, somewhere in there), some illustrations to help with the imagination, and plenty of gore to aid in the nastiness. Not only are there amusing last words and whoops I missed your necks accidents, there are pretty detailed accounts of how executions are performed.  I think the real problem wasn’t a lack of interesting stories or last words, I think it’s that after 50 or so, it just gets to be a challenge to get through them all.

On an interesting side note, I had an up close look at a botched hanging last month when we stayed the night in a historic, haunted hotel in Clayton, New Mexico. The Eklund has photos of the whoopsie hanging of Black Jack Ketchum – you can see him caught, noose around his neck, on the platform, and beheaded because the noose was tied in one of the ways Mr. Abbott describes. It was a bit gruesome to see photos, but hey, I had to look.

I don’t know that I would recommend The Executioner Always Chops Twice to anyone looking for a laugh, but it can be darkly comedic for a while. It’s just that after about 30 examples, you get immune and it gets a bit depressing and then a bit boring.

Rating: 3 Purrs for lots of historical and background information but some hisses for needing some comic relief – off with its head with a flamingo croquet mallet

Capote in Kansas by Ande Parks, Chris Samnee

I picked up Capote in Kansas at APE (Alternative Press Expo) in San Francisco last year, mostly because I judged a book by its cover and because I really enjoyed In Cold Blood. I thought it was an extremely well written and engrossing true crime story. Plus, who doesn’t like that crazy Truman Capote? I was really pleased with what I ended up with.

Ande Parks infuses a lot of truth in his fictionalized tale, Capote in Kansas. Here he tells the story of how Truman Capote came to write In Cold Blood, the struggles he had fitting in with the local folks in Kansas, the emotional struggle he had trying to get a grasp on the tale, and how writing that book changed him. It’s a high-level view of course, but hey, it IS a graphic novel. I mean, I don’t expect a whole ton of depth here. There is even the ghost of Nancy Cutter, who helps Capote get that sense of humanity to infuse into his story and shows him the heart, so to speak.

Samnee’s bleak, angled black & white drawings do a nice job showcasing the town, the time period, the emotional struggle of Capote, even the confusion and despair in the atmosphere of the town.  It does get a bit difficult to keep track of who is who though.

I would never say Capote in Kansas would be a replacement for reading In Cold Blood, or even a deeper look into Capote and the desires that drove him to write his masterpiece, but if Capote or the Clutter family murders interest you, you’d probably find this graphic novel of interest.

Rating: 3 ½ Purrs for a nicely meshed piece of art and story that is able to include a “ghost girl” without seeming trite

World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks

I waited anxiously for World War Z to be released in paperback for ages (I rarely buy hardback books, just too heavy to carry around with me), and when it finally was released I snatched it up so fast I might have knocked over some nuns on my way to the counter. After reading it, I would have bought it in hardback it was so good.

In World War Z, Max Brooks creates much more than just a zombie story. He takes that step that most zombie films have tried to do since Night of the Living Dead. He uses zombies to address the real possibilities of a global epidemic and how the world might be after the war is finished and peace is reached. It’s amazing. Brooks tells the story of the Zombie War, a true World War that affects every corner of the earth, from small province to large city using a series of first-person accounts and interviews. It creates such a feeling of history and truth that it’s almost spine chilling. The story covers tales from military folks, smugglers, doctors, teenagers and children, political officials, and regular Joes, all who in their own way dealt with the 200 million plus zombie horde. The ones that stick out to me, even now after weeks of reading it, are the stories from the young woman whose family fled to Canada to ride out the zombie horde, the military team with the trained dogs, and the military personnel who recount the stories of PTSD and the Battle of Yonkers.

I’m definitely going to pick up Max Brooks’ other book, The Zombie Survival Guide, just to see if it is just as good. I really can’t recommend this book enough. It’s scary as a horror novel, but it’s even scarier as a contemporary history or story of one of our possible futures. It feels impossibly real but never loses its entertainment value.

Rating: 5 Purrs for zombies with a purpose. Buy this now.

The Terror by Dan Simmons

I read several of The Hyperion series by Dan Simmons starting way back in high school. He is still one of the few sci-fi writers I can truly enjoy, so when I saw he wrote a horror novel I was really surprised. In fact, I went back and made sure it was the same Dan Simmons. I was even more surprised to see it on several top 10 lists, including Stephen King’s list in Entertainment Weekly. I had let this book sit on my bookshelf for a while, intimidated by its size and subject matter. I am very glad I finally picked it up and listened to the folks who thought so highly of it.

In The Terror, Dan Simmons creates a fictionalized story of the doomed Franklin Expedition. In 1845, two ships, the Erebus and the Terror, left England on a quest to find the Northwest Passage to the Pacific. They never returned. Rescue missions were sent, and few answers or traces were ever found. Dan Simmons takes what history knows and builds a deeply engrossing adventure, horror, and fantasy novel. In Dan Simmons version, the men of the Erebus and the Terror are frozen in the Arctic for the third (or second, I can’t remember to be honest) winter. Franklin is dead, and the two ships are dealing with not just frozen temperatures, rancid food, low rations of rum, and the general crew issues that come up in those kind of conditions, but also a weird tongue-less Eskimo woman and a strange beast that may be a polar bear or it may be something else. The “thing on the ice” is stalking the crew, and for the longest time I didn’t know if it was a polar bear, a figment of their imagination, or something like my old friend The Shrike from the Hyperion novels. It’s a definite pull into the narrative – is it real or is it symbolic for the evil within? (well, yes, but it’s also a rip-tastic slashie beastie.)

What stands out most to me about this book was the attention to detail. After reading it, I went to Wikipedia to find out more about the Franklin Expedition and I was surprised at how much truth there was in this fiction. Franklin of The Terror and Franklin of the real world were the epitome of that “British spirit of exploration,” a man who brings along fine china to the Arctic and yet refuses to adopt native customs that might help his crew live.

I really don’t know what compelled me more, the true story of the Franklin Expedition or the story that Dan Simmons tells and the idea that some of it might be true. The “thing on the ice” became secondary to me when faced with the bare facts of a crew of men faces the odds this crew faced: starvation, freezing temperatures, cannibalism, murder, psychosis, scurvy, the list goes on. Wow. This is one of those rare books that is more than just a horror story. Strip out the gore & beastie and you still have a novel fraught with horror .  Don’t let the thickness of the book scare you away. It’s an excellent read, just make sure you are ready to stomach some big icky areas.

Rating: 5 Purrs for a book well-worth the time and effort it took to read it. I love to find a book that scared me, disturbed me, and taught me something all in one story.

 

The Murders of Richard III by Elizabeth Peters

I read The Murders of Richard III ages ago, maybe junior high if I remember correctly. I forgot the name, and then stumbled upon this awesome group on Live Journal called “what’s that book.” I posted a summary of what I could remember and BAM – I had the name of this book in maybe a day. I had better memories of the book than the actual book, but overall it was a light, frothy mystery read.

In The Murders of Richard III, Thomas invites fellow academic Jacqueline Kirby to a gathering of friends who believe Richard III was innocent of the murders he is accused of committing. The group is gathering for their historical reenactment and to celebrate the finding of a new letter that supposedly will exonerate Richard. The problem is, someone is pulling pranks, putting the members of the group in the positions and situations like the real murders. Who will be next? Are they safe or will someone really get hurt? Jacqueline and Thomas race to find out who is behind the pranks, all while Elizabeth Peters includes plenty of historical references to keep the history buffs intrigued.

I remember this book being much deeper and involved, but then again, it has been awhile since I read it the first time. The characters are a bit stereotypical, but the historical information and the parlor mystery aspect made this one a fun read. If you go into it not expected a heavily plotted mystery, you won’t be disappointed. Just go into it with proper expectations.

Rating: 3 ½ stars for a trip down memory lane

Thunderstruck by Erik Larson

I loved Erik Larson’s book, The Devil in the White City. I thought it was an extremely well-written, engrossing non-fiction account of building the Chicago World’s Fair and the reign of the serial killer, Dr. H.H. Holmes. When I heard that Larson had another book out, I knew I had to give it a try just to see how it fared.

This time around in Thunderstruck, Larson tells the parallel stories of Guglielmo Marconi, the inventor of wireless telegraphy, and Hawley Crippen, murderer. Marconi’s struggle to succeed in creating wireless telegraphy is intriguing, but also a little hard to warm up to because of the subject himself. Marconi was not a humble man, and kudos to Larson for not glossing over that fact. The parallel story of Crippen is also interesting in its own. It is an excellent picture of an ordinary, mild-mannered man driven to a rather heinous murder to be free and happy with the woman he loves. His story, to me, was the more interesting one, but then again, it could be because murder interests me more than scientific invention.

Larson’s attempt this time didn’t really grab me the way his other book did. I think it could be a number of things: Marconi was not a likable character, and neither were the other men who were competing with him to succeed with inventing successful wireless telegraphy. (I will say the intrigue that comes up with the German government was an interesting tidbit though.) Hawley Crippen was a mild man, beaten down by an irresponsible, slovenly, and careless wife. It was hard to have any respect for him either. In fact, his life sounded down-right horrible. The book really takes off once you get to the part when Crippen’s wife turns up missing and the police investigation begins. Then you can clearly see why Larson decided to integrate these two stories into one book. Marconi’s tenacious quest to create wireless telegraphy enabled the police’s hunt of Crippen and his mistress to cross the ocean, and kept journalists and readers appraised much like we are now while watching O.J. drive around in his white SUV.

Overall it was a decent book, but not quite up to the excellent The Devil in the White City.

Rating: 3 ½ Purrs for what this book could have been

The Interpretation of Murder by Jed Rubenfeld

I am a huge murder mystery buff. I love mysteries, highbrow mysteries by Grand Dames like Agatha Christie or Anne Perry, silly serial mysteries like The Jane Austen series by Stephanie Barron, or even, sometimes, begrudgingly the whole time, mystery thrillers like James Patterson or Dean Koontz. The Interpretation of Murder by Jed Rubenfeld belongs in the first category. While I am sure he would rather not be called a “Grand Dame,” Rubenfled’s book is not just a mystery; it is literature.

Rubenfeld bases his book on Sigmund Freud’s first and only visit to America in 1909 and his comment that Americans were “savages." Despite his success while in America, he always talked of his visit as being an unhappy or traumatic one. From this kernel of an idea, Rubenfeld builds the story of a murder and the attempted murder of two socialites. While on their tour of New York, Freud and his apprentice Jung are called in to help diagnose why the young girl who escaped (but heavily beaten while being tied up in a very S&M fashion) is suddenly unable to talk. Our main character, Stratham Younger, is a disciple of Freud and is called in to help diagnose Nora, the fortunate (or unfortunate as her parents believe) girl. The police want to know what happened, and when Nora recovers her voice, Younger must put it all together to help catch the man who attacked Nora. He becomes his own detective, digging deeply into the high society relationships of Nora and her family to discover a twisted tale of sexual perversion, family relationships, and of course, blue-blooded intrigue.

While there are several subplots that do distract a bit from the meat of the story, I found them to be interesting and unexpected commentary on the New York or New England area of the US in the early 1900’s. The young society doctor is earnest enough and troubled when he feels his affection for Nora could get in the way of his treatment of her. Nora is a deeply convoluted and troubled girl who is wrapped up so much in her own lies it gets difficult to understand her motives after awhile, but when you see what is really going on in the story, you can understand why she is so confused and confusing. It is heavily mired in the interpretation of sex and sexual relationships of Freud, all of which seem very masculine to me. Of course, I have never studied that much psychology to really get into Freud, so maybe that is just my interpretation.

Overall, The Interpretation of Murder is a good first outing. It’s much better than some first novels I have read, and the mystery keeps you guessing quite a bit until the end. There are sufficient red herrings and twists and turns to keep you turning pages, and when you are finished with the book, you do feel like you picked up a bit of the flavor of what life might have been like in New York then. I have read better, but not often enough for me to lower this one to the second rung of the mystery ladder.

Rating: 4 Purrs for an engrossing and complex mystery with a bit of unexpected but a little disturbing kink.

Marie Antoinette

I love Sophia Coppola's previous work. The Virgin Suicides was just beautiful and a near perfect interpretation of the lyrical novel. Lost in Translation was a vision of a story , making the viewer a part of a newly formed friendship in a strange place. Her visuals made Japan a postcard that I wanted to visit, even though I felt the alienation of the main characters. Marie Antoinette was a visual feast much like Sophia Coppola's other movies, but while I loved the movie, I didn’t get the charm and the haunting, staying power of her other films.

Coppola used Antonia Fraser’s biography of the fated queen, which I hread after seeing the film, but from what I understand it is a much more generous interpretation of Marie’s life than some might give. The story is well told, but focuses mostly on the young queen’s life and her early years at court before her first children were born. You feel the alienation and the confusion the young Dauphine feels when she first enters Versailles, and you fear the intricate court politics that she must maneuver to survive. You feel sorry for this girl who is married off for the good of her people and is under pressure from all around her to fulfill her conjugal duties when the Dauphin is indifferent and every move she makes is gossiped about and scrutinized. When you get to the later years of her life, Coppola moves quickly to the end, but you also see the point Fraser and in turn, Coppola is trying to make: Marie Antoinette was maligned by the public at large, and while her excesses were problematic, she also was only a small piece of the puzzle. While most would lay the blame for the revolution at her feet, you see here the more human side of the woman with ships in her hair.

The movie is a like a big piece of intricately frosted cake, and of course you get the heavy 80’s influence you tasted in the trailer. The costuming is beautiful, with no detail left undone. The colors of the costumes are bright pinks, blues, greens, and yellows that could be more frou-frou versions of the neon teens would wear in the height of the big hair era. Even the food follows this color scheme. I thought this fit rather well with Coppola's comparison of the court at Versailles and the opulence that was the Reagan years. The only thing that didn’t fit was some of the music. Coppalla used a mix of traditional and retro tunes that sometimes worked and sometimes didn’t. The music fit really well during some of the shopping and ball scenes but the one point I really felt didn’t work was the song used when Marie and her entourage return from a masked ball in Paris. It kicked you right out of the moment. Not only was the song jarring, but it was a bad song.

There are many reasons you should see this film, but I can’t recommend it to everyone. Sophia Coppola has so much talent you can’t help but feel she is genetically encoded with good film-making genes. This would be a near perfect movie if it weren’t for the poor use of music in some places. It was beautiful, the actors were good in their roles, and the supporting cast was outstanding. However, if you are looking for a perfect interpretation of history with the soundtrack to match, you won’t find it here. Instead you will find a bright, independent, and inventive telling of a widely misunderstood person in history. This version of Marie Antoinette has guts and feelings, she’s no cardboard cutout or dry, unidentifiable woman who recklessly and uncaringly sends her country into revolution. I don’t know if it’s true, but I like it.

Rating: 4 ½ stars for such a beautiful feast for the eyes