jdcorley's Reviews (191)

I really dithered over how to rate this - one of the best horror anthologies I've ever read - should I give it the full five stars that I give to the greatest of the greatest, the best of the best of written work of all time, up there with Shakespeare and Le Guin, up there with Christie and Faulkner? Higher than some John Steinbeck? And I have to say, yeah, I can't not put it that high.  

There's a lot of third rate horror anthologies out there, especially in this digital age. Oddly, though, I don't necessarily blame them for their difficulties. Horror can be exceptional in short form, so it attracts writers to it in that form, and it's quite difficult to edit through to something that's worthwhile at all. Usually you get 2-3 top form short stories and 2-3 mediocre jumpscare stories and then a smattering of failed experiments, ideas that might be fleshed out into something longer but which lack substance in this form, or dull retreads that rely on outside knowledge of the genre or theme.  But this anthology plays to the strengths of its established writers and elevates the work of those who aren't, as well as trying new experimental things here and there that are exciting to see even if not every landing is hit perfectly. 

Bartlett is doing his Bartlett thing here (twice!), predictably, but in a grounded, focused form that tones down his worst impulses.  The freeform, experimental Givens Sensor Board feels meandering and even a little boring until the titular board snaps us to wild attention - if told in a straightforward way it might work or it might not but told this way we are swept away. Sharks With Thumbs is barely horror at all, but psychologically we feel the emotions of being spoken about, of being judged. These and more, no failures amongst them, nothing less than "solid" can be said about any of them. If you wanted me to point to a horror anthology that I thought horror anthologies could be or should be, it would be this one.

After so many odd Christie experimentations it's nice to have a straight down-the-middle murder plot, with Poirot present - but not too soon - and the solution visible - but not too visible.  If people want to know what the Christie "formula" is you could do a lot worse than this little sharp nugget of murder and lies.  You should always be on high alert when Christie puts an actor in her stories! 

Reading 87th Precinct novels in the age of ACAB is a new experience. You can remind yourself going in - these novels were written before Miranda rights existed, were written before the Law & Order TV show made prosecution a central part of the procedural formula, were written before the American police procedural was anything.  But there are still times when you think that for all of McBain's supposedly dispassionate observational style, presenting the racism and violence of Havilland, one of the more racist and violent cops depicted, that he truly doesn't quite see that Havilland's violence means that when good natured patrolman Bert Kling asks out a girl who he came to as part of his duties, she really can't say no, and when he accidentally stands her up, she still can't say no.  His persistence we are meant to admire and be charmed by but we know better now. Nevertheless the idea that a police procedural should be in a documentary style (even reproducing certain documents!),  an ensemble piece where characters come and go according to their function rather than their dramatic potential, with the real story being the story of the crime, is often forgotten in the post-Law-&-Order world we live in.  And he's right. The story of the mugger, and of Bert Kling's attempt at detection, is a good one. It's propulsive, it's detailed, it's mysterious, and when it ends (quickly, as he points out!) it doesn't feel like a deus ex machina - it simply feels like what might happen as the police trace down every tiny lead. It's extremely satisfying, and in a way we don't often get in today's procedurals. 

While you can argue over which is the quintessential Poirot and narrow it down to a few contenders, the field is smaller for Marple. This one is an exquisitely observed and extremely pointed satire of what it is to be quintessentially "English"; Bertram's Hotel intentionally outfits itself with every bit of "proper English" hotel life, and, in the second chapter, we learn that, very probably, it's all there to disguise a sinister, murderous international crime syndicate. Marple's job, as always, is to look past the Englishness and point out that actually, someone got murdered, so perhaps we need to take into account that everyone being so nice and polite and the muffins being so buttery and delicious isn't the full story of what's happening here. If you want a book that explains exactly what Christie really thinks of Englishness, it's this book - it's all fucking fake.

A pretty decent noir detective story - a lot of the stereotypes of noir detectives probably come from Liddell rather than the Continental Op, Spade or Marlowe.  Liddell is a New York City guy and the best parts of the book are where Liddell navigates a noir New York City of the past, but your typical noir detective is usually, in some respect, more of a Western U.S. figure if not fully Californian.  The main thing that makes Liddell grate on the nerves here is that he's a bit of a prig; a moralist as it pertains to other people's behavior, but not to his own cynicism.  If you need to be sarcastic and undercutting all sincerity from the first moment you step on screen, you can't then also be snippy with people that give that back to you.

When people talk about "a Poirot mystery" they are usually thinking of traits that are missing from Orient Express or Nile, or forgetting some of the missteps and awkward experimenting in those works. But the ABC Murders has it all perfectly; the police seemingly baffled, Japp and Hastings along for the hunt, a diabolical plot only solved through Poirot peeling back later after layer of mystery - many of which you can see through yourself, but never quite put together. It may be the best Poirot.

A marvelous mystery setup - one of Christie's best, in my view - is marred by just some relentless bigotry popping up in the mouths of people we are clearly meant to admire. Even Marple herself starts going on about heredity. Come on Jane. Hasn't all that time in St. Mary's Mead taught you anything? A pity, since the fog, the mysterious gunshots, the bizarre cast of characters and the looming threat of arsenic are all just what the doctor ordered.

A creditable Cussler-esque adventure story, with a mysterious supercave as the environment.  The hallucinatory parts of the experience eventually end up not adding up to much - in the last chapter all that the hero can think to do with his new insight into the universe is make money in a biotech company. After the revelation of what actually is going on at the bottom of the cave, the rejection of the cosmic horror and madness of it makes you feel like the build up was for nothing.  

Also the book is oddly cruel to a number of its characters for reasons that don't seem to add up.  If it's the main character feeling this way, then shouldn't I think less of him for it? Shouldn't that be called out when his consciousness is expanded?  It's odd that in all the realizations he doesn't come to any about his fellow expedition members, people who the audience has hopefully started to care for too.

Anyway, it's interesting but the horror elements are too modest to be of use to horror fans. Only real adventure-heads need to read it.

MacDonald puts a romance at the center of this novel and asks us to fully believe it as a motivating factor for the last half of the book.  But our hero is a little too craven, a little too wrapped up in his own self-satisfied self-loathing, for us to really root for him to get the girl.  It makes us think the girl is less charming when he's the one that's charmed.  What's funny is that the first relationships in the book are actually completely functional as motivation, and the titular question is fully believable as a motive for our hero to get himself in trouble. Even as the fingers of violence close around his neck, he cares for his ex and he wants her to be safe. He still wants her to be safe even as he cynically concludes she's dead. And that keeps him going looking for an outcome he knows he can't get.  

Freemantle puts himself through an exceptional exercise - delivering a set of connected short stories, each a full espionage thriller in miniature, tied together by characters from a single English intelligence bureau, and, from the beginning, concerned with who the Soviet mole in it is.  It suffers a little from the answer being so obvious that when a last-minute misdirect occurs, we are more annoyed than tricked, but ultimately it's better than an actual twist ending. Much better. The many personalities, and moreover, technical specialties of the operatives, are on full display, and you are always eager to see what the next star will bring to the table.  Freemantle wants you to love the men and women of the Factory and worry for their safety, via the traitor, and by spreading the spotlight around even to people like the financial analyst and the old-timey puzzle guy, accomplishes it masterfully.