Books & writing – Page 14 – Pop Culture Nerd

L.A. TIMES Festival of Books Slide Show

As promised, here’s a slide show of the good times I had at the book festival. This was done in fun so please don’t anyone sue me.

All kidding aside, I know how fortunate I am to have this festival in my backyard every year, even luckier that I have books to read. Thank you to the amazing authors and friends who made this weekend a memorable one for me.

(To read what I learned at the festival, click here. For Jen’s detailed recap of “The Kingpins” panel, go here.)

Photos by Jen Forbus, le0pard13, Brett Battles and me, but mostly them.

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L.A. TIMES Festival of Books Highlights, Part 1

This past weekend was the annual L.A. Times Festival of Books held on the UCLA campus. As usual, the Mystery Bookstore kicked off the festivities with their party Friday night, where authors and fans can schmooze and booze. Normally, I’d rather be thrown out of a speeding car than be subjected to large crowds, but I had a fantastic time because I got to meet some incredible people.

From L.: me, Christine, Jen. Photo by Brett Battles

I have to mention two in particular: Jen Forbus and Christine, who regularly liven up this site with their insightful, witty comments and have become my cyber pals. They flew in from Ohio and Tennessee, respectively, and are even more spectacular in person. We officially met at the party but I felt like I’d known them for years. They’re the kind of people who make me want to be better.

It would take me 27 days to recap all the fun I had so I’ll just share a few things I found out this weekend (Jen has a more detailed report on the party here). I also put together a slide show here and for even more party photos, click on le0pard13’s post here.

Some tidbits I learned from the party and book festival:

Michael Connelly‘s next book, The Reversal, has defense attorney Mickey Haller in a prosecutorial role (Harry Bosch is also in it; the novel comes out this October).
Sophie Littlefield is 8′ 5″ in heels and owns it. You also have to stand in line to talk to her at parties because she’s so popular and has every reason to be.
Like me, Brett Battles hates it when characters repeatedly address each other by name in conversation.
T. Jefferson Parker’s fourth Charlie Hood novel, The Border Lords, is slated for release January 2011.
Juliet Blackwell speaks Vietnamese.
Reed Farrel Coleman says he writes good sex scenes.
Lisa Lutz‘s next book, a standalone, sounds really cool; the writing process she used is interesting (don’t know if I’m allowed to talk about it yet). Putnam’s releasing it next year.
According to Connelly, Robert Crais is only on his first station of manhood.
Dipping cheese cubes into dip is too much.
le0pard13‘s son, little le0pard, is going to be as awesome a man as his dad.
Gregg Hurwitz has an impressive eye for fashion accessories.
After The Sentry, another Joe Pike adventure (available early next year), Crais will write an Elvis Cole novel.

OK, my bed just called and my exhausted self said, “Coming!” Check out the slide show, featuring photographic evidence of rampant misbehavior, only some of which was mine.

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What’s in a Name?

I recently asked Robert Crais fans in the Craisie Town part of my forum how their feelings about Elvis Cole would be affected if he’d been named something else, like Larry Jones. Blogger le0pard13 said he probably wouldn’t have started reading the books if that were the case, especially if Larry’s partner was named something like Lev Coen instead of Joe Pike.

This got me thinking about how character names play a large part in determining whether or not we want to read or watch something. Can you imagine Mark Twain’s tale about Huckleberry Finn being called The Adventures of Herbert Melton? Would 007 be as popular if he introduces himself as “Luftenhoser. Stan Luftenhoser”?

I think for the most part, authors put a lot of thought into character names, trying to make the moniker represent the personality. Crais has said he chose Elvis for his P.I. to let readers know they’re getting someone a little different, not your typical hard-drinking loner detective. Michael Connelly has made known Hieronymous (Harry) Bosch is named after the painter who created visions of chaos because Harry encounters chaos at every murder scene. And I think the last name of Sophie Littlefield‘s Stella Hardesty sounds like “hard as steel,” which she is.

So, have you ever picked up a book simply because you liked a protagonist’s name? Ever shunned a novel or movie because you didn’t? What if Harry Potter had been Harvey Scarsburn?

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Mysterious Allure of Greece and the Greek Detective

When Jen over at Jen’s Book Thoughts invited bloggers to participate in her Detectives Around the World theme week, I knew I wanted to write about someone from the Greek islands. Never mind that I’d never read or heard of any fictional detectives from there; I was determined to spotlight the most beautiful places I’d ever visited and I’ve been to Arkansas so that’s saying a lot.

My initial Internet research turned up several novels that took place in the years Before Christ. Pass. I wouldn’t know anything about Greek settings in those times and don’t have any pictures of ancient bath houses or the Parthenon when it was new.

Luckily, I finally discovered Anne Zouroudi‘s series about a mysterious Greek detective named Hermes Diaktoros, named after the Greek messenger god with the golden winged sandals (AKA the FTD logo). Though the first three books are already available in the U.K., with a fourth coming out this summer (Zouroudi plans seven books for the series, each covering one of the Deadly Sins), the first installment, The Messenger of Athens, doesn’t arrive in the U.S. until July from Reagan Arthur Books. It’s about time, because this unique series is a welcome addition to crime fiction.

Messenger takes place on the imaginary island of Thiminos and begins with a young woman’s battered body being found at the bottom of a cliff. The chief of police is quick to label it a suicide, but Diaktoros, an investigator from Athens who’s referred to as “the fat man,” arrives to dig more deeply into the case. No one knows who sent him, what his end game is, how he knows people’s secrets, or why he’s compulsive about keeping his tennis shoes pristinely white at all times. Though many try to avoid answering his questions, the fat man eventually unearths the real story behind the woman’s death—one which involves the Deadly Sin of lust—and administers his own brand of justice.

This novel satisfied many interests for me: mysteries, Greek mythology, and everyday life on a Greek island (more on that later). In mythology, Hermes is Zeus’s son, the messenger between the Olympian gods and humans. The fat man’s evasiveness whenever someone asks who he’s working for—coupled with other subtle clues—implies he’s not just a namesake of the god. Don’t worry if that sounds a little too mythological for you; Diaktoros is a stout, earthy presence, albeit one with slightly unusual methods of solving mysteries.

Zouroudi, who was nominated in 2008 for ITV3’s Crime Thriller Awards for Breakthrough Author of the Year, has a timeless style evocative of Agatha Christie’s, which is apropos for the setting. Thiminos is a remote island without modern trappings; life here is hard and the men are harder. Women are still considered as little more than baby producers and cooks. Irini, the victim, wanted more from life and instead ends up dead.

I mentioned earlier that this book addressed my curiosity about what it would be like to live on a Greek island. When I visited the islands in 2006, I was so overwhelmed by the beautiful vistas, I toyed with the idea of moving there (Zouroudi actually did this; she fell in love with the islands on vacation, relocated, married a Greek man and had a baby there before moving back to England). I chatted with locals about their lives and received candid answers about their struggles when tourist season is over. Zouroudi provides even more insight about the day-to-day existence, how being island-bound can breed despair in some people and fear of leaving it in others, how the landscape can be breathtaking yet harsh, how the old buildings I found gorgeous on the outside can be damp and drafty inside during the winter.

Reading Messenger of Athens (and about Greece’s recent bankruptcy troubles) may have deterred me from Greek-island living for now, but I still feel the pull of the splendor I found there. Since that beauty partly motivated Zouroudi to write this series, I thought I’d share some personal snapshots in the slideshow below to illustrate what captivated both my and Zouroudi’s heart. The book’s Thiminos isn’t real so my pictures are from Mykonos and Santorini, two of the prettier islands I visited. Maybe the photos will entice you to travel there someday or at least start reading the Greek Detective series.

For more on Detectives Around the World, be sure and visit Jen’s Book Thoughts.

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Buy The Messenger of Athens from Amazon

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Disclosure: I only get a small commission if you buy from Amazon. The indie link is for those who would rather eat glass than buy from Amazon.

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Book Review: Michael Harvey’s THE THIRD RAIL

I’d just schlepped my way through a couple books that were dull and slow-moving so as I picked up Michael Harvey‘s The Third Rail, I thought, “If this doesn’t grab me in three pages, I’m done.” No worries there. The breakneck pace compelled me from the first, third, forty-seventh—all the way to the last page.

In this third novel featuring Chicago P.I. Michael Kelly, he’s on the hunt for a sniper targeting random commuters on an L train and along a busy highway. After the killer (or an accomplice) makes a personal call to Kelly and delivers cryptic clues to his home, the detective starts wondering if the events may be related to an L crash thirty years earlier, one that Kelly happened to be in when he was nine years old. In a plot that never stops hurtling forward and taking unexpected turns, Kelly uncovers nefarious plans involving bio-weapons, greed, corruption and the Catholic Church.

Though I sped through Rail and enjoyed the ride—it reads like a ’70s action flick starring Steve McQueen as Kelly—I realized afterward some things didn’t make sense. Revenge is directed at a blameless person because the blamed party isn’t available, and it’s unclear what a sniper attack on Lake Shore Drive has to do with the 30-year-old L accident that occurred at a different location. (There are other spoilery head-scratchers I can’t discuss.) I even asked my husband to read the book in case I missed something and he could answer some questions for me. He couldn’t.

I think the problem stems from Harvey incorporating aspects of two real, unrelated incidents—a 1977 L accident and a 1993 Pentagon report called “Terror 2000”—into one story and they don’t mesh seamlessly. Throw in the Catholic Church angle and there’s a lot of ground to cover; two separate novels might have been a better idea (Harvey said in this Amazon interview a follow-up is possible). I take no issue with the ending leaving some threads untied—it adds to the sinister feel—but am confused by the lack of clarity and logic of the answers that were provided.

Nerd verdict: Third Rail zips by, but derails a few times along the way

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Winners of Neil Pasricha’s THE BOOK OF AWESOME

Congrats to Julia F and Erin, who won ARCs of Neil Parischa’s The Book of Awesome! Their names were randomly drawn with the help of random.org. Julia and Erin, please send me your address via the “contact” form above and the awesome Lydia from Putnam will ship you each an ARC. If you don’t respond by 9 a.m. Thursday April 8, alternate name(s) will be selected.

Thanks to all who entered and shared your awesome moments with me. The book will be available April 15 if you’d like to buy a copy.

Stay tuned for another fantastic giveaway coming up soon!

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Kim Wright: Finding Closure In MID AIR

The starred Publishers Weekly review for Kim Wright’s debut novel, Love in Mid Air, may have aroused my interest, but I really wanted to read the book and host Wright on her blog tour because the lead character’s name is Elyse. In all the books I’ve read in my entire life—and that’s a WHOLE lot—I’ve never encountered a protagonist who shared my first name (have you?). Thankfully, the similarity ends there.

Kim with Otis

Elyse is unhappy in her marriage with a husband who, while not an outright jerk, is frustratingly uncommunicative. She meets an attractive man on a plane and wonders if she should jump into a possibly destructive situation or remain in a comfortable suburban life that “most women would be happy with” but Elyse feels is suffocating. It’s the equivalent of choosing to skydive or stay seated with your seat belt fastened and tray in the upright position.

Because Kim based the story on her own experience (though Elyse is NOT her), I asked if writing the book gave her a satisfying do-over or helped her find closure on any unresolved issues. I give her the floor as she responds.

In a way, writing a novel is one big “do over,” a chance to revisit old conflicts and wounds but this time you’re infinitely more clever because you’ve had years to come up with the perfect response. Natalie Goldberg says in her memoir, Old Friend From Far Away, “Writing gives you a second chance.”

So yeah, I guess you can use a novel to re-imagine events in your personal history, only now you have the authorial power to punish the guilty and reward the innocent and say all the things you wish you’d said the first time.

But I didn’t use Elyse’s story that way. I wrote Love in Mid Air in first person present tense—we see what’s happening to her as it’s happening— so she’s not always thinking clearly. Divorce makes you crazy. You do and say things you never would have believed you’d possibly do or say. To make Elyse all balanced and perfect and aware of what was happening around her would have been a bit of a cheat. I wanted to show what it’s like for a woman in the moment that her whole world is coming apart in her hands. Show a smart woman doing stupid things.

But on a different level, writing a novel does give you closure. Not in the sense you get to go back and fix things, but in the sense that it requires you to imagine how a situation looked from all sides—what Elyse’s friends were thinking, as well as her daughter, her husband, and her lover. I had to give them reactions and dialogue, too, so there were points in the book where I stepped back from Elyse and tried to create the bigger picture. Seeing a situation from someone else’s point of view may be the ultimate closure.

Thanks so much, Kim, for taking time to answer my question and being so open and unflinching with Elyse. Best of luck with the book and rest of the tour!

Readers, hope you’ve enjoyed meeting Kim. For more info, visit the book’s website or click on the link if you’re interested in buying Love in Mid Air.

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AWESOME Giveaway

I’ve given away some great books but this one is literally Awesome. Thanks to Amy Einhorn/Putnam, I have two ARCs of Neil Pasricha’s The Book of Awesome, a collection of everyday awesome things that the author has documented on his blog 1000awesomethings.com. Next month, it comes out in book form so you can tuck it in your bag and pull it out whenever you need a little reminder that awesomeness is everywhere.

I love this book and am intentionally not reading it all in one sitting. At the end of the day, I’ll open to a random page, read the comment or mini-essay that accompanies that particular awesome thing, and find myself smiling and nodding in agreement.

Examples:

Successfully moving all your clothes from the washer to the dryer without dropping anything (this is a BIG deal for me ’cause I’m always dropping socks)
When the thing you were going to buy is already on sale
Waking up before your alarm and realizing you’ve got lots of sleep time left
When there’s still time left in the parking meter when you pull up
Snow days

Enter to win one of the ARCs by leaving a comment about something awesome you experienced in the last 24 hours. I’ll start: I sat on the couch and read all day while my husband cooked brunch AND dinner. If that isn’t a definition of awesome then I need to relearn the entire English language.

You also have to:

be a subscriber or Twitter follower (tell me which). Current subscribers/followers automatically get an extra entry; people who tweet about the giveaway get 3 entries

live in U.S. or Canada, no P.O. Boxes

Giveaway ends Monday, April 5, at 5 p.m. PST. Two names will be randomly drawn; winners will only be announced here and on Twitter and have 48 hours to reply with address before alternate name(s) are chosen.

Let’s start the Awesomefest!

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Serial Reader

This topic has come up a few times for me recently so I thought I’d open it up for discussion. If you’re about to start reading an author who writes a series, how important is it for you to start at the beginning? If you’re a reader who has been reading that series from the start, how much backstory do you want the author to include to fill in those who don’t read in order?

My husband was reading Jim Butcher’s latest Dresden Files adventure, Changes. It was the first one he’d sampled but 12th in the series. He said, “I wish Butcher had included more details on past events so I’d have a better understanding of what’s going on.” I said, “Well, if you’re curious, you can always go back and read the other ones. At least he didn’t spoil them for you.”

See, we’re not sticklers about starting with book one. What if the author doesn’t hit his/her stride until book 8? You might stop reading after the third one and miss out on a masterpiece. I know writers who’d prefer you don’t judge their series by the first book, like actors who try to steer you away from their very first gig in Children of the Corn: Impaled on the Cob. I’ve also known readers who quit a series too soon and no nagging on my part could get them to hang on for the breakthrough book.

Now, I’m not talking about a finite series with serialized plots heading towards an ending that’s already been planned out. If anyone ever advises you to start the Harry Potter series with Goblet of Fire or the Millenium trilogy with The Girl Who Played with Fire, just slap them hard. It’s like saying you should watch the Star Wars movies by starting with The Empire Strikes Back. You’d be sitting there, thinking, “What is a Muppet doing in here and why does Luke keep hearing some old dead guy in his head?” No, I’m only discussing series with self-contained installments here.

And let me be clear that I’m not against reading in chronological order. I’ve often done so and am all for it if that option is available/feasible to you. The experience will be richer if you know all the backstory before embarking on a new adventure. Which brings me to the second question in my opening paragraph: How much background is needed in each subsequent book?

When I’ve been following a series from the start, I sometimes get impatient as it progresses because the author has to include details from past books so new readers don’t feel lost. Depending on how well the writer incorporates those threads, I find myself skipping passages, thinking, “I know that already. Get on with the current story!” I’m also averse to TMI if I jump in mid-series: “The dead guy in the last book wasn’t really dead? Guess I won’t be reading it now.” It’s like I said to my husband: New readers can research the backstory on their own.

Do you ever feel this way? Am I being Grumpy McBitchy? What are your preferences when reading a series?

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IMPERFECT Giveaway

Are you a writer who carries around a marked-up, tattered copy of Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird in your knapsack? Perhaps you’re into spiritual journeys and are a fan of her Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith. How about a reader who just loves good writing?

This giveaway is for you: Two ARCs of Lamott’s latest work, a novel called Imperfect Birds being released April 6 by Riverhead Books, are up for grabs. Here’s the description from the Penguin website:

A powerful and redemptive novel of love and family, from the author of the bestselling Blue Shoe, Grace (Eventually), and Operating Instructions.

Rosie Ferguson is seventeen and ready to enjoy the summer before her senior year of high school. She’s intelligent-she aced AP physics; athletic-a former state-ranked tennis doubles champion; and beautiful. She is, in short, everything her mother, Elizabeth, hoped she could be. The family’s move to Landsdale, with stepfather James in tow, hadn’t been as bumpy as Elizabeth feared.

But as the school year draws to a close, there are disturbing signs that the life Rosie claims to be leading is a sham, and that Elizabeth’s hopes for her daughter to remain immune from the pull of the darker impulses of drugs and alcohol are dashed. Slowly and against their will, Elizabeth and James are forced to confront the fact that Rosie has been lying to them-and that her deceptions will have profound consequences.

This is Anne Lamott’s most honest and heartrending novel yet, exploring our human quest for connection and salvation as it reveals the traps that can befall all of us.

I haven’t read the book but think the idea is that we’re all imperfect birds. To enter, leave a comment telling me something about yourself you’d like to improve. I’ll go first: I wish I enjoyed cooking and grocery shopping more. I love a well-cooked meal but have no patience for selecting just the right melon or all that dicing and simmering. Sometimes I stand in front of the oven and yell, “Hurry up!” at the turkey inside.

Most of the time, we try to hide our flaws, but here’s a chance for you to get them out in the open and possibly be rewarded for your candor!

To be eligible, you also have to:

be a subscriber or Twitter follower (tell me which). Current subscribers/followers automatically get an extra entry; people who tweet about the giveaway get 3 entries
live in U.S. or Canada, no P.O. Boxes

Giveaway ends Wednesday, March 24, at 5 p.m. PST. Two names will be randomly drawn; winners will only be announced here and on Twitter and have 48 hours to reply with confirmation and address before alternate name(s) are chosen.

Let’s start the oversharing!

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Book Buffet

The other day, I was looking at my humongous stack of books, thinking, “Wish I had more time to read all those” when lo and behold, my TV broke. Ha! With no American Idol or Cougar Town to distract me, I tore through six books in quick succession, including the following four March releases.

The Last Child by John Hart (Minotaur, paperback edition, available now)

Thirteen-year-old Johnny Merrimon’s twin sister Alyssa disappeared a year ago while going home from school but he refuses to give up looking for her. He’s more convinced than ever that she’s alive after he witnesses a murder in which a dying stranger tells him, “I’ve found her.” His relentless search jackknifes him across the paths of sex offenders and other dangerous people with desperate reasons for keeping the truth from coming out.

Edgar-nominated for Best Novel this year, Child has a chilling timeliness considering the Jaycee Dugard and Chelsea King cases, though it was obviously written before those incidents. The prose can be overly descriptive at times but Johnny is a character who stays with you. He’s a child living a nightmare even his parents can’t seem to bear, forced to be an adult before his time, losing faith in God along the way but never in his family. The way he takes care of his incapacitated, grief-stricken mom; longs for his father to come home; and keeps a suitcase of Alyssa’s favorite things ready for when she returns is heartbreaking in its defiant conviction.

Hart tackles so many themes—redemption, faith, loyalty, forgiveness—and Johnny goes through so much in this book that it’s difficult to summarize his arc here. Suffice it to say that in the end, to paraphrase the Stones, he may not get exactly what he wants but finds he gets what he needs. Nerd verdict: A Child that’s hard to forget.

Buy The Last Child from Amazon
Buy from IndieBound

The Spellmans Strike Again by Lisa Lutz (Simon & Schuster, March 16)

After the darkness of Child, I reached for the new Spellman installment to lighten things up. Lisa Lutz didn’t disappoint. In her fourth novel about the wacky P.I. family from San Francisco, Izzy has taken over the business from her parents but her personal life is still one big puzzle. She’s juggling cases involving a missing butler and a screenwriter’s trash while being blackmailed by her mother into going on dates with men her mother thinks are good for her. There’s also her mission to take down her slimy nemesis in the P.I. business, Rick Harkey, and her unrequited feelings towards her cop friend, Henry Stone.

The cases are beside the point here. There’s no horrific violence, great tragedy or high body count; you read these books for the quirky characters. If you’re thinking, “But quirky can be annoying!” let me tell you that Lutz knows how to keep her characters on the right side of Crazytown. When one character does cross the line and goes too far, Lutz slaps hard and apt punishment on that person.

Several ongoing subplots get resolved in this book, some very satisfyingly, one realistically, and one sadly. There’s a sense that things, while not yet perfect, are finally falling into place for the Spellmans. Perhaps that’s why many publications, including Publishers Weekly, are reporting this is the last installment in the series. But in a goodreads discussion, Lutz said: “What I can say right now is that there won’t be another Spellman book in March, 2011. I’ve been working on other projects. However, I think I will probably do at least one more Spellman book after that.” Nerd verdict: Strikes the right note.

Buy The Spellmans Strike Again from Amazon
Buy from IndieBound

Caught by Harlan Coben (Dutton, March 23)

Wendy Tynes is a TV journalist who specializes in taking down sexual predators. When her latest story, targeting a social worker named Dan Mercer whom many swear is honorable, causes violent consequences, Tynes wonders if she helped excoriate an innocent man.

She also discovers a disturbing pattern of people with past ties to Mercer being publicly disgraced within a short amount of time, all involving evidence which seems to appear suddenly out of nowhere. Throw in a missing teenaged girl, a disappearing dead body, a mysterious character who hides in shadows, a vigilante parent of a molested boy and you’ve got the usual Coben tale that makes you stay up late and leave your chores undone.

This feels like a deeply personal novel for the author. A father of four, Coben writes about different types of family dynamics—a young widow raising a teenaged boy, a seemingly perfect family who may not be quite so, extended families with friendly ex-spouses—and kinds of situations I imagine keeps him up at night as a parent.

Like Hart, Coben covers themes like forgiveness, faith, and redemption, as well as the timely issue of what unemployment does to one’s identity and dignity. There might be too many plotlines here, though; several endings are required to wrap up everything, one of them hinging on a discovery that Tynes should’ve made much earlier in the book. But it moves at breakneck pace, has poignant moments plus a Win cameo, and will leave you with lots to think about. Nerd verdict: You’ll get caught up in Caught.

Buy Caught from Amazon
Buy from IndieBound

Known to Evil by Walter Mosley (Riverhead, March 23)

Up until recently, I’d never read Mosley. Boy, did I feel foolish when I finally cracked one open. I read last year’s The Long Fall and this follow-up back to back, swooning at the writing, envying how he makes it look so easy.

Now that Easy Rawlins is retired, Leonid McGill is Mosley’s new hero, a black man with a Russian-Irish name, a New York City private eye who’s trying “to go from crooked to slightly bent.” When one of his underground contacts asks him to watch over a young woman to make sure she’s safe, Leonid finds she’s gone into hiding and deadly assassins are after her for reasons unknown. Meantime, his two sons have also gone missing, getting into some trouble of their own.

Mosley’s writing has such a rhythm to it that I often read aloud to fully appreciate it. I can hear and see the city in his mean, lean descriptions, leavened by a healthy dose of humor. Witness the following passage about a day he took his family to Coney Island:

Two redneck Brooklynites got it in their heads that a beautiful white woman like Katrina could do better than a fat little black man. All three kids were with us…

The two guys had a brief span of time in which to retreat. I stood up, walked over to them, and time was up.

Leonid is a singularly complex character, a man who can’t bear to leave his loveless marriage for the woman he loves because his wife has asked him to forgive her infidelity (only one of their three children is actually his). It’s as if he’s doing penance for his own past actions; if she doesn’t deserve forgiveness, then neither does he.

I must say I was in love with the book until the last five pages or so, when the big bad person is revealed. The motivation behind all the killings is so illogical based on previous information that I had a hard time accepting it. Hit men were hired, multiple people died, and for what now? Come again? The explanation felt rushed, like a cop-out. Despite that (and this is rare for me because I have low tolerance for lame endings), I’d still recommend this book (and read future ones in the series) because the other 99.5% of it is so enjoyable. Nerd verdict: Weak ending, but still a lot of good in Evil.

Buy Known to Evil from Amazon
Buy from IndieBound

Do any of these strike your fancy? What other March releases are you looking forward to? What do you have on deck for this weekend?

Disclosure: If you click on any of the “buy” links here and actually purchase these or any other books, I’ll get a tiny commission that might eventually accumulate enough for me to buy a cup of coffee. I’m already overly caffeinated, you say? Then I’ll put the money towards maintaining this website. Thanks.

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One Cool DRINK

Reading a good book is always a pleasure, but there’s something extra exciting about discovering a new author and his smashing debut, a PWA winner for Best First Private Eye Novel. Thomas Kaufman‘s Drink the Tea is a witty, fast-paced mystery that made me hope, only a few pages in, that it’ll be turned into a series.

Willis Gidney is an orphan who spent his childhood in and out of foster homes, becoming an expert at stealing and lying, heading for a life of crime until he gets taken in by Captain Shadrack Davies of the D.C. Police. The experience changes him, not completely, but enough so that he grows up to be a smart-ass D.C. private eye.

An old acquaintance, jazz musician Steps Jackson, asks Gidney to find his daughter, Bobbie, the result of a one-night stand twenty-five years ago. Supposed to be a straightforward missing persons case but right away, thugs show up to rough up Gidney, people start dying, and Gidney realizes he’s stumbled upon something which might involve a powerful corporation and a corrupt congressman.

The story jumps back and forth between the present case and Gidney’s time in foster care, slowly doling out what happened between Gidney and Davies during their short stint together. Gidney has a quick wit, but we find it was born as survival instinct. We get to witness Gidney’s evolution from problem child to a man trying to do the right thing, if sometimes reluctantly.

Kaufman, an Emmy-winning cinematographer who’s shot shows like The FBI Files and The New Detectives, brings his eye for detail to his writing and excels in showing instead of telling. He describes a picture of a boy in a high-school yearbook thusly:

His interests included biology, chemistry, debate. He looked apologetic, as though his violin lesson had run over and he’d shown up late to chess club.

Kaufman didn’t need to write “nerd”; the description couldn’t be clearer. And instead of using variations on the word “big,” the author writes that an internet cafe “had an espresso bar the size of Congress but with less hot air,” and about “a pair of shoes that would have won me free tuition to Clown School.”

Gidney’s background and sensibilities make him part Elvis Cole, Robert Crais’s wisecracking P.I. who was an old youngster once; and Harry Bosch, Michael Connelly’s foster-care-raised detective whose biggest mystery is his own lineage. Since those two are top of my list of favorite series characters, Gidney is in lofty company indeed.

Nerd verdict: Drink this

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