034. The Widow Killer (1995) .

The Widow Killer by Pavel Kohout (1995).

         

In the final days of Nazi occupation in Prague, a serial killer with serious mental problem is butchering his way through the nights, leaving hideous sculptures (?) of human remains.

Sounds interesting, right?

But this consists of only the quarter of the story.

The rest is filled with grand detail of the war, superb murder mystery and inevitable heavy tension between Czech and Gestapo detectives, making this truly remarkable book to include in your book collection.

  

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layers. –There are three sides in this book. Czech side, Nazi side and then a killer who sort of belong to Czech side but ultimately stays in his own fantasy land.

Jan Morava.   A rookie police detective who is eager to prove himself to the legendary inspector Beran.

He is well built and well trained and more than capable of taking care of himself.

He is started out as a young rookie kid with bright mind but no experience. However at the end of everything (yes, he literary goes through heaven to hell), he becomes the man and more over, the leader.

 Kind of life made for the film.

Erwin Buback.   A great police inspector turned a Gestapo agent. The process of turning cops into Gestapo under Third Reich was mandatory, by the way.

Lost both wife and daughter to the bombing and since then, he has been looking for a reason to live.

The only Gestapo agent in Prague who can actually think with brain and does the proper police work.

A serial killer.    This could be the most deranged serial killer in my recent memory. The bad guy here is completely messed up.

He got brain-damage during the war and ever since became dangerously delusional: no boundary between reality and fantasy. He also frequently fades away to oblivion while just sitting on the bench or chair.

Just like Anthony Perkins in Psycho, he talks to his dead mother all the time and no, he doesn’t keeps his mum’s remain in his closet. Just lots of sharp knives to play with dead widows.

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lace. –Prague at the end of WW2. Since this is a very typical history based thriller where the real historic events and the surrounding of them are generally more important than either story or characters, it is extremely lucky for us that the writer of this book was one of survivors of political uprising in 1968’ Prague. In other word, Pavel Kohout knows his material inside out better than any writers out there ‘cause he was simply there when it happened. Also he is a hell of a writer, too.

Anyway, what I am getting here is that whoever lucky enough to pick up this book will know everything there is to know about Prague during the war: food, jobs, buildings, sewer system, economy, politics and even fashion.

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lot. – In the final days of WW2, on top of all the turmoil, the city of Prague is attacked by a seriously confused serial killer (more like a butcher from hell) who is specialized in dismembering widows with truly sick sense of justice(?).

And it is up to two men, Erwin Buback and Jan Morava, to stop this out of control killer and his hideous crime spree.

That is the thriller part.

The literature part is like this: Buback represents the German side of the war story. Morava, Czech’s. And this is the core of this book, I think.

Buback, as a Gestapo agent, knows a lot about the war the way only insiders’ know. And since after his rude awakening with his very wise wife (now deceased), he has been strongly doubting Hitler and his agenda. Bottom line is that he just can’t come up with any reasons for the fighting anymore and because of that, he is very cautious of what he is saying and doing because Nazi is zealously cruel when it gets down to 

the doubters.

Morava, on the other hand, is a young and straight forward Czech man who represents the oppressed. His job is not just going after the serial killer (which he does really well too), but to show the life of true Czechs during and the end of Nazi occupation. He and his colleagues represent everything there to know about being  

Czech.

For the plot line, this novel is divided into roughly two parts.

 The first half is your basic “developing story, introducing characters and their background” part.

The second half is a whole different story. With the death of Hitler, the uprising takes over Prague!! Once mighty Nazi is rapidly losing its ground and Czechs are getting wild screaming revenge!! And with all the chaos surrounding the city, our deranged serial killer sets himself free like a shark in the tank full of fat fishes. He kills and kills and kills and nobody pay any attention to him because they are too busy killing each others. War creates whole bunch of serial killers, I guess.

And it all comes down to one shocking ending. Just a Brilliant book.

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erdict. –This book is pure definition of a great and thoughtful period mystery: rich with historic background and full of vivid description of Prague and its citizens with excellent storyline and equally excellent characters.”

However, he just made one mistake, here. One simple but costly one, I think. The title “The Widow Killer” just doesn’t do the justice for this magnificent book. It sounds too narrow and sensational and contemporary and over all, cheap.

This book is not a simple mystery, far from it. This is a well-researched and brilliantly written war time literature with lots of fascinating characters with whole bunch of different backgrounds.  And of course, a crazy son of a bitch, literary, who thinks of himself as a war hero.

So don’t judge this book by its title. The chasing of the widow killer is a big part of the story but it’s only one part of the huge story line which includes everything there is to know about war in Prague.

It’s a wonderful book which requires a serious reading but well worth the effort.

033. The Brothers of Baker Street (2011).

The Brothers of Baker Street by Michael Robertson (2011).

         

A second adventure of Reggie and Nigel Heath.

A very unique take on Sherlock Holmes on 21st century.

For one thing, none of the brothers (Reggie and Nigel) are detectives and they are not that good at solving mysteries ‘cause they are lawyers!!

Yet, they are forced to face the cases that require Sherlock like intuition.

Only because they happen to rent “221B Baker St.” for their law office by mistake.

Somebody should make a TV series for this. Really.

  

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layers. – There are four important characters in this book. The rest are just extras.

Reggie Heath.   Older and more serious Heath. A barrister (lawyer) who was the sharpest and the best in the league but after a few crazy incident ( “The Baker Street Letters”, the brother’s first adventure), decided to quite the criminal justice and now kind of looking for the new clienteles which don’t involves criminals.

With his first case as a “Sherlock Holmes” (yes, he and his brother are forced to act as the legend when they sign the lease agreement with 221B Baker St. For more detail, just check out page 12 under “Additional Duties of the Lessee”. It’s hilarious), he lost almost everything: his decent amount of fortune, a beautiful girl friend and with that, a bit of confidence too. 

He is the one who always takes care of his younger brother.

Nigel Heath.   A more relaxed, casual and adventurous Heath. 

After the last case, he got his lawyer license suspended and now lives in LA doing…something.

He married a woman named Mara whom he met during the first case.

Quite a good listener and good investigator.

Although no where near Sherlock Holmes, Nigel and Reggie, together with the help of Laura, make one perfect (and lovable?) Sherlock Holmes. What a brilliant concept!!

Laura. A gorgeous stage actress who is about to become a new superstar.

She is one of those classic “Beauty with Brain”: smart, careful, considerate and thoughtful.

She is stuck between Reggie and Billionaire Buxton for love triangle and that makes a great subplot for this book. It is so juicy, it takes over entire storyline for a couple of chapters in the middle section of the book.

Moriarty. Yes, there is Moriarty in this book. But, because we have quite different Sherlock Holmes in here, inevitably Moriarty follows the same trend. 

Moriarty in this book is significantly scaled down on its evilness and not a genius criminal master mind that he is sooo famously known for.

                                   

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lace. –Present day London, England. More precisely, 221B BAKER STREET, probably the most famous fictional address ever created by human being.

Even today, people from all around the world send letter to this address for the famous sleuth’s advice. Kind of like North Pole for the troubled soul.

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lot. – A black cab driver is accused of killing a couple of innocent tourists and his solicitor somehow convinces our hero Reggie to take the case. As soon as he starts working on the case, a typed letter arrives on his office  with the name Moriarty on the bottom.

From there, the second case of the Brothers of Baker Street which involves a black cab and the most famous villain in the history of mystery keeps rolling and rolling until it reaches three different but entwined climaxes for each of the main characters: Reggie, Nigel and Laura. (Yes, each one has his/her own exciting endings.)

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erdict. –Splitting Sherlock Holmes into two totally different characters (brothers) is such a simple and brilliant idea, Michael Robertson should get some kind of award from Conan Doyle Foundation (if indeed such thing actually exists.).

Even if the feel of the book is quite different from the original: light-hearted, delightful and funny, as opposes to the original’s mysterious, scary and sometime dangerous atmosphere, this book still has enough kick and twist to hold its own against the original masterpiece.

Now, I’m waiting for the TV series.

This could be more like hugely entertaining Elementary than much more serious BBC masterpiece Sherlock.

032. The Eyre Affair (2001).

The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde (2001).

          
 A very strange book where the boundary between

reality and imagination and everything is completely and masterfully thrown away,

creating one of the most interesting books I’ve ever read.

Honestly, this book is insanely entertaining.

  

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layers. – Thursday Next.   A heroin. A war hero. Brave, intelligent, reasonable, over all, a perfect agent and probably the only person in this book who is not afraid of Jack Shitt and the Goliath Cooperation.

She is a Literatec officer who is working for the department which mainly deals with the forgery and thievery of literature which, in this world, is regarded as menacing and dangerous as terrorism. 

Her job consists of fairly regular, not to mention safe routine of checking out books and paper works until her uncle Mycroft invented the way to get inside the book. Then everything gets much more complex.

Later in the series, she gains an ability to get inside the book at her own will and stays inside the Bookworld for a few years patrolling the book world, making sure every characters does what they supposed to do.

Mycroft Next.   Thursday’s uncle. A brilliant inventor and somewhat-mad scientist with conscience.

A true genius who according to his wife Polly, got regularly kidnapped by foreign power or another during 60’s and 70’s for his brain.

His latest invention which allows a person to go inside the book by opening portal with worms(?) is the backbone of this Thursday Next book.

Later in the series, tired with everything, he decides to live inside the Sherlock Holmes books making himself second Mycroft in the Baker st.

With his brilliant wife, Polly, he has two sons who are dumb and dumber. The biggest mystery in family history. 

Jack Schitt. He is the head of Advanced weapons Division with eight billion annual budget with Goliath Cooperation which runs British empire since the last war. Another word, one of the most powerful men.

Short, chubby and annoying as hell, he is “villain” written all over him, but actually  belongs to the good side, sort of.

Acheron Hades. As the name indicates, he is a genius criminal mastermind with no empathy.

He lives for two things and two things only: Fame and Money.

He actually achieves his two goals in early part of this book. He is the most wanted man on this planet (fame) after stealing priceless manuscript from museum (money) and killing a few agents on his way out.

However, he doesn’t stop there. He wants to be the greatest criminal ever and also becomes the richest man on the Planet at the same time. So he kidnaps Mycroft and steals his invention and starts also kidnapping famous characters from literary treasures for huge ransom. 

What I mean is, can you imagine “Romeo and Juliet” without Juliet? How much you will pay if someone asking for ransom for her? If she got killed, the original story of Shakespeare’s play will be forever altered, right? How much do you think she is worth? Billions, easily. And that’s what Hades is doing. Goes inside the book and brings the literary character back to our world and kill them if he doesn’t get paid.

  Sounds crazy but it actually works well with all the characters and story flow. Really.

Others. Every single character in this book is either not normal or hilarious. Or not humans. Or all of it combines together. 

Hades henchmen are all psychopaths. Thursday’s co-workers are all hilarious or not humans. Goliath’s agents are all so mean and stupid. None of Thursday’s family members are normal. Especially her father Colonel Next who is traveling back and forth through out time to fix the glitches of history-matters for no other reasons than that he can actually do it(Dr. Who with military training). The crazy thing is because he is traveling with time machine all the time which apparently affects his metabolism or something, whenever Thursday meets him, he is always in different age!! Sometimes,  a lot younger then her!!

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lace. –Mainly, Swindon, England. A small town (year is 1986) where Thursday was born and raised with her two brothers.

Thursday works in a small branch of SpecialOP office in Swindon.

However, once the story gets going, she is literary everywhere and nowhere: something to do with time traveling and book/fantasy traveling.

The definition of linear time line (normal time) doesn’t exit in this book. Combine with the fact that Thursday can walk into the books(inside) and jump book to book with no difficulty(something she can’t explain why), this book gets really complex, not to mention, again, insanely entertaining!!

I’ll give you an example. Later in the series, after spending two years inside books, Thursday come back home (reality!) with Hamlet (yes, the HAMLET) and has a tea with the icily polite Prussian gentleman named Herr Otto Bismarck(1815-1898), the Iron Chancellor, man of “iron and brood”, courtesy of his dad(time traveler)’s intention of sorting out some kind of historic questions. Hilarious.

Compare to this, “Back to the future” is kid’s play.

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lot. – First half. A very rare manuscript is stolen from the high security museum without a trace.  The man responsible for the crime is Acheron Hides, the most wanted man in the world and Thursday is on his track with fellow agents.

Second half. After a spectacular mass-up, Thursday is retired (?) in her hometown Swindon with supposedly same old, boring job. 

But the small, quite town is not what it used to be and now filled with everything imaginably possible! : Kidnappers, murderers, secret society psychopaths, Government-backed cooperation agents, Vampires, werewolves, time machine etc, etc….

On top of that, Acheron is back and trying really hard to live up to his billing as the best criminal mind in history by committing hideous crimes of kidnapping/killing literary characters, altering the storyline of the classic books forever! by using Mycroft’s book traveling invention. 

Can Thursday stop him before it’s too late?

Also, there is small subplot of Thursday’s attempt to bring back her relationship with her ex.
 

And remember this. All above is just a basic storyline of the book. A small piece of iceberg. It’s what the writer puts in between the plots matters. He jammed the entire book with so much new ideas and crazy imagination, you should probably read it couple of times to appreciate the full value of it. Fantastic for book club, I think.

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erdict. –Jasper Fforde creates amazing world with his truly remarkable imagination: The world literary ruled by literature. Renaissancites (?) are causing riots. Surrealists form political parties. Shakespeare is regarded as a religion so every hotel room has equipped with (mandatory) complete works of the  master.

On top of that, it is also filled with all sort of imaginary creatures (dodo birds is the men’s best friends, not dogs, and smarter than dogs, too ). 

I dare to compare him to the other ridiculously imaginative writer: Douglas Adams. Both have wild imagination and tremendous talent to create the universe based sorely on their brain-work. And jokes, lots of them.

Only thing missing in this book is a spot light!!

Jasper Fforde needs more recognition!!

Fanfare of trumpets should sound for Jasper Fforde for his great work!!

031. Snuff (2008).

Snuff by Chuck Palahniuk (2008).

I’ll say this officially.

Chuck Palahniuk is mad!

On my book, the writer who gives us Fightclub is next only to the devil himself, Hunter S. Thompson.

Both shares completely mad imagination and tremendous talent to turn their insanity into jaw dropping (funny as hell) masterpieces!!

  This book is not for kids and probably not for women neither,

but a masterpiece ‘cause you are never going to find a book like this, ever.

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layers. – Cassie Wright.   An aging porn legend who tried to break world record by sleeping with 600 men and for the last time, making a film out of it for her kid whom she gives up to the adoption agency at the peak of her career.
  

She is starred in classic titles such as a groundbreaking adult feature named “Emergency Room Back Door Dog Pile”, civil war epic, “Ford’s Theatre Back Door Dog Pile”, and her greatest hits, “World Whore One: Deep In Trenches”, “World Whore Two: Island Hopping” and the one they are making today, according to industry rumor, will be titled “World Whore Three: The Whore To End All Whores”. I told you. Chuck is a genius. 

There are only four other characters in this book. All the male characters are called by numbers and when your number is called, it's your turn to perform. You are one of 600 men lucky enough to shag Cassie and leave your mark on history.

Sheila.   A young girl and an agent who is behind this crazy film. At the first look, she is just a very efficient, almost cold organizer. However , like everyone in this book,  she has some kind of hidden agenda which of course changes the total outcome of the book.

Mr. 72. A skinny kid  who for some reason, thinks that he is the legitimate son of Cassie. Only problem is that there are apparently hundreds of others kids (grown up watching Cassie’s films, of course) who think the same way.

Mr.137. Out of job actor who tries to revive his carrier by appearing in this controversially film. His agent sends him to get a face time with Cassie so when she dies during the shooting, he will get recognized as one of dudes who kill legendary Cassie Wright.

He almost becomes a star with “Dan Banyan Private Detective” at one point until someone finds out that years ago he made one gay gang bang porn movie to support himself. What a life.

Ms.600. Brach Bacardi. The last guy on the line to take Cassie. A retired porn legend who owns his own line of sex-toys and various sexual products.

An old co-worker and friend(?) of Cassie.

A star of “The Da Vince Load”, “To Drill A Mocking Bird”, “The Postman Always Cums Twice”, and the first ever musical adult feature “Chitty Chitty Gang bang”.

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lace. –Inside the studio somewhere in states. Place holds absolutely no meaning in this book. For all I know, they could be shooting this film in my back yard.

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lot. – Like other Chuck Palahniuk’s works, this book has a storyline which doesn’t make much sense and can be fit into couple of sentences: An aging porn legend is making her final appearance by doing 600 men and breaking record of all record!! However, one dude in the 600-long line up  may want to kill her. Who and Why? You see, it doesn’t make any sense. It sounds crazy, right? But don’t worry about it. This book doesn’t sound crazy. It is actually crazy. It won’t disappoint you.

What this book is actually about is the lifestory of 4 very different and extremely disturbing individuals.

Chuck Palahniuk’s signature style of characteristics is all here: psychopathic, extremely sad, damaged beyond repair, antisocial, desperate, and of course, hilarious as hell.

The misery Chuck creates is so extreme and hopeless, it just makes you laugh out loud. And quite honestly, I really enjoy reading about their despairs.

And also, for those who somehow survive this book through the last chapter, very typical Chuck Palahniuk ending is waiting at the end. It is so shocking and disturbing yet appropriate for this book, it will stay with you for long time. You just don’t get this kind of books that easily. So enjoy it.

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erdict. –Three things to consider.

First, this book can be read as coffee table book of Adult Film History. 

Although I am not sure how much of all the info in this book is true, they look awfully convincing to me. Chuck is lucky enough to know someone who works for the industry long time or owns tons of porns. Either way, he is THE MAN. The amount of knowledge of porn industry shown in this book is utterly impressive and quite astounding.

Second, because of the first, this book is filled with vivid and sometimes a bit gross details of sexual activities and behind the scene antics. Both fascinating and disgusting.

And that makes the third point easy to understand. Because of first and specially second, the final climax which is so shocking and disgusting won’t disturb you as much as it should be.

You see, because Palahniuk has been filling you in with all the gross details from the chapter one, by the time you reach the final, you kind of get numb of all the sex act. So you will be blown away at the end but not puking like drunks.

Read it for fun/shock but never talk about it with your wife or girl friend.

They will think you are crazy.

030. Rasputin’s Revenge (2003).

Rasputin’s Revenge by John Lescroart (2003).

         

 2^nd adventure of Auguste Lupa, a son of God himself Sherlock Holmes!!

THE SHERLOCK HOLMES!!

And 

He is as interesting and almost as good as his dad.

What more can you possibly ask for?

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layers. – Auguste Lupa.   Not just a great detective (like his dad), but also he is the best spy in Europe (like his uncle, Mycroft).

And, get this, one of the most respected chefs in the world!! Who would ever though that Holmes DNA can generate a great chef? Just Brilliant! 

This guy has an appetite of a giant elephant and drains dark beers like they are the bubbled water. Naturally, he has the size of his uncle (big in every direction) and of course attitude/brain of his dad.

Sherlock’s mainline is “Elementary”, Lupa has “Satisfactory”. 

Guess who his mom is? 

THE WOMAN!! Who else?

He is the living proof of the fact that Sherlock DID have a personal life. I guess even God needs a break. 

Jules Giraud.   Holms has Watson. Lupa, Giraud.

They, Watson and Giraud, are almost identical, except Giraud has a daughter and he is not a doctor but an ambassador/and a teacher. 

                                             

Rasputin. A charismatic monk who has a firm handle on a lot of royals, especially Queen, the wife of Czar.

He talks with staccato rumbling which sounds insane but very effective for convincing people that he is a son of God for real.

It is not clear what he intended to do with his power up until very end, but he is the most powerful and feared figure in Russia and he acts and speaks like one.

Others. There are whole bunch of characters based on real history figures.

Russian Czar, Nicolas Romanov, and his wife, Alexandra and their kids, Olga, Tatiana, Marie, Anastasia, Alexis and Alyosha. And then several generals and husbands and cousins of Czar’s daughters who all have long unpronounceable names. In fact, I think other than Lupa and his company, all the rest are based on real characters.

Then, of course, when things going south, Lupa has the best help any human can possibly find: Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson.

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lace. –A truly magnificent city of St. Petersburg which was and still is called “Venice of Russia” for its beautiful buildings and lovely canals. Except that its street is wider than Venice and as modern as Paris. 

Almost all events has taken place in Winter Palace which is according to Geraud, so vast it takes him 20 mins to just cross the hall and has more than 20 wings. The place is also stacked with luxuries like piles of Oriental rugs and tons of flowers which were imported from the other side of Russia with train just please the Queen and royals. No wonder they all taken down by mobs at the end.

However, the outside of the palace has totally different story. It’s winter time and the war is going on forever. People are angry, hungry and desperately want the change. You can practically smell the revolution in the air.

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lot. – Year is 1916. The war is raging on in the every frontline of Europe.  And the Western Allies need Russia to keep fighting until US decides to join the war. However, Czar is contemplating the peace agreement with German because he is sick of fighting. Out of desperation, France which is about to lose everything sends money and weapons to Russia trying desperately to persuade Czar to continue his campaign against Germany. This incredibly important job is handed to Geraud the ambassador and he is on his way to the winter garden at St. Petersburg.

In the winter garden, someone is killing people close to Czar to mentally put pressure on him. It somehow works and Czar is getting really tired of all the conflict. In order to persuade czar to continue fighting Germans, Geraud has to find the killer before Czar put a stop to the war. And Lupa is there to solve the mystery and help Geraud fulfill his desperate mission.

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erdict. –This book is ultimate tribute to the Sherlock Holmes fan. I’ve read quite a few Holmes books written not by Dolye, but this ranks at one of the top spots simply because Lescroart comes up with something I never ever expected: his son.

I mean, in order to have a kid, you have to have a girl friend or wife and have to spend sometime with her and that means relationship and the relationship is the absolutely the last thing any Sherlock Holmes fans with right mind would expect from the master. I mean, Sherlock is a logical monster/machine!! And machine is not supposed to have a pet or write a love letter or get involved with woman!! But then here you go. John Lescroart is apparently much better man than I am.

The interaction between Lupa and Sherlock is one for the ages, for Sherlock Holmes fans, anyway.

Really entertaining book with Russian history back ground 

and 

simply MUST for Holmes fan.