I'm not Scared

This 200+ page book, written by Niccolo Ammaniti in 2001 and translated from the Italian by Jonathan Hunt in 2003, was made into a movie of the same name in 2004. Our narrator, 9-year old Michele, lives in a cluster of four poor houses in rural southern Italy that doesn't even qualify as a village. In the nearby mansion, owned by the local landowner and lawyer, lives Salvatore, Michele's best friend. The gang of local kids are pretty much on their own that summer in 1978 when a record setting heat wave drives all the adults to hibernate indoors during the day while the kids get up to whatever will hold the boredom at bay. As the book opens, they have ridden their bikes quite a ways from home and are now in a race, masterminded by 12-year old bully "Skull," to the top of a hill. When Michele's little sister falls and hurts her foot, he stops to help, knowing he will lose the race and pay the forfeit. This turns out to be a dare to enter a derelict farmhouse. In the process he discovers what he originally believes to be a dead boy lying in a hole dug behind the house. He tells no one, but must return to find out if the boy is really dead. He looks barely human now: naked, caked with dirt, wrapped in a filthy blanket and using a bucket for a toilet. Michele tries to tell his father about the boy, but is rebuffed by the father's concerns with the impending arrival of a wealthy visitor. The man arrives, the adults of the small village convene at Michele's house and argue late into the night. Eavesdropping on the arguments, Michele begins to confirm his earlier suspicions that someone in his family is involved in the boy's situation. From the TV, which Michele surreptitiously watches while the adults are glued to the news, we learn the boy has been kidnapped from wealthy parents up north who are desperately trying to put together the ransom money. As things progress, Michele tries to help the boy with food and water, then to escape, but he is too weak to walk and too terrified to leave the hole. When Michele hears the adults plan to kill the boy, he knows he has to get him away somehow. A brutal loss of innocence is at the heart of this thriller. The relationships between the children are painfully accurate. The descriptions of the Italian countryside, the heat, the kidnapped boy, and the adult treachery are exquisitely wrought. A review of the book by Michael Dibden, author of the Zen novels, was published in The Guardian.

Addendum: I rented this movie from Netflix (Italian with English subtitles) and it was very well-done...lovely cinematography and good acting. They followed the storyline pretty closely as well. 

Hyperbole and a Half

Based on a blog by the same name written by Allie Brosh, this was written up in our local paper and my curiosity compelled me to reserve it at the library. Funny, often painfully so as when she talks about her depression, and often uproariously so as when she talks about her dogs (Simple Dog and Helper Dog) or the attack of the stray goose. I am not sure this has converted me to being a regular consumer of the blog, but the book was well worth the time--had me occasionally laughing out loud and all of us can use a little of that! There is an interview on NPR with Allie Brosh about the book here.

Robert B. Parker's Wonderland: A Spenser Novel

Having read just about every Spenser novel Parker ever wrote, I was understandably a bit dubious about Ace Atkins (the estate's selected author to carry on the Spenser series) matching up to Parker's wit and style. Nevertheless, it was a respectable effort and I enjoyed the book. Zebulon Sixkill is very present as Spenser's "apprentice" and Hawk is noticeably absent, ostensibly on a job in Florida. Henry Cimoli, former boxer, coach and now upscale health club owner, has never asked Spenser for a favor, so when he tells Spenser that some thugs are trying to pressure the owners in his condo building into selling, Spenser promises to get to the bottom of it. Along the way, Zebulon, called "Z" by his friends, gets badly beaten and falls back to drinking, although not irretrievably so. Susan shows up periodically from a teaching gig in South Carolina to dispense wisdom and keep Spenser on the straight and narrow. There are big players vying to buy up property and win the gaming license on the outskirts of Boston at the old Wonderland dog racing track. Henry's condo occupies a prime waterfront spot adjacent, hence the heavy muscle that shows up from Vegas. The biggest bidder from Las Vegas loses his head--literally, people are kidnapped, and Spenser eventually wins through in the end. There's nothing new or earth shattering here, but a venerable tradition has been carried on and for that, as a hard core fan, I am grateful.

Blood Orange Brewing

A totally fluffy book in Laura Childs' "Tea Shop Mysteries" series, as an antidote to reading The Goldfinch. I had read one other book in the series and love the descriptions of the city of Charleston, SC--the architecture and social customs in particular--as well as her lavish descriptions of tea and food. There are always several scrumptious sounding recipes included in the book, much like Diane Mott Davidson's books about caterer Goldy Schulz. In addition to running the Indigo Tea Shop, Theodosia Browning is also an amateur sleuth. She agrees to casually look into things when the husband of Pookie Wilkes is murdered at a candlelight concert to raise money for the Heritage Foundation. Theo stumbles into a secret room in the house where the murder happens, discovers the murder weapon came from the inventory of the Heritage Society, and show up on the scene of a second murder just minutes after the murderer has fled. Apparently someone thinks Theo is getting too close and they dognap her beloved Earl Grey, which only drives Theo to greater efforts to figure out what is going on. The bad guys are caught, Earl Grey is rescued, and lives return to normal.

The Goldfinch

This novel by Donna Tartt has been on a lot of bestseller lists. The painting at the center of this story is a real one that was on display at the Frick last fall. In the story, 13 year old Theo Decker and his mother had taken a side trip to MOMA on their way to a meeting with Theo's teachers at school. Just after they had viewed the painting in question, Theo's mom moves away to another part of the gallery while Theo lingers to ponder an intriguing red-headed girl, who has been making eye contact throughout their somewhat parallel wanderings through the museum. Suddenly a bomb explodes and life is changed forever for Theo. Immediately after the blast, Theo crawls toward the older man who had been accompanying the red-hair girl. The dying man hands Theo a ring and gives him a somewhat garbled message. As Theo crawls through the rubble, he finds the painting lying on the floor and "rescues" it. After all his losses, though, Theo cannot bring himself to return the famous painting and he becomes a captive to it, just as the subject bird is shown chained. Theo temporarily lands at the home of a school chum, but life takes another bad turn when Theo's gambler, alcoholic father shows up to take him to Las Vegas. Theo makes his way back to Manhattan when his father dies in a drunken car wreck and hooks up with the partner of the deceased man at the museum. He continues to make bad decisions, a legacy of his father, not his mother. I admit I skipped about 150 pages and jumped to the last chapter of this 700+ page book, because it was due back at the library. Her writing is beautiful with captivating imagery and detail. The story is heartbreaking; so much damage and opportunity lost. I wouldn't seek out other books by this author, but obviously a lot of people liked this work...see the comments here.

A Secret Rage

Charlaine Harris is the author of the Sookie Stackhouse (vampire) series, as well as several others--not all of which include supernatural beings (e.g., Shakespeare series, Teagarden series). In this novel, fashion model Nickie  has just been told by her agent that she is past her prime at the tender age of 27. She decides to accept the invitation of  BFF, Mimi, to move home and share a big rambling house left by Mimi's grandmother. Knolls, TN has a small college and Nickie is going to finish her bachelor's degree and get her novels published. A series of rapes, which include Nickie's, quickly dispel the sense of homecoming and safety. When the rapes escalate to murder, no woman in town feels safe. Nickie and one of the other rape victims, a professor at the university decide to solve this mystery on their own and have narrowed the list down to just a handful of names--none of whom seem to be the kind of person who could commit such heinous crimes. Nickie's long-standing and unrequited crush on Mimi's older brother is realized and, of course, the women triumph in the end. Good characters, well-developed southern setting (a specialty of Harris'), and fast-moving and tension filled plot all make this a very readable book.

Etiquette and Espionage

This is the first in Gail Carriger's "Finishing School" series for young adults...like her adult "Parasol Protectorate" series for adults in that it's the same setting, only 25 years earlier, i.e., Victorian England, steampunk society where werewolves and vampires are accepted--if not universally admired--segments of high society. (See previous reviews for Soulless, Timeless, Changeless, Blameless, Heartless). Our protagonist is Sophronia Angelina Temminnick, the youngest daughter of a landed country family, who is too much of a tomboy, too curious about how things work, and, hence too troublesome for her mother's taste. At the suggestion of one of Mrs. Temminnick's close acquaintances, Mrs. Barnaclegoose (Carriger loves goofing with names), Sophronia is to be sent off to Mademoiselle Geraldine's Finishing Academy for Young Ladies of Quality. What Mrs. Temminnick does not know, and Sophronia only gradually finds out, is that this is a very different kind of finishing school--one that teaches deadly skills with a knife as well as mastering the perfect curtsy or fluttering one's eyelashes to manipulative ends. To top it off,  the finishing school floats above the moors in an elaborate contrivance of joined dirigibles. Sophronia, though not a legacy recruit, takes to her lessons with relish and manages to learn a few things that are definitely NOT part of the curriculum. Like climbing around the outside of the school (high above the ground) in order to skirt the alarmed mechanicals and get to the boiler room, where she meets the "sooties" and procurs coal supplies for her not-exactly-permitted pet mechanimal (which resembes a dachsund run by a miniatures boiler).  This is totally enjoyable for those who like this genre and not so "young" that adult won't be challenged to figure out what's going on. Highly recommended.

Scarlet

This is Book 2 in Marissa Meyer's "Lunar Chronicles" series, preceded by Cinder. I am officially hooked. I really like the cyborg heroine of the first book and, although she plays a secondary role here, she is, in fact, the driver for the whole series. Cinder, an outcast because she is cyborg in a world of humans, finds out at the end of the first book that she is also the missing Lunar princess, Selene. People have been trying to find her for years, and if Queen Levana does find her, she will finish what she started when she tried to kill her as a toddler. Selene is the rightful heir to the Lunar empire.  Levana has made the moon her launching place for a planned takeover of earth and only Cinder/Selene has ANY hope of stopping her. Scarlet, the title character, gets involved because the kidnapping of her grandmother 3 weeks ago, is tied up with Levana finding Cinder. Her grandmother helped rescue the infant princess and now Levana's minions will torture her and anyone dear to her in order to find out what she knows about Princess Selene's location. There has been a little breakdown in communication, though, because Cinder inadvertently revealed herself to Levana at Emperor Kai's coronation ball. Captured, imprisoned and slated for execution, Cinder is an internationally wanted fugitive. She escaped from prison by using her newly available lunar powers of manipulating bioelectricity--she can manage people's perceptions and feelings. If you have seen any of the Star Wars movies, you are familiar with the tactic exercised by Obi-Wan Kanobi. Along the way, she hooks up with another fugitive who just happens to "own" (OK maybe he borrowed it from the U.S. military) a large star ship. Throw in some lunar super soldiers who have been hiding in plain sight--a bit like werewolves-- and you have a rousing good adventure tale. Will Emperor Kai cave in and marry Levana to stop the bloodshed, even though he knows she plans to kill him? I can hardly wait for the next in the series, Cress, due to come out this year.