Every Lost Country
Steven Heighton
Knopf Canada
It has been weeks since I finished this novel. I really would have gotten to it sooner, but work has been very hectic and I was more-or-less obsessed with the Tour de France. It's hard to write about a serious book when you're shouting crazily at the television. Oh, for those of you that have been following along, my guys came in 18th and 68th respectively. Go team!
Every Lost Country is a fictional story (based on a real event that occured in 2006) about a doctor/humanitarian who has signed up to provide medical support for a Canadian climbing expedition along the Tibet-Nepal border. One morning, while most of the climbers are making their way down from another camp, the doctor and his daugher are drawn into an international incident when they try to assist some Tibetans who are fleeing the Chinese authorities. Filming the incidint as part of the backstory for her documentary about the climb, a Chinese-Canadian woman is captured along with the doctor, his daughter and the hopeful refugees. Their treatment by the Chinese, their eventual escape, and their terrifying journey across the bone-chilling slopes of the Himalayas is gripping -- so much so that the book was impossible to put down until I had read the last page.
If an action-packed plot and elegant writing isn't enough to lure you in, the book is also compelling because it is a highly moral story that, at times, reminds me of a modern Everyman where characters are neither purely good nor purely evit. Think Conrad meets morality play -- same vivid characterizations and intellectually challenging situtions -- all woven into a beautiful narrative that catches the reader off guard. I'm not kidding -- you really do want to pick this up. Four and half prayer flags out of five.
Guilty Pleasures
Laurell K. Hamilton
Jove
Well, if we're speaking of guilty pleasures, I don't know which to address first -- the book that is the subject of this week's entry or my sudden fixation with the two-wheeled warriors. Oh hell -- I'm watching the replay of today's Tour de France coverage as I type this, so I might as well start with the cyclists.
Holy smokes ... what a fascinating sport! I'm not a huge television watcher, but I've suddenly become best friends with both my couch and the remote. I even got up at 6:30 AM on Saturday so I could watch the race live. I've yet decide if I think the riders are brilliant tacticians, Machiavellian strategists, or barking mad. In any case, they are monsters and I just can't look away.
Okay, enough of that ... on to another guilty pleasure. I know I promised you some time ago that I would lay off the vampire novels. Well, I hate to renege on a deal, but I was at the airport, I couldn't find anything to read and the oh-not-so-bookish clerk pulled Guilty Pleasures off the shelf and mumbled something that sounded like "favourite author." Who am I to spurn a recommendation? Guilty Pleasures turned out to be relatively entertaining and a little unconventional. Anita Blake dabbles in the paranormal and is an accomplished animator who is paid to raise people from the dead. She works for a man who is more interested in money than ethics, so it's probably a good that that Anita is a woman of integrity. She also happens to be a survivor of a vampire attack and freelances for the St. Louis police department as a vampire tracker/slayer. I know, right? It doesn't get more outlandish, but I have to admit that it was kind of fun.
I liked this novel because it defies convention. Anita is not a perfect heroine. She doesn't fall for the smooth talking and incredibly handsome vampire, she hangs out with assholes and doesn't judge, and she is fierce in a way that only a survivor can understand. I'll be honest and tell you that I'm probably going to be reading another one of these novels if I'm stuck at an airport with nothing else to do. And I'm going to secretly revel in it. Three mindless zombies out of five. Did I mention that there were zombies? ...
Crime Machine
Giles Blunt
Random House
Guess what? I have a new addiction. No, it's not any of the usual suspects (at my age, those would be meth, coke, booze or men.) And no, it's not even books or candy. Ready for it? Deep breath -- I've become addicted to the Tour de France. I know ... Just a few days ago I was telling all of you that I was going to get cracking and get back to blogging. Forget about writing ... I'm not even reading! I've plopped myself in front of the television every evening this week to watch the replay of a bunch of skinny dudes on bikes. Where has this been all my life?
So, when I haven't been either watching the spandex clad warriors or working like a maniac, I have managed to fit in a couple of chapters here and there This week I was kept company by Detective John Cardinal of the Algonquin Bay police force. What I really like about these novels (aside from the fact that I am familiar with a lot of locations) is the unpredictability and complexity of the plots. Whodunits are never fun when you have them figured out in the first few chapters and I've found that Blunt usually keeps me guessing until the very end.
In addition to the actual mystery in Crime Machine, the characters of John Cardinal and Lise Delorme are continuing to develop across the series. I was dead certain in the last novel that with the death of his wife, Cardinal would turn to his partner for a little romance. Blunt didn't really play it that way and I have found that very intriguing. I might just have to come back whenever Cardinal surfaces again to find out where he's at. I mean, he's no John Rebus, but he is interesting. Three watching the detectives out of five.
PS ... About this whole TdF thing ...they're not all skinny dudes. I quite like big Thor Hushovd. Legs like tree trunks and a happy, happy smile. I'm also cheering for the lone Canadian on tour. Go Ryder!
