The Final Girl Support Group

September 21, 2021September 25, 2021 ~ Wendy-Marie ~ Leave a comment

Contrary to what the spouse and my Tubi recommendations might claim, I’m not addicted to horror movies. I do enjoy a good cosmic horror movie but a slasher film? I’ve read more about slasher films then watching them. I’m An Old (Generation X) and we only had one TV. Sure, I might have peered through the stair rails in the late 1970s while my dad was watching the Rock Hudson classic Embryo and been scared out of my tiny wits, but I didn’t have a TV in my room or an older sibling with a TV. And because we had a VCR of our own, I missed out of the classic 1980s experience of renting a VCR and a stack of scary movies for a weekend. I did see some scary movies back in the day, but it was rare, usually involving a sleepover at a friend’s house who had older siblings.

I’m darn near AARP age and I still haven’t seen The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Friday the 13^th and the like. Which put me at slight disadvantage when I made the genius decision to “just read a chapter or two” of Grady Hendrix’s The Final Girl Support Group. And no prize if you guessed I just kept reading until I finished the book just before 11:30pm. My work shift starts at 6 am.

Like I said, I truly make genius decisions.

You could pick up The Final Girl Support Group without ever seeing a slasher film or even knowing what a final girl is. In my big book of Whiskey Tango that’s a waste of time, energy and resources but you know what the legendary children say, “you do you boo, you do you”. If you don’t have a horror background yet somehow decide oh yes, The Final Girl Support Group is for you. You are not going to get the full experience.

I’m not saying you need be to a horror superfan, listing the different Texas Chainsaw Massacres, Child’s Play, Friday the 13^th, Prom Night, Amityville Horrors like it’s the British line of succession. If you can? Impressive and is Brad Dourif as sweet as he seems in real life because I met Tony “Candyman” Todd and He. Is. A. Total. Sweetheart. I am curious about Brad Dourif. And I might <cue the spouse rolling his eyes> have the tiniest crush on Brad Dourif. Okay I do have a crush on Brad Dourif. Have you seen him in One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest?

And yes, the review!

The casual fan/reader might not figure out the titular final girls are named after actresses from the real-life movie franchises lovingly paid homage to. Tiny details like the naming matter. It took longer than I’d like to admit for me to realize Heather, tormented by the Dream King is a reference to the actress Heather Langenkamp from the Nightmare on Elm Street movies. And this is after I kept turning back to the mock “The Slash Franchises Ranked” magazine excerpt before the start of The Final Girl Support Group VI: The Next Generation chapter.

Go ahead, please feel free to laugh at me.

I never said I was a particular smart person.

And another tiny detail that matters are those stark black pages before each chapter. They range from a snippet of a magazine article, a review or even a battered VHS cover. Like my all-time favorite Grady Hendrix novel Horrorstör, these pages really help place you right in the book universe. Without them? I would have had a much harder time staying focused and motivated to keep reading. Would the book live up to the promise in those media snippets?

And here is where I guess I should touch on the plot. How do they say it on TV Tropes? Ah yes, Exactly What It Says On The Tin. In a church basement, the real-life final girls, whose worst tragedies inspired movies, meet in a support group for years until someone starts targeting them again. And stuff goes down. Like a good slasher flick there are several twists and turns. I didn’t regret staying up late to finish the book. The Final Girl Support Group didn’t drag on and on, a visit to a shunned Final Girl is very creepy and honestly the part I felt the most disturbed/scared. Your mileage may vary.

The Final Girl Support Group is a solid book, lots of interesting bits even if I couldn’t warm to our narrator/final girl Lynnette. Sorry Lynnette. It’s not my favorite Grady Hendrix book ever, hello there Horrorstör and Paperbacks from Hell, but unlike other Grady Hendrix novels I read this year, I haven’t developed any more food aversions. Seriously, I am still having issues with noodles and ice cream. Which might be a good thing according to my doctor. Such meanness. So, if you love horror give The Final Girl Support Group a read while I try to sit through Mortuary for more than five minutes without rolling my eyes at Erin Walton as the heroine.

Several People Are Typing

September 21, 2021 ~ Wendy-Marie ~ Leave a comment

One day I will learn to NOT try writing reviews while the spouse is on the couch watching videos.

But today isn’t the day.

Today is give commentaries on a let’s play video day.

Which in a way actually works for Calvin Kasulke’s Several People Are Typing. Between the let’s play gamer and the spouse it’s like being trapped in a Slack channel or chat or whatever it’s called (the actual job uses MS Team vs Slack so I’m not exact hip to the lingo). For those even less hip/out of the loop than me, Several People Are Typing is written as various Slack channels at a NYC public relations firm. It works. There are difficult accounts, a PR disaster, interoffice fun and games, a love affair complete with messaging the wrong person and one particular coworker who claims he is stuck in the Slack channels.

If you’ve worked in an office you’ve heard all sorts of reasons why people are calling out/unable to come into the office but stuck in the Slack channels isn’t one I’ve ever heard in all my years as an cube dweller. But Gerald claims he got stuck while browsing his winter coat spreadsheet. The dude made spreadsheet for picking out the perfect winter coat?!?!?! says the person who had a near meltdown trying to find the perfect matchy-matchy athletics leggings and top last month.

Back to Gerald. His coworkers, very skeptical…at first. Honestly, as an essential worker who has to go into the office everyday? I’m quite envious of the remote/hybrid workers. But when you work in an office with a coworker who claims to hear howling everywhere, another coworker is auctioning off a prime desk, and your boss is convinced the custodial staff are messing with his adjustable desk, is saying you’re sucked into the Slack channels really that odd?

I could go on and on about the meaning of technology and how we are losing ourselves to said technology. Are we becoming one with our tech? Can we exist without tech? But I’m not that sort of reviewer.

I’m the sort of reviewer who is going to enjoy peeking into people’s messages, wants to see Gerald’s spreadsheet and I imagine the public relations firm’s NYC office as a cross between a BBC sitcom and the really weird episode of Black Mirror when the game designer gets stuck in his game. I’m the reviewer who counts the pages and wonders how/if Gerald is ever going back into his own body. I’m the reviewer who is going to recommend you hunt down (actually it’s very easily found at Target and major bookstores/a Good Morning America book club selection) Calvin Kasulke’s Several People Are Typing and once you’re done? Order some takeout and watch that episode of Black Mirror.

An Elderly Lady Is Up To No Good

September 19, 2021 ~ Wendy-Marie ~ Leave a comment

True confession-I’ve never gotten into the Swedish mystery/crime trend. Considering the first book I Ever Read All By Myself was a Nancy Drew title, you would think I adore the genre. I’m An Old so I cut my adult mystery teeth on Mary Higgins Clark and cozy mysteries with quirky amateurs providing delicious recipes along with a body count. I followed the adventures of a certain big haired New Jersey bounty hunter until I was ready to grab her by the shoulders and force her to just form a triad with the two yummy men. Agatha Christie and her contemporaries never really caught my attention except for Georgette Heyer and Josephine Tey.

So how did I scoop up a wee hardcover short story collection from Swedish author Helene Tursten? Short story, I was at the Lucy Robbins Welles Library in Newington, CT and An Elderly Lady is Up to No Good was in the on going book sale nook tucked in the gift books for a mere 50 cents USD. It’s seriously a cute little hardcover with cross stitch cover design and just under 175 pages. Plus I’ve been trying to expand my reading comfort zone with The Bookstore podcast’s 2021 reading challenge and August is “a work in in translation by written by a woman”. A bit of a no-brainer there.

First off? On the surface Maud appears harmless. She’s lived in the same apartment her whole life. She’s an 88-year-old retired teacher who devoted herself to caring for both her mother and then sister after her father died leaving his survivors without a penny. She spends her golden years traveling and keeping her mind sharp but to keeps to herself. No harm in that?

But that’s just the surface. Maud’s precious apartment is only hers (rent free as long as she decides to live there) thanks to a real estate contract clause in the aftermath of her father’s death. A less clever person would have been out on their ear long ago but Maud isn’t that person. She uses her wits and is willing to play the long game to ensure her existence is a much nicer one than fate intended for her. People who cross her and threaten that existence? Heck I would have snapped just taking care of her mother and sister.

I could delve deeper, but you need to read An Elderly Lady is Up to No Good for more.I’m not saying Maud’s way of handling various situations are correct/proper, but I can certainly understand her motives. There is a certain gleeful joy that comes in wondering can she get away without getting caught as you read each story. I thought for sure she was going to be caught at least twice.

After finishing An Elderly Lady is Up to No Good, a normal person who would be very scared of having our title Elderly Lady aka Maud as a neighbor. People tend to die around Maud. All accidents of course Dearest Reader but people die.

However, I’m not a normal person and I really like Maud. An Elderly Lady is Up to No Good was such a quick read (just about an hour for me including interruptions from the spouse) and I was a bit sad when the final story ended. I’m not sure I will track down Helene Tursten’s flagship The Irene Huss Investigations series (Detective Inspector Huss does make a brief appearance in one particular story arc) but if Helene Tursten were to revisit Maud and perhaps let us know how her top-notch trip to South Africa went I would certainly read more.

The Missing Treasures of Amy Ashton

September 15, 2021September 16, 2021 ~ Wendy-Marie ~ Leave a comment

Sometimes you finish a book and wonder what the same plot would be in another author’s hands. This can be very interesting but not the most productive thing when midnight isn’t far off, and you have to be at work the next morning at 6 am.

Enter Eleanor Ray’s The Missing Treasures of Amy Ashton. The cover looked interesting, and the inner jacket copy had me tucking it into the library bag. If the first 20 pages didn’t captivate, I could always just not finish it and get a good night’s sleep for once. Imagine that.

Unfortunately for my sleep app, a good solid seven hours of sleep wasn’t in the cards. You meet Amy Ashton at a leaving-do (or if you are an American like me, drinks to celebrate a coworker’s departure). Amy isn’t psyched to be out or knocking back the drinks and within a few paragraphs I’m really liking Amy. I might not tuck an empty green wine bottle into my bag and then have a train full of people thinking I’m a raging drunk but the level of uncomfortable is familiar.

Then the story takes a turn. Amy is broken by something in her past. And her coping/survival mechanism is to retreat into things. She has a house but it’s literally falling apart and trying to get to the upstairs would honestly be excellent training for an Everest expedition. Sure, one neighbor is super annoying, but lady has a point. Someone needs to step in and stop things before someone gets severely injured.

And here is where Eleanor Ray’s genius lies. You could take this same plot, thirtysomething lady with a mystery past and deep personal issues and put in the hands of another author. Let’s say Marian Keyes because yup, I’ve devoured so many Marian Keyes books both good and bad. Marian Keyes isn’t a bad author; she has her strengths and can write a solid book.

But Marian Keyes’ Amy Ashton? The book would have been at least twice as long, we would know exactly who Amy and Chantel would be listening to while doing their makeup and watering down Toyah’s liquor cabinet. Also, I have the suspicion the Marian Keys’ Amy would have boinked the baddie and hoarded fancy handbags too.

Laurie Notaro could have done a lovely job, but her Amy would also have a crippling eBay/vintage collection to tuck into any corners not crammed with the local newspapers/bottles/broken pots/cups plus a few adorable elder dogs.

Never ever let me be the Plot Fairy doling out plots to authors.

My point is Eleanor Ray keeps the plot lean. That leanness helps disguise who the baddie is. He seemed to be engaged and wanting to help. And I like that Amy doesn’t magically get better once the main mystery is solved. She is still a hot mess, and she has a hard road ahead even if you can now see the floor of her front hall. And we leave her at the start of her journey. Anything can happen now. Any wonder why I didn’t stop reading even when the spouse wandered into the bedroom for his nasal spray and asked why I was still awake. Sometimes you must finish that book.

Crying in H Mart: A Memoir

September 15, 2021September 15, 2021 ~ Wendy-Marie ~ Leave a comment

Some of the best emails are the ones from the library letting you know a hold is in. You give a tiny squeal of glee and once the workday is over you are free to zip to the library, march up to the circulation desk and claim your quarry. The hard part is finding the time/a quiet place to actually read the chosen book. This can also be a bit hard when you’re on a budget and that particular book is just ready to leap off the shelf at Target and come home with you, even if you’ve just spent the bulk of your bank account on prescriptions. And other people are posting about it on Goodreads and Instagram.

Crying in H Mart was certainly on my list. Confession I have never been to a H Mart. K-mart yes. A few local Japanese and pan-Asian markets to get my Japanese Green Tea Kit Kat fix and a crack at the full Lee Kum Kee range for my pitiful attempts at amazing recipes online. I saw H Mart, memoir and was in.

Last week I got the happy email and finally had Crying in H Mart in my little undead racoon paws. Now I’m An Old who spent an entire day playing the newest Duran Duran and New Order singles back-to-back on Spotify. I recently figured out Nicki Minaj sings the song with the “twinkle twinkle little star” refrain. Insert my brother laughing himself into a choking fit over my LIKED SONGS Spotify playlist. Pitbull’s Hotel Room Service is perfect escape music no matter what Andy says. So safe to say I’ve never heard a single Japanese Breakfast song or even read Michelle Zauner’s New Yorker essay which spawned Crying in H Mart.

I’m a genius like that.

Book looks good put it in the library bag/wish list.

Trader Joes frozen food item looks good? Stick in it the cart.

Brain cells and sodium levels be damned.

I do wish I had probed a bit deeper into Crying in H Mart before reading. I spent more time trying to track down soup soy sauce this summer before my blood pressure hit GIRL YOU ARE GOING TO HAVE A DAMN STROKE LEVELS. I think TRIGGER WARNING is what people use on places like Reddit. Yeah, I’m a Redditor. Because certain material hit me in a deep, still unhealed corner of my soul after over twenty years.

I lost my mother to cancer and while the time between her final diagnosis to her death was very brief it was still searing. She died at home. I can tell you when her death rattles first started, what I was reading and what it felt like to wake up hours later to learn she was gone. I know what it’s like to frantically try and find something anything your loved one can choke down, the almost unicorn hunt and making something to have it rejected barely touched. Michelle Zauner had a much more prolonged road to travel.

Crying in H Mart is good solid memoir of growing up between two cultures and the struggles of mothers and daughters. The scenes in Korea are my favorites and I would love a Lisa See level deeper dive into the family past. Michelle’s father is a character and could have a whole book devoted just to him but the tiny details of her maternal family are the real draw. I want to know more about the older generations, especially her aunts.

Would I recommend Crying at H Mart? Yes, with a big trigger warning. Her mother’s death is brutal and if I had not had a similar experience at about the same age I would have stopped reading right then and there.

You might be stronger.

But it’s something to consider.

Crying in H Mart isn’t all sadness and death. There is joy and strong family ties even if an ocean separates people. Give it a read.

Klara and the Sun

September 12, 2021 ~ Wendy-Marie ~ Leave a comment

“I think I’m too dumb to understand this book. I like it but I’m not sure what even happened.”

Yesterday I read Kazuo Ishiguro’s Klara and the Sun. Yes, Klara and the Sun was released several months ago but I don’t lurk the New Fiction section at Barnes & Noble and watch the morning shows so the whole “Good Morning America” Book Club selection wasn’t on my radar.

I read it, even more confused and unsure of the world than the titular Klara and I’m convinced it is just too literary for me to grasp.

I didn’t even realize the story takes place in the United States until I had finished the darn book and was looking at proper reviews.

I’ve only read one other Ishiguro novel (Never Let Me Go) and just assumed Klara and the Sun was in some hazy other place, maybe Canada, maybe the UK, maybe Japan almost like a latter-day Atwood novel. Please tell me I’m not the only person this dim to read Klara and the Sun.

From last night’s review binge (and the darn jacket copy) I’ve learned Klara and the Sun is about the nature of the human heart. Okay…and here I am, who has the “Happy Birthday David” Prometheus promo video saved on her YouTube account and can sing Gary Numan’s “Are Friends Electric?” at the drop of a hat, getting excited to learn the Never Let Me Go guy who wrote a book about Artificial Friends (AF) in a hazy future with possibly modified humans.

Now I have questions about this hazy future America. These questions aren’t answered fully because Klara and the Sun is beautifully crafted literary fiction not a multi-part science fiction epic. Kazuo Ishiguro isn’t that kind of writer. And the main character is an Artificial Friend and unlike David 8 from Prometheus she’s not seeking answers to why she was created/messing with the humans. Klara the AF is curious and retains almost every small detail, constantly learning even when she is for sale in a shop. After Klara is purchased to be a companion, she has adventures and experiences which are the exploration of the human heart for smarter folks and for me clues to trying to figure out the world.

And the world! There is a lingering post war feeling. The older generation apparently had to make difficult choices for the future generations and people are now “lifted” and “unlifted”. Is the lifting process done at conception or later? Rank determines everything from your house, vehicle, career and it feels like even healthcare. At one point, I stopped reading, turned the spouse and started talking about Gattaca and Elysium before returning to Klara and the Sun and now I’m seeing threads between Klara and her idol (the actual Sun in the sky) and A.I.’s David and the Blue Fairy.

Okay.

Perhaps I need to add more romantic comedies and such like to my personal DVD/Blu-ray collection.

<sighs>

Even if I don’t grasp the underlying explorations of the human heart, grief, motherhood and more? Klara and the Sun is an interesting novel and I’m glad I read it even though I’ll never get answers to the things that consumed me the most.

Jayne Mansfield: The Girl Couldn’t Help It

August 30, 2021August 30, 2021 ~ Wendy-Marie ~ 1 Comment

I’m at the library, doing the half bent over but not too far bent over crouch to scan the New Non-Fiction section. I’m also in grave danger of my right arm being yanked out of the socket from a heavy library bag and somehow my wig is slightly askew from trying to fix my mask elastics caught in my glasses. My usual hot mess express self.

Then I spot a book with a L’Oreal Matte Me in Paris colored spine with big bold yet clean white letters JAYNE MANSFIELD with Eve Golden in smaller black letters. And I went from crouched beast to lunge mode because BOOK MINE NOW.

Now the average person might not know who Jayne Mansfield is. You need to be a Baby Boomer or older, a fan of the camp, 1950s/1960s Hollywood or have heard the Siouxsie and the Banshees song “Kiss Them For Me” to recognize who Jayne Mansfield is.

Jayne Mansfield was many things in her short life-mother, actress, model, beauty queen, scandalous, wild, parodied and laughed at but she was never boring. Finding a balanced measured account of her life can be difficult because so much of her life was lived in front of cameras it’s easy to see her as just a cartoon oversized figure, the Dollar Tree/Dollar General Marilyn Monroe all white-blond hair and heaving bosoms at her tacky Pink Palace.

It takes a special author to live up to that task and in thirty plus years of reading about Hollywood and film stars the only solid book about Jayne Mansfield was Martha Saxton’s 1975 Jayne Mansfield and the American Fifties a slender volume that is sadly out of print. If you find it? Sure, buy it, my own copy has gone astray over the years and if I stumbled across it during my adventures, it’s coming home with me.

But if your library has Eve Golden’s Jayne Mansfield: The Girl Couldn’t Help It or you have a spare $34.95? Give Jayne Mansfield: The Girl Couldn’t Help It a chance. Eve Golden wrote the definitive biography of Silent Hollywood legend Theda Bara and a very fine biography of Jean Harlow so she is no stranger to being able to dig past the crazy rumors/legends and give you a look at the actual person behind the hair and makeup. Behind all that bleached hair and extreme clothing is pain and frustration along with ambition.

Now some biographers would have made an enormous focal point of a particular rumor surrounding the paternity for one of her children but Eve Golden doesn’t sink to that level. The rumor is addressed and frankly whatever the biological truth, that child has lived a life well loved and accepted.

Eve Golden doesn’t sink to that level could just be applied to the final quarter of the book. Let’s face it. If you know who Jayne Mansfield it’s pretty much because of her tragic death. It’s certainly not her acting. And because other authors <insert majorly raised heavily penciled eyebrows at a certain Kenneth Anger> sank to those levels and beyond.

Jayne Mansfield wasn’t the finest actress to ever grace the silver screen. But she was hard working and stuck to her goals even if the world was laughing at her versus with her. She was both slightly out of date even at the height of her fame and ahead of her time. And thanks to Eve Golden and Jayne Mansfield: The Girl Couldn’t Help It she is more than just a bunch of publicity photos and press clippings.

Nowhere Girl

August 23, 2021 ~ Wendy-Marie ~ Leave a comment

.Morning snack at work. I’m on Instagram and my local library has just posted they finally offer Hoopla. A quick few taps and I’m checking out the selections looking for an audiobook to get me through the morning.

Then I spot a book I’ve seen promoted heavily on Instagram and decide to give it a go. Cheryl Diamond’s acclaimed memoir of her years as a child in a fugitive family who spends her childhood on the run from the people in power after her father.

Nowhere Girl it is.

I’ve been wondering how to do this review for the last several weeks.

Part of me is tempted to just cut/paste the thoughts typed at lighting speed, well as fast as you can type with one finger on the iPhone Notes app because I am An Old. Because this a book I had such a reaction to , I snatched a few moments to type out my thoughts to make them stop intruding on my concentration doing my actual factual pays my bills job.

Or I could try to put the notes in a nice coherent package with proper grammar, spelling and references.

I am thisclose to doing the former. It more tempting than the Mason jar crammed with Japanese Kit Kat on top of the Folio Society bookcase.

And those are FORBIDDEN Kit Kat.

I know there are people who adore this book and the publisher is very firm this is a true story and Cheryl Diamond’s story checks out. I am not one of those people.

And before anyone huffs and puffs and pulls the “You’re An Ugly Dumb Hater” card? I did finish the book.

Listened to the audiobook as long as I could bear it at work.

Borrowed the eBook when I got home and spent the bulk of my evening reading to the bitter end.

And when I say bitter end I mean I finished at 11:37pm and went to work the next day on about 3.5 hours of sleep and all the tea.

Let me share my first furtively typed note

“This book sucks”

More notes?

“Some things yes but am very suspicious”

“It’s only tolerable if you read it like a classic VCA novel”

“Holy shit this is like every actually written by VCA novel”

I could continue but I will spare you the poorly spelled comments.

There are strong parallels with the V.C. Andrews’ novels of my 1980s youth. Cheryl is the clear Cathy Doll/Dahl meets Heaven Leigh Casteel main character. She is just a being of goodness and light who the whole family revolves around. The fragile movie star looking mother. The handsome charmer father/bully who could run cons with Damien Adare when they’re not pushing their children to be perfect at everything. Brooding sister Chiara should really be My Sweet Audrina’s Vera’s best friend. As for her brother? At one point I do remember literally muttering to myself a particular situation which is a horrific one was very Flowers in the Attic and minutes later well… <bites lip>

Looking back weeks later my thoughts on Nowhere Girl haven’t changed. Some people have compared Nowhere Girl to Jeannette Walls The Glass Castle. I’ve read The Glass Castle and find it to be much more believable. Parents being so lost to their own mental demons. Very real.

But I don’t fully believe the whole story Cheryl presents. I do think there are threads of truth and darker things happened which could really change the narrative around the family. In fact I would love to hear her sister’s version of events.

Do I think her father was a con man and a deeply disturbing man?

Yes.

Was her family damaged?

Yes.

Do I trust Cheryl.

No.

Will people believe her.

Sure. But I’m not one of them.

The Operator

August 17, 2021August 17, 2021 ~ Wendy-Marie ~ Leave a comment

Life in a small town is like no other. Guaranteed someone knows your business, even the secrets you do not know. It doesn’t matter you live in a tiny English village straight off a biscuit tin, a New England mill town, a seaside hamlet or a Midwest town. And I am not immune to secrets and revelations so when I heard about a 2020 novel called The Operator? I was interested enough to take a screenshot and see if the local library carried it.

According to the author bio on the back flap of The Operator, this is Gretchen Berg’s debut novel. Seriously? Because unlike another debut novel I took a chance on earlier this spring I had absolutely no problem diving into tiny 1950s Wooster, Ohio even with the spouse braying at the antics of whatever Minecraft Let’s Play video he was watching. The first page sucks you in, you are right there with Vivian, wearing old winter boots on her way to work.

A 1950s woman…working? Weren’t all women housewives being supported by their husbands. Not exactly. Vivian’s work at the telephone company makes life nicer, paying for the things her husband’s salary cannot quite cover. And Vivian likes her work, she loves knowing the ins and outs of what is happening in her town and being a telephone operator is a great match. Until Vivian learns a secret about herself.

Giving away the secret takes away the fun of reading The Operator but let’s say Vivian doesn’t die, it’s a whopper with nesting boxes of whoppers. And Vivian is very relatable. She doesn’t curl up in a ball and give in even if some of her decisions are made from social pressure. She keeps on going and a bit at the end has me tearing up because that part of journey touches on something in my own mother’s life. Go Vivian go!

The Operator is a fine book club recommendation (I have book clubs on the brain at the moment having just joining a site wide book club at work) and between you, me and the World Wide Internet if the trade paperback edition has one of those book club suggested discussion questions I need to see “When did you realize CHARACTER NAME was THING I DIDN’T FIGURE OUT BECAUSE I AM THAT DIM” because I can’t be the only one this dim. Also The Operator would make nice Paramount Plus show because Vivian and her pluck remind me of Ginnifer Goodwin in Why Women Kill. Get cracking out that Paramount Plus.

I can give The Operator a firm Essie Hi Maintenance (Revlon’s Fire and Ice looks dreadful on me) thumbs up. Grab it from your book source, find a comfortable spot (I recommend not on the other side of the couch from your spouse) and spend a few hours with Vivian Dalton and the secrets of Wooster, Ohio.

Surrender Brain Cells

August 1, 2021August 13, 2021 ~ Wendy-Marie ~ Leave a comment

Years ago I wrote a post for this very blog about Caleb Carr. The Alienist and The Angel of Darkness truly hit a sweet spot for me. True crime blended with historical fiction. Formulaic yes but I really wanted a third volume.

It took years but unlike my nearly impossible to grant wish for Jasper Fforde to write a Shades of Grey sequel, my wish for a third Dr. Kreizler book was fulfilled back in 2016.

This is a bit hard to type. Either Caleb Carr has entered a season of suck or my brain has finally corrupted beyond repair over almost five decades on this big blue ball floating in space. Both are valid theories. So is the theory Caleb Carr has never been a good writer and I need to rethink my reading.

Now for a little story.

My favorite podcasts aren’t posting as much due to real life getting in the way. I’m not interested in certain podcasts or podcast companies so I’ve been using Libby/Overdrive and Hoopla to listen to audio books. And I most certainly don’t have Audible money.

I was at work, in the mood to listen to an engrossing book and what I want wasn’t available. The Libby app had a Caleb Carr book called Surrender, New York I wasn’t a firm 100% sure I’d read before so I was willing to give it a try. it was even set in Rensselaer County. I know those little tiny towns, those counties where farming still clings on, there can be more cows than people and working in the prisons is a solid job.

It couldn’t be worse than Killing Time could it?

We shall speak no further of Killing Time.

I downloaded Surrender, New York and grabbed the stack of ID cards needing mailing labels. Because I have an actual job besides reading books. And because this is a book review maybe it’s a good idea to touch on the plot yes? Okay here it goes.

Super detective Dr. Trajan Jones and his partner Mike have been exiled to tiny Surrender, NY where they teach crime solving inside a hidden plane inside a barn/outbuilding on the Jones family farm. Occasionally the local police enlist their aid. And the local police have come a calling…

No I have not eaten an entire bag of Japanese green tea Kit-Kat. I would like to do so even if I’m flirting with the diabetes but nope that is the plot. Exiled super detective stumbles across evil crimes in his historical stomping grounds. Oh and it’s in the Kreizler-verse because of course Dr. Trajan Jones is THE Dr. Kreizler expert and disdains modern science/techniques.

It took about five minutes to realize I had read Surrender, New York when it was a brand spanking new hardcover.

It took 30 minutes to remember how hard I wanted to smack the main character Trajan Jones so hard he fell off his leg prosthesis and cover him in Chick Fil A sauce as a snack for Marcianna Jones. I would also love some Chick Fil A frozen lemonade.

It took an additional three minutes to try and remember if I still have the Brotherhood of the Wolf DVD my brother bought in Canada or did I give it back to him? Because if I want to be strung along about what kind of beastie something is Brotherhood of the Wolf is the clear winner.

It took another minute to start twitching over how darn long it was taking to sum up anything. Lovecraft gets to the point quicker. Flipping never met an adjective he didn’t use Lovecraft. LOVECRAFT!

Then I paused Surrender, New York and decided perhaps the audiobook hack wasn’t working. The narrator was lovely and really captured the sheer superiority of Dr. Trajan “STFU DUDE” Jones. The utter suffocating pretentious pompous… <takes a deep breath>

Perhaps I needed the weight of a physical book and not being in a cubicle trying to remember how to spell Albuquerque properly vs “Al-bear-quirky” for mailing labels to appreciate Surrender, New York.

Three hours later I was on my couch, spouse watching his favorite You-Tubers with Surrender, New York on my lap.

I started to read.

Page 131. I carefully dog-eared page 131, my thumb firmly creasing the paper, a sharp dog ear in a sacred library book. Page 131.

It’s almost a month later. My local library in the City of Hard Hitting has auto-renewed Surrender, New York. more than once. Such a lovely gesture these auto renewals. But I never re-read past page 131. I never will re-read past page 131.

Surrender Brain Cells…