Tim Dorsey - Tropic Of Stupid

 

Rating: 5/5

 

Review: 

Another Serge cracker

This is another terrific read from Tim Dorsey. We know what to expect by now: Serge is manic, obsessive, murderous, very funny and strangely lovable – at least partially because his inventively homicidal attacks are all aimed at vicious, exploitative scumbags. He is also an inexhaustible and delighted fund of arcane Florida facts and history, which I find genuinely fascinating, especially when presented so wittily.

As if it matters, this time Serge has become obsessed with his own ancestry. His researches intersect with a police investigation into a serial killer with predictable mayhem. Coleman is on very good, drugged-up form and Tim Dorsey’s research and character insights are as remarkable as ever.

In a long series like this some books aren’t going to be quite up to peak standard, but I thought this one very definitely was. It’s a cracking, exciting and hugely entertaining read which I can recommend very warmly indeed.

(My thanks to Farrago for an ARC via NetGalley.)

Jane Harper - The Survivors

 

Rating: 4/5

 

Review:

Good, but not Harper's best 

The Survivors is good, but not quite in the same league as The Last Man, which I thought was quite outstanding.

This time, Jane Harper takes us to the other end of the continent – to the shores of Tasmania – but in many ways the structure is similar to The Last Man; a small community is disrupted by a death and the resulting upheaval and investigation brings some old feuds, tragedies and secrets to the surface. The protagonist, Kieran, is damaged by guilt and grief over an incident twelve years ago for which he blames himself and both this and another tragedy at the time become involved in the current investigation.

Harper is a very fine writer and she does much of this very well. The central section was excellent and had me completely hooked. Her character analysis is very good – I especially liked the heartbroken mother who retreats into a rigid placidity and self-help phrases. However, I thought that the opening was something of a slog and the denouement a little pat and sudden. The ending particularly seemed to have some of the contrivance which is common in mysteries and I think Jane Harper is better than that. Her sense of place is again well done, but not as brilliantly evocative as the killing conditions in The Last Man.

This is certainly a rewarding read. It’s not Harper’s best but still very recommendable.

(My thanks to Little, Brown for an ARC via NetGalley.)

Carl Hiaasen - Bad Monkey

 

Rating: 4/5

 

Review:

Classic Hiaasen 

Bad Monkey hardly needs yet another review, but it’s worth saying that it’s pretty classic Hiaasen. It is amusing, well written, involving and has all the elements we have come to expect: a somewhat flawed but likeable protagonist, scumbags defrauding the vulnerable and defacing and destroying Florida’s natural beauty and wildlife, and an exciting plot in which they eventually get their come-uppance.

This one is perhaps just a little over-long but I still enjoyed it a lot. Ideal cheering and escapist reading for time like these.

Joe Ide - Smoke

 

Rating: 5/5

 

Review:

Terrific stuff from Joe Ide

 

Joe Ide is back on top form in Smoke. I thought Hi Five showed a slight dip in quality but this has all of Ide’s wit, thoughtfulness and insight wrapped in a very good story. It would work as a stand-alone novel, but it would be far better to read the series from the beginning as there is a lot of history which continues to develop here.

Traumatised by the events of Hi Five, Isaiah is heading for the hills, determined to leave his old life behind and get away from the violence and criminality of East Long Beach – and to escape the various murderous gangs and individuals who are seeking him for revenge. Needless to say, he very reluctantly becomes involved in a scary (and very exciting) hunt for two deranged killers. Meanwhile, back in East Long Beach an unemployed Dodson is given an ultimatum by his wife and embarks on an internship in a swanky advertising agency while also acting as neighbourhood fixer in Isaiah’s absence. This leads to some genuinely hilarious stuff (the scenes where he is being tutored in manners by his mother-in-law made me laugh out loud several times) and also some genuinely thoughtful and incisive content.

These two independent stories work very well alongside each other. For me it is Dodson who is the real centre of this book as his character becomes much more developed and unlooked-for skills and inner decency emerge. Joe Ide brilliantly balances some excellent comedy with psychological insight, a thrilling story and some horrifying violence, which is somehow the more chilling for being inexplicit. His ear for language remains excellent and his characters become richer and more convincing with each book in the series.

In short, I thought Smoke was terrific and I can recommend it very warmly.

(My thanks to Orion for an ARC via NetGalley.)

Christopher Fowler - White Corridor

 

Rating: 4/5

 

Review:

Good, but not Fowler's best 

 

I enjoyed White Corridor, but I didn’t think it was one of Christopher Fowler’s best.

This time, John and Arthur end up stranded in a snowstorm on the way to Devon with a van full of arcane objects and theatrical props (of course they do – Arthur is involved) while the Unit is again under threat from Whitehall who have unleashed a Royal Visit on them at a very difficult time. Two deaths have to be solved simultaneously, one in the snowbound road and one in the Unit itself.

As always, Fowler writes with wit, insight and an excellent sense of his characters. It’s a very good, well told and well paced mystery. However, Arthur and John when out of London are never quite as satisfying; Arthur’s inexhaustible fund of arcane London knowledge is a source of immense pleasure to me, but in a snowbound location in the country it doesn’t have much of a chance to shine. This is still a very good read and a cut above a lot of crime fiction, but isn’t one of my favourites in the series.

Alan Bradley - A Red Herring Without Mustard

 

Rating: 4/5

Review:

Thoroughly enjoyable

This is another thoroughly enjoyable mystery narrated by 11-year-old Flavia de Luce, and set in the early 1950s. This time the plot involves a mysterious fortune-teller, an obscure religious sect, dodgy goings-on in the antique business and, of course, Flavia’s discovery of a body and her determination to solve the crime.

The story is ingenious and rather involving, but the real pleasure here is, as always, Alan Bradley’s development of his characters, the well-drawn time and place and Flavia’s delightful narrative voice. It is funny and engaging, the redoubtable Inspector Hewitt and other characters make welcome appearances and the whole thing was a fine, relaxing read. Ideal comfort reading for troubled times and a pleasure any time, I can recommend this warmly.

Francis Spufford - Light Perpetual

 

Rating: 4/5

 

Review: Flawed but rewarding 

 

In the end I enjoyed Light Perpetual a lot, but I did have my reservations – especially about the beginning. The narrative consists of snapshots of the lives which five children might have lived if they hadn’t been killed in an air-raid in 1944. It is, in effect, both a sort of social history of London and also a set of character studies as Francis Spufford develops his protagonists through childhood, the formative years of early adulthood and then, with increasing intervals between vignettes, into their seventies.

Frankly, I hated the beginning so much that I very nearly abandoned the book altogether. It is verbose, self-regardingly pretentious and in the end wholly irrelevant to the subsequent development of the book. I’m glad I persisted, though, because this subsides so I did become very involved with the characters’ lives and found Spufford’s analysis of their characters and the background events very shrewd much of the time. There is a fine line between really good, inventive writing and pretentious showing-off; Spufford begins on the wrong side of that line by a long way, in my view, but later I found the book readable, involving and with some important things to say. There are stories of opportunities missed and taken, of second chances and of the sort of unexpected turns that lives may take. I found some passages quite remarkably evocative, like the experience of being in hospital drugged on largactyl in the 60s or of the hateful, vicious bigotry of the far right in the 70s for example. Even though I think Spufford does stray into show-off territory sometimes, as a whole I found this a very rewarding novel.

So, not perfect but enjoyable and thoughtful in spite of its flaws. Recommended.

(My thanks to Faber & Faber for an ARC via NetGalley.)

 

Dorothy L. Sayers - Strong Poison

 

Rating: 5/5

 

Review:

A huge pleasure 

Strong Poison is still a terrific book. It must be thirty years since I last read it and even though I remembered the plot pretty well, it was still a huge treat.

This is the book in which Peter Wimsey falls in love with Harriet Vane when she is on trial for murder and makes it his business to prove her innocence. It’s a corny enough premise, but it’s so well done that it feels very fresh. Dorothy L. Sayers writes so well that for me any flaws are instantly forgivable – if I notice them at all. The old jibe about Snobbery With Violence has some truth here and Sayers is plainly in love with her creation, but none of that mattered to me. She creates such memorable and believable characters and writes with such elegance and wit that the whole thing was a pleasure. Wimsey himself is full of verbose charm (as Harriet remarks, “If anyone ever marries you, it wil be for the pleasure of hearing you talk piffle”), the wonderful Miss Climpson is on top form and a dinner party at Duke’s Denver, for example, is a beautifully understated portrait of a sort of antique, posh Twitter in which people have very definite opinions about matters of which they are wholly ignorant.

Dorothy L. Sayers is comfortably my favourite Golden Age author. This is one of her best – so much so that I now want to re-read the whole Wimsey canon. Very, very warmly recommended.