This is the sixth of the 24 Wall Street mysteries starring amateur sleuth John Putnam Thatcher. An investment banker at the Sloan Guarantee Trust, he finds himself embroiled in shenanigans in high finance and murder.

The plot involves an early trading treaty between the US and USSR, set in 1967. On the basis of the treaty that sent surplus US grain to the inefficient USSR, an elaborate theft cheats the Sloan bank out of nearly a million dollars. Lathen takes Thatcher through a typical series of absurd situations. The Cuban Navy buzzes ships in New York harbor. Ukrainian nationalists protest. The Leningrad Symphony practices in the CCNY basketball arena. A stage-Russian impresario imports a troupe of Russian otters that eat only smelt marinated in vodka. After a Russian trade delegation tours a US potato chip factory, where they are served various dishes involving chips, one member concludes nobody could defect after having potato chip soup.

Emma Lathen was the pen-name of Mary Jane Latsis, an economist, and Martha Henissart, an economic analyst. They bring much knowledge of business transactions and office life to their novels, which give them authenticity. The theme of “Money makes the world go ‘round” is very strong. They also have a keen sense of the absurd. Thatcher is a committed capitalist although he knows that human fallibility is real enough that lying, cheating, and stealing must be constantly guarded against. Latsis and Henissart, probably both Republicans, were conservative enough not to kid themselves about the ability of Wall Street to “self-regulate.”

I have a confession to make:  I don’t think I ever read a book by Judy Blume when I was an adolescent.  I am an anomaly in my generation, a generation that learned some of the facts of life by reading Judy Blume growing up.  Yet somehow I missed out.  So when I saw In the Unlikely Event advertised on a “must reads for the summer” list online, I was more attracted by the cover image than who the author was.

Although the story revolves around many characters, the main character is a teenager named Miri Ammerman and starts in 1951.  Technically the story starts (very briefly) and ends in 1987 but majority of the book takes place in 1951 and 1952.  Miri lives in Elizabeth, NJ in a two family house with her mother, Rusty, upstairs and her beloved Uncle Henry and grandmother, Irene, living downstairs.  Miri lives a relatively normal life.  She baby-sits, has two best friends, and knows that she is loved by her family.  The only abnormality in her life is that she doesn’t know who her father is since her mother was never married and she refuses to talk about how Miri came to be.  Miri only knows bits and pieces of her origin based on overheard conversations over the years.  Yet this mystery isn’t what unravels Miri’s life.  Miri’s life changes forever after a series of plane crashes over the course of 58 days happen in Elizabeth.

Blume tells this story by separating each chapter across several different characters.  Chapter 1 alone starts describing the experiences of ten different characters across eight separations (I’d say point of view, but I associate that with first person narration rather than third person, and this story is told in the third person).  Having to keep all of these characters straight can be a challenge, sometimes I felt like I needed a cheat-sheet to reference.  Some of the characters have their stories told throughout the book like Miri and others close to her, and some characters only appear once or twice.  But Blume masterfully weaves together each of the characters’ stories and shows how their lives manage to overlap in some way due to these plane crashes.  I found this book difficult to put down, and read it over the course of about 24 hours, even though it is nearly 400 pages long.  In part, I think I also read the book quickly so I wouldn’t forget which character was which from chapter to chapter.

Although Miri and the other characters are fictional, the three commercial plane crashes in Elizabeth, NJ in the early 1950s really happened.  I live in New Jersey and grew up less than an hour from Elizabeth, yet I had never heard about these events.  Granted, these were before my time, but I would have thought that I would have at least heard of something as tragic as three commercial passenger planes crashing in a town not far from where I live.  In an odd turn of events, I was going to take this book on vacation with me earlier this summer, but decided against it due to the cover and title (I figured it wasn’t the best thing to bring on a plane).  I started reading it when I came home, and the first plane that crashed was coming from Buffalo to Newark, the same trip I had just taken to get home from my trip (technically the flight in the book had two stops between Buffalo and Newark, but still, it was weird to read that and really made me glad I didn’t bring it on my trip).

I’m not sure how to classify the genre of this book.  Do the 1950s count as historical fiction or is that too contemporary (stories set in WWII are classified as historical fiction and this book takes place only a few years after WWII)?  I guess I could best classify this as a coming of age or self-discovery story since Miri and many of the other characters, including the adult characters, experience something so big that the paths their lives were on ended up getting altered forever.

Maigret goes after the culprit, but he must examine deeper human truths along the way, as part psychologist and part anthropologist. He contrasts his own culture (French, urban, Catholic) with that of the Protestant bourgeoisie in a small Dutch town. He realizes the behavior of the characters is profoundly influenced by a strict and austere environment against which some – like Conrad and Beetje – must rebel. Plus, he must contend with an unspoken attitude that doubts the social utility of denouncing and punishing the guilty if the guilty one belongs to the upper classes. Such a bad example for the lower classes, after all. As for comic relief, Maigret, the bull in the china shop, must deal with the delicate sensibilities of the Dutch police and Professor Duclos, who wants Maigret to do as the Dutch do when in Holland.

Fans count this one, the eighth Maigret novel, as one of the better early novels, written in the Depression era. Simenon’s powers lie in his economical style, his simple vocabulary, his way of setting scenes to evoke atmosphere, his probing of the psychology of his characters, and his awareness of and icy compassion for fallibility.

Have you ever had this experience?  Someone tells you about a book or a movie, and they praise it so highly, and tell you it’s the best thing they’ve ever seen or read…that they inspire you to read or watch it too…. and it turns out to be a huge disappointment?   And it’s not so much that it’s a bad movie or book…it’s just that the person built up your expectations to such an incredible height that a letdown was probably inevitable.

I’m always mindful of this whenever I recommend books to people.  I try not to make the book sound like the best thing ever written.  I try to point out what I enjoyed about the book, and what I didn’t enjoy (if anything) and why I would encourage someone to read it.  I don’t want to build up anyone’s expectations too high.

I’m relaying all this to you because I loved the book I’m recommending this week so much, I feel as though I should have a disclaimer!  I’m afraid I’m going to rave, and gush over this author’s abilities and end up disappointing some readers who may not agree with me.  But I can’t help it.  This novel is amazing.

The title is “Peace Like a River,” and the author’s name is Leif Enger.  It’s his first novel and an absolute gem.  Enger writes beautifully…his prose is clear, understated, flowing.  His characters are fully developed and endearing.

“Peace Like a River” takes place in Minnesota in the early 1960’s.  The narrator is Reuben Land, an 11-year-old boy with severe asthma.  Rube lives with his father, Jeremiah, a deeply spiritual man who truly seems to communicate with God; his older brother Davy, 16 and ready to be a man on his own, and his younger sister Swede, a budding writer at 9 years of age, who has a fondness for epic poems about the romantic Old West, and has read every Zane Grey novel in existence.

Mr. Land is the school custodian, and he has a run-in with two of the local “bad boys.”  He feels the incident has been settled, but it escalates.  The boys snatch Swede and then return her a few hours later, scared but unharmed.  Davy isn’t content to leave justice in God’s hands, and when the two boys follow his lure and break into the Land’s home late one night, baseball bats in hand, Davy is ready.  He guns down both boys and turns himself in to the sheriff.

On the morning of his sentencing, Davy breaks out of jail and disappears, a fugitive on the run.  And when Rube’s father inherits a motor home shortly after, it seems as though the family is being urged to try and find Davy.  And so begins their journey: all three of them eager to find Davy, but no one really talking about what they will do if and when they do find him.  Rube, Swede and their father, Jeremiah, are all counting on a miracle, for miracles are something they are familiar with:  As Rube says:

“Let me say something about that word: Miracle.  For too long it’s been used to characterize things or events that, though pleasant, are entirely normal.  Peeping chicks at Easter time, spring generally, a clear sunrise after an overcast week–a miracle, people say…I’m sorry, but nope.  Such things are worth our notice every day of the week, but to call them miracles evaporates the strength of the word.  Real miracles bother people…They rebut every rule all we good citizens take comfort in.  Lazarus obeying orders and climbing up out of the grave–now there’s a miracle, and you can bet it upset a lot of folks who were standing around at the time.  My sister, Swede, said something that rang in me like a bell:  No miracle happens without a witness.  The fact is, the miracles that sometimes flowed from my father’s fingertips had few witnesses but me. Is there a single person on whom I can press belief?  No sir.  All I can do is say, Here’s how it went.  Here’s what I saw.  Make of it what you will.”      Reuben Land bears witness for us all in Leif Enger’s beautiful novel, Peace like a river.

This golden age mystery is set in a rural village in England just after WWII. A fiend is poisoning the retainers of an old family. Evidence points to a 30-ish female artist, the last member of the family. Wagging tongues allege that the artist is knocking off retainers because they know too much about her wanton personal life. The local swine of a policeman wants to hang her and mopes because the Yard has been called in. The Yard inspector is smart and handsome and winning. Of course.

The murders hinge on the unvarying routines of the village people. The culprit must be a local; otherwise, how could anyone know how the victims took their tea and poison them in such a stealthy way? The murders unglue the locals, who have all they can put up with dealing with the pervasive fog the author endlessly refers to. Wind and rain, mud and wet contribute to the stifling gloom of the setting.

But the characters are not melancholy. Both the artist and her aunt are strong independent women. The police officers, but for the swine, are all well-drawn and convincing. The local doctor is an intense young crab. The locals are down-to-earth. The pacing and humor are appealing. This is a joker sergeant’s report:

Report from Sgt. Congreve.  All except the following, in and around Shotshall, had alibis for the night of December 1st between the hours of 19:45 and 21:00:  Capt. Belairs, who said he was in his house reading.  Miss Chattock, of Shots Hall, who said she was in her house doing nothing.  Mrs. Ashely who said what she was doing but it is not proven.  Mrs. Vale who said she was asleep in front of her fire which had gone out.  Harry Fewsey the butcher who was cutting up meat in his shop and said anyone ought to have been able to hear him doing it only no one did.  Winnie Marsh who said she had one round the corner, which one she would not say, to meet a boyfriend she won’t say either as it is not her regular one Bill Ellison, and she said not to tell about it as Bill Ellison would be mad. 

It’s a bit longer than I like a mystery due to usual romance angle and the main suspect sitting on information due to her mistaken assumptions about how the world works. There’s also an Allinghamesque tendency to go on about the heroine’s lovely looks. On the other hand, she deploys less frequently used verbs aptly.

Overall this is an excellent mystery that I recommend without reservation.

Part of working in a library is helping people find books, and making reading recommendations. But happily, people let me know what they’re reading…what they’ve really enjoyed.  I love these two-way recommendations, and I think it’s only fair that I pass along to everyone else some of the recommendations that I have been receiving.

Not too long ago, someone returned the book “The Winter People” by John Ehle and told me it was really, REALLY good.  And after reading it, I have to say that I agree.

 Collie Wright and her baby boy live alone in a 150-year-old log cabin in the mountains of North Carolina.  She’s an unwed mother at the beginning of the Depression, and since she refuses to name young Jonathan’s father, she is the object of much talk and speculation within this mountain community, and even within her own family.  Collie is rocking Jonathan one evening when a man and a young girl come down off the mountain and to her cabin door.  Collie offers them a warm meal and a place to sleep for the night, not realizing how her life is about to change.

Wayland Jackson is a clock maker, traveling from Pennsylvania to Tennessee with his young daughter Paula.  His truck breaks down, and he seeks shelter at the first sign of life he sees.  Wayland also wonders about Collie, about her past, about her son…and before long, the decision is made.  Wayland and Paula will settle here, he’ll work repairing clocks and is also set to build a clock tower by the little church.  And too, he is determined to court Collie, an idea that seems pleasing to everyone except little Jonathan’s father.

John Ehle is well-known for his depiction of his native North Carolina through his many novels.  The Winter People was written in the early 80’s, and won the Lillian Smith Award which each year honors the best fiction about the South.  He writes of mountain life before too much outside influence arrives to change people and their habits.  He paints wonderful pictures of a past era and of an interesting community.  When Collie hears someone outside her cabin, she ponders:  “At first she had thought it was Jonathan’s father come home, and her blood had run cold, her breath had almost suffocated her with fear; however, he would have come pounding his way into the house.  If it had been Campbell hunters on their way home, as often happened, they would have stopped to explain; Campbells were not secretive people, were always willing to declare their actions, except for Skeet Campbell who was sneaky, but he was not altogether sane, either, seemed to her.  It wouldn’t be McGregors sneaking about at night; they sneaked about of a day, as a rule, and talked and drank at night.  No, it was doubtless her brother Gudger himself.  Whatever star that brother had been born under, it was a guardian angel’s; he saw himself as the protector of the family.”

John Ehle’s “The Winter People” is a story of love and devotion to family, and of the sacrifices that we make in the name of both.  I’m so glad I was introduced to this author.  I finished this novel almost in one sitting, and turned the last page with sadness, not wanting the story to end.