Fiction Review

Authors Mike Maden and James O’Donnell spent time talking with Poisoned Pen Bookstore owner Barbara Peters recently. They both wrote books about men who could be called warriors. Maden’s Tom Clancy Enemy Contact features Jack Ryan, Jr. James O’Donnell’s featuring Julius Caesar is The War for Gaul: A New Translation. Both books are available through the Web Store. https://store.poisonedpen.com

Here’s the summary of Tom Clancy Enemy Contact.

Jack Ryan, Jr.’s race to stop an international criminal conspiracy is intertwined with the fate of an old friend in this blistering entry in the #1New York Times bestselling series.

The CIA’s deepest secrets are being given away for a larger agenda that will undermine the entire Western intelligence community. Director of National Intelligence Mary Pat Foley wants it stopped but doesn’t know who, how or why.

Jack Ryan, Jr., is dispatched to Poland on a different mission. The clues are thin, and the sketchy trail dead ends in a harrowing fight from which he barely escapes with his life.

If that’s not bad enough, Jack gets more tragic news. An old friend, who’s dying from cancer, has one final request for Jack. It seems simple enough, but before it’s done, Jack will find himself alone, his life hanging by a thread. If he survives, he’ll be one step closer to finding the shadowy figure behind the CIA leak and its true purpose, but in the process, he’ll challenge the world’s most dangerous criminal syndicate with devastating consequences.

*****

Here’s James O’Donnell’s new translation of The War for Gaul.

A new translation that captures the gripping power of one of the greatest war stories ever told-Julius Caesar’s pitiless account of his brutal campaign to conquer Gaul

Imagine a book about an unnecessary war written by the ruthless general of an occupying army-a vivid and dramatic propaganda piece that forces the reader to identify with the conquerors and that is designed, like the war itself, to fuel the limitless political ambitions of the author. Could such a campaign autobiography ever be a great work of literature-perhaps even one of the greatest? It would be easy to think not, but such a book exists-and it helped transform Julius Caesar from a politician on the make into the Caesar of legend. This remarkable new translation of Caesar’s famous but underappreciatedWar for Gaulcaptures, like never before in English, the gripping and powerfully concise style of the future emperor’s dispatches from the front lines in what are today France, Belgium, Germany, and Switzerland.

While letting Caesar tell his battle stories in his own way, distinguished classicist James O’Donnell also fills in the rest of the story in a substantial introduction and notes that together explain whyGaulis the “best bad man’s book ever written”-a great book in which a genuinely bad person offers a bald-faced, amoral description of just how bad he has been.

Complete with a chronology, a map of Gaul, suggestions for further reading, and an index, this feature-rich edition captures the forceful austerity of a troubling yet magnificent classic-a book that, as O’Donnell says, “gets war exactly right and morals exactly wrong.”

*****

Here’s the event, if you’d like to watch it.

When Stephen Coonts and aviation historian Barrett Tillman appeared at The Poisoned Pen recently, they were there to bring the history of the Vietnam War to life through their book, Dragon’s Jaw. You can order a signed copy of that book through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2X6zUkG

Here’s the description of Dragon’s Jaw.

A riveting Vietnam War story–and one of the most dramatic in aviation history–told by a New York Times bestselling author and a prominent aviation historian

Every war has its “bridge”–Old North Bridge at Concord, Burnside’s Bridge at Antietam, the railway bridge over Burma’s River Kwai, the bridge over Germany’s Rhine River at Remagen, and the bridges over Korea’s Toko Ri. In Vietnam it was the bridge at Thanh Hoa, called Dragon’s Jaw.

For seven long years hundreds of young US airmen flew sortie after sortie against North Vietnam’s formidable and strategically important bridge, dodging a heavy concentration of anti-aircraft fire and enemy MiG planes. Many American airmen were shot down, killed, or captured and taken to the infamous “Hanoi Hilton” POW camp. But after each air attack, when the smoke cleared and the debris settled, the bridge stubbornly remained standing. For the North Vietnamese it became a symbol of their invincibility; for US war planners an obsession; for US airmen a testament to American mettle and valor.

Using after-action reports, official records, and interviews with surviving pilots, as well as untapped Vietnamese sources, Dragon’s Jaw chronicles American efforts to destroy the bridge, strike by bloody strike, putting readers into the cockpits, under fire. The story of the Dragon’s Jaw is a story rich in bravery, courage, audacity, and sometimes luck, sometimes tragedy. The “bridge” story of Vietnam is an epic tale of war against a determined foe.

*****

Now, you can watch Coonts and Tillman discuss the history and their book.

While I mentioned Lauren Willig’s recent appearance at The Poisoned Pn in conjunction with her book, The Summer Country, I didn’t mention the authors who appeared with her. Barbara Peters, owner of The Poisoned Pen, also welcomed Jennifer Ashley, author of Death in Kew Gardens, and Kate Carlisle, author of The Book Supremacy. And, you never know who will show up in the audience at The Pen. Authors Paige Shelton and Jenn McKinlay were in attendance, as you can hear if you listen to the YouTube video of the event. Books by all of the authors are available through the Web Store. https://store.poisonedpen.com

Because I talked about The Summer Country just yesterday for Hot Book of the Week, here’s the information about the other two books.

In the latest in this New York Times bestselling series, San Francisco book-restoration expert Brooklyn Wainwright investigates a mysterious spy novel linked to a string of murders…

Newlyweds Brooklyn and Derek are enjoying the final days of their honeymoon in Paris. As they’re browsing the book stalls along the Seine, Brooklyn finds the perfect gift for Derek, a first edition James Bond novel, The Spy Who Loved Me. When they bump into Ned, an old friend from Derek’s spy days, Brooklyn shows him her latest treasure.

Once they’re back home in San Francisco, they visit a spy shop Ned mentioned. The owner begs them to let him display the book Brooklyn found in Paris as part of the shop’s first anniversary celebration. Before they agree, Derek makes sure the security is up to snuff—turns out, the unassuming book is worth a great deal more than sentimental value.

Soon after, Derek is dismayed when he receives a mysterious letter from Paris announcing Ned’s death. Then late one night, someone is killed inside the spy shop. Are the murders connected to Brooklyn’s rare, pricey book? Is there something even more sinister afoot? Brooklyn and the spy who loves her will have to delve into the darkest parts of Derek’s past to unmask an enemy who’s been waiting for the chance to destroy everything they hold dear.

*****

From the New York Times bestselling author of Scandal Above Stairs

Kat Holloway steps out from beneath the stairs and into international intrigue, where murder and stolen treasure lurk among the upper echelons of Victorian London.

In return for a random act of kindness, scholar Li Bai Chang presents young cook Kat Holloway with a rare and precious gift—a box of tea. Kat thinks no more of her unusual visitor until two days later when the kitchen erupts with the news that Lady Cynthia’s next-door neighbor has been murdered.

Known about London as an “Old China Hand,” the victim claimed to be an expert in the language and customs of China, acting as intermediary for merchants and government officials. But Sir Jacob’s dealings were not what they seemed, and when the authorities accuse Mr. Li of the crime, Kat and Daniel find themselves embroiled in a world of deadly secrets that reach from the gilded homes of Mayfair to the beautiful wonder of Kew Gardens.

*****

If you would like to hear more, watch the fun video.

Lauren Willig was just at The Poisoned Pen, so she had an opportunity to sign the current Hot Book of the Week. The Summer Country is her latest novel. You can order her books, including signed copies of The Summer Country, through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2WAJa0W

Here’s the description of The Summer Country.

A brilliant, multigenerational saga in the tradition of THE THORN BIRDS and NORTH AND SOUTH, New York Times bestselling historical novelist Lauren Willig delivers her biggest, boldest, and most ambitious novel yet—a sweeping Victorian epic of lost love, lies, jealousy, and rebellion set in colonial Barbados.

Barbados, 1854: Emily Dawson has always been the poor cousin in a prosperous English merchant clan– merely a vicar’s daughter, and a reform-minded vicar’s daughter, at that. Everyone knows that the family’s lucrative shipping business will go to her cousin, Adam, one day.  But when her grandfather dies, Emily receives an unexpected inheritance: Peverills, a sugar plantation in Barbados—a plantation her grandfather never told anyone he owned. 

When Emily accompanies her cousin and his new wife to Barbados, she finds Peverills a burnt-out shell, reduced to ruins in 1816, when a rising of enslaved people sent the island up in flames. Rumors swirl around the derelict plantation; people whisper of ghosts.

Why would her practical-minded grandfather leave her a property in ruins?  Why are the neighboring plantation owners, the Davenants, so eager to acquire Peverills? The answer lies in the past— a tangled history of lies, greed, clandestine love, heartbreaking betrayal, and a bold bid for freedom.

THE SUMMER COUNTRY will beguile readers with its rendering of families, heartbreak, and the endurance of hope against all odds. 

Perhaps Martin Walker’s Bruno, Chief of Police novels are not as well known in the United States as they are in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. In his recent conversation with Barbara Peters, owner of The Poisoned Pen, he comments that last year’s title is currently #1 on the bestseller lists in all three of those countries. However, American readers are lucky enough to have the new one available, The Body in the Castle Well. Walker was at the Pen recently to discuss his books with Peters. You can find copies of the books, including signed copies of The Body in the Castle Well, in the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2ynMUXE

Here’s the description of the latest Bruno book.

An aging art scholar and a visiting student, haunting echoes of France’s colonialist past, and a delicious navarin of lamb–Bruno is back, and his latest case leads him from the Renaissance to the French Resistance and beyond by way of a corpse at the bottom of a well.

When Claudia, a young American, turns up dead in the courtyard of an ancient castle in Bruno’s jurisdiction, her death is assumed to be an accident related to opioid use. But her doctor persuades Bruno that things may not be so simple. Thus begins an investigation that leads Bruno to Monsieur de Bourdeille, the scholar with whom the girl had been studying, and then through that man’s past. He is a renowned art historian who became extraordinarily wealthy through the sale of paintings that may have been falsely attributed–or so Claudia suggested shortly before her death. In his younger days, Bourdeille had aided the Resistance and been arrested by a Vichy policeman whose own life story also becomes inexorably entangled with the case. Also in the mix is a young falconer who works at the Château des Milandes, the former home of fabled jazz singer Josephine Baker. In the end, of course, Bruno will tie all the loose threads together and see that justice is served–along with a generous helping of his signature Périgordian cuisine.

*****

Whenever you have time, you might enjoy the Martin Walker event at The Poisoned Pen.

Tuesday, June 11 is release date for Michael Stanley’s latest book from Sourcebooks/Poisoned Pen Press, Shoot the Bastards. Authors Stanley Trollip and Michael Sears set their books in Africa. In this one, they introduce a new protagonist. You can order copies of their books, including Shoot the Bastards, through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2Mwmkml

The authors were recently interviewed for the International Thriller Writers’ magazine, The Big Thrill. You can catch Dawn Ius’ interview with them here. https://bit.ly/2K2496c

Here’s the summary of Michael Stanley’s Shoot the Bastards.

“From Minnesota to South Africa to Mozambique to Vietnam, Michael Stanley’s Shoot the Bastards is an extraordinary tale of the extreme measures taken to combat international poaching and smuggling.”—C.J. Box, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Wolf Pack

The black market feeds all appetites…

The dark winter nights of Minnesota seem to close in on investigative journalist Crystal Nguyen as she realizes that her close friend Michael Davidson has disappeared while researching a story on rhino poaching and rhino-horn smuggling in Africa. Crystal, fearing the worst, wrangles her own assignment on the continent. Within a week in Africa she’s been hunting poachers (“Shoot the bastards,” she’s told), hunted by their bosses, and questioned in connection with a murder—and there’s still no sign of Michael.

Crystal quickly realizes how little she knows about Africa and about the war between poachers and conservation officers. What she does know is she must find Michael, and she’s committed to preventing a major plot to secure a huge number of horns… but exposing the financial underworld supporting the rhino-horn market is only half the battle. Equally important is convincing South African authorities to take action before it’s too late—for the rhinos, and for Crystal.

Michael Stanley, author of the award-winning Detective Kubu Mysteries series, introduces an intriguing new protagonist while exposing one of southern Africa’s most vicious conflicts in Shoot the Bastards.

Private Eye Writers of America just announced the nominees for the 2019 Shamus Awards, for works published in 2018. The winners will be announced at the PWA banquet at Bouchercon in October. Check the Web Store if you’re looking for these titles. https://store.poisonedpen.com

Congratulations to all of the nominees.

Best First Private Eye Novel

The Best Bad Things by Katrina Carrasco 

Broken Places by Tracy Clark

Last Looks by Howard Michael Gould

What Doesn’t Kill You by Aimee Hix

Only to Sleep by Lawrence Osborne

Best Private Eye Short Story 

“Fear of the Secular,” by Mitch Alderman, AHMM

“Three-Star Sushi,” by Barry Lancet, Down & Out

“The Big Creep,” by Elizabeth McKenzie, Santa Cruz Noir

“Game,” by Twist Phelan, EQMM

“Chin Yong-Yun Helps a Fool,” by S.J. Rozan, EQMM

 Best Private Eye Novel 

Wrong Light by Matt Coyle

What You Want to See by Kristen Lepionka

The Widows of Malabar Hill by Sujata Massey

Baby’s First Felony by John Straley

Cut You Down by Sam Wiebe

Best Original Private Eye Paperback

She Talks to Angels by James D.F. Hannah

No Quarter by John Jantunen

Shark Bait by Paul Kemprecos

Second Story Man by Charles Salzberg

The Questionable Behavior of Dahlia Moss by Max Wirestone

Saturday tea at The Poisoned Pen is special, a time to listen to authors, have books signed, and enjoy the tea and baked goods by John Charles. It’s 2 PM this Saturday, June 8.

This Saturday, tea is with Jennifer Ashley, Kate Carlisle, and Lauren
Willig.

Ashley, Jennifer. Death in Kew Gardens (Berkley $15 June 8). This is a truly terrific Upstairs/Downstairs Victorian London mystery with evil housekeepers, a surprisingly stalwart butler, the murder of Sir Jacob-a mad collector of all things Chinese including plants, visits to Kew
Gardens, a Chinese gentlemen on a quest, and wonderful depictions of the meals prepared by Kat Holloway, the cook.  The third in the Death
Below Stairs series begins when Kat Holloway bowls over a Chinese
dressed in gorgeous but dirty silk while on her way home from market.Later that night when she steps out to share leftovers among the poor down the street, he appears and presents her with a beautiful box filledwith tea. Two days later when the kitchen erupts with the news that
Lady Cynthia’s next-door neighbor has been murdered. Known about
London as an “Old China Hand,” Sir Jacob claimed to be an expert in
the language and customs of China, acting as intermediary for
merchants and government officials. He also had a passion for plants
and frequented Kew Gardens. But Sir Jacob’s dealings were not what
they seemed, and when the authorities accuse Mr. Li of the crime, Kat,
the household, and her interesting friend Daniel find themselves
embroiled in a world of deadly secrets that reach from the gilded
homes of Mayfair to the beautiful wonder of the gardens. Read the
whole series

Carlisle, Kate. The Book Supremacy (Berkley $25 June 8). Here is lucky #13 in the Bibliophile Series. Newlyweds Brooklyn and Derek are enjoying the final days of their honeymoon in Paris. As they’re browsing the book stalls along the Seine, Brooklyn finds the perfect gift for Derek, a first edition James Bond novel, The Spy Who Loved Me. When they bump into Ned, an old friend from Derek’s spy days, Brooklyn shows him her latest treasure. Once they’re back home in San Francisco, they visit a spy shop Ned mentioned. The owner begs them to let him display the book Brooklyn found in Paris as part of the shop’s first anniversary celebration. Before they agree, Derek makes sure the security is up to snuff-turns out, the unassuming book is worth a great deal more than sentimental value. Soon after, Derek is dismayed when he receives a mysterious letter from Paris announcing Ned’s death. Then late one night, someone is killed inside the spy shop. Are the murders connected to Brooklyn’s rare, pricey book?

Willig, Lauren. The Summer Country (Harper $26.99 June 8). Willig has written many sorts of books, all rooted in history-she’s a meticulous researcher. She has outdone herself with a book she describes as her “full out M. M. Kaye” (one of my favorite authors who did the British Empire well). It takes you to Barbados where English sugar barons and local planters wrested fortunes from the cane and their slaves. She bookends her two-track tale with the fiery rebellion of 1816 on the island and the lead up to it from 1812, and with the cholera epidemic that struck in 1854. I learned so much from both (excellent Appendix with sources) along with following the absorbing narrative. It opens in 1854: Emily Dawson has always been the poor cousin in a prosperous English merchant clan-merely a vicar’s daughter, and a reform-minded vicar’s daughter, at that. Everyone knows that the family’s lucrative shipping business will go to her cousin, Adam, one day. But when her grandfather dies, Emily receives an unexpected inheritance: Peverills, a sugar plantation in Barbados-a plantation her grandfather never told anyone he owned. When Emily accompanies her cousin and his new wife to Barbados, she finds Peverills a burnt-out shell, reduced to ruins in 1816, when a rising of enslaved people sent the island up in flames. Rumors swirl around the derelict plantation; people whisper of ghosts. Why would her practical-minded grandfather leave her a property in ruins? Why are the neighboring plantation owners, the Davenants, so eager to acquire Peverills? As we zigzag from one set of characters to the other, we find out. This excellent standalone is not truly mystery but is so rich, moving, and relevant to today that it is our June Historical Book of the Month.

*****

If you can’t make it on Saturday, you can still order a signed copy of any or all of the books through the Web Store. https://store.poisonedpen.com

The current Hot Book of the Week at The Poisoned Pen is poet Ocean Vuong’s debut novel, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous. There are signed copies of the novel available through the Web Store. https://bit.ly/2KAke2v

Here’s the description of On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous.

Named one of the most anticipated books of 2019 by Vulture, Entertainment Weekly, Buzzfeed, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, Oprah.com, Huffington Post, The A.V. Club, Nylon, The Week, The Rumpus, The Millions, The Guardian, Publishers Weekly, and more.

“A lyrical work of self-discovery that’s shockingly intimate and insistently universal…Not so much briefly gorgeous as permanently stunning.” —Ron Charles, The Washington Post

Poet Ocean Vuong’s debut novel is a shattering portrait of a family, a first love, and the redemptive power of storytelling

On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is a letter from a son to a mother who cannot read. Written when the speaker, Little Dog, is in his late twenties, the letter unearths a family’s history that began before he was born — a history whose epicenter is rooted in Vietnam — and serves as a doorway into parts of his life his mother has never known, all of it leading to an unforgettable revelation. At once a witness to the fraught yet undeniable love between a single mother and her son, it is also a brutally honest exploration of race, class, and masculinity. Asking questions central to our American moment, immersed as we are in addiction, violence, and trauma, but undergirded by compassion and tenderness, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is as much about the power of telling one’s own story as it is about the obliterating silence of not being heard. 

With stunning urgency and grace, Ocean Vuong writes of people caught between disparate worlds, and asks how we heal and rescue one another without forsaking who we are. The question of how to survive, and how to make of it a kind of joy, powers the most important debut novel of many years.

On Thursday, June 6 at 7 PM, author Robin Burcell hosts David Ricciardi, author of Rogue Strike and Matt Goldman, author of The Shallows. Copies of both books are available through the Web Store. https://store.poisonedpen.com

However, today it’s Robin Burcell’s book that I would like to mention. Burcell is Clive Cussler’s co-author of The Oracle, the eleventh Sam and Remi Fargo adventure. Release date is June 11, and it’s available for pre-order. https://bit.ly/2WhpwlG

Here is the recent review of The Oracle, published in Publishers Weekly.

“In the prologue of bestseller Cussler’s exceptional 11th Sam and Remi Fargo adventure (after 2018’s The Gray Ghost, also coauthored with Burcell), Gelimer, the king of the Vandals, consults an oracle in a North African town in 533 C.E. Gelimer must retrieve a stolen scroll and return it to its rightful owner if his kingdom is to survive. The kingdom falls before he can find the scroll, whose location remains a mystery until the present day, when some clues turn up in an archaeological dig sponsored by Sam and Remi’s foundation. Meanwhile, the theft of a shipment of supplies to the girls’ school the Fargos support in Nigeria prompts the couple to travel from California to Africa to deliver replacement supplies. The subsequent kidnapping of Remi and some of the school girls by robbers appears to be related to the missing scroll. Witty dialogue, loads of detail about the local culture and food, and plenty of red herrings will delight Cussler fans. This entry may be the best yet in the series.”