***Content has been a little sparse lately as I try to get acclimatized to a few things. This combined with some technical difficulties has “put me off my game” as the saying goes. Look for more content after Labor Day, but the pace will still be quality over quantity. In the meantime, here are some books that have found there way to my doorstep that might be of interest.***

- Our American King by David Lozell Martin

Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. At the start of Martin’s compelling postapocalyptic novel, which reads like The Road as told by the crusty old woman from Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All, Mary and her husband, John, perch precariously in a tree while a huge, corpse-eating pig waits below. Flashback a few decades: Mary and John are starving in suburban Maryland outside Washington, D.C., after a disaster known as the calamity destroyed much of the country’s infrastructure. The top .1% of America’s richest citizens have bought up all the commodities and withdrawn to enclaves guarded by hired thugs. After a man known as Tazza emerges as a strong local leader, John declares him king. Martin (The Crying Heart Tattoo) charts Tazza’s self-sustaining kingdom from its early bucolic beginnings to its final bloody battles against rapacious Canadians hired by a resurgent American government bent on subduing this upstart leader. Filled with action, romance and terrific characters, this intelligent cautionary tale deserves a wide readership.

- The Echo Maker by Richard Powers

Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. A truck jackknifes off an “arrow straight country road” near Kearney, Nebr., in Powers’s ninth novel, becoming the catalyst for a painstakingly rendered minuet of self-reckoning. The accident puts the truck’s 27-year-old driver, Mark Schluter, into a 14-day coma. When he emerges, he is stricken with Capgras syndrome: he’s unable to match his visual and intellectual identifications with his emotional ones. He thinks his sister, Karin, isn’t actually his sister–she’s an imposter (the same goes for Mark’s house). A shattered and worried Karin turns to Gerald Weber, an Oliver Sacks-like figure who writes bestsellers about neurological cases, but Gerald’s inability to help Mark, and bad reviews of his latest book, cause him to wonder if he has become a “neurological opportunist.” Then there are the mysteries of Mark’s nurse’s aide, Barbara Gillespie, who is secretive about her past and seems to be much more intelligent than she’s willing to let on, and the meaning of a cryptic note left on Mark’s nightstand the night he was hospitalized. MacArthur fellow Powers (Gold Bug Variations, etc.) masterfully charts the shifting dynamics of Karin’s and Mark’s relationship, and his prose–powerful, but not overbearing–brings a sorrowful energy to every page.

- World War IV: The Long Struggle Against Islamofascism by Norman Podhoretz

Publishers Weekly

One of the few proud neoconservatives remaining, Podhoretz offers an impassioned defense of President Bush’s foreign policy, gleefully attacking those on the left and the right who harbor suspicions that Bush fils is less than infallible. Convinced that we are in the middle of the fourth world war (the Cold War was the third), he attempts to steel us for the years of conflict to come. But Podhoretz’s argument falls flat because of his refusal to face difficult realities in Iraq. He insists that the media has resolutely tried to ignore any and all signs of progress and repeatedly asserts that those with whom he disagrees are committed to seeing the U.S. fail in Iraq in order to enhance their professional reputations. Even in describing how the events of September 11 drew America together, Podhoretz cannot resist partisan sniping: [E]ven on the old flag-burning Left, a few prominent personalities were painfully wrenching their unaccustomed arms into something vaguely resembling a salute. Podhoretz’s take-no-prisoners writing style will delight his partisans while infuriating his ideological opponents, whom he brands as members of a domestic insurgency against the Bush Doctrine.

-Coincidentally: Unserious Reflections on Trivial Connections by George Rutler

Book Description

From the DaVinci Code and Roswell to E Pluribus Unum and the pyramid on the back of every dollar bill, we all are fascinated by secrets, codes, and coincidences. George Rutler - EWTN speaker, Crisis magazine columnist, and reigning Catholic wit - offers his reflections on the coincidental links that connect the most far-flung parts of our worlds. Topics cover the gamut of human life, from Louis Farrakhan and Edgar Allen Poe to Benjamin Franklin and the propensity of Scottish physicians to dominate the Nobel Prizes for Medicine. Each 4-page reflection is accompanied by line art to give this volume the perfect feel of antiquarian delight - perfect for the language lover and curmudgeon in all of us.

Those of us who have enjoyed Olen Steinhauer’s Eastern European crime series continue to be perplexed by their failure to break out into mainstream success. Although the books have been shortlisted for a variety of awards, they seem unable to break free of their genre label and reach the larger audience they deserve.

This week marks the release of the fifth and final book in the series, Victory Square. Appropriately, the book not only brings the series full circle by again featuring the lead character from the first book, but it also brings Steinhauer back to the subject of his first attempts as a novelist.

After getting his MFA and spending a year in Romania on a Fulbright scholarship Steinhauer returned to finish what he hoped would be his first novel. The resulting manuscript - a “sprawling epic” set during the Romanian Revolution of 1989 - revealed enough talent to spark some interest but it clearly needed work. Agents asked: got anything else?

The answer was yes. Inspired by reading Raymond Chandler, and his time in Romania, Steinhauer had decided to write a “straight story” something that didn’t set out to be the “experimental” novel of a recent MFA grad. This non-experimental experiment became The Bridge of Sighs a hardboiled detective story set in an unnamed country in communist occupied post-war Eastern Europe.

As it turned out, Bridge of Sighs was the first in a five book series centered on the homicide division of the People’s Militia in this unnamed country. Each book focuses on a new character and brings us forward a decade. In Bridge of Sighs Emil Brod is a 22-year old rookie investigating his first case, the murder of a popular national songwriter, when he uncovers evidence that a party leader worked for the Gestapo during the war. He ends up marrying the songwriter’s widow and sending his killer, the disgraced party leader, to a labor camp.

Victory Square, the fifth and final book, returns the focus on Emil and brings the series to a close. And it also brings Steinhauer back to the subject of that first manuscript: the revolutionary year of 1989 in a country very much like Romania.

Emil, now homicide chief, is called by the Ministry for State Security to complete the paper work for an apparent heart attack of one of their officers The stubbornly persistent Emil, however, uncovers evidence of foul play and a list of six people all connected to the very first case of his career. Two of the six have recently turned up murdered and the party leader Emil had sent away has disappeared. The other important name on the list? His own.

Read the rest of this entry »

I mentinoned previously that I planned to re-read Olen Steinhauer’s People’s Miltia series in order to fully apprciate the final book in that series Victory Square. Having done so, I wanted to offer some thought on the series as a whole prior to posting my review of the last book.

In thinking about the series I keep coming back to something I wrote in my review of 36 Yalta Bouevard:

What is so captivating and entertaining about Steinhauer is that each book tackles a new character and brings a new perspective. Steinhauer is not just cranking out sequels to make his publisher happy. He is using the history and culture of Eastern Europe as a setting and as a source for an imaginative tweak on a host of genres. Aspects of hard boiled detective story, police procedural, psychological mystery, espionage thriller, and historical fiction are all included as he tells the story of these unique characters.

And yet their is more. Steinhauer explores deeper issues than just who did what, where, and how. Thorny personal, political, and cultural issues are addressed while the mystery unfolds. Taken together they paint a thought provoking portrait of time and place; and yet each work stands satisfyingly on its own. “Literary crime series” may seem like an oxymoron to some, but it seems a perfect description of Steinhauer’s work.

This is indeed the appeal of this fascinating series. There is always more than meets the eye.

Read the rest of this entry »

Threshold of Terror: The Last Hours of the Monarchy in the French Revolution by Rodney Allen is an exciting and engaging piece of work. Allen brings to life the last vestiges of Louis XVI’s reign.

The book primarily centers on August 10 and 11, 1792 - when “the mob” stormed the Tuileries to end Louis’ reign. Allen pays particular attention to the fate of the Swiss Guards - a unit charged with defending the king after his personal guard was disbanded. In describing their fate, Allen dispels many myths about the Swiss Guards - one of which is that the Guards were overwhelmed and in many instances massacred, Allen contends through his research that many Guards were killed, but the unit was far from being completely annihilated.

Although Allen has a particular affinity toward the king, he justly criticizes Louis when he failed to act at certain points (Allen argues that the Revolution could have been halted in its tracks if Louis had just shown some leadership and backbone). For example, Allen argues that the monarchy may not have fallen if Louis had allowed more ammunition to be disbursed to the Swiss Guards and other loyal national guardsmen.

I think that Allen may have been able to make the book more succinct if he had cut down the number of chapters devoted to the escape of four men (each man’s story of escape had a chapter). Although the stories were different, I just do not think that including all four adds anything extra to the book.

All in all, I think the book is an entertaining and enlightening look at the last hours of the French monarchy in the French Revolution.

Few things are as popular among conservatives as internecine philosophical battles. In magazines, Op-Eds, and book length treatises conservatives of various stripes regularly lay out the reoccurring battle for the soul of conservatism. And as others have pointed out, this is probably healthy. Conservatives believe ideas are important and worth fighting about.

But let’s face it, not all of these battles are intelligent and civil debates over first principles. And that is what makes The Future of Conservatism edited by Charles W. Dunn and published by ISI so refreshing. Rather than a diatribe about which faction hijacked the movement, or which politician betrayed it, it is an intelligent and thoughtful discussion about the various perspectives within conservatism, the principles at issue, and how these debates might play out in the future.

There is a lot to chew on in this slim volume and I have been contemplating a longer essay/review for weeks. But I simply don’t have time at this point. So let me simply outline why you should read this book if you are interested in conservatism past, present, or future.

For a brief outline of essays involved click below.

Read the rest of this entry »

After reading a book about the last hours of the French Monarchy in the French Revolution (review to follow shortly), I found myself drawn to this time period in France. In this vein, I just finished an historical mystery entitled Mute Witness by Charles O’Brien. It is the first book in a series and, based on the first, I cannot wait to read the rest.

Here is a brief summary from the book’s website:

The story is set in France on the eve of the Revolution. Paris in 1786 seethes with fiscal crisis and social tensions. Anne Cartier hears distressing news. Her stepfather, the actor Antoine Dubois has mysteriously died in Paris. The official verdict: he killed his mistress, then himself.
Anne enlists the aid of Colonel Paul de Saint-Martin and his adjutant Georges Charpentier of the royal highway patrol. Their investigation goes nowhere. Then, a deaf, illiterate seamstress with a talent for puppetry leads Anne to the truth. Along the way, she confronts an amateur theatrical society of dissolute young noblemen; a tormented female botanist; a sadistic aesthete; a rich, well-connected financier; a professional assassin.

Unravelling the mystery tests Anne’s nerve as well as her remarkable acrobatic skills. At a critical juncture in the investigation, she acts the part of an exotic queen in Indian costume at a reception. Priceless Indian jewelry disappears. Its owner, an aged count is murdered. And a venal police inspector threatens to derail Anne’s project.

The story rises to a violent climax in a labyrinthine cave outside Paris where the city has begun to bury its dead.

The heroine and the heroes in the book are very likeable. They are very human – with believable strengths and weaknesses that allow you to embrace them and feel their varying emotions.

Although the book is fiction, it captures the time before the French Revolution perfectly. O’Brien describes the class tension between the poor and the aristocrats through Cartier’s experiences with both. You can understand why the French Revolution occurred because of the poor treatment of the commoners by the aristocrats and the unfair advantages the aristocrats had over everyone else.

This is a must read for anyone who is a connoisseur of mysteries or the French Revolution era.

The opening paragraphs of David Frum’s review (sub. req.) of Nixon and Kissinger:
Partners in Power by Robert Dallek is something I wish I had written. It sets up the subject, builds the tension, and then slides the knife in:

A protracted war. Divisions at home. Insecure energy supplies. Tensions with allies.

America in 2007? Yes, but also America in 1969. In the introduction to his new study of the foreign policy of Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger, Robert Dallek writes: “I am convinced that the many questions raised in this book have relevance for current national and international problems.”

The questions faced by Nixon and Kissinger do indeed resonate in our own time. Should Americans promote democracy abroad? How can peace be kept between India and Pakistan? Between Arabs and Israelis? Across the Taiwan Strait? How much deference should Congress show the president in foreign policy?

Nixon and Kissinger articulated forceful and coherent answers to these questions and many more — and Americans have fiercely debated their answers for nearly four decades. The debate continues into our own time. When President Bush charged, in his November 2003 Whitehall Palace speech, that “your nation [Britain] and mine, in the past, have been willing to make a bargain, to tolerate oppression for the sake of stability,” it was Nixon and Kissinger he was criticizing.

You might imagine that a historian would hesitate to join this voluminous and ferocious controversy unless he had something new and important to say. You would imagine wrong. Robert Dallek has written bestselling books about John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson. Somebody — his publisher, his agent, his wife, the financial-aid officers at his children’s colleges — obviously decided it made sense for him to add another administration to the series. Whoever that unknown adviser was, he did Dallek no favor.

Nixon and Kissinger represents itself as a deep new study of the making of American foreign policy. In reality, it is a hasty summary of newly released memos and phone transcripts from the Nixon and Kissinger archives, lightly seasoned with authorial commentary.

Ouch!

Anyone interested in rare or antique books might be interested to know I have two items for sale at eBay. OK, I don’t really know how rare they are, but they are old.

- The first is a unique 1961 school edition of Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway. This edition has a special study guide included.

- The second is a signed 1949 edition of I’m a Stranger Here Myself by Ogden Nash.

Both are hardbacks in good condition. So make a bid if you are interested.

Duck Duck Wally: A Novel by Gabe Rotter

Publishers Weekly

Rotter relies heavily on black street slang for comic effect in his zany debut, starting with chizapter 1. Wally Moscowitz, a self-described frumpy, kinda chubby little boring man living in Los Angeles, writes lyrics for rapper Oral B, the current star of Godz-Illa Records. When not penning lyrics full of four-letter words for Oral, Wally also writes dirty bedtime fables for adults, examples of which are sprinkled throughout the novel. Godz-Illa CEO Abraham Dandy Lyons has assured Wally that if anyone ever discovers that Oral B isn’t writing his own lyrics, Wally will end up in a ditch. Soon, Wally’s dog gets ‘napped, goons are trying to kill Wally and everyone rushes to and fro against a backdrop of glitzy L.A. bizness thuggery. Rotter’s a talented writer, though readers who find variations of the same joke funny enough to support the silly plot will be most rewarded.

The Worst Years of Your Life: Stories for the Geeked-Out, Angst-Ridden, Lust-Addled, and Deeply Misunderstood Adolescent in All of Us by Mark Jude Poirier (Editor)

Publishers Weekly

Sometimes sad, often poignant and always painfully honest, the stories in this fiction anthology do away with the rose-colored glasses that grown-ups often employ to make memories of adolescence bearable, drawing them back into the bewildering fog of youth. Beyond a talented group of writers-including George Saunders, Jennifer Egan, Stacey Richter, A.M. Homes and Nathan Englander-author and editor Poirier has gathered a happily diverse set of sad-sack stories. Julie Orringer produces a “Note to Sixth-Grade Self,” in which she advises an awkward 12-year-old how to get through excruciating dance classes (”Do not think about Zachary Booth’s hand warts”); Mark Poirier contributes the story of an unhappy boy whose compulsive lies hide an unspeakable secret; and Amber Dermont posits a convincing tale of a teenage girl learning to understand her abhorrent mother. For adult readers, this rich, candid collection is bound to stir memories of their own growing pains, and more than a few words of thanks that they’re in the past; for those in the thick of it, these stories will, if nothing else, take a little of the sting out of teenage loneliness and confusion.

The New Kid: A Novel by Eliot Schrefer

Publishers Weekly

Schrefer weds fluid prose to a trashy/sexy plot in his fun second novel, revisiting the corrupting world of the rich (his debut, Glamorous Disasters, featured an SAT tutor caught up in the dirty doings of his wealthy clients). Fifteen-year-old Humphrey Baxter, recently relocated with his down-on-their-luck parents to Florida, has trouble adjusting to his new digs (a motel), and though initially Humphrey’s narration strikes a familiar YA tone, Schrefer throws in a welcome wrinkle with two bizarre friendships (with a jock and the jock’s hot mom) that lead to Humphrey being savagely beaten. With Humphrey hospitalized, Schrefer cuts to Humphrey’s half-sister, Gretchen, who has found love with Rajan Lansing and surrogate parents in Rajan’s wealthy folks, Gita and Joel. After Rajan dumps her, Gretchen follows Gita and Joel to Rome to get Rajan back. During the luxurious, curiously intimate summer, Gretchen hears of Humphrey’s troubles and the Lansings enthusiastically invite Humphrey to join them. The Lansings handle all expenses, but there is a price to pay as the two Baxters become disturbingly (and not entirely unwillingly) entangled with philandering Joel and increasingly unstable Gita. Aside from the Hollywood thriller ending, the combination of smart writing and a decadent world make for a genuine if guilty pleasure.

Malvinas Requiem by Rodolfo Fogwill

The Spectator:

In the foreground of this fabulous, satirical, subterranean story is the crunching discomfort of fighting a war on the cold, windswept hillsides of the Falklands. Here, however, the campaign is seen from an Argentine perspective, where the Brits are efficient, well-paid, confident supermen eager to wipe out confused, hungry, half-trained peasant conscripts. Amid the carnage, the dillos live by getting food from the Argentines in exchange for kerosene and cigarettes. The kerosene and cigarettes they get from the British in exchange for information about Argentine positions. There is no overt morality except for the unspoken commentary provided by the image of the dillo with a thumb up its backside, an endlessly adaptable symbol for General Galtieri buggering up Argentina, inefficient officers screwing up helpless squaddies, and idiotic life messing up everyone.

Had Borges written All Quiet on the Western Front, it might have come out something like this. Amid the snow and slush, death arrives from mines buried in the ground, bullets fired from the hillsides and rockets from the air. But permeating the carnage, black-cowled nuns float into view, sheep explode in slow motion, Harrier jets hang silently in mid-air, and dead pilots swing by beneath orange parachutes, while burrowing deep into the earth the dillos cling desperately to life and pass time away with fantastical stories about the nature of the world above them.

I am finding it hard to post on all the interesting things that find their way to my inbox - I have no idea how bloggers with serious traffic sort through it all - and I am late to the game on this but I wanted to make a note of it nonetheless.

As part of the relaunch of the Vintage Classic Imprint Vintage is launching something called Vintage Classic Twins. The idea is to pair a classic work of literature with a contemporary novel in such a way as to provoke a new way of thinking about both classic and contemporary novels:

Each Twin consists of two books: a specially designed limited edition of one modern classic and one established work. The two books have been carefully selected to provide a thought-provoking combination. They have linked cover designs and will be shrink-wrapped together and sold for a special RRP of £7.99. Some of the pairings could be considered controversial but Vintage is keen to incite debate about these works and encourage readers to look at the classics from new and perhaps unexpected angles.

As a fan of both classics and contemporary works I think it is a great idea. Check out the website for the details and pairings. I am looking forward to the Crime pairing of Ripley’s Game by Patricia Highsmith &Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky shamefully neither of which I have read. The same goes for the Youth pack of Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh &Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens

Which pairing interests you? Any that you think are wrong? What classic and contemporary books do you think would match up well?