Walking Shadows

Walking Shadows: A Decker / Lazarus Novel by Faye Kellerman, 384 pages.
This was my first Faye Kellerman book in quite a while and I was a little disappointed. I don't think that the police can just casually access your tax records and I think that not paying any rent or utilities when you have a decent full-time job might explain always having enough money for nice restaurants.
Also, I was reading this while listening to a Louise Penny novel, so the crossed wires might have had a negative effect on my opinion of this book. Decker has retired from the LAPD and is living and working in Greenbury New York. While responding to a vandalism complaint Decker discovers a body and his investigation leads him to another more brutal murder in the neighboring town of Hamilton. These two murders are apparently linked and there also seems to be a connection to a pair of murders in Hamilton that occurred twenty years ago. Police corruption, family secrets, and betrayals are all threaded together in this police procedural.

All the Answers: A Graphic Memoir

All the Answers: A Graphic Memoir by Michael Kupperman, 218 pages.
Michael Kupperman knew that his father had been famous, but his father never wanted to talk about it. Father Joel taught philosophy at the University of Connecticut and had built their family home off in the woods. Michael grew up feeling isolated and alone. In the years before his father's death, as dementia began to set in, Michael tries to talk to his father and find out what it was about his childhood and teen years, time he had spent as one of the most famous kids in America, that had affected him so strongly. Michael finds that his father has blocked out large portions of his time as a radio and TV star on "Quiz Kids." Joel would grow uncomfortable when TV or radio were even mentioned and would leave the room if anyone brought up the show he was on or his famous past. The art is spare but very effective, and moves the story along well.

The Death of Mrs. Westaway

The Death of Mrs. Westaway by Ruth Ware, 368 pages.
Harriet Westaway, known as Hal, finds out that she may have some previously unkown-to-her family on her mother's side at about the same time she finds out that the consequences of borrowing money from a local loan shark and not paying back the interest can be serious. While Hal doubts that she is in anyway the granddaughter that the late Mrs. Westaway's estate is searching for, she is intrigued by the possible lifeline that the idea of inheritance offers. Hal decides that she is willing to go and meet her possible relatives and to keep her answers vague enough until she can see if there is an inheritance sufficient to keep her bones unbroken.
An intriguing book with plenty of twists and turns. The downloadable audio is brilliantly read by Imogen Church.

The Mars Room

The Mars Room by Rachel Kushner, 338 pages.
Kushner was a finalist for the National Book Award in 2013 for The Flamethrowers. Her newest book is quite different but does a great job of showing her range and in maybe showing that she is very good at whatever she sets out to do. From the very first page Romy Hall is going to tell the reader and her fellow inmates only so much. If you want to know her story or anyone's story here at Stanville Women's Correctional Facility then you have to be patient. Romy tells her story slowly, going back and forth between the now of prison life, and her time before prison, her life growing up in San Francisco and then the events that led to her incarceration. Romy and her fellow prisoners have all suffered abuse to varying degrees, but they are not claiming victimhood. Romy killed her stalker. Button was only fourteen when she and two companions killed a man during an attempted robbery. Conan and Teardrop, Betty and Doc, and many other characters have their interesting stories told. All in all it is a very good book with some odd little flaws. Rights are "waved" instead of "waived." The unabomber manifesto confused me, too.

Sky in the Deep

Sky in the Deep by Adrienne Young, 340 pages.

When Eelyn discovers that her brother, Iri, might still be alive, it changes her life. She and the rest of her Riki clan are locked in ritualized, but deadly battle with the neighboring Aska, their sworn enemy, the killers of their friends and family. Eelyn's journey from warrior to prisoner, her battle's with the rules of her clan, and the conflict she feels between clan loyalty and the love she feels for Fiske, a member of the enemy clan all have some familiar
Young tells an interesting tale about family and betrayal, and she has created a believable world. Ably narrated by Khristine Hvam.

No One Is Coming to Save Us

No One Is Coming to Save Us by Stephanie Powell Watts, 371 pages.
In looking over the reviews now, I realize that when I listened to this book, a couple of months ago, I completely missed the Great Gatsby connection. I like being able to prove, over and over again, that I'm not really a careful or close reader.

Pinewood, North Carolina is the setting for this tale of an extended family. All the good jobs have moved overseas and the people who have stuck around have all seen a measure of hard times.When JJ returns to the area, ostensibly a wealthy man now, after a childhood of poverty, old feelings and emotions are brought to the surface.
This was the One Book, One Kirkwood read for 2018, and I listened to the book in anticipation of going to see the author back in May. I wasn't able to make it to the event, but I am still glad that I read this excellent book.

The Bible of Dirty Jokes

The Bible of Dirty Jokes by Eileen Pollack, 307 pages.

As we meet Ketzel Weinrach she is a recent initiate to widowhood. She grew up imitating the comedians who performed at her parent's Borscht Belt resort. She could do dead-on imitations of Henny Youngman, Zero Mostel, and all the greats of the 1950s and 60s. As an adult, when she decided to take to the stage these imitations didn't take her very far. Comedy was shifting and Ketzel was being left behind, but then Ketzel met Morty and things were good for a while.
Ketzel has always been a little bit our of sync with the world around her. Her parents and her brothers were always playing a little bit loose with the rules. Grampa was allegedly in the mob's pocket, Leo, the family retainer, had a bit of a gambling problem and maybe left a few bodies at the bottom of a local lake. Brother Ira died during the Six-Day-War, brother Howie became a religious zealot after a stint in prison, and brother Mike died in a helicopter crash after he quit working for the family business and went to work for Donald Trump.
Ketzel has been drawn back into her parents' world now that her last surviving brother, Potzie, has disappeared. As she attempts to track down Potzie and their slimey cousin Perry, Ketzel keeps uncovering family secrets. A good solid mystery.

Valdez is Coming

Valdez is Coming by Elmore Leonard, 232 pages.

Bob Valdez worked as the shotgun rider on a Hatch and Hodges stagecoach. He also worked as the town constable in Lanoria, Arizona. He was an accommodating man, willing to go along, to get along. But, after Valdez was tortured and almost killed by the gunmen employed by a local cattle rancher, as he was seeking justice for a widowed mother, he reverts to the man he was when he served as a scout for the during the war against the Apaches.
Leonard did violence very well. No one is taking anything lightly, but people continually mistake the everyday for the extraordinary. Maybe the first book I have read because it was mentioned in the review of a novel, two characters in the forthcoming George Pelecanos novel discuss this book.

The World As It Is: A Memoir of the Obama White House

The World As It Is: A Memoir of the Obama White House by Ben Rhodes, 450 pages.

Rhodes has written a wonderful account of the Obama administration and the world he knew during that time. Before volunteering for the Obama campaign, Rhodes had worked for former Democratic Congressman from Indiana, Lee Hamilton, and had been part of the 2006 Iraq Study Group.
Near the end of the book, Rhodes, who had been kept out of meetings on Russian interference during the election, reflects on his last days in the White House when he was let in on what was being uncovered, "I'd run into different staffers who worked on Russia in the government, and they always had the same message: It's even worse than you think. Always the suggestion was that there was more to the story. Trump, one told me, is exactly the kind of person that the Russians liked to invest in for years."

Addendum: Barack Obama, on the eve of traveling to Africa gave us his Africa-focused reading list, and among titles by Nelson Mandela, Chinua Achebe, Ngugi wa Thiong'o and Chimamada Ngozi Adichie, he talked about this book by Ben Rhodes, saying, "Ben does not have African blood running through his veins. But few others so closely see the world through my eyes like he can. Ben’s one of the few who’ve been with me since that first presidential campaign. His memoir is one of the smartest reflections I’ve seen as to how we approached foreign policy, and one of the most compelling stories I’ve seen about what it’s actually like to serve the American people."

The Soul of America: The Battle for Our Better Angels

The Soul of America: The Battle for Our Better Angels by Jon Meacham, 402 pages. Narrated by Fred Sanders.

Meacham shows how American history has been hijacked by partisan, racist, hateful asshole-ness before and how it has recovered before, giving us a measure of hope for the future. Chapters on Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and Franklin Roosevelt show their flaws, their racist views, and their shortcomings, but they also show how these presidents tried to change things; how they grew, at least a little bit.
A nice overview of some parts of American history.
Sanders does a very good job on the narration.

A Manual for Cleaning Women: Selected Stories

A Manual for Cleaning Women: Selected Stories by Lucia Berlin, edited by Stephen Emerson, 403 pages. Audio is read by multiple narrators.

Christa and another coworker, Kathleen, maybe, had spoken well of this book back when it came out, in 2015. It took me a while to read it, or rather to listen to it and read it, but I am so glad I did.

The writing is beautiful and the arc of the book is amazing. The characters are so present, so clear; they're sad, or at least in pitiable circumstances, but they are not asking for pity. All of the characters are ware of what a mess their lives are, aware of they got there, and they are often at least thinking about changing their behavior. Her protagonists are working women, nurses, house-cleaners. There's no romanticizing the work, and no romanticizing the attendant problems with spouses, parents, siblings, and alcohol.
Really an amazing book.
It took me far too long to realize that these were the same characters (parallel characters? Is Charlotte, Carlotta also Lucille?)  appearing again and again.

I almost never read forewords or introductions to works of fiction (unless we're going to discuss the book), but since I listened to the first half of this book, I kind of had to. It was only because of Lydia Davis's foreword that I was aware of the parallels between the stories and the author's life; Davis quoting the author, "I exaggerate a lot and I get fiction and reality mixed up, but I don't actually ever lie."
Very glad I read this.

Echo: The Complete Edition

Echo: The Complete Edition, by Terry Moore, 590 pages.

 Julie is going to be divorced soon and wanders out into the wilderness around Moon Lake to get some peace and take some photos. It turns out that she is in the wrong place at the wrong time as a disagreement between Foster, the evil head of a nanotechnology / weapons research group,  and Annie, the non-evil inventor of the tech, leads to a nuclear explosion. Julie is transformed by the event, as is a nearby crazed drifter. Annie's boyfriend, Dillon, eventually joins forces with Julie, maybe-not-quite-dead Annie, and Ivy, a freelance operative, to try and stop Foster from misusing the new tech and ending the world. It's a relatively long and complicated graphic novel, but the story is well told and the art supports the story. A good read.

Babylon Berlin

Babylon Berlin by Arne Jysch and Volker Kutscher, 216 pages.

Gereon Rath had to leave the Cologne police after shooting the wrong man in the line of duty. He had to do it, but he was still forced out. Now he's in Berlin, working in Vice, trying to get transferred to Homicide. When a body is found in a car pulled from the river, Rath works with a Homicide clerk Charlotte Ritter on identifying the victim and figuring out the crime (Nazis, it was Nazis). Based on the books (by Kutscher) that inspired the German television series of the same name, the graphic novels are well-executed with some details different from the show.

The Clarence Principle

The Clarence Principle by Fahed Said and Shari Chankhamma, 224 pages

A graphic novel with beautiful art that explores a young man's suicide. I picked up this book at the library when I realized that I had come to the Library for a children's activity without a book to read and without my earbuds. I was upset at first and then realized that since it was a library, I could easily find something else to read. I went to the graphic lit section and found a couple of books, including this one. I thought that he art by Shari Chankhamma was extraordinary and very moving. I found the story that went along with the art a little muddled and sort of self-indulgent, but not bad. Clarence kills himself, apparently over a love affair gone wrong (not sure if Elissa left him, disappointed him or killed herself), and then enters an odd sort of afterlife.

Warlight

Warlight by Michael Ondaatje, 289 pages. Audio read by the author.

Set in post WWII England, this is Nathaniel's story. A semi-abandoned boy grows up to be a lonely man who is obsessed with finding out what his mother, and, to a lesser extent, his father were doing during the war that caused them to go. Nathaniel, nicknamed Stitch by his mother, and his sister, Rachel, or Wren, are left in the care of their parents' associate, Walter, a man they call the Moth.
After being left largely to their own devices for a year or so, Nathaniel tries to find out what had really happened to him, who the strange people around him were, and what his parents have been up to. A fascinating book, ably narrated by the author.

Destroyer

Destroyer by Victor LaValle, 160 pages.

LaValle's retelling of the Frankenstein story involves a scientist who is not so much mad as justifiably angry.
While working on a way to use nanotechnology to extend life towards immortality, her son was (maybe this is a spoiler, but I don't really think so. Stop reading here just in case and assume this was the best review you ever read. Then go read the book and be amazed at LaValle's work and at my reviewing skills) killed by the police. She is hunted by her former employers and by a monster from the past. While I found it a little loose in the beginning (why did Agent Byron and his partner immediately open fire on Baker when they were clearly tasked with bringing her in? is this a commentary on law enforcement and black citizens? wait, maybe it is. I am just realizing this as I am typing it and realizing once again what a slow reader I actually am). Never mind that last complaint. This is a very good graphic novel.

The Death of Stalin

The Death of Stalin by Fabien Nury and Thierry Robin, 119 pages.
Graphic Lit account of the days surrounding the death of the Soviet dictator in February of 1953. The book is based on actual events but focuses on the imagined words and actions of the Central Committee members Lavrentiy Beria, Nikita Krushchev, Antastas Mikoyan, Lazar Kanovich, Nikolai Bulganin, Georgy Malenkov, and Vyasseslav Molotov. The action is centered around the jockeying of Beria, head of the NKVD and a rapist and murderer on a evilly epic scale, and Krushchev to consolidate power. Marshall Zhukov, head of the Soviet army, is the key in the end. The graphic novel was the basis for the recently released movie of the same name. Kind of liked the movie better, but this was very interesting. Evokes nostalgia for a time when brutal, murderous thugs were considered our foes, instead of people whom we pathetically fawned over.

Righteous: An IQ Novel

Righteous: An IQ Novel by Joe Ide, 326 pages.
IQ, the 2016 novel by Ide that introduced Quintabe, the Sherlockian detective was a crisp, quick moving book. Righteous is a little bit more muddled. Isaiah teams up with his long-time neighbor and sometime friend and partner, Dodson. The book seems to be redefining their relationship, pointing towards a more structured working relationship in future novels (just a guess). Isaiah seeks to help out the woman he loved when he was a child. Sarita was dating Isaiah's brother before he was killed, and Isaiah has long been smitten with her. When she comes to him seeking help with her wayward sister, Isaiah is happy to have a chance to help. An interesting book.

Down the River unto the Sea

Down the River unto the Sea by Walter Mosley, 322 pages.

Joe King Oliver was railroaded by his fellow police officers years ago. After a harrowing three-month stint in Rikers Island he was able to escape prison with the help of officers he believes are still loyal to him, but his marriage and his career were in ruins. King has been working as a private detective for years now and he has rebuilt a relationship with his daughter.
When King receives a letter from the woman who had been the key part of his downfall asking his forgiveness and expressing a willingness to testify on his behalf, he starts down a path that may lead to his ruin or to his redemption. King lives in a strange world peopled by violent characters with odd, symbolic names and strange, haunted spaces.

Far from the Tree

Far from the Tree by Robin Benway, 374 pages.

Grace has grown up knowing that she had been adopted. Her parents have always told her that they will help her find her biological family when she was ready. Grace discovers she is pregnant and when she tells her boyfriend, his parents decide that he has to break up with her.. With her life spiraling a bit, Grace decides that it's time to seek out her family. When she finds her younger sister Maya, and her older brother Joaquin, she also finds that they have their own problems and questions. They get on relatively well together and they do their best to look out for each other as they try to unravel their shared past. It's a beautifully written book that brings tears to your eyes. Great characters too. Ably narrated by Julia Whelan.