Hardboiled ... and Then Some

The Maltese Falcon
Dashiell Hammett
Vintage Crime/Black Lizard

We met in a an out-of-the-way bar just off O'Farrell and Mason. I was on assignment writing a special for the Examiner, Sam was working a case. He came over to my table, stopped in front of me and said "Sweetheart, can you be a pal and talk to me like we know each other?" I shrugged my acquiescence and gestured toward a chair on the opposite side of the table. Sam quirked a thickish brow and surveyed me top-to-toe with those yellow-grey eyes. He signaled to the barman, sat down next to me and leaned in. "You look like a dame," he said with a languid grin, "Who can appreciate a drink. Tell me your story to help me pass the time." Sigh. If I had only known what I was getting into.

Sam, it seems, did not approach me by chance. I was in San Francisco chasing down leads on a stolen artifact related to the Templars. I didn't know it at the time, but Sam had been engaged to find the same object d'art by one of my paper's chief rivals. All I had was a story at stake -- for Sam, it was decidedly more personal. The night before we met, his business partner had been murdered and it was somehow all tangled up in the missing statue. Sam was charming and sexy, and while I was falling in love, he was pumping me for information. I should have figured him for a private eye the moment he walked in. He had that don't fuck with me, lone-wolf look that I've been attracted to before.

In the end, we both got what we wanted. The statue turned out to be a fake and for the most part, the bad guys got away. After a few days, I said goodbye to San Francisco as I was hot on the trail of another story. As for Sam, well, I have a feeling that I'll be back to visit him someday soon. He was an interesting man and I'm always up for a little murder and mayhem. And oh, just in case you were wondering -- the drink that Sam ordered? It was a Manhattan. Best damn drink I've ever had -- I'd give it five stars out of five.

Something Can Taste Worse than Buckley’s

The Shock Doctrine – The Rise of Disaster Capitalism
Naomi Klein
Random House

If you have been following this blog for even the briefest period, you’ll have noticed that, quite frankly, I read an awful lot of crap. While I don’t believe that you have to read/eat/be good all of the time, I do think that everyone has a social responsibility to try to improve themselves and in doing so, improve the quality of life of those around them. That said, every once in awhile, I try to read a book that I know will be “good for me” even though I might not like it.

Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine is a thoroughly researched, thought-provoking look at the rise of free-market fundamentialism of the last half-century and how various governments and regimes (from Pinochet's Chile, to Yeltsin's Russia to Bush's privatized war on Iraq) have followed the principles of shock and awe to re-make their respective economies. Sometimes, as in the case of New Orleans or Sri Lanka, the shock and awe is due to an overwhelming natural disaster that presents a "reconstruction" opportunity too good to be missed. In other cases, like the coup against Allende or the invasion of Iraq, economic shock therapy is directly tied to violence, torture and abuse. Regardless of the source, the disturbing trend in all cases is that the economic makeovers serve only to line the pockets of the already rich. Sure, it might be free market capitalism at its best, but is it moral?

I could go on at length about all the upsetting things that I read in this book. I have to say, though, that it was Klein's examination of present-day war profiteering that bothered me the most. To read the chapters in her book about Rumsfeld, Blackwater, Lockheed Martin, and Halliburton literally made my stomach hurt. So much so, that I wanted to stop reading. Like a good girl, I took my medicine and I'm better off for it. I'd suggest that you take it too. Four and a half cough drops out of five.

Roses are Red, Violets are Not ...

The Eaten Heart: Unlikely Tales of Love

Giovanni Boccaccio

Penguin Books

In honour of St. Valentine's Day, I figured I should post an entry about love. Don't laugh -- I know I'm not exactly considered an authority on the subject (can you say disaster with boys?) Thankfully, Boccaccio was an Italian living on the verge of the Renaissance and as such, I'd say that he knew all about the painful, beautiful, exciting, dreadful, angst-ridden, most joyful of all emotions.

The Eaten Heart is a series of tales excerpted from Boccaccio's Decameron. The year is 1348 and ten very witty and charming Florentines flee their plague-filled city and retreat to the country where they tell each other tales to pass the time. Unlike his literary predecessor, Dante, Boccaccio is no moralist and his stories are filled with humour, bawdy language, sex and intrigue. A lot of really good aphorisms have come out of this text, but my favourite has to be, "One woman could exhaust many men, whereas many men can't exhaust one woman." So who cares if it is a little anti-feminist? It's pretty funny and the fact that it said by an old woman encouraging a young wife to cheat on her husband makes me laugh even more. Three point five cupids out of five.

And oh, the title for this week's entry? I'll buy dinner for the person who comes up with the most creative/funniest completion to the poem.

Off the Grid

The Dark River
John Twelve Hawks
Random House

So, one of the things that I really like about fantasy/science fiction is its ability to provide biting social commentary without being overly didactic. Unfortunately, there was nothing subtle about this novel and Twelve Hawks basically uses a sledgehammer to drive home his message about the dangers of information age.

The Dark River continues the story of Gabriel and Michael, two young men who learn that they have the power to travel across "realities" and take themselves to other dimensions. The brothers are divided -- Michael joins the evil Tabula and uses his new powers to manipulate and control. Gabriel remains on the run, protected by the group of friends that he met in the first novel.

Like most second books in a trilogy, The Dark River is not as compelling as the first. While it is fast paced and moderately interesting, it is more of a transition novel and is (hopefully) setting things up for an action-packed, thought provoking finale. I'll probably wait until the last book comes out in trade paperback before picking it up. I'm not sure that The Dark River was worth the price of the hardcover. Two point five RFID tags out of five.