The Paton Street Case by John Bingham

Review by Matt B. (BuffaloSavage)

John Bingham’s fourth novel, The Paton Street Case (1955), was also published as Inspector Morgan’s Dilemma.

With his hard-hearted Anglo-Saxon partner Shaw, the Welsh inspector uses his Celtic intuitions as he investigates the murder of a gambler who lived a shabby double-dealing life. Sometimes Morgan’s gut feelings are spot-on but sometimes they lead him astray.

One suspect is Otto Steiner, who escaped the Nazis after a beating. The fallout of the attack, however, lingers. He’s scarred psychologically and in crisis acts unpredictably.

After questioning another person of interest, adultery is revealed, which leads to the aggrieved spouse taking irrational actions.

James Sandoe, a critic for NY Herald Tribune Book Review,  described this novel  as “an uncommonly compelling narrative artfully wrought and compassionately conceived.”

A Girl Named Zippy: Growing Up Small in Mooreland Indiana by Haven Kimmel

Review by Vicky T. (VickyJo)

I have recently developed a real passion for memoirs.  Not biographies: a person’s entire life story told by someone else…and not autobiographies, someone’s life story told by themselves, usually after they feel they have lived long enough and done enough important things to write it all down for posterity,  but memoirs: a small, significant slice of a person’s life, as reported by the one who lived it.  A memoir can revolve around an incident, the choice of a career, a relationship, or even a cherished pet (think “Marley and Me”).

Haven Kimmel, a young new author, wrote her memoir “A Girl Named Zippy : growing up small in Mooreland, Indiana” because she wanted to capture small town America during the mid-60’s.  It’s a love letter of sorts to Mooreland, Indiana, and to the people who lived there in 1965, and who helped to shape Haven’s childhood.  But don’t for a moment think that this is a serious, somber look back at a time long gone.  Not in the least.  The most charming part of Haven’s memoir is her humor.  She obviously appreciates the irony in life, and sees humor everywhere.

Haven, unlike her older brother Daniel and older sister Melinda, acquired a nickname from her father; he called her Zippy after a cute, energetic chimpanzee he once saw roller skating on television.  Haven shares with us her baby book, where her mother wrote the typical entries all mothers record: how many teeth, first steps, favorite toy, and of course first words.  But Haven’s baby book entries for “first words” remained empty at her first birthday…at her second birthday….until this entry by her mother, just before Haven’s third birthday:

“This weekend we went camping.  After dinner little Zippy was running in circles around the campfire, drinking from her bottle, and Bob decided she’d had it long enough.  He walked over to her and said, “Sweetheart, you’re a big girl now, and it’s time for you to give up that bottle.  I want you to just give it to me, and we’re going to throw it in the fire. Okay?”  The baby looked at us, back at her dad, and then pulled the bottle out of her mouth with an audible pop, and said, clear as daylight, “I’ll make a deal with you.”  Her first words!  Bob didn’t hesitate.  “What’s the deal?”  She said, “If you let me keep it, I’ll hide it when company comes and I won’t tell nobody.”  Now that we know she can talk, all I can say is: Dear God. Please give that child some hair.”

Zippy remembers her third grade teacher as the meanest woman in the history of Mooreland Elementary School, but she loved the druggist Doc Holliday, because you always knew where you stood with him, which was too close and making too much noise.  She recalls giving some hippies a haircut in return for a dog; she remembers the day “it became completely impossible for me to live without a pet chicken” and of course, she discusses all her adventures with her best friend Julie Newman, who lived on a farm where Zippy learned some very shocking things about life.

“A Girl Named Zippy” will make you laugh out loud and bring a lump to your throat.  The final chapter leaves you wanting more…which is available, since Haven Kimmel wrote another memoir, “She got up off the couch and other heroic acts from Mooreland, Indiana.”

Three Wishes by Liane Moriarty

Review by Mirah Welday (mwelday)

Liane Moriarty is quickly becoming one of my favorite writers. First I read and thoroughly enjoyed The Husband’s Secret and now I’ve experienced Three Wishes.   Three Wishes brings us face to face with the Kettle triplets who are celebrating their 33^rd birthdays.  The triplets are funny and frustrating.  I love them on one page and on another page I want to scream at them.  But all of this love/hate makes for an interesting novel that isn’t predictable.  Moriarty created strong female characters with their own methods of dealing with stress, happiness, and trauma.

The Kettle triplets (Cat, Lyn, and Gemma) are deeply connected but they each want to be individuals.  Their relationships with one another can be tumultuous and heartbreaking; however, they are also fiercely loyal to one another.  Each sister has her role to play and any move to break out of that role can be difficult and lead to resentment. I believe Gemma was my favorite character; a free spirit with hidden depths of intelligence and emotion, Gemma was, in my opinion, the most interesting and least predictable triplet.

Dispersed throughout the novel are memories other people have of the triplets at different times in their lives.  Having these strangers’ accounts of moments in the triplets’ lives (seeing them in a restaurant or on the beach) allows the reader to see how the triplets unknowingly impacted the lives of strangers around them.

Moriarty writes with an authenticity and a sense of authority on human relationships.  Her characters are realistic and have qualities we may see in ourselves or loved ones.  Moriarty puts a lens to these qualities and makes us reevaluate our own actions and thoughts without being condescending or obvious.

I enjoyed my brief time with the Kettle triplets. Now my big question is what Liane Moriarty novel should I read next?

Death Comes to Perigord by John Ferguson

Review by Matt B. (BuffaloSavage)

Young Dr. Dunn arrives on the sunlit Channel Island of Guernsey to substitute for a doctor in need of a spot of rest. The doctor is taken with scenery, which reminds him of the Near East:

Why look, for instance, at this very road, so long and narrow, stretching between those high blank walls, with invisible houses and hidden people behind them, I suppose. And look at those tall palm trees which seem to be peering over the walls as if stretching their necks, watching for something to happen in this deserted alley. Look at those shadows too, sharply cut as if by a knife in this brilliant white, un-English sunlight; and look at the colour, is that not Eastern?

Later he witnesses in the village square an old peasant woman railing against her rich neighbor de Quettville for stealing her garden statue. When the doc makes a house-call in aid of de Quettville, he finds him a cantankerous impossible patient but not necessarily mentally ill. Miser and usurer de Quettville mysteriously disappears. Dunn and two city officials and work on the case, in which psychiatric forensics plays a part:

The workings of a disordered mind are hard to follow, but it is an error to suppose an insane person cannot conceive, and adhere to a purpose. There is method in madness; and with homicidal lunatics the doctor frequently becomes an object of intense hatred, the first enemy who must be removed before the original murderous intention can be achieved.

Dunn is driven to ask his asked his friend McNab, a private investigator, to clear up the mystery. The reveal, though predictable, satisfies.

As the passages above indicate, the suggestive setting, smart content, and elegant prose style result in a fine mystery from the Golden Age. Unfortunately for the author, many writers were trying their hand at the genre in the late Twenties and early Thirties and so this book was overlooked by critics and readers. It sunk out of sight until Dover Publications re-released it in the 1980s. It is fairly easily found on Paperback Swap.

Rajmund by D.B. Reynolds

Review by Cynthia F. (frazerc)

I liked the first book (Raphael) and I like this one even better. Rajmund was a ‘warmer’ person than Raphael but certainly not a teddy bear. Just as alpha but less powerful than Raphael, he is still a power to be reckoned with.

The setup was interesting with converging plot lines for both the hero and the heroine. Sarah is a human friend of Cyn’s (Raphael’s mate from books one and two) who has left sunny California for a teaching position in a Buffalo, New York university. And if teaching freshman history surrounded by cold, snow and ice isn’t bad enough; her psychic ability to channel traumatized women comes screaming back. She can’t tell anyone, who would believe her? But she has to do something, it’s all happening again…

Cyn, who doesn’t know about the psychic stuff or her past, still recognizes her friend is depressed and unhappy. She talks Raphael into taking her to New York where she and Sarah can meet and have some ‘girl time’.

Raphael uses the excuse to meet with Rajmund, the vampire in charge of New York City, about a growing problem and imminent power struggle in the Vampire Council. Raj meets Sarah and they are both attracted but each move on to their separate lives. That’s until they end up working on finding the missing girls together and the sexual tension begins to build…

There’s a lot of wit in this one and less angst.  I loved quotes like Cyn’s answer when asked about the weather in California: “It’s raining, which means the natives are convinced the end is near and are engaged in ritual auto pileups in an attempt to appease the angry gods.” (Having grown up in California, all too true!)

The Sarah and Raj plot lines resolve nicely. My only complaint? There’s a cliff-hanger teaser masquerading as an epilogue…

Jabril (Vampires in America, #2)

Rajmund (Vampires in America, #3)

Sophia (Vampires in America, #4)

Duncan (Vampires in America, #5)

Vampires in America The Vignettes, Volume 1 (Vampires in America, #1)

Grave Descend by Michael Crichton, writing as John Lange

Review by Matt B. (BuffaloSavage)

Semi-broken down Marine combat veteran is hired to dive and salvage a sunken luxury yacht in waters off Jamaica. The yacht reportedly went down the day before due to unknown causes. The employer seems cagey about what exactly will be found on the yacht.

But ominous signs – like seeing the yacht deliberately blown up in front of his eyes – make our hero smell a rat. He realizes that he is being played for a fool, fall guy, or murder victim by very rich, very cunning villains.

All in all, this is an ordinary pulp thriller with rapid-fire action and violence. Plus, we have characters with bounteous curves, one of whom keeps two ocelots, named Fiona and Fido. Fido provides the only comic relief in the book, while they both feature in the climax.

The prose reminded me of Erle Stanley Gardner, since description and characterization were kept to a bare minimum.

“In the distance, he could see blue water, with waves breaking across the inner reefs, and hotels lining the beachfront.”

What more could a fan of bare-bone punch ask? Putting vapid characters through lots of twists and turns does have entertainment value, especially when we don’t feel up to reading something more challenging but perhaps less entertaining. Back in 1970, this novel was nominated for an Edgar Award, which must have tickled then-med student Crichton.