Kestrell

I'm currently reading a collection of short story mysteries set during the holiday time. Most of the stories are by golden age detective story writers such as Marjorie Allingham, Agatha Christie, and G. K. Chesterton. A few of the stories are more recently however. "Mr. Big" by Woody Allen is the second story in the collection, and I really enjoyed it, so I thought I would share. Here is alink to the story online:
http://www.wepsite.de/Mr._Big,Woody_Allen.htm

Now I'm off to search for the source of the final philosophical quotation.

I'm not normally a big fan of Ngaio Marsh because 1) I think her detective protagonist is pretty dull (really, what's the point of being a detective if one isn't going to be eccentric?) and 2) I find the pacing of her mysteries somewhat boggy and slow.

However, how can one resist a mystery involving mummers?

Well, maybe one can, but I couldn't, especially as there don't seem to be very many mysteries set on the winter solstice, which seems somewhat odd since, as this mystery points out, there are a lot of dark doings on the winter solstice, and that's even leaving aside all the werewolf birthday parties.

There's also a fanatical folklore lady and a number of rustic entertainments--including a pub called The Green Man and yes, there is a landlord's daughter--which kept reminding me of "The Wicker Man" in that creepy-cool way I enjoy (if this story had been written by John Dickson Car, it would have probably slipped in some gothic touches, like a coven of drug-crazed witches,* but this is Marsh, so that doesn't happen.)

The one element which I found rather icky was that there is a very negative stereotype of an epileptic man, and he is pretty much verbally abused throughout the story, and this is contextualized as allowable by other characters who like to talk about morals. The book was published in 1956, so one can mostly put on one's timetravel blinders and try to not dwell on it, but still, ick.

* I have been reading some John Dickson Carr stories which often feature murderers whose homicidal inclinations have been triggered by the use of...marijuana!

How have I not seen this before? And it all begins with, Prospero's magic book was the _Necronomicon_, to which I can only reply, well, of course, why hadn't that occurred to me before?
http://www.amazon.com/Shakespeare-Lovecraft-Shakespeares-Characters-Lovecrafts/dp/1479106135/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&tag=shadmano-20&qid=1350564373&sr=8-1&keywords=Shakespeare+v+Lovecraft

is the title of a book with recipes for cakes with a dark theme, including the Stabbed Cake, the Breakup Cake and, my favorite (of course) the Mini-Eyeball Cupcake.
http://www.amazon.com/Twisted-Cakes-Debbie-Goard/dp/0956438253/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1349893742&sr=1-1&keywords=Twisted+Cake

philocretinism?

I include the context at length because it is just so delicious. The setting is an annual conference of Poe scholars.

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In Stockholm, the Argentinian had called the German a racist and a Euromaniac; the German had accused him of philocretinism. Intellectual controversies tend to be like dog fights without the teeth, in which the barking not the biting does the damage. In the case of Rotkopf and Urquiza, however, according to the report in The Gold-Bug, they had very nearly come to bites. So much so that Oliver Johnson had to break off his discussion of Poe's influence on
Lovecraft - in which he defended the revolutionary theory that a supposed twentieth-century invention of Lovecraft's the Necronomicon or book of dead names, was, in fact, an esoteric code dating back to the beginning of time and to which Poe had already made cryptic references - and leave the stage, with Rotkopf congratulating him, saying that every time an imbecile stopped talking, the intellectual climate on Earth improved slightly.
Oliver Johnson had sworn to kill Joachim Rotkopf one day, and Rotkopf and Urquiza had continued their argument in the pages of The Gold-Bug, in a series of increasingly vitriolic articles, which I had followed with fascination, never dreaming that I would one day hear those magnificent, erudite dogs trading insults for real.
block quote end

_Borges and the Eternal Orangutans_, pp. 16-17, by Luis Fernando Verissimo

The new Lois McMaster Bujold book is available as an advance review copy in etext from the Baen Books Website. Alexx loaded it on his iPad and read it to me a few weeks back. It is--as I had always predicted Ivan's story would be--a romantic comedy which then turns into a heist novel, so it makes a great beach book (and there is even a beach in it).
Thank you to LJ user thnidu for prompting my memory.

Am I supposed to find Dief quite so adorable? I keep hoping that the female science fiction professor will ditch the oblivious engineering prof/writer and sweep Dief off his tweedy feet.

Now I must google for fanfic...

I thought this might be of interest to my SCA friends

_Women and Aristocratic Culture in the Carolingian World_ by Valerie L. Garver (Cornell University Press, 2012)

So, there were these three historians: a medievalist, a prehistoric historian, and a World War I historian (I'm sure there are jokes which begin like this, but all I could think of was one which began: "There were three engineers...", so if any of my historian friends know historian jokes, please post so I can address this sad oversight in my education).

Anyway, like a lot of historians, their studies have gained them much knowledge but little in the way of monetary riches, so they decide to share a house together. When their next-door neighbor disappears, the historians, who are very good at doing research and digging up obscure clues, decide to get involved.

And then it's as if the three musketeers decided that this time, rather than doing yet another adventure story with basically the same plot, they said, fuck that, this time we're ditching the poofy hats and doing a mystery!

I'm not sure that Fred Vargas intentionally rewrote _The Three Musketeers_ as a mystery, but once the idea occurred to me, I kept finding parallels. I'm not going to share them here, because they would be spoilers but, needless to say, there is a very evil cold-hearted woman who is working against them.

If you liked Arturo Perez-Reverte's _The Club Dumas_, I would recommend this book If you don't know who Perez-Reverte is, I would recommend this book anyway. If you have a thing for historians (swoonswoon), I would definitely recommend this book.

I've been averaging one Fred Vargas book a day for most of this week and, sadly, I'm almost out of Fred Vargas books, but I lovelovelove her novels. Before she wrote mysteries, Vargas was a historian and archeologist, so I'm thinking most of my friends would like her books.

I have one last Vargas mystery left and, oh look, it's supposed to be a rainy day tomorrow, so I won't even have to save it.

After reading Josh Bazell's debut novel, _Beat the Reaper_, I had already regarded Josh Bazell as possessing a certain raffish charm since (aside from teaching me the word "autofemurectomy") it was clear that, as an author, he considered realism to be more of a very loose, lightly-penciled-in guideline rather than a strict narrative methodology. Still, I thought of Josh Bazell as more of a guilty pleasure rather than as totally irresistible.

However, after reading Josh Bazell's new book, _Wild Thing_, resistance is futile and I think I am totally in love with Josh Bazell.

1. Josh Bazell implies that he can deliver action and suspense, and he actually follows through.
Don't you hate it when a man promises you action and suspense and all you get are cardboard characters and lots of pedantic info dumps? Sisters, you probably don't need me to tell you that there are way too many guys who, no matter how many times a female reader says, "Show me, baby, don't just tell me," never manage to figure out what a woman wants, but *Josh knows*.
The story opens with a couple of teenagers necking at an isolated lake right before they are torn apart by an unseen someone--or something--and, before you can even say "bite me," there are wacko monster hunters, hopped-up methheads, a pair of redshirts named Del and Miguel, a friendly but stupid dog named Bark Simpson (Josh, you are so shameless!), not to mention our hero, an ex-hitman-turned-cruise ship doctor.

2. The main female character in the book is a punk paleontologist.
I never get tired of saying that: punk paleontologist.

3. There are frigging footnotes!
Also, an academic article written by the punk paleontologist and an extensive references reading list. It's as if Josh knows I'm a metasexual and that the way to my heart is through the paratexts.

4. Josh blinded me with science.
Okay, not really 'cause, hey, already blind here, but...science! If I referred to this book as science fiction, some people would probably argue with me, but this book has more science in it than a lot of science fiction I have read. lately, and, see above, footnotes.

5. While the hero-protagonist his an ex-hitman-turned doctor, he doesn't spend a lot of time doing the alpha-male strut.
Actually, his mantra is "I am one dumb fucking shithead." I can't help but think that, if there were more male characters who had the superpower of admitting when they fucked up, that real-life males would be more willing to accept the radical possibility that the penis is not an antenna which allows males to possess all the knowledge in the universe.

So, those are my five reasons why I love Josh Bazell.

Note: if Josh Bazell should happen to read this review, I just want to say that I am not one of those crazy stalker-types, really, swear.