2012 Reading -- Part One

I have a plan for my reading in 2012.

The first part of the plan involves rereading. I’ll get to that topic in a future post.

The second part of the plan revolves around the need to reduce the pile of books to be read that are taking over my library like the tribbles took over the Enterprise.

Implementation of the second part of my 2012 reading plan is underway. I’ve decided that in January, and possibly February, I will focus almost exclusively on reading mysteries and thrillers. I enjoy the genre and books in that category generally prove to be a quick read.

The experiment is working. I’ve read eight books in 11 days, and, although the book pile is shrinking imperceptibly, I’m feeling better about all those books to be read.

Here’s one-half of a summary of my reading in 2012:

Book 1: North of Nowhere by Steve Hamilton

After reading The Lock Artist I resolved to become better acquainted with the work of Steve Hamilton. 

That resolve was strengthened after discovering that his Alex McKnight series was set in the U.P. I have vacationed in The Yoop two of the last three years. I’ve been to The Soo, Paradise and Whitefish Bay – all locations that regularly appear in Hamilton’s series.

Hamilton’s an entertaining writer. His plots move with the speed of a north wind out of Canada, McKnight is an appealing character and the location is unique.  North of Nowhere is the fourth book in the series. From my perspective, the books just get better and better.

Book 2: The Outlaw Album by Daniel Woodrell

Book 7: Crimes in Southern Indiana by Frank Bill

Two short story collections – from Daniel Woodrell and Frank Bill – that might be characterized as Hillbilly Noir.  

The Outlaw Album is the first short story collection from Woodrell, an accomplished novelist who is often compared to Cormac McCarthy. Crimes in Southern Indiana is not only Bill’s first story collection, it’s his first book.

Both are great; a disturbing serving of violence and depravity. Woodrell's collection is the strongest, but he’s been at it the longest. Crimes in Southern Indiana is an impressive debut. 

There are similarities in the subject matter. Both Woodrell and Bill explore a poor, marginalized segment of the American population that includes tweakers and drug dealers, the greedy and the victimized, hapless law enforcement officers and folks who simply see settling a disagreement with a gun as a logical and reasonable response.

I especially enjoyed The Echo of Neighborly Bones and Uncle by Woodrell; two stories as haunting and as disturbing as anything written by Stephen King.

Book 3: The Impossible Dead by Ian Rankin

Initially, I didn’t warm up to Ian Rankin’s new series, featuring Malcom Fox and the Complaints, Britain’s version of America’s Internal Affairs.   

The Impossible Dead, Rankin's second book featuring the Complaints, was slow taking off. Other cops don’t like the Complaints, practice a lot of passive-aggressive behavior and call it cooperation, etc., etc., etc.

But a third of the way into the novel, Fox starts digging into a long-forgotten cold case that appears to be connected to the current case of cop corruption he’s investigating and The Impossible Dead starts reading like an Ian Rankin thriller – flat-out riveting.

Fox isn’t Rebus, but by the time The Impossible Dead steams to its conclusion, it’s evident that Rankin’s new series, and his new cast of characters, has the potential to be just as compelling as the Rebus novels.

Tomorrow: A summary of books four, five, six and eight.

The Death of Sweet Mister a violent aria by a noir master

Book 48: The Death of Sweet Mister by Daniel Woodrell

"Him joining the group changed the feel of it the way one lit match does suddenly change the feel in a hay barn."

That sentence, with its odd, little rhythm and construction, which produces an awkward, yet stately tone, hiding the latent violence of the moment before laying it bare, is vintage Daniel Woodrell.

Woodrell, who sets his noir masterpieces in the Ozarks that he calls home, commands violence with the skill of a concert pianist.  The actual physical violence in Woodrell's The Death of Sweet Mister is limited or off the page.  But like the lit match in the barn, the threat of an explosion -- the suggestion that a quiet moment can become deadly in an instant -- is always present. And it is the threat of violence, its very imminence, that is Woodrell's canvass.

The "Him" in the quote above is Red, a particular unsavory piece of work, who inhabits violence like most men inhabit their skin. Red strikes out at his girlfriend, Glenda, or punches her teenage son, Shuggie, in the stomach with disturbing casualness. 

Perhaps even more disturbing is Red's constant verbal attacks on Shuggie, recruiting the boy to steal drugs from the home of sick men and women recently discharged from the hospital or his easy disregard for the boy's presence when he is having sex with Glenda or some other women.

Red is one of those men who wants what he wants when he wants. And when he's denied his desires, violence is his default setting.

But this story belongs to Shuggie, its narrator. His mother affectionately calls him her "Sweet Mister".  Shuggie despises Red and fears him, yet he is one of boy's few male role models. There is no other male figure in Shuggie's life to suggest that there are other ways to behave. 

The suggestion of violence is palpable throughout this slender novel.  The actual violence is tame by most stanrdards -- to a point.  And that point is reached in the novel's final pages when Shuggie undergoes a terrible and violence transformation.

A transformation that does, indeed, lead to the death of Sweet Mister.

Tomato Red a Woodrell classic

Book 39: Tomato Red by Daniel Woodrell

Writer Daniel Woodrell frightens me.  Not for the violence that is such a casual and accepted undercurrent in the lives of the characters who populate his novels, but for the accuracy of his observations. 

Tomato Red will be described as noir fiction, a hardboiled novel distinguished by its unsentimental portrayal of violence and sex. And it is that, but it is also a sociological study of class warfare in the tiny Ozark town of West Table, Missouri.

Americans like to believe that we are a classless society, but Woodrell knows that is far from true. He also knows that it is in the small towns that the distinctions of class are most closely felt and keenly observed. Everyone in West Table knows exactly who is above them and who is below them in society's pecking order.

And when you live in Venus Holler, like Jamalee Merridew, and your brother is country queer and your mother is the town whore, there is no one below you. It is Jamalee's desire to better herself that drives Woodrell's powerful story.

Our narrator, Sammy Barlach, an ex-con and classic loser, meets Jamalee and Jason in the course of a burglary. Fueled by drugs, Sammy clumsily breaks into a West Table mansion.  The brother and sister are already inside.  The pair break into rich folks' homes to learn their secrets, wear their clothes and to pretend they are something better.

Later, when Jamalee is ejected from the local country club where she has went to find a job, the three recruit a trio of pigs to vandalize the golf course.  In a town where the country club represents the pinnacle of social achievement, their actions trigger a series of tragic and violent events.

Woodrell is best known as the author of Winter's Bone, which was recently made into a superb film. He also wrote The Death of Sweet Mister, which is widely recognized as a noir classic. My copy of Tomato Red is a re-issue from Busted Flush Press, which was founded by the late David Thompson.