David Baldacci. The
Whole Truth. ©2008 This one is totally over the top. Multi-billionaire arms manufacturer Nicholas
Creel is working to get the Russians and the Chinese at each other’s throats in
order to build up demand for his products.
Shaw works for some secret agency in lieu of going to prison for
life. He loves Anna who is a high level
researcher at the Phoenix Foundation.
Katie is an alcoholic reporter, who is reduced from winning Pulitzers to
writing obits. Creel uses an attack on the Phoenix Foundation by fake Russians
to rile the Chinese. Anna and everyone else there is murdered. Shaw figures it out
and burns up Creel with a phosphorous bomb he has hidden under his skin. It’s all preposterous, but sort of fun. The
Guardian review was a total send up.
January 2014
.
Chris Bohjalian. The
Light in the Ruins. ©2013 In 1955 Francesca Rosati, the daughter in
law of Marchese Antonio Rosati, is found murdered and her heart has been cut
out and placed on a nearby table. When
Beatrice Rosati, the Marchese’s widow is also murdered and has her heart
removed, it’s clear that this is the work of a serial killer bent on destroying
the Rosati family. So begins a tale that
oscillates between 1955 and WW II. Monte
Volta, the Rosati estate, contains an Etruscan burial site which attracted the
Germans, always ready to appropriate art and artifacts. Christina, the Rosatis' daughter, had an affair with a
young German officer, who later is reported killed during the German retreat. Serafina Bettini, a police detective, has an
interest because she sheltered in the tombs, when she was a partisan recovering
from terrible burns incurred in an action against the Germans. Bohjalian manages to maintain the suspense through the telling of both
narratives. What is perhaps most
interesting are the compromises the Rosati’s must make, the Marchese to survive
the German presence and Christina in loving someone so totally inappropriate. January 2014
.
Nelson DeMille. The
Gate House. ©2004 This is a sequel to The Gold Coast in which attorney John Sutter’s wife Susan Stanhope murdered
the Mafia don, Frank Bellarosa, who was Sutter’s client and her lover. After the murder, Susan got off. She divorced Sutter, who got nothing because
of a pre-nup that had been insisted on by Susan’s mega-rich parents. He took off on a three year cruise on his
sailboat and then signed on with a prestigious law firm in London. It’s ten years later. Sutter comes back for the impending funeral of
Ethel Allard, who has a life tenancy in the gatehouse of the former Stanhope
estate. Sutter is her attorney and is
staying temporarily in the gatehouse as Ethel lies dying in a nearby nursing
home. An Iranian businessman now owns
the estate, but Susan has purchased and is living in the guest cottage in which
she and John had lived in better times.
Soon Susan and John meet up and quickly decide to get back together and
to remarry. Meanwhile Anthony Bellarosa
is lurking nearby. It’s time for him to
get revenge for his father’s murder. He
tries to hire John as his attorney and consiglieri. The implication is that he and Susan will be
safe if he works for Anthony, but maybe not if he refuses. John refuses, files a complaint with the
local police and calls the FBI. Anthony
comes to the guest cottage one night, but he doesn’t survive the visit. The other problem is that Susan’s unpleasant
parents threaten to disinherit her and her children if she remarries John. When Ethel dies she leaves behind a letter
for John that is so explosive that the Stanhopes back off and John, Susan and
their children are free to get on with their lives with money the least of
their worries. John Sutter is really
funny, which makes a great read even better.
February 2014
.
Dave Eggers. A
Hologram for the King. ©2012 This is a tiresome novel about a 50 something
American salesman, who goes to Saudi Arabia to try to sell an IT system for a
new city that the king is having built.
Everything he does seems to be tawdry or dumb or both. You can skip this one. February 2014
.
Michael Frayn. Skios. ©2012
When I went to check other reviews to make sure I had the names of the
players right, I found this in an NYT review and can’t think of any way to top
it: “As his uproarious 1983 play “Noises
Off” so nimbly demonstrated, Michael Frayn is a master of that most frantic of
genres: the door-slamming, coincidence-splattered, slapstick-studded genre of
farce. With his latest novel, “Skios,” Mr. Frayn tries to translate farce from
the theater to the page — with somewhat mixed results. The novel is immensely
entertaining, sometimes laugh-out-loud funny, but it’s also a pretty flimsy
production, with an unsatisfying and jerry-built conclusion.” The only thing missing is the Marx
Brothers. February 2014
.
John Grisham. The
Racketeer. ©2012 Malcolm Bannister was an attorney in a small
firm in a small town in Virginia. He did
some wire transfers for a Washington lobbyist who was buying a remote hunting
lodge. When it was revealed that the
lodge was used for providing Congressmen with sex with underage girls,
Bannister was caught up in an FBI sweep in a RICO investigation and sentenced
to 10 years for money laundering. Five
years later, when a federal judge is murdered, Banister persuades the FBI that
he knows who did it and says he will tell them in return for his freedom,
$150,000 and inclusion in the witness protection program. From there on this is a cliff hanger. It’s pure Grisham to the last page. It’s hard to imagine that anyone could be as
smart as Bannister. January 2014
.
Dennis Lehane. Live
by Night. ©2012 Joe
Coughlin, son of a Boston police superintendent, started with petty crime at 13
and was robbing banks by the time he was 20.
In a robbery gone bad, one of the two brothers he worked with was killed
after executing a policeman. The other
escaped to Canada. Thanks to his
father’s influence, Joe only gets five years but it is in the notorious
Charlestown prison, where he is in constant danger from the other inmates. He’s protected by a Mafia don, Massimo
Pescatori, but only on condition that his father do a few favors for the mob. After Massimo gets out, he puts his shyster
lawyer to work on Joe’s case and Joe is out after only two years. Massimo has recognized that Joe is smart and
sends him to Tampa to run the mob's operation there – bootlegging, narcotics and
prostitution. The most important and
lucrative activity is the distilling and distribution of rum. Joe eliminates all the middlemen and works
directly with the Cuban émigrés who supply the molasses for the rum. He becomes really tight with them, so that
when Massimo tries to replace Joe with his thuggish and mentally challenged
son, because Lucky Luciano wants an Italian in charge, Joe and the Cubans find
themselves in a war. They wipe out
Massimo and all the Boston muscle he has brought with him to Tampa, and Joe
heads off to New York to show Luciano his account books. Luciano’s first interest is earning, and Joe
keeps his job. February 2014
.
Colum McCann. Trans
Atlantic. ©2013 McCann uses three events in history to tie
together the ordinary lives of several generations of an Irish immigrant
family: the flight in 1919 from
Newfoundland to Ireland by Jack Alcock and Arthur Brown in a Vickers Vimy, Frederick
Douglas’s visit to Ireland in 1845, and George Mitchell’s efforts in 1998 to
get a settlement of the differences between Ireland and Northern Ireland. Maybe it’s not a novel but a succession of
stories, but it’s a wonderful read.
February 2014
.
Stacy Schiff. A
Great Improvisation. ©2005 This is Benjamin Franklin in Paris. I knew the French admired him, but I had no
idea how incredibly influential he was.
This book has a wealth of detail about his life in Paris, his women
friends, the French bureaucracy, English spies and his success in getting
French support for the American cause.
The demands of the job on this old and at times infirm diplomat were
unceasing, he had very little staff to assist him and he was under constant
attack from rival politicians. A great
read. January 2014
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