"Death of a Doxy" by Rex Stout

I think that the first episode I ever saw of the A&E series A Nero Wolfe Mystery was the one based on this story.  Because the actors for that show are most indelibly fixed in my head in these particular roles.

If you've never watched the show, I need to explain that the show is kind of a throw-back to the idea of a local repertory theater group.  By which I mean that while the regulars (Archie, Wolfe, Fritz, Saul, Fred, Orrie, Lon Cohen, and Inspector Cramer) are all played by the same actors all the time, there's another group of actors that all play different characters depending on the story.  For instance, this story has a character named Avery Ballou played by actor James Tolkan.  Tolkan plays 11 completely different characters in other episodes.  So while some series regulars on the show always play the same characters, other series regulars play a different character in every story.  Which took a little getting used to.  And for me, all those regulars are most indelibly stamped in my head as the characters they play in this story.  When watching other episodes, I'll sometimes think, "Oh, her!  She was Stella Fleming."  Or "Oh, him!  He was Avery Ballou."  So I think I saw this one first, and possibly more often than some of the others just because I only had a couple of eps on VHS at first, though I know have both seasons on DVD.  And a t-shirt, which I serendipitously am wearing today.  Hmm.

But enough about the show!  (It's wonderful.  Try to see it.  Swell period costumes, great acting, top-notch plots... sorry, I said enough, didn't I.)  I'm supposed to be reviewing the book here.  I hadn't read it before, so that was an added bonus :-)  But any trip through a Nero Wolfe novel is a delight for me.  I simply love these characters and their world.  Archie Goodwin might be my favorite narrator of all time, even over Philip Marlowe (!) -- he's got such zest and zing, and is generally cheerful.

The plot of this one, as you might have guessed, involves a dead doxy.  "Doxy" being another name for a "kept woman."  The doxy in question was two-timing her sugar-daddy with none other than Orrie Cather, one of the freelance detectives Nero Wolfe sometimes hires to help tail a suspect or gather information, etc.  When the doxy dies, Orrie lands in jail on suspicion of murder.  Wolfe, Archie, and the other tow freelance operatives they sometimes hire (Saul Panzer and Fred Durkin, just so you know) decide they don't believe Orrie did it, and they set out to find out to did.

Particularly Good Bits:

He uttered a French sound, loud, maybe it was a word (p. 142).

Cramer said a word, loud, which I omit because I suspect that some of the readers of these reports are people like retired schoolteachers and den mothers (p. 148).

If This Was a Movie, I Would Rate It:  PG-13 for allusions to people being in a sexual relationship.

LOTR Read-Along: The Bridge of Khazad-dum (FOTR Ch. 17)

Another of my favorite chapters.  Really, my favorite section of this vast story is the part where the unbroken fellowship is having their adventures.  So basically the two previous chapters and this one.  Not that I don't love the rest, cuz I do, but this is what I love the best.

How calm Gandalf is at the beginning of this chapter.  Everyone gets trapped in the Chamber of Mazarbul, and Gandalf says, "Here we are, caught, just as they were before.  But I was not here then" (p. 315).  It must be so cool to be Gandalf, knowing you can make that big of a difference.

So then we get lots of excitement as we battle some orcs.  And Sam kills one!  "Boromir and Aragorn slew many" (p. 317), Gimli gets one, and then Gandalf takes over and gives them time to flee down the stairs.  He did make all the difference after all!

This picture comes from the moment in the movie when Boromir says, "What new devilry is this?" as the Balrog approaches.  In the book, Gandalf gets that line.  Sorta.  He says, "There is some new devilry here" (p. 320).  Another instance where the script takes a line from one person and gives it to another -- I suppose this time it's because in the movie, Gandalf sort of knows or suspects they'll meet up with the Balrog, so it wouldn't make sense for him to wonder what it is since he's supposed to have some idea already.

The Balrog is just insanely cool.  Horrid and dreadful, of course, but so, so fascinating.  I love how Tolkien describes it:  "Something was coming up behind them.  What it was could not be seen:  it was like a great shadow, in the middle of which was a dark form, of man-shape maybe, yet greater; and a power and terror seemed to be in it and to go before it" (p. 321).  It's vague and formless, so scary because you can't really make out what it is.

And man, Gandalf's last stand still gets to me, even though I know what happens later.  I've got goosebumps again just thinking about it.  This part is especially awesome:  "It stepped forward slowly on to the bridge, and suddenly it drew itself up to a great height, and its wings were spread from wall to wall; but still Gandalf could be seen, glimmering in the gloom; he seemed small, and altogether alone:  grey and bent, like a wizened tree before the onset of a storm" (p. 322).  I love how that one image kind of encapsulates the whole book:  one tiny, seemingly helpless bit of resistance against a towering, seemingly all-powerful foe.  Awe-inspiring, I have to say.

Favorite Lines:

There was a rush of hoarse laughter, like the fall of sliding stones into a pit (p. 315).

"You cannot pass," he said.  The orcs stood still, and a dead silence fell.  "I am a servant of the Secret Fire, wielder of the flame of Anor.  You cannot pass.  The dark fire will not avail you, flame of Udun.  Go back to the Shadow!  You cannot pass" (p. 322).

Aragorn smote to the ground the captain that stood in his path, and the rest fled in terror of his wrath (p. 323).

Possible Discussion Questions:

When Gandalf fends off the Balrog back in the Chamber of Mazurbul while everyone else flees, he says he "had to speak a word of Command" (p. 319).  Anyone know what that means, exactly?

BTW, I hope nobody minds that I've kind of slowed down the pace for this.  I'm rather busy playing in the snow, making fudge, and baking gingerbread, not to mention reading endless Christmas books to my kids.  Come January, I'll start doing more than one chapter a week again, I'm sure.

Giveaways!

Hannah is hosting a giveaway on her blog, Reading in the Dark, that is sure to delight all my fellow Austen fans!  She's giving away a copy of the book Two Guys Read Jane Austen, the movie Lost in Austen, and some pretty Austenian postcards and an art print of Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy.  You have until December 31 to enter, so what are you waiting for?  Go here for all the details, rules, pictures of the prizes, etc.

Also, I've got a giveaway going on my other blog, Hamlette's Soliloquy.  I'm giving away a copy of The Best Years of Our Lives on DVD, and it ends Friday.  Go here for details and to enter.

"A Slight Trick of the Mind" by Mitch Cullin

This is not a happy book.  I didn't like it very well.  I found it quite depressing, to be honest.  I'm not saying it's a bad book, because it's not.  It's perfectly readable, and other people might really like it.  There's a movie version in the works, starring Ian McKellen, which is how I first heard of this and why I read it.

Anyway, A Slight Trick of the Mind is about an aging Sherlock Holmes who is slowly losing his memory.  He's in his nineties and succumbing to the ravages of age, just like anyone else.  He's living in Sussex, tending his bees, mentoring his housekeeper's son, and trying to finish writing up an account of a case he worked on back in London decades ago.  He also spends time reminiscing about his recent trip to Japan, and the author weaves those three sections of his life together to form a cohesive whole by the end.

But, like I said, I didn't like this book.  Seeing a character I have loved for twenty years as a frail, failing old man was very hard for me, and I will not read this book again.  

First Line:

Upon arriving from his travels abroad, he entered his stone-built farmhouse on a summer's afternoon, leaving the luggage by the front door for his housekeeper to manage (p. 3).

Particularly Good Bits:

His ears registered the low, concentrated murmur of the hive -- the sound of which, in that moment, refused to summon his isolated, content years cultivating the beeyard, but, rather, conveyed the undeniable and deepening loneliness of his existence (p. 186).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It:  PG for themes of death and loss.

LOTR Read-Along: A Journey in the Dark (FOTR Ch. 16)

I'm considering signing everything as "one stray wanderer from the South" (p. 288) from now on.  Totally my favorite description of Boromir.  Just so you know.

This chapter has lots of exciting parts, with the wolves, and then the watcher in the water, and then all the wandering around in Moria.  And once again, I don't have lots to say.  Hmm.  And yet, this and the previous chapter are one of my favorite sections of the book. 

Gandalf says that he "once knew every spell in all the tongues of Elves or Men or Orcs" (p. 299) that were used to open enchanted doors.  So... there must have been a lot of enchanted doors around at one time, and they've just fallen into disuse?  That seems foolish.  I mean, if I had an enchanted door that you could only open with the right password, I think I'd keep using it.  Sounds very handy in case of a siege, for instance.  Or for stockpiling Christmas presents where the kids couldn't get at them.

Once Gandalf figures out how to open the Doors of Durin, he says, "Of course, of course!  Absurdly simple" (p. 300).  This makes me laugh, not for a LOTR-related reason, but because there's a moment in the Sherlock Holmes story "The Dancing Men" where Holmes doesn't want to explain to Watson how he deduced something because he says that once he explains, Watson will say, "How absurdly simple!"  Watson insists that he won't, Holmes explains, and then Watson cries, "How absurdly simple!"  It's a funny moment in the story, and particularly funny in the Jeremy Brett movie version.  So just thought I'd share :-)

Favorite Lines:

"However it may prove, one must tread the path that need chooses!" (p. 289)

"The wolf that one hears is worse than the orc that one fears" (p. 290).

"That was an eye-opener, and no mistake!" (p. 291)

In the dark at the rear, grim and silent, walked Aragorn (p. 302).


Possible Discussion Questions:

Okay, what is up with Aragorn and Moria?  It says here that he went there once, and "the memory is very evil" (p. 289).  Is this explained in the appendices, and I've just forgotten because I've only read all of them once, and that was years ago?

"Beautiful Ruins" by Jess Walter

This is one of those books that make me want to give up writing in despair of ever creating anything that comes close to this kind of mastery.  I'm not saying this is a great book, mind you.  But it's written very, very well, and I admire that.

Jess Walter intertwines the lives of four protagonists and several lesser characters, allowing their connected stories to unfold slowly and not particularly linearly.  Pieces of the puzzle fall into their places at different moments, so that by the end of the book, you have the whole picture.  But in the middle of the book, that picture is very fragmented, and I spent quite a bit of time wondering how it would all mesh.  

Here is the basic story:  In the early 1960s, while Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor are filming Cleopatra in Italy, a young actress called Dee Moray leaves the production and ends up at a very small hotel in a very small Italian town.  The hotel's owner, Pasquale, falls a little bit in love with Dee Moray.  And then a whole bunch of stuff happens.  The rest of the story takes place in the present, revolving around Dee's son Pat and the way he tries to piece his fractured life back together.  There's also a WWII veteran trying to write a book, a Hollywood producer's assistant longing to make just one good movie, an aspiring screenwriter searching for meaning in his life, and Richard Burton himself playing a small but significant part.

As you can see, it's a little hard to explain.  The story bounces back and forth from the 1960s to the present, and to points in between too.  But it all makes sense in the end, and even ends pretty happily.  I wasn't very hopeful for a happy ending through most of the book, so I was pleasantly surprised.  This is one of those books where all the characters have problems and issues and hang-ups and are very troubled in their own way.  None of them are very happy through most of the book, and I have to admit the book as a whole is a little too depressing for me to want to read it again.


Particularly Good Bits:

He had never really mastered English, but he'd studied enough to have a healthy fear of its random severity, the senseless brutality of its conjugations; it was unpredictable, like a cross-bred dog (p. 9).

Weren't movies his generation's faith anyway -- its true religion?  Wasn't the hteater our temple, the one place we enter separately but emerge from two hours later together, with the same experience, same guided emotions, same moral? (p. 21).

It was curious what trying to speak English had done lately to his mind; it reminded him of studying poetry in college, words gaining and losing their meaning, overlapping with images, the curious echo of ideas behind the words people used (p. 112).

What if the only way to save the ones you love... is to leave them behind? (p. 126).

People can handle an unjust world; it's when the world becomes arbitrary and inexplicable that order breaks down (p. 148).

This is what happens when you live in dreams, he thought:  you dream this and you dream that and you sleep right through your life (p. 218).

We want what we want.  At home, she works herself into a frenzy worrying about what she isn't -- and perhaps loses track of just where she is (p. 301).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It:  R for sexual situations, drug use, adult dialog, and language.

My First Reading Challenges

I've decided to sign up for two reading challenges for next year.  I know lots of bloggers who participate in such things, and I thought it would be fun to try myself.  So I'm signing up for two of them, both aimed at getting through some of the books on my to-read list.

I keep a reading list on my library's website, and it has ninety-three books on it.  Yes.  Ninety-three.  Clearly, it's time to get serious about digging into those.  So I'm signing up for the I Love Library Books Reading Challenge hosted by the Book Dragon's Lair.  I'm choosing the "chapter book" level for 12 books.  That means I need to check out 12 books from the library and read them over the course of 2014.  I think I can do that.  I might even bump up to a higher level, who knows.  Either way, it'll be a nice chunk out of that reading list.

I also have a couple of shelves-worth of books here at home that I have not read yet.  I'd like to work through a bunch of those too, so I'm signing up for the Mount TBR Reading Challenge hosted by My Reader's Block.  I'm aiming for the "Pike's Peak" level, which also involves 12 books.  Again, I may surpass that, but between these two challenges, I'll be reading 2 books a month on top of continuing my Lord of the Rings read-along here, and that's probably plenty for this busy mommy.

Many thanks to Ruth for telling me about both of these challenges!