Sing a Worried Song

This is the 7^th Deverell novel that I’ve reviewed (all favorably), and the sixth and last one in the Arthur Beauchamp series. I am a fan of his writing and this series. He balances serious issues with humor and great characters. Much like the fifth book, in Sing a Worried Song, the author bounces back to an early part of protagonist-lawyer Beauchamp’s career, one in which he acted as a prosecutor, rather than his usual role as a defense attorney, for the thrill murder of a Vancouver street clown, Joyal (Joe) Chumpy. When the jury brought back a guilty verdict and Randolph Skyler was sentenced to life in prison, Skyler promised that he would see Beauchamp killed.

Jump forward 25 years to a time Beauchamp has had a remarkably successful career as a defense attorney, and has now retired and moved to Garibaldi Island, and Beauchamp was in the midst of island festivities when he learned of Skyler’s parole. There is conflicting evidence about whether Skyler has mellowed during his time in prison or if he has harbored the same obsessive fantasy about killing his prosecutor. Deverell successfully hides the resolution of this plot line until the very end of the novel. As with the other Deverell books, this one is a winner and gets my strong recommendation.

Deverell has published at least 17 novels, so now that I’ve gotten through all of the Beauchamp books, I’ll find one of his others to read. And, I can hope that this 79-year-old author still has more Beauchamp stories to come.

The Wright Brothers

David McCullough has written a lot of great historical works including The Path Between The Seas (about the Panama Canal), 1776, John Adams, and others. Now he has written a biography of The Wright Brothers. Before reading this, I knew little of the brothers other than their first powered flight in Kitty Hawk and that they were bicycle mechanics in Dayton, Ohio. This story tells of their remarkable engineering feats that allowed that moment of flight to happen, as well as their critical efforts after that first flight to advance the technical aspects of aviation. McCullough captured the cooperation and competition with others who were pursuing flight, especially in France. Neither brother ever married, and they always lived together with their sister and father in Dayton. Both Wilbur and Orville, named for preachers who were admired by their father, were honest and hardworking men of solid Midwest stock. You’ll be impressed with their characters, the risks they were willing to take as well as those they would not, and they way they went about their business. This was a quick and easy read – and it gets my strong recommendation.

Resume Speed

Lawrence Block is a prolific writer who has been reviewed three times previously in the blog. While the reviews in our blog of his other novels have been lukewarm, this one is nothing but hot. Bill Thompson began the story on a bus which was taking him to Montana. Skilled as a fry cook, he hopped off the bus in a small town, found a diner that needed a new cook, and began a new life there. He was fleeing a town in North Dakota where he had an alcoholic blackout, and awoke with some evidence that he had been in a fight, and he worried that he had done something awful he could not remember. His new boss is Andy Page, and Andy is most impressed with Thompson’s skills and work ethic. Eventually, Thompson meets a new love interest, the librarian, Carlene Weldon. But Block could not put down the drink, and just as it is want to happen, his efforts to carefully control his alcohol consumption gradually and unpredictably slipped to dangerous proportions. Eventually, we learn that at some time in his past, he had murdered a man in one such blackout. Fearful of repeating that pattern, he was still unable to leave his bourbon alone.

The story and dialogue almost reads like a script from “Sergeant Friday.” It was short, direct, and to the point – and at the same time, as the character of Thompson was developed, the story was gripping. To use a cliché, this is a hard hitting work, while also being a short and easy read. Well done Mr. Block.

The Hatching by Ezekiel Boone

A billionaire was trekking in the high plains of Peru. His flight home crashes without warning just outside of his Minneapolis home. A nuke explodes in remote China. A package is sent to an American entomologist at American University. 

Dr. Melanie Guyer and her grad students open the package sent by colleagues on a dig deep in Peru. It contains what appears to be a sac. The kind of sac that an insect would grow in. But it's calcified. They set up to begin to study the sac only to find its temperature rise.

In Dehli, India, some minor bureaucrat heads to an underground series of flood control chambers to obtain some routine measurements. On the Pacific trade routes, a super container ship filled to the brim from China is set on autopilot for the Port of Los Angeles. 

The Chinese say the nuke was an accident. An exercise that went south. Our bad. The series of doors in the Delhi tunnels are obstructed from the inside. Knee deep. Insects. All dead. Some the size of a fist. 

But not all are dead. And the ones alive are voracious. And they swarm. Eating any flesh in their path.

Which is not what spiders do.

Dr. Guyer's insect sac hatches and dozens of these spiders rush out, crashing against the glass walls of the insectarium. They are hungry, so Dr. Guyer drops in a lab rat . . . and it's devoured in seconds. By Spiders. Acting more like piranha. 

The doors of the Delhi tunnels are breached and spiders swarm like ants into the street. Flesh is stripped. Bodies stripped right down to the bone. The freighter's crew is dead and the ship is headed straight for the docks at open water speed. The crash spills thousands of containers, some of which have been breeding spiders. The containers came from the same corner of China as where the nukes were detonated.  And that Minneapolis plane crash yields a few spiders, one of which ate its way out of the billionaire's face.

The President essentially closes the borders. Grounds all flights. Imposes martial law in the hardest hit areas. Her Chief of Staff's ex is Dr. Guyer so before long, Dr. Guyer is an important and frequent guest of the Oval Office. 

Let's see. Peter Benchley (with an assist from Spielberg) scared everyone out of the water with Jaws. Hitchcock showed us how terrifying birds can be. Michael Crichton's Congo went overboard on gorillas. (and don't even get me started on Sharknado). Add Boone to the list. He has given everyone more reason to fear spiders. Normally a solitary creature, these spiders act like Army ants and feed like piranhas. And there are millions of 'em. China thought, in vain, a nuke would stop the spread. 

And no one knows how to stop them.

Sleep well tonight. 

East Coast Don

Available July 5, 2016.

An Honorable Man by Paul Vidich

Eisenhower has just been elected. The Senator from Wisconsin is runny roughshod across anyone in power who doesn't see the world the way he sees it; communists and homosexuals were in his crosshairs. The FBI is run by what some see as a dictator. The old OSS of WWII has evolved into the CIA, but it is still the new kid on the block that the FBI doesn't like nor think is even needed.  They've been thrown in the sandbox and told to play nicely.

The OSS/CIA recruits almost exclusively in the Ivy League because their people have to be smart and where are the smartest talent but in the Ivies. Secrecy was paramount. Wives, families, friends had to be kept completely in the dark. It was a time of trench coats, fedoras, suits and ties, cigarettes, and hard drink. 

Just after the war, food riots erupted in Vienna. The riots brought out the worst in the Soviet police and some generous acts of kindness by the occasional agents of the west. One act caught the eye of the Russian intelligencia and managed to turn an OSS agent. They now had someone placed inside during the CIAs infancy. 

The CIA suspects they have a mole and have dubbed him Protocol. The CIAs operations head meets with his inner circle to formulate a strategy to flush him out. George Muller, an experienced agent with ties back to Vienna is the reluctant point man. But he wants out. His marriage failed and his young son is growing up in Europe. He is a loner with a signed resignation letter in his desk drawer.

The CIA has a couple of relatively insignificant clues, but they realize the only way they will ever uncover Protocol's identity is to turn a Russian. Muller successfully entraps a high-ranking Russian and works him slowly to get that one piece of information that will reveal Protocol's identity.

This is Vidich's debut novel. Readers schooled on Kirk McGarvey, Scot Harvath, Mitch Rapp, John Wells, or even James Bond need to adjust their expectations. Muller is not a bull in the china shop. He would a contemporary of LeCarre's George Smiley. Old school espionage. Nothing better than a good old fashioned mole hunt - spy noir at its finest. Vidich skillfully reveals Muller to be a less than convinced patriot who has to hunt for an enemy amongst old friends.

A most impressive debut. He is being compared to LeCarre, so maybe it might be advised to pick up the with this newest entry to traditional espionage.

ECD

p.s. a few reviews ago, I mentioned that I need to pay closer attention to the publisher. I was referring to my recent entry into reading titles by Emily Bestler Books (an imprint of Atria/Simon & Schuster). Imagine my surprise to find out that Vidich is one of her authors. So far, I'm batting 1.000. Think I'm convinced that she really can deliver the goods.

The Wolves by Alex Berenson

When Berenson's previous John Wells book, Twelve Days, left off, Wells had convinced the President that the intel on Iran having a nuke was false and at the last minute, the invasion of Iran was called off. The architect of the false intel was Aaron Duberman, an American-born Jew and casino megabillionaire. The invasion was called off, but Duberman remained at large in Israel. 

The Wolves picks up the next week. The President has saved face, but his potential failure has put his entire administration in jeopardy; political pressure might force his resignation. Has to be knowing that Duberman is one of the Presdent's biggest donors. War was averted, but Wells still wants Duberman. The President loosens the reins on Wells, but will offer neither aid nor support if Wells chooses to go after Duberman.

Duberman knows Wells will be coming. Each knows the other is not safe until only one remains alive. The one thing the President does is squeeze Israel to kick Duberman out and force him to be on the run. Duberman retreats to his mountain fortress in Hong Kong near his feature casino.

His casino in expanding and the biggest of the big high rollers make the pilgrimage to Hong Kong, including the highest ranking general in the Chinese Air Force. The casino takes customer service to extremes and General Han has a liking for young girls. Plus, a Russian intelligence operative leans on an arms dealer (from Twelve Days) to recruit Duberman as a source for intel on China's military (via General Han).

Wells works his way into Hong Kong and sets Duberman's paranoia detector in high gear. He has Wells, the Russians, the Chinese, his security, and his wife threatening him from all directions. The Wolves are indeed baying at his door.

In previous John Wells books (all of which we have reviewed), the focus of the story is on Wells and his seemingly superhuman instincts. This time, however, Duberman's fate garners the largest fraction of the book. When Wells tightens a screw, Duberman has to juggle numerous possible outcomes, few of which are favorable. That Berenson emphasizes Duberman's fall, doesn't make this any less of a terrific and fast-paced tale. Berenson remains a consistent and enthralling story teller.

As people like us at MRB are famous for saying, "Buckle up, boys. It's going to be a bumpy ride." Especially for Duberman.

ECD

Known to Evil

Known to Evil is the fourth Walter Mosley novel that I’ve reviewed this year, so you know that I like his writing. This is the second book in his Leonid McGill series of mysteries, and for the first time, I find myself a bit disappointed. McGill is a semi-reformed Mafia hit man, and as he works to solve the murder of Wanda Soa and the disappearance of Tara Lear, it ends up as a novel about a group of sociopaths, and McGill looks good in comparison to the others.

I’ll put this one in the category of airplane books: good enough to entertain you on a cross country flight, but not so riveting that it would either keep you from a nap or would not bother you if you left it on the plane, unfinished. There’s more Mosley in my future, but not Leonid McGill.