Short Story Wednesday: Murder at the Foul Line

Today I am featuring two stories from Murder at the Foul Line, edited by Otto Penzler, and published in 2006. I have had this book for a long, long time. This one and Murder in the Rough, also edited by Penzler. This book got buried under a pile of books and I had almost despaired of ever finding it.

The theme for stories in this book is basketball, obviously. The subtitle is "Original Tales of Hoop Dreams and Deaths from Today’s Great Writers." I was a basketball fan for about a decade of my life, in the 1990s. I watched professional basketball games, focusing on the Lakers games of course. So I know enough about basketball to enjoy reading about the game but I am no expert.

The first story I read was "Shots" by S. J. Rozan. I have discussed short stories and novels by Rozan several times on this blog. Her Lydia Chin and Bill Smith series is one of the few contemporary mystery series that I keep up with, buying each book as it comes out. Lydia and Bill often work together on cases. Each book in the series is narrated by either Lydia or Bill.

This is a story featuring only Bill Smith and it was my fondness for the character and Rozan's writing that pulled me in. It was like getting a mini-dose of the series. The story was fairly long, 42 pages. 

The story is set in New York, and the team is the Knicks. Tony Manzoni, an investigator that Bill had worked with in the past, is one of the suspects in the murder of a star player for the Knicks, Damon Rome. The evidence is all circumstantial, but he is the prime suspect because he was playing around with the player's wife and he and Rome had a fight shortly before the murder. Bill takes on the case with the goal of finding out who really did it. He questions the wife, members of the team and those connected to management, etc. Nobody really liked Damon Rome and most people questioned don't have an alibi. It is a quiet story but I liked it.

The next story I read was "White Trash Noir" by Michael Malone. I have read novels by this author and one other short story, but now I can see I need to read more of his short stories. According to copyright dates in Murder at the Foul Line, this story was first published in 2006, but actually it first came out in a 2002 in a collection of Malone's short stories, Red Clay, Blue Cadillac: Stories of Twelve Southern Women (which is on my bookshelves). 

In "White Trash Noir," Charmain Luby Markell tells the story of her life leading up to when she killed her husband, at age 24. She is in court, on trial for that crime. Her lawyer wants her to get on the stand and tell her story; he is afraid that she will get the death penalty if she doesn't. As he says to Charmain: "This is Murder One, Charmain. You just cannot kill your husband in the state of North Carolina if he played ACC basketball." Charmain is more worried that her husband's parents will get custody of her young son. A fantastic story. Very emotional.

2021 Overview and Reading in December

 

2021 statistics ...

In 2021 I read 105 books. I usually aim at 84 books in a year, which would be seven books a month. In 2020 I read 113 books.

My reading continues to be focused on mystery novels. This year I read 69 mystery novels, which is less than last year. That group includes any historical mysteries and spy fiction I read. Of that total, 27 were published in 1960 or before, 26 were published between 1960 and 1999, 12 were published between 2000 and 2018, and only 4 were published in 2019-2021. The mysteries were divided almost equally between male and female authors. 

Other fiction reading was divided thus:

• Science fiction: 7
• Fantasy: 2
• General fiction: 8
• Historical fiction: 11

All of those numbers are up from last year, and I am pleased with that. I would like to read more science fiction in 2022.

I continued reading short stories every month, but I only completed one book of short stories. I have sampled stories from a lot of short story collections and anthologies, and I need to finish more of them this year. 

My nonfiction reading was much lower than last year. I only read 6 books in that genre. Of all the books I read, only 6 books were from my Classics List. That is another area I need to improve on. 

And now, on to books read in December 2021...

General Fiction

The Last Noel (2002) by Michael Malone

This book was set at Christmas and has a definite Christmas theme. It takes place in the small town of Moors, North Carolina. Noni (real name Noelle) is the daughter of the Tilden family, a rich and privileged family that has lived in the area for many years.  Kaye is the grandson of the Tilden's black maid, who has worked for the Tilden family for years. Kaye and Noni's relationship is viewed through twelve Christmases, starting in 1963 and ending in 2003. See review here.

High Rising (1933) by Angela Thirkell

This was one of the books set at Christmas, at least partially. I have been hearing about the Barsetshire series by Thirkell for years. At first I thought that they were not for me, but recently I became curious and decided I had to read one and I wanted to start at the beginning. I am glad I tried it, it was an entertaining read. I hope to continue the series, but there are 29 books in the series, so maybe that is a bit much. I will try to get through the books written during the war years, which is about half of them. 

Historical Fiction

Rules of Civility (2011) by Amor Towles

This is not a Christmas book, really, but the main story starts on New Year's Eve in 1937 and ends with a surprise Christmas gift two days before Christmas in 1938, so it felt like holiday reading to me. I loved this book. See review here.

Crime Fiction

Spence And The Holiday Murders (1977) by Michael Allen

This is the first book in the Detective Chief Superintendent Ben Spence series. It was an enjoyable read, the type of book I enjoy now and then, but it was a pretty standard 1970s police procedural. But is was set in the UK and around Christmas time, so a timely read.

Murder in the Snow: A Cotswold Christmas Mystery  (1950) by Gladys Mitchell

This book was originally published as Groaning Spinney, and it was the 23rd book in the Mrs. Bradley series. I read it as a part of a group read hosted at Jason Half's blog; there is commentary there from the group in four parts. It begins here and the final post is here.

As the subtitle above indicates, some of the action takes place at Christmas, when Mrs. Bradley is visiting her nephew and his wife, but the Christmas festivities are over very quickly. The investigation continues for months afterwards. I love the setting in the Cotswold and there are treks through the rural areas there. My only complaint is that the investigation drags on and on.

Pictures of Perfection (1994) by Reginald Hill

The 14th book in the Dalziel & Pascoe series. Pascoe is sent to a small village in Yorkshire to investigate the disappearance of one of their uniformed officers. Coincidentally, Sergeant Wield had just a few days previously stopped in the village on the way back from vacation and had a mild altercation with the missing village policeman. When he gets back from vacation, he is also sent to investigate, but neither of them finds any evidence of what has happened to the missing man. This entry in the series is Reginald Hill's version of a village cozy, and has much more humor than usual. 

Fortune Favors the Dead (2020) by Stephen Spotswood

This was Spotswood's debut novel and the first in the Pentecost and Parker series. The author is a fan of the Nero Wolfe series by Rex Stout and used it as inspiration in coming up with this detective duo. Since Rex Stout is my favorite mystery writer, I had to try the series. Lillian Pentecost is a successful private detective in her forties but she has multiple schlerosis and her health is failing. She hires Willowjean Parker, a young woman who ran off to work in the circus when she was 15, to be her assistant and offers to provide training in many areas. They are the perfect pair, and I loved the story. 

My husband took this photo at Mackenzie Park in Santa Barbara. The photo at the top of the post was taken at Lake Los Carneros located near Stow House in Santa Barbara County. Click on the images for best viewing quality.

The Last Noel: Michael Malone

This is a Christmas story, as the title indicates, with a serious topic.

Following is the description from the back of the book:

The Last Noel captures the exuberance and poignance of a lasting friendship between a man and a woman from very different backgrounds. Noni Tilden and Kaye King grow up and grow close as their lives come dramatically together through four decades of tumultuous change in a small southern town.

The story begins in 1963 when Kaye first meets Noni on the eve of their seventh birthdays. On that Christmas Eve, Kaye climbs through her bedroom window to invite her to come sledding with him in a rare southern snowfall. 

The story takes place in the small town of Moors, North Carolina. Noni (real name Noelle) is the daughter of the Tilden family, a rich and privileged family that has lived in the area for many years.  Kaye is the grandson of the Tilden's black maid, who has worked for the Tildens for years. Kaye and Noni's relationship is viewed through twelve Christmases, starting in 1963 and ending in 2003. 

The two main characters are both flawed, but very sympathetic. Many secondary characters are also memorable. My favorite is Kaye's grandfather (by marriage), Tatlock, a very vocal, colorful character who later in life starts painting and gains fame for his paintings.

I don't often read books set in the South, but this one covered from 1963 through the 1990s and handled racism and politics of that time pretty well. I enjoyed it because it is well-written and touches on events that happened in my own lifetime; it covers the Viet Nam war, politics, civil rights, the moon landing, and the music over the decades. 

The description at the publisher's website emphasizes the romance in this book, which there is little of. The description on the back of my book focuses on the lifelong friendship between the two main characters.

I have read two of Michael Malone's mysteries and some of his short stories. The crime fiction stories are darker. My review of Time's Witness is here and reviews of short stories from Red Clay, Blue Cadillac: Stories of Twelve Southern Women are here and here. This book was very different; it was a much more sentimental story.

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Publisher:  Sourcebooks, 2002.
Length:     292 pages
Format:    Trade paperback
Setting:     North Carolina
Genre:      Historical Fiction
Source:     Purchased in 2005.

Deal Me In 2015: More Short Stories

This year has passed by fast for me. Work has been very busy during the second half of the year, and that has meant less time and energy for reading, reviewing, and blogging. I fell far behind on my short story challenge and I intend to catch up because I plan to continue on the challenge in 2016.

For the Ace of Spades, I read "Stella: Red Clay" from Red Clay, Blue Cadillac by Michael Malone. It was a corker. Just wonderful. Set in a small town in the South, it is the story of Stella Dora Doyle, a has-been movie star, and Buddy Hayes, whose father dated her when they were in high school. Stella is on trial for murder after her husband is found shot with her gun outside their mansion.

The story follows Buddy and his encounters with Stella from his childhood into adulthood. Both he and his father have been mildly obsessed with Stella all their lives. It is a brief but telling picture of a small town and how its denizens react to the ups and downs of Stella's life.

The story won the Edgar Allan Poe Award in 1997.

I covered another story in Malone's book of short stories back in February ("Marie: Blue Cadillac"), and I am going to repeat some parts of that post here.

January Magazine featured a very long article by J. Kingston Pierce on Michael Malone's books, including an interview, in December 2002. Here is a extract from the interview related to Red Clay, Blue Cadillac.

Can you tell me what, in your mind, distinguishes Southern women from those reared in other parts of the United States?

They're like women in other parts of America, just more so. As Gloria Steinem said about Ginger Rogers: She was doing everything Fred Astaire was doing, just doing it backwards in high heels. Well, Southern women are doing and enduring what other women have to do and endure, but (at least until recently) they had to do it in heels and hats and white gloves and makeup and a sweet smile, with maybe a glass of bourbon and a cigarette to get them through the magnolia part of being a steel magnolia. The women in Red Clay, Blue Cadillac are all very strong people. Sometimes they have to pretend otherwise.

That description -- "white gloves and makeup and a sweet smile" -- is so true and very disturbing. 

I have also read two of Malone's novels, also set in the South: Uncivil Seasons and Time's Witness.

My list of short stories is here. Jay at Bibliophilopolis hosts the challenge.

Deal Me In 2015: Story #4 ("Marie: Blue Cadillac" by Michael Malone)

Every other week I draw a random card to determine what short story I will read for the Deal Me In Short Story challenge. My list of short stories is here. Jay at Bibliophilopolis hosts the challenge.

This week I drew the 2 of Spades, which corresponded to the story titled "Maria: Blue Cadillac" from a book of twelve stories about Southern women, Red Clay, Blue Cadillac. The stories are all written by Michael Malone. It shows how much I admire his writing when I purchase a book of his short stories, all very Southern in flavor, or so the reviews say. I usually avoid Southern literature.

"Marie: Blue Cadillac" by Michael Malone

I am discovering that a person's reactions to a short story is a very personal thing. (Sounds obvious but I am new to this.) In reviews I have read on this book of short stories, some reviewers pick this as the best story, others don't like it at all. 

On my first read of this story, I did not care for it at all. It felt like it had no structure. It seemed more like a vignette, like a small snapshot. I had a hard time getting into it and it ended somewhat ambiguously. 

I don't know if I read it too fast or I was too tired, but on a second read, I found it does have more depth.  The characterizations are good; some of the descriptions are wonderful. This story seemed like two stories intertwined. Marie is a beautiful young blonde, driving to Graceland in a blue Cadillac convertible to fulfill her mother's last wish. Braxton is "a high-tech sales rep going home to Memphis for his mama's sake to eat Thanksgiving dinner." His stewardess wife has just left him for a Brazilian oilman. They end up spending a few hours together.

January Magazine featured a very long article by J. Kingston Pierce on Michael Malone's books, including an interview, in December 2002. Here is a extract from the interview related to Red Clay, Blue Cadillac.

Can you tell me what, in your mind, distinguishes Southern women from those reared in other parts of the United States?

They're like women in other parts of America, just more so. As Gloria Steinem said about Ginger Rogers: She was doing everything Fred Astaire was doing, just doing it backwards in high heels. Well, Southern women are doing and enduring what other women have to do and endure, but (at least until recently) they had to do it in heels and hats and white gloves and makeup and a sweet smile, with maybe a glass of bourbon and a cigarette to get them through the magnolia part of being a steel magnolia. The women in Red Clay, Blue Cadillac are all very strong people. Sometimes they have to pretend otherwise.

By the way, I hear that Sourcebooks had another title in mind for this collection of stories.

They wanted to call it All the Wrong Women, but I told them that you obviously don't know Southern women. Just because they murder their husbands doesn't make them bad people.

That statement -- "white gloves and makeup and a sweet smile" -- is so true and very disturbing. My feelings about that subject probably mean I would benefit from reading more books about and set in the South, not less.

Favorite Reads of 2014

I read lots of books this year, mainly mystery novels as usual. I wish I could read twice as many books in a year. I neglected Agatha Christie and Ed McBain totally this year, and I had wanted to start reading Elmore Leonard and read much more of Len Deighton's books than I did.

I did read many great books by wonderful authors this year. I enjoyed almost all of them and it is hard to narrow it down to the ones that really resonated with me. But here is my stab at a list. I did go over 10 books but not by much.

The Danger Within by Michael Gilbert. 
Published in 1952, it is an exceptional story of men incarcerated in a prison camp in Italy toward the end of World War II. The book also includes a mystery, featuring an amateur detective, a prisoner in the camp who is asked to look into the circumstances of the death of a fellow prisoner.

The Little Shadows by Marina Endicott 
This is a historical novel set in the years preceding and during World War I (and the only non-mystery fiction on this list). It is the story of three sisters, teenagers as the story begins, who travel with their mother to support the family as a vaudeville act. I am very interested in vaudeville, and I don't know as much as I would like about the history of vaudeville. I found this book very readable, entertaining, with interesting characters.

Touchstone by Laurie R. King
This historical novel is set in the UK in 1926 and the story centers around the weeks leading up to the general strike. Harris Stuyvesant is an agent of the United States Justice Department's Bureau of Investigation, and he has arrived in England to track down the man responsible for terrorist bombings in the US.

The Cairo Affair by Olen Steinhauer
A spy thriller, which takes place during the activities of the Arab Spring, in February 2011. Sophie Kohl's husband Emmett is currently working at the American embassy in Hungary, but his previous assignment was in Cairo. Both of them have friends still in Cairo, and when Emmett is killed, Sophie seeks the reasons for his death there. 

Time's Witness by Michael Malone
This is the second book in a police procedural series. Cuddy Mangum is the narrator and the Chief of Police in Hillston, North Carolina. Cuddy is educated, but he is not refined, and to the powerful and rich inner circle of Hillston residents, he is a redneck. The book was published in 1989 and set around the same time period. The story in this book centers on George Hall, a black man arrested seven years earlier for killing a white cop. He is now on death row and supporters are seeking a reprieve or pardon. 

Eleven Days by Donald Harstad
Carl Houseman is a deputy sheriff working the night shift in the small town of Maitland, Iowa. He is sent to the scene of a crime after a 911 call comes in. At the scene, he finds a dead man but the woman who made the call is not found. By the next morning, a second crime scene has been found with three more bodies, and the two crimes seem to be related. The small department, with the help of state investigative agencies, works for the next eleven days to solve the crime.

9tail Fox by Jon Courtenay Grimwood 
This novel is fantasy blended with mystery, and the mystery elements were stronger in this novel than in many cross-genre novels. In addition to the noir thriller elements, this is the story of a journey of a man to understanding himself and his isolation from others. I enjoyed the book as much for the personal story of Bobby Zha as for the mystery.

I Am Pilgrim by Terry Hayes
I am very fond of espionage fiction, so it is no surprise that I liked this. The central character, the spy who has run an elite espionage unit in the past, has had many identities and many code names. Of those who even know of him, he is a legend. But he has reached a point in his life when he has left spying behind and is in a new untraceable identity.  Then several events come together to force him back into the spy game.

World of Trouble by Ben H. Winters 
Book III in the The Last Policeman trilogy, following the activities of policeman Hank Palace in a pre-apocalyptic world. An asteroid is headed for earth, and from the beginning of the series we know that it will be devastating. I also read Countdown City, Book II in the series, this year, and I rated it as highly as this one. In this final book, Hank goes on an odyssey to try to locate his sister before the asteroid hits.

Enigma by Robert Harris
Set in 1943, this book uses Bletchley Park and the code breaking efforts there as a background for a mystery. Tom Jericho had left Bletchley to recuperate in Cambridge after a nervous breakdown resulting from the stress of his work. Now he is asked to return to help in a new effort to break Enigma codes.

Garnethill by Denise Mina
Set in the city of Glasgow, this novel deals with tough topics: incest, patient abuse, drugs, unemployment, dysfunctional families. It is a very dark story. There is an optimistic resolution, but many of the characters in the book are not very pleasant people. Nor is there the possibility for a truly happy ending.

Kerrie of Mysteries in Paradise is collecting lists of  top crime fiction reads for 2014. Check them out HERE.

Mysteries in April and Picks of the Month

In April I read seven books, all mysteries. My reading included books set in four countries: one in Canada, one in Australia, two in the UK, and three in the USA.

It was a strange month for reading. I had a trip planned to visit my family in Alabama late in the month and most of my activities centered around that. My mother has health problems and my sister is her primary caregiver, so my thoughts have been focused on that for a while. I hate to fly and it is a long trip, but the positive factor is the reading I can get done in the air and on the ground (assuming I can get good light).

I have only reviewed four of the books I read.  I did have access to a computer to work on, but there was neither time nor energy to write reviews while I was in Alabama. So once I can get my thoughts on the books together, I will be catching up on reviews.

The books I read in April are:

Time's Witness by Michael Malone
The Burning by Jane Casey
Original Sin by David Mark
The Golden Spiders by Rex Stout
The Night the Gods Smiled by Eric Wright
Eleven Days by Donald Harstad
A Few Right Thinking Men by Sulari Gentill

I am not sure it is fair to pick a favorite for the month when I have not had time to digest and review my feelings for nearly half the books. This is especially true because so many of the books I read this month had wonderful qualities, yet none of the new books that I read for the first time this month really rose above the others.

I will feature two of the books I felt are worth highlighting:

Time's Witness, is the second book in a police procedural series. Cuddy Mangum is the narrator and the Chief of Police in Hillston, North Carolina. Cuddy is educated, but he is not refined, and to the powerful and rich inner circle of Hillston residents, he is a redneck. The book was published in 1989 and set around the same time period. The story in this book centers on George Hall, a black man arrested seven years earlier for killing a white cop. He is now on death row and supporters are seeking a reprieve or pardon. This is a very long book and there are many characters, but Malone does a beautiful job with them all. There are some quirky characters and the story is told with humor at times. Yet it is a very serious story. The themes are the death penalty, racism, inequity in the justice system, and the power that the rich can wield to get what they want. The author is passionate about his beliefs; telling the story via Cuddy make this more palatable.

The Nero Wolfe novels by Rex Stout are always a joy to read, and I have read all of them more than once. The Golden Spiders is typical in some ways: we get to see some of the activities in Wolfe's home, his love for food, his quirks, and we get the final gathering of suspects where Wolfe reveals the killer. However, in this novel, Nero Wolfe uncharacteristically agrees to work with a young boy from his neighborhood on a potential case of possible kidnapping. Archie and Wolfe and his pack of freelance detectives investigate a group of people taking advantage of poor immigrants who are seeking help in getting settled in this country.

This story seemed unusual to me because Archie, Fred, Saul and Orrie actually get into a gun fight with some thugs. Archie often carries a gun, but rarely uses it. The plot is very convoluted and the book is shorter than some Nero Wolfe novels. My copy was 150 pages. The first eight Nero Wolfe novels were all around 300 pages long.

The Crime Fiction Pick of the Month meme is hosted at Mysteries in Paradise. Bloggers link to a summary post for the month, and identify a crime fiction best read of the month.

Time's Witness: Michael Malone

Michael Malone is the author of three mystery novels that feature two policemen working in a small town in North Carolina. The two policemen are very different. Justin Savile V is the scion of an old and important family in the state. Cuddy Mangum's origins are much lower, but he and Justin are very good friends.

The first novel in the short series, Uncivil Seasons, is narrated by Justin. In that novel, Justin is charged with solving the murder of his Aunt Cloris, the wife of State Senator Rowell Dollard. I read that book years ago, and all I really remember is that I enjoyed it a lot, and bought several more books written by Malone, both in the mystery genre and not, shortly after that.

Time's Witness, the second in the series and the book I just finished reading, is narrated by Cuddy. Cuddy is educated, but he is not refined, and to the powerful and rich inner circle of Hillston residents, he is a redneck. And at the point in time of this story, he is the Chief of Police. He has cleaned up the police in his town and he has hired women and blacks as police officers. The book was published in 1989 and set around the same time period.

The story in this book centers on George Hall, a black man arrested seven years earlier for killing a white cop. He is now on death row and supporters are seeking a reprieve or pardon. One day after Hall is granted a reprieve, his younger brother, Cooper,  is murdered. About half of the book centers on the investigation of the murder, which leads to the discovery of corruption in the police department and further up in the local and state government. The other half centers on the retrial of George Hall.

This is a very long book and there are many characters, but Malone does a beautiful job with them all. There are some quirky characters and the story is told with humor at times. Yet it is a very serious story. The themes are the death penalty, racism, inequity in the justice system, and the power that the rich can wield to get what they want. The author is passionate about his beliefs; telling the story via Cuddy make this more palatable.

I highly recommend this novel, but I will warn readers that it is not a typical mystery. There is a mystery and the mystery and trial are the primary focus of the book; yet within the frame of a crime story this is the story of a man, his job, his friends, and his love life. The book can easily stand alone; I read the first one so long ago I remember only the two main characters. On the other hand, if the reader comes to the first book after this one some plot points might be revealed. Either way, these are books worth reading.

J. Kingston Pierce (of the Rap Sheet)  interviewed Michael Malone in 2002 for January Magazine. The article and interview are very informative.

The book was published in 1989. It falls at the very end of the range for the Silver Edition of the Vintage Mystery Challenge, hosted by Bev at My Reader's Block.

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Publisher: Sourcebooks Landmark [2002], original pub. in 1989
Length: 541 pages
Format: trade paperback

Series: Justin and Cuddy, book 2