2010 book log

Ah yes, Immortal in Death, the third of the “In Death” series by J.D. Robb, in which yet another critical side character gets her turn to shine in the spotlight as Eve’s investigations must involve her. This time around it’s Mavis Freestone getting the plot love, when she winds up being the prime suspect in the murder of a top supermodel. Turns out her current boyfriend was going to work with said model, and there were heavy rumors of romantic entanglement–until Mavis came along!

The plot’s complicated by the rumblings about a new wonder drug that’s said to dramatically slow the effects of aging, a veritable fountain of youth. Not terribly surprisingly, the investigation into the murder and the investigation into the drug eventually dovetail, like they do in an “In Death” book. But Mavis brings an undeniable effervescence to the story, enough that you almost regret that she and Eve are already established friends as of Book 1. It would have been fun to actually see their meeting on camera.

I like as well that this is one of the “In Death” books that reminds you that this is a setting far enough in the future that space travel is in fact commonplace. The drug around which much of the plot hinges has offworld ties, and even though that’s a fairly offhand worldbuilding detail, it’s still nice to see for a skiffy fan like me.

All in all, a fun early episode in the series. Four stars.

Glory in Death is the second of the long-running “In Death” series, and it’s early enough still that it doesn’t quite have its feet under it yet. The relationship between principal characters Eve and Roarke, which for my money is way more interesting once their marriage is established, is only just getting to the point of marriage here; moreover, another long-running critical character, Peabody, is barely introduced as of this installment. (I’d totally forgotten, upon re-reading, that she didn’t show up until Book 2. And I freely admit I cheered when I got to her first appearance!) You can tell, too, that Peabody still isn’t entirely fleshed out as a character as of this story; mostly, her function in this plot is to be noteworthy because of her unusual observation skills, her ambition to get into Homicide, and the fact that she gets quite, quite drunk at Eve’s engagement party.

I’d also forgotten how early the critical character of Nadine is introduced in the setting, as well. Nadine’s right in the forefront with the string of murders this time around, especially when one takes place right outside her own station–and Eve can’t help but notice how a rival of Nadine’s is surprisingly quick on the scene as each successive murder occurs.

I’ve said before that the “In Death” books are formulaic, but certainly at this early point in the series, the formula is still quite fresh. If you’re re-reading them like me, it’s nice to go back and see the characters coming into play. If you’re a new reader, this second book in the series is still early enough and gritty enough to give a greater sense of presence and reality for this futuristic version of New York than what comes later. And it’s certainly an enjoyable way to spend one’s reading time. Four stars.

This is the very first of the “In Death” series by J.D. Robb, who is of course better known by her other name, Nora Roberts. To this day I remain very fond of this entire series, since it’s among the first that got me into regularly reading romantic suspense, and it’s a good bridge between that and my more preferred genre of SF.

And given Ms. Roberts’ usual mode of writing, this first of the long line of Eve Dallas novels is actually more enjoyable to me for the futuristic worldbuilding than it is for the romance. Don’t get me wrong, Roarke is a very swoonable love interest–but his main function in this plot is to be handsome and mysterious, and to put our heroine, NYPD cop Eve Dallas, through a wringer of OHNOEZ HE IS MY PRIMARY SUSPECT YET I CANNOT RESIST HIS HOTNESS. Compared to how their relationship develops later, Eve and Roarke are really kind of cliched getting out of the gate. On the other hand, it must definitely be said that the way Roarke really gets to Eve emotionally, giving her real coffee, is both a great little worldbuilding detail, since real coffee is rare in this timeframe, and very, very sweet.

But don’t let that stop you from enjoying this book, if you like your romantic suspense with a light dose of SF on the side. The setting is just far enough into the future that we’ve got flying cars (YAY!), droids, interstellar travel as well as super-swift planetary transit, and other technological marvels. What appeals to me just as much are the political and social worldbuilding details, though. In the Eve Dallas universe, prostitution has become legal and those who engage in it are “licensed companions”; the Browncoat in me just has to grin at this. Motherhood is considered a paying career choice, and women who elect to stay home and raise their children are in fact paid salaries as full-time professional mothers, which is awesome.

This early in the series–and this is something I’d forgotten, given how long it had been since I read this one the first time–the setting is rather grittier than you see later on as well. Eve is still primarily a street cop, and she hasn’t gotten her future aide Peabody as of this story. So you see a lot more of her doing legwork and encountering various disreputable characters as she works the case. I really rather miss that from the later books, since it makes this one and the couple that follow stand out better as individual plots.

As for the case itself, it’s a high-profile serial killer case that has Eve running afoul of a U.S. senator as well as Roarke, the richest and most powerful man on the planet. The plot structure won’t surprise anyone familiar with Roberts’ work or really, with romantic suspense cop plots in general. But it’s a fun light read and a great start to a series with impressive longevity indeed. Four stars.

The latest of the Kate Martinelli series turned out to be a strong contender for favorite in the series, up against To Play the Fool, Book 2. I was highly interested in this one in no small part because it was billed as having a tie-in with Ms. King’s other renowned series, the Mary Russells–and unlike the disappointing tenuous tie between Elizabeth Peter’s Amelia Peabody and Vicky Bliss series, I found this one to work very well indeed. The best thing about it? King never came right out and tied the series together in any obvious way in the narrative, but to those familiar with both series, the link was very obvious.

Holmesiana is very strong in this book, nonetheless. The victim is a Holmes fanatic whose ardor for the great detective is so bright that he’s remodeled the entire first floor of his house to be in character for the Holmesian era, and he leads a Holmes fan club wherein the members indulge in dressing in period costumes, meeting to eat period meals, and discussing the works of Arthur Conan Doyle to their hearts’ content. Our victim is also a passionate collector of Holmes-related memorabilia, though, and may well have been killed over a mysterious manuscript that may–or may not!–be a previously undiscovered work by Arthur Conan Doyle.

The provenance of this manuscript, and the possible real-life secrets it reveals, are the driving force of this case. And, of course, this is where the tie to the Mary Russell series comes in. The adventure depicted in the manuscript, written out for the reader to enjoy along with the main story, slots in very nicely with the events in Locked Rooms. Most cleverly, the protagonist is never outright identified as Holmes himself, leaving it nicely dubious for Kate and the others investigating the case as to whether it’s a genuine Doyle manuscript.

Meanwhile, some lovely advancement has happened in Kate and Lee’s domestic life. This book’s set a few years after Book 4, and now Kate and Lee have a small daughter, a development that I found an absolutely beautiful counterpoint to the murder investigation. Over the top as the victim and his Holmes-obsessed compatriots are, the peaceful home life Kate is leading with her beloved and their little girl gives the story a rock-solid grounding.

Overall, highly recommended for fans of the Mary Russells. If you’re not already reading the Kate Martinellis, this one does stand decently apart from the preceding ones, so you wouldn’t do yourself too much of a disservice reading this one first. (But you should go back and read the previous four anyway!) Five stars.

Like pretty much everything I’ve ever read by Laurie King, I quite enjoyed Night Work, the fourth installment of the Kate Martinelli series. Of the ones I’ve read lately, it’s my least favorite–but this is in no way a disparagement, since I’ve found that even a lesser King work is still an excellent read.

In this particular work, as is often the case with a mystery novel with any substance, two seemingly disparate plots eventually become intertwined. Kate begins the story investigating incidents surrounding an anonymous group, the Ladies of Perpetual Disgruntlement, launching retaliatory assaults upon men known to have abused women. At first their assaults were comparatively innocent, and they’ve won the grudging admiration of many in the police department–but now actual murders with the earmarks of the Ladies’ activities have begun to turn up. Meanwhile, an activist friend of Kate’s has asked her to look into the death by burning of a young bride in the city’s community of immigrants from India, and Kate has the challenge of trying to balance Roz’s request against the fact that Roz herself may be a suspect for the ongoing attacks on male abusers.

Thanks to not only the plot involving the young Indian bride but also the abused women’s shelter, there’s a lot of Kali imagery involved with King’s prose here. It might get a little heavy-handed for some readers, especially when Kali is presented as a vengeful symbol to whom the shelter’s residence might turn for guidance. Some readers may also find the scenes where Kate and her partner have Roz and her partner over for dinner, and engage in quite a bit of “aren’t those straight people just WEIRD?” conversation, a trifle heavyhanded. As a queer person myself, I did have a moment of “agh do we have to have the obligatory boggling over the straight people conversation?”

Still, though, I found the scenes in the women’s shelter very effective, as well as the general sense of queer community that Kate and her partner Lee and their friends have established with the other characters. I particularly liked the advancement in Kate’s and Lee’s relationship, as they’ve been working to mend the fractures between them caused by the violent events from earlier in the series. And I must admit, I was cheering on the Ladies of Perpetual Disgruntlement from page one.

Over all, four stars.

The second of Laurie R. King’s Kate Martinelli books, To Play the Fool, is a tightly written, thoughtful work, and was a nice re-introduction for me to the series. I’d previously read the third and then the first ones; going back to read the second filled in the blanks nicely on things that I’d missed. It’d been long enough since I’d read the previous books though that I’d forgotten much of the nuances of the series, but I recalled enough to find this perhaps the most enjoyable of the ones I’d read so far.

Much of the pleasure of this book lies with the individual Kate must investigate: a homeless wanderer known only as Brother Erasmus, a charismatic preacher revered by the street people of San Francisco and who is the primary suspect in her current murder case. She quickly learns that the man communicates only in literary quotations and by presenting himself as a Fool, which makes questioning him frustratingly difficult. Yet as she investigates him further, she finds that he has a tragic and moving past, which all comes together to make the man a vivid figure indeed.

Against this, Kate’s domestic situation is a wistful counterpoint. Her partner Lee is recovering from traumatic injuries suffered in the first novel, and she and Kate’s home life has undergone major upheavals as a result. Kate’s efforts to find ways to help Lee regain her confidence while dealing with her disability are quietly touching.

Overall, this was quite an enjoyable read. Four stars.

By modern standards, The War of the Worlds isn’t much of a plot: Martians come and take over the world, everybody goes OHNOEZ!, Martians conveniently are beaten not by any efforts of the protagonists, but rather by a deus ex machina (which I will not identify, on the off chance that someone reading this review might not actually know what that deus ex machina is). That said, this story is still totally worth reading just for it being one of the very first SF stories, and for the general style and atmosphere that Wells sets up with a Britain falling apart under siege.

I found it interesting that not only was the narrator never identified by name, in keeping with the style of the time, but neither were his wife, his cousin, or any other characters he encountered. Rather, people were identified by their careers and/or general functions in life. This fosters a nice sense of these people less as individuals and more as representatives of humanity falling to the Martians. It makes it a bit hard to keep track of who is who, though, especially when large chunks of the narrative shift over to the narrator’s brother (presumably with the conceit that his brother told him later what he’d done and seen).

Wells’ focus on Britain is pretty much to be expected, and I never got any real sense that the Martians were invading globally–especially when at the very end, you learn that other nations bestowed much aid upon poor beleagured Britain. It’s fun, too, to see what bits of actual science he gets right in his assumptions for how the Martians work as biological creatures and what is just made up right out of whole fantastical cloth. And while the narrative as a whole lacks in overall structure, look for the sequence towards the end, too, when the narrator and a curate are trapped underground on the rim of a Martian pit, which is decently suspenseful and creepy. Overall, three stars.