July Books Read

Another indoor month, due to heat and humidity here this time of year, means lots of time for reading.  Having run out of Silverberg SF books, I am now reading his trashy pulp novels, which actually are pretty gritty and not half bad.  I am giving Michael Moorcock a rest for a few months, and returning to James Blish.  Blish wrote several dozen critical essays about the stories in SF pulp magazines in the 50s and early 60s, under a fake name.  I have a few of those books in hand.  There were among the rarest of books by Blish, and unavailable for decades.  However, thanks once again to the magic of Kindle publishing, I now have books I had given up hope of ever finding in stores.

 

Besides my five Avon/Equinox books, I plunged ahead with Delphi classics, beginning with stories by Wilkie Collins and Joseph Conrad, and also read some from beyond that incomparable series.

 

Gang Girl is from 1959 and is penned under the name Don Elliot (Silverberg). She's seventeen and has a body that can turn young males into her own personal playthings.  They will even kill for her.  Lora Menotti is one bad girl, striving to get to the top of the gang when her family moves into new digs in a different part of New York.  Silverberg manages to get inside this kinky girl's head, and we see what makes Lora tick.  Mostly it's sex, violence, drugs, and booze.  The book has a lot of each of those things.  Like most bad people in 1959 movies and books, she does get her comeuppance in the final chapter--she has made too many enemies not to escape gang justice.  The story is gritty and probably not too far fetched for its time.  I would not even wish to contemplate what contemporary gang life is like. 

 

The first half of A Sword For Kregen, the 1979 novel by Kenneth Bulmer that continues the adventures of Dray Prescott, is standard fare for the series, meaning that it is fun to read and advances the overarching plot.  Dray has been given a warning by the gods that his services as a warrior will soon be needed again.  He manages to tie up business at home before he is yanked away again to a distant corner of Kregen.  The second half of the book is Bulmer's homage to Edgar Rice Burroughs' novel The Chessmen of Mars.  Burroughs' Martians love to play chess, and that book in the author's Martian series features a game of human chess where the pieces must fight to the death when moved to an occupied square.  On Kregen the board game of war is called Jikaida, and is played everywhere, including at the beginning of this novel, as a  game is taking place between Dray and his wife (she wins, with a ruthless strategy).  And so Dray later becomes a piece in the game, and must fight. Besides redoing Burroughs (Bulmer also gives instructions on how to play his game at the end of the novel, as did Burroughs), a few tropes pop up in this story.  For one, the climax is yet again two males having a swordfight to the death.  How original.  For another, Dray is the underdog against a much superior swordsman.  So of course Dray loses until the very few final seconds on the match, when his opponent finally makes a mistake.  Dray, with his very last strength, just somehow manages to kill him.  Yawn.  Despite this, the book is again very well thought out and executed.  The series continues, with 15 more novels in store.  So far, so good.  I can't believe I have last through 20 books.

 

From 1956 comes The Curse of Quantrill, a Civil War era historical western, starring that scourge of the North William Quantrill.  Quantrill was a Southern Captain in the Rebel army.  This story takes place near the end of the Civil War, and near the end of Quantrill's short life.  It is a completely fictional account of the later years, with no mention of the James brothers being part of Quantrill's Raiders.  There are many nearly forgotten stories of the Civil War.  The criminal and violent things that Quantrill and his men did, and those of the rival Jayhawkers, are quite unspeakable, yet they are a part of almost any war.  The same with a victorious Union army as they marched through the South, burning, robbing, raping, and causing economic disaster for the losing side.  Even after the war a lot of very nasty things went on that are best never forgotten, but always are.  Tubb gives a creditable account of life near the end of the Civil War, and pulls no punches.  A good read, and it made me research the facts about Quantrill. 

 

The Bend At The End of the Road is another good collection of short essays by Malzberg concerning SF writing in the 50s.  Lamenting the demise of SF and trying to reason why might drive a person crazy.  Tolkien, Star Wars, and Star Trek seem to be the main cause, as well as editors who only accepted certain types of SF for publication.  The great comeback in the 60s was due to the British, mostly Moorcock's New Worlds publications, and within that, thanks mostly to Ballard.  This essay collection, published in 2018, contains essays written between 2007-17.  It apparently did not help that more than one Hugo was given out to works that were not SF at all.  

Malzberg is one of the most creative and funniest writers of SF I have come across in the Avon Rediscovery Series.  After reading even a few of his works, it can be seen why he did not become more famous as a writer--his stuff does not fit the category of SF that editors had been hammering into young minds since day one.  However, it is a shame that he did not even attempt to talk about some modern SF writers.  Given the dates of the essays, he does not discuss a single contemporary writer.  Not good, Mr. Malzberg.

Still, these essays are essential reading for people interested in 50s SF, and in discovering why SF writing disappeared (think dragons and elves).  You'll laugh, you'll cry, but you will continue to read the next essay, until there are no more.  Highly recommended for readers of this blog.

 

James Blish wrote critical essays about SF in the 1950s and 1960s, ostensibly to help budding writings in the genre.  He wrote under the name of Atheling, and his cover was not guessed for many years, when he finally came out.  He wrote about the magazine stories from the time, which was virtually the only place to publish SF stories.  The essays contained in The Issue At Hand are full of insight, and make a very good handbook for young writers and older editors.  Having recently read many essays by Barry Malzberg on the subject, Blish excels at getting to his point and proving it, something that Malzberg's essays often lack.  He was a very erudite writer, and not above criticizing his own works in his essays.  His emphasis on stories of humanity often fell on deaf ears for those writers engaged in space opera, but the essays invariably helped many writers, even the pros.  An invaluable gem of a book, unavailable for many years until it appeared on Kindle.  Praise Kindle!

On to the Delphi Classics!  Wilkie Collins wrote a short novel in 1856 called A Rogue's Life.  He made some revisions in 1879 for its first book publication (it had been serialized in a magazine).  He wanted to expand it, but didn't have the time.  A good thing, as it's perfect as it stands.  The son of Dr. Francis Softly tries hard to make a go of things, to uphold his family's high position (through his mother).  He tries learning medicine, but finds it not to his taste.  Next come several very funny episodes where he tries caricature, goes bankrupt and is sent to jail; next comes portrait painting, also a complete flop.  A friend gets him into painting old masters to sell as original works.  A few times he runs into a beautiful young woman who makes his heart flutter.  When the old masters racket is exposed, he flounders for a time.  The young Softly is a terrific character for a novel, and I was very surprised to see that nothing has been done for TV or film with this work.  It is a fun read, just long enough, with one of the most original endings I have ever come across.  A rogue indeed!  If you are a reader who has been put off by Collins' very (very) long novels, this would be a great place to dip into his writing.  Highly recommended!

Next came a strange tale by Joseph Conrad, co-written with Ford Maddox Ford.  The Inheritors is from 1901.  Ford was a neighbour at the time, helping Conrad write in English.  I didn't care much for the novel.  Without the sea it doesn't seem like Conrad, yet.  The book is well written, yet lacks action and emotion.  It is a political thriller that takes place in London, the countryside, and Paris.  The downfall of the old regime is in the hands of a heartless woman, who claims to be from the 4th dimension.  Forgetting that, it is interesting to speculate on how many humans there are that we might know who don't seem quite human.  Conrad digs up a few here, and shines a light upon them.  The main protagonist, a journalist, is used by the lady to help achieve her ends.  He is a pawn on her chessboard, who thinks that he has free will.  He falls in love with her, and needless to say it is unrequited.  At the very end, however, when the cataclysm has stopped its rumbling, she does confess a small bit of feeling for him.  The book ends with the man a lost soul, with nothing to do and nowhere to go.  The novel makes for an interesting read, but certainly not an engaging one.  For Conrad completists, and those trying to assess the influence Ford had on the story.

I read the Delphi Kindle edition.

 Anne Hillerman's latest mystery novel is called Lost Birds, published in 2024.  Continuing to write in her father's footsteps, retired Navajo cop Joe Leaphorn returns to centre stage for this story, mostly set in New Mexico's northwest badlands.  Ms. Hillerman's job is not an easy one.  First, she must use the characters introduced and developed by her father, putting her own spin on things while remaining true to Tony Hillerman's vision.  Second, she must reflect the current Navajo scene without offending anyone, using Native advisors as well as historical truths as a base.  Trying to deal with real problems facing the Navajo Nation is a pretty tough task for a white person to undertake these days.  She must also be very familiar with not only how the Navajo police do their job (and what their job actually is), but also with the NM State Police and the FBI.  Crime scene work today is much different than when Tony Hillerman wrote The Blessing Way, his first novel, back in 1970 (highly recommended reading).

Sometimes those tasks are so daunting that creating a workable plot with new characters can be overwhelming.  Ms. Hillerman has three main characters to deal with in her novels.  They are retired Lieutenant Leaphorn, police lieutenant Jim Chee, and his wife, officer Bernadette (Bernie) Manuelito.  The author jumps back and forth between these three characters throughout most of her 8 or 9 novels.  She not only deals with their police work (the retired Leaphorn is now a private investigator), but also their private lives.  Both sides of the characters are usually dealt with really well.

In the current novel, "lost birds" is an actual moniker for Navajo babies who were adopted into white families to help them escape their origins, and assimilate them into white culture.  This went on, protested by natives, until 1978.  This novel deals with a 50 year old woman trying to find out who her birth mother was.  There is also a murder, and explosion, and packs of wild dogs causing havoc (a real problem on the vast reservation).  The several plots winding through the novel have some holes, but overall it is a good read.  There is a vast area of NM we have yet to visit (next year, fall 2025?), as well as Monument Valley in Arizona, and some essential sites in Utah.  Reading any Hillerman story, by Tony or Anne, puts me in places I would rather be.  Though I can highly recommend most of the books by Tony, Anne does not always measure up to dad's level.  She does come pretty close this time, though.

 

I read the Kindle edition. 

 

F. Marion Crawford's To Leeward was published in 1883.  It is a mostly depressing novel that takes place during a hot summer in Italy.  It begins optimistically enough, with a young and intelligent Leonora marrying Marcantonnio, a well off man from a noble and old Italian family.  He loves her deeply, but it takes her a few months to realize she does not love him.  She is a romantic young thing, and longs for a sweeping heroic manly man to come along and sweep her off her feet.  Along comes Julius Bastiscombe, friend to Marcantonnio's sister.  He sees the lovely Leonora and decides that he must possess her.  Things escalate until the inevitable happens, and she elopes with the rogue.  Marcantonnio goes mad and sets out to kill them both.  So yes, a depressing story.  It is well written, and the characters (there are four main ones, including the sister) are well drawn and quite believable.  To me this would make a decent Merchant/Ivory type of film.  If you like your love stories tragic and very warm, you might like this novel.  However, the sudden and very brief ending to the story was disappointing.  I prefer my endings to epic stories to be somewhat more spacious.

Griffin and Sabine by Nick Bantok was published as three small, very artistic books beginning in 1990.  The second book is called Sabine's Notebook, and the third being The Golden Mean.  These works were first brought to my attention by a friend when they were published in the form of a sort of game for PC.  We bought the books afterwards, and gave them to my father.  When he passed away earlier this year I got the books back, and read them.  The story is told through letters and postcards only.  The first book is the best of the series.  Griffin is a designer of postcards, while Sabine is a stamp designer for a fictitious South Seas Islands country.  He lives in London, and they began to communicate.  A mystery lies at the heart of their relationship, and it is a great pleasure to gradually discover the mystery and its development.  The second book seems to me too much of a frustration, as they each travel across the world to meet, but never do.  Do they ever get to meet?  Read the third book to find out.  Besides the writing, the art is eccentric and quite fabulous, from the postcard designs and including the stamps.  A fun idea well executed, and worth discovering for lovers of things odd and unusual.

Book One of the series of three. 

 

Lastly comes one of the great adventure books of all time, The Lost World by Arthur Conan Doyle.  Published in 1912, this influential SF novel still makes for fun reading.  Somehow I had never read it before now, despite reading dozens of its imitators.  Of course it was heavily influenced by Jules Verne, but so what.  My Delphi Kindle edition included the original pencil illustrations.  Readers can immediately tell that this is the way adventure books were written back in the good old days, since it takes six or seven chapters to really get going.  But the entire exposition is priceless reading, especially where it concerns Professor Challenger, the man who claimed to have visited a site up the Amazon where prehistoric beasts still roam.  He is certainly one of the more colourful characters from early adventure fiction.  I found this to be a very fun read, despite the lack of female characters (though the lone female character does provide a chuckle or two at the end).  Of course a Mary Kingsley type of character could have easily been introduced as one of the party, but that probably would have stretched readers credulity at the time more than the dinosaurs.

 

Original cover of the first edition.

 

One of several original sketches included in the Kindle edition, done on site by Malone, the reporter who went on the  journey with three others. 

 

That's all the reading news for this month.  See you in August. 

Mapman Mike

 

 

 
 

 

February Books Read

Despite being a short month, and with three astronomy nights in there as well, I still managed to read 11 books; seven from my Avon/Equinox SF Rediscovery project, one off the shelf, and three from Kindle.  Needless to say my actual miscellaneous shelf is now down to about five books, from about fifty not so long ago.  Almost everything I buy now is on Kindle, at least 95 % of my book purchases.

The month always begins with Robert Silverberg, but this time he collaborated with Isaac Asimov.  There are at least three such books I will be reading in the course of completing the project (someday).  Nightfall is from 1990, and was the first collaboration.  Very loosely based on a 1940s short story by Asimov, the novel is the story of a post-holocaust society, much like the ones written by nearly every other SF author, including Algis Budrys, John Christopher (his specialty), Edgar Pangborn, and so on.  The differences here are worth noting, however.  This is an alien society, much like humans on Earth, but they are not humans on Earth.  They live on a planet with six suns, and dark skies are unknown here.  Except once every 2049 years.   Still, after the Mad Max movies, and so many previous tales of the mayhem that will ensue when society collapses, I am surprised that this book was written.  Of course without those big names on the cover, it is doubtful if it ever would have been published.

Isle of Woman by Piers Anthony was next.  From 1993 comes the first book in yet another epic series, this one under the title of Geodyssey.  This first book is 470 pages long, including the author's afterword.  In his own words, this is 'history light,' and the simple writing seems aimed at a high school audience.  He said that he hated history in school, finding it dull.  He wanted to make it more interesting with this series, which begins with a story from 3.7 million years ago, up to one from the near 'future' of 2021.   Probably something I would have found interesting around Grade Ten or Eleven.  I have one more Anthony book in my collection, the second book of this series.  At that point, I will likely stop reading Anthony's series.  I will carefully check out any remaining single novels before buying anything else by him.  59 books read so far, which is not even half of what he has written.  This book wins cover of the month.

Cover of the Month for Feb. 2023 goes to artist Eric Peterson.

From 1975 comes Boarders Away the 128 page continuation of the fascinating story of Commander Fox, that devil of the high seas.  Now under the command of a man he detests, obstacles to promotion are again put in Fox's path.  He always performs gloriously, craftily, and ruthlessly, yet is seldom, if ever, given the recognition required for his service in His Majesty's Royal Navy.  This time he must land two spies on French soil, then return to pick them up with other passengers on the next night.   Of course plans go awry, and Fox must use all his courage and ingenuity to make things right.  His reward is to be left behind, undermanned, while the other ships in his fleet go into action.  Guarding four prize ships turns into disaster for Fox, however, and the book ends in a most pessimistic way.  Bulmer is in top writing form once again, having found his true subject matter.

 

From 1970 comes The Jester of Scar, Book 5 of the Dumarest series. 

Scar is a planet that has useful spores.  However, some of them are deadly to humans.  To be safe when outdoors in the wild a special filtered suit must be worn.  We are not certain as to why Dumarest is here, but the opening scene is a classic Tubb setting, as two bullies come looking for trouble in a hut where he is staying with a woman.  On an excursion into the wilderness in search of valuable spores, Dumarest hits the jackpot.  The only problem is the location, on the other side of a treacherous range of steep hills.  The main adventure has Dumarest and his partner trying to reach, and then to harvest the crop.  Even without interference from the bad guys, it is unlikely they would have survived the ordeal.  But there is also aid from the leader of another nearby planet, visiting Scar.  The plot is just thick enough, and the adventure story is suitable readable.  Of course Dumarest learns nothing further about Earth.  Until next time....

 

From 2005 comes the 2nd and final edition of Wonder's Child, Jack Williamson's autobiography.  For anyone interested in the history of American SF, this book is a must read.  For any writer finding it difficult to impossible to get published (I raise my hand here), the book offers lessons, and again hammers home how difficult a task that has always been.  Above all else, Jack loved SF, and he helped legitimize it through college courses, and training high school English teachers to use it in the classroom.  there is no doubt that the field would be very different today without Jack's hard work.  What a life!  A highly recommended read.

 

Legends From The End of Time by Michael Moorcock was published in 1975.  It contains four stories, two novelettes and two novellas, of events occurring at the end of time in the absence of Jherek Carnelian, when he is off on his own adventures.  The first story, Pale Rose, and the last, Ancient Shadows, are the best ones and well worth seeking out.  It does take a while to get used to the people who live at the end of time, but once readers are familiar with them and the way they live, there is a delightful world of fantasy here to discover.  Best of all, Jherek is not missed.

A collection of short stories by Malzberg nicely finished of the SF portion of the reading month.  The Man Who Loved The Midnight Lady is a collection of stories and essays published in 1980.  There are several gems, especially the brief afterwards by the author for the 2021 edition.  I always recommend Malzberg, though his short stories are not the place to begin.  The short series taking place in Writers' Heaven is noteworthy in this collection; fun and quite hilarious.  The essays, though now quite old, are still good to read.  Malzberg rails against the prejudice held by traditional literature towards SF writing, lamenting that not one major prize was awarded to a SF novel during the 1950s.  Despite some of the best writing of that decade being SF, it is certainly a bone of contention.

Towards the end of the book Malzberg announces his own "best book of the decade by American writers" awards, up through the 1970s.  I took him at his word, finding as many of his winners on Kindle as I could manage to, and downloading them.  Some were free or very inexpensive, while others were top dollar (for Kindle books).  But I have them all except for one, which seems very rare.  Here is the list of his "awards."

1920s--A tie.  The Great Gatsby; The Sun Also Rises.

1930s--The Low Company, by Daniel Fuchs.

1940s--The Naked and The Dead, by Norman Mailer.

1950s--Invisible Man, by Ralph Ellison (unavailable currently).

1960s--Revolutionary Road, by Richard Yates.

1970s--The Franchises, by Stanley Elkin.

So we begin the next phase of reading in February.  I began with The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald.  I actually read this in high school, in Gr. 12.  Our school (Lasalle Secondary, in Sudbury) actually had a college level English department.  Classes would meet as per usual twice per week; twice per week we would meet in half class size round table seminars; and on Friday all classes would meet in the little theatre for ensemble lessons.  These were often dramatic readings or student acted performances of scenes from plays or novels being studied.  However, in addition to all this, a second and advanced English class was available to certain hand picked students.  There were twelve of us in this class, mostly boys if you can believe it, and we had to read at least a book a week.  Sometimes we were given a novel Friday afternoon, and by Monday we had to have a 500 word review ready to read to the class, defending our position.  Such it was with The Great Gatsby.  I only wish I still had my review from back then.

Reading it again more than a few years later, I can truly say that it is a remarkably good novel.  The first chapter, in which the main characters are introduced (all except Gatsby, who is still only a shadow), is one of the best first chapters of any novel ever read by this reviewer.  The parties, the empty lifestyles, the social criticism, and the gradual appearance of Gatsby's true character (nothing less than a knight in shining armour) come as revelations in how to write a novel.  The tragedy itself is barely sketched out, and if you reading the novel Sunday morning in bed after a long night of Saturday night partying, it would be easy to glance over and even miss!  Such are the events of life, and thus the invention of the "double take."  Anyway, I loved the book, and highly recommend a reread, if it's been awhile.

Next came a physical book from the shelf, one of my few remaining.  The latest Anne Hillerman mystery is called Sacred Bridge, and is from 2021.  Her next book should be out by April.  Jim Chee, Navajo police sergeant, is on a short personal holiday away from his home territory of Shiprock, NM.  He finds a body (don't we all?) and he becomes involved in the mystery of who killed the male victim, and why.  Meanwhile back on the home front, Bernadette (Chee's wife and also a Navajo constable) is dealing with the bullying tactics of a local cannabis farm, going undercover to see exactly what is going on.  Not a bad entry, and we again get to visit the fabulous landscape of the four corners area (which we have never visited ourselves!).

Now came two books from my Delphi Classics series.  The first one was Coffee and Repartee, from 1893.  It is the second humourous book by J K Bangs I have read and enjoyed.  What began as a series of short stories was bundled into this novel, which became so popular that it became a series.  A group of male boarders meet each day for meals, and have discussions.  The only females present are the landlady and her maid.  The conversations are invariably philosophical and often quite hilarious.  The star of the show is The Idiot, who bandies words with a man of the collar, a school master, an imbiber (his ally), a physician, a bibliophile,and a few other straight characters.  Highly entertaining, and I am looking forward to other books in the series.

Things wrapped up with an early collection of stories by J. M. Barrie called Auld Licht Idylls, from 1888.  There are 12 stories related to the doings of a small, out of the way Scottish village called Thrums.  It is difficult for a modern reader to relate to the meagre and spiritless existence of these god-fearing folk, and though the stories are told towards the humourous side of things, it is still appalling to think that any such folk ever existed, outside of fairy tales.  The first story, "The Schoolhouse," introduces the narrator, the local school master, and is the strongest of the set.  Many of the others are funny and quite revealing, but ghastly just the same.  The stories to do with anything religious are the funniest and the most head shaking.  Almost unbelievable, but not quite.

Next blog is already underway, dealing with the February film festival here at the Homestead.  See you soon.

Mapman Mike

 

 

 

October Books Read

With five clear nights in October used for observing with my telescope, I basically lost 5 days/nights of reading.  My daytime reading is used to write up observing notes and prepare for the upcoming night.  My nighttime reading is...well, spent at the telescope eyepiece.  I still managed to read 10 1/2 books, so all is not lost, and a few were quite long.

The month began with a Robert Silverberg book.  I am now reading novels and stories he wrote in and around his gigantic Majipoor series, but not related to those books.  So his writing has matured and really developed.  Even so, his short time travel novel Project Pendulum might not appeal to all readers of such stories.  His concept involves wending twins forward and backward in time simultaneously, in a sort of Powers of Ten manner.  One brother goes forward 5 minutes in time, while the other goes back 5 minutes.  The next jump is 50 minutes, then 500 minutes, etc.  The final jump takes them 950 million years from their starting time!  At the end of the book, they begin their trip homeward.  It's a very strange idea, and though the book, like the time jumps, begins slowly, it gradually gathers momentum and interest the further the brothers travel in time.  I enjoyed the book, and it would make a fantastic basis for a TV series.

Next came a dreary fantasy novel by Piers Anthony and Mercedes Lackey called If I Pay Thee Not In Gold.  This is the type of book I try to avoid at all costs.  Based on an idea by Anthony, it was penned by Mercedes Lackey.  Then Anthony went over it with a fine tooth comb, adding ten thousand words.  The first two hundred pages take place in a city ruled by women, who make slaves of the men.  Women can conjure magic, but men can't.  That part is never really explained very well.  The Queen is a bitch and tries to kill the young girl, Xylina, who shows much prowess in magic.  She tries to kill her over and over again, but somehow always fails.  This is too bad, since the story could have ended much sooner.  From 1993, this 398 page waste of time is one of the most boring books I have ever read.

Harry Harrison finishes his USA versus England trilogy with Stars and Stripes Triumphant.  It's a delicious series to read (and the third book is no exception), except by the English.  But Harrison, who lives in Dublin, is writing here for the Irish and the Scottish reader, as well as other countries colonized by England back in the good old days.  It really is a fun series, and looking at England's standing in the world at the present moment, it resembles the situation where England ends up at the end of the series.

Bulmer's Fox #8: Battle Smoke keeps up the humour and adventure in his epic sea going series,with Lieutenant Fox spending time back in Limehouse, London, with his family.  But he is itching to get back to sea, and after some local exploits, off he goes, finally aboard a class 1 battle ship, under Captain Staunton again.  this means that Fox is virtually in charge of everything aboard the ship, a de facto captain in all but name.  The climax is another great sea battle, this time between four English ships and seven French and Spanish ones.  With an incapacitated admiral aboard, Fox takes command of the fleet and leads the charge!  Great stuff for sea loving adventure fans.

I finally began E C Tubb's mammoth series featuring the adventures of Dumarest.  The Dumarest Sagas contains about 36 novels, and I am now underway.  The first book, published in 1967 as one half of an Ace Double, is called The Winds of Gath.  The lead character is a space wanderer and adventure seeker, and through mischance he ends up on a planet from which it is virtually impossible to leave.  He undergoes some hardships, but gets a big break when he defeats a strongman in an entertainment battle.  He earns a ticket off the planet.  But many more adventures await him on Gath, in itself a totally fascinating planet.  I like how the story stayed focussed on the one planet, and seems to cover nearly every aspect of its (limited) possibilities.  Very well written, and a very promising start to the series.

I am reading three huge volumes of stories by Jack Williamson.  Wizard's Isle contains 16 stories by the author, published between 1933 and 1937.  I read half of this vast volume last month, and will read the rest of it in November.  Lots of fun stories about mad scientists, and good people who just won't listen to reason.  The Wand of Doom has a nice bayou atmosphere to it, and The Plutonian Terror is a good horror story with a neat surprise ending.  Using an original pulp magazine cover as its cover for the this hardbound volume, I have awarded the prestigious Cover of the Month to this book.

SF cover of the month for October 2022.  

Next came Michael Moorcock's 2nd book in his Dancers At The End Of Time series.  Called The Hollow Lands, it is from 1974, and takes up where volume one left off.  Jherek Carnelian is still in search of his time lost lover, Mrs. Underwood.  He is able to return to her time in London, and finds his way to her house.  Before that are some truly bizarre adventures involving a robot nanny and a homicidal alien, he meets up with H G Wells in London and is soon off on more hilarious adventures.  The entire London adventure reminds me somewhat of a Carry On movie.  Overall the book is quite readable.  If you don't like something you are reading, it will soon change to something else, so carry on....

Lastly came a long volume of 37 short stories by Barry Malzberg.  There is a wide range of tales here, some SF and some not, some almost beyond classifying.  A Galaxy Called Rome is the novelette version of his novel Galaxies (see above).  It is a brilliant concept, about a story that a writer might or might not actually write, but if he did write it this is what he would do, and what he would include.  Very well done.  Agony Column is a very funny, but very devastating, story that contains nothing but various letters written by a Mr. Martin Miller, and the various replies he gets, mostly form letters.  A real gem!  Corridors is about Ruthven, an older, tired SF writer from the pulp days.  He has finally had some financial success, but it came too late to help with the bitterness he feels about his life and his writing.  This is a very moving tale about the "golden" days of SF pulp writing, and its effect on one writer.  Recommended.  A valuable collection for fans of this highly underrated writer.

Next came a book off the dwindling book shelf, and two Kindle books from my nearly endless Delphi collection.  With The Tale Teller, Anne Hillerman comes closest so far to equaling her father's writing.  This is her best book of the series, in which Joe Leaphorn returns to action, after she nearly killed him off in her first book.  Intertwined with the mystery story is more Navajo lore, including things about the Long Walk they were forced to undertake when the US government forced them off their sacred lands.  Tony and Anne Hillerman are both recognized by the Navajo as true friends, and in a book like this it is easy to see why.  Highly recommended, and the empty landscapes of Arizona and New Mexico resonate strongly in this novel.

Next came a short novel by one of my favourite Ballantine Adult Fantasy authors, George Meredith.  His first novel was The Shaving of Shagput, an Orientalist fantasy that I read and reviewed on my Ballantine blog page.  His second novel is called Farina, written in 1857, a year after Shagput.  It is in every sense a minor effort, though still fun to read.  It is a medieval fantasy that takes place in Germany, and concerns the beautiful daughter of a merchant who is the centre of attention of most young men in the vicinity.  It has humour, an easy-going story, and some supernatural events.  It is a bit of a let down after Shagput, but then that book is unique in the literature to begin with.  I look forward to his third novel, and didn't mind reading this one.

A. Merritt is one of the great fantasy writers from the late teens and early twenties, influenced by H Rider Haggard and Edgar Rice Burroughs, who in turn went on to influence a whole generation of writers, including H P Lovecraft.  His first novel was The Moon Pool, from 1919.  I had never read this one before, and while I found the fantasy element imaginative and somewhat engrossing, his writing style is quite poor.  Expanded from two novellas, the book often bogs down in descriptive detail.  When there is action, the book is fun to read.  When the descriptions go on for page after page, not so much fun.  The climax is exciting, and the ending is well thought out.  There is considerable humour, too, as Larry O'Keefe, an Irish American and the adventure hero of the story, woos Lakla, handmaiden of the Silent Ones.  The story begins at the ruins of Nan Madol, off the island of Pohnpei, in Micronesia.  It is narrated by Dr. Goodwin, who sets out to investigate the disappearance of a good friend and his family.  I really liked the gradual development of the story and the action,which eventually leads to a massive underground kingdom.

Mapman Mike

 

 

August Reading Summary

First, a note about the weather, and cutting grass.  It's been a dry summer, with very occasional rain that doesn't really soak into the ground.  While areas around us received an occasional deluge, we never did.  The last time I cut our grass was June 25th.  It finally got cut again yesterday, August 31st.  It was mostly straggly weeds that I cut, but things do look better today.  Our last rain was Monday, when again giant storms just missed us.  We still got some healthy, badly needed rain, though.  And a rainbow--a double one, actually.

Last Monday evening's double rainbow, as seen from our back deck. 

And it's been almost a week since our driveway cement was laid down.  Tomorrow night the car can finally return to the garage!  The final big project for this year is the large poplar tree in the far backyard, across the creek.  First, the leaves need to come off, and the bank account return to the black.  Hopefully early October, as that tree tends to lose its leaves early.

In reading news, I managed to finish 15 books, very assorted.  As usual, I continued my Avon/Equinox reading project, where I still have 8 authors works to complete.  And I dove into my Delphi Classics Kindle library, where I have now collected over 40 authors' complete works.  Of course I won't live long enough to get through most of those, but I will die trying.

It seems more than a month ago that I read Star of Gypsies by Robert Silverberg, an intriguing SF novel that takes the Roma and their culture into the far future.  Though the premise is worthwhile, the execution falls short, in my opinion.  The story is a very simple one, and it's a good thing, as it gets constantly interrupted by the main character's reminiscences and dream journeys.  Some of the best planet descriptions in SF are to found in these pages, as well as some fun adventures.  But after a while it gets to be a bit much, and we just want the main story to progress.  But it barely creeps along. And at 467 pages, it is a long creep.

Piers Anthony's And Eternity was meant to be his final book in his Incarnations of Immortality series, but he eventually wrote one more (which I will read in October).  It would be impossible to read this book without having read most of the others.  Even having read most of the others, it's still a pretty difficult road to follow as so many threads are tied together at last. Things that happened way back in the first book (this is Book 7) now finally come to fruition.  Though the series is pretty silly overall, it does have many moments that show the author's genius for plot, setting, and character.  Even so, this is a weak book overall, and not a little confusing.  Anthony is one of those writers who does not believe anything an editor tells him, so his books essentially are published as written, or sent to a different publisher.  Must be nice.

Next came Galactic Dreams, a short story collection by Harry Harrison.  However, there were only 4 of the 12 stories I had not read and reviewed already.  "Famous First Words" is a very funny tale about a professor who manages to find words once spoken by famous people that would eventually become prophetic.  "The Pad" is a sexist but very funny story about a rich man attempting to seduce an unwilling young woman.  Think of a Pepe Le Pew cartoon, only much funnier.  And a newly written (for the collection) story about Bill, the Galactic Hero, is also quite hilarious.

Fox 6 by Kenneth Bulmer, continues the saga of Abernathy Fox, a ship's officer in the British Navy during the Napoleonic wars.  Even though this one is just another pot boiler, it's still great fun to read.  I can easily handled on of these per month.  This adventure is enlivened by the appearance of a group of Turkish warriors and a horde of harem girls brought aboard, with their eunuch.  The girls add humour to the proceedings, and end up surprising Mr. Fox with their ability to help out his short handed crew on deck.

Only One Winner is an interesting collection of minor works by Tubb, including the novella of the title.  There is a long speech that Tubb gave at a SF convention in 1970, and though a bit rambling, it brings up some interesting points from one of the greatest pulp masters of the genre.  The three short stories it contains have already been read and reviewed.  Philip Harbottle also contributes a short essay.  The novella itself is standard pulp fare, and not Tubb's best.  4 losers attempt to take over a space liner filled with rich people on a cruise.  One of them is an alcoholic, and one is a female.  They are thieves and murderers of the worst sort, and they all come to their expected end, after causing much mayhem and death.

Wolves of Darkness is the 2nd of 8 or 9 hardcover books containing most of the shorter fiction of Jack Williamson.  Published in suburban Detroit, these are collectors editions, now long out of print.  I managed to get Vols. 2, 3, and 4 at somewhat decent prices, but the remaining volumes, when available, are way out of price range.  This volume is a 549 page collection of stories from 1931 and 1932.  There is a 23 page preface, followed by 509 pages of stories, and then an afterword of 40 pages.  The preface contains images of old pulp magazine covers, and an essay by Harlan Ellison.  The afterward contains some essays by the author about some of the works in this collection, as well as a short modern piece for this edition.  This volume also wins Cover of The Month, depicting an original magazine cover from back in the day, illustrating one of Jack's tales contained herein.  The cover story is very much in the Lovecraft tradition, and rather spooky at times.  Another story, "The Lake of Light", seems also influenced by Lovecraft, namely his Antarctic tale "Mountains of Madness."

Cover of the month, by pulp artist H. W. Wesso, from 1932.

It took Michael Moorcock 7 years to get around to publishing the third Captain Bastable story, called The Steel Tsar.  I enjoyed my stay on Rowe Island, discovering traces of Ballard in the writing setting, and some of the lost characters.  Most of the action and dialogue take place in the island hospital and in the lone remaining hotel.  Eventually, the Japanese arrive and capture the whites.  More adventures ensue, but the writing becomes more philosophical, as the author and his characters ponder the purpose of the multiverse and their place in it.  The Steel Tsar is a ruthless socialist, based on Stalin, and is also named after a giant creation that Harryhausen would have happily animated: a giant, scimitar-wielding robot created by one of the oddest characters to ever appear in a novel.  My edition is amply illustrated, and I enjoyed this third and final Bastable novel as much as the others in the series.  Recommended for the adventure, and the philosophical discussions.  Here is a quote from near the end which I particularly liked: Mrs. Persson is speaking.... "We have only institutions and a crude, fragile kind of democracy standing between us and absolute Chaos.  That is why we must value and protect those institutions.  And be forever re-examining them."  Well said!

Malzberg At Large is a story collection of his from 1979, containing a previously read short novel and 5 stories.  I had also read two of the five stories.  And one of the stories eventually became the first chapter of his brilliant novel, Overlay.  There is also an essay by the author, offering insights into his life that really brings a lot of his writing into much clearer focus.  The short story "Gaheena is From 1971" has been called Malzberg's Rashomon.  A very brief and tragic love story is told from 3 different perspectives, with a coda.  Interesting story telling.  And A Soul Song to the Sad, Silly, Soaring Sixties sums up so much of Malzberg's writing.  Very powerful.  If you have no time or patience to read any of his assassination novels, this story would be a good substitute.

And now we turn to books off the shelf, and from Kindle.  First up was another Anne Hillerman mystery, set in New Mexico's lava fields called El Malpais. Deb and I are very familiar with the area through hiking and exploring, and it is one of many unique and highly memorable landscapes in the state.  Cave Of Bones is perhaps her finest novel to date, getting very close to her father's love of the land, and his ability to transfer that to writing.  Like any modern mystery story, it is perhaps a bit too complex, filled as it is with characters.  But it was a fun read, and it is now off my shelf.

I managed to finish a large art book which I have been perusing for many months.  Towards A Modern Identity is the 3rd book dealing with the Detroit Institute of Arts' American painting collection.  This one has 129 paintings, each one discussed in detail and illustrated in colour.  It has been a multi-year journey reading all three volumes.  This one features many of my favourite artists, including Thomas Dewing, James McNeil Whistler, along with many American impressionists and tonalists.  I have now read all the published catalogues of paintings from the museum.  Others include Flemish and German Paintings from the 17th, Dutch paintings from the 17th Century, and Italian baroque art.  I'm still awaiting publication of early Flemish and early Italian catalogues.

I read 5 books from the Delphi Classics series.  First up was a reread that I first came across in paperback at least 40 years ago, probably more.  I don't know what ever became of my copy, but I have it now on Kindle, along with William Hope Hodgson's Ghost Pirates.  This is one of the better early ghost stories, written in 1909.  It was the 3rd book of a loose trilogy of terror by the author, which also included The Boats of the Glen Carrig, and The House on the Borderland.  All three are remarkable books, and a must read for lovers of early fantasy and horror.  The present novel builds nicely from corner of the eye sightings to a full fledged attack on a ship by ghost pirates.  Good late night reading, if you are all alone in a creaky house (or boat).

Fergus Hume's first novel, and the one he is still most famous for writing, is called Mystery of a Hansom Cab, and was first published in 1886.  Delphi has the 1898 corrected edition by the author, as well as his original intro to the updated version.  Hume was a new Zealander, though he lived mostly in Australia, where this novel takes place (Melbourne).  He had studied many different mystery stories before he wrote this, and it shows.  He has all the necessary ingredients for a good murder mystery, and then some.  With the success of this novel, he eventually went on to write about 130 books.  Highly readable, and though the Victorian morals do dominate the mystery and the story, they are not nearly as hard to take as in works by other authors of the time.  Well worth a read for mystery fans.

Next came a real treat, M. R. James' first collection of ghost stories, called Ghost Stories of an Antiquary, from 1904.  My Delphi edition contains 8 stories, each one chilling and quite scary.  If some of his stories were ever literally transferred to screen, they would prove as violent and hard to watch as something by Stephen King, or directed by Del Toro (he would actually be a perfect director for these stories).  For example, in "Lost Hearts", children are murdered by a madman trying to follow an ancient formula to help him live forever.  Their beating hearts are cut out while they are still alive. Imagine what Del Toro could do with that!  And in "The Ash Tree," your worst nightmare regarding giant spiders will haunt you for many days after.  Ohter storeis are just plain scary, without too much violence.  In "The Mezzotint", an old architecture print without any people in it gradually acquires a frightening entity that is seen to move slowly across the print and into an open window.  This story reminded me of the Doctor Who episode called "Blink."  "Oh, Whistle and I'll Come To You" is yet another example of good, old fashioned pure blood curling horror.  Great stuff!!

Next came Jerome Jerome's sequel to Three Men In A Boat, called Three Men on the Bummel.  The same characters (minus the dog) go on a bicycle tour of parts of Germany.  Published nearly 10 years after the first book, this one is also rich with side splitting humour.  Even though there are many parts where things don't really come off too well, there is enough entertainment in these pages to keep me reading passages to Deb for the entire winter.  His observations on marriage are priceless, and still give me pains in the chest when I think of them.  At one point I simply could not read any further; I was hurting too much from laughing.  The best parts are in the first three chapters, which are among the funniest things ever to be written down.  There are stories about sailing holidays, too, as well as many walking and bicycling tales.  Very rich reading.

With one day to spare before resuming my Avon/Equinox SF books, I turned to the next story by Frank Baum, entitled The Road To Oz.  Dorothy sets out from Kansas one day, as she agrees to show the wandering Shaggy Man the correct road to take.  They meet up with Button-Bright, and with Toto following along, are soon lost in another strange world.  The first half of the book details the usual scary adventures one seems to have in trying to reach Oz safely.  Along the way they meet the lost Poly Chrome, daughter to the Rainbow Man.  They are also helped out by Johnny Do-It at one point, in trying to cross that impenetrable desert.  He builds them a sand sleigh to sail across it!  The second half of the book has the group safely in Oz, and soon meeting up with old friends.  By the end of the book, virtually every character we have met so far in the entire series is present, for it's Ozma's grand birthday party, and everyone is coming to help celebrate.  While there is very little adventure in the 2nd half of the book, there is spectacle.  A good addition to the series.

I'll be back soon with film updates. Stay tuned.

Mapman Mike

 

 

 

 

March Reading, Part 2

 My first book after reading my monthly allotment of Avon/Equinox authors' works was one from my miscellaneous shelf.  It was called Changing Planes, by Ursula Le Guinn, a book Deb appropriately purchased at the Detroit airport on one of our excursions.  It is a volume of short stories, mostly anthropological in nature, about various other planes of existence.  One can learn to get to these planes only after being stranded many times in airports.  Acquiring the knack is worthwhile, as it alleviates the boredom of such places by allowing the traveller to visit other places and other cultures.  It is a very funny and witty book, and well worth seeking out.  Don't look for deep plots or depth of character.  It seems like a type of Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, only more restrained and informative.

Next came my introduction to the writings of Algernon Blackwood, one of my Delphi Classics purchases for Kindle.  Blackwood's ghost stories influenced writers such as Lord Dunsany, H P Lovecraft, and William Hope Hodgson.  I read his first collection of tales, called The Empty House and Other Ghost Stories, from 1906.  While several of the stories are pretty standard haunted house yarns (a murder was once committed there, therefore an evil presence still lingers), a few are really quite surprising and good.  "Keeping The Promise" is a plausible tale of two students who made a pledge in blood when they were younger that the first to die would come back to see the other one.  Other unusual and worthwhile stories are "Wood of the Dead;" "Smith, An Episode In A Lodging House;" and "The Strange Adventures of a Private Secretary in NY."  I am really looking forward to more by this influential author.

One of the more difficult things about undertaking the collecting and reading of (and blogging about) the Ballantine Adult Fantasy Series, was not going into further depth with some of the incredible writers I encountered.  I was focussed on the series only, and not reading beyond it at the time.  Fortunately, a few authors had several volumes of their works published in that series, but some did not.  Now, as I come towards the end of my Avon Equinox project, I find I have time and inclination to go back and read more of the Ballantine authors.  One of the authors whose writing I fell in love with was Ernest Brahma.  Lin Carter published 2 of his Kai Ling books, as well as a Kai Ling novella and another short story.  Kai Lung is a Chinese story teller from long ago, and he could be found unrolling his mat under a mulberry tree in various towns and cities throughout the season.  He passes a wooden donation bowl around, then sets out to tell a tale.  This month I read the first such volume, called The Wallet of Kai Lung, from 1900.  The very first story is called "The Transmutation of Ling", and was the novella that Carter published in the Ballantine series.  I reread it joyfully, as it is one of the best of the author's stories.  He writes about a China that never was, an ancient China that he conjured up in his imagination.  The many Kai-Lung stories that he wrote are highly imaginative, very witty, and sometimes brilliant in their messages.  Somehow, the stories are never racist or condescending, and can be read easily today.  This first volume, overall, is not up to the same level of sophistication as his later books in the series (from the 1920s), except for the novella, though there are a few stories that make reading the volume highly worthwhile.

An early edition. 

Next up, I finally returned to the works of Edgar Rice Burroughs!  Between the ages of about 12-16, I collected and read everything available at the time by this author, who greatly influenced me growing up.  Tarzan was a special hero of mine, and drew my mind towards the rain forest, and on to such works as Hudson's Green Mansions, among many others.  Though I read virtually all of the author's books, I did skip out on some of the later Tarzan novels (there were 24 in all), and I never read the Mars series, for some strange reason, even though I collected it.  Anyway, I started with his first published work, A Princess of Mars, which was serialized beginning in 1912, and finally published in book form in 1917.  Just after reading it, the SF lectures series I am watching discussed this book at length!  It combines SF and fantasy, mixes in the style of western pulp stories (of which Burroughs wrote several), and leads readers into a new world from which SF would never be the same.  Using what was known about Mars in 1912 (almost nothing), Burroughs takes us on an unforgettable adventure to a dying planet filled with monstrous alien beings, animals, ruined ancient cities, and people very much like humans.  Because everything is so new, there is a lot of explanation in the story, especially the first third or so.  But once things get going, the action is non-stop.  Having enjoyed Michael Moorcock's version of Burroughs' Mars stories, it's time now for the real thing.  Great fun from the earliest days of SF pulp writing.

 

 

The first cover, art by Schooner, is included in my Kindle edition.

Song of the Lion, by Anne Hillerman, marked my second female author project for this month.  Anne is Tony Hillerman's daughter, and she has carried on his Navajo mystery series, with the same characters and locations, but focusing more on a female officer introduced by Tony but not developed.  She takes that character and runs with it, and I'm sure her father would be proud of her accomplishments.  Though we have been to NM 38 times, we have not been to Shiprock, the area where many of the tales take place.  But readers learn a lot about Navajo life by reading the books.  This story takes place in and around Tuba City, AZ, and the Grand Canyon.  An easy read, it was my choice for my day of recuperation last month from a minor medical procedure I had undergone.  I finished it in one day.

Another fabulous Ballantine author whose writing I fell in love with was James Branch Cabell.  Thanks to Delphi Classics, I now have all his works on Kindle, with original covers and interior art work.  I read his very first novel, The Eagle's Shadow, which sounds a bit like a Navajo mystery story.  It isn't.  It is a drawing room comedy, with such subtle and delightful humour and turns of phrase, that from the outset Cabell was obviously a very fine writer.  The silly plot reminded me of a book by Wodehouse I read not long ago, and would make a fine comparison between the two works (the first Jeeves book).  Both authors are very good at storytelling, and both are hilarious.  But Cabell is so sly and subtle, his prose so low key and unintrusive, and his characters so finely carved, that there can be no mistaking the two writers.  Both are essential reading, but Cabell will be a major revelation to someone who has never encountered him before.  Before being published as a book in 1904, it was serialized in The Saturday Evening Post.

Last up for March was another book from the shelf, one I've had for many years awaiting its turn.  The Necropolis Railway, by Andrew Martin, is a murder mystery story set in London in 1903, specifically in and around Waterloo Station.  It follows the exploits of a young Yorkshire lad who wants to drive trains, fast ones, and gets hired on as a cleaner in London, the first step to becoming a driver.  He cleans engines that are used to run funerals out to Brookwood Cemetery, southwest of the city.  The book gives vivid descriptions of working class life in London at the time (gruesome), and a lot about the funeral railway.  In fact, this book sparked renewed interest in the history of that railway.  A fun read, though mostly for the environment of the time.

Before leaving off, I will include a few more pictures from our summer of /82 trip to Spain.  these next images are all from Segovia.  One of my favourite pics from that trip was the one of the aqueduct.  The other two are what I call "here and there" photos.  First, from the Alcazar looking out towards a Norman church, then back to the Alcazar from the inside of the church.

Roman aqueduct, downtown Segovia, Spain.

 

Looking towards a very old church from the Alcazar.

Looking back to the Alcazar from the church interior.  

Signing off for now.  Looking forward to a visit from Jenn G. on Monday.  There will be ale tasting with snacks, and some fun conversation.

Mapman Mike

 

 

December Books Read Part 2

 January has welcomed us with our first snowstorm of 2022.  That didn't take long!  Much colder air is arriving as well.  At least we are quite used to staying indoors by now.  That is one of the reasons why I read so many books in December.  I was finished my required reading last month by the 15th, so on the 16th I began the first of 6 books not related to the Avon/Equinox SF authors.  Three of the six books were real, live books, and three were Kindle reads.  Three were SF, one was an art book, one was classic fiction, and one was a mystery story.

First up was Station Eleven, a tale of post-apocalyptic Ontario and western Michigan after a virus has ravaged the world, killing over 99 % of the people very quickly.  Imagine my surprise as I neared the end of Emily St. John Mandel's absorbing novel to read in the Globe and Mail newspaper about a new HBO series just coming out called Station Eleven.  I will have to subscribe to another paid channel if I wish to see it, and I probably will.  The first episode should tell me if I will continue to watch.  I have read so many books in the past 5 1/2 years that I now much prefer them not to be made into anything to do with TV or movies.  But I will give this one a try soon.  There are ten episodes, and so far 5 have been released for viewing.  I liked the book a lot, though Emily owes much to writers like John Christopher and Edgar Pangborn, both who have written exceptional novels of post-apocalyptic life.  Highly recommended, the book was written in 2014, not long after the SARS scare.

Next up was Olaf Stapledon's first novel, called First And Last Men.  There are very few writers with superb imaginations that are able to put down on paper exactly what they are thinking, in terms that we mere mortals might comprehend.  This is a novel (from 1930) that greatly influenced generations of SF writers, and is still regarded as one of the best SF tales ever told.  It relates two billion years of human history, from today through then, in a most astonishing tale of success and failure.  What Stapledon has managed to do is provide enough material for future SF authors to write literally thousands of additional novels, filling in the details he has forced to skim over.  If ever there was a SF novel to end all SF novels, here it is.  It is a fairly long book, but broken up into manageable units, and not difficult to read if taken a bit at a time.  There is a lot of food to chew on, so chew slowly and enjoy.

Next up was another SF classic, this time a reread for me.  The House On The Borderland is from 1908, written by William Hope Hodgson, the man who brought us The Night Land.  I haven't read it in many years, and though it is much easier to see the flaws today, it is just as easy to become engrossed in one of the best horror novels ever composed, one that Lovecraft would try and copy many times.  The setting is a large, lonely house on the Moors, and it happens to sit atop a gaping hole that goes deep into the earth.  Very strange and threatening things happen at the house, and we are there for all of them.  This is a must read for fans of the genre.  Don't expect great writing, but expect some wonderful chills and mysterious doings.

Rock With Wings, by Anne Hillerman, is a continuation of her father's famous mystery stories set in Navajo land in new Mexico and Arizona.  She uses the same characters as Tony, but we now see things from a female officer's perspective.  Bernie Manuelito and Jim Chee are a couple, and they both are sworn officers of the Navajo police.  Their beat covers a vast area, thinly populated, where cell phone service is often absent, and even police car two way radios don't work.  This is her second book (she has six so far, and another on the way), and it is quite good.  We get a mix of police work and life on the reservation.  This plot involves a zombie movie production on location at Monument Valley.  Well done.

The Cincinnati Museum of Art has long attracted our attention, and when Deb had films accepted in the Cincinnati Film festival two years in a row, we visited the city again both times.  I was able to spend a luxurious day at the main art museum, one of two in the city.  I recently reread Dutch, Flemish, and German Art In The Cincinnati Museum of Art, a catalogue of paintings.  I was reading this while reading the above novels, focussing on a painting or two each day.  While the collection is much smaller than the one at the DIA (for example, Detroit has more 17th Century Flemish paintings than all of Cincinnati's Dutch, Flemish, and German art from all ages combined), there are choice paintings here that too many people will never see.  Like many museums, their choice Rembrandt selection was downgraded a few years ago to Studio Of..., but there are still plenty of autogrpah masterpieces to see.  I also have their Italian paintings catalogue, but now I am embarked on a DIA catalogue of American Art, Volume Three of their American painting collection (which is vast beyond words).  Cincinnati is a beautiful Midwest city of the shores of the Ohio River, and their main art museum is a world class institute that will never disappoint visitors, even ones like me who have been there many times.

Last, but not least, was Joseph Conrad's Outcast Of The Islands.  This was his second novel, though the events in it are related to Almayer's Folly, his first novel.  The events in Outcast take place prior to those in Almayer, with several of the same characters present.  No one writes like Conrad, or as well.  That man could handle a sentence, a paragraph, and a chapter in such masterful ways as to leave readers gaping open-mouthed at his prowess.  His use of nature as a foil to human emotions and deep, inner thoughts is brilliant and unique.  He tackles racism and White feelings of superiority head on, portraying characters not so much as mean or evil towards their "inferiors", but merely clueless as to what they are really like, their thinking and their potential.  Why are dark people inferior?  Because white people say so!  The story revolves around Wilhelms, a Dutchman with a respectable job with a major trading company.  He loses at poker and borrows from the company to pay his debts.  He is caught, disgraced, and forced to leave the area forever.  Captain Lingard (who is in all three related novels) takes him to Almayer, where he proves to be not only his own worst enemy, but Almayer's and Lingard's as well.  In my early 30s I first got seriously interested in reading Conrad.  Now that I have the Delphi collection of complete works, I can finally read his entire canon.  With greatest of pleasure.

If you have a few more minutes, I will go on to show another work of art from the DIA collection.  It's been awhile!  I think from time to time about one of the exhibits we saw in Vienna in December 2018.  The museum chooses a celebrity, allowing him or her to select anything from the storage rooms and to create an exhibit.  We happened upon one created by Wes Anderson, and it was totally brilliant!  I like to fantasize about me being allowed into storage at the DIA (I was allowed in once!), and being able to form an exhibit based on what I came across.  The last print exhibited here (False Faces), and this one, would likely be involved.   

Le Stryge, 1853.  Charles Meryon, French, 1872-1907.  Etching printed in black ink on Japan paper.  13" x 10".  Collection Detroit Institute of Arts.

2 details of above. 

There is some fresh snow on the ground, and the temp will remain below freezing all day today and tomorrow.  It feels like January.  On the bright side, the days are growing longer, and we are already 12 days into winter, being that much closer to Spring.  I would linger here, but there are books to read, movies to watch, piano pieces to practice, and laundry to do.  Until next time.

Mapman Mike