Two-For-One Review: "Doc" and "Epitaph" by Mary Doria Russell

"He began to die when he was twenty-one, but tuberculosis is slow and sly and subtle. The disease took fifteen years to hollow out his lungs so completely they could no longer keep him alive. In all that time, he was allowed a single season of something like happiness.

"When he arrived in Dodge City in 1878, Dr. John Henry Holliday was a frail twenty-six-year-old dentist who wanted nothing grander than to practice his profession in a prosperous Kansas cow town. Hope--cruelest of the evils that escaped Pandora's box--smiled on him gently all that summer. While he lived in Dodge, the quiet life he yearned for seemed to lie within his grasp.

"At thirty, he would be famous for his part in the gunfight at the O.K. Corrall in Tombstone, Arizona. A year later, he would become infamous when he rode at Wyatt Earp's side to avenge the murder of Wyatt's brother. To sell newspapers, the journalists of his day embellished slim fact with fat rumor and rank fiction; it was they who invented the iconic frontier gambler and gunman Doc Holliday. That unwanted notoriety added misery to John Henry Holliday's final year, when illness and exile had made of him a lonely and destitute alcoholic, dying by awful inches and living off charity.

"The wonder is how long and how well he fought his destiny. He was meant to die at birth. The Fates pursued him from the day he first drew breath, howling for his delayed demise."

***

Doc by Mary Doria Russell (2011)

4 out of 5 stars 

Complexity of Writing: 3/5
Quality of Writing: 5/5
Strength of Characterization: 5/5
Logic of Plot Development: 3/5
Evocation of Setting: 5/5
Effectiveness of Pacing: 3/5
Resolution of Conflict: 3/5
Emotional Engagement: 5/5
Mental Engagement: 4/5
Memorability: 5/5
Bechdel Test: pass
Diverse Cast: pass
Content Warning: character deaths, racism, misogyny, mention of child abuse, mention of sexual assault, chronic illness

Overall Response: I bought a copy immediately.

***
More Thoughts: Here I break my rule about writing my own summaries. Russell's opening paragraphs convey the sense of the novel better than anything I could scribble. Doc doesn't follow the classic novel format with a central conflict, confrontations, and all the rest; instead, it is a character piece. And not just one about Doc Holliday. It is a portrait of a time and a place, and about the types of characters that inhabited it.

The words "character piece," uttered about a lesser book, would ordinarily make me run in the opposite direction. Trust me, dear reader. Presumably, I have been right about a book a time or two before, or you wouldn't still be here.

Review: "We Have Always Lived In The Castle" by Shirley Jackson

Five years ago, an arsenic-filled sugarbowl claimed the lives of the Blackwood family. The three survivors have found peace in their shared isolation: Constance, acquitted of the murder by the courts but not in the minds of the neighbors; her imaginative and slightly feral sister Mary Katherine, called Merricat; and their uncle Julian, crippled in mind and body by the poison that killed the others.

Merricat, a creature of habit and ritual, views herself as the guardian of her troubled family and the groundskeeper of the Blackwood estate. Change is a threat, and any visitor an invader. When a long-estranged Blackwood cousin makes himself at home, and Constance begins to talk of rejoining society, Merricat determines to restore order and expel the intruder by any means necessary. But Constance may no longer be her ally.

***

We Have Always Lived In The Castle by Shirley Jackson (1962)

5 out of 5 stars 

Complexity of Writing: 4/5
Quality of Writing: 5/5
Strength of Characterization: 5/5
Logic of Plot Development: 5/5
Evocation of Setting: 5/5
Effectiveness of Pacing: 5/5
Resolution of Conflict: 5/5
Emotional Engagement: 5/5
Mental Engagement: 4/5
Memorability: 4/5
Bechdel Test: pass
Diverse Cast: fail
Content Warning: character deaths

Overall Response: I say this very rarely, so listen up: this is a perfect book.

***

More Thoughts: I've mentioned this before: when someone recommends a book, nine times out of ten, I will put it on hold at the library without even pausing to read the synopsis. (I only write summaries for you, dear reader; on my own, I would go straight into opinionating.) Some long-ago Wikipedia binge left the impression that  We Have Always Lived In The Castle was about murder, but no more than that. When a friend praised Shirley Jackson's writing, it reminded me that I had never followed up on the book. That was all the preface that I had.

From the first page, I was hooked.

Review: "The Star of Kazan" by Eva Ibbotson

As a baby, Annika was abandoned in a mountain chapel. She loves her adoptive family--the servants who found her and the three eccentric professors they work for--and life in beautiful, peaceful Vienna. But she always dreams that her real mother will come find her.

Then, one day, her dream comes true.

Without warning, Annika is whisked away from the warmth and cheer of Vienna into a cold house of strangers. Her love for her long-lost mother wars with her sense that all is not well. These aristocrats eat worse than peasants, and creditors beat on their door in the middle of the night. Her new brother plays soldier and ties fireworks to his dog. The gypsy stablehand, Annika's only friend, is accused of theft. 

Meanwhile, the Viennese community she left behind investigates their own robbery--the stealing away of Annika by someone who could not possibly love her like they do.

*** 

3.5 out of 5 stars

(grump + breakdown below the cut)

***

Review: "Imperial Purple" by Gillian Bradshaw

Even slaves are honored to work with Tyrian purple, the rarest and most expensive of dyes in Byzantium. Demetrias, who weaves silk tapestries for the emperor, is luckier than most. But the honor turns to danger when Demetrias is secretly ordered to weave an imperial cloak in dimensions she knows are not the emperor's.

The secret commission is evidence of treason, and Demetrias wants no part of it. As a slave, though, she has no choice but to follow orders. After the conspirators escape with the finished cloak, Demetrias herself is seized as evidence of the plot and dragged a thousand miles from home to the court in Constantinople.

Her husband Symeon, a state slave himself, fishes for the murex shells which give the dye its hue. When Demetrias is kidnapped by the investigators, Symeon sails his tiny boat across the sea to follow her and force the powers of the state to return her home. But it was Symeon's well-meaning attempt to protect Demetrias that revealed the conspiracyand endangered her in the first place.

*** 

4 out of 5 stars

(grump + breakdown below the cut)

***

Review: "The Queen of Attolia" by Megan Whalen Turner

(The Queen of Attolia is the second book in a series. I reviewed The Thief, the first book , here.)

"My" cover of The Queen of Attolia,
which apparently other fans despise.

The Queen of Attolia has not forgiven the thief Eugenides for outwitting her and escaping her judgment. When she captures him a second time in her own megaron, she invokes the historical punishment for thieves and orders his right hand be cut off before sending him home to his people.

The maiming of the thief becomes the catalyst for a war between three countries. The invading Mede Empire waits to overrun the first one weak enough to allow them a foothold. And Eugenides, one-handed and shaken, is called upon once more to snatch an impossible victory.

*** 

4.5 out of 5 stars

(grump + breakdown below the cut)

***

Review: "The Thief" by Megan Whalen Turner

"I can steal anything," the thief Gen claimed--and proving it has already landed him in the king's prison. Now the king's advisor, the magus, wants to put Gen's boasts to the test.

With the magus and his apprentices, Gen is dragged across the mountains and into hostile country where discovery will mean death. The magus believes Gen can steal a sacred stone from the altar of the long-forgotten gods. With the authority of the gods behind him, the magus could dictate the future of alliances and wars for years to come.

But Gen has plans of his own. And he is is used to playing a very long and risky game to get what he wants.

*** 

3.9 out of 5 stars

(grump + breakdown below the cut)

***

Review: "Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children" by Ransom Riggs

As a child, Jacob loved his grandfather's stories about the magical island off of Wales where he and other children waited out the devastation of World War II. When he grew up, he recognized them for the fairy tales they were--until the day he finds his grandfather dying in the woods behind his house, and lays eyes on the monster which killed him.

Jacob is haunted by nightmares of what he saw. The peculiar photographs his grandfather entrusted to him make the impossible old stories seem real. With the encouragement of his worried psychologist, Jacob and his father travel to Wales. His father hopes that Jacob will see how ordinary the island is and realize that his grandfather's stories were only imaginary. Jacob hopes to find proof that the peculiar children from the photographs really existed. He finds far more than he ever dreamed.

***

1 out of 5 stars

(grump + breakdown below the cut)

***

Review: "Seven Daughters and Seven Sons" by Barbara Cohen and Bahija Lovejoy

Buran is the fourth of her father's seven daughters, and the apple of his eye--but her village of Baghdad doesn't see it that way. While her uncle's seven sons venture off to make their fortunes, Buran and her sisters can do nothing to save their impoverished family. As women, they are forbidden to leave the house to work, and no one will marry such poor brides.

With her father's reluctant blessing, Buran disguises herself as a man and joins a caravan bound for Tyre. She plots to match the success of her uncle's sons, providing for her sisters and giving her father a reason to hold his head up high. But her cleverness might prove her undoing, when it brings her to the attention of the prince himself.

*** 

  5 out of 5 stars

(grump + breakdown below the cut)

***

Review: "The Patron Saint of Ugly" by Marie Manilla

When stories come pouring out of the tiny town of Sweetwater, West Virginia, about the miraculous healing powers of Garnet Ferrari, the Vatican dispatches an investigator to determine the truth of the so-called saint.

Garnet herself denies all claim to sainthood or miracles, but she cannot deny that something strange has been happening all her life. From the day she was born with a birthmark of the world covering her entire body, she has been set apart, marveled over by superstitious grandmothers and reviled by her peers. Only her mother, a blue-blooded runaway from Virginia's highest society circles, is determined to adore her map-stained daughter.

The Vatican's investigation follows Garnet back through time to the miracles she performed and the ones she failed. Was there ever really a Santa Garnet del Vulcano before her, or is Garnet truly the rebirth of a long-lost Sicilian saint? It's a legend the world has never heard before, but one which in Garnet's memory has been told a hundred times and more. 

*** 

4.5 out of 5 stars

(grump + breakdown below the cut)

***

Review: "The Wolf Hunt" by Gillian Bradshaw

When her brother is killed fighting in the Crusades, Marie Penthievre becomes the heir of the family manor: a rich prize fought over by Normandy and Brittany for generations. Now Marie herself is the prize. Before her Norman overlord can act, Marie is kidnapped from her convent and smuggled into Brittany.

Alone in the Breton court, Marie defends her honor and her right to refuse a husband from among her enemies. Tiarnan of Talensac, a knight in Duke Hoel's service, serves as her champion. But Tiarnan, a married man, has his own crisis of honor to endure: whether his new bride will still love him when she learns that he is a werewolf, an abomination in the sight of God.

When Tiarnan disappears, Duke Hoel's court grieves their favorite while Marie mourns for her first friend. But Tiarnan is not dead--only trapped in his monstrous form by his faithless wife and her former lover. Now the duke he once served hunts for him, and the forests of Brittany become a battleground.

*** 

5 out of 5 stars

(grump + breakdown below the cut)

***

Review: "Breath and Bones" by Susann Cokal

The nuns at the Danish convent always knew young Famke would fall into sin. Such a pretty girl would never stay on the path of righteousness, they said. She was born for rebellion--and for ruin.

Aspiring painter Albert Castle sees Famke's beauty as his means to join the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood of artists. His painting of Famke as Nimue cursing Merlin is a masterpiece. But when Albert goes to make his fortune, he takes only the painting and leaves behind the naive girl whose reputation he has destroyed. 

Too fallen to be afraid of God, too sheltered to be afraid of the world, Famke sets off on her own pilgrimage. She follows Albert's wake across the ocean to the American frontier, through brothels and Mormon communes and all the wild places of a new and chaotic country. She has one shining purpose: to find her artist and be his muse again.

*** 

4.5 out of 5 stars

(grump + breakdown below the cut)

***

Review: "The Storyteller" by Jodi Picoult

The nocturnal hours of her profession suit baker Sage Singer. In darkness and isolation, she nurses her pain over her mother's death, killed in the same car accident which disfigured Sage's face.

In her grief support group, Sage bonds with elderly widower Josef Weber. But her new friend discloses a terrible secret: he was a member of the SS, overseeing a concentration camp in Nazi Germany. Josef believes Sage's Jewish ancestry grants her the authority to forgive him--and the right to assist in his suicide plan.

Sage is no stranger to guilt and despair, but Josef's confession and its accompanying plea horrify her. She is convinced to endure the truth by Nazi hunter Leo Stein; by her own grandmother, a survivor of the camps; and by her lingering compassion for Josef. For the sake of the Holocaust's victims, she must see Josef's story to its end--no matter what skeletons they unearth along the way.

*** 

  3.5 out of 5 stars

(grump + breakdown below the cut)

***

Review: "Code Name Verity" by Elizabeth Wein

"I am a coward," the wireless operator writes on the first page of her confession. In exchange for gentler treatment and a delay of her execution, she has agreed to tell her Nazi jailers everything she knows.

But the pages she fills with words have very little to do with the locations of British airfields, or the types of planes they are sending into the war. Instead, she writes about her dearest friend, Maddie Brodatt--clever Maddie who never gets lost; courageous Maddie who became a licensed pilot just before the war broke out; faithful Maddie who flew the the wireless operator to occupied France, where she was captured.

For page after page she draws out Maddie's story (punctuated with just enough details of airfields and planes to keep her captors interested.) She masks her treason inside memories of their friendship. As time runs short, the prisoner's scheme takes shape: to reach Maddie, if she is still alive, to fulfill their duty, and to take their revenge on the cruel regime that has darkened all of Europe.

*** 

  5 out of 5 stars

(grump + breakdown below the cut)

***

Review: "Bridge of Birds" by Barry Hughart

When all the children in the village of Ku-fu fall mysteriously ill, Number Ten Ox goes to find a cure for them. In Peking's Street of Eyes, he hires the assistance of the ancient and unscrupulous sage Li Kao. But the only known cure for the mysterious ailment appears to be something out of a fairy tale--a magical ginseng root.

Ox and Li Kao set off in search of miracles, and money, and revenge. Every trail they follow leads them back to the Duke of Ch'in, with his terrifying tiger mask and his deadly labyrinth. Against his power, even Li Kao's clever schemes and Ox's pure faith may not be enough. Meanwhile, the sickly children of Ku-fu are running out time.

*** 

  2.5 out of 5 stars

(grump + breakdown below the cut)

***

Review: "The Thirteenth Tale" by Diane Setterfield

The famous writer Vida Winter is renowned for the outlandish histories she makes up for interviews. Each one has been a lie. Now an old woman, dying of cancer, she wants to lay certain ghosts to rest before she joins them.

As far as Winter is concerned, biographer Margaret Lea is a blank slate: unfamiliar with her works, untouched by preconceptions. But while Margaret listens to the old novelist's confession, she finds that not all of the ghosts are silent--and that some are calling her own name.


***   4 out of 5 stars (grump below the cut) ***

Review: "Fitcher's Brides" by Gregory Frost

The Charter girls' new stepmother is a very religious woman--and her religion of choice is Elias Fitcher, whose prophecies schedule the end of the world for October 1843. Whether they want it or not, Vernelia, Amy, and Kate are going to be among the saved--and the married--on that day.

While their hapless father mans the turnstile allowing penitents into Fitcher's commune, the charismatic preacher courts each of his daughters in turn. But life as the bride of God's final prophet is far from heavenly. A darkness hides inside the walls of Harbinger House, and in the marriage bed.

***

  2.5 out of 5 stars (grump below the cut) ***