book reviews

Moving right along! I feel like I'm making real progress toward shrinking the stack this year.

Henry James, The Turn of the Screw. Otherwise known as a tempest in a teapot. Such a dated novel - all this dramatic tension, all sorts of shadowy things suggested but never fully explained ... all leading to really just nothing. Way too overblown in tone, completely underwhelming in plot and denouement.

Hugh Pentecost, Murder in High Places. Back to the international terrorism plots, and filled with further cantankerous commentary on modern life. I appreciate that Pentecost is willing to have his narrator look like a shallow cad on occasion, and I liked the departure from established routine ... but I am very tired of having Chambrun's poor secretary have to be tied up and in peril all the time.

Jim Kjelgaard, Stormy. A nice little book about a dog and a boy (well, late teens, I would say). A little more filled with commentary than his usual, and more details on the arts of hunting and fishing, but still a good tale with a lot of action and a pair of heroes to root for.

Hugh Pentecost, Murder Goes Round and Round. Weird but interesting plot to this one, lots of action. Again with the kidnapping, though, which I grant makes a nice change of pace from all the times the poor narrator has gotten stuck escorting a killer through the hotel, waiting for someone to save him, but it does bug me that Chambrun and his secretary continue to prove in each book that they have an intimate relationship, but by the next book that's all just speculation again.