11. A Rule Against Murder - Louise Penny

Fourth book in the Armand Gamache Three Pines series, finally a murder happens in Quebec that isn’t in the tiny village of Three Pines. I was beginning to wonder….

Armand and his wife Reine-Marie are on vacation at a lodge hidden deep in the Quebec woods on a pretty lake.  They go there every year for a few weeks, and this time they are there to celebrate their anniversary.

A wildly eccentric extended family arrives and under Armand’s nose, one of them is killed.

As usual the mystery and the killer are relatively minor factors in the book, the focus being on the psychology, the links, and the philosophy of the characters, Armand front and center.

I enjoy the series but am not a rabid fan as some folks I know are. They’re interesting and a little bit different in focus so I’ll keep reading them.

10. Consider Phlebas - Iain M. Banks

This is a re-read for me, in order to join a group reading of the Culture novels at Library Thing.

 

This book certainly brought up a lot of mixed emotions for me. I spent 20 years in the US Air Force, most of it working with fighter pilots. The warrior culture at it's best. Needless to say, given that comment, all 20 years I was seen as an outsider, a rogue and a troublemaker. I retired at 20 years, as soon as I could.

Even though my particular career field was computers, not directly combat related, even so I participated in some vile things and watched lies and damn lies used to further the drumbeats for war and conflict, and worse, politics.  I watched grown men cry when a Democrat was elected president, because, of course, they’ll sell us out.

Sorry if I offend anyone. Just my personal thoughts regarding my career, and still at odds with all my retiree friends and even my spouse.

More specific to the book:
I found the depiction of the Idirans and Horza, and yes Belveda quite realistic throughout the book. I also agree with the depiction of the futility of war, how little the grinding reality of folks caught up in it matters in the big picture, and how it changes us and hardens us and makes us crazy, driving principles and conscience into a tiny little box as we’re caught up in the madness of group psychopathy.

9. Polaris - Jack McDevitt

Indiana Jones and Tomb Raider in Space!

Alex and Chase run a small antiquary company on the planet Rimway. Alex has a nose for finding lost or unknown antiquities and Chase pilots their superluminal ship. Between the two of them they’ve got a penchant for getting into trouble, rubbing planetary authorities the wrong way, and sticking their noses in where no one thinks it’s a good idea.

This time, through a series of events, they begin to get interested in the ship Polaris. The ship disappeared for a month or so with a small complement of crew and very well-known passengers.  When the ship was finally found, no one was aboard. This all happened 60 years ago and no one has ever figured out what happened, and Alex doesn’t figure it was some unknown alien who spirited the crew away.

But the more he researches the ship and the lost passengers the more his life and Chase’s suddenly are at risk. But whoever doesn’t want him and Chase looking into it, hasn’t realized how stubborn, and determined either he or his partner are.

A ‘locked room’ mystery. Lots of fun. And the secrets are well worth discovering!

8. A Trace of Smoke–Rebecca Cantrell

First of the Hannah Vogel series, the story begins with a 30 year old single woman on her own in 1931 Berlin, The Nazis are just beginning to step up their persecution of Jews and homosexuals. Hannah’s young brother is a gay man who sings and dances at a gay club in the city. She writes a column for the newspaper and goes to the police station to gather information for a column and finds her brother’s picture on the wall of the unknown dead newly discovered in the city. He’d been stabbed and thrown into the river, naked. She admits to no one her brother is dead and determines to discover who has killed him – someone he knows? Or some roaming bad of Nazi soldiers?

The story takes many twists and turns and the discovery of the killer is complicated by secrets and lies her brother told and kept and the need to hide her interest from the authorities for fear she herself might be killed by learning too much about very powerful men.

I really enjoyed this view of Germany after the Great War and as Hitler was just beginning to create his fascist state. Hannah as believable and her actions obviously those of someone who navigated dangerous waters just barely ahead of people out to keep her brother’s secrets secret.

I hope to continue this series soon.

7. The January Dancer–Michael Flynn

A down-at-the-heels starship captain takes his broken down ship to a world off the beaten path to mine for metals to fix his engines. When they start excavating they find instead a buried chamber which holds alien artifacts.  He picks up the only one that is moveable and there starts the tale of the January Dancer.

The artifact might be a powerful object and everyone and their siblings are after it. Thus begins a chase across the galaxy to get control of the Dancer.

The book is written as a tale a harper wants to set to music from an old man she finds in a bar. It’s an interesting method of telling the story but complicated it and made it a bit harder to follow for me.

6. The League of Frightened Men - Rex Stout

Second in the Nero Wolfe series, takes on a group of men who are responsible for a horrible accident to one of their number. They are certain he is killing them off.

Some of the story was interesting, but I found the morality of the time a bit wearing. I expected the attitudes toward women, so that wasn’t a surprise, but the continual use of ‘cripple’ to describe the main suspect I found annoying and troublesome.

Archie can be amusing but also annoying in his attitudes as well. Nero is a bit less so, which I found surprising.

5. The Pure in Heart - Susan Hill

Second in Hill’s Simon Serailler series, is just as deep and complex as her first. Simon, on vacation in Italy, is called home to the bedside of his sister. In her 20s she has the mind of a baby, and has been ill and in a home all her life, but Si cares deeply for her and rushes home when it looks as if she’ll succumb to this latest illness.

He arrives home just as a 9 year old boy has gone missing.

As with the first mystery, Si and his family figure prominently and at times the mystery of the boy takes second place to the mystery of Si himself, and his complex and multifaceted family and their friends. We delve into what it means to love, how we love, how we view the world and how we learn to deal with the tragedies and horrors it holds for us.