The Watcher in the Woods by Florence Engel Randall

(pb; 1980: YA novel)

From the back cover

“Jan had felt it the very first day, walking up to the door of the old house. She ahd known the watcher was there as they knocked and waited for old Mrs. Carstairs to come. And the little old woman, glancing at the woods, had known it was there, too.

“No one wanted to discuss it, certainly not mom or dad. Then mirrors were mysteriously broken, the TV began to transmit strange programs, and ten-year-old Ellie began hearing strange songs and receiving even stranger messages. Jan couldn’t explain it, but she was afraid.

“It hadn’t been easy for Jan, moving to this new town and starting a new school when she was almost sixteen. Meeting Mark seemed to make it better, but would he believe her if she told him about the watcher in the woods?”

Review

Watcher is a fun, sometimes rambling read, with its dread-lite atmosphere of constant paranoia and lackadaisical characters. Its use of supernatural/science fiction and mystery makes it worthwhile, but not great, stuck-at-the-DMV distraction.

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The resulting film was released stateside on October 9, 1981. John Hough and an uncredited Vincent McEveety directed it.

Bette Davis played Mrs. Aylwood. Lynn-Holly Johnson played Jan Curtis. Kyle Richards played Ellie Curtis. Carroll Baker played Helen Curtis. David McCallum played Paul Curtis. Benedict Taylor played Mike Fleming. Ian Bannen played John Keller. Georgina Hale played “Young Mrs. Aylwood.”

Sudden Impact by Joseph C. Stinson

(pb; 1983: movie tie-in)

From the back cover

“Rape─and revenge!

“There he was! She had never been able to forget his face. His face─and the leering, jeering gang who  had been with him enjoying her pain and humiliation as each one took his turn. Well, he wouldn’t get away. He deserved to die.

“This murder will only be a beginning. And Dirty Harry finds himself smack in the middle of revenge on a grand scale as he tracks the woman who is tracking the rape gang.”

Review

This is a fun─as in darkly amusing, brutal and violent─lazy afternoon book (based on Stinson’s screenplay). Stinson streamlines this short, blunt, ugly, action-dominated and not-for-the-sensitive movie tie-in into a read that one should not take seriously, lest one slip into pompousness or equally unattractive attitudes. This is not high art this is well-written pay-the-bills work.

Readers who are especially sensitive about the subject of rape (Sudden suggests that a bullet will go a long way toward alleviating post-violation suffering), occasional blue collar racism (Harry affectionately thinks of a close friend, Horace, as a “darky son-of-a-bitch”) and general Dirty Harry-isms will probably not like Sudden. If you fit that description, and read it anyway and are offended, that’s on you, no one else.

I do not know if this is a collector’s item or not, but if you find a good condition copy of Sudden for a relatively cheap price─like I did─it might be worth picking up.

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The film version─the fourth of five Dirty Harry flicks─was released stateside on December 9, 1983. Joseph C. Stinson, sometimes billed as Joseph Stinson, wrote the screenplay, based on Earl E. Smith and Charles B. Pierce’s story. An uncredited Dean Riesner also contributed to the story. Stinson also wrote Clint Eastwood's City Heat (1984) and was an uncredited writer on Eastwood's Heartbreak Ridge (1986).

Eastwood, who directed the film, played “Dirty Harry” Callahan. Sondra Locke played Jennifer Spencer. Albert Popwell, who appeared in two other Dirty Harry films as different characters (Magnum Force, 1973, and The Enforcer, 1976), played Horace King. Mark Keyloun played Officer Bennett.

Audrie Neenan, billed as Audrie J. Neenan, played Ray Parkins. Jack Thibeau played Kruger. Nancy Parsons played Mrs. Kruger. Paul Drake played Mick.

Pat Hingle, another Eastwood-flick semi-regular, played Chief Jannings. He, playing different characters, appeared in an episode of the Clint Eastwood show Rawhide (Season 7 episode 14: "The Book"; original air date: January 8, 1965). He also appeared in Hang 'Em High (1968).

Mara Corday played “Loretta—Coffee Shop Waitress.” She also appeared in four other Eastwood flicks as different characters (Tarantula, 1955, in which Eastwood played an uncredited "Jet Squadron Leader"; The Gauntlet, 1977; Pink Cadillac, 1989; and The Rookie, 1990).

The Noir Western: Darkness on the Range, 1943—1962 by David Meuel

(pb; 2015: nonfiction)

From the back cover

“Beginning in the mid-1940s, the bleak, brooding mood of film noir began seeping into that most optimistic of film genres, the western. Story lines took on a darker tone and western films adopted classic noir elements of moral ambiguity, complex anti-heroes and explicit violence.

“The noir western helped set the standard for the darker science fiction, action and superhero films of today, as well as for acclaimed TV series such as HBO Deadwood and AMC’s Breaking Bad. This book covers the stylistic shift in westerns in mid-20^th century Hollywood, offering close readings of the first noir westerns, along with revealing portraits of the eccentric and talented directors who brought the films to life.”

Review

Darkness is an excellent nonfiction read, the equivalent of a micro-course on noir westerns. A burn-through, engaging and informative book, it shines a light on lesser known and well-known directors and selected standout works they created in the titular period. These directors, writers and film technicians include: William Wellman, Raoul Walsh, André de Toth, Robert Wise, Sam Fuller, Henry King, Anthony Mann, Allan Dwan, Delmer Daves, Budd Boetticher and John Ford. These is a should-read for anyone interested in western and noir cinema, and a book worth owning.

That Was Then, This Is Now by S.E. Hinton

(pb; 1971: YA fiction)

From the back cover

“Bryon and Mark have been inseparable best friends from childhood, but now, at sixteen, they both sense they are growing apart. Bryon is disturbed by the fights and violence, yet Mark takes all of it as a matter of course─part of the life of a kid on the street. Things seem to be changing too fast for Bryon. He is in love with Cathy─growing up and beginning to care and to realize that they are no longer kids.

“When Bryon discovers that Mark is pushing dope to young kids, he mut face a decision that might destroy their longtime friendship.”

Review

That is a mostly excellent, character-focused, waste-no-words YA novel that deals with tricky-for-YA subject matter, drugs, rough living and criminal activity.Its characters are relatable,even─especially?─when they screw up. This is another genre milestone from Hinton, who specialized in writing about troubled teens and life on the wrong side of social expectations.

I wrote “mostly excellent” because Hinton’s near-the-end hyperbolic just say no take regarding a canary-in-the-coal-mine character (M&M) and LSD comes off as screedish. Other than that, this is a worthwhile and life-smart novel.

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The resulting film, That Was Then. . .This is Now, was released stateside on November 8, 1985. Christopher Cain directed it, from a screenplay by one of its stars, Emilio Estevez, who played Mark Jennings.

Craig Sheffer played Bryon Douglas. Larry B. Scott played Terry Jones. Matthew Dudley played Curly Shepard. Jill Schoelen played Angela Shepard. Kim Delaney played Cathy Carlson. Frank Howard played M&M Carlson.

Morgan Freeman played Charlie Woods. Ramon Estevez, billed as Ramon Sheen, played Mike Chambers (Ramon is Emilio Estevez’s brother).

From Dusk Till Dawn: A Screenplay by Quentin Tarantino

(pb; 1995: screenplay)

From the back cover

“You’d better hope you don’t cross paths with the infamous Gecko brothers─Richie and Seth. They’re fond of banks─robbing them, that is. They’re tough. Cool. Notorious. In From Dusk Till Dawn, we follow them as they tear a path through the heartland of America on their way to the borner. It is there, near El Paso, that they will meet up with their Mexican partners-in-crime to divvy up the loot they’ve acquired.

“Along the way, though, an innocent family will enter their lives─an ex-Baptist preacher, his teenage son, and sexy daughter. We watch as Richie and Seth enlist the family’s help in getting them safely across the border in the family’s Winnebago. When they arrive at their dreamed-about world south of the border, they are met with a terrifying twist.”

Review

Cutting to the point─there is not a lot to say about this fast-moving, character-intense heist/vampire screenplay and film, aside from: if you are a fan of Quentin Tarantino, Robert Rodriguez, or just like the 1996 film that resulted from this screenplay, chances are you’ll enjoy reading it. If you’re not, you probably won’t. Tarantino keeps the writing lean ‘n’ mean, with no lag in action, sleaziness and sketched-out character development, creating a screenplay/film that is a modern milestone in the vampire flick genre, one that brings to mind the trashy, Americanized thrills of a 1960s/1970s Hammer film. Worth reading and owning, this, if you appreciate Tarantino and Rodriguez’s work, or the film in general.

Chumpy Walnut and Other Stories by Will Viharo

(pb; 2016: story anthology)

Overall review

This excellent story twelve-story anthology shows Viharo’s range as a writer. There’s the sweet “Chumpy Walnut,” as well as atmospheric, existential vignette-plays (“Night Notes,” “The Inbetweeners,” etc.) and straightforward horror-pulp hybrids (“People Bug Me,” “Short and Choppy,” etc.). Whether you are a longtime Viharo fan, or just coming into his prolific, penned world, this a diverse story collection worth owning.

Standout stories

“Chumpy Walnut”: A young man as tall as a ruler─the kind one measures with─goes on a wild adventure in a big city where sexy dames, gangsters, kind-hearted hustlers and musically inclined adolescents run rampant. Lots of wordplay, colorful characters and dizzying action in this ultimately warm and funny novella─this brings to mind elements and characters from Hollywood films, circa 1930s to early 1950s.

“A Wrong Turn at Albuquerque”: In this one-act play, a writer gives a beautiful hitchhiker a ride, a passenger who may change his life in ways he does not expect. Entertaining, clever-conversation and smile-inducing piece.

“Night Notes”: Mood-effective story about a hotel night clerk (who wants to be a sax player) and could-be poet in the a.m. hours. Haunting, great finish.

“Coffee Shop Goddess”: Sweet, melancholic story spanning most of the 1980s. In it, a young man befriends a funny, smart woman appropriately named Lightbulbs (for the previously stated reason). This being a Viharo story, there’s plenty of era-centric pop music and film references as well as clever banter.

“People Bug Me”: An on-the-lam reporter interviews a small town shrink for an article after the shrink has been attacked by one of his patients─a teenage “lycanthrope,” according to the doctor. Then things get really weird. . . this quick-blast, fun and excellent story has a 1950s film feel: it’s a conjoining of two 1957 films─Sweet Smell of Success and I Was a Teenage Werewolf.

This story has been published twice before this. In March 2014, it was published in the fifth issue of Nightmares Illustrated. Its second time-around was in the Spring 2015 issue of Dark Corners magazine.

“Short and Choppy”: Grisly, sexually explicit tale about a dwarf (Cameron) whose hatred for his writing teacher (Sean) and lust for Sean’s wife (Sabrina) leads Cameron toward fantastic, violent acts. Excellent, black-hearted and pulpy laugh-out-loud piece.

This work appeared in the Fall 2014 issue of Dark Corners magazine.

“The Lost Sock”: Mood-effective desperation, dread, eroticism and surrealism highlight this pop culture-savvy and lust-crusty work about a down-on-his-luck man tried to locate a missing sock. Excellent, Twilight Zone-esque tale, this.

This story was originally published in the Winter 2014 issue of Dark Corners magazine.

The River at Night by Erica Ferencik

(hb; 2014)

From the inside flap

“Winfred Allen needs a vacation.

“Stifled by a soul-crushing job, devastated by the death of her beloved brother, and lonely after the end of a fifteen-year marriage, Wini is feeling vulnerable. So when her three best friends insist on a high-octane getaway for their annual girls’ trip, she signs on despite her misgivings.

“What starts out as an invigorating hiking and rafting excursion in the remote Allagash Wilderness soon becomes an all-too-real nightmare: a freak accident leaves the women stranded, separating them from their raft and everything they need to survive. When night descends, a fire on the mountainside lures them them to a ramshackle camp that appears to be their lifeline. But as Wini and her friends grasp the true intent of their supposed saviors, long-buried secrets emerge and lifelong allegiances are put to the test. To survive, Wini must reach beyond the world she knows to harness an inner strength she never knew she possessed.”

Review

River is an immersive, excellent female-centric thriller that is near-impossible to set down. The characters are deftly sketched out, as are their histories, and River’s setup and pacing makes it a great, lazy afternoon read. Check this out!

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According to the May-June 2019 issue of Scream magazine, River is the basis for a forthcoming film, to be co-written with Kevin Williamson, screenwriter of the Scream quadrilogy, and possibly directed by Eli Roth.

How to Fight Anti-Semitism by Bari Weiss

(hb; 2019: nonfiction)

From the inside flap

“On October 27, 2018, eleven Jews were gunned down as they prayed at their synagogue in Pittsburgh. It was the deadliest attack on Jews in American history.

“For most Americans, the massacre at Tree of Life, the synagogue where Bari Weiss became a bar mitzvah, came as a shock. Yet anti-Semitism is the oldest hatred, commonplace across the Middle East and on the rise for years in Europe. So that terrible morning in Pittsburgh raised a question Americans can no longer avoid. Can it happen here?

“This book is Weiss’s answer.

“Like many, Weiss long believed this country could escape the risingtide of anti-Semitism. With its promise of free speech and religion, its insistence that all people are created equal, its tolerance for difference, and its emphasis on shared ideals rather than bloodlines, America has been, even with all its flaws, a new Jerusalem for the Jewish people. But now the luckiest Jews in history are beginning to face a three-headed dragon known all to well to Jews of other times and place: the physical fear of violent assault, the moral fear of ideological vilification, and the political fear or resurgent fascism and populism.

“No longer the exclusive province of the far right, the far left, and assorted religious bigots, anti-Semitism now finds a home in identity politics as well as the reaction against identity politics, in the renewal of America First isolationism and the rise of one-world fascism, and in the spread of Islamist ideas into unlikely places.”

Review

Fight is one of the best and most intense nonfiction books I’ve read this year. It is informative, disturbing, angry, pro-active─and life-changing, at least for this reader. Weiss, with her measured use of the above elements and logic, lays out how the hatred of Jews is a distinctive, constantly morphing horror, not rooted in a few main reasons but many. If you are interested in confronting racism or interested in the subject for other reasons, this is a should-read, one worth owning.

Day of the Animals by Donald Porter

(1977: movie tie-in)

From the back cover

“No one knew what would happen when man’s chemical blundering destroyed the ozone layer in our atmosphere. But in the hills and mountains of the world the effects were already clear. The animals had turned angry─and vicious.

“High in the thin air of the Sierras, a small group of men and women were caught in a struggle that at the same moment was being waged around the world─cut off without weapons─alone against the razoring claw, the piercing beak, the crushing fang of the bird and beast─they were fighting for their lives. . .and losing.”

Review

Day is a fun movie tie-in book, an example of a solid writer making the most of a paper-thin storyline and characters who are one-note caricatures. Porter writes his animals-attack-humans scenes with relish, easily the highlights of the novel, but the rest is merely okay, a minor and forgettable distraction for readers who do not need to care about the characters and do not mind a lot of skim-reading. Note that there are differences between this book and the film version─Porter wrote Day based on the film’s original screenplay, not the shooting script.

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The film version was released stateside on May 13, 1977. William Girdler directed it.  William W. Norton and Eleanor E. Norton wrote the screenplay, based on Edward L. Montoro.

Christopher George played Steve Buckner. Leslie Nielsen played Roy Jensen. Lynda Day George played Terry Marsh. Richard Jaeckel played Professor MacGregor. Michael Ansara played Daniel Santee. Ruth Roman played Shirley Goodwyn.

Letters from an Astrophysicist by Neil deGrasse Tyson

(hb; 2019: nonfiction)

From the inside flap

“. . . Tyson invites us to go behind the scenes of his public fame by revealing his correspondence with people across the globe who have sought him out in search of answers. In this hand-picked collection of 101 letters, Tyson draws upon cosmic perspectives to address a vast array of questions about science, faith, philosophy, life, and of course, Pluto. His succinct, opinionated, passionate, and often funny responses reflect his popularity and standing as a leading educator. . .”

Review

Letters is a good, entertaining addendum to Tyson’s previous book Astrophysics for People in a Hurry. Of course, you do not need to read Astrophysics to enjoy Letters. Tyson’s answers are, for the most part, concise and reflect a practical, polite (if sometimes blunt) and trust-scientific-fact attitude─because of this, those of a religious faith who hate science should avoid this book. Other nonfiction readers might well enjoy this fast, informative and short read. 

The Auctioneer by Joan Samson

(hb; 1975)

From the inside flap:

“Harlowe, New Hampshire, is a rural township still isolated from the pressures and changes of the second half of the twentieth century. It is here that John Moore works the land farmed by his family for centuries, here that he lives with his wife and daughter, and here that he expects to die when his life’s work is done. But from the moment that a magnetic stranger named Perly Dunsmore arrives in the community and begins a series of auctions to raise money for the growth of the local police force, the days of John Moore’s freedom and independence are suddenly numbered.

“Page after page, the reader is trapped with John Moore in the grip of chilling horror as he is relentlessly stripped of his possessions, his ability to resist, his courage, and his hope by the ever-growing power and demands of the auctioneer. What was initially a minor nuisance, then an infuriating intrusion, now becomes for John Moore a desperate, seemingly doomed battle against a force that has already corrupted all of Harlowe and is now systematically destroying it.”

Review

Auctioneer is a steady build, excellent and near-perfect read, a simply stated metaphor for how people will kowtow under a legalized─even if it is oppressive─system. To say I enjoyed it might be a stretch, for it is also an endurance test, frustrating given the menace displayed toward, and dignities heaped upon, some of its characters. This would be one of my all-time favorite books, were it not for its spot-it-from-miles-away, bulls**t end twist (also spoiling an otherwise effective climactic finish). I understand that Samson is following through on her people-are-cowards-until-they’re-not metaphor with this ending but maybe she should have been more concerned with wrapping up Auctioneer is a satisfying manner. 

If you can accept its flawed denouement, Auctioneer is worth reading.

BlacKkKlansman by Ron Stallworth

(pb; 2014: memoir)

From the back cover

“When Ron Stallworth, the first black detective in the history of the Colorado Springs Police Department, came across a classified ad in the local paper asking all those interested in joining the Klu Klux Klan to contact a P.O. box, he did his job and responded with interest, using his real name while posing as a white man.

“His decision launched what is surely one of the most audacious and incredible undercover investigations in history. During the months-long investigation, Stallworth sabotaged cross burnings, exposed white supremacists in the military, and even fooled David Duke himself.”

Review

BlacKkKlansman is a funny, fascinating and timely cop story-memoir, one worth reading. Stallworth, a few times in the book, repeats himself unnecessarily but otherwise it’s a focused, entertaining and sometimes alarming nonfiction work.

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The resulting film was released stateside on August 10, 2018. Spike Lee directed and co-wrote the screenplay. His co-screenwriters were Charlie Watchtel, David Rabinowitz and Kevin Willmott.

John David Washington played Ron Stallworth. Adam Driver played Flip Zimmerman. Ken Garito played Sergeant Trapp. Topher Grace played David Duke. Alec Baldwin played Dr. Kennebrew Beauregard. Michael Buscemi, billed as Michael Joseph Buscemi, played Jimmy Creek.

The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America’s Shining Women by Kate Moore

(hb; 2017: nonfiction)

From the inside flap

“The Curies’ newly discovered element of radium makes gleaming headlines across the nation as the fresh face of beauty and the wonder drug of the medical community. From body lotion to tonic water., the popular new element shines bright in the otherwise dark years of the First World War.

“Hundreds of girls paint watch faces amidst the glowing dust of the radium-dial factories. The glittering chemical covers their bodies from head to toe; they light up the night like industrious fireflies. With such a coveted job, these ‘shining girls’ are the luckiest alive─until they begin to fall mysteriously ill.

“But the factories that once offered golden opportunities are now ignoring all claims of the gruesome side effects and the women’s cries of corruption. As the fatal poison of the radium takes hold, the brave shining girls find themselves embroiled in one of the biggest scandals of America’s early twentieth century and a groundbreaking battle for workers’ rights that will echo for centuries to come.”

Review

Radium is an excellent, burn-through, entertaining and infuriating book about the conspiratorial, systematic poisoning of American generations by corrupt scientists, dentists and corporations, from 1914 through 1978. The writing is informative, entertaining (if often downbeat and alarming), flows like a modern-day thriller, and is one of the best nonfiction books I have read in recent years. Its theme of corporate and scientific malfeasance is as timely, educational and enduring as any other more-celebrated American elements and institutions, and serves as yet another reminder of who we need to be fighting─in other words, not each other.

Radium is worth owning.

Cutter and Bone by Newton Thornburg

(hb; 1976)

From the inside flap

“A scarred and crippled veteran of Vietnam, Cutter is nevertheless not one to feel sorry for. He has a beautiful and devoted Mo, who lives with him in Santa Barbara with their baby son. And he has friends, a government pension, a brilliant if mordant turn of mind. But he also has a savage and unrelenting despair, a ‘recklessness unto death,’ as his buddy Bone describes it─Bone who seems to have nothing in common with him except their friendship and their love of Mo. An ‘establishment dropout,’ Bone has left behind him a junior execution job in Milwaukee, a wife and children and a suburban home. Handsome enough to live off women, he does just that, going with the flow, going nowhere.

“Then one night, walking home, he happens upon a man disposing of a girl’s body. He catches only a glimpse of him, a silhouette in darkness. But the next day, after reading a newspaper account of the crime─LOCAL GIRL SLAIN, BODY FOUND IN TRASHCAN─Bone comes across a photograph of conglomerate tycoon J.J. Wolfe and he remarks on its similarity to the silhouette he saw.

“This is just what Cutter needed, an obsession big enough to fit his manic recklessness. He becomes convinced that Wolfe is the killer, and sets out to prove it, then to blackmail him for it. In his fervor, he drags Bone and Mo and the dead girl’s sister with him. Only after a wild cross-country drive from the Coast to the Ozarks─home base of the Wolfe empire─does Bone begin to understand the real nature of his friend’s obsession, that Cutter is not pursuing a murderer so much as the great enemy itself, them, the very demons that have dogged his life.”

Review

Thornburg’s immersive, hard-to-set-down and offbeat neo-noir novel captures well the fatalistic malaise that suffused the 1970s, with characters─some manic, others burnt out and exhausted─whose personalities and actions drive this Don Quixote-esque quest to its inevitable, appropriate Easy Rider-esque finish. This is an excellent read, its twists and turns character-centric and organic, one that─for its time─updates America’s dark legacy. This is one of my all-time favorite crime reads, one worth owning.

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The resulting and lighter-in-tone film, retitled Cutter's Way, was released stateside on February 10, 1982. Ivan Passer directed it, from a screenplay by Jeffrey Alan Fisker.

Jeff Bridges played Richard Bone. John Heard played Alex Cutter. Lisa Eichorn played “Mo.” Ann Dusenberry played Valery Duran. Arthur Rosenberg played George Swanson.

Stephen Elliott played J.J. Cord. Patricia Donahue played Mrs. Cord. Geraldine Baron played Susie Swanson.

Julia Duffy played “Young Girl.” Billy Drago played “Garbageman.” Ted White, who later played Jason in Friday the 13^th: The Final Chapter [1984]─an uncredited role─played “Guard #1.” An uncredited Paul Thomas, ex-porn star, played “Man at table in dive bar.”

Killers of the Flower Moon by David Grann

(pb; 2017: nonfiction)

From the back cover

“In the 1920s, the richest people per capita in the world were members of the Osage Nation in Oklahoma. After oil was discovered beneath their land, they rode in chauffeured cars and lived in mansions.

“Then, one by one, the Osage began to be killed. Mollie Burkhart watched as her family became a prime target. Her relatives were shot and poisoned. Other Osage were also dying under mysterious circumstances, and many of those who investigated the crimes were themselves murdered.

“As the death toll rose, the case was taken up by the newly formed FBI and its young, secretive director, J. Edgar Hoover. Struggling to crack the mystery, Hoover turned to a former Texas Ranger named Tom White, who put together an undercover team, including a Native American agent. They infiltrated this last remnant of the Wild West, and together with the Osage began to expose one of the most chilling conspiracies in American history.”

Review

Killers is an excellent nonfiction book that masterfully mixes reportage of an egregious, real-life criminal conspiracy with the cinematic-vivid draw of a mystery and thriller. It is a sad, horrifying and oh-so-American read but its horrors are balanced by Grann’s superb  writing and characterizations. This is one of my all-time favorite nonfiction reads, one that I intend to keep on my bookshelf (I rarely keep books due to lack of space).

Robin by Dave Itzkoff

(hb; 2018: Robin Williams biography)

From the inside flap

“From his rapid-fire stand-up riffs to his breakout role in Mork & Mindy and his powerful Academy-award winning performance in Good Will Hunting. Robin Williams was a singularly innovative actor and comedian. He often came across as a man possessed, holding forth on culture, politics, and personal revelation─all with mercurial, tongue-twisting intensity as he inhabited and shed one character after another.

“But as Dave Itzkoff shows in this. . . biography, Williams’s brilliance masked a deep well of conflicting emotions and self-doubt. In his comedy and in celebrated films such as Dead Poets Society; Good Morning, Vietnam; The Fisher King; Aladdin; and Mrs. Doubtfire he showcased his limitless gift for improvisation, bringing his characters to life and using humor to seek deeper truths.

“Itzkoff also shows how Williams struggled mightily with addiction and depression and with a debilitating condition at the end of his life that affected him in ways his fans never knew. Drawing on more than a hundred original interviews with family, friends, and colleagues as ewll as extensive archival research, Robin is a fresh and original look at a performer whose work touched so many of our lives.”

Review

Robin is an excellent, relatively thorough, funny, nostalgic and sometimes sad biography of a gifted man who hid a lot of his pain─like a lot of comedians─behind humor and whimsy. If you are a fan of Williams and can put up with a few sad parts, this is worth reading.

A Dog’s Ransom by Patricia Highsmith

(pb; 1972)

From the back cover

“. . . a high-minded criminal hits a Manhattan couple where it hurts the most when he kidnaps their beloved black miniature poodle, Lisa, from Riverside Park. Ed Reynolds, a forty-two-year-old editor at a prestigious publishing house, returns home one night to find a note: ‘Dear Sir. I have your dog Lisa. She is well and happy. . . I gather she is important to you? We’ll se.’ and so the nightmare begins for the Reynolds couple in this harrowing portrait of mid-century urban life shattered by a single bizarre event.”

Review

Ransom is an okay read. Highsmith, as usual, takes a standard thriller setup and restructures, shakes it up, with her analytical, incisive genre-mixing tone and style.

The main villain, Kenneth Rowajinski, reminds me a lot of the emotional/criminal journeys of other Highsmith characters─namely, Walter Stackhouse from her 1954 novel The Blunderer as well as young Tom Ripley in The Talented Mr. Ripley (1955). Her distinctive setup reminds me of her excellent 1983 novel People Who Knock on the Door, with its long, steady build into murder and further tragedy, as well as its effective takedown of middle-class smugness and over-reliance on material comfort.

That said, Ransom is not as good as People, at least for this reader. I could not relate to most of the characters, whose actions and outlooks were apathetic, callous, needy, languid (in that Highsmithian way) and overtly self-destructive. I “get” that we are viewing things through her lens, but none of these characters have redeeming qualities. It’s all various shades of darkness, ignorance and other negative elements─in a phrase, a hundred-percent nihilistic.

It does not help that Highsmith has one of her less odious characters, Clarence Pope Duhamell, think: “A pity that New York had been overrun by blacks and Puerto Ricans instead of by some race that might have improved things.” This is not the only part with racist rumblings. While she is reflecting the spirit of the age (and most ages), it felt unnecessarily ugly.

Ransom is worth reading, if you don’t mind Highsmith’s into-a-void misanthropy and unlikeable characters. The style and writing are fine, for the most part, but its darkness is a bit much, even for Highsmith.

Cold Moon Over Babylon by Michael McDowell

(pb; 1980)

From the back cover

“Welcome to Babylon, a typical sleepy small town, where years earlier the Larkin family suffered a tragedy. Now they are about to endure another: fourteen-year-old Margaret Larkin will be robbed of her innocence and her life by a killer who is beyond the reach of the law.

“But something strange is happening in Babylon: traffic lights flash an eerie blue, a ghostly hand slithers from the drain of a kitchen sink, graves erupt from the local cemetery in an implacable march of terror. . . And beneath the murky surface of the river, a shifting, almost human shape slowly takes form. Night after night it will pursue the murderer. And when the full moon rises over Babylon, it will seek a terrible vengeance.”

Review

Cold is an excellent, character-rich and steady-build horror/revenge tale, unrushed in its cinematic-vivid, unfolding terrors, truths and consequences. Its arc and ending are not unpredictable but, in this case, it is the atmospheric, masterfully wrought journey that matters, cherry-topped with a deliciously low-key but devastating end-line. Worth reading and owning, this.

Doom Patrol, Volume 2: The Painting That Ate Paris by Grant Morrison, Doug Braithwaite, Richard Case, Scott Hanna, John Nyberg and Carlos Garzón

(2016: graphic novel, collects issues 35-50 of the rebooted-in-1989 comic book series)

From the back cover

“Originally conceived in the 1960s by the visionary team of writer Arnold Drakes and artist Bruno Premiani, the Doom Patrol was reborn a generation later through the singular imagination of a young Scottish author─and the result took American comics in a wholly unexpected direction.

“In forging their new path, the reborn World’s Strangest Heroes left behind almost every vestige of normality. Though they are super-powered beings, and though their foes are bent on world domination, all that is conventional ends there. Shunned as freaks and outcasts, and tempered by loss and insanity, this band of misfits faces threats so mystifying in nature and so corrupted in motive that reality itself threatens to fall apart around them─but it’s still al in a day’s work for the Doom Patrol.”

Review

Doom, with its sly humor, unique and unsettling characters and multiverses as well as its smarty pants, abstract notions/genre twists, is one of my all-time favorite comic book series. It does not hurt that the artwork is stellar, straddling the line between Golden Age and then-Modern Age illustrations and tones; it furthers my enjoyment of Doom that the storylines are unpredictable and, at times, mind-bending.

In this particular Doom volume, our unusual heroes further their acquaintance with Danny the Street. They also battle The Men From N.O.W.H.E.R.E. (fake and real), fangsome smoke dogs, and the chaotic Mr. Nobody─escaped from the “Painting That Ate Paris” he was trapped in, in Volume 1─and his new Brotherhood of Dada.

Followed by Doom Patrol, Volume 3: Down Paradise Way.

Knife by Jo Nesbø

(2019: twelfth book in the Harry Hole series. Translated from the Norwegian by Neil Smith.)

From the inside flap

“Harry is in a bad place. Rakel─the only woman he’s ever loved─has kicked him out, permanently. He’s drinking again. And though he’s been given a chance for a new start with the Oslo Police, it’s in the dreaded cold case office. Wht he wants to be is investigating─what he’s made to be investigating─are new cases that he suspects have ties to Svein Finne, the most notorious criminal in Norway, the serial murder and rapist Harry helped put behind bars a decade ago. Now Finne is free. Free and, Harry is certain, unreformed, and already taking up where he left off.

“But things are about to get worse. When Harry wakes up the morning after a drunken blackout, it’s only the beginning of what will be a waking nightmare. . .”

Review

Knife is an excellent, near-impossible-to-set-down pot boiler thriller that─for the most part─masterfully builds on previous events in the series, repercussions from Harry’s and others’ pasts that now come to often-violent fruition. Main characters are knocked off or their stories warmly or horrifyingly expanded upon, big-and-bold twists and turns punctuate every other chapter, and its pace is full-speed-ahead.

The only misstep is the identity of the main killer(s) stalking Harry’s family. While it was technically well-foreshadowed, its seeds planted expertly along the way, the reason for his/her turn to the dark side felt forced, a trifle-excuse of a justification for Nesbø to further show off his clever chops. That said, it is a minor nit, albeit a near-the-end-book-take-away one, in an otherwise wow-that’s-popcorn-worthy entertaining read.

Knife is worth reading, and owning, if you can get past a killer (or killers) whose breaking points seem writerly. Followed by Killing Moon.