The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year Volume Two, 2008

Edited by Jonathan Strahan

"The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate" by Ted Chiang
A man travels to the past through a magical gate.

"The Last and Only, or Mr. Moskowitz Becomes French" by Peter S. Beagle
A man can't remember how to speak English and can only speak French.

"Trunk and Disorderly" by Charles Stross
A man has to rescue his robot girlfriend from a diabolical plot.

"Glory" by Greg Egan
Two visitors come to a planet searching for the lost theorems of a vanished race only to become embroiled in a power struggle between two rival nations.

"Dead Horse Point" by Daryl Gregory
A woman helps another woman deal with her mental condition.

"The Dreaming Wind" by Jeffrey Ford
Every year a village has to cope with a strange, crazy wind until one year when the wind fails to blow.

"The Coat of Stars" by Holly Black
A costume designer uses his talents to rescue his lover from the faeries.

"The Prophet of Flores" by Ted Kosmatka
A story of creation versus evolution.

"Wizard's Six" by Alex Irvine
A man has to stop an apprentice wizard from becoming a wizard.

"The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairy Tale of Economics" by Daniel Abraham
A money changer runs afoul of an powerful and bored Lord.

"By Fools Like Me" by Nancy Kress
A woman and her granddaughter get in trouble for reading books.

"Kiosk" by Bruce Sterling
An entrepreneur opens a little store with merchandise supplied by his magical duplication machine.

"Singing of Mount Abora" by Theodora Goss
A woman does what it takes to get her man, even though her man is a dragon.

"The Witch's Headstone" by Neil Gaiman
A boy helps a young, dead witch get a headstone for her unmarked grave.

"Last Contact" by Stephen Baxter
The universe is being destroyed and nothing will stop it.

"Jesus Christ, Reanimator" by Ken MacLeod
Jesus Christ returns but it is no big deal.

"Sorrel's Heart" by Susan Palwick
Mutants on the run, hiding from murderous nonmutants.

"Urdumheim" by Michael Swanwick
Demons try to destroy the first people.

"Holiday" by M. Rickert
A man is visited by the ghosts of dead children.

"The Valley of Gardens" by Tony Daniel
In the far future, humanity strikes a blow against an implacable enemy bent on destroying the universe.

"Winter's Wife" by Elizabeth Hand
Mr. Winter gets himself a strange bride from Iceland.

"The Sky is Large and the Earth is Small" by Chris Roberson
An old man is questioned about his knowledge of Mexico, a story of an alternate history.

"Orm the Beautiful" by Elizabeth Bear
A dragon sacrifices himself to save the remains of his ancestors.

"The Constable of Abal" by Kelly Link
An odd woman and her daughter can see and capture ghosts.

The nice thing about a collection like this is that there will probably be at least a few stories that will please the reader. The bad thing is that you have to wade through the unappealing ones to get to the goodies. The same is true of this collection. All the stories are interesting, but some I just liked a lot better than the others and some just didn't click with me at all. Though I usually don't care for short stories, reading a collection like this introduces the reader to new authors, which makes it worth while.

For reviews of the individual stories, see Best SF.

New Words
Bimaristan: Bimaristan is a Persian word meaning hospital. "She was taken to the bimaristan, but the physicians could not save her, and she died soon after." ("The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate")
Ablative: Materials that provide fire resistance by gradually eroding to the flame front at a known or predictable rate. "She took in my appearance, from scorched ablative boots to champagne hairstyle." ("Trunk and Disorderly")
Hypergolic: A term related to spontaneous ignition upon contact. "For one thing, in a fit of misplaced bonhomie I'd offered Edgestar Wolfblack a lift, and old Edgy wasn't the best company for a post-drop pre-prandial, on account of his preferred tipples being corrosive or hypergolic, or both." ("Trunk and Disorderly")
Clade: A group of animals or other organisms derived from a common ancestor species. "'Blackdeath? Is no posthuman of that nomenclature in my clade,' Edgy complained." ("Trunk and Disorderly")
Plangently: Plangent means having a loud, mournful sound. "It's hard to remain stressed out while reclining on a bed of silks in a pleasure palace on Mars, with nubile young squishies to drop pre-fermented grapes into your mouth, your very own mouth-boy to keep the hookah smoldering, and a clankie band plangently plucking its various organs in the far corner of the room." ("Trunk and Disorderly")
Amanuensis: One employed to take dictation, or copy manuscripts; A clerk, secretary or stenographer. "He said it so emphatically that even my buggy-but-priceless family heirloom amanuensis recognized it for an infoburst and misfiled it somewhere." ("Trunk and Disorderly")
Katanas: A type of Japanese sword. "His Excellency Abdul al-Matsumoto, younger sibling of the Emir of Mars, rose from his seat upon the throne; naked eunuch bodyguards, their skins oiled and gleaming, raised their katanas in salute to either side." ("Trunk and Disorderly")
Ontological: Ontology is a study of conceptions of reality and the nature of being. "During the early 1990s Egan published a body of short fiction -- mostly hard science fiction focused on mathematical and quantum ontological themes -- that established him as one of the most important writers working in science fiction." (from the introduction to "Glory" by the editor)
Fullerene: A form of carbon having a large molecule consisting of an empty cage of sixty or more carbon atoms; buckyballs. "The products of this factory sprayed out of the star, riding the last traces of the shockwave's momentum: a few nanograms of elaborate, carbon-rich molecules, sheathed in a protective fullerene weave." ("Glory")
Lemmas: A lemma is a theorem proven only for use in the proof of more important theorems. "Rali was not a mathematician, and he was not offering his own opinion on the theorem the tablet stated; the Niah themselves had had a clear set of typographical conventions which they used to distinguish between everything from minor lemmas to the most celebrated theorems." ("Glory")
Amphioxus: The lancelet, a small translucent lancet-shaped burrowing marine animal; primitive forerunner of the vertebrates. "He studied fruit flies, and amphioxus; and while still an undergraduate, won a prestigious summer internship working under renowned geneticist Michael Poore." ("The Prophet of Flores")
Graupel: Pellets of snow. "Then he climbed, with pain and resignation, up the shiny black stairsteps into this eerie, oversized, grandiose rock-solid black fort, this black-paneled royal closet whose ornate, computer-calligraphic roof would make meteors bounce off it like graupel hail." ("Kiosk")

Billy the Kid: The Endless Ride

By Michael Wallis

What is really known about Billy the Kid? According to author Michael Wallis, not much. The paper trail just doesn't exist. Authorities can't even agree on what his real name was, some arguing for Henry McCarty and some for William Bonney. Cases can be made for both names, the strongest perhaps for Henry McCarty. Even the people who knew Billy in the final years of his life had differing memories about him.
What Billy was is a spirited young lad left to make his own way in the world, without anyone to guide him. After his mother died, Billy turned to his stepfather for help, only to be spurned and driven away. Not even out of his teens and undersized, it is not surprising that Billy turned to the outlaw life to make his way in the world.
Living by stealing and rustling cattle and horses is bound to get a boy into trouble. He fell in with rough characters that helped him refine his life as a rustler and thief. But despite his chosen profession, to those who knew him, Billy was a fun, light hearted boy who loved music and dancing and chasing pretty senoritas. He had an aptitude for languages and quickly learned Spanish, earning himself a home among the Spanish-speaking community of Lincoln County in the New Mexico territory. He was an Anglo who didn't look down on that community, unlike many of the whites who were quickly colonizing the territory and threatening the old, establish communities that had been there for so long.
Lincoln County was a desperate place full of greedy, ambitious men looking to make their fortunes. It was under the control of a gang called the Santa Fe Ring. This powerful group had its web spread all over the territory, stealing land and cattle through its corrupt legal and governmental minions. Billy joined a group of men that were trying to go up against a mercantile association that had lucrative contracts to supply Federal troops in the area with supplies and beef. This mercantile was affiliated with the bosses of the Santa Fe Ring.
Too bad for Billy that he backed the losers in this conflict, known to history as the Lincoln County War. If he was on the side of the winners, he would probably be just another guy. Because, according to this book, Billy was no better and a lot less worse than most of the men of that time and place, who were a ruthless, cruel, greedy and despicable bunch.
After the deaths of his two employers, Billy could have just cleared out and made a new start somewhere else. But Billy and many of his friends and companions just couldn't accept defeat and tried to get justice for the murders of their employers. They continued to confront their enemies, raising the ire of the establishment. Thanks to the local newspapers, public attention began to center on Billy as the leader of the rebels. Things were a lot looser then and printing a bunch of exaggerations and lies was normal practice and Billy's reputation was blackened in the press. In effect, he was tried and convicted before he was ever brought to justice. And, as the book points out, that "among the more than fifty individuals indicted for crimes in the Lincoln County War, only the Kid was ever convicted." In fact, according to the book, the only two murders that it is certain Billy did are the two guards he killed when he escaped from jail after being convicted of a murder that he claimed not to have done.
So Michael Wallis says that Billy pretty much did not deserve the reputation he attained as a bloodthirsty killer. He says that Billy became the bugbear that the winning side used to turn the attention away from their own nefarious deeds during those lawless years. As he points out, Billy's reputation was created by the press and after his death, the press continued to make money and still continues to exploit the name of Billy the Kid, thus the "endless ride" of the title.

I found this book an easy and informative read. It tells you what is known for sure about Billy and points out how few are the facts about the Kid. I felt, after reading this book, that Billy was just a kid who fell into bad ways because he had no one in his life to care for him or look out for him. It is a real tragedy how such a bright and charming young man how no person in his life that tried to save him from his own youthful impetuosity.

Review from the Historical Novel Society.

Good Omens

By Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman

This is a story of the end of the world, loosely based on the New Testament book of Revelation. This book should probably not be read by devout Christians unless they have a good sense of humor.
So the bad guys (the devil and his minions) have delivered a baby boy to a hospital run by the nuns of the Chattering Order of St. Beryl. This baby, the Antichrist and the son of Satan, is to be switched with the newborn son of the American Cultural Attaché, where he will be raised to fulfill his satanic destiny. Instead he is mistakenly placed with Mr. & Mrs. Young, a local English couple, the nun in charge of the switch has somehow mistaken Mr. Young for the American Attaché. Neither the good guys or the bad guys realize what has happened for quite some time.
Years pass, neither side aware that the kid being raised to be Antichrist is just and ordinary boy and that the real Antichrist is enjoying the normal, mundane life of the typical active kid. Neither side realizes anything is wrong until the child's eleventh birthday. On that date, a hell hound is to appear at the Antichrist's side to serve him as he wishes. Both sides are watching the Attaché's boy, waiting for the hound to appear. It never does, because it has gone to be with Adam, the real Antichrist, who thinks of himself as just a boy. Because Adam has wanted a little scruffy dog for a long time, that is how the hell hound appears to him and the hound embraces the life of a mutt with a great deal of appreciation, finding chasing cats and rabbits a lot more fun than devouring damned souls:

And then there were cats, thought Dog. He'd surprised the huge ginger cat from next door and had attempted to reduce it to cowering jelly by means of the usual glowing stare and deep-throated growl, which had always worked on the damned in the past. This time they earned him a whack on the nose that had made his eyes water. Cats, Dog considered, were clearly a lot tougher than lost souls. He was looking forward to a further cat experiment, which he'd planned would consist of jumping around and yapping excitedly at it. It was a long shot, but it might just work.

Just as Dog is starting to really enjoy life as a mutt instead of as a hell hound, Adam starts to come into his power and realize he can change the world to please himself and thus bring about Armageddon. The armies of the Lord and the armies of Satan begin to align themselves for the final battle. Maybe the end is inevitable. But two old boys, two old adversaries, have decided they are going to do their damnedest (in one case) and their best (in the other case) to stop it. Because after all these millennia of living among humans, they have decided they quite like it and that they would like very much for thing to just muddle on as they always have. So the demon Crowley and the angel Aziraphale, old enemies and old friends, join together to try to thwart the end of the world. They are helped by a cast of unlikely characters, including Anathema Device, a witch and the descendant of the prophetess, Agnes Nutter, who predicted in exact detail every occurrence of the time of the end; Shadwell and Newton, both witchfinders in the Witchfinders Army; and Madame Tracy, a woman of loose morals and a Medium.

This story is just a whole lot of fun. Every page is jammed packed with originality. There are so many crazy characters like the four horsemen (bikers) of the Apocalypse who are the Real Hell's Angels and who run across the biker gang who call themselves the Hell's Angels. I have read this book several times and I expect I will read it several times more. It is always interesting and fun and irreverent and just one of the best books I have ever read.

For more reviews of Good Omens see Booklore.

Curse of the Blue Tattoo

By L. A. Meyer

Second in the series, in this story Jacky Faber finds herself in a proper school for young ladies in Boston. Not too surprisingly, she doesn't fit in. Life as a beggar on the streets of London, England then as a ship's boy doesn't exactly prepare a girl for a school like the Lawson Peabody School for Young Girls. But Jacky's prize money has gotten her a place at this prestigious and select institution.
Well, it doesn't take her long to run afoul of the school's and Boston's strict requirements for the behavior of a young lady. After being arrested for dancing in the streets, Jacky is demoted by the head mistress from student to servant. Now instead of sharing in with the other girls and their studies, Jacky has to fetch and carry for them. However, life as a servant is pretty soft compared to life as a ship's boy and Jacky quickly makes herself to home with downstairs contingent. She even finds she has more freedom to explore Boston as she runs errands around town. She joins up with a drunken fiddler and sings and plays at a local tavern, earning herself a little spending money. As soon as she has enough, she plans to buy passage on a ship to England in search of her love, the boy she meant on board the Dolphin, Jaimie, who hasn't answered the many letters she has sent him. Of course, Jacky being Jacky and as prone to trouble as can be, nothing works out the way she plans.

The setting of this story, Jacky in proper Boston, was not as interesting as the first novel where she was a ship's boy on the Dolphin. For one thing, as Jacky finds out, life at the school is very controlled and restricted, with little opportunity for hijinks. So the author makes her a servant, giving her more freedom to move about on her own and more scope for mischief. I think the author gave her more freedom than servants of her day and gender were really allowed. So I found her activities as a servant rather unbelievable. I just don't think a young girl her age would have been given the freedom she had, even if she was just a servant. I also found the misadventures she got herself into unlikely. The minute the race horse was introduced to the story, I knew Jacky would end up riding it in the big race. Oh, and winning of course, even though riding a race horse is a highly skilled occupation and Jacky just learned to ride a few months previously. Frankly, I found Jacky Faber more than just a little tiresome in this story. Maybe she has more appeal for a young adult reader who can embrace her shenanigans more easily than I could.

Review by Kirkus Reviews.

The Sweet Potato Queens' Guide to Raising Children for Fun and Profit

By Jill Conner Browne

Another in the Sweet Potato Queens series, this is a humorous look at child rearing. Though meant to be amusing, it still offers sound advice on how to cope with the problems of parenthood, written by a woman who has been there and done that. Browne's amusing and acerbic take on parenting is a good read even if you don't have kids yourself. Lots of fun to read, just like the other Sweet Potato Queen books and with a few killer recipes thrown in to boot. Although in this book, the talk of bribing men with BJs is significantly absent. Maybe Browne has finally realized that all this talk of BJs is just not a good thing. It has been one of the only things about her books that I never liked. In this book, they are only mentioned as one of the problems parents of boy have to face, teaching their boys how to handle today's sexually aggressive girls.

I enjoyed this book a lot, just as I have enjoyed all the Sweet Potato Queen books. In fact, I think I liked it best of all the books and it has some real down to earth advice for parents. It took me just a couple days to read it, which is the sign of a good book.

Bloody Jack

By L.A. Meyer

Mary Faber is a street kid in 1790s London, England. Her mom and dad, who taught her to read, died in an epidemic, leaving Mary to fend for herself. She falls in with a street gang and spends her days begging. She is frequently hungry and always dirty. Still it is better than being alone.
One day, the gang leader is killed. He was bigger and older than the other kids and without his protection, the gang can't survive. Mary sets off on her own, using the leader's old clothes, she passes herself off as a boy. Because she can read, she lands a position as a ship's boy, calling herself Jacky.
Together, she and the other ship boys form a new fraternity. Mary is thrilled with her new life. Not only does she get plenty to eat, but she is clean for the first time in many years. Her only problem is keeping her gender a secret. That is until she runs afoul of a nasty pederast who is determined to have his way with what he believes is a young boy.
Consequences of that run in divide the ship and divide Mary from her ship boy pals. Plus Mary, who is a young teen, finds her body betraying her as she fights to hide her maturing figure and deal with her monthly cycle. She begins to tire of the deception and comes to realize that it must soon end. She just hopes the captain puts her down at a nice port and doesn't just dump her overboard. Then the ship has a devastating encounter with a nest of pirates and Mary finds herself all alone on a strange and frightening shore.

This was a fun and enlightening look at life on board a British ship set in the years just before the turn of the century from the 1700s to the 1800s. Somehow, Mary manages to keep her secret, which was kind of hard to believe. Still, I enjoyed reading about her and her growing maturity and her blossoming love for one of her fellow ship boys.

Review by Kirkus Reviews.

A Confederacy of Dunces

By John Kennedy Toole

This novel won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1981.

Ignatius J. Reilly is a character, no doubt. No dummy, Ignatius has a master's degree and a razor sharp intellect, yet he spends his days wallowing in bed, jotting in his collections of note pads and watching movies that he hates just so he can criticize them. Ignatius lives with his mom and off his mom and when his mom crashes her car into a building while drunk, Ignatius is forced to go to work to help Mom pay for the damages or her home will be seized to pay what she owes.
Ignatius tried to work for a living before, but, according to what he says, the bus ride nearly did him in. He is just too sensitive for his own good. Still, with his master's degree in hand, he lands a job as a file clerk for Levy Pants. He quickly solves the filing problem by tossing the files in the trash and then he rouses the factory workers into rebellion against the owner of Levy Pants. The rebellion is very brief and Ignatius soon finds himself looking for another job.
His next job is as a hot dog vendor. He just kind of lucks into the hot dog job. He pushes a hot dog cart through the city streets, humiliating his poor mother to death. Apparently, hot dog vendor is just about the lowest kind of job a man can have in New Orleans of the 1960s. Plus Ignatius isn't making much money since he eats most of the hot dogs himself. His mom is further humiliated when his boss requires that Ignatius dress as a pirate while selling the dogs. Surprisingly, Ignatius rather enjoys dressing as a pirate. Since he is too fat to fit in most of the costume, it consists merely of a sash, a hoop earring and a plastic saber. Ignatius has lots of adventures while pushing the dog cart but makes almost no money and eventually flees New Orleans to escape his vengeful mother.

I don't think I will ever forget Ignatius J. Reilly. He is an amazing, funny, crazy, loony and smart character. Although he is not the kind of person you would actually want in your life, he was a tremendous amount of fun to read about. I truly enjoyed this prize-winning novel and look forward to reading it again sometime.

Review by Danny Heitman in The Wall Street Journal.

New Words:
Hexerei: Witchery, sorcery, wizardry, witchcraft. "'Never in my life have I seen a shop filled with so much religious hererei.'"
Recherché: Sought out with care; choice. Hence, of rare quality, elegance, or attractiveness; peculiar and refined in kind, especially with an artificial or pretentious effect. "Ignatius filmed the scene before him for a minute of two more, then he followed a post upward to the ceiling for what he imagined would be an interesting and rather recherché bit of cinematography suggesting aspiration."
Vibrissae: Long whiskers specialized as tactile receptors, commonly located in the facial region. "'I thought that the vibrissae about my nostrils detected something unique while I was outside.'"
Daube: A classic French stew or pot roast consisting of a single piece of meat such as a shoulder or joint , stewed in a rich, wine laden broth. "'I'm trying to cook her some spaghettis and daube, and she keeps on playing in my pot.'"
Banquette: Sidewalk. "'Irene!' Santa screamed when she opened the door and saw the hesitant Mrs. Reilly on the front steps and her nephew, Patrolman Mancuso, standing down on the banquette.
Sodality: Companionship; a fraternity, society, an association. '"You probly belong to a ladies' sodality or something.'"
Onanism: Masturbation. "The suggested onanism with the piece of chalk intrigued Ignatius."

Twilight

By Stephenie Meyer

Bella Swan has made the hard choice to leave the city she loves, Phoenix, Arizona, for rainy, dark, gloomy Forks, Washington. Her mom has just gotten remarried and wants to go on the road with her new husband. So Bella, who is just seventeen, volunteered to move to Forks to stay with her father, Charlie.
Bella doesn't expect to be happy in Forks. It's not that her dad is hard to live with. In fact, he bought her a truck to get back and forth to school with, which was pretty nice since Bella had been saving money to buy a vehicle. It's just that Forks is a small town with a depressing climate and not much going on. It doesn't even have a decent library! (Horrors!)
Her first day at her new high school goes OK until biology class. She has to share a lab table with a strikingly good looking boy, Edward Cullen. But Edward seems to despise Bella at first sight, scowling and moving away from her as if she has head lice or something. Bella finds his behavior inexplicable and humiliating. Bella isn't vain, but she knows she isn't a troll so Edward is either a kook or jerk, she is not sure which.
Turns out Edward has several siblings attending this high school too. They are all very attractive yet very aloof. They sit together at lunch and they don't socialize with the other kids. They are all very pale with shadows under their eyes.
One morning, after a storm, Bella wakes up to a world covered in ice. She manages to drive herself to school safely. While standing in the parking lot next to her truck, another student loses control of his car and skids towards Bella. She has no time to flee and faces being crushed between her truck and the car when, out of nowhere, impossibly, Edward snatches her to safety. This is the beginning of the thaw in Edward's attitude to Bella.
Bella comes to realize that Edward is not human. He and his family are all vampires. She also finds out that Edward and his family are reformed vampires, refusing to prey on humans. Instead they go after deer, bears, mountain lions and other big game. However, there are vampires who do prey on humans and, as her relationship with Edward and his family grows, Bella has the misfortune to run afoul of one of these dangerous vampires.

This was a pretty interesting story. It is the first in a series, which, as I understand it, extends to five novels, which is a rather long series. Meyer's vampires are not the stereotypical vampire, they don't sleep in coffins (they don't sleep at all), and they can go out in the sun (but they glitter in the light so that is why they stay out of the sun). In this story she doesn't say if they are sensitive to garlic, don't appear in mirrors or photos and are burned by holy water. They are definitely not the typical vampire. I did have a few problems with Bella falling so hard for a guy who, besides being gorgeous, according to the author, feels cold and hard to the touch, like a corpse. Who would want to cuddle with a guy who feels dead when you touch him? Ewww! To necrophiliac for my taste. Also, since Edward finds Bella mouthwatering, they have to be careful not to get too close in case Edward turns Bella into a snack in spite of himself. So the romance in the book is very tame and low key. Still it was pretty interesting, reading about the author's version of the vampire life.

Review from Loves Vampires.

New Word
Dight: To prepare; to dress, array and put on things; to adorn. "Throughout the vast shadowy world of ghosts and demons there is no figure so terrible, no figure so dreaded and abhorred, yet dight with such fearful fascination, as the vampire, who is himself neither ghost nor demon, but yet who partakes the dark natures and possesses the mysterious and terrible qualities of both."

The Executioner's Song

By Norman Mailer

This book won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1980.

Back in the mid 1970s, a recently released convict named Gary Gilmore killed two men during the commission of two robberies. He was caught and convicted and sentenced to die. Gilmore, who had spent many years in prison, decided that he couldn't bear to be in jail any longer and so he declined to appeal his conviction and he demanded to be executed as per his sentence. This decision launched an uproar over the death sentence as a form of punishment and many people tried to prevent the execution through legal means even though they went against Gilmore's wishes. They failed though and Gilmore was executed by firing squad. This novel is Mailer's presentation of those events.
When I found out what the novel was about I really wasn't that keen on reading it. Plus, the book is huge, more than 1000 pages. So I made a schedule, planning to read so many pages a day till I was finished. But I didn't need the schedule. This book, despite its nasty main character and ugly subject matter, is very readable and absorbing. It is very detailed but still manages to avoid being boring. It examines Gilmore's life after his last prison release, takes us through the trial and the furor generated by his wish to be executed and his two suicide attempts and to the fulfillment of the death sentence. You certainly learn a lot about Gilmore who was a very angry, irresponsible, selfish and childish person. He was so selfish that he talked the gullible woman who thought she loved him into committing suicide with him (they both survived). He was never really able to explain why he shot two men who put up no resistance during the robberies. Both men were solid citizens, married with young children, who were complete strangers to Gilmore. About the only explanation is that Gilmore was angry at his girlfriend and took his anger out on his two victims.
Gilmore got what he deserved, he was a manipulative, selfish creep, but he died like a man. I guess that's something.

As a portrait of a killer, The Executioner's Song is top-notch. As a look at how the media operates, the book is a revelation, a real insider's view. I thought I would hate this book. I won't say I loved it, but I will say it was well worth reading.

Review from Kirkus Reviews.

New Words:
Rotogravure: a printing process by which the paper is rolled through intaglio cylinders; a print made by such a method; the portion of a printed work produced by this method. "Bessie studied dresses in the rotogravure before sewing her own, and went ballroom dancing at the Utahma Dance Hall in Provo when they brought orchestras in."
Tautologic: repetition of same sense in different words: 'a true fact' and `a free gift' for example. "The reason you couldn't find the word in the dictionary is because you read it wrong -- or I didn't write it right -- anyhow it's TAUTOLOGIC not TANTOLOGIC."

The Resurrectionist

By Jack O'Connell

One sad day a terrible thing happened and a little boy, Danny, ended up in a coma from which he has never awoken. His father, Sweeney, has gotten his son a place at the Peck Clinic, a clinic devoted to victims of coma and which is doing cutting edge research on coma. Sweeney has also gotten a job in the clinic's pharmacy, working nights. The Peck Clinic has been in the Peck family for generations and is currently run by Dr. Peck and his physician daughter, Alice.
Before his illness, Danny was a huge fan of a comic book, Limbo, the tales of a set of runaway circus freaks, the main character of the comic being Chicken Boy, a young man covered with feathers and with beak instead of lips. He is the kind of leader of the freaks, guiding them on their travel through the visions he receives during his episodes of epilepsy. Supposedly, Chicken Boy is leading the little band to safety in a world that generally makes life hard for such as them.
Sweeney spends a lot of time with his son Danny, reading to him from the Limbo comics. Other than that, Sweeney doesn't have much of a life. He is eaten up with guilt and anger.
Sweeney gets kidnapped by a group of drug addled bikers. The bikers want to help Danny and they claim they have a drug brewed with Danny's own brain fluid that enables them to enter Danny's world. For they claim Danny has recreated in his own coma brain the comic world of Limbo and Danny is the Chicken Boy. They offer Sweeney the chance to take the drug and be with Danny if he will join their gang.

The story of Chicken Boy and the freaks in the Limbo comic is more interesting and makes more sense than that of Danny, Sweeney and the outlaw bikers. Sweeney, the Peck Clinic, the bikers and their clinic accomplice, the nurse Nadia (the brain behind the bikers), were weirder and stranger than the freaks and the cruel, heartless world of Limbo. The conclusion of the story is just creepy and unappealing. The depths that Sweeney allows himself to be drawn into don't make sense for a man who claims to love his son as much as he does. Nonetheless, this is an unforgettable story and Chicken Boy and his freak friends captured my heart. Though I didn't like the ending of the story, I did enjoy reading this book.

Review by Cathi Unsworth for The Guardian.

New Words:
Autodidact: a self-taught person. "An autodidact, he had a well-known passion for the Bible and the Bard, and Bruno hoped he wouldn't have to endure a reading from the Song of Solomon."
Gazonie: itinerant carnival and circus laborers. "The legend was that the Bedlam Brothers had started out as ordinary gazonies, signing on with a lower tier show when it passed through their hometown of Mt. Seir one summer's day."
Donniker: a rest room or toilet. "They had labored as concessionaires and cleaned up the most gruesome donnikers in the land."

Beginner's Greek

By James Collins

This is a story of star-crossed lovers that, despite a plethora of obstacles, manage to find true love, a modern romance with an old-fashioned happy ending.
Peter Russell falls in love at first sight when he meets Holly on board an airliner. The attraction is mutual and he leaves the plane with Holly's phone number in his shirt pocket. In his hotel room later on, Peter is dismayed to discover he has lost the phone number and he doesn't know Holly's last name or where she lives.
Years later and Peter's best friend Jonathan shows up with a new girl friend. Surprise, the new girl friend is Peter's Holly. Too late for Peter because Holly is now involved with his best friend and they end up getting married. Peter gives up and marries Charlotte, a woman he doesn't really love but he does care for her and figures they will have a good life together. At their wedding reception, Jonathan is killed by a bolt of lightning. Now Holly is a widow and Peter is a newlywed. Once again it seems the fates are against them. As much as he would like to, Peter doesn't abandon his new bride and run after Holly. He feels it would be too cruel to treat Charlotte thus.
Meanwhile, things are not going well for Peter at work. He unknowingly ticks off his boss and his boss goes after him for it. He forces Peter to assist a marginal employee's nutty plan to turn cereal box tops into the new worldwide currency. To make things worse for Peter, the wealthy owner of the business starts dating Peter's true love, Holly. Seems like Peter just can't get a break.

This is fun story, and you find yourself pulling for all the many decent characters that populate the book. It's hard watching Peter and Holly just miss each other all the time. Will Peter stand by his wife? Will Holly find love with another man? Will poor Charlotte discover that her husband is in love with another woman? Will Peter's rat bastard boss succeed in destroying Peter's career? Will Holly let herself be swept away by a rich man's charm and wealth? It's really enjoyable reading about these charming people and their struggles to find true love and to do the right thing.

Review by Amy Scribner on BookPage.

New Words
Cicatrix: a scar; an elevated, rigid spot. "All the while that Jonathan spoke, Peter had been staring at a tear in the back of the taxi's front seat...The cab, making the usual sudden starts and stops, jounced Peter around, but he kept staring at this cicatrix.
Trig: clean-cut; neat and smart in appearance. "Jonathan managed to look both more trig and less stiff than Peter."
Démarche: a diplomatic representation or protest. "M. Becqx denied it and threatened an angry démarche from his government."
Soignée: polished and well-groomed; showing sophisticated elegance. "She was dressed and made up, and she looked soignée, Peter thought."
Dolmen: a prehistoric megalithic tomb typically having two large upright stones and a capstone. "She loved the nearby castles, villages, churches, ruins, dolmens, and caves."
Putti: winged cherubs. "A painting or fresco containing innumerable gods and putti, all twisting and turning dramatically, covered the ceiling."
Epigone: an heir, descendant, or successor, frequently an inferior successor. "'I thought that after so many generations of having so much money, families were supposed to decline and produce weak, effete, coupon-clipping, zillionth-copy epigones of the founding titan.'"
Apposite: being of striking appropriateness and pertinence; an apt reply. "Having gone shooting once in his life, he was able to discuss with Thorndale the tricks of working setters and retreivers together; he made an apposite comment when Bernard, a philatelist, mentioned that he had just acquired a misprint from the Kingdom of Naples."
Predella: Spanish footstool or kneeling stool. Also foot of an altarpiece for kneeling. "Holly and Arthur talked about a couple of people at their table; Holly asked Arthur about the predella she and Peter had admired earlier, and he said that it was funny she should have noticed it because it had always been on of his favorite pieces."

Darkfever

By Karen Marie Moning

MacKayla is a typical young American woman, enjoying life, working on her tan, when it all changes with the murder of her sister in Ireland. When the police investigation bogs down for lack of evidence, Mac goes off to Ireland to try to convince the police to not give up. But the police just don't have the time or resources as they are dealing with an epidemic of murders and disappearances.
Mac has a message on her phone from her sister, telling her that she must find the Sinsar Dubh. Not only does Mac not know what the Sinsar Dubh is, she doesn't even know how to spell it. Trying to discover just what it is, she runs into Jericho Barrons, a shady and threatening character with a bunch of secrets. He knows what the Sinsar Dubh is. In fact, he wants to find it for himself.
As she stays in Ireland, trying to chase down her sister's killer for herself, she starts seeing strange, terrifying creatures, creatures that apparently no one else can see. Jericho enlightens her as to what she is seeing and enlists her reluctant help in his efforts to contain these creatures by finding the Sinsar Dubh.

This is a romance story, although it is also a horror story. I don't read romance novels for the most part as they just don't appeal to me. So I wasn't familiar with a branch of romance fiction known as paranormal romance. It was kind of disconcerting to be in the middle of a horror story, only come across a detailed description of the outfits Mac and Jericho are wearing. Despite these typical romance novel aspects, this is a pretty creepy story full of scary monsters and vile characters. I found the story rather depressing and I don't know if I will read the next in the series. This is not surprising since I don't generally enjoy either romances or horror. People who like paranormal romances will probably like reading this series which is exciting and inventive although a bit too much for me.

Review by Chelsea on Vampire Book Club.

New Word:
Metempsychosis: a philosophical term in the Greek language referring to the belief of transmigration of the soul, especially its reincarnation after death. "They believed day followed night, and held to a credo of metempsychosis in which the human soul does not die but is reborn in different forms."

The Girl Who Stopped Swimming

By Joshilyn Jackson

Laurel loves her life. She loves her beautiful home, her teen daughter Shelby, her sometimes distant husband David, and her work designing and sewing artistic quilts. She especially loves the fact that since she moved to her new house in Victorianna, she never sees the ghost of her Uncle Marty anymore.
Her cozy life is turned upside down the night she sees a new ghost, Molly, a friend of her daughter. Turns out Molly is dead, drowned in Laurel's backyard swimming pool. Drastic times call for drastic actions, and Laurel undertakes the drastic action of inviting her sister Thalia to visit to help Laurel cope with the death of Shelby's friend Molly. The trouble with Thalia is that she is trouble. She criticizes Laurel's life, as she feels Laurel is stifled by her marriage, and Laurel's husband, who Thalia refers to as a robot, a guy that is all brain and no heart. Thalia really doesn't have room to criticize though, she comes off as supremely selfish, as evidenced by the night Laurel was sleep walking and Thalia let her walk out of the house and into a rain storm just so Thalia could follow her and observe how a sleepwalker behaves. Thalia is a serious actor and will do anything for her art, including endangering her sister's life. This episode caused a serious rift between the two sisters and put Thalia on David's shit list.
As Laurel looks into Molly's death, which has been ruled accidental by the authorities, she is certain there is more to the story. She suspects her daughter knows more than she is saying and she also suspects the local creepy guy may be involved too. But as she looks closer, with Thalia's prickly help, she finds that many of the things she assumed were true are not, past and present.

Although I did enjoy this story, I can't say that liked most of the characters, especially Thalia, Laurel and Shelby. About the only character that made sense to me was the husband David, and Shelby's cousin, Bet. I thought Laurel was a flake, Thalia is just mean and Shelby seemed pissed off all the time for no good reason. David was the real rock in the story and all my sympathy was with him and the pathetic hanger-on, Bet. Despite not caring much for the main characters, I still liked the book, which is really the story of two deaths, that of Uncle Marty and the teen girl, Molly.

Review from Kirkus Reviews.

Adam

By Ted Dekker

FBI agent Daniel Clark is on the trail of an unusual serial killer known as Eve. Eve didn't stab, shoot, torture or abuse any of his sixteen victims, he infected them with an unknown form of meningitis. The FBI knows very little about Eve, yet Daniel Clark is determined to stop him, anyway he can.
They finally get the break they are looking for and manage to get to Eve's latest victim before she has died. Daniel and a coworker, Lori Ames, are driving the woman to the hospital when their vehicle is waylaid by a man with a gun. The man, Eve, shoots Daniel and tries to shoot Lori but only wings her. He then grabs the victim and makes off with her. Lori starts CPR on Daniel and he is revived later at the hospital. Lori didn't get a look at Eve, as she was trying to give medical aid to the victim, who was already dying of the meningitis-like illness. Daniel was the only one who saw Eve's face, but he cannot remember it due to the trauma of his near-death experience.
Eve knows Daniel Clark is on his case and starts leaving scary messages with Daniel's ex-wife, Heather. Daniel must be getting closer to catching him and Eve snatches Heather, knowing Daniel will come after her. Daniel falls into his trap and finds himself locked in a cellar with the very creepy killer, a killer who demands that Daniel open himself to the same dark spirit that has possessed Eve for so many years, a spirit named Eve.

I did enjoy this story, although I found the unprofessional behavior of the two FBI agents, Daniel and Lori, a bit unbelievable. Also, although I didn't know this when I picked up the book, it is a story about demon possession, which is a subject I generally avoid due to a folk saying I read long ago, "Touch the devil and you can't let go." That's my philosophy, don't mess with the devil and hopefully the devil won't mess with you. Nonetheless, by the time I realized where the book was heading, I wanted to see how it came out. Like I said, I did enjoy the story, which I found compelling and involving. I think I read this book in two days, which says a lot about it.

The Tin Roof Blowdown

By James Lee Burke

A Dave Robicheaux novel.

As fans of the series know, Dave Robicheaux is a former New Orleans police officer who now works for the New Iberia police force. Set at the time of Hurricane Katrina, Dave has to deal with the aftermath of looting that involves his best friend Clete Purcel and his adopted daughter, Alafair.
Water and chaos fill the streets of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. A group of hapless looters think they have struck the motherlode when they discover the walls of the house they are looting are filled with bundles of cash, drugs and diamonds. While making off with their loot, two of them are shot by what appears to be a vigilante. One is killed and the other is paralyzed when the bullet pierces his spinal cord. A third looter stashes the loot and manages to get the wounded man, his brother, to a medical facility. What the men don't know is the house they stole the loot from belongs to notorious New Orleans crime boss Sidney Kovick. Some very bad people are anxious to get their hands on the property the looters made off with and will do almost anything to get it. Standing in the way is Dave Robicheaux and his best friend Clete Purcel.

A fascinating look at the aftermath of the hurricane that devastated south Louisiana, one can feel the author's grief at the fate that has fallen his beloved country. The hurricane serves as the blank canvas against which the callousness and cruelty of humankind are painted as Burke tells a tale of evil men doing evil for their own corrupt ends. Like the previous Robicheaux stories, this one is well worth reading.

Review from Leslie Budewitz for BookPage.

New Word:
Boudin: A Cajun sausage filled with anything from meat to crawfish, mixed with rice, and temptingly seasoned. It comes in two varieties: boudin rouge, which is blood sausage; and boudin blanc (white boudin), which is made with pork shoulder. "In a booth at the back of the club I saw a young black man sitting by himself, a beer and a length of microwave white boudin unwrapped from its wax paper in front of him."

Duma Key

By Stephen King

Edgar Freemantle was almost killed when a crane crushed his pickup truck. He received brain injuries and lost an arm and nearly lost his leg. He spent months in the hospital and, as a result of his brain injury, has violent rages and memory loss. His wife finds his rages terrifying and she leaves him. He becomes depressed and, on the recommendation of his doctor, opts for a change of scenery, so he rents a house on Duma Key.
Duma Key is a small Florida island. The beachfront home Edgar has rented, which he calls "Big Pink", is owned by a rich old woman who lives farther down the beach. The woman, Elizabeth, has lived her whole life on Duma Key. Frail and becoming senile, Elizabeth has a caretaker, Wireman, a man who is also dealing with a tragic past.
Edgar takes up painting to occupy his time and as therapy. He finds that his paintings have the power to change reality. One of the things he does with his paintings is to heal Wireman of the disability caused by a botched suicide attempt that occurred before Wireman came to Duma Key.
Edgar's talent clues him into the mysteries of Duma Key. He starts to realize that some evil force is at work on the key, a force that has smashed lives in the past and is awake again. It wants Edgar Freemantle and it will reach into the lives of those dearest to Edgar, causing death and destruction.

In Duma Key, King has written a compelling story about evil and one man's struggle to do the right thing, even through events that would crush most people. I really enjoyed reading this story. It may not be high art but Stephen King is a great storyteller.

For a synopsis of the novel, check out Wikipedia.

Review by Alison Flood for The Guardian.

New Words:
Juco: An acronym for junior college.
Docent: A docent is officially defined as a professor or university lecturer, but the term has been expanded to designate the corps of volunteer guides who staff many of the museums and other educational institutions in the world.

The Stories of John Cheever

By John Cheever

This collection of short stories won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1979.

John Cheever's stories are cruel and mean and nasty and occasionally slightly amusing. Very rarely do they end happily. Mostly they are about ordinary yet creepy men and the women who like to make their lives a misery. According to the Wikipedia article about Cheever his most famous stories are "Goodbye, My Brother", "The Enormous Radio", and "The Swimmer." The only one I was previously familiar with was "The Swimmer" which was made into a movie starring Burt Lancaster and which I saw on TV as a kid.
In "Goodbye, My Brother", a family gets together at their summer home on the beach. One brother is a spoilsport who always has some critical comment to make. His brother gets fed up with his sourpuss brother and clonks him on the head with a chunk of wood.
In "The Enormous Radio", an old radio gets replaced with a new radio. It has such an acute receiver that it picks up the conversations of the other tenants in the apartment building. The wife listens in to these conversations and is shocked and dismayed at all the shameful things going on in the superficially happy homes of her neighbors. Her husband chides her, pointing out her own foibles.
In "The Swimmer", (which doesn't appear til almost the end of the book) a man is attending (or thinks he is attending) a pool party when he decides to swim home using all the neighborhood pools via a route he calls the Lucinda River in honor of his wife Lucinda. He does swim home but when he gets there the house is abandoned.

I found these stories interesting and engaging, even if they are a rather twisted view of ordinary people. I didn't find the book hard to read, even though I don't care for short stories for the most part.

New Words:
Fitch: Polecat; dark brown mustelid of woodlands of Eurasia that gives off an unpleasant odor when threatened. "Irene Westcott was a pleasant, rather plain girl with soft brown hair and a wide, fine forehead upon which nothing at all had been written, and in the cold weather she wore a coat of fitch skins dyed to resemble mink." From "The Enormous Radio".
Vitiated: Marred, made imperfect, corrupted. "Hills blocked off the delicate, the vitiated New Hampshire landscape, with its omnipresence of ruin, but every few miles a tributary of the Merrimack opened a broad valley, with elms, farms, and stone fences." From "The Summer Farmer".
Plangent: Loud and resounding. "He mowed, cultivated, and waxed angry about the price of scratch feed, and at that instant when the plangent winds of Labor Day began to sound he hung up his blunted scythe to rust in the back hall, where the kerosene was kept, and happily shifted his interest to the warm apartments of New York." From "The Summer Farmer."
Snath: The long wooden shaft of a scythe. "Then the wet wind climbed the hill behind them, and Paul, taking one hand off the snath, straightened his back." From "The Summer Farmer."
Copore sano: Latin for "sound body". "They were people who emphasized copore sano unduly, Baxter thought, and they shouldn't leave Clarissa alone in the cottage." From "The Chaste Clarissa".
Sumptuary laws: Laws intended to restrain or limit the expenditure of citizens in apparel, food, furniture, etc.; laws which regulate the prices of commodities and the wages of labor; laws which forbid or restrict the use of certain articles, as of luxurious apparel. Sumptuary means regulating or controlling expenditure or personal behavior. "He dressed -- like the rest of us -- as if he admitted the existence of sumptuary laws." From "The Five-Forty-Eight".
Banlieue: French for outskirts of a city. "I served four years in the Navy, have four kids now, and live in a banlieue called Shady Hill." From "The Housebreaker of Shady Hill."
Parablendeum: a kind of plastic wrap; a word that may have been created by the author. "I went to work right after the war for a parablendeum manufacturer, and seemed on the way to making this my life." From "The Housebreaker of Shady Hill".
Schuhplattler: A traditional folk dance from Bavaria and Austria. "It seemed to me that if it had been my destiny to be a Russian ballet dancer, or to make art jewelry, or to paint Schuhplattler dancers on bureau drawers and landscapes on clamshells and live in some very low-tide place like Provincetown, I wouldn't have known a queerer bunch of men and women than I knew in the parablendeum industry, and I decided to strike out on my own." From "The Housebreaker of Shady Hill".
Riggish: Wanton. "I was thinking sadly about my beginnings -- about how I was made by a riggish couple in a midtown hotel after a six-course dinner with wines, and my mother told me so many times that if she hadn't drunk so many Old-Fashioneds before that famous dinner I would still be unborn on a star." From "The Housebreaker of Shady Hill".
Gymkhana: A meet at which riders and horses display a range of skills and aptitudes. "I'm having a little gymkhana next month, and I want your children to ride in it." From "The Bus to St. James".
Soubrettes: A soubrette is a stock female character in opera or theater; in theater it is a vain, girlish, flirty comedy character. "On Saturdays after the movies they go into one of those bars called Harry's or Larry's of Jerry's, where the walls are covered with autographed photographs of unknown electric-guitar players and unknown soubrettes, to eat bacon and eggs and talk baseball and play American records on the jukebox." From "The Bella Lingua".
Upzoning: The process, often controversial, of changing the zoning in an area, usually to allow greater density or commercial use. Sometimes the term is used to mean the opposite -- changing the zoning in a broad area to limit growth and density. "The Wrysons' civic activities were confined to upzoning, but they were very active in this field, and if you were invited to their house for cocktails, the chances were that you would be asked to sign an upzoning petition before you got away." From "The Wrysons".
Rubato: To play with a flexible tempo. "He threw the tempo out the window and played it rubato from beginning to end, like an outpouring of tearful petulance, lonesomeness, and self-pity -- of everything it was Beethoven's greatness not to know." From "The Country Husband".
Neurasthenics: Neurasthenia is an old-fashioned unspecific word usually meaning weakness of the nervous system or nervous exhaustion. Not a phrase that is used much these days. "They took so many hot baths that she could not understand why they were not neurasthenics." From "Clementina".
Hoardings: A temporary wooden fence around a building or structure under construction or repair; a billboard. "All scornful descriptions of American landscapes with ruined tenements, automobile dumps, polluted rivers, jerry-built ranch houses, abandoned miniature golf links, cinder deserts, ugly hoardings, unsightly oil derricks, diseased elm trees, eroded farmlands, gaudy and fanciful gas stations, unclean motels, candlelit tearooms, and streams paved with beer cans, for these are not, as they might seem to be, the ruins of our civilization but are the temporary encampments and outposts of the civilization that we -- you and I -- shall build." From "A Miscellany of Characters That Will Not Appear".
Laconic: Crisp, brief and to the point. "In closing -- in closing, that is, for this afternoon (I have to go to the dentist and then have my hair cut), I would like to consider the career of my laconic old friend Royden Blake." From "A Miscellany of Character That Will Not Appear."
Contumacious: Wilfully obstinate; stubbornly disobedient. "It was one of those places where lonely men eat seafood and read the afternoon newspapers and where, in spite of the bath of colored light and distant music, the atmosphere is distinctly contumacious." From "The Ocean".
Suffragan: An assistant or subordinate bishop of a diocese. "Should he ask the suffragan bishop to reassess the Ten Commandments, to include in their prayers some special reference to the feelings of magnanimity and love that follow sexual engorgements?" From "Marito in Città".
Tufa: A type of stone. "The tufa and pepperoni and the bitter colors of the lichen that takes root in the walls and roofs are no part of the consciousness of an American, even if he has lived for years, as Bascomb had, surrounded by this bitterness." From "The World of Apples".
Orison: Prayer. "The man's face was idiotic -- doped, drugged, and ugly -- and yet, standing in his unsavory orisons, he seemed to old Bascomb angelic, armed with a flaming sword that might conquer banality and smash the glass of custom." From "The World of Apples".
Lordosis: An exaggerated inward curvature of the spine; also called swayback. "Her back and front were prominent and there was a memorable curve to her spine that could have been a cruel corset or the beginnings of lordosis." From "The Jewels of the Cabots".

Humboldt's Gift

By Saul Bellow

This book won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction for 1976.

Poor Charlie Citrine. His life is a shambles. A petty gangster has pounded Citrine's beautiful car to a pulp. Charlie's ex-wife is suing him for a bigger share of his assets and a judge has frozen Charlie's money telling Charlie that Charlie can always make more money. It is true that Charlie has been successful in the past but lately he hasn't done much of anything except sit around his house and meditate on death and the afterlife. Also, Citrine's girlfriend is angling for a marriage proposal and Charlie doesn't care to commit himself again. Charlie and the girlfriend are supposed to head off to Europe but Charlie has to deal with a legacy left to him by his old, estranged friend Humboldt. Humboldt was a failed poet with an alcohol addiction and mental problems so severe that he had to be committed. Humboldt and Charlie became estranged when Charlie wrote a play that was based on Humboldt's life without his permission. The play was very successful and made Charlie a lot of money.
Charlie is a strange fellow, a kind of walking encyclopedia, with literary allusions constantly falling from his lips. He is involved in something called Anthroposphy and he worries about death and about life after death and about art and destiny and reincarnation and philosophy.

Supposedly, the Charlie character is based on Bellow and the Humboldt character on his friend and poet, Delmore Schwartz. Bellow won the Pulitzer for this book, but in the story, this is what the Humboldt character says about the Pulitzer Prize: "The Pulitzer is for the birds -- for the pullets. It's just a dummy newspaper publicity award given by crooks and illiterates." That's probably one of the funniest things in the whole book.
Frankly, this book was a giant pain to read. There is practically not a page where some literary name (or two or three) is not dropped. In fact, I made a list of most of the names; you can see it below the list of new words. It includes names of books and other works and fictional characters and mythological characters. Too much of the book is about Charlie and his philosophy or search for a philosophy. I had never read Saul Bellow before and, after reading this book, I never want to read him again. Too much gobbledygook. I guess this book is just too sophisticated for me.

Review by Richard Rayner in the Los Angeles Times.

New Words
Grenadier: A member of the British Grenadier Guards or a soldier formerly bearing grenades. "With grenadier tails they [cats] bounded to sharpen their claws on trees."
Busby: A tall, full-dress, fur hat worn in certain regiments of the British Army. "His head was shaped like a busby, a high solid arrogant rock covered with thick moss."
Crepuscular: Of or like twilight; hazy, dim. "They brought crepuscular fortune to people down in the streets."
Anthroposophist: A spiritual philosophy based on the teachings of Rudolf Steiner which postulates the existence of an objective, intellectually comprehensible spiritual world accessible to direct experience through inner development. "Under my head I put a needlepoint cushion embroidered by a young lady, ... a Miss Dora Scheldt, the daughter of the anthroposophist I consulted now and then."
Orphic: Of or ascribed to Orpheus; mystic, occult, esoteric. "He got a Rationalistic, Naturalistic education at CCNY. This was not easily reconciled with the Orphic. But all his desires were contradictory."
Sortilegio: Sortilege is the art or practice of foretelling the future by drawing lots; sorcery; witchcraft. "'What? Sorcery! Fucking sortilegio!' 'It's not sortilegio. It's mutual aid.'"
Morphology: The biological study of the form and structure of living organisms. Protoplasts: The living material of a cell as distinguished from inert portions. Ergastic substances: Metabolically inert products of photosynthesis, such as starch grains and fat globules. "I obtained a large botany book by a woman named Esau and sank myself into morphology, into protoplasts and ergastic substances, so that my exercises might have real content."
Attainder: The loss of all civil rights legally consequent to a death sentence or to outlawry for a capital offense. "The hereditary attainder rule was very strict."
Relume: To make bright or clear again. "I remember the shine of his [Humboldt] eyes when he dropped his voice to pronounce the word "relume" spoken by a fellow about to commit a murder, or when he spoke Cleopatra's words 'I have immortal longings in me.'"
Antinomian: In theology, the idea that members of a particular religious group are under no obligation to obey the laws of ethics or morality as presented by religious authorities. "But it was only antinomian, not free."
Theosophy: Religious speculation dealing with the mystical apprehension of God, associated with various occult systems; or the doctrines and beliefs of a religious sect, the Theosophical Society, incorporating aspects of Buddhism and Brahmanism. "If he added theosophy to literature and the insurance business, what would become of him?"
Exousiai: In anthroposophy, based on the teachings by Rudolf Steiner, the Exousiai represent the sixth realm of the Christian angelic hierarchy of the Roman Catholic tradition. This hierarchic level of divine spirits is immediately above the three levels comprising the Angels, Archangels and Archai/Principati. The role of the Exousiai in spiritual evolution is essential, since the human Self has emanated from them. Having their residence in the spiritual spheres of the Sun, the Exousiai are specially devoted to the development of Earth and humanity. "But when Humboldt cried, 'Life!' he didn't mean the Thrones, Exousiai, and Angels."
Havelock: A cloth covering for a cap, having a flap to protect the back of the neck. "On her head was a garrison cap and a Sam Browne belt crossed her chest --the works: fleece boots, mittens, her neck protected by an orange havelock, her figure obliterated."
Tinia crura Tinea crura is a fungal infection in the skin of the groin. "And Dr. Tim Vonghel gave me a bucket of gentian violet to sit in. He told me I had a bad case of tinia crura."
Hydrostatics: The statics of fluids, especially incompressible fluids. Statics is the equilibrium mechanics of stationary bodies. "He was quite old now, and the unkind forces of human hydrostatics were beginning to make a strained and wrinkled bag of his face, but his color remained fresh and he was still the Harvard radical of the John Reed type, one of those ever-youthful lightweight high-spirited American intellectuals, faithful to his Marx or his Bakunin, to Isadora, Randolph Bourne, Lenin and Trotsky, Max Eastman, Cocteau, André Gide, the Ballets Ruses, Eisenstein -- the beautiful avant-garde pantheon of the good old days."
Mansard: The upper story formed by the lower slope of a mansard roof, which is a roof having two slopes on all four sides. "Renata was still criticizing the mansard room."
Inductive: Of reasoning; proceeding from particular facts to a general conclusion. "'It isn't mysticism,' I said. 'Goethe simply wouldn't stop at the boundaries drawn by the inductive method.'"
Epistemologies: Epistemology is the philosophy that investigates the nature and origin of knowledge; a theory of the nature of knowledge. "Five different epistemologies in an evening. Take your choice. They're all agreeable, and not one is binding or necessary or has true strength or speaks straight to the soul."
Tremor cordis: Irregular heart beat. "I recalled how he had looked in Connecticut, when he quoted me King Leontes in my yard by the sea. 'I have tremor cordis on me: my heart dances; but not for joy, not joy.'"
Carabiniere: A military body that polices both military and civilians. "Thaxter's carabiniere costume looked sick by comparison."
Soutane: A cassock worn by Roman Catholic priests. "'Priests' pockets are picked under the soutane.'"
Chandala: An untouchable; especially someone engaged in the profession of carrying of dead bodies and in the process of cremation. "I knew all of that would-be Shavian wit you could hear at dinner tables on Lake Shore Drive: they wanted to make an untouchable and a chandala of Flonzaley, a scavenger, but he would take their gold into the gloom with him, and he would be a Prince there -- that sort of stuff I could do without."

The List of References from Humboldt's Gift:

Adventures of Ideas by Alfred N. Whitehead
Aida opera by Giuseppe Verde
American Mercury magazine
Antony and Cleopatra by Shakespeare
Antigone by Sophocles
Balzac sculpture by Auguste Rodin
Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis
Bonnie and Clyde movie
Carmen opera by Georges Bizet
Comédie Humaine by Honoré de Balzac
Deep Throat porno film
De Anima (On the Soul) by Aristotle
Diaries by Franz Kafka
Elégie song by Jules Massenet
Encyclopedia of Unified Science
Finnegan's Wake by James Joyce
From Hegel to Marx by Sidney Hook
Guernica painting by Pablo Picasso
Hamlet by Shakespeare
I Am Curious Yellow movie
Ils Ne M'auront Pas (They shall not have me) by Jean Hélion
Intimate Journals by Charles Baudelaire
King Solomon's Mine by H. Rider Haggard
Knock play by Jules Romains
Knowledge of the Higher Worlds and Its Attainment by Rudolf Steiner
La Comédie Humaine by Honoré de Balzac
Les Amours Jaunes by Tristan Corbière
Letters by John Keats
"Liebestod" from Richard Wagner opera
Maja paintings by Francisco Goya
New World Symphony by Antonín Dvorák
Oedipus at Colonus play by Sophocles
Pagliacci opera by Ruggero Leoncavallo
Paradise Lost by John Milton
Pastorale symphony Ludwig van Beethoven
Phaedrus by Plato
Phenomenology by Georg Wilhelm Hegel
The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan
Revista de Occidente magazine
Satyricon movie by Frederico Fellini
State and Revolution by Vladimir Lenin
Symposium by Plato
The Barber of Seville opera
The Dial magazine
The French Connection movie
The Godfather movie
The Great McGinty movie
The Hastings Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics by James Hastings
The Magic Flute opera by Mozart
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(Whew!)

Absurdistan

By Gary Shteyngart

Misha Vainberg has a problem. He is in Russia but he wants to be in the United States. Too bad for Misha that the US won't let in. Seems like his father, the gangster, has murdered a citizen of the US and thus Misha is not welcome. Sons of murderers can just stay home.
Misha is not a stranger to America. He went to college there. But now he is back in Russia where his father wants him. Next thing he knows, he father is blown up by a rival gangster and Misha is free to do as he pleases except the only thing he wants is to get back to America.
Misha is told that if he goes to the former Soviet satellite country of Absurdistan he can buy a Belgian passport and use it get to America. Happily he heads off to Absurdistan and gets his Belgian passport. He is scheduled to leave the next day when a revolution breaks out and Absurdistan's borders are closed. Misha is now trapped in the crazy political crisis that has overtaken Absurdistan and he finds himself allied with the very people who have engineered the country's downfall. Getting to America is farther away than ever.

One of the biggest jokes in the story is Misha's weight problem and his gluttony. His eating habits are minutely described and the gyrations of his blubber are gone into in depth. All of which was very gross and akin, I think, to pointing and laughing any disabled person's trials. I did not find it amusing. Another big joke is the political double dealing that is the theme of the whole Absurdistan experience. Again, I did not find it amusing. I just don't find liars and corruption to be funny. Still, this book does have its funny moments. It wasn't exactly my cup of tea but it paints a vivid picture.

Review by Patrick Ness in The Guardian. 

New Words:
Agitprop: Communist term meaning revolutionary agitation and Propaganda. Khui: Penis. "After decades of listening to the familial agitprop of our parents ('We will die for you!' they sing), after surviving the criminal closeness of the Russian family ('Don't leave us!' they plead), after the crass socialization foisted upon us by our teachers and factory directors ('We will staple your circumcised khui to the wall!' they threaten), all that's left is that toast between two failed friends in some stinking outdoor beer kiosk."
Laphroaig: Scotch whiskey. "In the next 318 pages, you may occasionally see me boxing the ears of my manservant or drinking one Laphroaig too many."
Popka: A Russian term for a baby's behind, considered more polite than ass. "'Because there's no future in this country for a little popka like you.'"
Oblomov: Oblomov is a character in a novel of the same name written by Ivan Goncharov. Oblomov is indecisive and lacking in will power and self-confidence. "The Oblomov inside me has always been fascinated by people who are just about ready to give up on life, and in 1990, Brooklyn was an Oblomovian paradise."
Vitrine: Cabinet with a glass door. The sides and top may also be of glass, and it is designed to store and display china and curios. "She reminded me of a lovely olive-colored mannequin I had seen in a store vitrine."
Shapkas: A Shapka is a Russian fur cap with ear flaps that can be tied up to the crown of the cap, or tied at the chin to protect the ears from the cold. "I had seen a dozen kindergarten pupils trying to cross the boulevard, each bundled in a jaunty collection of misshapen coats, their shapkas falling off their tiny heads, their feet encased in monstrous hand-me-down galoshes."
Oligarch: Oligarchy is government by the few, especially by a small faction of persons or families. "The Yeltsin era was still ten years away, but already Papa was angling to become an oligarch."
Shtetl: A small Jewish town or Jewish enclave within a town in eastern Europe. Klezmer: A style of Jewish or Yiddish music. "It was a shtetl funeral, in many ways, a kind of impromptu klezmer act minus the musical instruments."
Shawarma: A Middle Eastern-style sandwich featuring shaved lamb or chicken or other meats. The typical shawarma is pita bread filled with meat, hummus, tomato, cucumber and toppings like tahini. "The windswept Fontanka River, its crooked nineteenth-century skyline interrupted by the post-apocalyptic wedge of the Sovietskaya Hotel, the hotel surrounded by symmetrical rows of yellowing, waterlogged apartment houses; the apartment houses, in turn, surrounded by corrugated shacks featuring, in no particular order, a bootleg CD emporium, the ad hoc Mississippi Casino ('America Is Far, but Mississippi Is Near'), a kiosk selling industrial-sized containers of crab salad, and the usual Syrian shawarma hut smelling invariably of spilled vodka, spoiled cabbage, and some kind of vague, free-floating inhumanity."
Baldachinos: A baldachino is a canopy. "The palaces of Nevsky Prospekt, wishing to properly say goodbye to me, dusted themselves off and bowed their chipped baldachinos in my direction..."
Superannuated: Obsolete; antiquated. "After we'd boarded and the plane had hobbled down the rutted runway and ascended, we looked down at the country beneath us, at the strange shaped of superannuated factories squatting below."
Payess: The uncut sideburns worn by male Orthodox Jews. "By the time they started boarding our flight to Svanï City, he had curled me a nice set of payess."
Fin de siècle: Of or characteristic of the last part of the 19th century, especially with reference to its artistic climate of effete sophistication. "I could even make out the fin de siècle Parliament building on the Pest side and the old Austro-Hungarian seat of power on the Buda..."
C'hai: A Hebrew symbol and word which means "living" and it is worn as a medallion. "He was wearing nothing but sweatpants, his naked chest sporting a standard Orthodox cross and a Jewish c'hai."
Dyophysitism: A theological term refering to the two natures of Jesus Christ, human and divine. Monophysitism: The theological position that Jesus Christ has only one nature which combines both the human and divine. "She used complex terms to describe the religious differences, such as 'dyophysitism' and 'monophysitism,' along with frequent allusions to some Holy Council of Aardvark that rocked the region in A.D. 518, not to mention that whole Good Thief, Bad Thief hullabaloo."
Knout: A leather scourge formerly used for flogging criminals in Russia. "I was ready to reach for my knout."