Fiction – Page 56 – BooksPlease

Book Beginnings & The Friday 56: An Event in Autumn by Henning Mankell

Published on February 25, 2022 by Margaret4 Comments

Every Friday Book Beginnings on Friday is hosted by Gillion at Rose City Reader where you can share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading. You can also share from a book you want to highlight just because it caught your fancy.

This week I’m featuring one of the library books I borrowed this week – An Event in Autumn by Henning Mankell a Wallender thriller,

The Book Begins:

On Saturday 26 October 2002, Kurt Wallender woke up feeling very tired. It had been a trying week, as a severe cold had infected practically everybody in the Ystad police station.

Also every Friday there is The Friday 56, hosted by Freda at Freda’s Voice, where you grab a book and turn to page 56 (or 56% of an eBook), find one or more interesting sentences (no spoilers), and post them.

Page 56:

Linda surprised Wallender by having dinner ready when he came back home. Although it was an ordinary weekday he was tempted to open a bottle of wine – but if he did Linda would only start stirring up trouble, so he didn’t.

I’ve only read one of Mankell’s Wallender books before and that was the first one in the series – Faceless Killers. I fully intended to read more, but then never did, although I have read two other books by him. An Event in Autumn is a novella and, as explained in the Afterword, was originally written and published as a free book as part of a campaign to encourage reading in Holland.

Summary

Some cases aren’t as cold as you’d think

Kurt Wallander’s life looks like it has taken a turn for the better when his offer on a new house is accepted, only for him to uncover something unexpected in the garden – the skeleton of a middle-aged woman.

As police officers comb the property, Wallander attempts to get his new life back on course by finding the woman’s killer with the aid of his daughter, Linda. But when another discovery is made in the garden, Wallander is forced to delve further back into the area’s past.

And this has reminded me that I really must read more of the Wallender books. I bought the second book, The Dogs of Riga four years ago and it’s been sat on the bookshelves unread ever since!

Library Books 24 February 2022

Published on February 24, 2022 by Margaret6 Comments

I love libraries – here are some of the books I have on loan at the moment. I had made a few attempts to take a photo of these books and wasn’t happy with any of them. I’d left the books in a pile on the floor and was delighted to see this photo that my husband had taken – much better than any of my attempts.

Trigger Mortis by Anthony Horowitz – because I enjoy his books, but I’m not sure I’ll like this one as much as his crime fiction books. It’s a James Bond thriller set in 1957 re-inventing the golden age of Bond, incorporating previously unseen Ian Fleming material.

An Event in Autumn by Henning Mankell, a Wallender thriller, again because I’ve enjoyed other books by him. This is a novella in which Wallender makes an offer on a house, and then discovers the skeleton of a middle-aged woman in the garden. What a nightmare!

Prague Nights by Benjamin Black. Black is the pen name of John Banville, another author whose books I like. This is historical crime fiction set in Prague in 1599, when the mistress of Rudolf II, the Holy Roman Emperor, is killed and her body found thrown upon the snow in Golden Lane.

Presumed Innocent by Scott Turow, the first book in his Kindle County series, because I enjoyed the last book in the series, The Last Trial so much. This is a courtroom drama in which prosecutor Rusty Sabich stands accused of killing Carolyn with whom he had been having an affair.

Ordinary Heroes by Scott Turow, historical fiction set in World War Two, described on the front cover as ‘part mystery, part thriller, this is a quietly powerful piece of fiction.’ A courtroom journalist researches the experiences of his grandfather during the War.

The Man in the Bunker by Rory Clements

Published on February 20, 2022 by Margaret3 Comments

I’ve read two of Rory Clements’ books in his Tom Wilde series, the first one, Corpus and the fourth Hitler’s Secret, both of which I loved. So I was looking forward to reading more of his books – The Man in the Bunker is the sixth book in the series, but fortunately they all read perfectly as standalone books.

This is a complicated novel and I am not going to attempt to describe all the details. In August 1945 an American and professor of history, Tom Wilde is preparing for the Michaelmas term at his Cambridge University college. He had spent most of the last three years in a senior advisory role with the Office of Strategic Services, America’s wartime intelligence outfit. He has quit the OSS and wants to put the war behind him, so when he sees a big American car parked outside his home where he lives with his wife and young son, he is not at all pleased. His three visitors bring news that there’s reason to believe that Hitler is alive and hiding out in Bavaria – and they want Wilde to find him.

The rumour that Hitler didn’t die in the Berlin bunker has always interested me, especially as his body was never found. I remember seeing a TV documentary about it, so I wondered what Clements would make of it and what his conclusion would be. Did Hitler live on after the war or not? His version of events is thrilling and dramatic as Wilde travels across the continent, mainly in Germany and Austria, seeing the devastation the War had brought both to places and to people. There were millions of people without homes – refugees, some living in displaced persons camps dotted around Europe. Some had been slave labourers interned in concentration camps, others were survivors of the death camps.

Wilde was accompanied by a young lieutenant, Mozes Heck, a Dutch Jew who had escaped to England and joined the British Army. Heck is desperate to find out what had happened to his family, loathes the Nazis and Hitler, and he is set on revenge. He is both headstrong and dangerous. They were both co-opted to the US Counter Intelligence Corps in Garmisch, an Alpine town in Bavaria. Wilde has a difficult job restraining Heck, but eventually they work well together in tense and extremely dangerous situations.

I thoroughly enjoyed it. The search for Hitler across Germany and Austria is fast paced, full of action, danger, and violence. Needless to say really, but I was gripped by this novel and I just had to find out what had happened, whether Hitler had died in the bunker – or did Wilde find him in hiding somewhere in the Alps? I’m not telling – you’ll have to read the book to find out.

Many thanks to Bonnier Books for a review copy via NetGalley.

The Last Trial by Scott Turow

Published on February 16, 2022 by Margaret6 Comments

In this explosive legal thriller from New York Times bestselling author Scott Turow, two formidable men collide: a celebrated criminal defense lawyer at the end of his career and his lifelong friend, a renowned doctor accused of murder.

The Last Trial is the first book by Scott Turow that I’ve read. It is a great book and I wish I’d come across his work before now. This one is the 11th book in his Kindle County series (Kindle County is a fictional Illinois county that is based on Cook County). Now I’ll have to read his earlier books, not that I had any problems reading this as a standalone book, but because I enjoyed it so much I want to know more. I love legal thrillers and this is one of the best I’ve read.

There are quite a lot of characters, the main ones being the defence attorney, Sandy Stein, aged 85 and nearing retirement and his daughter, Marta also a lawyer, and Kiril Pafco, his friend and Nobel Prize winner, a doctor, who has developed a drug to treat cancer, which is currently still in its clinical trial period. Sandy is one of his patients whose life has been extended by the drug. Other characters who stood out for me are Pinky, Sandy’s granddaughter, whose offbeat approach to life proves invaluable – I really liked her, and Dr Innis McVie, who had been in a long term relationship with Kiril and until recently had assisted him in his cancer research.

Most of the book is centred on the trial – Kiril is charged with murder after some of the clinical trial patients had suddenly died, and with fraud and insider trading, after he allegedly doctored the research results and sold shares before the details of the deaths became public. Kiril insists he is innocent – but is he?

The details and the of sequence of events is important and gradually becomes clear during the witness testimonies and cross examinations. It all became real to me as I read – I believed in the characters, even the minor ones, and tried to follow all the details of the charges as though I was on the jury. I might not have fully understood all the details of the insider trading, but the medical details were easier for me to follow. This is, however, mainly a character-driven book, revealing their relationships, secrets, motivations and betrayals. It is full of suspense right up until the end.

I loved it and have his first book, Presumed Innocent lined up to read as soon as possible. If you love legal thrillers you’ll love The Last Trial too.

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B081YWP83K
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Mantle (28 May 2020)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 689 KB
Print length ‏ : ‎ 465 pages
Source: A BorrowBox book
My Rating: 5*

Book Beginnings & The Friday 56: The Honourable Schoolboy by John le Carré

Published on February 11, 2022 by Margaret8 Comments

This week I’m featuring one of the books I’ve just started to read – The Honourable Schoolboy by John le Carré, a Cold War spy thriller, the sequel to Tinker, Tailor, Soldier Spy. It’s based in the Far East in the mid 1970s.

The Book Begins:

Afterwards in the dusty little corners where London’s secret servants drink together, there was argument about where the Dolphin case history should really begin.

I like this opening sentence – it focuses attention immediately on the Dolphin case – what was it and where did it begin? I hope all will become clear.

Also every Friday there is The Friday 56, hosted by Freda at Freda’s Voice. *Grab a book, any book. *Turn to Page 56 or 56% on your ereader . If you have to improvise, that is okay. *Find a snippet, short and sweet, but no spoilers!

Only George Smiley, said Roddy Martindale, a fleshy Foreign Office wit, could have got himself appointed captain of a wrecked ship. Only Smiley, he added, could have compounded the pains of that appointment by choosing the same moment to abandon his beautiful, if occasionally errant, wife.
At first or even second glance George Smiley was ill-suited to either part, as Martindale was quick to note. He was tubby and in small ways hopelessly unassertive. A natural shyness made him from time to time pompous and to men of Martindale’s flamboyance his unobtrusiveness acted as a standing reproach.

Surely, unobtrusiveness is just the quality a good spy needs.

Summary

In the second part of John le Carré’s Karla Trilogy, the battle of wits between spymaster George Smiley and his Russian adversary takes on an even more dangerous dimension.

George Smiley, now acting head of the Circus, must rebuild its shattered reputation after one of the biggest betrayals in its history. Using the talents of journalist and occasional spy Jerry Westerby, Smiley launches a risky operation uncovering a Russian money-laundering scheme in the Far East. His aim: revenge on Karla, head of Moscow Centre and the architect of all his troubles.

John Le Carré’s Books

Published on February 10, 2022April 18, 2026 by Margaret4 Comments

I have been having a sort out of both my physical and e-books and realised I have several books by John Le Carré, that I’d like to read sometime this year. I have three ‘real’ books by him and nine e-books. I’ve only read two (three now April 2022) of them!

Books shown in bold are the ones I’ve read and those in italics are the ones I own that I have yet to read. There are nine books in the Smiley series, in which the character George Smiley appears (in four out of the nine, Smiley is only a minor character). Within that series is the The Karla Trilogy (Books 5, 6 & 7).

Smiley
   1. Call for the Dead (1961) read
   2. A Murder of Quality (1962) – TBR (ebook)
   3. The Spy Who Came in from the Cold (1963) read
   4. The Looking Glass War (1965)
   5. Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (1974) read
   6. The Honourable Schoolboy (1977) read (paperback)
   7. Smiley’s People (1979) TBR (ebook)
   8. The Secret Pilgrim (1990)
   9. A Legacy of Spies (2017)

Standalone novels:

A Small Town in Germany (1968)
The Naive and Sentimental Lover (1971)
The Little Drummer Girl (1983) – TBR (ebook)
A Perfect Spy (1986) – TBR (ebook)
The Russia House (1989)
The Night Manager (1993) – TBR (ebook)
Our Game (1995)
The Tailor of Panama (1996)
Single and Single (1999)
The Constant Gardener (2000)- TBR (paperback)
Absolute Friends (2003)
The Mission Song (2006)
A Most Wanted Man (2008)
Our Kind of Traitor (2010) – TBR (ebook)
A Delicate Truth (2013)
Agent Running in the Field (2019)
Silverview (2021)

As I’ve read Tinker, Tailor, Soldier Spy, the next one I’ll read is The Honourable Schoolboy.

Summary

In this classic masterwork, le Carré expands upon his extraordinary vision of a secret world as George Smiley goes on the attack.

In the wake of a demoralizing infiltration by a Soviet double agent, Smiley has been made ringmaster of the Circus (aka the British Secret Service). Determined to restore the organization’s health and reputation, and bent on revenge, Smiley thrusts his own handpicked operative into action. Jerry Westerby, “The Honourable Schoolboy,” is dispatched to the Far East. A burial ground of French, British, and American colonial cultures, the region is a fabled testing ground of patriotic allegiances and a new showdown is about to begin.

And after that as I did enjoy watching the TV adaptation of The Night Manager a while back, I might read that later on.