THE SKELETON ROAD

Val McDermid. THE SKELETON ROAD. HarperCollins, 2014.

A book loaned by writer friends, this is my fifth Val McDermid and I only discovered her last year. A Karen Pirie story set in Kirkaldy, Edinburgh, Oxford, and Dubrovnik, the plot returns to the Balkan wars of the 1990s and the ethical grappling with "war crimes" and the International Criminal Court. The skeleton initiates the quest for a killer seeking private justice. 

ESSENTIALS

 David Whyte. ESSENTIALS. Many Rivers, 2020.

One of my finds at Arundel Books in Seattle. I never knew Whyte was located in Washington State. My promise to myself was that every new book I bought on the trip had to be read before being shelved. I started with this one. Inspirational. My copy looks like a porcupine, with all the post-its sticking out. A poem about Kevin and the blackbirds, from a friend of Seamus Heaney. Beautiful cover too.

STUDY FOR OBEDIENCE

Sarah Bernstein. STUDY FOR OBEDIENCE. Knopf, 2023.

Found this Giller winner at Village Books in Bellingham (along with a fancy Montaigne). My rule is that any new books have to be read by me before shelving. The final total included one Mary Oliver, Vol 2, New & Selected, and three David Whytes. Who knew he is from Washington State?)

The Bernstein is interesting as a female reaction against the traditional "tumescent" arc of the story as quest. One female POV, one setting in some unnamed foreign country where communication is difficult; the only other relationship, strained, is between the narrator and her brother.

This is a story I will have to read again. The first time through, I was just looking to see if anything happens.

REPRODUCTION

 Ian Williams. REPRODUCTION. Random, 2019.  Giller Prize winner, 2019.

A family saga of sorts, three generations of unplanned reproduction. Cultural differences within homes and families. Families in various configurations. Obsessions and difficulties communicating. The challenges of being a successful modern male, and of mothering, parenting. The scramble to earn or deserve money complicates all.

This is the first novel I’ve read where STYLE is dominant. Variety of style, with most of the plot communicated through dialogue. In different voices, some with accents. Set in Brampton and Toronto. With a soundtrack covering fifty years, from the 1970s to the early 2000s.

Only the last section started to leave me behind a bit. No chapter breaks. The name Edgar degenerates every time, to a different spelling. The video-obsessed child shifts from videoing masturbation, paint drying, to adults dying.

I began by READING for PLEASURE, loving the style, sharing examples with fellow writers:

Felicia meets her ex-lover she has not seen in 14 years: “He had gained weight in the face so now he looked like three rectangles stacked on each other: head, neck, the rest. His hair was between the colour of pennies and loonies, but streaked throughout with dimes.”

The son, Army, finds weight-lifting equipment and imagines: “By the end of the summer, most of the boys would have V-shaped torsos and tiny legs, like martini glasses.”

“Heather’s breasts grazed his chest then she set them firmly against him like the paddles of a defibrillator.”

Sorry, the newness of these comparisons just made me laugh and then gasp at the writer’s mastery of word and image. STYLE trumps story yet I hesitated to finish, not wanting to leave these people, this family.

REPRODUCTION almost made me question: Why bother writing? This is just too good. 

MALICIOUS INTENT

Sean Mactire. MALICIOUS INTENT: A Writer's Guide to How Murderers, Robbers, Rapists and Other Criminals Think. Writer's Digest, 1995.

It is dated, and I ignored the less than useful arguments about vampirism and blood lust and crime as illness. I also omitted the chapters I am not interested in--terrorism, cults, kids, career criminals, gangsters, drugs, women. Which seems like a lot of omitting. I feel my info gathered from experience in corrections, and more from television--Law & Order, Without A Trace, Cold Cases, etc is stronger than this source. 

I was looking for ways to improve my manuscript IN YOUR DREAMS, especially for ways to improve the villain(s), and I got some ideas. Organized/disorganized. Psychopath, psychotic, and personality disorders. Good. The point about all family members and others within the victim's circle are also victims. Good. The idea that profiling the victim is just as important as profiling the possible criminal. Good. This book still uses the term "rape" if, when replaced by "sexual assault", makes it obvious that the crime is not about sex. Sex is just another tool to use to harm or attempt to control. Not new. That most criminals can be described as having some form of "arrested development" makes sense. They all put themselves first, like adolescents. The fact that there is absolutely no reference to incarceration, to the difference between punishment (penitentiary) and reform (corrections) never comes into it. Nor the idea that any criminal can change. The word "cognitive" does not appear. "Coping mechanisms" are mentioned. The wide-spread interest in crime and true crime suggests fear, but also that we are all very interested in "the dark side of human nature" but would rather not have to go there ourselves. 

THIS IS THE FIRE

Don Lemon. THIS IS THE FIRE: What I Say to My Friends About Racism. Little, Brown, 2021.

Found this at the library booksale and bought it as research for my TRC workbook. I did enjoy reading this. My notation bookmarks make it look like a post-it porcupine. I found the personal material most interesting. He is from Baton Rouge, Louisiana. 

I do not get CNN so am not that familiar with the writer. I suspect he no longer works for that network, although the book is current, Trump-era and COVID lockdown. 

It seems difficult to imagine a journalist being objective where this subject, racism, and inequality in America, is involved. 

At this time, my takeaway is: ANGER & ACTIVISM.

Later.

THE GHOST CLAUSE

Howard Norman. THE GHOST CLAUSE. Houghton Mifflin, 2019.

I picked up this novel at the library book sale because I know the author. Because he is American but has written about Canadian and Indigenous stories and settings. His WISHING BONE CYCLE: NARRATIVE POEMS OF THE SWAMPY CREE INDIANS I used teaching high school. A student made a mural of its image. I also read THE MUSEUM GUARD which was set in Nova Scotia. I was also intrigued by the title, as I am working at incorporating a ghost in IN YOUR DREAMS (although it can also be explained as 'haunted by the memory of her dead sister'). 

This 'ghost clause' idea is so interesting. If someone buys a house which then turns out to have a ghost, to be haunted, then the seller is obligated to buy the house back. A clause written in to the bill of sale.

I did enjoy the book. I also enjoy its representation of a marriage of equals which is passionate and happy.