All the Time in the World

Really, really torn about the rating on this one. Beginning was rather abrupt and extremely off-putting with the sadistic rape and torture of the main character, followed by chapter after chapter of Felix being BARKING MAD and seemingly no movement toward Felix's story converging with that of the other main character, Mildmay (aka Milly-the-fox.) In fact, the two character's paths do not cross until more than halfway through the book. All of that said, the world-building is pretty fascinating (although the whole conceit of septads [as far as I can determine, counting by sevens - i.e., a "Great Septad" = 7x7 or 49; age septad-and-three = 10, etc.] and how that impacts numbers and time-keeping got more than a little wearing as I tried to figure out what time/day it was, or the age of a character) and the magic systems as well (particularly the philosophical conflicts between the magicians of the Mirador and those of other systems, which turn out to be relevant when the biases of your training blind you to alternate explanations.)

Looking forward to reading the next one.

This was one of those desperation buys that turned out well - stopped in a thrift store to grab something that looked interesting, just to have something to read over dinner. I'm not much a fan of political-type thrillers, and the reference to Ludlum on the cover almost put me off, but something about the description convinced me it was worth at least spending a few hours with.

Hugo Fitzduane is a former member of an Irish elite military force-turned-war photographer, and when he's not traipsing the globe taking pictures he lives in a remote island off the coast of Ireland, in a castle that has been in his family for hundreds of years. Not a cushy, plushly-appointed castle - a place designed for military defense and not all that updated for modern convenience. Oh, and chock-full of weaponry of all sorts, both antique and modern. Seems the Fitzduanes are fond of collecting things that go boom. Also sharing the island is a sort of finishing school for children of wealthy parents, who for one reason or another feel their kids need the place's odd mix of traditional education, physical challenge, and obscure location.

When Fitzduane happens on the body of a student who has hanged himself and is compelled to investigate what led to the young man's death, he is drawn into a mystery that will tax every skill he has learned just to keep up with his quarry, a sadistic international terrorist whose inexplicable game warps everyone he encounters.

The good parts: What kept me engaged was the characters and their interaction - the mature, loving relationship of Hugo and his long-time girlfriend Etan; the insubordinate but highly capable Swiss police officer, Bear; Hugo's former superior, Kilmara, who is very good at his job as head of Ireland's national anti-terrorist group when not obstructed by politicians. And the book is FUNNY in places - often the sort of gallows humor you find among compatriots working at a difficult task or in a stressful field. I also enjoyed the depiction of life in Bern, Switzerland, where murder is extremely uncommon, and a series of violent deaths upsets not just those directly affected, but the order of the whole city. I also appreciated the inclusion of women amid the fighting - not just as non-participants needing to be protected, but as tough and wily fighters themselves.

The bad parts: over-the-top, gloatingly evil, sadistic bad guy, and accompanying gore galore. Gratuitous sex. I like a good sex scene, but really? Hugo goes around getting boners as readily as a kid half his age, and virtually every woman he meets wants to have sex with him. (Being a one-woman-man, though, he resists, managing even to avoid offending the rejected women. A paragon among men!)

Too much dwelling on military hardware for me, but I'm sure devotees of the genre would delight in the details.

I've read a couple of reviews that assert that Red Seas is a better book than The Lies of Locke Lamora. Really? Not in my opinion. Took me a little longer to get hooked by Red Seas, the various schemes being juggled made it all a little choppy, and the ending was a little too abrupt/convenient for my liking. Also, I was sad that Lynch took the easy way out in killing off Ezri -- it's the classic "death to fall in love with one of the Cartwright boys" trap. Poor Ezri should have known better.

That said - I still loved it. I like the humor, I like that Locke & Jean don't automatically triumph in every situation, that they are sometimes unwilling participants and not the best at everything, as so many fantasy heroes are portrayed. Can't wait for the next book.

Ugh. Dreadful.

The best part was right at the end where I burst out laughing as the bad guy fell to his death, screaming, "Noooooo! You can't do this! I must live!" NOT JOKING.

Once you've read a number of the Burke books, you can pretty much anticipate how it's going to play out - the roles of the usual cast of characters, if not the nuts and bolts of how this particular plot will be resolved. (Actually, this one surprised me a little in the denouement.)

I was pretty uncomfortable with Burke's relationship with Gem - her infantilization. Come to think of it, all of his relationships with women have a similar tone, if I recall correctly. I would have to go back and re-read to be sure, and honestly, I'm not sure that I'm up for it. I appreciate Vachss' commitment to the Children of the Secret, and the dedication of his main character to ridding the world of sexual predators, but I don't know that I want to re-immerse myself in Burke's world.

Although I do also appreciate how much he loves his dog.

Interesting setting (California, mainly in the first half of the 20th century), interesting time frame (covering from the end of the gunfighter era to the end of WWII), somewhat interesting characters, if rather too perfect (this is an issue I have with Diehl in other books too - see, Martin Vail in Primal Fear/Show of Evil/Reign in Hell.) Everyone is heroic, or fantastically attractive, or dazzlingly good at what they do. (Except the bad guys, who drop before the heroes' hail of bullets just like they'd read the script in advance.)

Seems like Larson was trying to do the same thing here as with The Devil in the White City - parallel stories of two historical personages/events that eventually come together. Although the intersection of Marconi (or at least Marconi's technology) and putative murderer Hawley Crippen (since this book's publication, DNA evidence has shown that the body found in Crippen's cellar was not only NOT Cora Crippen/Belle Elmore, but was in fact MALE) was a little more clear than the stories of architect Daniel Burnham & serial killer H.H. Holmes in White City, I thought the book overall was less successful.

Tough call on rating - really a 3.5, but on the high side. ;) Thomas Perry has a twisty brain, and I like that.

Strong and *believable* female characters. Charlene/Tanya/Nancy/Judith is a sociopath, but you grow to understand why she's wired that way. Detective Sergeant Catherine Hobbes is good at her job, but still finds her instincts second-guessed by her co-workers, superiors, and Joe Pitt, the private investigator hired to look into a murder Hobbes is working on, and to whom Hobbes is growing increasingly attracted, despite her best intentions. Their relationship is mature and realistic, a repeated theme of Perry's books that I appreciate.

Like most of Perry's work, Nightlife is not about bigger, better guns or faster cars; it's a battle of wills, a contest between killer and officer of the law to see which can out-think the other.

I don't remember how I happened to pick this book up - might have been prompted by a review from Powell's? - but it made me jones for an immediate trip to Italy. Still haven't made it, but if I do, you can bet this quirky little gem will be front and center for my trip planning!

I previously read one of the later John Cardinal books (Blackfly Season, I think) and remembered liking it, so when I ran across a copy of Forty Words I grabbed it.

Rather gruesome, so those who are easily squicked out should avoid. This is not a cozy mystery. John Cardinal is a detective with the Algonquin Bay police department; he is newly partnered with Lise Delorme, who has just transferred from "Special" (I think the equivalent of Internal Affairs?) and may or may not be investigating Cardinal's possible involvement in leaking advance information to a criminal about planned raids. Cardinal is in disgrace, having insisted to his superiors that a series of teen disappearances is connected and gotten booted out of the homicide division as a result. The discovery of the body of one of those missing teens gets him back in their good graces, though, and he and Delorme try to connect the cases and track down a murderer in their midst.

Interesting characters, but not very well developed. Felt like a set-up for a series (which I believe it is.)

Despite some (IMHO) overly gruesome descriptions, and also despite its obvious ripping off of Stephen King's The Stand in many ways, I ended up enjoying this more than I had expected.

One terribly picky detail - in a late part of the book, there's a bit about a horse affectionately biting a person's hand. AFAIK, that's totally wrong. The mechanics of a horse's jaw makes it so that once they have something in their mouth, they have to bite down until their mouth is almost closed before it will re-open. So they might "nibble" at clothing, or even skin, with the teeth just a tiny way apart, but if they open their mouth widely enough to take in a finger and then close down on it, that's going to HURT (and possibly result in amputation of the finger.) Plus, there seems to be remarkably little difficulty in feeding said horse, despite there being no grass for the critter to forage and one would assume little or no hay remaining 10 yrs after the holocaust. McCammon just doesn't deal with these issues -- I suspect the horse was a convenient fix for the transportation problem and he didn't think enough people would object to those pesky details to waste time figuring out a work-around.

I still can't figure out what this book was trying to be - murder mystery, psychological study, political thriller, "erotic" thriller... Whatever Thayer was trying to do with it, I don't think it succeeded at any of it. A very odd book.

SO. MUCH. FUN.

However, I'm a little distressed to find out it's book #1 of a planned 7-volume series. Fortunately, at least this one can be read as a stand-alone - the story is wrapped up completely by book's end, with only "can't wait to see what happens next to these characters", not a cliffhanger. I'll definitely be picking up the next one.

Some interesting ideas here, but internal inconsistencies and some gauche phrasing kept throwing me out of the story. It reads at times like a really young writer. Won't be running right out to get his other books.

Really annoying book, interspersed with moments of brilliance.