Books Completed Since June 1

  Butcher & Blackbird, Brynne Weaver
Our friends' daughters were passing this around at a birthday dinner at a Korean steakhouse. I bit more than the delicious dinner.

The protagonists are Sloane Sutherland and Rowan Kane. Both are serial killers who only kill serial killers. Rowan's known as the Boston Butcher, Sloane as the Orb Weaver (because after she kills she creates a "map" of the serial killer's victim's locations with thread and the victim's flesh and eyeballs). They meet when Rowan rescues her from a cage in which she's trapped with her latest victim. There's no denying the sexual attraction, or the competition between the two, so once a year they meet up to see who can take down a serial killer first, a game arranged by Rowan's older brother, who's a hit man. (In the real world, Sloane is a data scientist and Rowan is a chef.)

You're right if you think this is a dark romance. Very, very dark. Both have their demons—in Sloane and her best friend Lark's case, it was a school at which they were abused—and their sex and their romance and the text is all very rough. Not for kids or people who get nightmares easily.

  Watership Down: The Graphic Novel, Richard Adams, James Sturm and Joe Sutphin
I've read the book, but the graphic novel looked so beautiful...there are wonderful watercolor-looking drawings of the English countryside and the little farms and nature scenes. The rabbits are slightly anthropomorphized (the big eyes, especially the blue eyes on Fiver and Pipkin), but they don't look cartoonish, and the other animals are beautifully drawn.

   Re-read: Enterprising Women, Camille Bacon-Smith
Two seminal texts on (mostly) fanfiction came out in 1992; I snapped both of them up at Magicon (the 59th World Science Fiction Convention in Orlando, FL) and re-read them every so often, because it was so novel to see serious writing, indeed serious educational writing, about a subject much-maligned: fanfiction ("All written," detractors jibe, "by hormonal teenagers who want to have sex with Spock").

Bacon-Smith, an ethnographer (studying of cultural norms in individual groups), became interested in the mostly female fans of Star Trek, Blake's 7, other science fiction shows, and also non-science fiction series (mainly Starsky and Hutch and The Professionals) who, for entertainment purposes only, wrote further tales involving the characters from their favorites in various themes: hurt/comfort tales, continuing adventures, psychological thrillers, and sexual encounters both hetero- and homosexual. As she became friends with the participants, she found that they bonded through these stories, worked out emotional disruptions in their lives, and took a far more realistic look into the emotional lives of the characters and the original characters created to interact with them than the source material, since the source material had to "play it safe" within boundaries set by the producers.

As indicated by the title, the text concentrates on women in (mostly SF) fandom, a place where many times they have been unwelcome, and how they made a society for themselves. While the shows and also the media (fanzines and story sharing) have aged, the themes have not (women worrying about sexual harassment, for example). Pair with Textual Poachers for a wide view of fandom.

  Re-read: Textual Poachers, Henry Jenkins
This was the other academic study of fandom and, by extension, fanfiction that came out in 1992. Jenkins' text takes off from William Shatner's infamous "Get a Life" Saturday Night Live skit, in which incensed fans responded that they did have a life; that interest in science fiction/detective series/British programming was just as legitimate as sports fandom or any other intense interest. It also takes the time to define "fan" and "fandom," and note how fans have been portrayed as distorted crazies.

The following chapters address much more than fanfiction: one discusses how the fans of the fantasy drama Beauty and the Beast felt betrayed by the network's choice to turn the romantic/action storyline to just action. Another discusses fanfiction, while a third addresses slash fanfiction, and there is also a chapter about music videos and another about filksongs, something rare in the online fandom today. Although the author in this case is male, there is still much discussion about women being the primary "makers" in fandom and how they react to female characters being marginalized in programming at that time.

Fan art is scattered throughout the book.

Again, much academic vocabulary, but the fan studies are fascinating.

  Not in Love, Ali Hazelwood
Rue Siebert grew up in an uncertain world: her mother was chronically underemployed and she and her brother often had to shift for themselves. Now she has a stable job in the food science industry under an clever woman who has fought her way up in the business world, and she feels safe for the first time in her life.

Then she finds out her boss started Kline, the business, with a big loan, and the Harkness Group has taken over that loan. Is the Harkness Group also going to buy out Kline? For Rue, this fact is almost as bad as when representatives of Harkness come to talk to Kline's scientists, it turns out she knows one of them: it's Eli Killgore, the man she unsuccessfully hooked up with on a dating app, only to have her brother horn in on their meetup.

As it works out, Rue and Eli are much more than rivals; they're rivals with an undeniable attraction for each other which they give into—surely two adults who are not in love can have kick-ass sex and not get emotionally involved? Outside of the hot sex, there's a duplicitous co-worker lurking at Kline and an injustice trying to be resolved. Much more sex that Hazelwood's usual mix and a sniffly HEA but still not quite up to Love Hypothesis.

  American Ramble: A Walk of Memory and Renewal, Neil King Jr.
King had, for some time, toyed with an idea to walk from Washington, DC, where he lived, to New York City, but after a cancer scare and treatments, decided to make the dream real. So in the spring of 2021, with a backpack and arrangements to stay at small bed and breakfasts or alternative lodging (and not averse to sleeping wild), King did just that, traveling the back roads from his home "nine blocks east of the U.S. Capitol" to the Ramble in Central Park. What follows are his adventures along the road, including incredulous people who can't believe he's walking the whole way (he does, except for a couple of minimal car rides), encounters with curious people along the way, including Amish and Mennonite communities, stops at tiny museums (like one which holds only tools that early Americans would have used) and historical spots, meeting people of all philosophies from MAGA stalwarts to offbeat rebels, enjoying spring blossoming over the countryside (he walks north just in time to follow the flowers blooming), crossing through historic sites (like the crossing of the Delaware and also Valley Forge), and other diverse adventures.

One interesting part is his endeavor to use only old roads and ways to travel, so he doesn't wish to cross modern bridges. This leads him to being lent a kayak to cross a river gap only otherwise accessible through a major highway. He also accepts a ferry ride from the New Jersey shore to Staten Island.

I enjoyed hell out of this, although I could never emulate him!

  Winter's Gifts, Ben Aaronovitch
FBI Special Agent Kimberley Reynolds, who was introduced in Aaronovitch's "Rivers of London" in Whispers Under Ground, is the focus of this short novella with a seasonal theme (after The October Man and What Abigail Did That Summer). A retired FBI agent calls in an alarm about a mysterious event in Eloise, Wisconsin, that no one understands until Reynolds finds out about it. She travels to Eloise to find that portions of the town have been destroyed by an "ice tornado," the FBI agent is missing, and some ominous creatures are wandering the shore of the nearby lake.

This starts out slowly, with Reynolds narrating her involvement due to her knowledge of esoteric activity that she learned from Peter Grant during his involvement in the previous case and talking about her past. However, the pace picks up very quickly as odd "monsters" creep out of a blizzard and wreak havoc in the town. The end is a tense chase straight out of a horror film as a long-buried curse has been unearthed involving Native American spirits.

I enjoyed this although it was a different narrative from the British-set books. Some British-isms do creep in, but I don't find them all that distracting. Reynolds herself is an interesting character because she was brought up as a strict Christian, but is now dealing with otherworldly events with no relation to the beliefs her mother tried to instill in her. I also liked the slow-attraction romance that is very peripherally part of the story (the ending is particularly sweet).

  Any Other Name, Craig Johnson
The tenth book in the Longmire series. Longmire's daughter Cady, now married to the brother of Walt's undersheriff Victoria Moretti, is expecting her first child and expecting Walt to be there at the birth. And he expected to be there, until his friend and former boss Lucian Connally asks if he will help out in the case of a fellow law-enforcement officer in the next county who apparently committed suicide. He figures it will only take a day or two.

If you believe that, you haven't read a Longmire book. Vic Moretti and Walt's best friend Henry Standing Bear end up helping in the investigation, which comes to involve a missing woman from a strip club, sending Walt from a casino to a lodge on the trail of what made Gerald Holman kill himself.

Slow build with a frantically tense ending involving a railroad spur line that will leave you gasping.

Does Longmire make the birth? It's Walt—you figure it out.

 The Joy of Independent Living for Seniors, FC&A Publishing
From the book sale. Really nothing I didn't know. I got some tips from it, though. Worth the $1.50 I paid for it.

Books Completed Since October 1

 The Daughter of Sherlock Holmes, Leonard Goldberg
I am on the fence about this book. First, it's always neat to see what is a new take on the world after Sherlock Holmes. In this novel, Watson is an elderly retiree, and his son, another John, is also a doctor. In the spring of 1914, a woman turns up at Watson's old digs at 221B Baker Street, looking for justice for her brother. It is said he committed suicide by leaping out a window. However, a woman and her young son were there when the man fell, the boy witnessed the event, and they are convinced it was not suicide. When Watson Sr. discovers that the woman witness was named Joanna Blalock, he becomes excited. Truly, the game is afoot, because based on young Johnnie Blalock's testimony, it could not have been suicide. Not only that, but the man who supposedly "committed suicide" leaped out of the window of the house of Christopher Moran, a noted gambler, and son of the notorious Sebastian Moran.

I think I like the idea of this book better than the execution. I haven't yet figured out why Goldberg has named his protagonist the same name as the protagonist of a contemporary series he wrote some years ago. Why is it said Sherlock Holmes died in 1903 when we know from the stories in "His Last Bow" that he was alive at least up until 1914 (with his line about the deadly wind from the east)? How did a photograph of a 10-year-old Sherlock Holmes get in a monograph? (There was photography in Sherlock's lifetime, but who might have taken such a thing, and how would it end up in a monograph and why?) And I'm really iffy about just how Joanna was actually conceived. The story makes it sound like she came to pass after a private love-in.

The story and the personalities are reasonably okay, and the growing attraction between Joanna and John Jr. very low key. They actually solve the mystery well before the novel ends and use the remaining time to spring a trap for the culprit. All in all, it was okay (much better than the Sherry Thomas books!), but not at all one of the best pastiches ever. (Scroll down to Robert Ryan's book for a better suggestion.)

 Re-read: From Holmes to Sherlock, Mattias Boström
Upon finishing this, all I can say is "wow."

I read this originally as an e-book, which was very badly formatted, so I was happy to find a remaindered copy recently. It was just as impressive as I remembered.

If you think this is your run-of-the-mill "how Sir Arthur Conan Doyle created Sherlock Holmes" yarn,  you'll be in for a surprise: while the beginning of the book does follow that formula, the rest of the story follows how Holmes became a literary phenomenon even after Doyle's death, and the people who kept him alive: a boy named Kit who devours all the stories and grows up to be Christopher Morley; Doyle's sons Adrian and Denis, who hope to make a living off Holmes while keeping their father's memory alive (neither of them come off particularly well in this book—Adrian is money grubbing and Denis an alcoholic and spendthrift, with a Russian wife who's just as bad) while the boys' half-sister, daughter of Conan Doyle's first wife Louisa is pushed to the background; the Baker Street Irregulars and their anti-female attitude,;actors like the noted William Gillette (whose silent film Sherlock Holmes was rediscovered and restored just recently; it was Gillette who originated some of the symbols that we know Holmes by, such as the calabash pipe), Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce, Peter Cushing, Arthur Wontner, even the 1980s Russian Holmes (which became famous due to videotapes recorded in the 1980s before the Berlin Wall fell); women like Edith Meiser, writer for the classic American Holmes radio series, just one of Holmes' female fans who fought to break into the "old boys club" that originally was Holmes fandom; collectors and enthusiasts such as John Bennett Shaw and Vincent Starrett; and even Eve Titus, who wrote the "Basil of Baker Street" pastiches for children, finally ending with Robert Downey Jr, Jeremy Brett, all the way down to Mark Gatiss and Steven Moffat plotting out a modern-day Sherlock on a train. (The author misses almost nothing, even to noting the portrayal of Holmes by "Wishbone," only forgetting the animated Sherlock Holmes in the 23rd Century.) And all the time the rights to the stories and the estate bounce from one member of the Doyle family to the next.

There are lots of interesting tidbits tossed your way in this book, but you must be a Holmes fan to completely appreciate it. Boström has done an enormous amount of research and it shows, but the writing (or perhaps the translation) is at times almost too cut-and-dried. Rewards abound if you stick with it.

 A Study in Murder: A Dr. Watson Thriller, Robert Ryan
In this third of Robert Ryan's World War I-set novels of John Watson serving as an Army doctor, the story picks up where it left off. Watson, who was captured by the Germans while driving a prototype tank, is at first assigned to a reasonably comfortable prisoner-of-war camp. But involvement in an escape attempt and the machinations of an old foe have sixty-year-old Watson shipped off to Harzgrund, the worst German camp of all. Upon arrival, Watson finds his possessions stolen, the prisoners set against him, and no cooperation among the troops, only a raw fight for survival, since the mercenary commander makes the prisoners pay for any "privileges" like Red Cross packages. However, he also finds out that prisoners believe there's a means of escape. The truth will be more gruesome than he realizes, as is the reason he's been transferred to Harzgrund.

I don't know what superlatives I can attach to these books that I haven't used before. The plots are tense and complicated, and Watson is competent in working out what's going on once presented with the clues. But most importantly, they bring the real horror of "the Great War" to life. Harzgrund, the terrible POW camp portrayed in this book, was based on a real POW camp where the commander made the prisoners pay for what should have been theirs by rights, like those Red Cross packages. The portrayal of escape attempts and escape methods are based on real events. Some of the revelations will give you chills of horror. It's only in the climax to this book that the plot gets a tad fanciful, as Mrs. Gregson seems to be able to manage to do impossible things. But...recommended, recommended, recommended!

 The Annotated Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett, edited by Gretchen Holbrook Gerzina
When I had finished up the annotated version of Charlotte's Web, I recalled I still had this lavishly illustrated annotated volume in the spare bedroom. In that Charlotte's Web review, I noted that editors chose to emphasize different things in their annotations: "Some annotated books use their annotations to point out unfamiliar terms, or expand on the history behind events in a story, or to point out the morals and mores of the time. [The author of this annotated volume] uses them most to point out White's careful choice of words, his edits of the text, and (forgive the pun) how he spun his web of words to create his classic novel." Gerzina uses her annotations chiefly to emphasize the secret garden's rediscovery and rebirth to symbolize Mary's and Colin's reformation from spoiled, selfish, brooding children to purposeful young adults who greet the future with anticipation.

This wonderful edition is illustrated with almost all the famous illustrations from different editions of The Secret Garden since its publication, including Ernest Shepherd and of course the iconic art of Tasha Tudor, plus photographs from media products of the book (the 1949 Margaret O'Brien film, the television version with Kate Maberly, etc.). The book also contains a short biography of Burnett and her successes and setbacks, a timeline of her life, and an essay she wrote called "My Robin" about the bird she adopted at her home in England. A must for any Secret Garden fan.

 Journal of a Solitude, May Sarton
Ms. Sarton's books, especially this one, were recommended on another book blog that I read, and this appeared to be one of her most noted ones, so I picked it up when I saw it. I can't say I was disappointed, but it was different from what I was expecting. Sarton, a poet and essayist, chronicled her thoughts about living alone—she found she could not concentrate on her poetry when surrounded by family, friends and day-to-day tumult, so she would stay solitary between book tours in order to concentrate on her art. She talks frankly about her bouts of depression and the positives and negatives of a solitary life. However, I think I was expecting something more like the Stillmeadow books. (It seems I spend a lot of time searching for someone else who "sounds like Gladys Taber.")

Still, this is a nice quiet introspective book, perfect for a relaxing day's read with a favorite beverage and a cat in the lap, perhaps cuddled in a favorite afghan.

 Howards End is on the Landing, Susan Hill
One fall afternoon, while looking for a book she wanted to read in her extensive collection, Susan Hill discovers other books she purchased but hadn't read, or books she'd even forgotten she'd purchased, along with books she realized she wanted to read again. Hill resolves to buy no new books (except for volumes she needs to read in connection with work) until she plows through her to-be-read and begging-to-be re-read piles.

This slim but delightful volume reminds one of her nature volume The Magic Apple Tree, but with books instead of the countryside, allowing her to review her life with books. She wanders happily from her old "Observer" books on trees and airplanes and how good titles entice you into a literary world and the magic of Dorothy Sayers to Shakespeare, Dickens, and poetry to the joy of finding things in used books to the favorites she turns to along with the strange volumes she's found around the house. Even if you are young and American and recognize few of the titles and authors you cannot but help be caught up in her memories and recollections and obvious affection for certain writers and her books. A delight for any bibliophile.

 Caught Dead-Handed, Carol J. Perry
This is the first book in the cozy "Witch City Mystery" series. Lee Bennett, young widow and native of Salem, Massachusetts, has returned home lined up for a job interview with the local cable station WICH. Unfortunately, the position is filled by the time she gets to the interview; while returning angrily to her car, she spies a body lying in the tide line. It's Ariel Constellation, WICH's spooky movie host, who also runs a psychic hotline. In a bind, WICH offers Lee the host position, and she figures any "in" to the station is better than nothing. She even makes some friends at the station: Janice, the program manager, and her brother George, Marty (who, like others at WICH wears lots of hats), and even Scott Palmer, who was the guy who got her job. Soon she'll meet Detective Pete Mondello and a friendly cab driver named Jake, not to mention Ariel's cat Orion—Lee calls him O'Ryan—whom Lee and her Aunt Ibby adopt.

And discovers someone has tried to kill the cat, and then later tries to kidnap him. Like it or not, Lee is drawn into the puzzle of Ariel's dead, and suspects another murder, that of a woman with an abusive husband, is part of the same puzzle.

Okay, about two thirds of the way through the book I realized what was going on, but it didn't matter because I already like Lee, Aunt Ibby, Pete, and Jake, and since I bought the book because it was set in Salem, it was already pretty satisfactory. Lee puzzles her way through the clues intelligently for the most part, and does not do what annoys me most in most cozies: determines that she is going to be the one to solve the mystery due to some misguided idea that it's her responsibility. The other thing that may be a problem for some people is that about halfway through the plot takes a turn which indicates child abuse is involved. The chapter which this is finally explained is pretty strong stuff. There's also sort of an instant romance in the story, which is common for modern cozies, and of course the pair are both gorgeous. So far this one isn't all that annoying.

I confess, I went ahead and bought the rest of the books. No redeeming social value, just sent in New England and enjoyable fluff.

 Make a Nerdy Living, Alex Langley
I'm sorry I bought this book.

This is nothing against Alex Langley. It has a catchy cover and graphics, and the people interviewed in the various careers (comics artist, blogging, podcasting, video game design, etc are all cool and nice, but it was an impulse buy and just so very, very basic for the price and catchy graphics. I would have preferred more content (at least two people interviewed for each profession) and lots more words and fewer graphics. This would be perfect as a $2.99 e-book, but it was an expensive mistake.

 A Knife in the Dark, Bradley Harper
The first few "Jack the Ripper" murders (at that time referred to being performed by a man known as "Leather Apron") electrified London. In Portsmouth, England, struggling physician Arthur Conan Doyle, having written the first Sherlock Holmes story some time earlier, is asked to come to England's capitol by Prime Minister William Gladstone to investigate the killings. As his partner, he will have Dr. Joseph Bell, whose sharp observational style formed the basis for Holmes. He is even offered an unconventional guide, a woman author of good upbringing named Margaret Harkness who nevertheless lives in Whitechapel among the poor. Together Doyle, Bell, and Harkness follow the trail of the Ripper, but he seems to know their every move, and has even sent threatening notes to Doyle.

This is a very good semi-Sherlock Holmes pastiche. Doyle's narrative is descriptive but brisk-paced and very few anachronisms are noted. The "Three Musketeers" partnership he forms with his old teacher and the writer Harkness (Margaret Harkness was an actual writer who exposed the dismal and often fatal lives of the poor in London slums) seems very real, and the narrative follows a realistic pace. Too, Miss Harkness is not a 21st century woman in 19th century dress. My only problem with this book—and perhaps then I should not have chosen it to read—is that I've never been all that interested in the minutia associated with the Ripper murders, despite having attended panels about it at conventions (I confess it's because I liked the writers on the panel). Much of the evidence is detailed as Bell, Doyle, and Harkness investigate the crime. Anyone who holds a fascination with the mystery surrounding the Ripper might enjoy this novel.

 True North: Exploring the Great Wilderness by Bush Plane, George Erickson
So I saw this book: guy flying a Tundra Cub; hey, it might be a good book for James. But it appealed to me, too, and I started on it almost as soon as I got home from the book sale. It's indeed about Erickson's trip across Canada and a bit of Alaska from his home in northern Minnesota and has many flying stories, but I'm not sure James would enjoy it, as it's so much more. It's a history of Canadian exploration (and, sadly, longtime mistreatment of the First Nations people), it's a paean to nature full of quiet lakes, pesky mosquitoes and blackflies, polar bears and black bears, caribou, ravens, beautiful trees, cold, rain, wild swimming; his encounters with the people who live year after year in remote locations; adventures in fishing; and the intrusion of industrialization on formerly natural areas.

Not only that, but Erickson loves one of my favorite books ever, A Natural History of the Senses!

Sometimes the flashbacks aren't as well delineated as they should have been, but in total this is part travelogue, part history book, all wonderful!

 Nine Lessons, Nicola Upson
This is a great installment of Upson's mystery series built around mystery writer Josephine Tey (Elizabeth MacIntosh) that treats her as both a real person (using her actual books and plays) and as a fictional character (to her friends, of course, she was not "Josephine" as she is here). This time Inspector Archie Penrose gets a chance to shine as he investigates the particularly horrific murder of a church organist in Hampstead; the man was evidently buried alive with a photo of a manor house and a cryptic note. As more murders occur, Archie realizes they are all associated with King's Chapel in Cambridge, just coincidentally the city where Josephine and her lover Marta have just taken up residence. But there is no ease for Josephine when Marta goes to the States in conjunction with the release of her movie, as there is a rapist loose in Cambridge attacking young ladies living on their own—indeed, the crime strikes too close to home when one of Josephine's new neighbors, a nurse, is attacked.

And what is Josephine to do with the news that Archie has a long-lost daughter? The girl's mother wants to break it to him in her own time, but can't seem to do it.

Lots of good, solid investigating in this outing for Archie, who learns more about the famous "Monty" (horror writer M.R. James) who was once provost of King's College and who served as mentor for the murdered men. Josephine helps him in his investigation, but it's all solved by good old fashioned detecting and footwork, although she comes up with a solution for another problem.

Incidentally, a clue to the mystery may be found if you are familiar with any mystery short stories by Thomas Burke. (Yes, that's a spoiler.)

 The Years of the Forest, Helen Hoover
Helen Hoover and her husband Ade (Adrian) anticipated the back to nature movement way back in the 1950s, when she quit her job as a metallurgist and he his job as an artist to move to a log cabin/summer house arrangement in Minnesota off the beaten path: no plumbing, no running water, no electricity, no phone. She wrote of their earliest experiences in A Place in the Woods; this volume is a summary of their experiences in the years they lived in Minnesota before moving to the Southwest.

After reading this book, I'm not sure whether I would want to hug Hoover or shake her. Her writing about the forest, the lake, the animals, all of the nature she experiences so beautiful it nearly overwhelms everything else. Her nature narrative rivals some of the best I've read.

However, on a personal level, these are two of the worst "babes in the woods" people I've ever seen. They make no provision for eating (they don't hunt) other than buying groceries in bulk before the delivery truck quits making its rounds for the season, and start a garden and then don't protect it from the animals. At one point they are so low on food that Helen (at least) gets scurvy, but they take what's left of their food and feed the wild animals because the animals are having a tough time during the winter. Except for the articles Helen writes and some notepapers that Ade designs, they've got no way of making a living, plus at the beginning of their stay, they did nothing to dissuade their neighbors (except for one Native family) from thinking they're kooks, so no one ever asks after them except for two people. When strangers claim a shipment of their food, they end up still having to pay the bill for it because the local grocer knows them so little that they can't prove they weren't the ones who picked it up. They crashed their car and have no way to get into town when Helen gets a fever. Finally after a few years they start to talk to their neighbors and are so surprised at how generous they are! They take pride in living as naturally as they can so not to spoil the woods (a constant theme is the progress bringing hunters and campers to their woods), but all their food comes in cans! They've got to be throwing those cans somewhere, having no way to portage them out, so they've still despoiled the woods! And it's very sweet that they feed the deer, including Peter, the deer Helen wrote a book about, and the groundhog, and the rabbits, but by doing so they allow the animals to rely on them and also lead hunters right to the deer!

Gorgeous prose, and Adrian's pen-and-ink drawings are stunning, but their lifestyle choices left a lot to be desired.

 The Spellbook of Katrina Van Tassel, Alyssa Palombo
I should have read up on this book before I bought it. Having watched the series Sleepy Hollow, I thought this might have been yet another reworking of the Washington Irving story which has Katrina as a witch and bought it as something to read for Hallowe'en. Sadly, it wasn't to be. As in the Irving story, Katrina is the gorgeous young daughter of the community's richest man, who's being courted by the muscly Brom Van Brunt ("Brom Bones"), when schoolteacher Ichabod Crane comes to town. However, in this version Katrina is well-read and well-educated (Brom still comes off as Gaston from Disney's Beauty and the Beast) and the moment she and (slightly jug-eared but) handsome Crane with his green eyes lock glances they are in love. Soon she offers him her virginity and they tryst in the wood and once at her friend Charlotte's house while trying to keep their relationship a secret (though Katrinia's ex-slave nursemaid knows pretty much immediately, unlike her clueless parents). Charlotte is known to have witchlike powers and reads the tarot cards for her, and it shows the relationship will end in disaster, and yes, Katrina still persists. So what happens on Hallowe'en when penniless Ichabod plans to ask for Katrina's hand in marriage (and he has to do it soon, because Katrina forgot to take the pregnancy prevention tea Charlotte brewed up for her)? Yeah, you can guess.

So basically this is historical chick-lit with a couple of torrid sex scenes in a romantic wooded glade and Charlotte's visions tossed in for good measure. Katrina also has nightmares that turn out to be precongnition, but so symbolic that she can't understand it till the grim end. There is no spellbook, just a diary in which she records her dreams. I have to admit that at times the narrative is very good at setting a scene, but most of the narrative is Katrina twittering or worrying over Ichabod. Frankly, I would have preferred a book about Charlotte and her mother, who are herbalists and midwives. If you want a romantic version of "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow," this is the book for you; otherwise steer clear.

Oh, yeah, I liked Katrina's dog, but unlike Lassie, even he can't save the story.

 Halloween: An American Holiday, an American History, Lesley Pratt Bannatyne

 Halloween: From Pagan Ritual to Party Night, Nicholas Rogers

 The Halloween Encyclopedia, Lisa Morton

Books Completed Since September 1

 Winter at Death's Hotel, Kenneth Cameron
In January 1896, Arthur Conan Doyle and his wife Louisa (and Louisa's maid Ethel) arrive in New York City on the first stop of Doyle's lecture tour, staying at the new and supposedly fireproof New Britannic, a small exclusive hotel. They are scheduled to stay only a few days, but Louisa badly sprains her ankle and cannot travel; she tells her husband to continue on his lecture schedule while she recovers. But while looking for something to read, she sees the sketch of a young woman who was murdered in the Bowery, and recognizes the woman's face as someone she saw in the hotel lobby the day they arrived. When she dutifully reports it to the police, she doesn't realize the murder is the object of a coverup, and that it seems no one wants to find out who killed the victim.

How you enjoy this book depends on whether you like a detailed setup of the era and the setting and the personalities involved with the story. While I did enjoy the story, the details were sometimes overwhelming.  Cameron carefully builds up a world around Louisa and builds Louisa as well, a woman used to the traditional role of a man caring for her, who must learn to think and care for herself, especially as it becomes more and more evident that something sinister is going on at the New Britannic and she must toughen herself in order to survive. In the process she befriends an elderly resident of the hotel, the famous offbeat writer Marie Corelli, the house detective, and a tough woman reporter, not to mention actor Sir Henry Irving and Buffalo Bill Cody, and writes a letter to Police Commissioner Theodore Roosevelt that begins yet another chain of menacing events.

Be forewarned that this is not some sweet little cozy about "Mrs. Sherlock Holmes" solving a murder. The sleazy, dangerous underside of 19th century New York is always evident in its pages, even in the halls of the swank hotel, and some extremely violent events happen in the course of the plot. I did read on in order to find out the solution, but sometimes it was a struggle even as I was absorbed in Louisa's voyage of self discovery and terror.

 Doctor Who's Greatest Hits, R. Alan Siler
Okay, I admit I'm a little prejudiced about this book since I know the author. On the other hand, I love books of lists, and since this is a book of lists about Doctor Who episodes, it's now a triple threat of goodness.

The one novelty about this book is that the author includes episodes of the series that aren't usually included in lists of this kind; "The Gunfighters," for instance, never makes a list of 10 (or 25, or whatever) "best episodes." But then these aren't always the "best," but episodes Alan finds notable for reasons he explains ("The Gunfighters" for its setting and for William Hartnell's delight in his role and also because it's one of the historical episodes that were later dropped from the show).

My favorite part of this book is that I can hear Alan's voice in it; it's a nice informal countdown of his favorite bits, characters, etc. and he doesn't mind telling you straight out about things that bother him as well. Doctor Who fans should certainly enjoy.

 Skin Game, Jim Butcher
Now that Harry Dresden, Chicago's only practicing wizard, has been raised from the dead (a death he arranged himself) and made the Winter Knight, where else can he go? This chronicle of the next of Harry Dresden's adventures is driven by the machinations of Queen Mab, who enlists Harry to accompany treacherous Nicodemus Archelone and a hand-picked group of companions to invade a vault belonging to Hades. (That's right. Hades, the Lord of the Underworld.) Harry must not only survive, but figure out who is on his side and who isn't—and that seems to change with each chapter.

A welcome new story in the Dresden saga, with significant appearances by both Karrin Murphy (sounds like a hint of something new here!) and Michael Carpenter, who is given a rare gift in order to be able to help Harry. Mousy Waldo Butters, who has surprised everyone in previous books, has a great role in this one as well, and I really loved Harry's encounter with Hades, who turns out to be much different, yet much the same, as you would expect.

Brace yourself: as in all the Dresden books some nice folks lose their lives and it's not pretty. But if you've read the series for a while you know that. Just wish ROC would quit publishing the paperbacks in those mutant tall forms!

 Servants, Lucy Lethbridge
If you're a fan of Downton Abbey or English manor house mysteries or even go back to Upstairs, Downstairs (which, this book reveals, was supposed to be chiefly about the latter), you will probably enjoy Lethbridge's examination of the British system of servants which came into its peak in the late 1800s and then coasted after the first World War and completely died after the Second. Lethbridge uses the real diaries and books of servants to detail the relationship: the backbreaking work of the "skivvies," the precise formality of the upper-servants, the eccentricities of the wealthy that were served (one master insisted on the yolks exactly in the center of the egg, another must have his potatoes all the same size, a couple insist on full-course Edwardian dinners even though there are only two of them, one household of two is supported by sixty-plus servants who are expected to be "unseen and unheard."

Interesting nuggets of information abound: about the parsimony of some employers, to the lost feeling that some lifetime servants felt when they weren't needed any longer in sharp opposition to the young women and men of the latter half of the 20th century who would rather work at any job (even in a noisy, dirty factory) than be "help," of the bland food eaten, of servants who worked for other nationalities who found American children overfed and rude, of the wealthy helpless when their servants deserted them because they could not even boil an egg or dress themselves. We also hear about servants' employment agencies, the new Au Pair, the Doctor Barnado homes which took starving orphans off the street to train them up for domestic work, and even the rise of the English kitchen from a bleak room in the basement to the heart of the home. In fact, a good deal of this book is the downfall of the servant class system, which is not oft talked about in books about servants. Food for thought and much info if you've wondered about life "below stairs."

 A Medal for Murder, Frances Brody
In this second of the Kate Shackleton mysteries, our widowed detective for hire has been asked to find missing goods from a pawnshop at the same time she is attending a friend's play. As she and Meriel leave the theatre after a successful performance, they stumble upon the body of a local automobile dealer who has been stabbed. And soon the leading lady in the play, an ambitious young woman who wants to pursue acting despite her guardian grandfather's objections, has disappeared. And there seems to be an additional mystery about the grandfather's past as well.

Brody takes many different threads and winds them together into an intricate plot involving repercussions from the Boer War's seamier side and secrets kept. The story has a nice 1920s atmosphere with very few small mistakes, as in other period mysteries set in the same era, which draw you out of the story. Kate is an astute investigator, if a bit plodding; you should be fond of classic British mysteries to enjoy this story the most. There's no flash-bang action or quirky cozy characters, just a straightforward murder investigation.

 The Parker Twins: Cave of the Inca Re, Jeanette Windle
This is the first in a series of Christian-based novels for kids about thirteen-year-old Justin and Jenny Parker, fraternal twins, children of a Boeing analyst and a stay-at-home Mom. As the story opens, their oil-executive uncle Pete arrives in their hometown in Washington State with an intriguing proposition for the kids: he'd like to take them along to Bolivia to check out ancient Inca sites. They quickly make friends with Uncle Pete's missionary friends and even Pedro, a boy who scorns God for not being powerful, but they begin to believe that the men staying at the hotel room next to them are not what they seem.

This is an okay tween adventure and the Christian angle is not so emphasized as to mute the adventure aspects of the story, unlike the Marian Bray Lassie books. My big problem with the story is the kids—they're just kind of blah. He likes baseball and reading. She likes basketball. They're nice kids. The author has spent time in South America and it shows, but some of the dialog is just a big info dump about Inca culture or antiquities thieves. I have several more of these books (they were a dollar each) and still am not sure I want to read the rest.