The Thicket by Joe R. Lansdale

(hb; 2013)

From the inside flap

“Jack Parker thought he’d already seen his fair share of tragedy. His grandmother was killed in a farm accident when he was barely five years old. His parent have just succumbed to the smallpox epidemic sweeping turn-of-the-century East Texas─orphaning him and his younger sister, Lula.

“Then catastrophe strikes on the way to their uncle’s farm, when a traveling group of bank-robbing bandits murder Jack’s grandfather and kidnap his sister. With no elders left for miles, Jack must grow up fast─and enlist a band of heroes like the which has never been seen─if his sister stands any chance of survival. But the best he can come up with is Shorty, a charismatic, bounty-hunting dwarf; Eustace, the grave-digging son of an ex-slave; and Jimmie Sue, a street-smart-for-hire who’s come into some very intimate knowledge about the bandits (and a few members of Jack’s extended family to boot).

“In the throes of being civilized, East Texas is still a wild, feral place. Oil wells spurt liquid money from the ground. But as Jack’s about to find out, blood and redemption rule supreme.”

Review

Thicket is an excellent, timely mix of revenge thriller and western, an often-grim work of brutal violence balanced with humor (often with quip-filled exchanges) and well-placed instances of cautious empathy. Its key characters’ pasts and other aspects are effectively established and reader-involving, without slowing up the pace of this terse, dire mission (to rescue Jack’s sister, Lula, from a trio of sadistic villains, Fatty, Cutthroat and N***er Pete).

Thicket is not a novel for those who are especially sensitive about murder, rape (not explicitly shown, but emotionally recounted), torture, brief instances of animal cruelty, racism, and other human-born horrors. Anyone else who enjoys a masterful and especially nasty-twist thriller may find this burn-through book a more-than-worthwhile read.

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A film version of this is supposedly forthcoming. IMDb lists the following information (as of December 18, 2019).

Elliott Lester is set to direct, from a screenplay Chris Kelley.

Charlie Plummer plays Jack Parker. Peter Dinklage plays Reginald Jones. Sophia Lillis is attached to the project as well as Noomi Rapace.

A Dance with Dragons by George R.R. Martin

(pb; 2011: Book Five of A Song of Fire and Ice)


From the inside flap:

"In the aftermath of a colossal battle, the future of the Seven Kingdoms hangs in the balance - beset by newly emerging threats from every direction.  In the east, Daenerys Targaryen, the last scion of House Targaryen, rules with her three dragons as queen of a city built on dust and death.  But Daenerys has thousands of enemies, and many have set out to find her.  As they gather, one young man embarks upon his own quest for the quen, with an entirely different goal in mind.

"Fleeing from Westeros with a price on his head, Tyrion Lannister, too, is making his way to Daenerys.  But his newest allies in this quest are not the ragtag band they seem, and at their heart lies one who would undo Daenerys's claim to Westeros forever.

"Meanwhile, to the north lies the mammoth Wall of ice and stone - a structure only as strong as those guarding it.  There, Jon Snow, 998th Lord Commander of the Night Watch, will face his greatest challenge.  For he has powerful foes not only within the Watch but also beyond, in the land of the creatures of ice."


Review:

Dance, like A Feast for Crows,  is a transition book - in the sense that it's not as fast-moving and action-brutal as the first three Song novels.  Because of this, Dance sports many of the same faults of Feast (e.g., its emphasis on secondary characters who are less intriguing). 

On the plus side, though, there are a plenty of character-based moments in this fifth Song book where I experienced the same sense of thrill that I felt while reading the first three books.   These moments made Dance a worthwhile, if overwritten, read.

Not as great as the first three books, it - like Feast - is still a more impressive read than most fantasy series I've read.  Check it out from the library.

A Storm of Swords by George R.R. Martin

(pb; 2000: Book Three of A Song of Fire and Ice)


From the back cover:

"Of the five contenders for power, one is dead, another in disfavor, and still the war rages, as alliances are made and broken.  Joffrey sits on the Iron Throne, the uneasy ruler of the Seven Kingdoms.  His most bitter rival, Lord Stannis, stands defeated and disgraced, victim of a sorceress who holds him in her thrall.  Young Robb still rules the North from the fortress of Riverrun.  Meanwhile, making her way across a blood-drenched continent is the exiled queen, Daenarys, mistress of the only three dragons left in the world.  And as opposing forces maneuver for the final showdown, an army of barbaric wildlings arrives from the outermost limits of civilization, accompanied by a horde of mythical Others - a supernatural army of the living dead whose animated corpses are unstoppable.  As the future of the land hangs in the balance, no one will rest until the Seven Kingdoms have exploded in a veritable storm of swords."


Review:

All the elements, plot-twisty action and characters that made A Game of Thrones and A Clash of Kings great reads structure and set the tone of this second sequel.  This grim, bloody, whimsical and sometimes surprising (but always character-consistent) series continues to wow; it has made me excited to be a reader, in a way that I haven't been in a long time.

Worth owning, this - as are the first two novels.

Followed by A Feast For Crows.

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Most of the events in Storm are the basis for the third season of the first HBO/cable series, A Game of Thrones.  The series' first episode originally aired on April 17, 2011.  HBO recently aired its Season 3 finale, with a fourth Season set to air next year. 

Given the many characters in this series, I'm not going to list the characters, nor the actors who play them.  (I have a busy schedule.  Maybe later, when I have a little more time, I'll list those who have worked on the series.)

A Clash of Kings by George R.R. Martin

(pb; 1999: Book Two of A Song of Fire and Ice)


From the back cover:

"A comet the color of blood and flame cuts across the sky.  And from the ancient citadel of Dragonstone to the forbidding shores of Winterfell, chaos reigns.  Six factions struggle for control of a divided land and the Iron Throne of the Seven Kingdoms, preparing to stake their claims through tempest, turmoil, and war.  It is a tale in which brother plots against brother and the dead rise to walk in the night.    Here a princess masquerades as an orphan boy, a knight of the mind prepares a poison for a treacherous sorceress, and wild men descend from the Mountains of the Moon to ravage the countryside.  Against a backdrop of incest and fratricide, alchemy and murder, victory may go to the men and women possessed of the coldest steel. . . and the coldest hearts.  For when kings clash, the whole land trembles."


Review:

All the elements, plot-twisty action and characters that made A Game of Thrones a great read structure and set the tone of this first sequel.  This grim, bloody, whimsical and sometimes surprising (but always character-consistent) series continues to wow; it has made me excited to be a reader, in a way that I haven't been in a long time.


Worth owning, this - as is its source novel.

Followed by A Storm of Swords.

#

The events in Clash are the basis for the second season of the first HBO/cable series, A Game of Thrones.  The series's first episode originally aired on April 17, 2011.  HBO recently aired its Season 3 finale, with a fourth Season set to air next year. 

Given the many characters in this series, I'm not going to list the characters, nor the actors who play them.  (I have a busy schedule.  Maybe later, when I have a little more time, I'll list those who have worked on the series.)

A Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin

(pb; 1996: Book One of A Song of Fire and Ice)


From the back cover:

"In a land where summers can last for decades and winters a lifetime, trouble is brewing.  The cold is returning, and in the frozen wastes to the North of Winterfell, sinister and supernatural forces are massing beyond the kingdom's protective protective Wall.  At the center of the conflict lie the Starks of Winterfell, a family as harsh and unyielding as the land they were born to.  Sweeping from a land of brutal cold to a distant summertime kingdom of epicurean plenty, here is a tale of lords and ladies, soldiers and sorcerers, assassins and bastards, who come together in a time of grim omens.  Amid plots and counterplots, tragedy and betrayal, victory and terror, the fate of the Starks, their allies, and their enemies hangs perilously in the balance, as each endeavors to win that deadliest of conflicts: the game of thrones."


Review:

I'm not fan of sword-and-sorcery fantasy novels, but this may be first book of this genre to fully immerse me in its vivid, often grim, sometimes kind and seductive world since I read J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings trilogy as a teenager.  In fact, Game - for this middle-aged reader - may even trump Tolkien's work for its better editing and brutal realism. 

I'm sure this review will add little to what others have already said, given my late entrance into Martin's created world, but to be clear: I loved and/or loathed the fully realized characters and their twisted, interwoven and intense histories; the action was raw, intriguing and unsparing; and the epic scope of Martin's world, as well as the "plots and counterplots" of its widely varied denizens absorbed this noir-minded (that is to say jaded) reader into its wild storylines.

One of my all-time favorite books - worth owning, this.

Followed by A Clash of Kings.

#

The first HBO/cable episode of A Game of Thrones aired on April 17, 2011.  This series is still going - HBO recently aired its Season 3 finale, with a fourth season set to air next year. 

Given the many characters in this series, I'm not going to list the characters, nor the actors who play them.  (I have a busy schedule.  Maybe later, when I have a little more time, I'll list those who have worked on the series.)