Published 2017
Joe Picket is in a small aircraft looking for a presumably lost hunter as part of his job as Game Warden in Wyoming. What Joe fears is that Dave Farkus, the hunter in question, is running for his life in the woods that he knows so well. Farkus had left Joe a message regarding a man whom Joe had put behind bars, but who has come back to Saddlestring in the last few days. Farkus sees Dallas Cates with two other men and a woman in a bar he frequents. Dave has been trying to hook up with the bartender, Wanda, for years now, but to no avail. Joe knows that Farkus isn’t lost; he knows the woods too well. But his camping buddy reported him missing when he arrives at camp, a cold beer still in the arm rest, and Dave’s gun left behind, like he left in a hurry. What happens next lets Joe know that he, his family and friends are all in danger now that Cates is back in town.
Joe can’t blame the man for wanting to get revenge. It was all because of Joe that Dallas lost his career as a rodeo star, ending up in prison. But Dallas also blames Joe for the death of his father, his brother, and for sending his mother to the pen as a quadriplegic. Joe feels somewhat guilty about all of that. It was self-defense, but nevertheless, he can see the man’s point of view. When Joe’s daughters are threatened he knows he will do whatever it takes to save his family from Cates’ revenge.
Meanwhile, Joe is looking for a well-organized ring of poachers. For months now he’s gotten reports of animals killed out of season and without permits but so far he hasn’t caught up with them. By the time he reaches the site all that is left is tire tracks and kill guts.
This book was a quick read because I kept wondering what would happen next. Lots of action in this tale of the wild, wild west. This is the first of CJ Box’s novels that I’ve read, but will definitely read more.
The Name of the Wind, by Patrick Rothfuss
Published 2007
I really enjoyed reading this book. It reminds me of reading Heinlein when I was younger, and the Dune trilogy. Mr. Rothfuss does not mind taking his time in the telling of his story, which is fine, since it’s a good one. It’s a very imaginative tale about Kvothe (sounds like ‘quothe’) who is at the time we meet him the owner of The Waystone Inn. He goes by the name ‘Kote’ and seems to be trying to leave his former life behind. But it comes searching for him in the form of a spider-like beast which attacks one of the townsfolk, killing his horse. When the man staggers into the Inn after the attack, Kote knows that there will be more of the monsters and prepares for battle. All the while, he keeps what he knows about them to himself. Shortly afterwards a traveler known as ‘The Chronicler’ arrives at the inn and confronts Kote with his past. But all Chronicler wants is his story, and is will to play along with the disguise, a harmless innkeeper in an out of the way place in the Commonwealth, to get it.
Of course it’s magical. Another world dreamed up by Rothfuss. With shades of Harry Potter and the Lord of the Rings, it’s set in another world altogether. Kvothe grew up as part of a travelling minstrel troupe, his father being the head of it. At a very young age, his first teacher, Abenthy, Ben for short, joins the troupe. He was what they call an ‘arcanist’ which I guess is a combination tinker, doctor and magician all rolled into one. As they travelled from town to town Ben taught Kvothe much of what he had learned at University, finding him an extraordinary pupil. So much so, that he suspends his training after Kvothe tries some spells which almost kill him. Ben leaves the group shortly afterwards and a good thing too, since very soon, the Chandrian attack while Kvothe is away, killing everyone and burning the campsite with their tell-tale blue flames. Kvothe returns and is almost killed too, but the Chandrian retreat, leaving him alone in the burned out forest camp site. Kvothe, an orphan and utterly alone, makes his way to the streets of a nearby town, Tarbean, where he manages to survive by pickpocketing, stealing, and staying away from the law and the gangs who are his enemies as well. After three years of living on the streets a bit of luck brings enough money to get him out of town, and on his way to University himself, where unfortunately, more enemies await. His goal since the death of his parents has been to find out about the Chandrian, whose name he has known all along as part of childhood rhymes and songs, but about whom no one has any real information. Why did they attack his troupe in particular, and not others? Kvothe will study at the University, developing his skills as an arcanist and finding out whatever he can about the murderers.
Most of the story is told by Kote in the form of narration to the Chronicler as they sit in the deserted Waystone Inn. It’s a long book, over 650 pages, and the story doesn’t really end there. Searching Rothfuss’ website I see there are 2 other books in the series. I look forward to reading them both.
The Moth Catcher, by Ann Cleeves
Published 2015
Characters: Vera Stanhope, detective
Holly and Joe, her asssistants
Lizzie Redhead, a young offender whose parents live in the converted farmhouse near where the murders take place
Percy, a local man is driving home from the pub when he stops to answer the call of nature. Off the side of the road he finds the body of a young man, a house-sitter for the big house, Gilswick Hall, whose owners are visiting Australia where they are about to become grand-parents. Vera Stanhope arrives on the scene and then takes Percy to the home he shares with his daughter Susan. She goes into the big house once a week to clean and has a key, which Vera takes, and with Joe they head to the house itself for clues to the identity of the deceased. They let themselves in through the kitchen and explore the area, only to find the body of another, older man in the apartment where the house sitter lived. Both of these men turn out to be avid students of moths and at first the team can find no other connection between the two. The nearest inhabitants to the crime scene are some retired couples who live in an old farm house that’s been converted to modern apartments. Lizzie Redhead’s parents live in one apartment and they are anxiously awaiting her return home from prison. Lizzie had served time for attacking a young woman with a knife and her parents are understandably uneasy about having her back home with them, although they love their daughter, they don’t know how to handle her. She was locked up when the murders took place, but she may have known the killer.
The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton
Published 2013
This is a long story, over 700 pages, which takes place in New Zealand during the time of the gold rush. As one might imagine there’s plenty of wheeling and dealing and added to it are some tales of the opium trade, its origins in China and a few of the men, both English and Chinese, who were caught up in it there. In this story they brought the trade with them to New Zealand.
What a tangled web the lust for gold is in Catton’s story. Walter Moody, a well-educated young man from England, is newly arrived on the coast and has had a very rough crossing, one so rough he feels lucky to be alive. Still stunned by the ordeal and by a man, phantom or real, he still can’t make out, he makes his way to the smoking room at the Crown Hotel. Unbeknownst to him, a dozen local men have gathered for a meeting about the death of Crosbie Wells, a local hermit. At the same time the wealthy prospector Emory Stains has disappeared and is feared dead. On the same day Anna Wetherell, the most popular whore in town is beaten so severely she collapses and ends up in jail, which it turns out is a far better place to be than the local hospital. A fortune in gold is found Crosbie Wells’ cabin after his death, and a smaller amount of gold is found sewn into the seams of Anna’s dress. Moody learns bits and pieces of the story and gets drawn into it further by relating that he was brought to shore by a ship captained by Francis Carver, who was Emory Staines’ business partner. The characters are inviting and the story kept me looking forward to my next chapter.
Ms. Catton includes in the book illustrations and mentions of astrological signs and meanings that I admit were completely lost on me. I know that for someone who keeps up with astrology more than I do, the novel would take on a whole new depth of meaning, but I managed to enjoy the book immensely without it.
The Last Templar, by Raymond Khoury
Published 2005
Since the publication of Dan Brown’s The DaVinci Code, any book mentioning the Knights Templar is bound to intrigue. The story begins with the fall of Acre and the Templar’s last stand in the holy city in 1291. A band of knights escapes from the battle carrying a small chest wrapped in velvet, its contents a well-kept secret, even from all but a few of the Templars themselves. They make their way to the Falcon Temple, a galley ship waiting in the harbor.
Moving forward to the 21st century, four horsemen dressed as Templars ride out of Central Park and into, literally, the Metropolitan Museum of Art where, guns blazing, still astride their horses, they steal several of the items on display at a special showing of Treasures of the Vatican. Witnessing the theft of an unusual object from behind untouched exhibits, Tess Chaykin, is terrified. After the fact, and reunited with her daughter and mother, who had been in the ladies’ room during the commotion, Tess is intrigued. The daughter of a well-known archeologist, and a trained archeologist herself Tess begins to wonder why this particular object was taken.
Sean Reilly is the FBI agent in charge of the investigation. When he questions Tess regarding the incident he realizes that she is holding back something, but doesn’t know what. Tess calls on experts she knows in the field and discovers that the object taken from the exhibit was an encoder, an ingenious device which the Templars used to code messages making them indecipherable to anyone else, even within the Catholic Church. What she and Reilly find out later is that one of the horsemen has discovered one of these messages and needs the device to break the code. Meanwhile the other three horsemen are dropping dead like flies, presumably killed by their leader.
The story continues to flash back to the events immediately after the knight’s escape from Jerusalem in 1291, the path of a small band of knights, the sinking of the Falcon Temple during a storm, the enigmatic reason behind the Knight Templar’s rise to power and subsequent fall. Tess and Reilly, for different reasons, try to stay a step ahead of the lone horseman’s quest to unearth the mysteries of that last ill-fated journey out of the holy land.
The High Mountains of Portugal, by Yann Martel
Published 2016
This is a story which takes place over several decades, starting in December, 1904. At the beginning we meet Tomas, who is on a mission to find a religious relic created by Father Ulisses in the seventeenth century. This mission masks the devastation Tomas suffered when he lost his lover and their son, as well as his father, all within one week. From that time onwards, Tomas has walked backwards wherever he goes. It is a protest against a fate so cruel that he feels his soul has perished. Finding the relic will be give him purpose, prestige as a curator at the Museum in Lisbon. It will give him a reason to live. Tomas starts out on his journey by visiting his wealthy uncle, the older brother of his father. His uncle has provided Tomas with an automobile, one of the first in the country, in which to make his journey. When Tomas realized he has to drive the contraption himself, he almost gives up the quest. But having nothing else to live for he carries on, struggling with the automobile and with the crowds who gather to see it. He encounters flat tires, fires, an ongoing search for fuel in a country not prepared for auto travel. He develops a ruse to keep the people from knowing he has an automobile. Whenever he approaches a town, he parks the vehicle outside the city, walks in and says he needs to buy moto-naptha for some horses infested with lice, the product being used mostly for that purpose. Poor Tomas suffers onward and achieves his quest, he finds the relic in a small town in the mountains of Portugal, but when his goal is almost within reach he accidentally kills a small boy with the horrid automobile and so his victory has caused him more grief than he can bear.
The next section of the book begins on the last day of December 1948, with Eusebio, a hospital pathologist in a town not far from Tomas’ church containing the relic. He is working late on his autopsy notes when his wife Maria knocks on the door of his study. Maria is very religious and she wants to explain to her husband how she has found a relationship between the writings of Agatha Christie, whom they both admire, and their Savior, Jesus of Nazareth. After his wife leaves, another knock comes on the door, this time of another Maria, who bears the body of her husband in a suitcase. As it turns out, they are the parents of the child that Tomas has accidentally killed with his uncle’s automobile. This second Maria requests that Eusebio perform an autopsy on her husband, even though she knows that he has died of grief for their only child.
In the last part of the book begins in 1981 with Peter Tovy, a Canadian politician. Peter has a happy life until his wife becomes ill and shortly thereafter dies. His son and daughter-in-law divorce and Peter becomes estranged from his family. While in the midst of his grief over his wife’s death Peter takes a trip to Oklahoma, to the zoo. But the zoo is unfortunately closed for renovation so the administrator tells him of a chimpanzee refuge not far away. Peter visits and is compelled to buy one of the mail chimps, a very laid back primate named Odo. Having made arrangements to pick up the ape in a couple of weeks Peter realizes that he will have to move from Canada and decides to go to Portugal, the country where he was born before his parents immigrated to Canada when he was two years old.
This was a very strange story, told over several decades but the author tells an intriguing story. There is much more to it than just odd behavior like walking backwards, or even buying a chimp while on vacation. There is grief throughout but also humor and imagination intertwined with simple lives in the High Mountains of Portugal