“Losing Earth.” Nathaniel Rich, author, with photographs by George Steinmetz (NY Times Magazine, 8/5/2018). All of the above are fiction. There’s nothing fictional about global warming and its resulting extreme weather events we’re currently experiencing. This is the first time I review a magazine article, but it’s important. I’d have called it “Murdering Gaia.”

The article covers ten years of world history, 1979—1989, describing how science defined the “greenhouse effect” from atmospheric CO2 and how it leads to extreme climatological events. This disaster can’t be simply described as “global warming,” and it’s NOT a hoax.

The article also describes how politicians (mostly Reagan and Papa Bush and their minions), energy companies and their lobbyists, and, yes, even corrupt scientists failed to do a damn thing about it. Motivated by pressures from many sectors who preferred immediate gains to saving the future of generations to come—indeed, creating the distinct possibility that life on our planet will end as Earth becomes a planet like Venus where 800 degree surface temperatures are caused by a CO2 atmosphere—they went about murdering Gaia.

And no one has done anything sense. More carbon has been released into the atmosphere since 1989 than in the entire preceding history of civilization.

Everyone should read this article. There’s a small possibility we can still save the planet enough that future generations can live by adapting to the extremes. It’s time for everyone to rise up and take action. The future for life on Earth is at stake.

***

Gaia and the Goliaths. #7 in the “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco Series,” this novel has murdering Gaia as a theme, both figuratively and literally. Gaia Papadakis, an environmental activist, is assassinated on a street in Manhattan. In following the clues for the case, the two detectives uncover a national and international conspiracy. Arch-villain Vladimir Kalinin is back too, but in a new way, as the twists and turns lead to the climax. (Every ebook in this series can be read independently.) Available on Amazon and Smashwords and all the latter’s retail affiliates (iBooks, B&N, Kobo, etc). Mystery, thrills, and suspense for your late summer and fall reading.

Hunter’s Chase. Val Penny, author (Crooked Cat Books, 2018). If you can imagine Ian Rankin writing more of a mystery than a police procedural, you’ll like this book. Yet again the reader sees the seamy side of Edinburgh. DCI Hunter has his flaws and has problems with police and government bureaucracy, but he also has a capable crew of interesting cops to aid him. A series of hit-and-runs have similarities. Forensic work and sleuthing led by Hunter gathers the evidence together, but some case oddities and personal battles add many twists to make things interesting.

Veiled Memory. S. P. Brown, author (Black Opal Books, 2018). Celtic myths and legends, Sumerian clans in Manhattan and around the world, Cornell University and ABC News, and paranormal quantum magic—what great fun! Let’s call this a sci-fi/fantasy/mystery/thriller; most of all, let’s call it interesting and exciting storytelling.

Dr. Madeline Alleyn, professor of Celtic History at Cornell, has a past she’s not quite sure about. Her mother died in childbirth, but not before she hid some rune stones that were the first discovered in the Middle East. How they relate to her triplet daughters’ increasing psi powers and their discovery of their mother and grandmother’s pasts make for intriguing storytelling.

That’s the plot. Characters and venues are interesting too. It’s such a treat to encounter a book that offers fresh ideas. And the author pushed all the right buttons for this reader. I read this in two nights—couldn’t put it down. OK, S. P. Brown, what do you do for an encore? Let’s have the sequel. (See my interview with S. P. Brown—it’s archived in the blog category “Interviews.”)

Requiem. Celina Grace, author. Interesting characters, interesting twists. Kate Redman’s brother has a love interest who’s murdered. In this well-plotted mystery, we find as we follow the case that there’s a lot more to it than meets the eye. I’m a sucker for British mysteries. I think this is the second book by Celina Grace I’ve read. She’s a prolific author, and I’ll be reading more.

***

Rembrandt’s Angel. Mystery, thrills, and romance await the reader of this novel. Scotland Yard Inspector Esther Brookstone is trying to decide whether Interpol Agent Bastiann van Coevorden will become husband #4 as she becomes obsessed with recovering a Rembrandt painting stolen by the Nazis in World War Two. As the case morphs into an international conspiracy, the two become closer as they battle neo-Nazis, a drug cartel, and ISIS. Available in ebook format from Amazon and Smashwords and all the latter’s affiliated retailers, as well as print format at Amazon or your local bookstore (if they don’t have it, ask for it).

Pasodobles in a Quantum Stringscape. This potpourri of speculative fiction contains sci-fi and fantasy short stories and the novella “From the Mother World” (a separate story that explains how the ETs arrived earlier than Humans to the planet featured at the beginning of Sing a Zamba Galactica, now bundled as Book #2 in The Chaos Chronicles Trilogy Collection—last few days for 50% off at Smashwords). ETs, ghosts, zombies, with a bit of comic relief thrown in—what more do you want? Available in ebook format on Amazon.

Best of Our Spies. Alex Gerlis, author. (Studio 28, 2012) Most everyone knows the Nazis were fooled into believing the D-Day invasion would occur at Pas de Calais, not Normandy. When the Normandy invasion began, many Nazi forces weren’t there to counter the Allies’ attack. This book is a fictional account about how that occurred.

Not quite as interesting as the author’s Vienna Spies, this is still a gripping and gruesome spy story. Like the best historical fiction, it’s hard to tell fact from fiction. Great plot and characters.

Definitely a great summer read…or anytime.

Murder in the One-Percent. Saralyn Richard, author. (Black Opal Books, 2018) One-percenters attend a birthday party at a country home. No one likes one of the guests very much, so it’s no surprise that he becomes a murder victim. Like a good Christie murder mystery, all the other guests except the hosts become suspects. Ms. Richard’s detective is black, but he holds his own when interrogating his rich and spoiled suspects, some of whom try to stop his investigation.

Part police procedural, part study of how one-percenters live, this novel has little action but a wealth of intrigue. Oh, and one of the characters is a mystery writer, a bit amusing for me. I would have liked to have seen her play a bigger role—a one-percenter Jessica Fletcher, as it were.

Again a great summer read—or anytime, because the plot occurs during the transition to a new year in the Northeast.

***

Rembrandt’s Angel. Scotland Yard Inspector Esther Brookstone’s obsession with recovering a painting stolen by the Nazis in WWII leads to uncovering an international conspiracy. Interpol Agent Bastiann van Coevorden steps in to help her, and their romance blossoms as they travel through Europe and South America in pursuit of the conspirators. Available in print format at Amazon or your favorite bookstore (ask for it if they don’t have it), and in digital format from Amazon and Smashwords and the latter’s associated retailers (iBooks, B&N, Kobo, etc.). A mystery/thriller for great summer reading…or any other time.

In libris libertas! 

(Celina Grace, Echo, Kate Redmen #6, Isaro Publishing Ltd, 2015)

I’ve read other books in the Kate Redmen series (maybe all of them?) as part of my love affair with British mysteries (my most recent novel is an homage to Christie and her two famous sleuths, Miss Marple and M. Poirot). This novel has an important theme: the sexual abuse of children. When it’s done by VIPs, they often get away with it. When the system puts little girls and boys in the hands of VIPs as part of social services, it’s deplorable.

DC Redmen is facing a few personal crises in this tale too. The author creates a nice blend of mystery, police procedural, ad personal angst. The plot drags a wee bit in a few spots, and, while readers of the other books will appreciate the references to those other cases, this book is a stand-alone that can be independently read.

Plot and dialogue are done well, but I would have like a bit more character and settings description. In particular, the villains aren’t well described, but the nature of this murder case might excuse that a bit. You’ll see what I mean. By the way, you won’t find out the reason for the title until the end.

I had a good time with this book. Crime fiction lovers will too, especially those avid readers of British mysteries. Ms. Grace isn’t Ian Rankin, but this book is a tasty treat for your fall nights by the fire. But what’s the big deal with kidney pie? It doesn’t sound as disgusting as haggis (note the British v. Scottish play on words here), but ugh!

***

Sci-fi book sale: More than Human: The Mensa Contagion and Rogue Planet are now on sale at Smashwords from October 1 through October 31. Their prices are reduced to $1.99—that’s one-third off. In the first novel, an ET virus changes the world, but in a good way, and leads to the colonization of Mars. In the second, there’s a wee bit of “Game of Thrones” fantasy mixed into the hard sci-fi as Prince Kaushal leads his Second Tribe in their fight against the First Tribe’s brutal theocracy. Both books are stand-alone, not part of a series. Use the Smashwords coupon numbers when you check out. Note that the second book is also available in paper format at Amazon. Lots of exciting fall entertainment for a reasonable price!

In libris libertas….

Ice Cold. Tess Gerritsen, author. I usually can’t afford Ms. Gerritsen’s books, so I snap one up when I see them on sale. The Rizzoli and Isles TV show doesn’t do justice to them, and this one is a gripper and a fun read.

While R & I are the main characters, it’s more about Isles than Rizzoli. The good M.E. is attending a convention in Wyoming, and she and some casual friends she encounters there get lost in a snowstorm. Surviving the cold is only part of the story, though, as we discover there are some violent bad guys in them thar hills—OK, the action mostly occurs in a valley, but you get the idea.

I always wind a good theme or two around and through my own plots, but here an important theme is the story, and to talk about it would be a spoiler. It’s a well written novel that will take you on an enjoyable roller coaster ride (maybe I should say skis and snowshoes), but don’t look for those TV characters here: they’re completely different and much more interesting.

Hey, since when does Jane have a kid? (Part of the difference, of course.)

Shoulders of Giants. Jim Cliff, author. I found this novel less serious than the above but very enjoyable too. It’s a standard mystery written in a tongue-in-cheek Parker-style (lots of name droppings of American crime fiction writers and TV shows). The main character is a new PI who gets quite a first case. There’s a love interest a la Hollywood too (I could have done without that) and a cop-buddy for the newly minted sleuth. A search for an old cop’s daughter turns into a search for a serial killer, and the killings seem random.

Good plotting, characterization, and snappy dialogue make for interesting reading, but unfortunately the editing was a wee bit lacking. And the use of a few very British terms made me wonder why Chicago was picked for the setting. Mr. Cliff is from Essex, England, so they were bound to creep in, I suppose, and I can’t and shouldn’t complain because he could probably say the same thing about my Rembrandt’s Angel with its English and Scottish settings. Maybe the anti-cultural appropriation crowd hates it when an author sets his story in another culture; I think it’s a skill to be admired and congratulate Mr. Cliff for doing the job so well.

Lots of fun, this novel makes me want to try some more of the young sleuth’s cases. Never figured out whether the title had to do with anything, though. (Maybe because I’m an ex-physicist?)

***

The Midas Bomb (Second Edition). With a plot motivated by signs of the impending financial collapse of 2007-2008, Ponzi plots, and international terrorism, this first novel in the “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco Series” is as current today as it was back then. The story connects an unscrupulous hedge fund CEO with two Manhattan murders and terrorist attacks. The two detectives team up for the first time. Connecting the two murders undercovers the larger conspiracy. Available in ebook format from Amazon, Apple, B&N, Kobo, and Smashwords (and its lending affiliates) as well as in paper format from Amazon, this novel starts off the series with a bang. Good summer reading!

In libris libertas…

The R.E.M. Effect. J. M. Lanham, author. In this novel, the reader will find entertaining reading with some serious themes interwoven. Because my very first book Full Medical was a sci-fi thriller of this type, I’ve always been particularly fond of this subgenre which mixes sci-fi with thrills and suspense. This is one you don’t want to miss.

Mind-altering drugs are more common in real life than most people think. Big Pharma loves to peddle them, especially when they find out that their drug has other applications like alleviating pain by turning off the human brain’s ability to receive pain signals. Drugs for various brain problems like seizures find a new market amongst pain sufferers in this way. They aren’t necessarily addictive, but they’re still scary.

What happens when a drug to cure insomnia gives outliers in the test population of a clinical trial ESP powers as they dream? This sci-fi theme might become a newspaper headline in a not too distant future as Big Pharma strives to broaden its markets and create drugs with many application. The novel answers that question and adds duplicity by the pharmaceutical company as it colludes with the CIA, because the latter is interested in mind control for political purposes.

Channeling Crichton and other authors who have written tales describing future events that aren’t that farfetched, I found this book a good read that is well worth your time. My only complaint—and it’s a minor one—is that a lot of things are left unresolved at the end. To avoid spoilers, I’ll refrain from making a list. Of course, some of the best sci-fi stories share this feature as their authors leave their readers wondering.

I hope to read more by this author in the future, though, because he is a gifted storyteller.

***

Teeter-Totter between Lust and Murder. Detective Chen is framed for the murder of a U.S. senator. As her partner Castilblanco moves to prove her innocence, they uncover a complex plot involving the underbelly of NYC as well as the overbelly corresponding to the rich and powerful. #3 in the “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco Series,” this book is now on sale at Smashwords and is available in all ebook formats. Use coupon code XW55G. Coming soon this spring from Penmore Press: Rembrandt’s Angel, an international tour de force involving a Scotland Yard expert on art heists and an Interpol agent. Chasing down some dealers in stolen artworks suddenly becomes very dangerous!

In libris libertas…

Under the High Ground. Scott Michaels, author. In spite of its faults, this novel is entertaining. There’s a thirty-year-old conspiracy in Washington D.C. that started with the death of the main character’s father and ended with the death of his brother, who is president of the United States. That premise gets your attention, but the reason for the conspiracy will leave you saying, “Huh?” It also comes out of nowhere—no real hints—so in that sense this is more a mystery than a thriller. The characters aren’t well-developed and many aren’t believable, especially the main character, who does a Mr. Hyde/Dr. Jekyll flip from frail and needy sot to Rambo-like hero. The main character’s love interest adds unnecessary international flavor and is too enamored with psycho-babble. The best character is the assassin, a one-man wrecking crew, but you’ll learn little about him too. He’s a clone of the Jackal. Maybe the author was trying to do too much?

Serenity. Craig Hart, author (Y, …) Not a bad tale, but it leaves too many things dangling, creating a diffuse novel with multiple cliffs remaining for the reader to hang over. Too much is left unresolved. There’s not enough back story about the main character, his ex-cop buddy comes out of nowhere and then returns to nowhere, and the premise is a bit absurd: turf wars between drug pushers in the Michigan woods? The main character’s daughter is a whiny irritant all through the story too. Like the book above, this novel still is entertaining, though. Just skip through the whininess of the daughter and you’ll be fine, but don’t have high expectations. The best character? The sixty-year-old main character’s thirty-year-old girlfriend. The two have a modernized Marshall Dillon and Kitty relationship.

***

Teeter-Totter between Lust and Murder. Detective Chen is framed for the murder of a U.S. senator. As her partner Castilblanco moves to prove her innocence, they uncover a complex plot involving the underbelly of NYC as well as the overbelly corresponding to the rich and powerful. #3 in the “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco Series,” this book is now on sale at Smashwords and is available in all ebook formats. Use coupon code XW55G. Coming soon this spring from Penmore Press: Rembrandt’s Angel, an international tour de force involving a Scotland Yard expert on art heists and an Interpol agent. Chasing down some dealers in stolen artworks suddenly becomes very dangerous!

In libris libertas…

Death in Holy Orders. P. D. James, author (2001). We can call this “finding hidden treasure.” The ebook was on sale, so I decided I wanted the ebook version. (I did the same with Heinlein’s Podkayne recently.) I took a look and became pleasantly surprised when I realized that this was one book in the Adam Dalgliesh series (#11) that I missed. I read so many books that they become fuzzy if cherished memories in my mind, especially in a series where you have a strong main character like Commander Dalgliesh.

The book is in James’s verbose and very English style (that was a turnoff for me in the much shorter sci-fi story Children of Men). It’s filled with excess narrative (like Christie, she hides the clues among the verbose weeds), but I’m always a sucker for British mystery, the DS, DCI, and, in this case, Commander-ranked agents and detectives in London’s Metropolitan Police AKA Scotland Yard. Christie’s detectives Miss Marple v. Poirot were different; they were both private citizens, one a meddling spinster and the other a PI. The crime is still murder, though—in the case of this novel, multiple ones. We peer back a little bit into Dalgliesh’s past and into the pasts of many of the suspects’, as well as the victims’, dark pasts in some cases.

The setting is a struggling divinity school. For a while I couldn’t figure out whether it was Roman Catholic or Anglican, but no matter (I still don’t know, but it seems like it’s Anglican in the RC tradition, whatever that means). The characters are complex and interesting and woven with skill into the complex plot and seaside scenes of the story. James has Dalgliesh performing his usual methodical sleuthing. It’s an interesting read albeit a bit too long and verbose.

This novel generated a bit of nostalgia. I was reminded how P. D. James and other English mystery writers, Christie included, influenced my own writing in the upcoming Rembrandt’s Angel, which can be partly considered an homage to these great English writers who have entertained me.  Of course, I minimized the verbiage a wee bit, following my minimalist writing tendencies, but Esther Brookstone, a Scotland Yard inspector, and Bastiann van Coevorden, an Interpol agent, stubbornly plow into a case like Miss Marple and Poirot…or Dalgliesh. I hope you have as much fun reading about their adventures as I did (and you will) reading this one.

***

Coming soon! Gaia and the Goliaths has environmental issues as a theme, but Chen and Castilblanco still have to solve a crime. #7 in the “Detectives Chen and Castilblanco Series” starts out with the murder of an environmental activist on a street in Manhattan. As the detectives pursue the investigation, they discover that the activist’s boyfriend is also a target. His activity overseas leads to the conclusion that there is a conspiracy involving an American energy company, a Putin surrogate, and an old nemesis. This new novel will be available in all ebook formats.

In libris libertas!

The Pope of Physics. Gino Segre and Bettina Hoerlin, authors (Henry Holt/Macmillan 2016). Nobel Prize winner Enrico Fermi not only brought Italian physics out of the Dark Ages, he was a national and international icon who was the last great physicist to excel in both theory and experiment. He was also a great teacher to many students. He had a cameo role in my novel Sing a Samba Galactica for asking one day at Los Alamos, “Where are they?” He was referring to extraterrestrials. That statement is now called the Fermi Paradox: if ETs are abundant in the Universe, why haven’t they come to visit? It probably inspired Freeman Dyson to come up with his famous estimate for the number of ET civilizations.

Fermi’s less rhetorical accomplishments, while noteworthy, aren’t described in great detail in this biography. The book is more a tribute to the man. The person who first explained beta decay, designed the first atomic reactor (then called a nuclear pile) at the University of Chicago, and helped bring World War Two to a swift close with the development of a fission bomb, was a complex person who tried to isolate politics from science—for him the bomb was an experiment in nuclear science. He’s been criticized for that attitude, but the criticism is unjust—one can read between the lines here that scientists were used by the politicians. They still are.

Perhaps more important in this story is how Fermi, who wasn’t Jewish, still suffered from anti-Semitism. His wife was Jewish, so they had to flee Mussolini’s Italy. His wife’s father died in a concentration camp. Friends and their relatives were persecuted and murdered. Fermi’s flight from Italy was immensely beneficial to the U.S., though, as it was the case for many refugees from the hatred and bigotry ravaging Europe.

(more…)

Our Revolution. Bernie Sanders, author (Thomas Dunne/St. Martin’s, 2016). Thank goodness for Christmas gifts. The price on the flyleaf for this hardbound is $27! Not Bernie’s fault, of course. If you don’t know it already, Bernie Sanders is one of my heroes, right up there with Kurt Vonnegut. I identified with this man and his campaign—probably the first time since McGovern—and now I know why. His background is similar and his views are similar. Mind you, I don’t agree with him 100%, but the percentage is higher than with any living politician.

This book is a post mortem of his campaign and an introspective look at a great progressive. His ideas need to continue into new generations to give hope to the downtrodden. As he states, the progressive movement isn’t about one candidate or one campaign. It must build from the ground up so that America can return to being the shining star of freedom in this world that has become so dark in its move toward fascism, exploitation by multinationals, and enriching the one-percenters. Every progressive who deserves the name should read this, absorb the ideas, and act. Yearn for the Bern.

Poisoned Palette. Jill Paterson, author (J. Henderson, 2017). Not a bad little mystery, emphasis on “little,” as DCI Fitzjohn and DS Betts solve another one in the Blue Hills region two hours from Sydney. But wasn’t the last one in this series about an art shop too? (This is #6 in the series.) OK, it was a literary agency. Similar. The downhill slide noted in Mini-Reviews #18 continues. The twists and turns in earlier books are fewer and the story more predictable. The 172 pages relies too much on the previous books for character development—the MCs aren’t further developed here, the feud between Fitzjohn and his boss becomes more of a stretch, and the romance between a victim/suspect and a visiting American is left as a cliffhanger.

Maybe the author is tired of old Fitzjohn and should have taken the opportunity to end the series with the old boy retiring to babysit his orchids? The rush to end this story hints at a yes answer. Editing errors, noted in previous books, also continue, although the author seems to be more into dropped words now (I can fill something in, but I don’t know about the average reader, and s/he shouldn’t have to do so). The $3.99 price seems to be a bit much too, considering this is more novella than novel. If you’re new to this series, don’t start with this one—numbers one through three are better fare.

***

Silicon Slummin’…and Just Gettin’ By. The Silicon Valley hasn’t seen anyone like Mary Jo Melendez, ex-USN Master-at-Arms, and she’s not sure she wants to stay there either. Readers met the MECHs (Mechanically Enhanced Cybernetic Humans) in Muddlin’ Through. Russia and the U.S. still want them and think Mary Jo knows where they are. But they have to compete with Mary Jo’s stalker. Unlike the first book in the series, this one doesn’t travel around the world, but the dangers for her might be worse. This mystery/suspense/thriller novel is available in all ebook formats.

In libris libertas!