“Even though he was exhausted and stabs of pain pulsed through his ear, Cody refused to take the medication they’d given him because he knew, he just knew, that if he let his defenses down even a little he’d start drinking. He knew himself.  He’d find a justification to start off on another bender.  His ear hurt; he was suspended; precious hours for finding the killer had been wasted and he’d never get them back; his dog had died (granted, it was twenty years before, but it was still dead; he missed his son; his 401(k) wasn’t worth crap anymore…”

Book Review:

Review by Bonnie Brody  (AUG 20, 2011)

Back of Beyond by C. J. Box is just what a mystery thriller should be – a wild ride through twists and turns with rogue characters that have depth of spirit and lots of baggage. This book is a hardcore page-turner with characters the reader gets to know well. It’s well-plotted and everything comes together just when it’s supposed to; no red herrings and no deus ex machina. Box knows exactly how to plot his book so that each page brings the reader closer to crisis and then conclusion. There is the dark side that is required in order for good to prevail and there are lots of cold, dark pathways that wind their way to a fine conclusion.

Cody Hoyt is a rogue cop with a history of alcoholism and wild behavior. If he doesn’t like a suspect he will shoot him in the knee to get a confession. He’s been kicked out of the Denver police force and finds himself back in Helena, Montana where his people hail from. As he self-describes his family, they’re “white trash.” The only good thing to his credit is his son Justin, who has turned out to be a good kid raised primarily by his ex-wife, Jenny.

As the book opens, Cody has been on the wagon for 59 days and is participating in Alcoholics Anonymous (AA). His AA sponsor, Hank, is a man Cody trusts and who has guided him to his tentative sobriety. Cody finds out that Hank’s cabin has been destroyed by fire and that Hank has been killed. It appears, at first, to be a suicide but after careful investigation, Cody realizes it’s a homicide. He knows Hank and he knows that Hank would never take his life. He also realizes that Hank’s AA coins are missing and Hank never kept these coins far from his person. Whoever killed Hank stole the coins and made the scene look like a suicide.

The only person who believes Cody is his partner, Larry. The clues that Cody finds lead him to an outfitter called Wilderness Adventures run by one Jed McCarthy. Jed is a narcissistic self-promoter who is about to start his longest trip of the season into Yellowstone Park. He calls this trip “Back of Beyond” because it goes so deep into the National Park. Unfortunately, Cody finds out that his son, Justin, along with Jenny’s fiancé, are on this trip. He tries to get to Yellowstone in time to prevent the trip from starting but doesn’t make it.

Meanwhile, Cody gets suspended from the Helena police force and must make the trip alone as a civilian. He realizes that he’s being followed and stalked and that his very life is in danger. As he gets closer to the park, there is an attempt on his life. Cody becomes paranoid and doesn’t know who to trust. Could his partner Larry be his nemesis?

The book has a lot of good information on alcoholism and recovery, both the disease, the confidentiality and the rehabilitation process. It shows Cody’s constant efforts to remain sober along with his slips. It also shows him picking himself up again to get on the wagon. I was impressed by how much Box knows about AA and the program.

The reader can’t help but notice the author’s love and respect for the wilderness. His descriptions of Yellowstone and its geologic formations are breathtaking. We get to see Wyoming and Montana from the eyes of a writer who loves the spaces of the great outdoors. Back of Beyond is hard to put down. It’s one of those thrillers where each page adds new information and each of the characters are interesting. The book comprises the best of both worlds – it is character and action driven. It may be a bit formulaic but it’s a great formula, one that keeps the reader on his toes and coming back for more.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 182 readers
PUBLISHER:	Minotaur Books; First Edition (August 2, 2011)
REVIEWER:	Bonnie Brody
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	C.J. Box
EXTRAS:	Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: Cold Wind

Bibliography:

Joe Pickett Series:

• Open Season (2001)
• Savage Run (2002)
• Winterkill (2003)
• Trophy Hunt (2004)
• Out of Range (2005)
• In Plain Sight (2006)
• Free Fire (2007)
• Blood Trail (2008)
• Below Zero (2009)
• Nowhere to Run (2010)
• Cold Wind (2011)
• Force of Nature (2012)

Stand-alone:

• Blue Heaven (2008) /  / / 
• Three Weeks to Say Goodbye (2009)
• Back of Beyond (2011)

“There was no induction ceremony, no melding of spit and blood. Those who tattooed themselves did it with no pressure from Jude or anyone else. The only thing they had to give was their word – no drinking, no drugs. Extra credit for no fucking or flesh eating.”

Book Review:

Review by Bonnie Brody  (JUN 08, 2011)

It’s 1987 and New York’s lower east side and alphabet city are places for the homeless, vagrants, the impoverished, hippies, some immigrants who have held out through the next generation and some younger folks who call themselves “straight edge.” Straight edge refers to teenagers who like hard rock and punk but live a straight and clean lifestyle – no meat, no sex, no booze and no drugs. Many shave their heads and are into tattoos. That’s what Ten Thousand Saints by Eleanor Henderson is about – a group of straight edge teens and their parents trying to understand themselves and one another as they venture through life, a lot of it in alphabet city in Manhattan.

The book opens up in Vermont in a city that sounds a lot like Burlington. Two teenagers who live there, Jude and Teddy, are way into drugs. They smoke weed, huff, drink , do mushrooms and basically try to stay high as often and for as long as they can. They also hate school and cut out as often as they can get away with it.

Jude has been adopted by parents who are now divorced, both semi-hippies. His mother blows glass for making bongs and his father, who lives in New York, sells weed for a living. Since his parents’ divorce, Jude’s father, Les, has been living in Manhattan and has been seeing a self-absorbed ballerina named Di. Di has a daughter named Eliza who plans to visit Vermont and wants to meet Jude. Eliza is a rich girl who has been kicked out of several boarding schools for drugs and truancy.

Teddy’s mother is an alcoholic who splits town on New Year’s Eve, the day of Teddy’s sixteenth birthday and the day that this book opens. Teddy has no idea who his father is. He has an older brother named Johnny who lives in New York and is into the straight edge lifestyle.

Jude and Teddy feel like outcasts in Vermont. They hang out with each other but basically don’t have other friends. They like to hang out at a record store and play music together. They’re teased a lot and just don’t fit in.

Eliza arrives in Vermont and parties with Teddy, sharing cocaine with him after he’s already huffed freon, and gasoline, smoked weed and drank. They also have sex. The next morning, Eliza is on her way back to Manhattan and Teddy is dead by OD. Jude is in the hospital with hypothermia and getting detoxed from all the substances he’s used. It was a close call for Jude but he makes it. When Jude gets out of the hospital, he decides to go live with his father in New York.

In New York, Eliza, Jude and Johnny become like a family of three. This is intensified when Eliza finds out that she is pregnant with Teddy’s baby from their one night together. Because Teddy is dead, Johnny really wants Eliza to have this baby to honor Teddy’s memory. Eliza is into this idea as well. She is also into Johnny who does not appear to be into girls.

Eliza and Jude embrace the straight edge lifestyle which is portrayed as a hair’s width from a cult. It embraces Hare Krishna and many Hindu concepts. Johnny is called Mr. Clean because of his devotion to Straight Edge and his fanatic adherence to its principles. It becomes ironic then when he says he is the father of Eliza’s child. In their minds, the parents are more likely to let them keep the baby if the father is alive.

Eliza runs away with Johnny so that she can have the baby. Her mother wants her to have an abortion but she won’t hear of this. The parents are portrayed as distant, absent or stoned. There is not one parent who is really present and attuned to their child’s life. Ironically, at one point in Jude’s childhood, his doctor thinks he may have fetal alcohol syndrome because of his dyslexia, facial structure and hyperactivity with ADD. Despite this possible diagnosis, Jude emerges as a real hero in the novel, a good guy with empathy and strong emotions. He may not have the best judgment but he turns himself into a leader who is respected.

They form a music band and Jude becomes a natural born leader of the group. They travel back to Vermont several times during the novel and recruit others for the band and for the straight edge lifestyle. The band travels up and down the coast and is even interviewed by different zines for their lyrics and overall music.

It is interesting to imagine the Tompkins Square Park of their day – filled with homeless, empty crack vials, condoms, and violence. Now, the same park is filled with nannies and babies and surrounded by million dollar condos. The book is careful to stay true to the New York of the late 1980’s and the gen X’ers who are looking for a place to fit in and make their mark. Ms. Henderson is not judgmental about straight edge but this reader felt that it became another sort of addiction for many of its followers.

The book was fascinating. At times it was repetitive and went off on some rabbit trails. It could have been about fifty pages shorter and been stronger for that editing. However, even with the length it stands at now – 383 pages – it is a fascinating book. I’ve never read a book that caught the gen X’ers so vividly and so perspicaciously. This accomplished novel does not read like a debut novel, which it is. Ms. Henderson is a writer with a rare talent.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 10 readers
PUBLISHER:	Ecco (June 7, 2011)
REVIEWER:	Bonnie Brody
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Eleanor Henderson and her website
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: The Bewildered by Peter Rock

Bibliography:

• Ten Thousand Saints (June 2011)

“The steward leaves. As he passes the kitchen door on his way back to the stairs a Sudanese cook comes out and tips the scraps from a bucket over the Borromeo’s stern. The steward pauses and watches the scraps bobbing in the churned-up water for a while. The moon’s gone: only the ship’s electric glow illuminates the wake, two white lines running backwards into darkness. When the stretch in which the scraps are bobbing fades from view, the steward turns away towards the staircase. The wake itself remains, etched out across the water’s surface; then it fades as well, although no one is there to see it go.”

Book Review:

Review by Devon Shepherd (SEP 26, 2010)

Tom McCarthy’s latest novel, C, is a strange book that, without the draw of a gripping plot or the pathos of interesting, well-rounded characters, somehow manages to intrigue all the same. Perhaps the appeal lies in McCarthy’s haunting prose. Or, perhaps it’s the unshakeable feeling that underneath it all – underneath the layered ideas – there’s a message of sorts, a message as profound as it is ephemeral: just as you think you’ve figured it all out, it escapes you. Whatever the reason, C, while far from perfect, is a bizarrely captivating book.

The novel, in four sections – Caul, Chute, Crash, Call – follows the life, birth to death, of Serge Carrefax. Serge is born in the English countryside, at the turn of the 20th century, on his family’s estate, Versoie. The first section, Caul, deals with Serge’s charmingly tragic childhood. Serge’s mother floats around the grounds – and the warehouses of her silk factory — in an opium-induced fog. Serge’s father is equally preoccupied: when not tending to his school for deaf children, he holes himself up in his workshop, devoted to developing various wireless transmitters. Fortunately, Serge is saved from unbearable loneliness by his older sister, Sophie. However, an incestuous shadow hangs over their relationship, and when she commits suicide over a bizarre (and disastrous) love affair, Serge’s unpurged grief leaves him ill enough to be sent to a restorative spa in Central Europe. Wonderfully strange, the charm of this section lies in the details: silk-production, Serge and Sophie’s Realty Game, the mechanics behind a school production of Seduction and Marriage of Persephone, Sophie’s taxidermy, Sophie’s rigged grave.

The second section, Chute, tells of Serge’s experience as an aerial observer in World War I. Aerial observers accompanied pilots on reconnaissance flights. Their job was to sketch, and later to photograph, an area, as well as signal, via wireless transmitters, the location of enemy artillery or soldiers. Although intricately detailed, and wonderfully written, the horrors of war – death, destruction, destitution — as experienced by Serge, are rendered flat, superficial, and narrative drive slackens to a halt.

But perhaps that’s the point: it’s during the war that Serge develops his penchant for cocaine and heroin. Narcotically numbed to the horrors around him, Serge’s observations, while inappropriately cold, are also strangely beautiful:

“In states such as this, he finds himself captivated by the German kite balloons. . .He fires on the airbourne ones that come into his range, not out of hatred or a sense of duty, but to see what happens when the bullets touch their surface, in the way that a child might poke at an insect. When flame-tendrils push outwards from inside the balloons and climb up their surface before bursting into bloom, he watches the men in their baskets throw their parachutes over the side and jump. Often they get stuck halfway down, tangled in the ropes and netting. Seeing them wriggling as the flame crawls down the twine towards them, he thinks of flies caught in spiders’ webs; when they roast they look like dead flies, round and blackened.”

Or:

“As they sink through the smoke-cloud, Serge sounds his klaxon again, then looks down. The battlefield’s now strewn with fragments: of machine parts, mirrors, men. Legs, wedged in by earth, stand upright in athletic postures, crooked at the knee as though to sprint or straightened into sprightly leaps but, lacking bodies to direct and complement their action, remain still; detached arms semaphore quite randomly across the ground; torsos, cut off at the waist, mimic the statues of antiquity.”

Unfortunately, drug addiction follows Serge home from the war, and it’s the third section, Crash, that chronicles (rather disappointingly) Serge’s descent into the drug-fuelled London underworld. After the eponymous crash of this section, it’s decided that Serge should be sent away, far from the temptations of London. In the fourth and final section of the book, Call, Serge tags along on an archaeological dig to Sedment, Egypt.

Actually, the failure of the last two sections is instructive as to what is wrong with this book: while the novel is a brilliant (dare I say, genius) exploration of ideas, Serge has all the depth of a paper-doll. There’s so little at stake – so little emotional investment – that as his addiction worsens, or as he falls ill in Egypt, there’s little to compel the reader to turn the page.

C , much like McCarthy’s celebrated debut, Remainder, isn’t for everyone. What it lacks in rounded, interesting characters, or any semblance of a traditional plot, it makes up for in its exploration of ideas such as the subjectivity of experience, our need to force meaning onto meaninglessness, communication and connectedness, cycles of birth, death, rebirth. This isn’t a novel to lose yourself in. It isn’t even a well-told story. It is, however, a complex mesh of themes that, for those so inclined, will provide some bulk to chew on.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 52 readers
PUBLISHER:	Knopf (September 7, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Devon Shepherd
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Wikipedia page on Tom McCarthy
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Another book structured much the same, from birth to death of the main character: Spooner by Pete Dexter

Bibliography:

• Remainder (2005; 2007 in US)
• Men in Space (2007; Not yet published in US)
• Tintin and the Secret of Literature (2006)
• C (September 2010)

Nonfiction:

• Tintin and the Secret of Literature (2006; 2008 in US)

“Before he went on the latest drinking bout, when he was supposed not to be taking alcohol in any form, he used to take Phoebe to dinner here on Tuesday nights and share a bottle of wine with her, his only tipple of the week. Now, in trepidation, he was going to see if he could take a glass or two of claret again without wanting more. He tried to tell himself he was here solely in the spirit of research, but that fizzing sensation under his breastbone was all too familiar. He wanted a drink, and he was going to have one.”

Book Review:

Review by Lynn Harnett (MAY 19, 2010)

Black’s third 1950s Dublin thriller featuring pathologist Garret Quirke (after Christine Falls and The Silver Swan) finds Quirke in a rehab hospital, from which he will shortly spring himself, for his daughter’s sake.

“Quirke had never known life so lacking in savor. In his first days at St. John’s he had been in too much confusion and distress to notice how everything here seemed leached of colour and texture; gradually, however, the deadness pervading the place began to fascinate him. Nothing at St. John’s could be grasped or held.”

The fog does not dissipate all that much once he’s out, however. Quirke buys himself a fancy car, though he can’t drive – this injects some comic moments into an essentially dark tale – but it can’t quench his thirst for drink, which he fights and succumbs to throughout the story.

Quirke’s daughter Phoebe sets the plot in motion – her friend April Latimer, a junior doctor and very independent woman, is missing though no one will admit it. April’s prominent family has essentially washed their hands of her and most of her friends assume she’s gone off with some man. But Phoebe asks her father to investigate.

Quirke consults his friend Inspector Hackett, stirs up the hornet’s nest of April’s family, and questions April’s rather brittle circle of friends – devious journalist Jimmy, beguiling actress Isabel and exotic and polished Patrick Ojukwu, a handsome Nigerian student, suspected of sleeping with everyone, including April.

Black’s characters, even those who strive for type, like April’s snooty family, become individuals as the story progresses, which doesn’t always make the reader like them better.

Quirke, a canny, opinionated, floundering loner, works at himself, but succumbs easily to temptation. Selfish as he is, though, he is not self-absorbed and his idle reflections often lead to thoughts of others, particularly Phoebe and her concerns.

“Idly he pondered the distinction between solitude and loneliness. Solitude, he conjectured, is being alone, while loneliness is being alone among other people. Was that the case? No, something incomplete there. He had been solitary when the bar was empty, but was he lonely now that these others had appeared?

“Had April Latimer been lonely? It did not seem probable from everything he had heard of her so far.”

Black’s (aka John Banville) plot rises from these well-fleshed characters and the damp, wintry setting as Quirke probes corrosive family secrets and challenges the reign of the Catholic Church in an insular, hidebound city.

Readers of Ken Bruen and Ian Rankin will enjoy Black’s fine atmospheric prose and noirish insight.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 68 readers
PUBLISHER:	Henry Holt and Co.; 1 edition (April 13, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Lynn Harnett
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Benjamin Black
EXTRAS:	Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: A Death in Summer Christine Falls The Silver Swan Also by John Banville: The Infinities  The Sea

Bibliography:

• Christine Falls (2006)
• The Silver Swan (2007)
• Elegy for April (2010)
• A Death in Summer (2011)
• Vengeance ( 2012)
• Holy Orders (August 2013)

Stand-alone:

• The Lemur (2008)

“There are so many evils that pull on our children.”

Book Review:

Review by Bonnie Brody (APR 15, 2010)

If you are at all familiar with any of Anne Lamott’s books, Imperfect Birds will have a very familiar ring to it. It tackles the themes of addiction, spirituality, 12- step programs and enabling.

The novel is about Rosie,  now a 17 year-old adolescent who has her parents wrapped around her fingers. She is heavily into drugs and alcohol but is lying to her parents about the extent of her substance use, cheating on her urinalyses. She is a great manipulator and excellent with triangulation. Her mother, Elizabeth, and her step-father James, are at their wit’s ends. Rosie’s father, Andrew, died when she was a young child.

Elizabeth is a recovering alcoholic who has two years clean time. She has a feeling of emptiness and has never felt whole since Andrew died. Her rocky relationship with Rosie makes her feel fragile and distrustful of her own gut feelings. James is very grounded and tries to get Elizabeth to be more secure in her boundaries with Rosie and to trust her instincts, not to any great avail.

Rosie has two best friends, Alice and Jodie. As the book opens, Jodie has just completed three months at a rehab facility. They are all three using drugs and sometimes trading sex for drugs. They don’t use condoms and seem unaware of the dangers of unsafe sex.

Elizabeth doesn’t work outside the home. She and the family live in the vicinity of Marin County. James has a weekly show on National Public Radio and has published one novel. Up to this time, Elizabeth has considered herself his muse and now feels lost, her place in the family insecure. Marital stress is at an all time high due to Rosie’s lying, splitting and manipulation. Elizabeth, especially, is very enabling of Rosie’s behaviors.

The book discusses a lot about recovery and there is a lot of spirituality-centered talk in it as well. Elizabeth’s best friends are ministers and they are the ones that Rosie is referred to for counseling. Elizabeth, James, and their friends all used to drink together years ago and are all in recovery. Elizabeth is active in Alcoholics Anonymous. Additionally, she suffers from depression and is on medication for her psychiatric issues.

Rosie tests Jame’s and Elizabeth’s limits to the max. She breaks curfew, sneaks out of the house in the middle of the night, asks Elizabeth to withhold information from James, and generally lies, steals, and is rude, disrespectful and snide to both Elizabeth and James. She is a bright girl who is a whiz at physics who also reads Robertson Davies and Maria Rilke. Despite her intelligence, she has little or no insight about the extent of her substance problems.

The author does an excellent job of showing the strain and difficulties posed by a drug abusing adolescent. There is too much about spirituality for my taste, but this is to be expected in a book written by Lamott.

The novel very excellently shows the grip of addiction, the pain that it causes loved ones and the strains it puts on marital and family relationships. Lamott is the perfect writer to tackle a topic like this, a topic that is harrowing, frightening and life-threatening. This is a good book, one that every parent will benefit from.

* Editor’s note:  Rosie is the same character that appears in Rosie (1983) at age 5 and then in Crooked Little Heart (1997) at age 13.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 17 readers
PUBLISHER:	Riverhead Hardcover (April 6, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Bonnie Brody
AMAZON PAGE:	Imperfect Birds
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Anne Lamont Fan Page
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Made me think of this book: Blame by Michele Huneven

Bibliography:

• Hard Laughter (1980)
• Rosie (1983)
• Joe Jones (1985)
• All New People (1989)
• Crooked Little Heart (1997)
• Blue Shoe (2002)
• Imperfect Birds (April 2010)

Non-fiction:

• Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son’s First Year (1993)
• Bird by Bird : Some Instructions on Writing and Life (1994)
• Traveling Mercies : Some Thoughts on Faith (1999)
• Plan B : Further Thoughts on Faith (2005)
• Grace (Eventually): Thoughts on Faith (2007)

“Harry had felt the gnawing ache for alcohol from the moment he woke up that morning. First as an instinctive physical craving, then as a panic-stricken fear because he had put a distance between himself and his medicine by not taking is hip flask or any money with him to work. Now the ache was entering a new phase in which it was both a wholly physical pain and a feeling of blank terror that he would be torn to pieces.”

Book Review:

Review by Eleanor Bukowsky (FEB 24, 2010)

In Jo Nesbø’s The Devil’s Star, Harry Hole is an alcoholic who will be lucky to reach his fortieth birthday. His job as an inspector in Oslo Police Headquarters is hanging by a thread. He would not have a position at all if his supervisor, Crime Squad Chief Inspector Bjarne Møller, did not feel sorry for him, especially since he knows what a terrific detective Harry is when he manages to stay sober. Harry’s self-loathing is deepened by regret over his crumbling relationship with his lover, Rakel. He is all too aware that he cannot offer Rakel the stability and security that she and her young son, Oleg, need and deserve.

It is summer in Oslo, and the city is in the grip of a debilitating heat wave. In addition, the police force is working with a skeleton crew since so many people are away on vacation. When a fresh homicide falls into Møller’s lap, he calls Beate Lønn, a forensics whiz and a straight arrow who practically lives in the lab and is blessed with a photographic memory. Next, he contacts Inspector Tom Waaler, a rising star who is handsome, self-confident, and respected by everyone in the department. Møller hesitates before telephoning Harry Hole, “the lone wolf…the department’s enfant terrible.”

Harry is still reeling from the death of his colleague, Ellen Gjelten. Although Ellen’s case is closed, Harry is obsessed and will not let it rest; he has some disturbing theories about what really happened to her. He spends hours pursuing leads that turn out to be dead ends. Out of frustration, he goes on a binge and Bjame covers for Harry by placing him on leave. However, Harry’s boss cannot protect him indefinitely.

Circumstances bring Waaler, Hole, and Lønn together on a strange case of a serial killer who seems to be fixated on pentagrams, “devil’s stars.” The perpetrator appears to pick his victims randomly and his motive is unclear. As the killings continue, the police remain baffled. Harry, who gradually emerges from his alcoholic haze, uses his keen insight and out-of-the box thinking to shed some light on this murky investigation. As he does so, he butts heads not only with a cold-blooded psychopath but also with a sworn enemy who has a great deal to lose if Harry succeeds in unmasking him.

Although Harry is something of a stereotype (the brilliant cop who needs a big case to give him an excuse to go on the wagon), he is likeable, honest, and compassionate. Unsurprisingly in a book that exceeds four-hundred and fifty pages, the mystery is complex, with red herrings galore, clues scattered throughout to tantalize the reader, and of course, a climactic and violent final confrontation. Although The Devil’s Star is far from realistic and breaks little new ground in a well-worn genre, it is evocative and suspenseful, with detailed and vivid descriptive writing and a fascinating look at the minutiae of forensics, interrogation, and surveillance. Nesbø’s characters are varied and intriguing, there is plenty of action to hold the reader’s interest, and the twists and turns keep us guessing, even after we think that the crime is solved. Aficionados of novels that feature a talented cop who lives on the edge, a sadistic and devilishly clever serial killer, and a plot that teases and surprises us until the truth is finally revealed, will find much to like in this multi-layered thriller.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 422 readers
PUBLISHER:	Harper (March 9, 2010)
REVIEWER:	Eleanor Bukowsky
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Jo Nesbo
EXTRAS:	Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Read our review of: Police The Snowman Nemesis

Bibliography:

• The Bat (1997; 2013)
• The Cockroaches (1998; 2014)
• The Redbreast (2000; 2006 in UK; 2007 in US)
• Nemesis (2002; 2008 in UK; January 2009 in US)
• The Devil’s Star (2003; 2010 in US)
• The Redeemer (2005; 2009 in UK; not in US)
• The Snowman (2007; 2011 in US)
• The Leopard (2011)
• Phantom (2012)
• Police (October 2013)

Stand-alone Novels:

• Headhunters (2008)
• The Son (May 2014)

“I’d left a bed and a mother to sleep under storefront awnings right beside men who thought a homeless girl was a warm radiator they could put their hands to. I’d slept in shelters, in abandoned buildings. I’d been beaten. And at the start of every new day, I still believed I could choose my own beginning, one that was scrubbed clean of everything past.”

Book Review:

Review by Bonnie Brody (DEC 8, 2009)

Nami Mun’s Miles From Nowhere is a bold and gritty account of a young girl who leaves home at thirteen and experiences life on the streets, rape, addiction, and a series of horrific life events. She writes with no holds barred and her book reminded me in some ways of Last Exit to Brooklyn by Hubert Selby, Jr. It’s has that succinct, in-your-face style of writing that is both riveting and painful at the same time.

Joon is a Korean girl who leaves home at thirteen. Her father is a philandering drunk who is physically abusive and her mother has been unable to function since her father left. Her mother is virtually catatonic and does not interact with Joon at all. Sometimes Joon finds her mother lying in the dirt in their backyard. Her mother has stopped speaking to her. As Joon says, “One night I found her reading her bible on the sofa. I sat next to her and begged her to say one word, just one. I even gave her some suggestions: Apple. Lotion. Jesus. Rice. She didn’t look up from the pages. This lasted six months. This lasted until the day I left”.

The book is structured in chapters, each one capable of standing alone as a short story. In fact, several of the chapters have been published as short stories in different literary journals. The chapters show Joon’s life past and present, providing the reader with Joon’s story: her feelings, experiences, loves, friendships, disasters, pain, and ultimately, hopes for the future.

The novel begins with Joon in a shelter for run-aways. There she is befriended by a girl named Knowledge who is present in several of the book’s chapters. Knowledge is more worldly than Joon and tries to mentor Joon in the ways of the street. She actually gives Joon lessons in street morality asking her what she learned today. She proudly tells Joon, “Sometimes you gotta do wrong to do right, know what I’m saying?” There’s a complex rule of law for the street, very different from the rule of law that governs regular citizens.

During the course of this book, Joon struggles with heroin addiction, alcohol abuse, and uses most every drug she can get her hands on. She works as a hostess, a street vendor, a hooker, an Avon lady, a geriatric aide, and as a food deliverer. One can’t help but wonder if some of this book is not autobiographical. The author herself is Korean and the blurb about her states that she worked as an Avon lady, a street vendor and in a nursing home. She also attained a GED before college rather than going the usual route of high school.

Joon is a survivor. She struggles and finds herself challenged at many junctions but she plods on. She even finds it in herself to help others who are in worse shape than she is. However, the presentation of her ultimate aloneness in the world is profound. She has no one and is on her own as a child in the dangerous world of the Bronx. She often is homeless, sleeping in abandoned buildings or at bus stops. She is a pragmatist, knowing that life in the streets is not easy or good for her. “ In order to get what I needed – – shelter, food, money, friendship – – parts of me, piece by piece, would have to be sacrificed.” Joon learns to leave others before she is left, to move on without having to feel intimacy, even if she needs to squelch her feelings with a needle and smack.

This is a powerful book, not for the faint of heart. It is also a rewarding book, one that allows the reader to companion Joon in her life. It keeps our eyes open to another world, one that we may not have lived ourselves but one that is lived every day by so many of the children in the world. By the time I had finished this book, Joon had grabbed my heart and taken a piece of it with her.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 46 readers
PUBLISHER:	Riverhead Trade; Reprint edition (September 1, 2009)
REVIEWER:	Bonnie Brody
AMAZON PAGE:	Miles from Nowhere
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Nami Mun
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	More like this: The Blue Notebook by James A. Levine

Bibliography:

• Miles from Nowhere (Dec 2008)

“I could feel my hair catch fire, then I could smell it. My flesh began to singe as if I were a scrap of meat newly thrown into the barbecue, and then I could hear the bubbling of my skin as the flames kissed it. I could not reach my head to extinguish my flaming hair.”

Book Review:

Review by Bonnie Brody (NOV 21, 2009)

The Gargoyle is one of the most gripping novels I have ever read. I am not one to usually read books more than once and I can probably count on two hands those novels that I’ve read two or three times. This is my second reading of The Gargoyle and it is even better the second time around.

The book is a first person narrative, told by a man who is severely burned in a car accident. He is driving in a ritzy sports car, stoned on cocaine, alcohol and other drugs du jour, when his car goes out of control. The bottle of booze he has been drinking from is held between his legs (a most unfortunate place for it to be) and when the car explodes in a wreck of fire, most all of his body turns to cinder. He is not expected to live, but miraculously he does. While recuperating in a rehabilitation hospital, he reflects on his past life as a good looking stud, a pornographer, drug addict, alcoholic and sex addict. He sees his life as valueless but does not know how to turn himself around. He is now a “monster” to most who see him – – a man without a face and with most of his body parts missing. He is in constant pain and his hospital rehabilitation is an effort that will take years to complete.

Amazingly, one day he is lying in his bed when a young woman named Marianne Engel, walks up to him and says quite simply, “You’ve been burned. Again.”  Marianne is a patient in the psychiatric ward but believes absolutely that she has known this burnt man in a prior life, some time in the early 1300’s when she was a nun and a scribe in the German village of Engelthal. Is she schizophrenic as her diagnosis reads or is she telling the truth? This is a hard question to cipher and forms the crux of the book.

The book is chilling in that Marianne knows many things about her paramour , things both simple and sublime. One amazing fact is that he was born with a small scar right near his heart and Marianne is aware of that. She is also aware of his life history, those events they shared and those that he suffered on his own.

I read this book with chills going up and down my spine, trying to decipher the truth(s) of the story as Marianne tells it. She captures her lover by telling him Scheherazade – like stories, one after the other, all about their lives together,
one story more interesting than the next.

Supposedly, Marianne is one of the great scribes of the town of Engelthal, writing a new version of the bible and a copy of Dante’s Inferno. Her style and script are unique and beautiful, not to be confused with anyone else’s.

What is revealed from these nights of stories after stories is that theirs was a great love, one that is to be repeated forever, through eternity. Whether the reader is a believer or a doubter, there is there is always the great question – – Could this have been possible? Is it still possible? Will this great love repeat itself through eternity?

Davidson is a writer of remarkable talent. I found it impossible to believe that this was his debut novel. He is able to combine several genres – – the psychological thriller, historical fiction, horror, and mythology. His genre is unique, and I, for one, was grasped from the first page and the story never left me outside its grip.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 313 readers
PUBLISHER:	Anchor; First Edition edition (August 4, 2009)
REVIEWER:	Bonnie Brody
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK?	YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Andrew Davidson
EXTRAS:	Excerpt and Interview and Reader’s Guide
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	Other explorations of “past lives:” Diary by Chuck Palahuniuk Fangland by John Marks Yes, My Darling Daughter by Margaret Leroy

Bibliography:

• The Gargoyle (August 2008)

“Drug dramas. And manic-depression. Hard to know which roller coaster you’re riding.”

Book Review:

Review by Bonnie Brody (NOV 11, 2009)

Ginnah Howard’s Night Navigation is a powerful and unflinching novel about drug addiction and mental illness. It is beautifully written in a terse and spare style that is both rich and evocative. The narrative reminded me of the music of Erik Satie or the pizzicato violin in the andante movement of Prokofiev’s Second Violin Concerto. The writing is that beautiful and melodic. It made me rise out of myself into the world that Ms. Howard has created.

The story takes place in a one year time period in upstate New York. Del is a retired high school teacher and artist. She is the mother of 37 year-old Mark who has been diagnosed as a MICA, a dually diagnosed “mentally ill chemical abuser.” Mark is manic depressive and a heroin addict. He has been in and out of rehab and various psychiatric hospitals. As the book begins, Mark is once again wanting to go to detox and then rehab in a therapeutic community. Like a fugue, the chapters switch back and forth between Del and Mark, sharing their thoughts, feelings and actions. They are superimposed yet also separate.

Mark is on a lot of psychotropic medications including Zyprexa (an antipsychotic), neurontin (a mood stabilizer), and an antidepressant. He talks about the various side effects of the medications: weight gain, fuzzy tongue, tardive dyskinesia, an incipient manic episode. He has a history of stealing in order to get money for drugs. He once took Del’s car, worth $8,000 and sold it for $700. He has drug dealers after him trying to get the money that he owes them. When the novel begins, Mark is living with Del, a living situation that is not working out for her. She is terrified every time the phone rings – that it will be one of Mark’s dealers, that someone will be calling to tell her about a crisis, or that she will be notified that Mark is dead. Del is an enabler and is working hard to let go of Mark, to not buy into his life issues. “When the phone rings, think marsupial: once he gets too big for the pouch, out you go.” She is torn between being “Mama Marsupial” and being “Mama Bear.” What makes it so difficult for Del to let go of Mark is that her husband, Lee, committed suicide when her sons were boys. Mark’s brother, Aaron, also committed suicide seven years ago. Del is terrified that she will lose Mark, too.

There is a lot about twelve-step programs in this book and the author is very familiar with them. She writes about AA, NA and Al-Anon with a knowledge that is authentic and wise. When Del is thinking about the family program at Mark’s rehab center, in which family “are integrated into the clinical process as thoroughly as possible on an encouraged voluntary basis,” her response is “As thoroughly as possible . . .on an encouraged voluntary basis. Between these carefully edited phrases, this chorus: Night after night we expected to find out this person was dead. Hundreds of promises have been broken. You want us to open up, on an encouraged voluntary basis, to hope again, as thoroughly as possible to feel that pain once more.” For Del, every day is a challenge. She tries to avoid the telephone, she has to walk past the cabin where Aaron was living when he took his life. “What happens in her gut when the phone rings and whether she can look up this hill or not are the two barometers of how she’s really feeling.”

Del’s life is paved with crisis after crisis. Mark wants everything done right away, yesterday if possible. Del jumps to accommodate Mark’s requests and demands. This makes her relationship with her long-time partner, Richard, rocky. He wants her to have clearer boundaries and limits with Mark. He doesn’t really get the pressure and fear that Del is living under. Ms. Howard is carefully non-judgmental about Del and Mark, presenting their situations and outcomes in a compassionate and straight-forward way. Even when Del repeats the same errors in judgment that allow her to be used by Mark, there is no condescension or sense of “I told you so” in the story. Concomitantly, Mark is not judged when he relapses or acts in a profoundly wrong manner. These are two people who love each other, trying to get through their days, one day at a time – – difficult days that Ms. Howard knows no one but them can truly understand.

It is poignant when Del is sitting in her living room and “She sees she’s pulled the cushion over to rest on her knees. The pillow to shield against a head-on.” For this is the stuff of her life – – head-on collisions with no seat belt. The author understands addicts and addictive thinking, the way that an addict manipulates, is self-centered and loses sight of right and wrong in the desire to get the next fix. She realizes how difficult it is for Mark to try one more stint in rehab, this time in what he calls a “junkie boot camp. Going to tear you down; then build you back up. Mortification and absolution.” Of course Mark isn’t able to cut the mustard in this type of environment but this is not held against him. He is an addict and addicts do what they have to do to get their way, always. As the saying goes in Alcoholics Anonymous, “Fake it till you make it.” It’s all faking, all the time, until real recovery sets in. For Mark, he’s a fledgling at all this and has never had any real time being clean and sober. He’s never made it to true recovery.

Anger is a huge issue for both Del and Mark. They have difficulty discussing Lee or Aaron’s suicide with one another and their anger comes out sideways at one another or turned inward against themselves. One day, while in rehab, Mark is looking in a mirror, “He is the only one left in the bathroom. The face is a death mask. Shifting into Aaron’s face. All his teeth ache. Stuff surging up in front of him that he’s pretty sure isn’t there. Dad in the pole barn, blood all over. Aaron, drifting down. And always the low hum.” The ghosts of Aaron and Lee are always in the background of Mark and Del’s lives. They live in despair, fear, if only’s, what ifs, and quiet desperation. It’s hard to imagine what it’s like to be the only two members left of a nuclear family, the only half of that family that has not succumbed to suicide.

Ms. Howard knows mental illness well. She describes the incessant smoking that most manic depressives and schizophrenics need in order to balance their minds. Mark says to himself at one point, “The trembles are back to moderate and transmissions from outer space reduced to occasional.” And this is a fairly good day for him. On bad days he hears click-clacking, humming, and feels like his head might explode. His mouth is like mush and it’s hard to speak. Del hates to see Mark like this and she sees herself as a rescuer even if she can’t be a savior. It is the only action she can live with – – for what would happen to her if Mark took the same route as his brother and father.

One might think this is a depressing book and in some ways it certainly is. However, it is a book about hope and resiliency, about love and coping, and about acceptance and second chances. As Roethke, the poet said, “What is madness but nobility of the soul at odds with circumstance.” With Mark and Del, we have two noble souls struggling to survive. Thriving is still a long way down the road. But neither of them give up. They keep at it, one day at a time. This is a remarkable book in its reality and starkness, in its ability to light the way for two tormented souls. It is a book that kept me up all night reading because I could not put it down.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 34 readers
PUBLISHER:	Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; 1 edition (April 14, 2009)
REVIEWER:	Bonnie Brody
AMAZON PAGE:	Night Navigation
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Ginnah Howard
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	A Cure For Night by Justin Peacock Blame by Michelle Huneven Somethings that Meant the World to Me by Joshua Mohr

Bibliography:

• Night Navigation (April 2009)

“Disbarment had been a real possibility, so much so that my six-month suspension for admitted drug use actually came as a relief.”

Book Review:

Review by Bonnie Brody (OCT 24, 2009)

In this debut novel, Justin Peacock offers the reader an intense courtroom thriller. From page one, I was hooked and stayed hooked until the very end. As with the best page-turners, you won’t want to put this novel down until you find out what happens.

Joel Deveraux is working at a top-notch, white collar law office in New York City when he decides that he wants to date his legal assistant, Beth. Not only is this potentially unethical, but Beth also has the air of something forbidden; she is an adventurer in life, perhaps on the dark side. Joel soon finds out that Beth is playing with fire, a powdered fire called heroin.  While Beth is really into this drug and has already let her professional life flounder, Joel joins her as a weekend partier. He fools himself into believing that because he uses only on the weekend, he’s really okay. One day, at work, Beth overdoses and dies. Joel is at the center of the investigation and loses his job. He is given the option of resigning before he is fired and he takes this option. He also finds himself at the losing end of a civil lawsuit filed by Beth’s father who mistakenly believes that he was the one who got Beth into drugs. Joel loses his license to practice law for six months and finds himself unable to land a job at any reputable law firm. Word travels fast on the grapevine, even in Manhattan. Joel finally secures work as a public defender in Brooklyn. Though he’s not there for the idealistic reasons that many public defenders share, he appreciates the work. He’s not using heroin any longer but he’s not in a good recovery program either.

Joel has been working as a public defender for about six months, primarily doing arraignments, when his boss offers him the chance to play second chair in a murder investigation. This is where things begin to pick up and get really interesting. The reader is privy to intricate courtroom dramas between the public defender’s office and the prosecution, between lawyers and clients and between victims and perpetrators. We are shown the ugly head of racism as it peaks out from every corner, especially in jury selection and in impulsive judgments about clients. The dialogue is very realistic and the lingua franca of the city projects appears to be genuinely portrayed.

Joel is paired up with a senior defender on his team, Myra Goldstein. She is a seasoned six year veteran of the public defender’s office – tough, assertive, self-assured. She doesn’t see the need to have a second chair but her boss is concerned that she won’t have enough time to give to this case. Myra is also working on an appeal for another client who she believes is innocent but has just been sentenced to life in jail. Joel likes to be in the courtroom, an experience he did not have at his posh law office. The murder case also interests him a lot. A jewish student from Brooklyn College has been murdered at the projects. A second man, a black drug dealer, has been shot in the back twice and is alive. The alleged perpetrator, Lorenzo Tate, has been identified by an eye witness but continues to assert his innocence. It is a case with a lot more than meets the eye at first look. Joel learns that it is often not the best case that wins, but the best story. But what is the real story of this case? That’s what this book is about.

The title of this book is interesting in itself and forms one of the backdrops for the story. Myra says to Joel that “the day tries to correct the night’s mistakes. Most of my cases, people have done something they never would’ve dreamed of doing in broad daylight.” Joel asks Myra if that makes them the night janitors. Myra says “We’re absolutely that … What else do we do but clean up after it? That’s why we’ll never run out of work. Not unless someone invents a cure for night.”

While the novel is riveting at times and always a page-turner, the ending is a bit of a let-down. Despite fitting together nicely, I expected more of a drama and revelation than I was given. It seemed a bit too pat and a bit too far-fetched at the same time. Despite my disappointment with the ending, I could not put the book down until I got there. It had me in its clutches like a pit bull and I lost quite a bit of sleep last night.

I think that Justin Peacock has a good career ahead of him as he polishes his style and continues in this vein. I haven’t read such a good courtroom drama since The Juror by George Dawes Green or The Thirteenth Juror by John Lescroart. Peacock has a wonderful way with dialogue that keeps the nail biting going strong. I wanted better physical descriptions of Joel and Myra from the author but I made them up for myself. Peacock knows the courtroom. He understands the confrontations and the ethical dilemmas. He understands addiction and the rationalizations that addicts make to themselves when they’re not in full recovery. He knows how to keep the reader turning pages. I look forward to his next book.

AMAZON READER RATING:	from 58 readers
PUBLISHER:	Vintage (October 6, 2009)
REVIEWER:	Bonnie Brody
AMAZON PAGE:	A Cure for Night
AUTHOR WEBSITE:	Justin Peacock’s blog Daily News article on Justin Peacock
EXTRAS:	Reading Guide and Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION:	More courtroom drama: Missing Witness by Gordon Campbell The Legal Limit by Martin Clark The Lincoln Lawyer by Michael Connelly The Last Goodbye by Reed Arvin

Bibliography:

• A Cure for Night (2008)
• Blind Man’s Alley (August 2010)