Reading Summary, August 2018

This month I read 12 books, which is a lot for me. One was very short, one was very long (for me). I don't know where I found the time to read all those books, but I do know I have energy for reading but often not enough mental energy for reviewing. I completed reading all the books on my 20 Books of Summer list (actually there were 21 on the list) but reviewed only 6 of them.

Three of the books I read this month were not crime fiction, which is unusual.

NON-GENRE FICTION in August

Starting Out in the Evening (1997) by Brian Morton

This book follows a short period in the life of four people: Leonard Schiller, a novelist in his seventies; Heather Wolfe, a woman in her early twenties who wants to write her thesis on Schiller's novels; Ariel, Leonard's daughter, who wants very much to have a child; and Casey, one of Ariel's ex-boyfriends. It was a wonderful read but very different from my usual reading. There is a film adaptation; I will be watching it soon.

The Uncommon Reader (2007) by Alan Bennett

I enjoyed this book very much, although of course it bears no resemblance to reality. The Queen ends up visiting a bookmobile on the grounds of Buckingham Palace because her Corgis are causing a ruckus in that area. She checks out a book with no real intention of reading it, but as she gives it a try she becomes intrigued and decides to check out a another book. And thus the Queen becomes a reader. For me, it was all about discovering reading and the joys of reading.

SCIENCE FICTION reading in August

The Time Traveler's Wife (2003) by Audrey Niffenegger

It is difficult to put this book in a category. It could just as easily (and more logically) be called a romance. Time travel books are usually categorized as science fiction but on the other hand, this one has very little science involved. For several days my reading time was spent mesmerized by this story and I had no complaints about the book at all. (I will follow up with a more detailed post eventually.)

CRIME FICTION reads in August:

Dark Passage (1946) by David Goodis

A noir novel about a man in prison for his wife's murder, which he did not commit. He manages to escape from prison and returns to San Francisco and the neighborhood he lived in to try to prove his innocence. We also watched the film adaptation which starred Bogart and Bacall. See my thoughts on the book and the film adaptation here.

Follow Her Home (2013) by Steph Cha

This book is  hard to describe. It starts out seeming light, even frothy, contrary to the descriptions of noir on the cover. It takes a long time to turn darker but when it does it gets very dark quickly. The protagonist, Juniper Song, is Korean American. Philip Marlow has always been her hero, and she models her "detecting" on his adventures (sort of). I don't think this would work for everyone but it did for me.

Death in the Clouds (1935) by Agatha Christie

In this Hercule Poirot mystery, a woman is killed on an airplane during a flight from Paris to Croydon. Her death isn't discovered until well into the flight. Hercule Poirot is a passenger on the airplane but he slept through most of the flight. My full review here.

The Limbo Line (1963) by Victor Canning

Richard Manston has quit his job in intelligence work but his old  boss has called him back for another assignment. It is an old story but by one of my favorite authors so I enjoyed it a lot. I would describe it as Alistain Maclean crossed with the James Bond books by Ian Fleming. Manston shows up in the Rex Carver series by Canning. 

Death on the Nile (1937) by Agatha Christie

My second Agatha Christie for the month! I liked it even more than Death in the Clouds, but this one was a good bit darker. The death occurs on a cruise along the Nile, and Hercule Poirot, along with his old friend Colonel Race, must solve the mystery. A large cast of interesting people. And we have watched the film adaptation with Peter Ustinov as Poirot.

The Cold, Cold Ground (2012) by Adrian McKinty

This is the first in a series of six books featuring Detective Sean Duffy of the Royal Ulster Constabulary. The book is set in Belfast of 1981, during the Irish Troubles, and Duffy is a Catholic cop in a primarily Protestant police force. Very good, and I hope to find a copy of the 2nd in the series soon.

A Cold Day For Murder (1992) by Dana Stabenow

Kate Shugak is a former investigator for the Alaska District Attorney's Office as this books starts. Her former boss talks her into taking on an assignment to investigate two men who have gone missing in the Alaskan wilderness. Kate is an Aleut, and very familiar with the area and the people. I had waited 12 years after I purchased my copy to read this book. What a mistake. I will be looking out for the next few books in this series. She has a lovely dog, and I loved the setting.

The Bigger They Come (1939) by A. A. Fair (aka Erle Stanley Gardner)

This was the first book in the Donald Lam and Bertha Cool series. This is the origin story. It was good to hear how Bertha and Donald got together. It was only the third book I have read in this series (since my youth) and definitely my favorite.

A Spy by Nature (2001) by Charles Cummings

Alec Milius is a natural liar, which makes him perfect for the espionage business. He gets involved in corporate espionage, but his work is guided by government departments, whether they admit it or not. It seems to be a very accurate picture of how lonely a person's life can become once he  becomes an agent. There is no one to trust, no one to turn to. It was very good read and based on the author's experience of having been recruited by MI6. I will be following this book up with the sequel, The Spanish Game.

Dark Passage: David Goodis

This is a dark novel about a man in prison for life for the murder of his wife, which he did not commit. Vincent Parry manages to escape from prison and returns to San Francisco and the neighborhood he lived in to try to prove his innocence. A young woman befriends him and helps him hide from the authorities.

He knows he must move on, that he cannot stay with her for long. She wants to buy him some clothes as all he has are some old clothes that he stole.

When he came back to the bedroom she was opening the paper boxes. 

It amounted to almost a wardrobe. Four shirts, three white and one grey. Five neckties, three grey and two on a grey-violet theme. Five sets of underwear and a stack of handkerchiefs. Six pairs of grey socks. A grey worsted suit with a vertical suggestion of violet. A pair of tan straight-tipped blucher shoes. And grey suspenders. 

There were other things. A military brush and a comb. A toothbrush and a jar of shaving cream and a safety razor. 

...  His hair was still damp from the shower and it moved nicely under the brush and comb. He had on one of the white shirts and a grey-violet tie and he put a white handkerchief in the breast pocket of the grey worsted suit. He felt very new and shining

The story is not told in first person narration but much of the story is revealed through the main character's internal dialog. His frustration and the build up of anger at his situation is portrayed in a realistic way. It was very well done.

The twists and turns are many and have a feeling of unreality at times, but it is a very compelling story. And I liked the ending. Shortly after that we watched the film adaptation. In both the book and the film, the San Francisco setting is used well.

This a very effective noir novel, but it isn't one that leaves you feeling entirely hopeless, and I was grateful for that.

David Goodis claimed that the TV series The Fugitive was based on Dark Passage. An article at Mystery*File discusses Goodis’ suit against United Artists TV in detail.

Comments on the movie...

The movie was very faithful to the book, but there is no way that a film can convey the protagonist's inner turmoil as effectively. I still enjoyed it a lot, and it has tremendous atmosphere and the wonderful San Francisco setting. And with two talented stars like Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, how can it not be worth watching? It isn't their best movie together but it is very good. Agnes Moorehead also stars as the woman who testified against him at the trial.

See these reviews. Many of them also comment on the movie. 

Ed Gorman's Blog

Barry Ergang's review at Kevin's Corner

His Futile Preoccupations .....

Vintage Pop Fictions

 -----------------------------

Publisher:   Library of America, 2012 (first published 1946)
Length:       190 pages
Format:       Hardback collection
Setting:      San Francisco
Genre:        Mystery
Source:       I purchased my copy.

Forgotten Books Not Yet Read

A couple of years ago I did a post on some forgotten books I had recently bought but not yet read. Lacking any other subject for a blog post this week, I thought I would try that again. This time I am featuring recent reprints or omnibus editions of older books.

Death Brings a Storke / 
Cradled in Fear  by Anita Boutell

From the back of the book....
In not at the birth but not long after the death is Dr. Archibald "Archie" Storke, when during a pleasant breakfast one morning with his wife Janey he receives a urgent call from the housekeeper at Whiteleaves,  home of Andrew Herrick, informing him that her employer has been discovered dead in his sitting room, with a ghastly gunshot wound to his head. It is thought Herrick committed suicide, but the doctor is doubtful... A classic tale of detection, Death Brings a Storke (1938) was the first published crime novel by Anita Boutell, an American expatriate chosen by mystery fiction scholar Howard Haycraft in his book Murder for Pleasure (1941) as one if the rising stars of British manners mystery, and has now been reprinted for the first time in nearly eighty years.

In Cradled in Fear. . . After a whirlwind courtship of three weeks, young Molly Nash, mostly alone in the world, married Sheridan "Sherry" Prescott. Now she has traveled with her handsome new husband to the old family mansion at Prescott's Point, Connecticut, a gloomy Victorian edifice clinging to a forbidding cliff overlooking Long Island Sound. But what did Molly really know about Sherry, and just what grim mysteries are hidden behind the walls of the house at Prescott's Point? What Molly does not know could be the death of her. . . .

Cradled in Fear was Anita Boutell's fourth and final crime novel and her only one set in the United States.

In 2014, I reviewed one of Boutell's other two books, Death has a Past. I was thrilled to discover this double volume, with a very detailed introduction, including biographical information, by Curtis Evans. See the post at The Passing Tramp about this book and lots more information about the author.

Poor Poor Ophelia  by Carolyn Weston

Next up is the book that was the basis for the pilot episode of the TV series, The Streets of San Francisco. Poor, Poor Ophelia was the first book in a brief series by Carolyn Weston. The series featured a pair of homicide detectives but in the books they were based in Santa Monica, California. Brash Books has brought these novels back into print. 

Just about a year ago I reviewed the second book in that series, Susannah Screaming. Now I plan to read this book and then re-watch the pilot of The Streets of San Francisco. We are big fans of this show. We have watched all the episodes of the first four seasons over the past year or so.

See this detailed post at the Rap Sheet, and the review at Col's Criminal Library.



David Goodis: Five Noir Novels of the 1940s and 50s  Edited by Robert Polito

Last but far from least is this omnibus of novels, which includes Dark Passage, Nightfall, The Burglar, The Moon in the Gutter, and Street of No Return.

I purchased this book because I have been wanting to read Dark Passage for years... and then watch the movie starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. Every time I look for a copy, everything I find is more expensive than I want to pay. Including this volume. What I really wanted was a vintage paperback, but those were even more expensive. So I finally gave in and now I will have access to four other novels by Goodis. Books that gather several novels in one book are not my favorites because they are heavy and unwieldy to read, but I will admit that the Library of America series of books are very nicely done.

Check out these very interesting posts on this volume:
At Criminal Element
Reviewed by Martin Walker at Mystery*File