The Ferguson Affair (MacDonald, 1960)

 Ross Macdonald. The Ferguson Affair (1960) Lawyer Bill Gunnarson believes his client Ella Barker is innocent. An unlikely P.I., he starts digging, and turns up the usual corruption, ancient secrets, double crossings, dysfunctional families, and impossible dreams that characterise MacDonald’s world. The McGuffin is a stolen diamond, which his client received as a gift. The police believe otherwise, and charge her with theft.  Murders ensue.

Published in 1960, but it reads like an early novel. There aren’t many of the edgy metaphors that make the Lew Archer novels such a pleasure to read. But MacDonald as always raises uncomfortable questions about the difference between legality and justice, and about the desperation of people trapped in situations where the only options are bad ones. The line between perpetrator and victim is sometimes blurred.

Still, I enjoyed the book. Gunnarson’s willingness to risk reputation and life in his quest for truth and justice makes him another knight in rusty armour. Recommended ***

Speer's Prison Diaries (The Secret Diaries, 1976)

 Albert Speer. Spandau: The Secret Diaries (1976) The diaries were secret in that it was forbidden to send out more than one letter a month. But friendly guards helped Speer smuggle his diaries out. He selected and edited his notes, and this book is the result.

It’s surprisingly compulsive reading. The revelation of the man’s character is what kept me turning the pages. I’d recently watched The Rise of the Nazis documentary series. The historian who discussed Speer pointed out that he had carefully doctored the record of his work as war production manager for the Reich. I’m not sure to what extent these diaries continue the attempted deception. In the early years, Speer repeatedly muses about how he was enthralled by Hitler’s architectural ambitions. Later, he castigated himself for admiring what he now sees as grandiose kitsch (a word he does not use), and refers to how his responsibility for war materiel production has burdened him with guilt.

He also discusses architecture, and his hope that he could reestablish an architectural practice on release. He confesses to a taste for traditional styles, and wonders how he might fit into the modern fashions. As the years pass, the hope of early release fades in the face of Soviet intransigence, his musings about a possible professional future fade also.

The most genuine sounding passages are his sorrow that he’s missing the growth and development of his children, and the inevitable failure to establish a close parent-child bond. There aren’t enough visits and letters. It's clear that his family have made the best of their situation, and their father figures less and less in their lives.

An essential book for anyone who wants to understand the 3rd Reich. The desire to build huge monuments seems to be a universal trait of tyrants. ***

Canadian Pie (Ferguson, 2011)

Will Ferguson. Canadian Pie (2011) Ferguson has made a decent living writing for hire. Here we have a collection of his mostly commissioned pieces.. They vary in quality, probably because the assignments varied in their appeal for Ferguson. He writes very pleasant light humour, with an irritating habit of doubling the punch line to make sure the casual airline magazine reader gets it. He’s best at satire and personal anecdote.

All in all, I enjoyed the book; I guess I read it casually. A highlight is As the Irvings Turn: A Maritime Soap Opera. It ran on CBC Moncton, but it seems the Irvings were not amused, as the last episode never aired. The opener, The Lost Art of Crank Calls, is one of the best pieces in the book. The examples are clearly based on personal participation.

A good book to have on hand for the times when you have a few minutes of time you’d rather not spend with your gloomy thoughts about the state of the universe. **½ to ****

Uniform Justice (Leon, 2003)

 Dona Leon. Uniform Justice (2003) A murder at a private “military academy” leads Brunetti into discovering corrupt politics, ruthless power seeking, and conspiracy to pervert the course of justice. The perpetrator(s) will never face justice. Brunetti finds them out, but knowing how a good man was punished for his unwillingness to play the power game sours his success.

Another in the Commissario Brunetti series, darker than previous ones I've read in its depiction of the moral filth in which political corruption grows. Recommended, but not a happy read. **** 

The Cat Wears A Noose (Hitchens as Olsen 1944)

Dolores Hitchens (originally published by "D. B. Olsen"). The Cat Wears A Noose. (1944) Hitchens wrote a lot of books, mostly mysteries, under various pseudonyms and in several series. This one (#4 in the Rachel Murdock series) begins with Rachel’s sister witnessing a murder on her way home from a church meeting, but she doesn’t tell Rachel. Rachel meets one of the household who enlists her aid in finding out what really happened. She offers her services as cook, which enables her to find the clues she needs. Family secrets, money, and tangled, unacknowledged  relationships make for a good puzzle. The cat is a wanderer. Following her, Rachel chances on a couple of the crucial clues. Hitchens is a bit weak on character and ambience, but the book is pleasant read.

The online info on Hitchens indicates she must have made a decent living writing these novels, some of which were made into movies or TV episodes. I enjoyed it. **½

The Sentinel (A. C. Clarke, 1983)

 Arthur C. Clarke. The Sentinel. (1983) Collection of short stories, including the one that sparked 2001: A Space Odyssey. Clarke provides an intro to each piece, telling about the circumstances of composition and publication. These are interesting in a tabloidy way, but add nothing to the stories. Clarke is very good at imagining technical problems and their effects. He’s careful to keep extrapolation as close to known science as possible. His characters tend to be 2.5D or flatter. Like pretty well everybody at the time, he assumes the geopolitical realities of the Cold War would continue into the relatively far future.

But his tight focus on the tale keeps us reading. He’s good at advancing plot with dialogue. His early work was published in the SciFi pulps, whose editors wanted a high narrative-to-words ratio. The resulting conciseness hides flaws that longer works would have revealed.

A good collection. Essential for the fan, and likely a pleasant diversion for anyone else.

** to ***

:Pictures of the Past: 1920s, 1930s, 1940s (Yapp, 1998)

 Nick Yapp. Getty Image 1920s, ... 1930s, ... 1940s (1998). Three lively collections of photographs illustrating the lives of our ancestors. The illustrated papers and magazines that provided the images tended to publish the unusual and dramatic (see the 1940s cover), so Yapp must have had a difficult time finding the ones that showed ordinary lives. The photos of political and other significant events are mostly well known. The others provide most of the charm. It’s an odd feeling to experience nostalgia for a world I didn’t actually know (the late 1940s excepted). But that’s what happened. I will likely look at these books again. ***