Category: Books

Book Beginnings

Published on by Margaret4 Comments

I’ve been reading books recently and not writing about them. I didn’t have the impetus at the time (too many other things going on in my life right now to distract me), but I hope to write about them quite soon:

  • The Hanging Wood by Martin Edwards – excellent
  • Evil Under the Sun by Agatha Christie  – very good
  • Murder on the Eiffel Tower by Claude Izner – a bit disappointing

I’m about to start reading S J Bolton’s second book Awakening. Here are the opening sentences from the Prologue:

The darkest hour I’ve ever known began last Thursday, a heartbeat before the sun came up.

It was going to be a beautiful morning, I remember thinking, as I left the house; soft and close, bursting with whispered promises, as only a daybreak in early summer can be. The air was still cool but an iridescence on the horizon warned of baking heat to come. Birds were singing as though every note might be their last and event the insects had risen early.

This opening is full of threat. Even though it is a beautiful morning it foreshadows some dreadful event coming soon, in contrast to the fine day.

I decided to read Awakening after finishing Sacrifice, which I wrote about in my last post, especially as several people commented that her later books are better.

Book Beginnings on Friday is hosted by Katy at A Few More Pages.

Sacrifice by S J Bolton: a Book Review

Published on by Margaret6 Comments

I found most of Sacrifice an absolutely compelling book to read. It begins with the discovery of a corpse buried in the peat in Tora Hamilton’s field on Shetland. This is no ordinary corpse because the heart has been removed and there are marks etched into the skin that look very similar to the carvings Tora has seen in the cellar of her house. Tora is an obstetric surgeon. She had recently moved to the Shetland Isles with her husband Duncan, who although he had been born on the Isles, hadn’t been back there for twenty years.

Tora uses her position at the hospital to search patient records and aided by D S Dana Tulloch begins to discover some very suspicious and sinister facts. Despite opposition from her boss and from Dana’s boss the two women dig deeper and become involved in a very dangerous and bizarre situation, endangering both their lives.

I was swept along with the story, but as more twists and turns in the plot developed with links to folklore and myth I found it became rather far- fetched the more I read. But, having said that I did like the book. I liked the drama, the characters were well-defined, and I liked the tension that built up between the characters as Tora began to wonder who she could trust. I liked the setting of a mysterious, remote and isolated place where outsiders find it difficult to fit in and where dark deeds could take place. I liked it enough to want to read more books by S J Bolton.

Crime Fiction on a Euro Pass: France

Published on by Margaret6 Comments

This week’s Crime Fiction on A Euro Pass destination is France. When I think of French crime fiction Georges Simenon’s Maigret immediately pops into my mind.  Simenon was actually Belgian, not French, but as the Maigret books are set in France (mainly in Paris) they fit the criteria for the Europass.

Simenon wrote 75 novels and 28  short stories featuring Commissaire Jules Maigret and I first knew of them from a friend at school who loved the books. Then there were the numerous TV productions with Rupert Davies as Maigret.

I have read several of them in the past and most recently I’ve read the following three Maigret books. The links are to my posts on the books:

  • Lock 14, which was the second book, originally published in 1931 as Le Charretier de la ‘˜Providence’ and translated as Maigret Meets a Milord in 1963. It’s a short book of 124 pages set along the canal from Epernay to Vitry-le-Francois. It’s a mystery in which Maigret gets increasingly grumpy, exasperated and tired.
  • My Friend Maigret, first published in 1939 as Mon ami Maigret. It’s a study of Maigret himself, and of life on a small Mediterranean island, three miles from the French coast, where he investigates the murder of Marcellin, a thug, drunkard, thief and pimp. He is accompanied by Mr Pyke, a British detective who is shadowing Maigret to studying his method of working.
  • The Man on the Boulevard, first published in 1953 as Maigret et l’homme du banc. This book is set in Paris where Louis Thouret is found stabbed in a little alleyway. Louis  has led a double life that his wife knew nothing about. It appears he had been having an affair for three years.

There are many things I like about the Maigret books – the attention to detail, the descriptions of the weather, and the characters themselves.  The descriptions of the locations are good, but above all I like the characterisation of Maigret himself.

Tom Fleck: a Novel of Cleveland and Flodden by Harry Nicholson

Published on by Margaret2 Comments

I don’t often get offered books for review that really appeal to me, but recently I have had two – one was Dorte Jakobsen’s The Cosy Knave, which I wrote about earlier and the second is Tom Fleck by Harry Nicholson.

When Harry emailed me to ask if I would review his book I knew I couldn’t refuse – a book set in the 16th century and about the Battle of Flodden Field. Now, I love history and historical fiction. Flodden Hill, where the battle took place in 1513 is just down the road from me and it’s a place that fascinates me.  I replied saying that I’d like to read it but it could be some time before I did as I have so many other books queued up to read. But as I opened it and started reading it I just had to carry on!

Harry Nicholson is a really good storyteller and as I read I was transported back to the 16th century. His book is well-researched, but the detail never reads like a text book or intrudes. He consulted many sources, including primary and secondary sources such as wills, inventories and parish registers, printed journals and historical and archaeological society papers as well as studying military costumes and weapons at the national museum of arms and armour at Leeds.

From the Back Cover

The year: 1513. The place: North-East England. Tom Fleck, a downtrodden farm worker but gifted archer, yearns to escape his masters. He unearths two objects that could be keys to freedom: a torque of ancient gold and a Tudor seal ring. He cannot know how these finds will determine his future. Rachel Coronel craves an end to her Jewish wanderings. When the torque comes to rest around the neck of this mysterious woman, an odyssey begins which draws Tom Fleck into borderlands of belief and race. The seal ring propels Tom on a journey of self-knowledge that can only climax in another borderland – among the flowers and banners of Flodden Field.

 

The story is about Tom, a young farm worker on the Warren Manor Estate in Cleveland. He longs to escape and farm his own land. So when Mark, the Lord of the Manor’s son orders him to go north with the militia from the manor to fight against the Scots on the border, he takes matters into his own hands and leaves home to join forces with drovers from Durham.  The drovers and Tom get caught up in the preparations for war and as Tom is a gifted archer he is pressed into joining the English forces in fighting against the Scots under James IV at Flodden Field.

It is also a love story, as Tom and Rachel fall in love, but then there is his sweetheart, Mary who he left behind at home. Who will he choose, if indeed, he should survive the battle? Generally I’m not keen on reading battle scenes but Harry dealt with this very well and actually I think it’s one of the best accounts of the Battle of Flodden that I’ve read.

All in all, this is a fascinating glimpse into the lives of ordinary people and the aristocracy in the 16th century, caught up in war.  It highlights differences in their lives and in their deaths – the rich received honours and church burials, whereas the rest were simply bundled together in pits in the field:

‘That’s the way of it, Tom – that’s the way of it; no stone lions at our feet, nor a brass plate to cover us. There’ll be nowt apart from green rushes to mark our spot.’ (page 230)

More information on Tom Fleck is on Harry’s website where you can read Chapter 1.  And for more details of the battle, including the routes the armies took and a tour of the battlefield see The Remembering Flodden Project.

  • Paperback: 266 pages
  • Publisher: YouWriteOn.com (11 Jan 2011)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 1908147768
  • ISBN-13: 978-1908147769
  • Source: review copy from the author

Crime Fiction on a Euro Pass

Published on by Margaret3 Comments

A new challenge: Crime Fiction on a Euro Pass

Kerrie at Mysteries in Paradise is hosting a new challenge taking us on a 12 stage European Journey in Eurail Pass style. As our travel agent she has chosen 12 destinations for our journey. It began last Monday with with a stop in England. Click HERE for additional details.

The challenge is simple really.

You have to connect us to a blog post on your site that relates to crime fiction in the country we are visiting. The meme will enable us to share our knowledge and perhaps point out new reading opportunities to each other.

You can choose one of the following (or something more imaginative)

  • a book review (create a new one or revive an old one)
  • an author profile
  • a reading syllabus for crime fiction either set in this country, or written by authors from this country.

I don’t think I’ll be taking part every week, but for this week I’m in Spain, featuring C J Sansom’s Winter in Madrid, which I thought was one of the best books I’ve read. I wrote about on this blog back in January 2008, describing it as a book that had me in tears as I was reading about the devastation, desolation and waste of war. I little thought that a few years later we would be witnessing the devastation that has been happening here in England with the terrible riots that have been taking place this week.

Back to the book. I already knew from reading his 16th century crime thrillers that C. J. Sansom is a master storyteller and this book exceeded my expectations. It is an action packed thrilling war/spy story and also a moving love story and historical drama all rolled into this tense and gripping novel.

Sansom vividly conveys the horror and fear of the realities of life in Spain during the Spanish Civil War and the first two years of the Second World War. The opening chapter dramatically sets the tone for the book with the brutality of the Battle of Jarama in 1937 then leaps straight into the bombing of London in 1940. Then Harry Brett, traumatised by his injuries at Dunkirk is sent to Spain to spy for the British Secret Service. He is plunged into the terrible living conditions in Madrid where people are starving, children are left homeless to fend for themselves and wild dogs roam the rubble of bombed houses.

He turned into a square. Two sides had been shelled into rubble, all the houses down, a chaos of broken walls rising from a sea of shattered bricks and sodden rags of bedding. Weeds had grown up between the stones, tall scabrous dark-green things. Square holes in the ground half filled with green scummy water marked where cellars had stood. The square was deserted and the houses that had been left standing looking derelict, their windows all broken.

Harry had never seen such destruction on such a scale; the bombsites in London were small by comparison. He stepped closer, looking over the devastation. The square must have been intensively shelled. Everyday there was news of more raids on London ‘“ did England look like this now?

This is a long and detailed book, but it moves along rapidly, with believable characters, including the bullying Ambassador, Sir Samuel Hoare, Alan Hillgarth, the chief of intelligence (both of whom are real historical figures), diplomats, Spanish Monarchists and Falangists and the ordinary Spanish people. Franco’s Madrid is shown as a place where fear, poverty and corruption stalk the streets; where hatred and suffering are paramount. It’s a chilling picture, but Harry finds love too when he meets Sofia and plans her escape with him to England after he has completed his mission.

The question is will Franco maintain Spain’s neutrality and enter the war in support of Hitler? Harry’s cover is as an interpreter, whilst his mission is to make contact with Sandy Forsyth, who he had known at public school in England, gain his confidence and discover the truth behind the rumour that gold deposits have been discovered in Spain, which would boost the economy making Spain less reliant on British support. Harry, a reluctant spy, soon finds himself in danger. He is plagued by memories of another school friend Bernie Piper, an ardent Communist who had enlisted in the International Brigades and had disappeared, reported killed at the Battle of Jarama. Barbara, an ex- Red Cross nurse, now Sandy’s girlfriend and Bernie’s former lover is convinced Bernie was not killed She appeals to Harry for help in finding Bernie, and so the story moves to its climax.

With its haunting themes of corruption, murder, the power of authority and heroism Winter In Madrid captivated my imagination. It’s a book I’d like to reread some time.

Dumb Witness by Agatha Christie: a Book Review

Published on by Margaret4 Comments

I found it wasn’t too difficult to work out who the murderer was in Agatha  Christie’s Dumb Witness, because there is a rather obvious clue at one point, but that didn’t spoil my enjoyment of this book. In fact I felt it added to my satisfaction and there was a further development which I hadn’t thought of at the end, which surprised me.

From the back cover:

Everyone blamed Emily’s accident on a rubber ball left on the stairs by her frisky terrier. But the more she thought about her fall, the more convinced she became that one of her relatives was trying to kill her. On April 17th she wrote her suspicions in a letter to Hercule Poirot. Mysteriously he didn’t receive the letter until June 28th … by which time Emily was already dead!

Dumb Witness is set in the small country town of Market Basing (a fictional name) where Miss Emily Arundell lived in Littlegreen House. Part of Poirot’s problem is that he doesn’t actually have a murder to investigate because Miss Arundell’s death was certified by her doctor as a death from natural causes from a long standing medical condition. But he thought he was under an obligation from Miss Arundell to investigate. He uses subterfuge to find out more information, pretending to be writing a biography of General Arundell, Emily’s father. And from some very slender facts he reconstructs the sequence of events leading up to her death.

As usual there are a number of suspects, mostly the members of her family, her nephew and niece Charles and Theresa Arundell and her married niece Bella and her husband Doctor Tanios. Then there is her companion, the rather ineffectual Miss Wilhelmina Lawson, and the servants. Poirot considers each one in turn. He also considers the character of the murderer, as he explains to Captain Hastings, the narrator, who is completely baffled as he assists Poirot in looking at the evidence:

‘Since at the moment, it is only suspicion and there is no definite proof, I think I must leave you to draw your own deductions, Hastings. And do not neglect the psychology – that is important. The character of the murderer – that is an essential clue to the crime.’

‘I can’t consider the character of the murderer if I don’t know who the murderer is!’

‘No, no, you have not paid attention to what I have just said. If you reflect sufficiently on the character – the necessary character of the murder – then you will realize who the murderer is!’ (page 184)

The ‘dumb witness’of the title is Bob, Emily’s wire-haired terrier in what is described as ‘the incident of the dog’s ball.’ Agatha Christie dedicated Dumb Witness to her wire-haired terrier, Peter, describing him as ‘most faithful of friends and dearest companion, a dog in a thousand‘. Bob plays an important part in the plot and indeed Agatha Christie gives him some dialogue!

I didn’t think I knew anything about Dumb Witness before I read it – I didn’t even know the title. But after I read it I checked the entry in wikipedia and found that Dumb Witness  had been adapted for television in 1996 as one of the episodes of Agatha Christie’s Poirot with David Suchet playing the role of Hercule Poirot. I then remembered watching it and being surprised because it was set in the Lake District, which I thought was most unusual for an Agatha Christie book.  Now I’ve read the book I can see that the TV adaptation differed considerably from the original story. As I hadn’t read it when I watched the adaptation that didn’t bother me in the slightest. It would have done the other way round!

NB: take care reading because if you haven’t read earlier books featuring Poirot, in chapter 18 he gives away the names of the murderers in four of his earlier cases.

First published in Great Britain in 1937
published in the US as Poirot Loses a Client, also known as Mystery at Littlegreen House or Murder at Little Green House.
This edition published by Harper Collins 1994
ISBN: 9780006168089
251 pages
Source: My own copy