Booked (and Printed): May 2025

 

Booked (and Printed) May 2025   We’ve all heard the rhyme, “April showers bring May flowers”—which is popularly thought to come from a poem written by Thomas Tusser in 1557; although his version reads, “Sweet April showers / Do spring May flowers”—but a more accurate maxim for Vermont would be: “May showers bring June flowers.” Yeah, May was chilly and wet around here, but all the trees have leafed and as I write this the sun is shining and the temperature is hovering at a comfy 70-degrees. But we’re still waiting for the promised flowers even as I took a leisurely, but ill-considered swim in the icy waters of Lake Bomoseen on Memorial Day. I’m certain I’ll still have goosebumps in July from that misadventure. But, all that rain made a nice excuse for spending some of May’s the spring-time weather reading. And I took advantage of it by finishing an impressive (for me at least) eight novels and two short stories. Before I go on, you’ll notice this Booked (and Printed) is shorter than usual even though my reading in May was higher than average and my reviewing for the blog was below normal. I only reviewed three of the eleven titles I read, and one, THE BLUE HORSE, by Bruce Borgos, isn’t scheduled for release until July 8—so come back and read my review then. So, since I’ve had recent trouble with eye strain, I’m going to be brief for once. First up is David Housewright’s fourth McKenzie mystery, DEAD BOYFRIENDS (2007). This is my last out-of-order title in the series and while it isn’t top-tier McKenzie, it’s still pretty good for the usual reasons: well-painted setting, a bunch of action, a solid mystery, and well, McKenzie is at the helm. Next up is Mailan Doquang’s second Rune Sarasin caper thriller, CEYLON SAPPHIRES (2025). I liked it. You can read my review here. A read a trio of titles from John Lutz, starting with a couple short stories: “TOUGH”—published in Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine in 1980—and “HIGH STAKES,” which originally appeared The Saint Magazine in 1984. Both tales are hardboiled and fun with “High Stakes” coming out the clear winner for overall quality. In fact, I reviewed “High Stakes” here. The third Lutz title is his 1988 novel, KISS, which is private eye Fred Carver’s third outing. The Carver books are top-notch, and Kiss is no exception. The mystery is taut, the suspense is built scene-by-scene until that final climax, and Florida’s brutally hot and wet climate is perfectly detailed. An absolute winner.

ROBAK’S FIRE, by Joe L. Hensley (1986)—which is the eighth Don Robak—is a book I intended to review, but time got away from me and…. In nutshell, Robak’s Fire is a nice mixture of a private eye novel and a legal thriller. Robak’s investigative genius is done in the streets while his partners are stranded in the courtroom. The rural Indiana setting is bleak, the suspects—in what begins as an insurance case and morphs into something else—are nicely cut, and Robak’s no nonsense demeanor perfectly makes the case. Robak’s Fire isn’t brilliant, but it is a competent and an entertaining fiction. Another title I had hoped to review is John D. MacDonald’s THE DEEP BLUE GOOD-BY (1964). This was my third reading of the first Travis McGee novel and I was even more impressed this time than I had been the first two. The Deep Blue Good-by is, by my estimation, the best in the McGee series and perhaps one of the best men’s adventure-type detective novels ever written. JDM manages to tell a tightly plotted and a surprising story with a minimal of the cultural asides that clutters many of the other books in the series. My May foray into the literary was THE RED PONY, by John Steinbeck (1933), which is comprised of four interconnected tales about a boy named Jody growing up in the late-Nineteenth Century on a farm in northern California. The titular red pony only appears in the first tale and while that title gives the quartet a “book for kids” vibe it is anything but. There is loss, heartache, joy, and everything in between. It is realistic and damn good.  The month ended with Terry Shames’s disappointing DEEP DIVE (2025). The second book in her Jesse Madison series—Jesse is a scuba diver with aspirations of joining the FBI’s diving program, USERT—is short on plot, high on implausibility, and climaxes with a ho-hum sigh. It was good enough to finish, but it could have been so much better. As for my favorite read of the month? I’m going to break all the rules and choose The Deep Blue Good-by, even if I’ve read it before. It’s just that good.  Fin— Now on to next month…

My Favorite Mystery Books Read (But Not Published) in 2024

My Favorite Mystery Books Read (But Not Published) in 2024   I debated about doing a second best of the year post featuring mystery books I read in 2024, but were published in a prior year. I mulled it over, lost sleep about it, and finally concluded—well, that conclusion is obvious, I guess. So…drum roll please…here are my favorite five mysteries I read in 2024, which were published in the far away past. My favorite mysteries published in 2024 can be found here.
SHOOTING SCRIPT, by Gavin Lyall (Charles Scribner, 1966). This aviation thriller from the master of the form, is Lyall’s fourth novel. Set in the Caribbean—Jamaica and the fictional Republic Libra—with a film crew, an ancient WW2 bomber, freedom fighters, and a little revenge. In my review I wrote: “Shooting Script is about as good as a mid-century thriller gets.”   Read the review here (see second paragraph). Check out Shooting Script here at Amazon.
THE SUMMONS, by Peter Lovesey (Mysterious Press, 1995). This traditional mystery, which is the third Peter Diamond investigation, is a marvelous fair-play puzzler with humor, wit, and a cracking good plot. In my review I wrote: “the denouement is a blissful surprise, and even better, a surprise that makes perfect sense.”   Read the review here. Check out The Summons here at Amazon.
ROBAK’S WITCH, by Joe L. Hensley (St. Martin’s Press, 1997). Don Robak, a trial lawyer that has just been elected as a rural Indiana judge, is recovering from a gunshot wound before he officially takes the bench. He agrees to help another lawyer defend a woman accused of killing two kids and what he finds is a marvelous mixture of the hardboiled and the traditional mystery. In my review, I wrote: “Robak’s Witch is simply terrific!”   Read the review here. Check out Robak’s Witch here at Amazon.
MADMAN ON A DRUM, by David Housewright (Minotaur, 2008). The fifth Rushmore McKenzie novel, which is also my favorite of the twelve series books I’ve read, is a personal case for McKenzie. When his goddaughter is kidnapped, there isn’t much McKenzie wouldn’t do to get her back. In my review, I wrote: “Madman on a Drum is a hardboiled tour-de-force private eye novel about justice and revenge.”   Read the review here. Check out Madman on a Drum here at Amazon.
SUN, SAND, MURDER, by John Keyse-Walker (Minotaur, 2016). This easy-going mystery is set on the tiny Caribbean Island of Anegada, part of the Royal Virgin Islands, where crime is uncommon and murder is unheard of. But, of course (as the title suggests), murder finds Anegada. In my review, I wrote: “Sun, Sand, Murder is a delightful whodunit (although it isn’t exactly fair-play) with a smattering of eccentric characters…a brilliant setting, and just enough action to keep the pages turning.”   Read the review here (see second paragraph). Check out Sun, Sand, Murder here at Amazon.
HONORABLE MENTIONS: Hemingway’s Notebook, by Bill Granger (Crown, 1986); Turnabout, by Jeremiah Healy (Five Star, 2001); Flamingo Road, by Sasscer Hill (Minotaur, 2017)

Booked (and Printed): July 2024

 

Booked (and Printed) July 2024 July always plays better on paper than in the real world. It is too hot, the days are too damn long, and I never get as much reading done as I would like. This July was no different than any other. I read a sparse five books—sparse because two were far short of novel length. The first of these thin interludes is DIVVY UP: SCIENCE FICTION STORIES, which is a marvelous collection of three tales—one novelette and two shorts—written by Stephen Marlowe in the 1950s. Marlowe was best known as a crime writer but he could write just about anything and he truly excelled at turning out entertaining science fiction. You can read more about Marlowe and this collection here, which I should tell you was retitled as Alternatives: Science Fiction Stories. The other shorty was the mediocre thriller COME AND GET US, by Shan Serafin, about a family being hunted in the Utah-Arizona desert. Published in 2016 as part of James Patterson’s BookShots series of novellas, which was a cool idea that never worked out in either quality or sales, Come and Get Us lacks plausibility and characterization, but the setting and action sequences are sharp enough to have kept me turning the pages. Speaking of short stories—the latest single author collection from Stark House, CREAM OF THE CROP: BEST MYSTERY & SUSPENSE STORIES OF BILL PRONZINI (2024), is as good a collection as I’ve read this year. It covers Pronzini’s entire career from the late-1960s to 2023. There are standalones, Nameless detective tales, and one entry from the historical detectives series, Quincannon & Carpenter. It is highly recommended and you can read more of my thoughts about it here. Of the five individual short stories I read, which were all enjoyable, my favorite was Ed Gorman’s “A DISGRACE TO THE BADGE”—a standalone western about an alcoholic lawman, a spoiled rich kid, and a locked-room murder—is rich with characterization and atmosphere and, best of all, it is ironic and surprising. I’m not sure when “A Disgrace to the Badge” was originally published since The Long Ride Back (2004), where I read it, had a disappointing copyright page. The two shorts I read by James Reasoner—“DOWN IN THE VALLEY” (1979), “DEATH AND THE DANCING SHADOWS” (1980)—both fit comfortably in the crime / detective field. I had read “Down in the Valley” once before and Reasoner’s ability to shift perspective from one character to another so easily, and without any confusion for the reader, is amazing. I liked “Death of the Dancing Shadows” just as well and reviewed it in detail here.

I dug both full-length novels I read in July. ROBAK’S WITCH, by Joe L. Hensley (1997)—which is my favorite read of the month—is the eleventh (of twelve) book in the Don Robak series. Robak is a rural Ohio attorney, soon to be judge, with experience working death penalty cases. When he is called in to help an old friend from law school defend a woman accused of murdering her teenage niece and nephew, Robak finds a community convinced of her guilt. A wacky fundamentalist church spreading rumors she is a witch and far too many citizens, including the County Sheriff, content with going along. You can read my review here. Then, of course, I read the next in David Housewright’s McKenzie series, CURSE OF THE JADE LILY (2012), because boy do I love these books. McKenzie is a witty, funny, and likable cuss with several million dollars in the bank and nothing to do but favors for friends. In this one, McKenzie helps a museum get a priceless artwork back after it was stolen by their security chief. The busy opening and sprawling character list mark this one down from the best in the series, but it is still good fun. The only book I started and chose not to finish was Jack Higgins’s 1992 EYE OF THE STORM, which is where Higgins’s longtime series-character Sean Dillon was introduced. The Dillon books have never been my cuppa but I have fond memories of reading Eye of the Storm back in my innocent youth. While Eye of the Storm still held some attraction for me, I simply wasn’t in the mood. Maybe I’ll try reading it again in one of the colder months when I’m not quite as grumpy. Fin— Now on to next month…

Review: "Robak's Witch" by Joe L. Hensley

 

Robak’s Witch by Joe L. Hensley St. Martin’s Press, 1997   In the Spring of 1992, while perusing the stacks at Waldenbooks, I found a mass market paperback tagged at 10-cents. It was a PaperJacks Bogie’s Mystery—remember that long gone Canada-based publisher?—titled Robak’s Fire, by Joe L. Hensley. I snapped it up like all I had was a dime, which was probably about right, and took it home. I started reading that same afternoon and turned its final page the next morning. The rural Indiana setting, the colorful and believable characters, and the main player, a lawyer named Don Robak, all rang true and the plot, which has mostly been lost from my head over the decades, was exciting enough that I’ve carried Robak’s Fire around with me ever expecting that I’ll read it again. I haven’t read it again, which isn’t so strange, but Robak’s Fire is the only Joe L. Hensley novel I had ever read, which is downright weird. Until now, anyway, because Hensley’s eleventh (of twelve) Robak mystery, Robak’s Witch, is (finally) my second excursion into Robak’s world. In Robak’s Witch, Don Robak has just been elected as a judge—he will take the bench at the first of the year—and recovering from an abdominal gunshot wound he received in the courtroom while representing a woman in a divorce proceeding. The details of the shooting, which are relevant to the story being told, are spread throughout the narrative like so many tasty tidbits. Robak, who has quit his practice and plans to take it easy and heal during Indiana’s fickle autumn, is facing his own divorce. His wife Jo took their son to live with her sister in Chicago. So when Robak’s college buddy, Kevin Smalley, calls and asks for his help on a death penalty case, Robak pretends to hesitate but agrees with some enthusiasm. Bertha Jones, an herbalist labeled as a witch by a local millennialist pastor, Reverend Allwell, is accused of poisoning her nephew and niece, Jim and Mary, by dosing a stew she made with nicotine. Bertha had cooked the stew outside in the yard and most of her neighbors in the trailer park where she lived saw the teenagers die in excruciating pain. The good Reverend Allwell was so upset, he tried setting Bertha on fire. There is little doubt in the community of Bertha’s guilt and Robak’s job is to ensure the defense has performed its due diligence for Bertha. But what Robak finds is a community, including government officials, fearful of Allwell and his followers. Robak’s Witch is a sparkling example of a low-key regional legal thriller. Robak, nursing his gut wound and often in pain, perfectly narrates the story with colorful character descriptions, easy legal explanations, and tense—well written—suspense. There is a smooth climactic twist that is more surprising than it should have been and, in the end, the good guys win. The background themes about fundamentalist religion, White Christian Nationalism, and hate mongering are as relevant—perhaps even more so—today as they were in the late-1990s. Robak’s Witch is simply terrific! Now if only I will read another Joe L. Hensley book before three decades ticks by again.

Robak’s Witch, and all of Joe L. Hensley’s Robak novels are out-of-print, which is a shame—but it does give me an excuse to haunt a few used bookshops.