Two Country Music Mysteries

In this post I am covering two humorous mystery novels set in the country music world. 

The first book was Fender Benders by Bill Fitzhugh, published in 2001. I read it in February.

This book is about a young country music singer in Nashville who makes it big with his first song. Eddie Long has high ambitions to become a big star and has been playing small gigs in Alabama and Mississippi; then his wife dies, possibly a suicide, and he heads for Nashville. He writes a song inspired by her death, and is noticed by a pair of well-known producers, Big Bill Herndon and Franklin Peavy. 

Jimmy Rogers, a freelance journalist, is writing Eddie's biography; he and Eddie had been planning the book since before Eddie went to Nashville. Jimmy gets shut out of the rights to the biography by Eddie's managers but decides to go ahead; while gathering facts, he begins to suspect that Eddie killed his wife. As the story moves along it gets darker and darker. 

There were many things I liked about Fender Benders, including reading about the country music business, how albums are made and such, but almost all of the characters are very unlikable. Sometimes I am OK with that, but this time it did not work well for me. There are funny moments throughout, but the story is also very dark and cynical.  It was the great plotting and pacing which kept me reading, and I had to know how it ended. 

A possible problem for some readers is that although one murder is solved, the one that starts the whole story is kind of left hanging.  

In early March, I started Baby, Would I Lie? by Donald E. Westlake, published in 1994. This next book was suggested to me by Todd Mason at Sweet Freedom, since it also had a country music theme. It had been on my shelves for six years, and it was a good companion read to Fender Benders.

Baby, Would I Lie? is part of a two-part series (a duology). In the first book, Trust Me on This, Sara Joslyn and Jack Ingersoll are working for the Galaxy, a supermarket tabloid that pays its employees three times the going rate but also demands that they use any means possible, often illegal and demeaning, to get the news. In the following book, Sara and Jack have escaped the Galaxy and are working at Trend, a Manhattan weekly magazine. Sara has been sent to Branson, Missouri, a center for live entertainment and tourism, to cover the trial of country singer Ray Jones for the rape and murder of Belle Hardwick. Staff from the Galaxy are also setting up in Branson, looking for any dirt that they can rake up.

I liked the character portrayals. Sara has a lot of sympathy with Ray Jones, and understands the love that his fans have for him, but she is there for the story. Jack is now her boss at Trend, but his main goal is to get revenge on the Galaxy and expose the underhanded methods they use. Ray Jones doesn't seem at all worried by the trial. All the evidence against him is circumstantial. A side plot concerns a large amount of money that Ray owes to the IRS. And there are many interesting secondary characters that go beyond caricatures.

This book was more of a fun read than Fender Benders and a different look at the country music industry. This one also focused on journalism as the main characters worked for a weekly magazine. 

Important things to know:

• The mystery (did Ray Jones actually murder Belle Hardwick and if not, who did) is not central to the story. 
• It is not necessary to read the first book in the Sara and Jack series, both can stand alone. But they work better as a pair.
• Some reviewers felt that the portrayal of Branson, Missouri, and the tourists who visit, is mean-spirited. In retrospect, I can see that, although I did not take it too seriously. 

Reading Summary for February 2023

 

I did not read a lot this month but I enjoyed all of my reading. I was reading The Sisters: The Saga of the Mitford Family by Nancy S. Lovell throughout the month, off and on; it was a very slow read for me. I recently finished that book (on March 10) and I have already started reading The Mitfords: Letters between Six Sisters (which is over 800 pages).

Nonfiction / Books about Books

Books for Living (2016) by Will Schwalbe

On Goodreads, in his author bio, Schwalbe describes Books for Living as a book "about the role books can play in our lives and how they can show us how to live each day more fully and with more meaning." Each chapter focuses on a book that he has read that is special to him, and what he learned from it. This book can also be categorized as a memoir, and those parts of it are interesting also. This book counts for the Bookish Books Reading Challenge hosted by Bloggin' 'bout Books.

Graphic novel

A Man and His Cat, Vol. 2 (2018) by Umi Sakurai (Writer and Artist)

This is a short graphic novel from Japan about a widower who lives alone and decides to get a cat for the first time. This second volume provides some hints to his life with his wife and flashbacks to his childhood and continues to emphasize his love and enjoyment of his cat. I have started reading volume 3. Per Goodreads, there are now 10 books in the series.  

Cartoon Collection

Revenge of the Librarians (2022) by Tom Gauld

I have seen Tom Gauld's cartoons from time to time on the internet, but this is the first collection of his comics that I have read. Some are about librarians and libraries. Some are about the writing process, or TBR piles, or bookshelves. Not all of them are about books but a large percentage of them are. Some of my favorites are lockdown humor from during the pandemic. This book also counts for the Bookish Books Reading Challenge. 

Crime Fiction

The Cover Wife (2021) by Dan Fesperman

This is the second book in an espionage series by Dan Fesperman. The main character in this book is Claire Saylor, a CIA agent stationed in Paris who is sent to Hamburg, Germany to pose as the wife of an academic. I will definitely be reading the third book in the series, which returns to an earlier time in Claire's career. See my review.

Bullet Train (2010) by Kotaro Isaka

I read this book for the Japanese Literature Challenge hosted at Dolce Bellezza. The book was adapted to film and I saw the film first. I liked the book a lot, and the train setting was a plus. My review here.

Fender Benders (2001) by Bill Fitzhugh

This is a humorous mystery about the county music business in Nashville. There were many things I liked about it, including reading about the country music business, but almost all of the characters are very unlikable. Yet I still found this to be a compelling read and I had to know how it ended.

Currently reading

In addition to reading the letters of the Mitford Sisters, which I am sure I will be taking breaks from, I am also reading The Mask of Memory by Victor Canning. This is the 3rd book in an espionage series about a "dirty tricks" department in British Intelligence. 

Status of challenges

• Fender Benders by Bill Fitzhugh was my first read for the 2023 TBR Pile Challenge.
• I have now read two books for the Bookish Books Reading Challenge.
• Four of the books I read in February count for the Mount TBR Reading Challenge, for a total of 10 (out of my goal of 48).

We recently revisited the grounds of Stow House, on a rare day when we had overcast skies, which is great for taking photos. The images at the top and bottom of the post were taken on that walk. It was in late January after the rains and the area was so much more green and beautiful.

My husband took the photos. Click on the images for the best viewing quality.

500th Post! More Skulls and Skeletons

For my 500th post, I thought I would celebrate by featuring one of my favorite things... mysteries with skulls or skeletons on the cover. Only one of the books in this post has been featured on the blog before, and my goal is to read all of these by the end of the year.

Murder Sunny Side Up is the first book in a series about Congressman Ben Safford. The series was written by Emma Lathen under the pseudonym R. B. Dominic. At least ten years ago, I discovered the existence of this series. Being a big fan of the other books by Emma Lathen, I searched for books in the series. This book was very hard to find at a reasonable price, but my wonderful and dedicated husband found it (and three others in the series) at a used book store in the San Jose area.

Emma Lathen was the  joint pseudonym of Mary Jane Latsis, an economist, and Martha B. Henissart, a lawyer. From Whodunit? A Who's Who in Crime & Mystery by Rosemary Herbert:

The pair introduced their most famous character, John Putnam Thatcher, executive vice president of Sloan Guaranty Trust, in Banking on Death (1961). During a thirty-six-year collaboration, they portrayed Thatcher as using business savvy and urbane wit to investigate mysteries in a variety of business settings. In Murder Sunny Side Up (1968), under the joint pseudonym R. B. Dominic, they introduced another popular series character, Congressman Ben Safford. Safford solves crimes mostly set in Washington, D.C. The success of both series had much to do with the authors' ability to make readers feel like insiders in the worlds they depicted.

I have read three of the seven books in the Ben Safford series. I have copies of all of them.

There are seven mystery novels starring Masao Masuto, a Japanese-American detective in the Beverly Hills Police Department who grows roses and practices Zen meditation. The mysteries were written by Howard Fast,using the pseudonym E. V. Cunningham.The first was The Case of the Angry Actress (1967, originally published as Samantha). I enjoyed the first book in the series mostly because of the setting (Southern California), the time period it was written in, and the political and social commentary.

The last book in the series was The Case of the Murdered Mackenzie (1984).  Since it came 17 years later, it will be interesting to see how it compares.

Andrew Macdonald discusses Masuto in Howard Fast: A Critical Companion:

The detective hero Masuto combines Buddhist meditation with Holmesian ratiocination to make intuitive leaps of both reason and imagination that leave his colleagues and superiors puzzling over the assumptions that further investigation, physical evidence, and testimony confirm. The close observation that allows the Buddhist in Masuto to see beauty where others see ugliness also allows him to see the mundane, the corrupt, and the repulsive behind the beautiful facade of Beverly Hills. These stories look at the wealthy California scene from the perspective of an outsider, racially, culturally, and economically. Masuto can bring Asian perceptions to unraveling the mysteries of his adopted community and counters the mainstream disintegration of family values with his own deep-seated commitment to home and family.

I have had Fender Benders over ten years. The edition I bought was a trade paperback with skeleton playing the guitar. I don't think I bought the book just for the cover, but this book is clearly humorous and that is not strictly my kind of mystery. Maybe I was trying to broaden my horizons.

Author description at Amazon:

Bill Fitzhugh was born and raised in Jackson, Mississippi. He has also lived in the U.S. Virgin Islands, Seattle, Washington, and Los Angeles. He writes satiric crime novels, the occasional comic mystery, and for five years, wrote, produced and hosted "Fitzhugh's All Hand Mixed Vinyl" for the Deep Tracks channel of Sirius-XM Satellite Radio.

Story synopsis from the author's site:

Fender Benders is set primarily in Nashville. The backdrop is the country music industry. The story was originally going to be in the pop/rock music industry set in Los Angeles, but my agent kept telling me to do something set in the south, so I guess this is it. Suffice it to say there are some murders, some attempted murders, and some other nefarious activities. Oh, and lots of fried food.

I bought the hardcover edition above (for the cover of course) at the Planned Parenthood book sale last year.

A year and a half ago I purchased Sugar Skull (2003) by Denise Hamilton at the Planned Parenthood book sale. Sugar Skull is the second in a five book series about Eve Diamond, a journalist in the Los Angeles area. Recently I read and reviewed the first book, The Jasmine Trade, and I hope to read this book before the end of 2015.

Review at Publisher's Weekly:

In Edgar finalist Hamilton's (The Jasmine Trade) passionate new puzzle, feisty Los Angeles Times reporter Eve Diamond is anxious to advance from the Valley to a more prestigious desk downtown. She gets her chance when, while writing the roundup of weekend murders, she's confronted by a man frantic to find his runaway daughter. Then the nude body of beautiful socialite Venus Della Viglia Langdon, wife of mayoral candidate Carter Langdon III, turns up in the couple's pool. These two seemingly unconnected occurrences reverberate across the vast urban sprawl that is home to one of the country's most diverse populations. The Mexican Day of the Dead festivities are in progress, and the little sugar skulls given to mark the occasion appear in the strangest places. Eve is soon immersed in the down and dirty worlds of runaways, a high-powered political campaign and the exploding Latin music scene—and caught up in a torrid affair with Silvio Aguilar, son of a music-industry tycoon and Venus's brother. The tenacious Eve discovers that even the most twisted and distant paths can converge, that very little separates the privileged from the desperate and that it's all-too-easy to step over the line of journalistic ethics, become part of the story and maybe wind up dead.