Review Archive for author's that start with ... T

FURY is an incident full novel. There are many characters, many events, many subplots and quite a few themes sardined together within the one work. Could we, perhaps, be seeing a case of over-kill in this work? Of course, it is not only murders that are on the menu but there is a main dish of rape as well as a dessert of terrorism. There are bombs under New York City, no less, together with denizens of the famed tunnels.

Liz Tyler, a twenty-eight year old mother of a two year old daughter, enjoys jogging, up until the time she runs near a pier at Coney Island on one inauspicious morning. That day, horrifyingly enough, she is dragged under the pier then raped by several of a group of five boys who had been helling around during the night, then tossed to a repulsive Latino  for a final abuse. Liz is left for dead but four of the five (one having been killed) are picked up and gaoled. Enrique Villalobos, the man who sodomised Liz, also finds himself in gaol, but for an unrelated crime.

Obese black lawyer Hugh Louis gets hold of the case and is determined to make a fortune for himself and the rapists because of a confession from Villalobos, made twelve years after the crime, in which the criminal claims he was the sole rapist. He found god in prison, you see, and couldn't bear to see four innocent boys blamed for his crime. When Liz was discovered, after the assault, she was attempting to wash all evidence of the rape from her body, understandably enough, and the only recoverable DNA was on her clothing and was that of the ultimate rapist. Now Louis is determined to sue the city on his clients' behalf, for wrongful imprisonment. District Attorney  Butch Karp is asked by the new Mayor to defend the case.

Karp's wife, Marlene Ciampi,  is not denied a few crumbs of the total action in this romp, although the sub-plot of the Russian poet/academic accused of raping a student does not take up a huge percentage of the text. Sarah Ryder, a student of Alexis Michalik, fabricates a complicated plot and then performs a sort of reverse rape on the academic. She would really like to obtain her doctorate, not bothering to do any work for it, with his help but, failing that, is quite happy to profit financially from her scheme.

There are several other themes and subplots to fill out the substantial volume of prose: Alzheimer's disease, marital infidelity, Islamic terrorism involving a 'dirty' bomb planned to explode under Times Square on New Year's Eve, hostage taking, supernatural guidance and Indian mysticism, prophetic dreams and political corruption being just a few aspects of the overflowing plot. Perhaps one might accuse the author of providing too much of an overflowing cornucopia of thrills and themes for one novel.

Given the amount of action in the book, perhaps it is not to be wondered at that characterisation is somewhat lacking. I felt that the characters were moulded to fit the adventure rather than the reverse. Ciampi's potential for violence was downplayed although not altogether dampened but her character was not, in this outing, given much space for introspection. The other characters appeared to be sketched rather than painted as well.

If you, Dear Reader, are looking for a book that is heavy on action, sampling the delights of a multiplicity of disparate notions, but are not particularly interested in the inner workings of the characters, this novel could provide several hours of vicarious excitement.
 

                                              KEPT
                                            by D J Taylor
                                         ISBN 0701180366
                                                 431 pages
                                          Chatto & Windus
                                                   London
                                            March 1 2006
                                                    $32.95
                                 reviewed by Denise Pickles
                                          March 15 2006

Anyone who has read the work of critic D J Taylor as he evaluates the prose of others, cannot fail to be impressed by the man's own knowledge and style of writing. The author of KEPT is a writer of both fiction and non-fiction, a biographer whose work evidences painstaking research. The research he expended on his book on Thackeray would no doubt have given him much insight into  Victorian times as well as familiarising him with contemporary writers of the period. It would be interesting to discover at what point Taylor was inspired to make his own venture into the style of the time and whether he could not bear to lay aside all the hard work he put into the biography so decided to invest some of it into his own fiction.

A prologue of sorts comprises two newspaper articles, one from August 1863 detailing the death of Henry Ireland and the other, from December 1866, concerning the discovery of the body of an elderly man apparently killed by a wild animal, and the discovery of an insensible young lady confined in the gentleman's house.

The tale from that point becomes quite complicated, told, as it is (in the style of various authors) from several viewpoints,  including at one stage from a supposed extract from the diary of novelist George Eliot. There is the servant girl, Esther, who arrives at Easton Hall to work there, together with Sarah and footman William, both destined to play important roles in the tale. Easton is owned by Mr. James Dixey, an ardent naturalist who commissions men of dubious reputation to procure both rare eggs and strange creatures to be numbered in his collections.

Henry Ireland's widow, Isabel, is a delicate lady possessed of a fragile grip on sanity. Prior to his death, Ireland requests that his father's friend James Dixey, should look after Isabel should he, Henry, die prematurely (surely a remarkable request since at the time of asking Dixey is already elderly while Ireland is only thirty.) This leads to the wealthy heiress becoming a virtual prisoner in the house of the impecunious Dixey. One point I noticed was that the chapters devoted to Isabel's story slip from past to present tense, then back again. This device made me wonder if it was indicative of the lady slipping from periods of sanity to sickness then back.

At the same time as all this is going on, Richard Pardew, a dealer in discounted bills, is hatching an ingenious plot, the transacting of which became known as The Great Train Robbery of 1855. All the major players of the tale, from the servants at Easton Hall through to James Dixey, Isabel Ireland and lawyer Crabbe are somehow affected by or involved in the crime.

Taylor acknowledges his debt to various authors including Dickens, Thackeray, Jack London (for a chilling chapter set in the Canadian Yukon) Anthony Trollope and others. Readers may even amuse themselves with a 'spot the author to whom this particular pastiche may be attributed', though perhaps on a second reading so as not to spoil the continuity of the plot. The author, too, has based his stories on historical events and real people.

The tale, given all its characters and settings, is necessarily dense. The writing is carefully crafted to resemble that of authors of the time, despite occasional anachronisms. Sometimes the writer seems almost to misuse a word (I have a particular grievance against his fondness for the words 'demure' and 'demurely' which, at times, seemed remarkably inapt) but on the whole, the work is  impressive and the mystery only gradually resolved.
 
 
 
 

                                                    The Hotel South Dakota
                                                           by Kathleen Taylor
                                                                 Avon books
                                                               copyright 1997

                      This is another in the Tory Bauer series. The book is enjoyable but not deep. It is a comfortable read since the characters are reflections of people in everyday life, here in Adelaide as well as in South Dakota.

                     The book describes events in the present which closely parallel those in the past of the town and the main character, Tory Bauer.

                    Taylor makes no effort to glamourise youth nor insist on the innocence thereof. She depicts people whom we must all have encountered in our own youth, no matter how recent or far in the past that may be.

                   There is the overweight, clever outsider (Tory herself), the glamorous homecoming queen with her attendant cheerleaders and the assorted sports heroes as well as the sycophants of the two latter examples.

                   At the 1969 homecoming party in Delphi, South Dakota, the queen and one of the sports stars disappear and a student is drowned. Is the death an accident?

                  Now Tory is a waitress at the local cafe and shares a trailer with the town's sexpot, Del, and her son, Presley. In 1969 Del was the bad girl of the school. Her appearance has scarcely changed, her outlook and behaviour not at all.

                  In the previous volume of the series, Tory becomes involved with a married man, Stuart McKee, whose wife has left him, taking their small son . Stuart, in 1969, was one of the sports jocks entangled with Janelle Ross the then homecoming queen, now a second rate movie star returning for the latest homecoming celebrations.

                The drowning of the abusive success-at-all-costs oriented football coach (who in 1969 had vanished with the homecoming queen) begins the series of mysteries following all too closely the events of the earlier year.

                This is light reading, but quite absorbing. Taylor does not attempt to cover up the existence of child abuse nor family stresses. Nor does she attempt to portray the lives of young people as anything other than difficult. Her descriptions of her characters are, alas, not too overdrawn. I was sorry to recognise many types I have met in my own life.

                I like the character of Tory Bauer. She has no illusions about herself. She is bright and recognises herself as a bit of a misfit. Even though she is forced to come to terms with life as it is ... she married heartthrob Nicky Bauer but then watched  him cut a swathe through the female population of the town, much as his cousin Del did through the male population, Tory manages to maintain a kind of optimism.. When Nicky is killed in a car accident, while quite literally engaging in one of his numerous infidelities, Tory is devastated.  Perhaps it is Tory's realistic outlook on life that makes her such a successful detective.

                 I shall keep an eye out for any forthcoming books by Kathleen Taylor.

Fictional archaeologists seem an unlucky lot. Mind, those who sought out Tutankhamen's tomb were pushing their luck, falling victim, seemingly, to a curse of the pharaoh. Something certainly caused the premature death of several associated with that discovery. In keeping with the ill fortune of archaeologists being dogged on their digs, Sir Rodney Davis, after uncovering what is probably a portion of The Book of Names, at the opening of the book of the same name, finds he is being kept in the loop by a trusted assistant -- the loop of a garrotte, that is.

Also in the prologue, the reader is introduced to David Shepherd on the day he almost dies as the result of an accident. He and his mate Crispin happily survey David's inert body from the comfort of what is presumably their astral bodies. Nineteen years later it is obvious David didn't succumb for he is now a lecturer in Political Science. David's happiness is marred by the frequent intrusion into his mind of names, names which he records in a journal.

The Serpent is a rather nasty person, a member of a group calling themselves the Gnoseos (derived from the Gnostics.) The Serpent knows the end of the world is nigh -- he is doing what he can to bring about that end -- but in the meantime, he is brightening his existence with erotic ritual as well as long sessions on his computer doing something mysterious for the betterment of his sect.

David seeks help to solve the mystery of the names that are invading his brain -- especially when one of those names is that of his beloved stepdaughter. (Just a minor query here: if a man is divorced, is his former wife's daughter still his stepdaughter?) A rabbi (David is a secular Jew) tries to help him, introducing him to a beautiful Israeli, Yael HarPaz, archaeologist and antiquities expert. Then things begin to fall apart.

The names into possession of which David has fallen are the names of the Lamed Vovniks, or Hidden Ones, righteous people who, unknown and unknowing, preserve the safety of the Earth through the generations. The well being of the Earth depends on the lives of these Hidden Ones. When they all die, the world will end. The Gnoseos are attempting to kill all of these people in order to bring about the end of the world. Certain precious and semi-precious stones, reputedly from Aaron's breastplate, are also involved in the event -- and David has owned one since his accident.

This is an engaging Jewish fairytale with plenty of action. I remember the blurb on a computer game, which says "Only you can save the world" and this is the challenge that faces David Shepherd. He has to tear around the world, wishing all the time he could be beside his stepdaughter whom he knows is in dire danger, seeking to foil evildoers. He and Yael are plunged into the direst of dangers. Their enemies comprise world leaders as well as mortals of lesser significance.

I must say, it always puzzles me as to why people of any faith would want the world to end. The Gnoseos are apparently convinced their future world will be far better than the present one but such reasoning has never convinced me. Still, that little matter aside, the story is chock full of thrills, the action taking precedence over the characterisation in the tale. If you would like to learn a little about Jewish fable in tandem with a hefty swag of excitement, you could do worse than peruse this novel on a lazy summer day.
 
 

                   BROTHER AND SISTER
                             by Joanna Trollope
                              ISBN 0552771732
                                     367 pages
                                    Black Swan
                               February 1 2005
                                        $22.95
                      reviewed by Denise Pickles
                              February 22 2005

It is surprising, given her famous ancestor, that Joanna Trollope did not immediately turn to writing as a career. The former teacher did not even read her first Anthony Trollope book until she, like many others discovering that author's wonderful work, was a student. Now, however, she seems determined to make up for lost time and has proved to be a prolific and talented author.

While this is Trollope's first book about adoption, she has previously researched the family. OTHER PEOPLE'S CHILDREN contained some similarities in that it dealt with step-parenting. BROTHER AND SISTER delves perhaps deeper into the feelings of children displaced from their natural parents as well as with the anguish of the relinquishing parents.

Steve Ross is a designer. He is an imaginative man working from a converted seventeenth century cottage. He has three employees, one of whom, Titus, has a girlfriend, Sasha, who is writing  a thesis on personal identity. Sasha wants to interview Steve's partner Nathalie, mother of his five year-old daughter Polly. Nathalie is adopted and Sasha thinks she would be an ideal subject for an interview. At the same time, Polly is diagnosed with an hereditary ear condition and suddenly and astonishingly, Nathalie finds herself wondering about her birth parents and what they may have unwittingly bequeathed her.

Lynne and Ralph, Nathalie's adoptive parents, brought David into their lives when Nathalie was four years old. Despite initial difficulties, the children eventually became close - far closer than either was to Lynne or to Ralph, to the former's chagrin. Sasha's interview stirs feelings that eventually precipitate a host of dramas into the families of both Nathalie and David. Nathalie decides she must trace her birth parents but insists David do the same.

Carole, David's birth mother, pretended to have an abortion when her boyfriend Rory insisted on the move after discovering she was pregnant. Instead, Carole gave birth to David and permitted his adoption although forever thinking of him and his father, who dumped her on learning of the pregnancy. She married soon after, giving birth to two more boys, the first one never getting along with his mother. Cora, Nathalie's natural mother, was a different, infinitely sad case. As a teenager, she had gone to a party where her drink was drugged and she was raped by a sailor whose name she never discovered. Despite her urgent wish to keep her baby, she was forced by her family to relinquish the child she had secretly called 'Samantha'. She never married.

This narrative compares and  contrasts the upbringing of children raised by their adopting parents and those  reaching maturity surrounded by their natural families. The book examines the emotions of relinquishing parents as well as those of adoptive parents whose lives are thrown into upheaval when loved children wish to trace their genetic families. The sense of their own identities which can be shattered despite their careful construction of a factitious self, cultivated over many years, is described in most affecting prose.

This novel is one which could be read to good effect by both adopting and relinquishing families as well as by adoptees. It is a touching, convincing work, well researched, beautifully written and, at times, even understated. Trollope is a mistress of the written word. She deserves high praise, both for her meticulous research and her imaginative construction of  credible outcomes of sad events.
                                  EVERYTHING CHANGES
                                       by Jonathan Tropper
                                         ISBN 1863254129
                                                  335 pages
                                                   Bantam
                                                May 2 2005
                                                    $29.95
                             reviewed by Denise Pickles
                                             April 23 2005

PLAN B, Jonathan Tropper's first novel, seemingly did not have the same impact as THE BOOK OF JOE, the author's second novel. Whether EVERYTHING CHANGES will have an impact equal to that of its predecessor is still to be seen. Regardless, it is a tale which should be appreciated by a wide audience of both men and women.

Zach King, self described 'middle man' at the Spandler Corporation, is awakened, ominously, by an earthquake which tumbles the inhabitants of Manhattan. This is a physical shakeup which should have prepared Zach for the tumultuous times, both physical and psychological, to follow. Zach is sleeping with his fiancée, Hope, but dreaming of his best friend's widow, Tamara. When light assaults his sleepy eyes, the world begins to go wrong. A visit to the bathroom provides a bloody enlightenment as to Zach's possible physical ill health. To make matters even worse, Zach's long absent father, Norm, appears on his son's (more accurately, his son's friend's) doorstep in search of a reconciliation. Norm, now optimistically sporting an apparently permanent, chemically induced erection, wishes to become part of the lives of his three sons: Zachary, the eldest, Matt, a musician and Peter who is retarded and fiercely protected by his brothers and mother alike.

Suddenly, Zachary's life is no longer the epitome of all that a young man, with every prospect of happiness before him,  could wish. Zach is constantly haunted by the vision of the death of his best friend Rael, the husband of Tamara. Zach was with Rael at the time of his death and partly blames himself for the tragedy. Zach visits Tamara and her young daughter Sophie very frequently but now it is time to examine his motivations for his care of them.

This is a very involving, well told narrative. It deals with a number of very serious issues - infidelity, single parenthood, death, mental illness and alcoholism to name but a few - yet is told in such a humorous and light hearted manner that the reader may at first think she is reading the male equivalent of chick lit; male tale? Hymn to him? Gradually one becomes aware of the serious problems, tragedy and drama underlying the almost frivolous manner of the telling of the plight of Zachary King.

This novel deserves a place on the bookshelves of anyone interested in the drama of the human condition and everything that can go wrong in the life of an apparently successful and responsible young man who is inconveniently burdened with ideals.
 

                                                             GOING LOCO
                                                               by Lynne Truss
                                                           ISBN 1861977336
                                                                  244 pages
                                                              Profile Books
                                                           September 3 2004
                                                                  $21.95
                                                   reviewed by Denise Pickles
                                                             August 25 2004

If, Gentle Reader, in your typically bloodthirsty, puzzle seeking way, you are looking for menace, deep characterisation and hair raising thrills, might I suggest, ever so gently, that you look otherwise than at GOING LOCO by Lynne Truss? The cruelly witty writer of MAKING THE CAT LAUGH and EATS, SHOOTS AND LEAVES (yes, Virginia, it IS possible to make punctuation interesting) has invented a tale and a cast of characters which, if representative of the population of London or Sweden, will ensure I never seek to revisit  either place.

Belinda Johannson is a freelance literary critic and creative writer. She is also the home of Neville, the bespangled acrobatic rat that lives in her tummy, practising backflips and other assorted athletic feats when Belinda is under pressure. She is married to Swede Stefan. Belinda is constantly under pressure. If she manages to catch up on her writing (but the work on her chef d'oeuvre on literary doubles never manages to progress despite her output on her popular children's books managing to keep her budget afloat) she is never able to do her housework. She has a cleaning lady, Mrs. Holdsworth, who, somehow, never actually keeps the house clean. Thus, when Belinda and Stefan go to a dinner party hosted by Viv and Jago, the author doesn't have many scruples when she steals Viv's cleaning lady Linda.

At the same dinner party, Belinda's best friend, Maggie, is introduced to sportswriter Leon. Presumably Lynne Truss's experience in Leon's world had some input into her creation of this character.

Linda deserts the household of anaesthetist Viv for whom she had performed acts going well beyond normal cleaning duties. Suddenly, Belinda discovers that Neville the Rat has deserted her as effectively as Linda has deserted Viv and removed all pressures from the writer. Now Belinda is free to concentrate on writing the book about doubles!

To Belinda's great delight, Linda takes over the responsibility of Belinda's rather unpleasant plastic surgeried mother as well as all Belinda's publicity engagements. Belinda no longer needs deal with her sleazy agent, either - Linda has fired him.

Then the doubles begin to infiltrate the book. Of whom is Stefan the bizarre double? Who is this Noel who so strangely resembles Maggie's admirer Leon? And has Stefan ever produced a successful clone?

If the reader can stop laughing for long enough, she can well be forgiven for accusing Ms. Truss of producing a comedic masterpiece. She gets in many sly digs at all kinds of people, from writers to scientists and cleaning ladies. One can only wonder, as one reads, through which strange and unexpected byways the internally logical plot will meander on the way to a fantastically illogical conclusion.

                                          DEAD EUROPE
                                        by Christos Tsiolkas
                                          ISBN 1740511948
                                                411 pages
                                                  Vintage
                                             June 1 2005
                                                $22.95
                                 reviewed by Denise Pickles
                                          June 13 2005

Those who have encountered Christos Tsiolkas in his previous books, the successful Loaded or  The Jesus Man, will, perhaps, be prepared for the impact of Dead Europe. For casual readers it may be well to issue a warning: this novel is not for the faint hearted.

Like his creator, Isaac Raftis is a Greek Australian living in Melbourne. He determines to leave his lover, Colin, at home and venture to Europe. He is a photographer, albeit one not making a generous living from his work, and has an exhibition in Greece. He has, many years previously, visited Greece and wishes to see the changes wrought by time in that country and across Europe. The son of an intellectual father and a mother of peasant stock, reputed by her Melburnian peers to be a witch, Isaac visits the village where his mother lived and discovers the family is supposedly cursed.

In counterpoint to the tale of Isaac's libidinous peregrinations through modern Europe is a story beginning in Greece prior to World War II. Lucia is 'the most beautiful woman in Europe'. She is married to Michaelis, a man who made his fortune in America but returned in order to give his poor family a better life. Michaelis is charged with the care of a Jewish child by a couple fleeing  persecution by the Nazis and is paid with a box of jewels to protect their son.

The tale is part allegory, part myth and part fact. There is a heavy emphasis on an examination of anti-Semitism which can induce a more pronounced frisson of horror than even the supernatural fable intermingled with the truth and corruption. At times there is a change in tense in the telling of the tale but I was unable to discern the motive as, for this reviewer at least, it didn't seem to alter the impact of the narrative. For those followers of the old master of horror, Theodore Sturgeon, there are even resonances with some of his work. Tsiolkas employs modern idiom which employment no doubt justifies what can be interpreted as obscene and profane language but a fault might be found with that as the effect can be lost through too frequent use: in some cases, less is decidedly more. The writer never shirks to depict all kinds of sex, either, from paedophiliac through to bestial.

What is left for this impressive author to say?
THE CURE FOR MODERN LIFE
by Lisa Tucker
ISBN 9781741754933
326 pages
ALLEN & UNWIN
May 2 2008
$32.95
reviewed by Denise Pickles
July 15 2008

This is very much a character driven , morality tale. Matthew Connolly is a Vice President of a pharmaceutical company, Astor-Denning. He is extremely rich, extremely selfish and, were it not for the fact that he needs to suck up to influential and/or knowledgeable people, would never have taken an Ecstasy tablet, but he needed to impress a Med School professor, so took the drug in order to keep the man happy. Thus, having given the fellow a woman whom he, Matthew, would otherwise have taken home with him, Matthew is making his solitary  way along the streets, in an elevated mood, when he is approached by a homeless boy of ten, who asks Matthew to help him and his  three year-old sister. Astonishingly, Matthew acquiesces and takes the two, Danny and Isabelle, with him, in order to stop Isabelleís vomiting, with Emetrol and Gatorade. The shops are closed, but Matthew has some at home and takes the children with him in order to dose Isabelle.

Matthew is to fly to Tokyo in the morning, but what to do with the children? Not that he wants to do anything with or for them, really. In fact, Danny had dragged their mother, obviously a drug addict, along to Matthewís digs and, while Matthew had slept, the mother had swiped his emergency fund (of $5,000) and anything else she wanted. Matthew threatens to call the security of the apartments where he lives, but Danny blackmails him into letting them remain until Isabelle wakes up. Matthew is in a hurry, catching the plane is a priority, so off he goes.

Amelia, Matthew and Ben had been a trio at college. At that time, Matthew and Amelia had been romantically involved but Amelia had come into conflict with Matthew when she became an ethicist and found herself morally at odds with Matthew, for whom the profit of his company was more important than the morality of flogging various drugs. Then Amelia and Ben became involved-- and Ben was interested solely in producing new drugs-- that worked.

Amelia wants children but Ben does not. Amelia falls pregnant -- and here is a very weak point in the narrative, so far as I am concerned-- Matthew becomes envious of Amelia and Ben and this decides him to care for the children, if at one remove, hiring people to look after the kids for him.

While the whole story tends to be a bit of a tear jerker, I am not too certain about the characterisation. Danny is just too good to be true-- the perfect knight caring for his little sister, despite the horrors visited on him by his mother. Nonetheless, Danny is, to me at least, the most likeable of all the characters. Amelia is plausible in wishing for her baby, but Ben? I felt his reaction was over the top, despite his addiction to his science. Matthew deserves his fate but one trusts he doesnít renege on the new standards imposed on him.

On the whole, this comprises an interesting and involving tale even if, as said before, it is a bit too much of a tear jerker for intent  perusal for long periods.
 

                   Lee Tulloch is an expatriate Australian living in New York. She is married to a photographer so one can imagine she is well placed to find out all the gossipy bits of fashion photography. Like archy the cockroach, the fabulous creation of the inimitable Don Marquis, she would get to 'see things from the underside.'

                 I found I did not need to plough through a hundred pages or so before being grabbed by the story. From page one it was engrossing.

                 Jane Anne Kirk prefers to be known as Nile ('like Cleopatra'). The novel begins in a gaol cell where Nile and the ghost of Berenger, for whom she was Personal Assistant, are having a conversation.

                 The story is related in the first person from the point of view of Nile. She is tantalising in what she lets drop to the reader. We are aware that there are things  Nile is not disclosing, but what are they? What bearing do they have on the narrative?

                Nile is English and comes to New York. She is engaged for a secretarial job by Aaron Karsner, an 81 year old famous songwriter of genius. Aaron 'arranges' to have Nile's visa regularised so she can continue working for him in America.

                From the cover of the book and the blurb thereon, I had expected a vampyric blood fest. Far from it. Funny and black, certainly, but also with an unerring eye for human frailty as well as strength.

               Nile half falls in love with Aaron but then meets his grandson Addam (named after cartoonist Charles Addams) and falls for him. Pop musician Addam is used to, and rather repulsed by, the immediate adoration of women of all ages. Then he brings his spoiled teenage model girlfriend, Berenger, to meet Aaron, and Aaron marries her.

               Aaron gives resentful Nile, as a chattel, to Berenger as her PA.
              Tulloch exposes the tantrums, drug taking and general dissoluteness of the drug ridden modelling world as well as the pop music scene. She draws many parallels and contrasts within her story... e.g. spoiled, beautiful Berenger with all her possessions but her nasty nature contrasted with the poverty stricken Indian girl, the burned wife Ayesha, with the spoiled face but gentle, giving nature. There is even a perhaps unrecognised parallel between Addam and a heart throb of almost two centuries earlier, George Gordon, Lord Byron. Both are crippled.There are the three wraiths.. live Berenger, so christened by her adoring fans, doubly so since she then becomes the ghost wraith of the title, and Addam who resembles a wraith in his thinness and frailty.

                    The author is witty... I particularly liked Nile's reference to Berenger the Wraith as 'my reconstituted friend'. Berenger, who in her life was seemingly adored by all (except Nile) yet, ironically, in death could be seen only by Nile.

                   Nile constantly drops darkling hints of unspeakable evil and possible multicide. Who did  murder Berenger? Did Nile? Was Berenger deliberately poisoned and suffocated? Why did Aaron allow his contented life to be turned upside down by the manifoldly and manifestly cuckolding Berenger. Her undiscriminating taste in men cannot be understood by protective and loyal Nile who resents Berenger's infidelity to both Aaron and Addam.

                The vicious excesses of the modelling crowd and their cohorts are portrayed crudely yet no scene is superfluous to the plot. There is only one real scene of sex, and that is very necessary for a complete understanding of the characters and the story. Abuse of all kinds... child abuse, abuse of women... is detailed or hinted at yet the book never becomes boring as it builds to its unexpected resolution.

               The novel could not be characterised as 'horror' in the traditional sense... although the lifestyle of the models chilled my blood rather more than did the unpleasant incidents of the tale. There was certainly no excess drop of gore.

               This story of haute mode may not appeal to everyone's taste but I think the Australia Council 'its arts funding and advisory body', by which the work was 'assisted', has received its collective money's worth. It will be interesting to see to what fictional work Ms Tulloch next turns her extremely capable keyboard.
                                                     ORPHEUS  LOST
                                              by Janette Turner Hospital
                                                  ISBN 9780732284411
                                                          352 pages
                                                        Fourth Estate
                                                          May 4 2007
                                                               $32.99
                                                reviewed by Denise Pickles
                                                            May 7 2007

There have been many narrations of the Orpheus myth, from the original sad tale, through the irreverent Offenbach version (for which I must confess an inordinate fondness) and now Janette Turner Hospital's retelling with a female Orpheus as the protagonist.

Leela-May Magnolia Moore is studying mathematics in Boston. As she is about to catch a train, she hears astonishingly beautiful music being played by a busking violinist, although the busker seems not to be interested in money. Mishka Bartok, the busker, is an Australian, also studying in Boston.

Leela and Mishka become lovers and soon Leela learns of Mishka's passion for his various instruments, including the oud, a middle eastern instrument similar to a lute.

Cobb Slaughter, another mathematician, grew up in Leela's home town. Unlike Leela, he did not follow his love of mathematics but joined the military. Now he works in security and has Leela picked up because of her association with Mishka -- or perhaps because he has a more personal interest in her. He shows her photos of Mishka, who is not where he had told Leela he was.

There is a bombing in the subways of Boston -- and Mishka had been friendly with the bomber.

Mishka goes to Beirut, intent on meeting his father, whom his mother had always told him was dead. His mother's family comprises Hungarian Jews who live a strange, isolated life in Queensland's Daintree. His mysterious Great Uncle Otto is a talented musician who is never seen outside his room but is heard every night as he plays for his family's entertainment.

Leela is distraught when Mishka, to all intents and purposes, disappears. In her search for her lover, she meets Mishka's family and learns the mystery  of Uncle Otto.

The character of Leela is very well drawn as is that of Cobb Slaughter. My own feeling is that Mishka is not, perhaps, quite so convincing. His motives are certainly adequate to make his character lifelike but I felt there was just a soupçon of something that could have been added to make him as credible as the other characters.

The descriptions of both Leela's and Mishka's childhoods are  enough to make the reader wonder at the success each has found. Cobb, on the other hand, earns the reader's sympathy, nursing his unrequited love for Leela.

The author has done a splendid job with her description of the colourful Daintree. Her description of Promised Land, the ironically named home town of both Leela and Cobb, depicts a colourless, almost hopeless, background for both Leela and Cobb.

The retelling of the Orpheus myth, with the male and female roles reversed, works quite well. Of course, there are other differences from the original but I am not about to give them away. Suffice it to say that the author has done a good job of weaving an interesting tale using the threads that first appeared in the ancient Greek myth.
 

                                             ORDINARY HEROES
                                                     by Scott Turow
                                                   ISBN 1405088451
                                                           371 pages
                                                        MACMILLAN
                                                    November 3 2005
                                                               $32.95
                                                reviewed by Denise Pickles
                                                       October 22 2005

Scott Turow has been described as a "lawyer turned writer" but, in fact, that description is not quite accurate. Turow studied Creative Writing before he entered law school. It is, then, to the advantage of the crime fiction reading public that he turned his attention to writing legal thrillers. Nonetheless, he has not forsaken his practise of law, a fact perhaps attested to by the paucity of his novels. For those readers accustomed to legal fireworks ignited by Turow in such works as PRESUMED INNOCENT or BURDEN OF PROOF, ORDINARY HEROES may prove a surprise since although Law plays a part in the narrative, the emphasis is on War.

The book opens with a  letter, written in March of 1944, from Lance Lieutenant David Dubin to his fiancée, Grace Morton. Stewart Dubinsky, son of David and his wife Gilda, is packing away his dead father's possessions in 2003 when he reads the letter and, impelled by a natural curiosity about his antecedents, seeks more information. His mother refuses to disclose any knowledge she may have, Stewart's sister respects their mother's wishes and withholds her assistance. Stewart, a journalist, employs all his professional training and considerable guile and deceit to discover more, horrified when he finds his father faced a courtmartial during the war. Stewart tracks down Barrington Leach, a nonagenarian, who defended David and persuades him, by fair means and foul, to divulge his knowledge of the affair.

Documents that Leach holds narrate how David is sent to investigate the activities of Major Robert Martin who has been immersed in covert operations but who is accused of disobeying orders. The investigation involves lawyer Dubin, by then a Captain, in the real war as opposed to the paper pushing  which  had previously frustrated his soldierly ambitions. He is teamed up with Staff Sergeant Gideon Bidwell, a man at first unwilling to be friendly but eventually Dubin's closest ally in the conflicts that ensue.

Turow explains that the novel was inspired by his own father's history but emphasises that he has incorporated many stories of many men into the history he attributes to David Dubin. Turow deals with family secrets and the rights, or otherwise, of children to know and understand their heritage as opposed to the rights of the parents to keep their own secrets. He explores the foundations of faith and rebellion, exposing the futility of rebellion based on false premises.

The author maintains remarkable tension in sustained war scenes and supplies minute detail that must have come as a result of meticulous research into World War II . For those readers who wish an easily digested account of the history of the war as seen through the eyes of soldiers, this narrative is invaluable.

The plotting and characterisation of the story are excellently constructed. The motives of the characters are plausibly built and interest is sustained at a high pitch. I have only one criticism: I wish someone would tell Mr. Turow that 'momentarily' means 'briefly' and not 'soon'!
                                                LIMITATIONS
                                                  by Scott Turow
                                                        238 pages
                                                        PICADOR
                                                   December 3 2006
                                                            $29.95
                                             reviewed by Denise Pickles
                                                    November 23 2006

Given the still reverberating impact Scott Turow made on legal thrillers with his debut fiction , PRESUMED INNOCENT, it seems odd to think of him as an old master, but that he is: an ever reliable author guaranteed to hold the reader's attention through the legal complications he incorporates into usually gripping dramas. LIMITATIONS was originally published as a New York Times serial so perhaps coping with a different form may have altered the practising lawyer's approach to his writing and hence the overall effect.

Judge George Mason is the character from whose point of view the unfolding tale is seen. Rusty Sabich, someone devoted readers will remember meeting in PRESUMED INNOCENT, is also a player, although a minor one, in the tale.

George Mason is being uncharacteristically indecisive while considering a case. People v Jacob Warnovits et al. is the result of a gang rape. The four defendants had assaulted a fifteen year-old girl, rendered drunk and unconscious, in 1999. The incident had been videotaped so there was no doubt it had occurred, but the victim, unsure of what had happened, had not reported the assault to police until the tape came to light years later and by that time the statute of limitations had expired. Now George, with his two fellow judges, must make a ruling.

Patrice, George's wife, is a cancer sufferer undergoing radiation therapy. Such a circumstance is enough to divert the judge's attention but in addition, George has been receiving threatening messages from someone his staff has designated #1 -- George's number one fan.

As usual, Turow produces an involving tale with an excellent character study of the protagonist. The behind-the-scenes glimpse of what goes on in the offices of a judge is also fascinating, giving an insight, as it does, into a jurist as a person with problems other than those encountered on the bench. Nonetheless, I felt the tale was, somehow, lacking. Perhaps the brevity of the work was in some way to blame: the text occupies only 197 pages, the remainder comprising the opening extract of ORDINARY HEROES, Turow's previous work. Perhaps, too, the novel lacks the complex structure normally found in the works of this author. I didn't feel the individual threads were sufficiently tightly knit but that the ancillary tales were more of a casual drape to clothe a skeleton.

While it is impossible for Scott Turow to write a bad book, I hope his next work will see a return to his novels' more usual style and structure.
                              THE DARK RIVER
                             by John Twelve Hawks
                               ISBN 9780593054901
                                          368 pages
                                    BANTAM PRESS
                                    August 1 2007
                                           $32.95
                           reviewed by Denise Pickles
                                       July 27 2007

A classic tale of Good vs. Evil is to be found in this sequel to John Twelve Hawks' popular  THE TRAVELLER. It is the second part of a trilogy. Unfortunately, I have not read the first part so was somewhat at sea to begin with but gradually gathered up the threads of the story before having to consume too large  a part of the novel.

Travellers are people who are able to move through the various alternate worlds that make up creation. Matthew Corrigan is one such but he has been missing, presumed dead, for fifteen years. Matthew's sons, Michael and Gabriel (big on biblical names, that family) are also Travellers and seem to comprise the entire Traveller population of the earth, together with their father. Travellers are each allotted a guardian, presumably to ward off any harm that might threaten the earth bound body of a Traveller when  he is caught in another realm. These bodyguards are known as Harlequins. Gabriel's is Maya, an atypical Harlequin as she has developed  a fondness for her charge. Maya's father, Thorn, was the original defender. Matthew's Harlequin is Mother Blessing, who has taken refuge on an island in Ireland. To the relief of Gabriel, who wishes to rescue his father, Matthew's body is still living, though the Traveller is trapped within the First Realm, the equivalent of Hell.

While Gabriel is on the side of Good, Michael has been subverted by the forces of Evil, embodied in the Brethren, the people who control all the technology of a force determined to master all of Earth's people. They have all but achieved their aim, having within their dominion the Vast Machine, which controls most humans, but there is still one step to go: the Panopticon. Meanwhile, there are a few people who are able to live totally "off the grid", unobserved by the Brethren.

Since there is still one novel to go, there are a lot of unresolved plot lines remaining. Perhaps the concept of the different realms will be explained.

I really enjoyed the notion of the Free Runners, the people who live entirely off the grid and so have a certain freedom of movement, albeit one bedevilled by many complications.

There is the little girl, Alice (who wishes to be a Harlequin) with whom the author begins the book. Having survived the massacre of New Harmony, a settlement founded by Matthew Corrigan, Alice is in hiding but is spared, no doubt to appear in the third of the series.

The action is fast and violent. The reader gets to know Gabriel Corrigan and Maya quite well. While the First Realm is no longer too much of  a mystery it will be interesting to discover if Gabriel manages to enter a further realm. It will be interesting, too, if Maya is able to accompany him, since, in this story, she is able to find a way into the First Realm.
THE GILDED SEAL
by James Twining
ISBN 9780007260744
438 pages
Harper Collins
December 1 2007
$32.99
reviewed by Denise Pickles
June 11 2008

Hereís a nice little thriller involving one of the more enigmatic and mysterious wonders of the art world, the Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci. Is it possible that the painting, sitting in splendour in the Louvre and venerated by all who see her, could possibly be  a  talented copy. and if so, by whom and how could the substitution have been performed-- and why?

Tom Kirk is a reformed crook, his specialty being art. People who previously shivered in fear at his exploits now queue up for his advice. Da Vinciís Madonna of the Yarnwinder  has been stolen and a message, unmistakably for Tom (nicknamed Felix), left at the site-- presumably by art thief Milo, one of Tomís old adversaries. A star-crossed cat has fulfilled its destiny in Tomís life.

FBI Special Agent Jennifer Browne is called in to investigate the impossibility of a Gauguin being auctioned while at the same time being held in the US.

Kirk is horrified to discover that master art forger, Rafael, is dead.  On investigating, he learns that Rafael has been crucified.

Leigh Lewis is an unpleasant journalist of the sensation seeking kind. He is on the trail of Jennifer and coins the expression ìBlack Widowî to describe her, since people with whom she has had a relationship tend to meet their death rather quickly.

Tom travels to Spain in order to investigate the death of his friend but since he is still wanted by the Spanish authorities, finds his activities hampered.

Another of Tomís former lovers, Eva, becomes embroiled in the investigation. Eva is Rafaelís stepdaughter and comes across Tom when he is inspecting Rafaelís studio. She is implicated in the ongoing crimes rather more than it at first seems.

This is a well thought out, if bold, tale which invokes quite a few thought provoking notions. The possibility of the Mona Lisa being replaced, undetected, by a forgery is rather delicious. The  art history to which the reader is treated is interesting, especially if the reader is anxious to find out things about the art world.

As to the characterisation, well, yes, that is believable (if betrayal is your thing.)

On the whole, this is an interesting, if convoluted tale that provides quite a bit of excitement for the discerning reader.
 
 
 
 
 

                                         GOOD MAN HUNTING
                                                 by Jacinta Tynan
                                                ISBN  1863255745
                                                        362 pages
                                                          Bantam
                                                September 1 2005
                                                            $32.95
                                          reviewed by Denise Pickles
                                                September 7 2005

This is a work which will affect those female contemporaries of media personality Jacinta Tynan in one of two ways: it will make them horribly apprehensive or ineffably smug. Unless, of course, it leaves them cold. Since, regrettably, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation commands only a minority  slice (although one fervently trusts this situation is being remedied) of the viewing and listening audience of Australia and taking into consideration that Tynan was better known on the ABC's  Asia Pacific service, it is quite possible the lady does not possess what could be deemed a household name. Nonetheless, extrapolating from Tynan's  profession, it is reasonable to assume she is attractive so what hope have her less beauteous sisters of finding a Good Man to have and to hold if Ms. Tynan is unable to pull off that particular feat? If, on the other hand, one of the less comely sisterhood has acquired a satisfactory mate, perhaps she has a right to a smug attitude - unless she begins to wonder if she could do better.

Jacinta begins her book in a period of her life when she finds herself Suddenly Single. She was unable to commit herself fully to her boyfriend then discovers she no longer has anyone to whom to commit herself. Strange to think that someone who seemingly has it all occupies her non-working (and sometimes working) hours with thinking about men and bemoaning her lack of the same but this is how the author portrays herself. She details her past loves (only one of whom was completely satisfactory and he died) and runs past the readers' collective nose the love lives of various of her friends. She and her friends compare notes on past, present and would-be loves down to the strangest anatomical details. They jet set around the world in pursuit of, or to escape from, sundry seducers. On the way, the narrative is interspersed with musings philosophical on the nature of love and men as a commodity. It was interesting to have a theory confirmed, that sometimes people in gossip columns are paired with characters they have never even met.

This work is likely to appeal to readers who enjoy discovering details of the lives of  stellar luminaries of entertainment in the various magazines devoted to TV personalities. It is light and entertaining while at the same time painting a depressing picture of how one aspect of life can take up an inordinate amount of brainpower and cunning.

                                                        THE RECKONING
                                                                by Patricia Tyrrell
                                                               ISBN 0297848925
                                                                    218 pages
                                                           Weidenfeld  & Nicolson
                                                                    London
                                                              September 3 2004
                                                                    $26.95
                                                      reviewed by Denise Pickles
                                                               August 26 2004

It seems almost incomprehensible that a writer of the calibre of Patricia Tyrrell should have gone without formal recognition for as long as she did. She was a septuagenarian before THE PROMISED LAND was the runner up for the Sagittarius Prize in 2001. Bridesmaid like, THE RECKONING  was shortlisted for the Encore Award of 2003. Both books were self published,  the latter with a very limited run of three hundred copies.

Essentially, THE RECKONING (initially released with the rather less attractive title of THE BONES IN THE WOMB) is a character study of two women, that flesh being draped on the skeleton of the plot. Mind, the skeleton displays signs of osteoporosis in certain areas, but the health of the whole is so good as to ensure the happy survival of the body without medication.

The narrative begins with Les, a homeless man, making a telephone call from a public phone booth in New Mexico to a middle class woman, Janice Wingford, in Virginia. Twelve years previously, Les had kidnapped three year-old Cate, daughter of Janice and Brad, from their tent at a camp site. He had never divulged the reason for his crime to Cate and the reader remains similarly unenlightened until many pages later. Now Cate is fifteen and Les is unable to cope with her because she has, to her own horror, killed a man, a college boy, in circumstances kept unclear, again, until well into the narrative.

 Les is certain that Janice will immediately recognise Cate and be joyful at her return. Cate KNOWS exactly what her mother is thinking and also how she is telling her estranged husband what is happening, causing a thawing of relations between the two. Except that Janice's reactions are quite different from what is expected.

Janice refuses to believe Cate is her daughter when the hard-bitten pair arrive at the maternal residence in a wood. She insists on having DNA tests performed at a distant laboratory - she has been the victim of imposters previously so is unwilling to make a fool of herself again at a local laboratory - and only permits her feelings toward her now confirmed daughter to thaw when the results arrive. The author sensitively depicts the shifting parameters of the relationship between mother and daughter as there are more revelations on either side.

Presumably in order to maintain the focus of the study on the two women, Tyrrell heartlessly incarcerates Les and forces Brad, Cate's father, to do a runner in preference to seeing the daughter for whose absence he has blamed himself for twelve years. When Cate attempts to lie about the particulars surrounding her own crime, Janice forces the girl to return with her to the home town of the murdered boy. There Janice announces she is, at various times, a writer and an investigator, in order to uncover the exact character of the boy and, in so doing, of her daughter.

This is a very moving story of growing love between a mother and estranged daughter. The author deserves wide recognition for her accomplishment. Perhaps readers can hope publishers will now fight for the privilege to purchase the reported nine unpublished novels for which this writer had previously failed to find a home.