“Relic”, by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child

 

382 pages, Forge, ISBN-13: 978-031285630X

Relic by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child is set in the New York Museum of Natural History (now the American Museum of Natural History) and follows the opening of a new exhibit called “Superstitions”, about native and obscure religions and beliefs from around the world – only to be plagued by a series of brutal murders in which people are savagely mutilated and their brains partially eaten (the 1997 movie The Relic was also based on it, but that bombed so you probably didn’t see it). It turns out this book was the first to feature their reoccurring characters Special Agent Aloysius Pendergast and Detective Vincent D’Agosta.

So, anyway, Relic was okay. The mystery at the heart of the story is over the relic in question that is the center of the new exhibit, the culture from which it was taken and its connection to the bloody murders. As the scientists and researchers study the history and mystery surrounding the whole, bits and pieces fall into place as the novel barrels headlong. All of this was fine as these Very Smart People try and piece together the strange findings that come their way. If you are not a geek then much of this may be dull, but any library rat worth their salt will find all of this techno-digging to be well worth the read.

The real problems lay in the wooden characters; not once while reading Relic did I feel any dread or suspense, a damning critique for a book that purports to be a thriller. This is mostly because I couldn’t give a damn for any of these posts masquerading as people. Then there is Special Agent Pendergast of the FBI who is investigating these murders due to their similarity to deaths that had occurred in New Orleans a few years before. While Aloysius brims with personality – especially in relation to the blocks of wood all around him – he also knows…everything and has had just the right unreal life experiences to make him indispensable.

And the ending is LONG, as everything comes to a head and all hell breaks loose and there’s blood and guts and – hell, just wading through the last several chapters was a chore when it should have been a suspenseful hell-ride as we bump and jostle towards the conclusion. The Epilogue, however, was good, as the writers wrap everything up and answer all of your unanswered questions – and set up the sequel. The character through which they do it was always present and, while arrogant, was not very malevolent, until he reveals his ultimate plans. If I had enjoyed Relic more then I think that this last chapter would have gotten me excited for the next book.

The Relic was a ‘B’ Movie, which should come as no surprise, seeing as the book it was based upon was also subpar. An entertaining enough read that occupied me for a week, I shan’t be reading any more Preston and Child books and must bid adieu to Special Agent Pendergast and Detective Vincent D’Agosta.

“Battlefield Earth: A Saga of the Year 3000”, by L. Ron Hubbard

 

1144 pages, Galaxy Press, ISBN-13: 978-1619865099

My first encounter with L. Ron Hubbard and his Sci-Fi novel Battlefield Earth: A Saga of the Year 3000 came way back sometime during the Glorious 80s when my older brother Tom bought a hardcover edition of this thing with cover art by Gerald Grace (the softcover version I borrowed from the Fraser Public Library – “21^st Century Edition, complete with Expanded Content, Author Interview and Discussion Guide” – featured art by Frank Frazetta, a marked improvement). And I had my eye on it ever since, because it was one of those instances that stayed with me for reasons I cannot fathom. But one day when I was doing one of my laps around the Fraser Public Library, I passed by this thing for the umpteenth time and decided at long last to take the plunge. If you eliminate the long-winded introduction and the post-novel Author Interview, that still leaves one with over 1000 pages to barrel through, divided into 33 Parts and each Part into several chapters. So I had my work cut out for me but, hey, who doesn’t like a challenge?

So what’s it all about, then? It is the year 3000; after having been conquered a millennium before by an alien species, the Psychlos, Mankind is on the brink of extinction, reduced to a few primitive tribes in isolated parts of the Earth and numbering fewer than 35,000 worldwide, while the Psychlos strip the planet of its mineral wealth. In what was once Colorado, Jonnie Goodboy Tyler begins the long process of discovering his world and how to drive the alien interloper off and freeing all from its vile presence. So what we have here is some rather classic Sci-Fi pulp fiction in which big themes are discussed, grand vistas are explored, huge battles are fought and goodness and righteousness are tested; if Battlefield Earth had been published during the golden era of pulp fiction then Jonnie Goodboy Tyler could very well have taken his place alongside such exemplars of the genre like Buck Rogers or Flash Gordon (not surprising, really, considering that Lafayette Ronald Hubbard was born in 1911).

But throughout reading this book I couldn’t shake the notion that I was reading another type of book masquerading as Sci-Fi. Most of the first third is taken up by the machinations of Terl, the Psychlo chief of security of Earth, who desperately wants to escape this backwater world and return to Psychlo – and get rich, in the bargain. This is when he captures Johnnie and launches his plan to turn the Man Animals into unpaid workers who will mine the gold he needs. This is all in keeping with the “leverage” that Terl seeks over his superiors, a concept that dominates this part of the book so much that one forgets that this is supposed to be science fiction. Not bad, mind you; seeing Terl plot and plan his way off of Earth is all rather amusing, while Johnnie’s attempts to gain some leverage of his own are likewise engrossing. And whenever one train of thought seems to have run its course Hubbard always does a course correction and refreshes the tale, keeping one interested enough through several hundred pages.

But (you just knew a “but” was coming, dintcha?) there are issues with this magnum opus. While Mankind is on the brink of extinction, there are still several groupings alive around the planet, such as in Scotland, where kilts are still worn, bagpipes are still played and the word “laddie” is used liberally. And it was all just a bit too precious for me. As Hubbard would have it, after 1000 years Scots culture is unaltered, which is nonsense; the Middle Ages lasted from about 500 to 1500 and during that time Europe changed so much as to become unrecognizable, and yet the Scots haven’t altered one iota during the millennium (don’t get me started on the perils of inbreeding). This idea becomes truly ridiculous as other tribes are discovered – like the Red Army – across the globe who likewise have kept the old ways of a world a thousand years dead and languages that, apparently, have remained unchanged. I like the idea that Man and his cultures are resilient, but Hubbard takes this idea to absurd conclusions that beggar belief.

Hubbard liked to say that Battlefield Earth was “Hard Sci-Fi” – that is, science fiction characterized by concern for scientific accuracy and logic (no sound effects in space here) – but this, too, is absurd. From planes that “fly” through unknown means to an alternate periodic table, this book is suffused with technology that can only be described as fantastical. One would think, after reading this, that Hubbard’s grasp of science was mediocre at best and that he made up that which he didn’t know (which was a lot). Some of it works – like the enormous teleportation plate by which the Psychlos transport their earthly plunder back to the homeworld, or the learning machines that force-feed Johnnie the knowledge Terl thinks he needs; I could suspend my disbelief over those. But there were just too many convenient technological solutions to the myriad problems Hubbard raises and then just as easily dismisses in order for his heroic hero to man-up and take on the evil aliens and defeat them at their own game.

But all that isn’t the worst thing about Battlefield Earth. As I noted earlier this book has its roots firmly in the pulp fiction era of novels, and so it is big, brash, loud and as unsubtle as a brick to the head. If Hubbard can say something using 20 words rather than only 5 than you can bet that’s just what he’ll do. The characterizations are simplistic and paper-thin, and while Hubbard can write about the most base and evil impulses, other, grander ideas – like, say, love, generosity, compassion – are ignored altogether. Several times Tyler is challenged and forced to grow and develop, which at least gives him a hero’s arc to complete. And Terl is as devious and plotting a villain as one could hope for, not just a stupid alien to be defeated and purged. But the fate of Psychlo is absurd at best (to say nothing of convenient), the dismissal of the Psychlo Empire is weak, other alien species of the universe are ridiculous and half of the book meanders about, like Hubbard wanted to write a Sci-Fi equivalent to The Lord of the Rings without enough material.

So then…I don’t regret having read Battlefield Earth, but I also can’t recommend it. Not as bad as others have said it was, it certainly isn’t as good as it’s backers would have you believe. There are better uses for trees than all those killed printing this thing (and if you think I’ll go anywhere near the Mission Earth dekalogy you’re nucking futs).

“The Historian”, by Elizabeth Kostova

 

642 pages, Little, Brown and Company, ISBN-13: 978-0316011778

Lots of new authors get loads of attention and praise when their first book gains the interest of the right people – like, for instance, Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian, first published in 2005. Basically, our author blends the fictional Count Dracula with the very real Vlad Țepeș (The Impaler) with the story of Paul and his (unnamed) daughter and their quest to find the tomb of everybody’s favorite 15^th Century Romanian Tyrant – who may or not be extant and unliving it up. To do so the novel ties together three separate narratives using letters and journals, much like the original Dracula: Paul’s mentor in the 1930s; that of Paul in the 1950s; and that of Paul’s daughter in the 1970s, with the last being the principle narration.

These letters and journal entries, written by earlier Dracula hunters and being read by later ones, form the basis of the book; so what we have, then, are one set of scholars reading an earlier scholar’s account who in turn read from this other scholar’s work which references an even earlier piece of work…layer upon layer upon layer of scholarship and research to read and sift through, and you the Reader are along for the ride through it all (it was, I think, an homage to Stoker’s original novel, which was structured in much the same way). But I often had to remind myself that I was reading a character’s letter…that went on for page after page after page with a level of detail that was…um, interesting. Yeah, let’s go with that.

And the pacing reflects this scholarly hunt, for even when a character is being hunted by the denizens of the dark, they still manage to tear through whole sheaves of paper and record how “I can hear them right now, outside my window, they are coming for me” and so on and so forth. Very thoughtful of them. And…well…unrealistic, for while, for the most part, I enjoyed Kostova’s writing, it was events like this that made me realize that I was reading a novel and not a record of events, which took me quite out of the fantasy. I get wanting to show off and write these wonderful passages in which the world in described minutely, but come on, already; does one write a 10-page (or more) letter while the forces of evil lurk outside your door?

And, well, there are other issues, not least the original MacGuffin that sets the plot in motion: a mysterious tome, consisting of empty pages but for a dragon woodcut in the center, is given to a character and, no matter what they do, they just can’t get rid of it. Following the clues of the woodcut should lead them to the mystery at the heart of The Historian – and here is where my first real problem with the book comes into focus, for as MacGuffins go this one is weak. I mean, a blank book with one woodcut? That’s it? No rhymes, or poems, or archaic words to set one off on a life-or-death quest? And why a book? Wouldn’t a broadsheet work just as well? There are better, more satisfactory ways to get a plot rolling.

As for the quest, there, too, we have issues. The scholars, spurred on by the book and disappearance of one of their own, begin their investigation, only to be checked by shadowy forces who assault, intimidate, steal, vandalize and even kill all who would oppose them (it’s never stated, but its vampires). Their motivation – and the appearance of the mastermind – are finally revealed at the end of the book and…man, was it dumb. DUMB, I tell ya. I’m really trying not to spoil it for you but you’d have thunk that an immortal would have thought up a better plan or have had loftier goals. After wading through 600+ pages of, admittedly, mostly artful prose to end her book so stupidly was the ultimate Lucy-and-Charlie-Brown-Football-Yank.

The Historian was, then, LONG, beautiful, intriguing but, ultimately, disappointing. I wish I could recommend it but the conclusion just left too bitter an aftertaste, even after page after eloquent page.

“Girl in a Green Gown: The History and Mystery of the Arnolfini Portrait”, by Carola Hicks

 

256 pages, Vintage Books, ISBN-13: 978-0099526896

Girl in a Green Gown: The History and Mystery of the Arnolfini Portrait was the last work by the British art historian Carola Hicks (indeed, it was published posthumously) and concerns one of the most popular and enigmatic paintings of its time. Painted in 1434 by Flemish artist Jan van Eyck in oils rather than tempera – and measuring a mere 3’ tall – the Arnolfini Portrait is regarded as the first work of art which simultaneously celebrates both middle-class comfort and monogamous marriage, although the subjects of the portrait are in dispute; it is assumed that it shows Giovanni Arnolfini and his probably pregnant wife at their home in Bruges.

What Hicks has written is a kind of double-portrait of this most enigmatic of works: numbered chapters that trace the provenance through the centuries are interspersed with non-numbered chapters that detail the painting itself and all of the hidden meanings of the same. She explores not only who owned this painting and where it travelled, but also all of the hidden details and meanings that may be found dispersed throughout the whole, often hidden in plain sight (unless you didn’t know what you were looking at). Overall, through her vivid descriptions and apt writing, it is obvious why Hicks was such a popular and well-regarded historian.

I like art as much as the next fella but can’t honestly say that I could tell Alla prima from Underpainting. But with Hicks you don’t need to; everything is described in clear language and a detail that doesn’t get bogged down in academic jargon. She “shows” you this detail or that, walks you through its significance and wraps it up with its importance, when she isn’t tracing the history of its owners and place in the world. While doing so, the reason for the importance of this seemingly minor work of art becomes evident to even the most cretinous Cretan. A rare double-feat and more evidence of why Carola Hicks will be missed.

“The Woman in the Window”, by A. J. Finn

 

 

448 pages, HarperCollins, ISBN-13: 978-0062678416

Another book I assigned for the Fraser Public Library’s Mysteries & Munchies book club, The Woman in the Window by A. J. Finn (that would be Daniel Mallory to his friends) features another unreliable female narrator. Dr. Anna Fox, a once-successful child psychologist, finds herself a prisoner in her own home suffering from agoraphobia. She spends her days drinking (too much) wine, playing online chess, counseling patients on the ‘net, watching old movies, recalling happier times with her husband and daughter – and spying on her neighbors. The way in which Finn unrolls the clues of Anna’s life and condition, and how she got here from there, really draws one in and hooks them from the beginning – as does her voice; Anna’s near-constant irreverence and snideness drew me in ever-deeper until I found myself devouring page after page, wanting to learn more and more about her and what drove such a bright woman into such dire circumstances. I was hooked from the get-go.

I admit, the number of thrillers out there that involve an unreliable woman whom nobody believes because she drinks too much, or pops too many pills, or both, is becoming rather tedious (see my review of The Woman in Cabin 10 from coming soon as an example). But this unreliability is central to the plot (and, probably, to all the other plots driving all those other books). What makes Anna stand out so is her voice as, trained child psychologist that she is, she dissects everything she sees with a scalpel and then minutely observes the results. And in a voice that is as acerbic as rubbing alcohol on sandpaper. As the book rolls out its facts in dribs and drabs, you learn that this observational technique is used on herself, as well – only you don’t know it. I have read other reviews that claim that the plot is obvious and predictable, but I found this not to be so; the writing is such that each revelation was a surprise that made me reread what I had read and to admire Finn and his technique.

Whether or not The Woman in the Window is derivative, I thought that Finn wove a mystery that kept me guessing for most of the book. The facts I found to be excellent accessories to the tale, with details from old movies and references to Hitchcock and Christie adding to the story; furthermore, Finn did so in such a way that the end result was not some slavish imitation of past masters of the art but rather an homage to the same. But it all comes back to Anna, as compelling a Train Wreck as one could hope for. While the revelation as to how and why her agoraphobia took over her life changes your view of her, it adds rather than detracts; she is no saint and knows it, once again bringing her therapist eye to a subject close to her – herself. None of us is perfect and most of us don’t like reading about flawless, impossible characters; it is our faults that make us human and, by extension, relatable to each other. And Anna is no different, God bless her.

If you have read other books that I have heard resemble The Woman in the Window – Gone Girl and The Girl on the Train come to mind – then perhaps you will not be so enamored with Finn’s efforts; IF, however, those other books are mysteries to you, then this one will rope you in and keep you hooked from start to finish. In this regard, ignorance truly is bliss.

“Perfume: The Story of a Murderer” by Patrick Süskind

 

272 Pages, Knopf Doubleday, ISBN-13: 978-0375725845

I read Perfume: The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Süskind for a history course on the French Revolution; my Prof. assigned it not so much for its subject matter – more on that in a minute – but because of how the writer described pre-Revolutionary Paris, especially its awful slums. And make no mistake, Paris under the ancien régime comes to life once more under Süskind’s pen (keyboard?) in all its filthy glory. It turns out that Perfume was also Kurt Cobain’s favorite book, and upon completion of this bleak work I could see why. In the man’s own words, “I’ve read Perfume about ten times and I can’t stop reading it. It’s like something that’s just stationary in my pocket all the time. It just doesn’t leave me. I read it over and over. It just effects me”. Depending on what you think of Cobain, this is either an echoing endorsement or a resounding rejection.

Perfume follows the life of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille, a person born with a seemingly supernatural sense of smell in a world in which he is forsaken and unloved. Given birth by his mother at a market stall among rotting fish guts and the stench of corpses – she even uses a fish knife to cut the umbilical cord – Grenouille is eventually discovered in the street, covered in flies and offal (his mother is found and executed for infanticide). Thus orphaned at birth, he is passed between wet nurses, one of whom, Jeanne Bussie, saying of him: “He’s possessed by the devil…This baby makes my flesh creep because it doesn’t smell the way children ought to smell… like fresh butter”. Loved by none and unwanted by all, Jean-Baptiste grows to hate humanity as much as humanity hates him. In so many respects he was damned from the very beginning.

Eventually, Grenouille lands an apprenticeship with a perfumer where that remarkable nose of his can truly come into its own. As he learns his craft and eventually eclipses his employer, he aspires to become the greatest perfumer of the age, an olfactory artisan par excellence whose creations move their wearers like no perfume ever has before. Indeed, it is Grenouille’s ambition to create scents that are so overwhelming that they will allow him to control them and bend them to his will even – and this is key to his motivation – force them to love him. But in order for this godly scent to come into creation, Grenouille must harvest the most pure, delightful and innocent scents from their source – and that source is living, virgin girls. The lengths he goes to in order to bring forth his obsession are monstrous, but what obsessive can corral his demons?

This is grim stuff, and so I find it eminently believable that Kurt Cobain drew inspiration from it for Nirvana’s 1993 album In Utero; the second song, Scentless Apprentice, draws directly from the novel with lyrics such as, “Like most babies smell like butter/His smell smelled like no other/He was born scentless and senseless/Every wet nurse refused to feed him” and a chorus that shrieks “Go away/Get away”, coming from a line in the novel in which “Grenouille no longer wanted to go somewhere, but only to go away, away from human beings”. On could easily argue that many more songs on In Utero were inspired by Perfume, but I won’t belabor the point. As I said above, Cobain’s love of this novel may serve either as a recommendation or a damnation; for me it was neither, as I viewed the thing through its own prism.

Perfume is one of those books that sticks with you, whether you want them to or not. There can be no doubt that Süskind’s descriptive powers are second to none, and that the character he created and the tale he crafted affects one for their sheer detail if nothing more. Paris under the kings comes alive, Grenouille himself virtually walks off the pages and the scents he creates virtually waft around the reader as he takes it all in. And the murders…the murders of all of those young girls strike at one’s heart, so much so that you wish you could reach into the page and throttle Grenouille before he can harm anyone else. I guess I can see how Cobain was inspired by this dark work, but as to why he carried a copy with him everywhere always escapes me – then again, I’m not a drug-addled manic depressive with black thoughts.

“Byzantium”, by Stephen Lawhead

 

645 pages, Zondervan, ISBN-13: 978-0061092961

Stephen Lawhead’s Byzantium tells the tale of Aidan, a 10^th Century Irish monk sent to take the Book of Kells to the Byzantine Emperor in Constantinople. During his quest he becomes separated from his fellow pilgrims and undergoes a variety of exotic adventures, from being captured and enslaved by Vikings, to engaging in political intrigue at the court of the Byzantine Empire and enslavement (again) in the caliph’s mines. Throughout it all his faith in God and Man are tested, and whether or not he comes to the end of his journey a better, bigger man – well, you’ll just have to find out, wontcha?

Byzantium is one of those books that, while I read it lo, many moons ago, has stayed with me ever since. The tense situations Aidan are thrown into time and again are well drawn and fairly exciting, especially the sea battle towards the end of the book, a battle that hums with energy and tension. Throughout each event, Aidan must rely on his wits and various abilities to stay alive and hope to complete the mission he set out on. Lawhead certainly has the ability to create intriguing set pieces, whether in a Danish festhall, an Arab palace, or the city of Constantinople itself. An excellent piece of historical fiction.

But there is more to it than that, for Byzantium is also a tale of a Christian man whose faith is tested time and again. As Aidan is tossed upon the seas of faith, his trust in God is likewise tossed about, and as he witnesses Man’s inhumanity towards Man, that faith becomes ever-more frayed until – to repeat myself, you’ll just have to find out, wontcha? It is to Lawhead’s credit that his writing never turns into preaching, and that his message is delivered with the subtlety of a brushstroke rather than of a sledgehammer. And Aidan’s encounter at the end of the book with the Viking who enslaved him at the beginning…there is no finer example of a Christian apologia in popular fiction.

So Byzantium is great historical fiction with a subtle Christian message that is all the more powerful for being so. It is also great entertainment that kept me engrossed the whole time I was reading it, a rare trifecta of literary skill that Lawhead should be applauded for.