Wasteland of Flint

By Thomas Harlan

This story is set in the future of an alternate timeline, where the Japanese discovered the Americas and where the Aztecs are the rulers of known space. So the story is set in a future where humans have spread out from Earth to other planets. In their travels they have discovered the remains of past spacefaring civilizations. Gretchen Anderson, a xeno-archaeologist, is an expert at alien remains and she and her team are sent to a desolate, desert planet to investigate what has happened to a previous team that has been out of contact. They travel on a military ship to the planet because the Empire is worried about what dangers may be on the planet.
When the team arrives, they find the first team's spacecraft in orbit, empty and silent, with no sign of the crew. The ground team is OK, but terribly worried about their fellows on the spacecraft. Investigation reveals that an artifact uncovered on the planet and brought on board the spacecraft ignited and destroyed all the organic compounds on the ship, including the crew, their clothes, food, furnishing and even some of the cheaper components of the electronics. Anything inorganic was left untouched.
When this is realized, it is decreed that the planet is off limits by the Empire's man, Hummingbird, who is a kind of cross between the secret police and a witch doctor. He and Gretchen go down to the planet to destroy any traces of humankind on the planet and to retrieve one missing member of the first team who has flown off in an ultralight to do some surveys. And while they are doing that, the rest of Gretchen's crew will be getting the derelict spacecraft back in working order. The military ship will be tracking down and removing, without attracting any hostile attention from the desolate planet, a mining ship in a nearby asteroid belt.

First of all, why the people in this story have a different history than ours is never explained. Apparently the story is based on some video game or something created by the author in which this alternative history is all worked out. But coming into it without being familiar with this back story made for a rather confusing start. Secondly, a large part of the story is concerned with the military ship and its crew and its hunt for the mining ship, with descriptions of weapons and tactics and technology, that I just found completely boring and also felt that it added nothing to the main story. Thirdly, the whole Aztec empire stuff and all that mystical mumbo jumbo just did not appeal to me. I thought the Hummingbird character was a giant pain in the ass who should have been shoved out an airlock without a spacesuit.
The only part I really enjoyed was when Gretchen and her crew are figuring out what went wrong on the derelict spacecraft and when Gretchen is down on the planet helping Hummingbird with his investigation and tracking down the missing person and trying to understand the weird ecology of the devastated planet. That part was fascinating and kind of scary.
So I only enjoyed about a third of the story, the rest was confusing, unappealing or just plain uninteresting.

Death and the Visiting Fellow

By Tim Heald

Tudor Cornwall has been invited to spend a semester as a Visiting Fellow at a university in Hobart, Tasmania. But when he arrives, his old friend from his college days who was supposed to pick him up at the airport, Ashley, is nowhere to be found. And as Tudor finds out, not only has Ashley vanished, but Ashley, who is also a professor at the university, is being accused of sexual harassment by some female students.
Tudor takes up his position at the school and soon receives emails purporting to be from Ashley, claiming that he had to disappear for awhile and asking Tudor to do a favor for him. Tudor isn't convinced that the emails are from his friend, but still agrees to do the favor, which is to mix up a mulled wine drink, using Ashley's recipe and ingredients, to be entered into a school competition.
Tudor makes the beverage and disaster strikes. A woman who drinks some of it, turns out to be fatally allergic to one of Ashley's ingredients and dies before anyone can help her. Now Tudor is in the middle of a big mess and still his old friend is nowhere to be found.

This murder mystery is a bit different. The location, for one, is very exotic, and at times, I didn't know what the author was talking about, with the down-under and British terms. A book like this could use a glossary in the back. The first one that stumped me was shooting brake, which sounds like a it would be a hunting blind but means a car like a station wagon or an SUV. Then there's wattle, which I never did figure out what that is. There's a few more, but I don't recall them exactly.
Also different is that the murder victim is not the obvious choice of the missing professor but is the woman who drank the mulled wine. But the biggest difference between this book and most murder mysteries is the ending. Bit of a spoiler here: the killer, though revealed, is not brought to justice. Very unsatisfying ending, I thought. So, even though I found the exotic locale interesting and the story engrossing, because of the crappy ending, I can only rate it as fair.

The Mind Pool

By Charles Sheffield

At a time when humans have expanded among the stars and encountered alien races and space travel is instantaneous due to a human invention, that very human inventiveness has placed everyone, human and nonhuman, at risk. A biological machine, developed by human scientists, has unexpectedly run amok, turning against its own creators. In the battle that ensued, most of the constructs were destroyed, except for one that escaped. But the only experts on the constructs were killed in the battle.
The one that got away has been located hiding on a jungle planet. A conference of aliens and humans has decided that teams composed of one member of the four different types of intelligences will be assembled and trained and sent in, one at a time, in an attempt to subdue and neutralize the rogue construct. But the conference has decreed that the human component of the team has to meet certain very limited conditions, which means that only a very few humans will qualify to become team members. Which is how two street kids end up being key components of a race to protect intelligent life from a machine that seems determined to destroy it. Together with their alien comrades, these kids will set off into the jungle to come face to face with the smartest, most dangerous being ever encountered. And before it is all over, what they learn will change everything.

I liked this book. The future human society is weird and different, yet still familiar. The aliens are weird, but not in a bad or threatening way. The interactions between the aliens and humans were entertaining and comforting, not monstrous or implacable, as aliens are often portrayed. I liked the aliens, I liked the puzzle of the rogue construct and I really liked how the teams came together to solve the puzzle. I found this to be an enjoyable and enthralling read.

Voyagers II: The Alien Within

By Ben Bova

Keith Stoner was an astronaut who was given the chance to investigate a derelict spacecraft that had drifted into Earth orbit. When disaster struck the mission, he decided to stay on the spacecraft even though it meant his certain death. He froze to death and his body was recovered and kept frozen until the technology advanced to the stage that he could be successfully thawed and revived.
A large, multi-national corporation came up with a method to revive Keith successfully many years later, and once he was back among the living, the corporation head felt that Keith was, in effect, corporate property. Of course, Keith didn't agree with this attitude at all. But even more than his personal feelings, Keith was sharing his body with that of an alien intelligence, an intelligence acquired during his time on the alien spacecraft. And this intelligence did not approve of humankind's messy emotional attachments and it overrode Keith's own human instincts, making Keith a sort of alien even among his own kind.
Keith managed to slip away from the control of Vanguard, using special abilities given him by the alien presence within himself. And he set off on a journey of exploration, trying to figure out why humanity was in such a mess and who was behind all the many little wars spreading across the land.

This was a pretty boring book. The constant sneering of the alien within Keith at human desires and emotions got pretty old, pretty fast. And the political stuff was just dull. Keith becomes a kind of superman but all it gets him is nearly starving to death in some refugee camp in Africa. He eventually pulls off some kind of peace conference and figures out who the bad guy is behind all the conflicts. But none of it was very interesting.

I Remember Nothing and Other Reflections

By Nora Ephron

A collection of humorous essays on growing old by Nora Ephron, written when she was sixty-nine. She writes about, of course, not being able to remember things very well, but she also talks about her start as a young journalist in New York City and about divorce, meat loaf, chicken soup, egg white omelets, getting together with friends for Christmas, email, loss and so on. The pieces are entertaining and often funny, sometimes sad and very enjoyable. I liked it quite a bit.

(I changed the book image a little to make the letters more visible.)

Here Be Demons

By Esther Friesner

An archaeology professor's summer job is leading tours to dig sites and letting the tourist try their hand at digging for a couple weeks. The latest site is in Egypt and the professor, who has never had a successful dig, is hoping to discover the location of an ancient monastery. What he doesn't know is that the site he and his merry band will be staying at is infested with demons.
The demons are outcasts from Hell, sentenced to stay in this desert location until they succeed in tempting at least one human to sign away his or her soul. The demons are an unpleasant lot but turn out to be no match for their human quarry because, deep down, the demons are just not that demonic.

This is one of those books with an amusing cover & an blurb on the back describing it as "a hell of a lot of fun." But it is just not that funny or even mildly amusing. One of the characters you meet at the beginning is Steve Ritter about whom you are given fascinating glimpses that he is more than he appears. But then, he fades into just a minor character until the end of the story when his true identity is revealed. I was wanting to read more about the mystery of Steve, but not much more is said, except for some mysterious and not very enlightening conversations he has with the demon trying to tempt him.
I also found the story rather directionless, the characters being pushed and pulled without really getting anywhere until the last part when several of them are snatched away to some place that isn't Purgatory but is in the same neighborhood. There is a lot going on but it all seems rather pointless as media types descend on the dig, earthquakes uncover tombs and ancient temples still filled with nubile priestess prostitutes pop up out of the sand then sink back down again. I think there was maybe too much going on in the story and it all made for a kind of a mish-mosh. To me, the most interesting part of the story was when several people are taken down to the Purgatory-esque place and each has their own unique encounter there. My two favorites were Honest Ariel's Sandwiche Shoppe (Ariel is an angel who still hasn't decided whether he is on the side of God or the Devil and even though he is indecisive he is an excellent chef) and the temple of the fish god, who turns out to be a pretty decent guy. I did find some aspect of the ending a bit confusing, though.
Anyway, even though I thought the story was lacking and not funny, still I did like the last part so I will say it made for a fair read.

Check out Battle Hymns for another review of the book.

No Touch Monkey! And Other Travel Lessons Learned Too Late

By Ayun Halliday

Halliday's travel memoir of some of her various trips around the world, told in a self-deprecating and frank way and including lots of adventures and misadventures of herself and her traveling companion of the moment.

This was an OK book. The book is supposed to be funny but at the most I found it mildly amusing. It just didn't grab me. I especially didn't like reading about her drunken binges or stupid drug trips.

Agatha Raisin and the Witch of Wyckhadden

By M. C. Beaton

Agatha Raisin is in Wyckhadden, a seaside British resort, during the off season. She had a run-in with a vengeful hairdresser who doused her head in hair remover leaving Agatha with several bald spots on her head. So she has retired to Wyckhadden to rest and recover and hopefully grow her hair back. But Wychhadden in the winter is a dismal sort of place and the hotel where she is staying seems to be full of old people who live there year round. Chatting with some of them, Agatha finds out about a local witch, who is said to have many effective potions for sale. Agatha pays a visit to the witch and not only does she buy a hair tonic she also buys a love potion, with a notion of using it on an old lover who seems rather indifferent lately.
After her fur coat is vandalized, Agatha decides to visit the witch again, thinking the witch maybe have been the one who vandalized the coat, only to discover the woman dead, with her head bashed in. So once again, Agatha finds herself involved in a murder investigation.

This was a pretty good read. I liked Agatha, even though she is a bit of a nut. She doesn't think twice about doping the men around her with the witch's love potion just to see if it works. She also doesn't have many qualms about stringing a new guy along when all she really wants is to make the old boy friend jealous. Which works, even though Agatha doesn't know it, as the old boy friend becomes so enraged that he totally writes Agatha off.
So even though there are two murders to solve and Agatha eventually figures out who the killer is, she is not able to figure out the mystery of why Agatha is so alone. The story ends on a down note, as she returns home to her cottage with no one but her cats to keep her warm.
Still, despite the rather morose ending, I found Agatha Raisin to be an amusing if rather unscrupulous heroine and I enjoyed this story which is not only about two deaths but is also about the death of Agatha's youth. It was a good read.

Death of a Cad

By M. C. Beaton

Captain Peter Barlett is a cad. He steals, he cheats, he chases women, he boozes, he lies. He is an all-around bad fellow. So how does he end up being invited to an exclusive week in the Scottish countryside at a select party for an up-and-coming new London playwright? Basically it's because, when he wants to, he can really turn on the charm. But at this gathering, he seems to be on his worst behavior, and therefore it is no surprise when he is discovered dead in the morning.
At first, it seems as if he has shot himself accidentally while out hunting. But local policeman Hamish MacBeth soon discovers that the scene was staged to look like an accident when it is actually murder. Now Hamish has to discover which of the guests at the party is the killer when it becomes apparent that pretty much everyone had reason to hate Peter Bartlett.

What a poisonous lot the people at this country gathering are, starting with the overbearing hosts of the party and including not only their guests but their hot-then-cold daughter Priscilla who is engaged to the guest of honor but is sneaking around with local policeman, Hamish MacBeth. In fact, the only likable person in the whole story is Hamish. It is hard to imagine why anyone would want to spend even an evening with these pills, much less a whole week or weekend, which ever it was. In fact, if it wasn't for Hamish, the whole story would be a wash, but Hamish not only saves the day, he saves the story. Without him, it would not be worth reading. So, thanks to Hamish, this is a good read.

Five Card Stud

By Elizabeth Gunn

Detective Jake Hines is used to solving crimes so the report of a dead body on the side of the road is nothing new to him. It's not common for people to freeze to death during the winter in Minnesota, but it is also not that unusual either. This latest victim is laying, partly clothed, which is also not uncommon in hypothermia cases where the victim can experience the delusion of heat when in fact they are dying of cold. But it soon becomes apparent that their unknown victim didn't freeze to death when the body is turned over and the huge, bloody hole in his head is revealed. It's murder and the first thing the police have to do is figure out just who this man with no wallet or identification is. Once they know that then they will have a better handle on understanding how he ended up where and how he did.

Jake Hines comes across as a real likable character in this story. He has a girl friend now and they have bought a house together and he seems much happier which also seems to reflect on his professional life, as he tries to deal fairly with his investigators and not make their lives any harder than they already are. This is a really good story and like this Jake much better than I did when I read TRIPLE PLAY. Altogether, I liked this story and Jake a lot, more than I did the previous book I had read.

The Color Purple

By Alice Walker

Pulitzer Prize for fiction, 1983.

Celie is a black girl in rural Georgia in the 1930s and she has a hard life. She was raped by her step-father and had two babies by him. He then gave the babies away, without her approval or knowledge. She was then given in marriage to a widowed man who needed someone to help raise his kids. Celie did not care for this man but she wasn't given any choice in the matter. The man, who she calls in the story Mr. _____, beats Celie, mainly because she is not Shug Avery, the woman Mr loves. Celie's sister Nettie lives with her and Mr briefly, in order to get away from the attentions of the cruel step-father. But Mr starts bothering Nettie too and she leaves, promising Celie that the only thing that can stop her from writing is death. But Celie never receives any letters and assumes Nettie is dead.
Nettie, meanwhile, has found refuge with the minister and his wife who adopted Celie's two lost babies. Nettie and the minister and family head off to Africa to start a mission. She writes to Celie, but never receives a reply because Mr has been hiding her letters. When Celie finds out what he has been doing, she wants to kill him. But Shug, who had been staying with Mr and Celie and who has become very close to Celie, talks her out of it.
Eventually Celie and Shug leave Georgia and move to Tennessee. Shug is a successful singer and, under her sheltering wing, Celie is able to start her own business. She even forgives Mr, who has seemingly changed his evil ways, acquiring some wisdom and grace with age. At about this time, the long lost Nettie and the two babies, who are now grown, come back to Georgia and the two sisters are reunited after decades apart.

This was a pretty good story, especially the part about Celie and the other characters in the Georgia part of the story. The letters from Nettie to Celie about her life in Africa were not quite as captivating as Celie's story, but still added a different and informative perspective. And everything seems to work out for the best despite all the suffering endured, so the book ends on a high note, which is what I prefer. I always like a happy ending and this book provides that.

The Star Treasure

By Keith Laumer

Ban Tarleton was a young Lieutenant on a Navy starship. He accidentally became entangled in a conspiracy to thrown down the ruling forces which resulted in his deserting his post when he thought the starship was being taken over by the conspirators. He fled to Earth where he hid out in extreme hardship, nearly starving to death in the process. He eventually fell into the hands of the authorities and was court-martialed and sent to work the mines on a hot, desert planet.
Life is brutal there and once again, Ban runs afoul of the conspirators, who are convinced that Ban has information vital to their cause, despite his protests to the contrary. He also refuses to join them, maintaining his loyalty to the status quo. His stubbornness results in his being framed for a crime he didn't commit and being cast out of the mines and into the implacable desert of this dry, hot, barren planet. But he doesn't die. Instead he stumbles onto a secret that will not only save his life but will gain him his freedom.

This was a pretty good read. Poor Ban get the stuffing knocked out of him but he keeps on going, even when it looks hopeless. This is a real adventure story, first with Ban trying to escape detection while as a fugitive on Earth and then as he struggles to survive on the prison planet. And the last part of the story is really satisfying, as Ban stumbles on to the secret that will completely turn his life around.

The Cats of Our Lives

By Franklin Dohanyos, Editor

A collection of stories and anecdotes about cats. Mainly, it is a short reminiscences about the cats that have shared their lives with people. Some of the stories are interesting, some are amusing, and some are predictable, but all illustrate what amazing creatures cats are. Not exactly a scintillating read, but it was OK.

Devil May Care

By Sheri McInnis

Sally Carpenter is a struggling actor in New York City. While on an audition for small TV role, she falls into casual conversation with a man, a man it later turns out is the head of the network and who, it seems, has taken a bit of a fancy to Sally. Suddenly she finds she is the darling of the network, backed by her powerful new acquaintance. But as she becomes more involved with this man, and as bad things begin to happen, Sally starts to think that this man is the devil. Literally. But that's not the worse part. The worse part is that she loves him.

What to say about this book? First of all, the main character comes off as a nut job. A series of coincidences convince her that her new man is the devil, on the flimsiest of evidence. Second, as a romance novel, the ending just sucked. It was frankly depressing. Third, speaking of depressing, I found the whole book depressing. One of the first things you find out about Sally is that her father killed himself when she was a little girl. And that just sets the tone for the rest of the book. Contrary to the blurbs on the back that proclaimed it to be "genuinely funny" and "clever fun" and to have "dead-on comic timing," this book is most definitely not funny, if anything it is just sad. A real disappointment.

A Choice of Gods

By Clifford D. Simak

Set about 5000 years in the future and humanity is no longer a presence on Earth except for a few isolated bands of people. At the beginning of the 5000 years, most of the people just disappeared, vanished in an instant. Those who were left behind discovered that they suddenly had magical new abilities like telepathy and teleportation. They could now go anywhere in the universe by just thinking it. And so they did. A few homebodies stayed on Earth with all the leftover robots, who now had nothing to do.
One of the universe-travelling people discovered a vast, implacable intelligence at the center of the galaxy. In his wanderings, he also discovered what had happened to all the people who had so mysteriously vanished thousands of years ago. He returns to Earth to tell the few people there what he has discovered and to warn them that they may now be in danger.

This was just a weird book. Suddenly everyone disappears and just as suddenly those left behind are now super-beings with magical abilities who live for thousands of years. Plus there are a bunch of robots who, built to serve humanity, now have no one to serve. So they become robot monks and set about trying to figure if God is real and other robots who are building a super computer which manages to contact the evil intelligence at the center of the galaxy. So much going on in this book, like a wandering boy able to heal everyone, including a "can of worms" who wants to have a soul, and Indians living in the forests of Minnesota and it all doesn't add up to very much at all, as far as a story goes. It is more like someone's wishful thinking. Just a fair read, I think.

The Magic Army

By Leslie Thomas

Before the D-Day invasion of German-controlled Europe during World War II, the Allied planners realized that their troops would require many weeks of rehearsal before they could attempt such an invasion. Apparently beach invasions are almost never successful. Since the beaches of England were very similar to their counterparts across the English Channel, it was decided to practice for the invasion in England. It was also decided that the troops would be training under fire of live ordinance. So the powers that be ordered that all the locals in the training area be removed, for their own safety. Suddenly, productive farm land and little country villages are abandoned and American troops are moved in, setting up camps, security, mines and guns. This is the story of that time, when the United States invaded and took over a large section of the United Kingdom, much to the chagrin and disgust of the locals.

This sounds like it is a combat story, but it really isn't. It is more concerned with the interactions between the locals and the Americans and how the two different populations came to view and to understand each other. It is a very fascinating story, often touching and often funny and I enjoyed it tremendously. It was a very good read.

Tomorrow is Too Far

By James White

Jim Carson is the head of security at a rocket and jet engine manufacturing plant. It's a huge complex with thousands of employees and Jim has his nose into everything, sniffing out anything that may threaten the security at the plant. So when he suspects that there is a super-secret project at the plant that he has not been informed about, his nose gets put out of joint. And he decides he is going to discover exactly what is going on, for the sake of security. Oddly, he finds out that the super-secret project seems to revolve around a mildly-retarded janitor who works at the plant. But as Jim gets closer discovering whats going on, people start to disappear and die. And Jim maybe next in the killer's sights.

Although this is a science fiction story, it was more like reading a mystery story. The only science-fictiony aspect is the secret project, which the reader doesn't find much about until almost the end of the novel. So that was somewhat disappointing. But, taken as a kind of mystery story, it was a pretty good read. Still, I will rate it only fair, as it was rather short on the science fiction.

The Sensible Courtship

By Megan Daniel

Lord Richard Devlin and Lady Francesca Waringham had met and kissed before. But he was preparing to leave for an extended trip around the world and she valued her independence too much to let a man into her life. So, although their attraction to each other was undeniable, they were both too stubborn to give in to it and so they went their separate ways, each with a bit of a chip on their shoulder about the other.
Five years later and Lord Devlin is back in England. He has decided it is time for him to settle down and so he is looking for a wife. He figured a good place to start would be the great estate of Hockleigh, where a large assembly of the gentry has gathered to enjoy the hunt.
It just so happens that Lady Francesca is also a guest at Hockleigh. Still unwed, Cesca has also been thinking of marriage. Although she hates to give up her independence, she has realized that she wants to have children and that requires a husband.
When she and Devlin discover that are both after the same thing, they make a little bet as to who can catch a spouse first. Daring, dashing Devlin, who thinks he wants a meek, mousy, biddable woman for his wife, sets his sights on shy, little Priscilla. And fiery, independent Cesca, who thinks she wants an indifferent, pliable husband, aims for Caspar Maltby, a mild-mannered fellow whose main passion is botany.
They say that opposites attract. Then why are Devlin and Cesca secretly disappointed when both their selected mates agree to wed them?

This was a pretty good read. True, the plot was rather predictable. Of course, Cesca and Devlin belong together and of course mousy Priscilla and boring Caspar are made for each other, so that was no surprise. There is a kidnapping and a jealous, conniving widow to liven things up, but they play a pretty minor role in the story. But it all works to make for a surprisingly enjoyable and interesting story.

An Idiot Girl's Christmas

By Laurie Notaro

Funny Christmas-themed stories about the author and her family including stories about the neighbors like Frank, who electrified his yard to protect his Christmas decorations from vandals and Kyle/Lyle and Annie who refused to return the author's cheerful greetings and the two little neglected neighbor kids who used to bum food when their mother was too drunk to get out of bed. Also included are stories about Nana, author's grandma and also about her mother, who has turned worrying into a competition sport, leading to a showdown over a Christmas tree that the author kept standing clear into March. All the stories are amusing, all are familiar (who hasn't been embarrassed by the overly loud complaints of an elderly parent or grandparent: for me, it was my grandma who had to let the whole airplane know that she thought the service was lousy) and I thoroughly enjoyed reading them.

The Ancaster Demons

By Norman Russell

Dean Girdlestone is a man of conscience. And as the head of Ancaster Cathedral, his conscience tells him that the beautiful stained glass window of the cathedral and the four statues of angels on the roof of the cathedral are idols that need to be destroyed. To take care of the window, he plans to build a school that will block the sun from shining through the window. To take care of the statues, he orders them removed. Of course, many people are outraged at his plans. One of those people is Nicholas Arkwright.
Nicholas has known Gridlestone since they were boys at school together and he has always disliked him. He has even had dreams in which he killed the Dean. So when the Dean turns up murdered, Nicholas, who is on powerful medication, thinks he must have done it and confesses to the police.
But there is more going on with the cathedral than Girdlestone's destructive plans. Someone has been embezzling from the cathedral accounts. And the finger points to Girdlestone himself. But then why was he killed? Because of his planned alterations to the cathedral or because he knew who the real embezzler was?

This was a pretty good book. It is set in late-Victorian England and takes the reader into the world church politics and small town rivalry. Nicholas is a dopey, but appealing character and Girdlestone, whom you want to hate because of what he wants to do to the cathedral, turns out to be pretty decent if misguided. The other characters are just as interesting, including Girdlestone's widow who fairly dances for joy when she learns of her husband's demise. It was an interesting mystery and an enjoyable read.