September Books

Five books this month -- three mysteries, one novel and one that's pretty hard to categorize but I'll call non-fiction/history. All of these books are by favorite writers of mine, and I was predisposed to like them (and I did!) But they might not all be for everyone!

 

  "Bryant and May: Peculiar London" by Christopher Fowler 

 

I love London and I love Christopher Fowler's wonderful mystery series featuring Arthur Bryant and John May, detectives in the city's Peculiar Crime Unit. This book is an amalgam of the best of both.

First note, this is NOT a mystery. It is a history, a history of this remarkable city, as told by (mostly) the eccentric Arthur Bryant, whose interest in the odd and esoteric is part of what makes his crime solving abilities so unique. Bryant is old, and before he dies, he wants to share his knowledge of the secrets of London. 

As he "narrates" his audio memories (this is not an audio book), he calls on his partner, John May, and various others from his department that fans of the books will remember -- detectives Janice Longbright and Fraternity Ducaine, and medical examiner Giles Kershaw, along with experts he's met along the way in different subjects.

The various participants speak of lost venues, odd buildings, theaters and the arts, churches with fascinating hidden stories, various neighborhoods, hidden pubs, rumors and legends that may or may not be true. Their subjects range from places you might know well to those you've never heard of (and then wish you had).   

As you might imagine, I loved this book. You do not need to have read any of the Bryant and May mysteries to find it interesting, but it is written in the voice of the very eccentric characters (especially Arthur Bryant), so it may take the uninitiated a bit of time to adapt to its style. If you are fascinated by London, keep with it. (After the first chapter, you're "in" it.) You'll learn a lot and maybe even chuckle a lot along the way. 

"Whistler" by Ann Patchett

 

It's pretty difficult to write about perfection, about a book that captures the heart so completely, there aren't really the right words to capture all the feelings inside that one may have for an exquisite novel. "Whistler," Ann Patchett's newest, is one of those books.

The story follows the life of Daphne over the course of at least a year after she has a surprise encounter while she and her husband are visiting the Metropolitan Museum of Art. A man seems to be following them who cannot take his eyes off of Daphne. When finally confronted by her husband Jonathan, he reveals that he is Eddie, her stepfather, and hadn't seen her since she was nine years old.

It's then that we begin to follow the lives of these two -- their past and their present. Eddie and her mother divorced shortly after an accident where Daphne and Eddie were injured and were saved only through ingenuity, courage and bravery. They have lifetimes to catch up on. And, through the course of this eloquently written novel, we see the bond they shared years before and the joy of rediscovering and enhancing that connection.

A lifetime is filled with love, loss, grief, guilt, and people -- parents, siblings, husbands, lovers -- and all the emotions that come with these things. Patchett weaves them together so seamlessly in this beautiful book of reconcilliation, that I really didn't want it to end. But then, perhaps all those things never do end. They just evolve. 

(Clearly, this made my Top Ten. Patchett usually does but no doubt on this one! One of my favorite authors has done it again.) 

"Earthly Remains" by Donna Leon

 

"Earthly Remains" is the 26th book in Donna Leon's "Brunetti" series and if you've read them all, as I have, you'll see that the Inspector has rarely taken a vacation. But the stress of his work is getting to him, so much so that he fakes a heart attack (partly to save a colleague from assaulting a suspect under interrogation). At the hospital, the doctor finds his blood pressure is soaring and mandates a vacation from work.

Relieved, he decided to spend two weeks at the now-vacant home of a relative of Paula's, where he will enjoy rowing on the laguna and reading Pliny and other favorite historians. The early days are terrific as he rows with Casati, the caretaker, who turns out to have been a friend of Bruno's father. Casati's passion is his bees and he is worried. They are dying. 

It's a lovely holiday until Casati disappears after a storm. A suicide or an accident, perhaps? Brunetti is not so sure and his holiday soon involves into yet another investigation.

This is another solid mystery, one that relies somewhat less on his colleagues, Vianello, Signorina Elettra, and Comissario Claudia Griffoni -- but fans of those characters will find that they all are an integral part of the plot. Leon's passion for the environment and how humans are destroying it plays front and center here. And, I have to say, I learned a lot about bees  (and thought of blogger Erika in the process!)

You don't need to read Leon's books in order, apart from having better understanding of the various secondary characters and if you are picking one at random, this might be a good one!

"The Last Word" by Elly Griffiths

 

When I first wrote about "Bleeding Heart Yard," one in a series by Elly Griffiths featuring detective Harbinder Kaur, I hoped there would be more in the series. Turns out, there are -- that wasn't the first and I'm still not reading them in order! This is the most recent and it's less about Kaur than it is about three amateur detectives introduced in an earlier book I've not yet read. No matter -- it doesn't affect the story, but the surprising part is that Harbinder isn't present for much of the book and leaves the detecting to the others.

They are an engaging group. Benedict runs a coffee shop near the beach. His girlfriend Natalka (a Ukrainian refugee) and his best friend, the 84-year-old Edwin, have a detective agency (introduced in a previous book) that usually takes on divorce cases, although their previous case was a murder. Minnie and Harmony, the daughters of Melody, a well-known romance writer, hire the duo to find out if their stepfather, Alan, killed their mother.

Edwin also realizes that a former colleague at the BBC had passed, and Benedict (a former monk) receives a message from a friend that one of their former colleagues from the monastery, had died and left a message that he thought he was going to be murdered. Brother Don had a secret. He was a romance writer as well. The coincidences seem too strong to be isolated cases.

The case sends Edwin and a somewhat unwilling Benedict to a writer's retreat that both both the authors (and the writer who had done Melody's obituary, now deceased) attended. All's well, until another murder takes place.

Confused? Don't be. This is unlike Griffiths' "Ruth Galloway" mysteries. It's much lighter, funny at times, and reads like the wind. If you're looking for a deep, psychological mystery or thriller, skip this one. But if something fun, with a good deal of mystery and a clever murder story appeals, this one might delight. I wouldn't mind seeing Edwin, Benedict and Natalka again.

"Thin Air" by Ann Cleeves

 

When the newly married couple, Caroline and Lowrie Malcomson, return to Lowrie's home on the northernmost island of Unst in Shetland to celebrate their marriage with the traditional hamefarin', four of the guests are Caroline's former roommates, Polly and Eleanor, and their partners Marcus and Ian. For Eleanor, a television producer, the gathering is also a chance to do some undercover research for a documentary she is doing about ghosts, and in this case, Peerie Lizzie, a child ghost known to haunt the area. 

But when Eleanor is found dead, posed as Peerie Lizzie was said to have been, the holiday takes a sinister turn and inspector Jamie Perez and his team are called in, along with Perez' boss, Willow Reeves, to investigate.

Nothing is as simple as it seems and as the detectives try to find out more about Eleanor and why she was killed, secrets of both villagers, Eleanor's life and her group of her friends are revealed, adding another level of complexity to the mystery.

Cleeves writes well about relationships and her characters are well drawn. Perez, still grieving for his finacee, Fran and now parenting Fran's daughter, is stepping forward in his healing, while his sergeant, Sandy, is taking gentle steps toward new love. Polly, a librarian in the throes of new romance, is slowly falling into depression, triggered by her own sighting of Peerie Lizzie. Her partner, Marcus, is overly solicitous, while Eleanor's husband Ian, is full of bluster. We get to know about the capable and efficient Caroline and her new husband, Lowrie, as well as Lowrie's parents, George and Grusche and Charles and David, who own the hotel where the investigators are staying. Do any of them have reason to see Eleanor dead? And, if it's just Eleanor at risk, what happens to any suppositions when another, seemingly unrelated, death occurs?

One doesn't have to read the Shetland mysteries in order but you'll get far more out of them if you have read one or two before, especially "Blue Lightning," which highlights Fran's murder. It help sets some of the characters in context. This one is darker than some of her others in the series. Perhaps it is the ghost, or the moody weather with constant rain. In any event, it is a solid story and well worth the time.