So, yesterday was the official kick-off of the Keep Portland Weird festival here in Paris, which meant that I had a reading/screening in the...
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Count To A Trillion by John C. Wright is one of the best, if not the best, science fiction novels of 2011. Wright's novel Orphans of Chaos was nominated for a Nebula Award; I believe that Count To A Trillion will also be nominated, and will win. It's the first of a trilogy, and follows the life of the Texan Menelaus Montrose from his early childhood on to his journey through space to an alien artifact enscribed on every inch with messages that, if and when deciphered, could mean the salvation of the Earth and of mankind.
America has fallen into the status of an almost Third-World nation cue to economic collapse, a terrible man-made winter called the Japanese Winter that has lasted for several years, bioterrorism, and the rising of the technologies of other nations across the world.
Menelaus's mother is strict, and deterministic about her views of the roles of males and females. She brings up Menelaus desiring the best education possible for him, and he is a natural mathematical prodigy from an early age. He has in his personal elctronic library, besides the classics of literature, the cartoon series about a more peace-filled, perfect ideal of the future, called Asymptote. Asymptote, as described by the author and Menelaus, has many references to some of the original Star Trek episodes. Menelaus's mother forces him to delete the entire series, which devastates him; but, Menelaus never gives up the hope of a better future for mankind and for himself, and he tries to doo his best to make this future come true.
Count To A Trillion is an exciting, page-turning beginning to John C. Wright's trilogy. Menelaus's attempts to bring about a better futre include injecting his own brain with a substance to further enhance his intelligence, in the hopes that he will be able to decipher enough of the alien messages on the Monument to make the sort of future Asymptote depicts come true. In the desire to bring about a more peaceful future, Menelaus risks it all--even his own life and sanity. It's one of the year's best SF novels--check it out!
Communicating with the dead �" ghosts - might seem a blessing to some people. To sixteen-year-old Violet Willoughby, though, in the historical/supernatural YA novel Haunting Violet by Alyxandra Harvey, it’s more like a curse.
While growing up, Violet has participated in too many fake seances conducted by her mother, conning the rich and gullible out of their money, to believe that ghosts are real. But as she approaches sixteen and her mother is invited to conduct seances at the country estate of the renowned Spiritualist Lord Jasper, she discovers that ghosts think that she is real. She finds it’s difficult to ignore the vision of a ghost her own age, Rowena, dripping water from her incorporeal body, smelling of lilacs, seeking justice from beyond.
Set in England during the 1800s, Haunting Violet is a page-turning supernatural novel but also a romantic one. Though Violet, her mother and her “brother,” Colin (a teen from Ireland her mother “adopted” by taking him off the streets and a life of pickpocketing to survive), move in the wealthy circles of the peerage among earls and lords and ladies of the realm, they aren’t really from that world of wealth and privilege by birth.
They are looked down upon by many of the people Violet’s mother seeks to cultivate as clients, those who see through Violet’s mother’s attempts to pass off studied knowledge of etiquette and rejuvenated secondhand clothing as signs that they somehow fit in.
While her mother uses Violet and Colin to help her produce various supernatural effects for her seances, she also partakes too much in alcohol and flirts outrageously with the men at Lord Jasper’s estate, hoping to land herself a rich husband. Whenever Violet isn’t helping with a seance, her mother seems to consider her more of a nuisance just getting in the way. She does, however, scheme to marry Violet off to the handsome Xavier Trethewey.
Violet is not opposed to this idea, as he comes from a rich family (though not one of the peerage) and he seems to be nice, as well as handsome. She warns him that she has no dowry, but he dismisses her concern: “You are quite ten times more beautiful than any other girl in England. Let that be your dowry!”
Colin clearly likes Violet and tries to dissuade her from going along with her mother’s plans to marry Violet off to Xavier. He derogatorily refers to Xavier as Violet’s “prince” and argues that if he or his parents ever learn the truth about her and her mother, they would want nothing to do with her.
As Colin is getting older, he has also become more handsome and muscular; one day when he kisses her, Violet finds herself liking the way he kisses even better than how Xavier kisses. As a result, not only does she have Rowena’s persistent attempts to get Violet’s attention to expose her killer to deal with. She’s also in emotional turmoil as she decides who would make a better marriage partner - Xavier or Colin.
Violet and her friend Elizabeth, the daughter of an earl, enjoy such things on Lord Jasper’s estate that young women of the age would normally enjoy, like homemade strawberry ice cream and dressing up for fancy balls. Violet at first doesn’t want to tell Elizabeth or anyone else about the visions of Rowena (not to mention other ghosts clamoring for her attention when they figure out she can see and hear them) dripping water all over, with bruises around her neck, as if someone has strangled her.
Tabitha, Rowena’s twin sister, is aloof and mean towards Violet, and she doesn’t want Violet around. Is it because she is jealous, or because she is afraid that Violet might be getting closer to uncovering the truth?
Alyxandra Harvey takes the reader back to 1800s’ England; Violet reminds me of a Jane Austen heroine, had Austen ever decided to write novels about the paranormal. Haunting Violet is a witty, suspenseful novel of the supernatural that I highly recommend.
Be like the Egyptians (walk like them if you want). Investigate, and get wrapped up in your work, along with Queen Victoria’s top agents, Sir Maurice Newbury and Veronica Hobbes. Learn how the Egyptians tried to extend life indefinitely by rites and rituals attributed to the god Osiris. And, track down a rogue agent, half-man, half-machine, just returned from years living undercover in Russia. It’s easy enough to pick up his trail: he’d be the one who smells of rotting flesh. These two cases, along with one Veronica takes on involving a villainous magician and doctor with a taste for murdering young women, add up to a suspenseful page-turning novel that’ll keep you reading until late into the night. The Osiris Ritual is George Mann’s second installment in his Newbury & Hobbes Investigations series, combining the Supernatural and Mystery genres.
Set in 1902, three months after the events of the first novel, The Osiris Ritual starts off with the opening of a unique Egyptian sarcophagus with a mummy inside that is highly unusual: its eyes were stitched shut, and the mouth is “wide open in a silent, millennia-long scream.” As much as the strange mummy intrigues Newbury, he cannot dwell on it because he was asked by the Queen to meet the agent William Ashford, who is perhaps more machine than human thanks to a bizarre mutilation by his predecessor, Knox. Meanwhile, Veronica is handling a case of women who have gone missing. The only link seems to be that they all attended a magic show and volunteered for the Disappearing Lady trick. Her primary mission given to her by the Queen, however, is to watch over Newbury and try to make sure he doesn’t let the laudanum he takes and his involvement in the occult turn him into the same sort of person as Knox. Yet she can’t help but to identify with the missing women and want to prevent any more women from becoming victims.
This splitting up of cases is one of the major ways The Osiris Ritual differs from the first novel in the series, The Affinity Bridge. For all of his Sherlock Holmes-like intellect, Newbury has only ever thought of Veronica as his assistant. It’s not until late in this novel that he gets the revelation that Veronica is also an agent. The two of them are attracted to each other, and Newbury has considered telling Veronica this, but hasn’t so far in the series. His learning of Veronica’s keeping the secret from him that she’s been, in effect, spying on him, no matter what the motive might be, causes him to wonder if he can trust her.
One loose end (I think of it as one, at any rate) from The Affinity Bridge continues in The Osiris Ritual. That is, zombie-like victims of a plague brought over from India, revenants, still roam the foggy streets of London, claiming victims. The revenants are a major part of The Affinity Bridge’s plot, and Newbury himself gets bitten by one of them and he is treated by Dr. Fabian. The plague doesn’t end in the first novel–it continues on in The Osiris Ritual–but it’s not a big part of the plot, and is only mentioned in passing. I found this kind of curious, and I wondered why the author didn’t either come up with some reason why the plague ended, or why it continues on. This loose end didn’t detract from the rest of George Mann’s excellent second novel in the series for me, but it is something I kept thinking might be resolved by the conclusion of The Osiris Ritual, though it never was–perhaps Mann is planning on taking this up again and making it an important part of the plot of the third novel in his series.
The Osiris Ritual is a heart-pounding, adrenaline-inducing combination of the Steampunk and detective genres, the twisted but ultra-cool result of a literary genetic experiment gone wild. Maybe a good name for this hybrid might be Holmes-punk (hyphenated to be sure one takes care in dividing the syllables when it’s pronounced out loud). George Mann is a worthy successor to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and fans of Steampunk and page-turning thrillers should check out both this and The Affinity Bridge.
The Internet has countless uses other than to surf for gambling sites or porn. For instance, murderers can use it to search for victims on the pretext of looking for “love.” Villain by Shuichi Yoshida is a page-turning mystery presented from several different points of view, and it’s a look at what can happen when young women sell their bodies for a quick bit of cash on the World Wide Web–they can end up very, very, dead. The version I have is ably translated by Philip Gabriel. Villain‘s plot and action is set in Japan, where it was first published in 2007. When I got the chance to read and review it for this site, I jumped at the chance, as I’d heard a lot of good things about the book. This year, a film based on this novel is due to be released in Japan, as Akunin.
From the very cool-looking cover on, I was not disappointed. The cover is one of the most unique and eye-catching ones I’ve ever seen, picturing a gun made of human bones. In the first chapter of the novel, “Who Did She Want To See,” the body of a strangled woman, Yoshino Ishibashi, is found abandoned “up at Mitsuse Pass,” at the base of a cliff. It’s a creepy place at nighttime, and it’s rumored that ghosts of the several people who died there haunt the area and are sometimes seen by those who travel that route.
The novel goes back and forth between when Yoshino was alive and the aftermath of her death, and presents the perspectives of her friends (if they can be called that truthfully), and various men whom she’d contacted on-line and later met up with for casual sex for pay. Yoshino tells her small circle of girlfriends that she has a steady boyfriend, and she uses him as an excuse for when she is really meeting up with other men.
You may have guessed by the title of the first chapter what the title of the second chapter might be: “Who Did He Want To See?” Who the “He,” is, is up for debate, for the chapter is about detectives working on the case going to the places of residence of as many of the men Yoshino contacted on-line as they can track down, and questioning them about the night when Yoshino died, to see if they have convincing alibis. A construction worker named Yuichi and his relationship with his family is most focused on, so the chapter’s title could be referring to him. If so, he knew, of course, he wanted to meet Yoshino so he could give her the money, but possibly the title refers to an idealized version of Yoshino he had built up in his imagination.
There are only three more chapters in the novel, somewhat long ones: “Who Did She Happen To Meet?”, “Who Did He Happen To Meet?”, and “The Villain I Met”. Each of the chapters is told in the third person, except for the final chapter, which is told in the first person. Suspense and mystery is carefully developed by the author’s depiction and development of the characters in the novel, but especially of the male characters. The way the author leaves open so many possibilities and doesn’t make his characters solidly black or white, good or evil, really adds to the mystery of who is Yoshino’s murderer.
But, some readers may not like being presented with so many possibilities as to who could have committed Yoshino’s murder. Also, there’s perhaps too much attention paid by the author to developing, for instance, Yuichi’s relationships with the rest of his family. It’s important in that it shows the type of person Yuichi is, not just with the prostitutes he meets, but in other circumstances. When we read about how he takes his ailing uncle to the hospital, it puts doubt in our minds as to whether such a person could also be a murderer. And, being presented with many suspects made me feel like what I imagine the detectives working on the case must have felt like, having to shift through many possibilities and red herrings until they arrive at what they feel is the truth.
Villain is a mystery novel that will make you think and will leave you guessing right up to the very end of the novel. It will also leave you thinking about what sorts of attributes make a person (in other respects just like you and me) become a villain, capable of murder. And, what if the so-called “villain” actually shows a sense of remorse for his/her victim(s), in comparison with a person who is a friend or acquaintance of the victim, who feels nothing at all? If you have a yen (please forgive my terrible pun) for page-turning mysteries that make you think, Villain is a novel you’ll love to read!
“Listen, my child, and you shall hear, of the midnight ride of”–no, no; that’s not it! The way cooler, vampire-related legendary country song by “Slack Whitside, the Singing Switchman,” about the Bolade sisters, Patience and Prudence, as quoted by Alex Bledsoe in his novel The Girls with Games of Blood, goes entirely differently:
Listen to what I tell you, son, every word is true
The sisters haunt the night, and might fight over you
Nothing can steal your soul and stamp it in the mud
Like being the new play-pretty for the girls with the games of blood.
The song is about the two sisters’ undying rivalry that was said to stretch even beyond the grave. Bledsoe’s novel is set in the year 1975 and brought back many (perhaps best forgotten) cultural references to me. Baron Rudolfo (Rudy to his friends) Vladimir Zginski, the main male vampire character so far in the Memphis Vampires series, has never heard the song, but he comes into very intimate contact with both Patience and Prudence in Blood Groove’s sexy and violent sequel, The Girls with Games of Blood. Zginski looks suave and sophisticated (albeit tan-challenged), but he’s a ruthless and selfish monster who always has a motive behind what he does and puts his own desires above those of everyone else.
Besides New World blood, Zginski’s Continental tastes include willing women and high-speed automobiles. These vices, and the fact that he is traveling around the South in the 1970’s with a black man (a vampire called Leonardo who is also in Blood Groove) attract way too much attention. Attention is a thing Zginski can ill afford, and yet, perversely, pursue attention is just what he does. He becomes infatuated with and obsesses about a Ford Mustang he sees in the (original) movie Gone In 60 Seconds, so when the opportunity arises to purchase a similar cherry, 1973 Mach 1 Mustang Zginski jumps at the chance. This puts him on the wrong side of an ex-sheriff who also wanted the car (Cocker’s character, a nod to the actual movie Walking Tall and Sheriff Buford Pusser, is one of the cultural references I mentioned above), who spends the rest of the book trying to get revenge on Zginski and Leonardo.
Alex Beldsoe weaves a tale rich in atmosphere and makes you feel as you read that you are in the South he’s writing about. The characters and their motives seem very real, and though many of them are vampires, Bledsoe makes you empathize with them and like them better than many of the bigoted hate-filled humans in the novel. There’s also enough gore and violence to satisfy the most discriminating lover of vampire stories. I’d heartily recommend The Girls with Games of Blood to anyone who is a fan of the horror genre, and especially fans of vampire literature.
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Count to a Trillion by John C Wright
Douglas Cobb, January 1, 2012
Count To A Trillion by John C. Wright is one of the best, if not the best, science fiction novels of 2011. Wright's novel Orphans of Chaos was nominated for a Nebula Award; I believe that Count To A Trillion will also be nominated, and will win. It's the first of a trilogy, and follows the life of the Texan Menelaus Montrose from his early childhood on to his journey through space to an alien artifact enscribed on every inch with messages that, if and when deciphered, could mean the salvation of the Earth and of mankind.America has fallen into the status of an almost Third-World nation cue to economic collapse, a terrible man-made winter called the Japanese Winter that has lasted for several years, bioterrorism, and the rising of the technologies of other nations across the world.
Menelaus's mother is strict, and deterministic about her views of the roles of males and females. She brings up Menelaus desiring the best education possible for him, and he is a natural mathematical prodigy from an early age. He has in his personal elctronic library, besides the classics of literature, the cartoon series about a more peace-filled, perfect ideal of the future, called Asymptote. Asymptote, as described by the author and Menelaus, has many references to some of the original Star Trek episodes. Menelaus's mother forces him to delete the entire series, which devastates him; but, Menelaus never gives up the hope of a better future for mankind and for himself, and he tries to doo his best to make this future come true.
Count To A Trillion is an exciting, page-turning beginning to John C. Wright's trilogy. Menelaus's attempts to bring about a better futre include injecting his own brain with a substance to further enhance his intelligence, in the hopes that he will be able to decipher enough of the alien messages on the Monument to make the sort of future Asymptote depicts come true. In the desire to bring about a more peaceful future, Menelaus risks it all--even his own life and sanity. It's one of the year's best SF novels--check it out!
Haunting Violet by Alyxandra Harvey
Douglas Cobb, July 10, 2011
Communicating with the dead �" ghosts - might seem a blessing to some people. To sixteen-year-old Violet Willoughby, though, in the historical/supernatural YA novel Haunting Violet by Alyxandra Harvey, it’s more like a curse.While growing up, Violet has participated in too many fake seances conducted by her mother, conning the rich and gullible out of their money, to believe that ghosts are real. But as she approaches sixteen and her mother is invited to conduct seances at the country estate of the renowned Spiritualist Lord Jasper, she discovers that ghosts think that she is real. She finds it’s difficult to ignore the vision of a ghost her own age, Rowena, dripping water from her incorporeal body, smelling of lilacs, seeking justice from beyond.
Set in England during the 1800s, Haunting Violet is a page-turning supernatural novel but also a romantic one. Though Violet, her mother and her “brother,” Colin (a teen from Ireland her mother “adopted” by taking him off the streets and a life of pickpocketing to survive), move in the wealthy circles of the peerage among earls and lords and ladies of the realm, they aren’t really from that world of wealth and privilege by birth.
They are looked down upon by many of the people Violet’s mother seeks to cultivate as clients, those who see through Violet’s mother’s attempts to pass off studied knowledge of etiquette and rejuvenated secondhand clothing as signs that they somehow fit in.
While her mother uses Violet and Colin to help her produce various supernatural effects for her seances, she also partakes too much in alcohol and flirts outrageously with the men at Lord Jasper’s estate, hoping to land herself a rich husband. Whenever Violet isn’t helping with a seance, her mother seems to consider her more of a nuisance just getting in the way. She does, however, scheme to marry Violet off to the handsome Xavier Trethewey.
Violet is not opposed to this idea, as he comes from a rich family (though not one of the peerage) and he seems to be nice, as well as handsome. She warns him that she has no dowry, but he dismisses her concern: “You are quite ten times more beautiful than any other girl in England. Let that be your dowry!”
Colin clearly likes Violet and tries to dissuade her from going along with her mother’s plans to marry Violet off to Xavier. He derogatorily refers to Xavier as Violet’s “prince” and argues that if he or his parents ever learn the truth about her and her mother, they would want nothing to do with her.
As Colin is getting older, he has also become more handsome and muscular; one day when he kisses her, Violet finds herself liking the way he kisses even better than how Xavier kisses. As a result, not only does she have Rowena’s persistent attempts to get Violet’s attention to expose her killer to deal with. She’s also in emotional turmoil as she decides who would make a better marriage partner - Xavier or Colin.
Violet and her friend Elizabeth, the daughter of an earl, enjoy such things on Lord Jasper’s estate that young women of the age would normally enjoy, like homemade strawberry ice cream and dressing up for fancy balls. Violet at first doesn’t want to tell Elizabeth or anyone else about the visions of Rowena (not to mention other ghosts clamoring for her attention when they figure out she can see and hear them) dripping water all over, with bruises around her neck, as if someone has strangled her.
Tabitha, Rowena’s twin sister, is aloof and mean towards Violet, and she doesn’t want Violet around. Is it because she is jealous, or because she is afraid that Violet might be getting closer to uncovering the truth?
Alyxandra Harvey takes the reader back to 1800s’ England; Violet reminds me of a Jane Austen heroine, had Austen ever decided to write novels about the paranormal. Haunting Violet is a witty, suspenseful novel of the supernatural that I highly recommend.
The Osiris Ritual (Newbury & Hobbes Investigations) by George Mann
Douglas Cobb, January 1, 2011
Be like the Egyptians (walk like them if you want). Investigate, and get wrapped up in your work, along with Queen Victoria’s top agents, Sir Maurice Newbury and Veronica Hobbes. Learn how the Egyptians tried to extend life indefinitely by rites and rituals attributed to the god Osiris. And, track down a rogue agent, half-man, half-machine, just returned from years living undercover in Russia. It’s easy enough to pick up his trail: he’d be the one who smells of rotting flesh. These two cases, along with one Veronica takes on involving a villainous magician and doctor with a taste for murdering young women, add up to a suspenseful page-turning novel that’ll keep you reading until late into the night. The Osiris Ritual is George Mann’s second installment in his Newbury & Hobbes Investigations series, combining the Supernatural and Mystery genres.Set in 1902, three months after the events of the first novel, The Osiris Ritual starts off with the opening of a unique Egyptian sarcophagus with a mummy inside that is highly unusual: its eyes were stitched shut, and the mouth is “wide open in a silent, millennia-long scream.” As much as the strange mummy intrigues Newbury, he cannot dwell on it because he was asked by the Queen to meet the agent William Ashford, who is perhaps more machine than human thanks to a bizarre mutilation by his predecessor, Knox. Meanwhile, Veronica is handling a case of women who have gone missing. The only link seems to be that they all attended a magic show and volunteered for the Disappearing Lady trick. Her primary mission given to her by the Queen, however, is to watch over Newbury and try to make sure he doesn’t let the laudanum he takes and his involvement in the occult turn him into the same sort of person as Knox. Yet she can’t help but to identify with the missing women and want to prevent any more women from becoming victims.
This splitting up of cases is one of the major ways The Osiris Ritual differs from the first novel in the series, The Affinity Bridge. For all of his Sherlock Holmes-like intellect, Newbury has only ever thought of Veronica as his assistant. It’s not until late in this novel that he gets the revelation that Veronica is also an agent. The two of them are attracted to each other, and Newbury has considered telling Veronica this, but hasn’t so far in the series. His learning of Veronica’s keeping the secret from him that she’s been, in effect, spying on him, no matter what the motive might be, causes him to wonder if he can trust her.
One loose end (I think of it as one, at any rate) from The Affinity Bridge continues in The Osiris Ritual. That is, zombie-like victims of a plague brought over from India, revenants, still roam the foggy streets of London, claiming victims. The revenants are a major part of The Affinity Bridge’s plot, and Newbury himself gets bitten by one of them and he is treated by Dr. Fabian. The plague doesn’t end in the first novel–it continues on in The Osiris Ritual–but it’s not a big part of the plot, and is only mentioned in passing. I found this kind of curious, and I wondered why the author didn’t either come up with some reason why the plague ended, or why it continues on. This loose end didn’t detract from the rest of George Mann’s excellent second novel in the series for me, but it is something I kept thinking might be resolved by the conclusion of The Osiris Ritual, though it never was–perhaps Mann is planning on taking this up again and making it an important part of the plot of the third novel in his series.
The Osiris Ritual is a heart-pounding, adrenaline-inducing combination of the Steampunk and detective genres, the twisted but ultra-cool result of a literary genetic experiment gone wild. Maybe a good name for this hybrid might be Holmes-punk (hyphenated to be sure one takes care in dividing the syllables when it’s pronounced out loud). George Mann is a worthy successor to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and fans of Steampunk and page-turning thrillers should check out both this and The Affinity Bridge.
Villain by Shuichi Yoshida
Douglas Cobb, January 1, 2011
The Internet has countless uses other than to surf for gambling sites or porn. For instance, murderers can use it to search for victims on the pretext of looking for “love.” Villain by Shuichi Yoshida is a page-turning mystery presented from several different points of view, and it’s a look at what can happen when young women sell their bodies for a quick bit of cash on the World Wide Web–they can end up very, very, dead. The version I have is ably translated by Philip Gabriel. Villain‘s plot and action is set in Japan, where it was first published in 2007. When I got the chance to read and review it for this site, I jumped at the chance, as I’d heard a lot of good things about the book. This year, a film based on this novel is due to be released in Japan, as Akunin.From the very cool-looking cover on, I was not disappointed. The cover is one of the most unique and eye-catching ones I’ve ever seen, picturing a gun made of human bones. In the first chapter of the novel, “Who Did She Want To See,” the body of a strangled woman, Yoshino Ishibashi, is found abandoned “up at Mitsuse Pass,” at the base of a cliff. It’s a creepy place at nighttime, and it’s rumored that ghosts of the several people who died there haunt the area and are sometimes seen by those who travel that route.
The novel goes back and forth between when Yoshino was alive and the aftermath of her death, and presents the perspectives of her friends (if they can be called that truthfully), and various men whom she’d contacted on-line and later met up with for casual sex for pay. Yoshino tells her small circle of girlfriends that she has a steady boyfriend, and she uses him as an excuse for when she is really meeting up with other men.
You may have guessed by the title of the first chapter what the title of the second chapter might be: “Who Did He Want To See?” Who the “He,” is, is up for debate, for the chapter is about detectives working on the case going to the places of residence of as many of the men Yoshino contacted on-line as they can track down, and questioning them about the night when Yoshino died, to see if they have convincing alibis. A construction worker named Yuichi and his relationship with his family is most focused on, so the chapter’s title could be referring to him. If so, he knew, of course, he wanted to meet Yoshino so he could give her the money, but possibly the title refers to an idealized version of Yoshino he had built up in his imagination.
There are only three more chapters in the novel, somewhat long ones: “Who Did She Happen To Meet?”, “Who Did He Happen To Meet?”, and “The Villain I Met”. Each of the chapters is told in the third person, except for the final chapter, which is told in the first person. Suspense and mystery is carefully developed by the author’s depiction and development of the characters in the novel, but especially of the male characters. The way the author leaves open so many possibilities and doesn’t make his characters solidly black or white, good or evil, really adds to the mystery of who is Yoshino’s murderer.
But, some readers may not like being presented with so many possibilities as to who could have committed Yoshino’s murder. Also, there’s perhaps too much attention paid by the author to developing, for instance, Yuichi’s relationships with the rest of his family. It’s important in that it shows the type of person Yuichi is, not just with the prostitutes he meets, but in other circumstances. When we read about how he takes his ailing uncle to the hospital, it puts doubt in our minds as to whether such a person could also be a murderer. And, being presented with many suspects made me feel like what I imagine the detectives working on the case must have felt like, having to shift through many possibilities and red herrings until they arrive at what they feel is the truth.
Villain is a mystery novel that will make you think and will leave you guessing right up to the very end of the novel. It will also leave you thinking about what sorts of attributes make a person (in other respects just like you and me) become a villain, capable of murder. And, what if the so-called “villain” actually shows a sense of remorse for his/her victim(s), in comparison with a person who is a friend or acquaintance of the victim, who feels nothing at all? If you have a yen (please forgive my terrible pun) for page-turning mysteries that make you think, Villain is a novel you’ll love to read!
The Girls with Games of Blood by Alex Bledsoe
Douglas Cobb, August 12, 2010
“Listen, my child, and you shall hear, of the midnight ride of”–no, no; that’s not it! The way cooler, vampire-related legendary country song by “Slack Whitside, the Singing Switchman,” about the Bolade sisters, Patience and Prudence, as quoted by Alex Bledsoe in his novel The Girls with Games of Blood, goes entirely differently:Listen to what I tell you, son, every word is true
The sisters haunt the night, and might fight over you
Nothing can steal your soul and stamp it in the mud
Like being the new play-pretty for the girls with the games of blood.
The song is about the two sisters’ undying rivalry that was said to stretch even beyond the grave. Bledsoe’s novel is set in the year 1975 and brought back many (perhaps best forgotten) cultural references to me. Baron Rudolfo (Rudy to his friends) Vladimir Zginski, the main male vampire character so far in the Memphis Vampires series, has never heard the song, but he comes into very intimate contact with both Patience and Prudence in Blood Groove’s sexy and violent sequel, The Girls with Games of Blood. Zginski looks suave and sophisticated (albeit tan-challenged), but he’s a ruthless and selfish monster who always has a motive behind what he does and puts his own desires above those of everyone else.
Besides New World blood, Zginski’s Continental tastes include willing women and high-speed automobiles. These vices, and the fact that he is traveling around the South in the 1970’s with a black man (a vampire called Leonardo who is also in Blood Groove) attract way too much attention. Attention is a thing Zginski can ill afford, and yet, perversely, pursue attention is just what he does. He becomes infatuated with and obsesses about a Ford Mustang he sees in the (original) movie Gone In 60 Seconds, so when the opportunity arises to purchase a similar cherry, 1973 Mach 1 Mustang Zginski jumps at the chance. This puts him on the wrong side of an ex-sheriff who also wanted the car (Cocker’s character, a nod to the actual movie Walking Tall and Sheriff Buford Pusser, is one of the cultural references I mentioned above), who spends the rest of the book trying to get revenge on Zginski and Leonardo.
Alex Beldsoe weaves a tale rich in atmosphere and makes you feel as you read that you are in the South he’s writing about. The characters and their motives seem very real, and though many of them are vampires, Bledsoe makes you empathize with them and like them better than many of the bigoted hate-filled humans in the novel. There’s also enough gore and violence to satisfy the most discriminating lover of vampire stories. I’d heartily recommend The Girls with Games of Blood to anyone who is a fan of the horror genre, and especially fans of vampire literature.
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