My wife loves cozy mysteries, so I told her about the Railway Detective series after reading your reviews of the first two. She has ordered the first book from the library. And in the course of searching the library database for it, she found two other cozies that she also ordered.

Thank you for several weeks of pleasant bedtime reading in her future!

The Day of the Jackal
Frederick Forsyth, 1971

In the wake of the failed attempt to assassinate French President Charles de Gaulle in 1962 by the right-wing paramilitary group known as the OAS (Organisation armée secrete, or Secret Army Organization) and the devastation of their ranks in the ensuing crackdown by the authorities, the leader of that organization’s remnants realizes that the only way to eliminate the hated de Gaulle (and then assume power in France during the chaos that follows) is to hire a contract killer that nobody in the French police or intelligence services know about. After searching for several months, he finds just the right man: a mysterious, apparent Englishman in his mid-30s who has successfully carried out several assassinations outside of Europe, and who insists on being called the ‘Jackal’ by the few OAS members who will be in contact with him. The rest (bulk) of the book, which all takes place in July and August of 1963, is a rundown of how the Jackal plans and prepares the kill, followed by another lengthy section describing the efforts of the French authorities to figure out who he is and track him down once they (almost by chance) get wind of the plot. Interesting is that much of it comes down to mundane, often tedious police work, which is reflected in that fact that the task force formed to hunt down the Jackal is led by the deputy national police commissioner, Claude Lebel, a rather deceptively unassuming and placid middle-aged former police detective.
I found this pretty enjoyable and mostly quite fast-placed – despite the fact that so much of it is just descriptions of how both the assassin and the police go about their day-to-day business (I’d almost say it’s competence porn, but there are a few instances where dumb luck, both good and bad, play a crucial role for both the Jackal and Lebel.)

The Burnt Orange Heresy by Charles Willeford

James Figueras is an up and coming art critic spending some time covering galleries and openings on the Gold Coast of Florida.  He gets the opportunity to meet and potentially interview Jacques Debierue, a famously reclusive artist who has only ever displayed one work and whose work nobody has seen for decades...and then only select critics.  He is the "golden" mystery artiste, who has captivated the art world, even though his work is more mysterious than he.  The meeting is arranged by Casidy, a lawyer and art collector and it comes with strings attached, because this is nominally a noir novel.  Figueras takes his girlfriend (reluctant girlfriend on his part) Berenice with him as bait for the artist.  And, this being a crime novel, unlawful things happen. 

I feel like I'm in the vast minority here, because I really don't like this one bit.  I mean, I finished it, so it was good enough for that (though it's super short).  But it is generally quite well reviewed.  And I just don't get it.  I know it's not that I don't like Willeford's work.  I've read "Pick-Up" and "Cockfighter" which are his two best reviewed stand-alones (this is probably number three) and I liked both.  "Pick-Up" was a great noir marred by two twists at the end, neither of which made any sense in the context of the book.  And, while it's been a long time since I've read "Cockfighter" I know that I liked it quite a bit, though I didn't review it.  So it's not Willeford as a writer. 

I'll cop that I know little to nothing about fine art and less about the art world of collectors and critics.  Since that was the focus of almost 2/3 of the novel...that didn't help.  The idea that an artist can be renowned and world famous even though almost nobody has seen his work, didn't ring true to me.  Maybe it's possible...but I'd need proof.  The meat of the book didn't happen until the third act.  And even that didn't really work for me.  Part of the issue is that Figuera is...well he's just dumb.  I mean, profoundly dumb.  Yeah, this is noir.  But he's not trapped in to his dumb moves for love of a femme fatale.  He really doesn't even like poor Berenice and she is not the cause of his downfall.  It's all about him making choices that are just...stupid.  And really making them to no apparent purpose.  He could have reached an interesting (though not probably worthy of a noir novel) conclusion without precipitating his own downfall.  None of it makes sense.  

So I'll cop that maybe I'm missing something.  But I have no idea what it is.  Because this just didn't work beyond the mechanics of it being well written.  

Outlaw: Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, Kris Kristofferson and the Renegades of Nashville by Michael Streissguth

Author Michael Streissguth follows up his biography of Johnny Cash with a look at the birth and short life of the Outlaw Country sub-genre.  Streissguth primarily focuses on the three artists in the subtitle, Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson and Kris Kristofferson with the focus on Nashville's role in the growth of the outlaw movement.  Both choices are interesting and potentially problematic.  In particular Streissguth focuses very heavily on Waylon, which is, in my opinion, a valid choice.  

I want to start out by saying that I enjoyed the book and it was a super quick read.  So any short-comings or questions I have about the author's decisions have to be taken within the context of the fact that I not only like the book, but that I would recommend it to folks who are interested in country music history.  I definitely understand focusing in on the three named artists.  Ultimately the Outlaw movement was about shaking up the Nashville establishment and artists gaining control of their own recordings and music.  All three were instrumental in that.  Kristofferson was, by far, the most prominent of of the new breed of songwriter who brought a new poetic lyricism to country song-writing.  And his prominence, particularly after he became a Hollywood star (though you can very easily argue that the move made his songwriting suffer) helped to establish the new look of country, longer hair, beards, and blue jeans instead of clean-cut fellers in Nudie suits.  Waylon and Willie both revolted against the Nashville recording machine (in slightly different ways) and were absolutely the two poster children for what became known as Outlaw Country. 

Waylon revolted against RCA and the control of Chet Atkins and ultimately gained complete control of his music and how, and by whom, it was recorded.  It was an internal revolt as his best work was still, ultimately, released by RCA.  Willie, on the other hand, ended up leaving RCA, which had never figured out how to market him, had a brief stay at Atlantic (one that was creatively excellent, but disappointing in sales) before finally landing at CBS and hitting superstardom.  Both stories are incredibly important in what would become the death of the Nashville machine.  But they weren't the first.  Streissguth, recognizes that Johnny Cash had long been able to do his own thing.  But he really doesn't recognize Bobby Bare, who had had his own battle with RCA and Atkins a few years earlier and gained a fair bit of autonomy for his music.  And he absolutely gives short shrift to Jerry Jeff Walker and to the Texas music scene in general.  But Bare's music never changed the way that Waylon or Willie's did and Walker (and Doug Sahm and the rest of the Texas crowd) doesn't fit in with the Nashville narrative. 

I'll also say that unless you have a pretty significant back-ground in country music of the period, including the business side of it, this book could be daunting.  Streissguth trots out a LOT of names, including a lot of songwriters and sidemen who may have been fairly well known in the late 60s and the 70s, but are largely forgotten today.  And I think that he probably could have gone in to more depth on the way the business of country music worked leading up to Waylon and the rest's revolt.  I knew about it, but a lot of people almost certainly won't and will have no idea the kind of power that Chet Atkins and other Nashville execs wielded.  I also would suggest a copy editor go over the book.  I noticed more than a few misspelled names and at least one song title that was wrong.  

Still, this is a good book and it's never less than interesting.  And if you pull up your Spotify (or other service) and play the music that is mentioned as you're reading it's an even better experience.  

Majic Man by Max Allan Collins

Shamus to the Stars Nate Heller is back and he's dealing with two connected historic cases.  The first deals with the break-down and death of Secretary of Defense James Forrestal, who Heller met during his search for Amelia Earhardt.  Initially Heller is hired by Forrestal to tail and convince his wife (a not terribly functional alcoholic) that she isn't being followed and that nobody is trying to kidnap their children or assassinate them.  After Truman asks for Forrestal's resignation it pushes Forrestal, a man who already sees Reds behind every bush, to move in to his own paranoia.  This ultimately leads in to Heller investigating the Roswell crash and possible government cover-up there.  

Forrestal's death/suicide really is kind of a natural for Heller to investigate.  Roswell...maybe a little less so.  But Collins does his usual great job of making it interesting and following the various strands of conspiracy.  While I don't necessarily agree with the conclusion that Heller finds (and who is to say the author does either) it's definitely interesting and honestly makes a fair bit of sense.  And, at risk of spoilers, Collins works in Operation Paperclip in in a very good way, which is a huge plus in my book.  And by interesting, I don't mean I approve.  The only good Nazi is a dead Nazi.  

This one also prompted me to start re-watching The X-Files.  So that's a nice bonus.  

Latest read...



Latest read, revisiting Conan the Swordsman by de Camp, Carter and Nyberg for the first time since high school, though recently read adaptations of many of them in my Savage Sword of Conan read through. It's an interesting collection of tales, and these were among the first prose Conan stories I read, as I had access to this series of Conan books through my cousin before I had access to the Ace collections. I think I read a couple of the later novel length Conan tales from the series before I read this short story collection, but memory of the order I read them is a bit fuzzy. I read what I could get my hands on then, and that wasn't necessarily in any kind of series order. These days, I vastly prefer the Howards originals to any of the pastiches, but I was fond of these as I was discovering them and they're decent Conan tales, they just lack that Howard punch and feel unique to his Conan stories.

-M