Carl Deuker -- Books, Movies, TV

Weaving various stories together.  IQ & Dotson as teenagers.  Dotson trying to pull a job on his own after he sells stolen goods without consulting IQ. Skip/IQ  battle of wits.  IQ wanting to kidnap Skip's massive pit; Skip trying to kill IQ. Cal still depressed and unable to perform--who among his posse is the traitor. Enjoying this.  Plot is the weakest link--characters, settings--terrific

70% Skip is the hitman, so there's no drama there.  Ide takes us back to IQ at 17 with Dotson using a battering ram to rob stores.  Nearly captured by cops. Dotson being willing (maybe) to kill the cop to escape jail.  Now Skip is in IQ's apartment, hiding in his room, ready to kill.  My guess: IQ will defeat him with his brain, not his brawn.  Inventive metaphors, witty, but a bit clunky with exposition at times.

Listened today in car.  IQ using inductive reasoning to track down the owner of the pit bull that attacked Cal.  Good sections on pit bulls and the history of the breed.  IQ and Dotson becoming a team, different strengths.  IQ searching for hit-run murderer of his brother. Funny/pathetic descriptions of the life (excesses and misery) of rap star who is the target of the pit bull attack.

Initials of Isaiah, black sorta detective.  His history as teenager and now on the case of rap singer, Cal, who was nearly murdered by a pit bull sent through his doggy door in his house to attack him. Tremendous Audible reader.  Some very funny moments. 

These strike me as modern day Chekhov stories. Great observations of character. Quiet lives are nevertheless filled with drama. Liked them very much. I listened to audio tapes, and I was a little put off by the reader. A bit too laconic. I think I'd have enjoyed these even more had I read them on the page.

Sea Oak:  Main character is a male who works in a sleazy sex restaurant (Joysticks) as a waiter. He lives in a miserable place with a dysfunctional family just able to make ends meet. "Sea Oak's not safe"  Brass knuckles, crackhouse, shots fired.Then his aunt Bernie dies.  She's lived a bland life, but in death -- whoa!  She digs her way out of her grave, returns to her home, decomposes, falls apart, foul mouth. She missed out, and in her second coming, she continues to miss out. The whole family misses out. Maybe the whole world misses out. Grim

A "little" man goes to a self-help seminar where he learns how to become a forceful man.  He's thrilled . . .  what he needs to do is throw his sister out! Then he'll find Inner Peace. Saunders wonderfully captures/parodies the self-help jargon and milieu. Our "hero" returns home, determined to begin his new forceful life, and immediately upon seeing his poor sister returns to the person he was and always will be.  Interestingly, it would have been sadder had he thrown his sister out.

Liked this a lot.  Two ordinary guys caught up in a national security thriller because a senator lost her laptop at the airport. Both of the main characters (Tanner & Will) are wonderfully ordinary, and author Finder does a great job of ratcheting up the stakes as the novel moves along.  And that's another thing--this novel really moves.  One action packed sequence after another.  It would make an excellent movie and I suspect the book would be an easy switch to a screenplay.  80 chapters . . . 80 one or two minute scenes. Definitely will read another Finder novel soon.  What a pleasure to find him!

Excellent thriller/mystery. Semi-cozy.  Tanner, a coffee entrepreneur, accidentally picks up the laptop of a senator. The laptop contains top secret info on a govt. Big Brother spying operation.  Tanner brings it to a reporter friend who is promptly dead (suicide, but we suspect murder). The senator's chief of staff, Will, wants the laptop back and will do anything to get it. Interesting in that NONE of the characters are stock villains or heroes.  Both grow into their roles.  Will becomes more ruthless; Tanner more resourceful.  Chase scenes, hit-and-run, marriage and baby problems.  Really a different mystery.

I liked this very much and found the ending satisfying.  The final section is the daughter's.  As with Rev. Steven Drew's section, she reveals herself to be an unreliable narrator . . . or at least an unreliable witness when speaking to our prosecutor. I noticed that this has lower ratings than other Bohjalian books.  Not sure why--maybe not as suspenseful in the traditional way, but I found the characters to be quite believable, and the depiction of spousal abuse convincing. Maybe that's why it's not as popular--it's too good.

Nearing the end of "Angel" woman's narration. Discover that Reverend Drew seems to know more than he should.  Winter nightgown during summer. Gun kept in bin where clothes are stored.  CB is building up more and more evidence that Drew is the murderer, so I'm pretty sure he isn't.  Which leaves?  "Angel" woman?  Seems unlikely--it would mean that Alice reached out to her, that she then visited the house, found Angel dead, somehow got a gun and shot Hubby.  Unlikely.  Daughter?  Even more unlikely.  I'll be interested as to how this is resolved.  I like that Bohjalian is able to have the "Angel" lady narrate without lampooning her.  She believes, she's not stupid, so her -- crazy -- belief in Angels is not incoherent.  Really good writing to pull this off.

Finished with the prosecutor. She's frustrated.  George did not kill himself, that's clear.  She believes Reverend Drew, but she's got no real proof.  She thinks "Angel Woman" is a loon and weirdly attracted to the murder, but that doesn't make her a murderer either.  Interestingly, as a reader none of the "suspects" seem plausible. Definitely a different sort of mystery in that we don't have one suspect, let alone a handful.  Next narrator is Angel Woman.

Prosecutor continues to narrate.  Rev. Drew went to Adirondacks with Heather, "explaining" his failure to return calls. (No cell reception.) She's unimpressed.  Interview includes questions regarding Alice perhaps having an affair.  Drew denies any knowledge, realizes he's getting himself into trouble, hires a lawyer. Medical examiner concludes Alice's husband murdered her (DNA under fingernails) but also concludes that George (husband) did not kill himself. Too drunk (o.37)  So who did? Nice description of interview with teenager daughter who is vague in a teenage way. Hopeful for reconciliation of parents even up to the day of the murder. So the mystery is:  Who killed the husband? Suspects are Reverend Drew (but he's so obvious) and daughter (but that's too far-fetched.) No clue.

Got a nice note from Bohjalian thanking me for commenting on his book--what a good guy! Finished (at least for a while) with narrator 1, the minister. Really well done--he slowly reveals himself to be an unreliable narrator (a man of the cloth with a strong sex drive), but is he unreliable when it comes to the murder?  He leaves his small town quickly after the funeral because (he says) of a crisis of faith.  He also rather quickly beds Heather, the "Angel" author who he visits in NYC. Just started Narrator Two.  I should know whether she's a DA or a detective, but listening in the car does that to you. Anyway, she definitely is throwing suspicion on our reverend.  Maybe not a murder/suicide. Maybe a murder/murder. Why did the good reverend beat it out of town so quickly?  Pathologist is skeptical, too. Plot thickens as characters develop--what more could I want? (Audible reader of the Reverend section was terrific. Just a little defensive tone in his voice on occa

Abusive father murders wife/kills self in rural Vermont.  Narrator (Reverend) is crushed. Crisis of faith and -- we learn offhandedly -- he was having an affair with the murdered wife.  15 year old daughter survives.  A writer of a book entitled Angels & Auras visits him.  Flake, publicity hound, he thinks--but it emerges that her father killed her mother and himself when she was 15, so her interest is understandable. Main character decides to leave the community and maybe give up his calling as a minister.  Funeral.  Writer shows up.  Bohjalian is terrific.  Character, plot, description, building a plot.  Suspect that reverend will become a suspect.  His sexual interest in the dead wife is clear, and he seems attracted to 15 year old as well.  Likely to get complicated.

Depiction of British campaign from the regular soldier's viewpoint at the end of WWII in Burma.  This was a remarkable book. It feels honest all the way through, which must be one of the hardest things to do. Interesting topics discussed:  Hiroshima--just or unjust (yes) Minor battles--no such thing to soldier Cumbrian fighting man, inner strength and toughness Virtues of not talking about everything Not feeling guilty about killing in war I'm not coming close to giving this book justice.  Short, memorable.  I'll definitely reread in a few years.

The middle 80% of this book was terrific, but the ending -- like the beginning -- didn't work for me. Plot: Danny makes yet another deal, this time by saving the city from a race by getting an iPhone video of a cop murdering a black teenager in exchange for no charges.  Of course, the deal goes entirely to hell, and the book ends up with a series of bloodbaths.  You need a scorecard to keep track of all the bodies.  In fact, there are so many at various points I'd find myself thinking:  Okay, which gang?  Dominicans, Mafia, Black, or maybe a rogue cop. Final scene, Danny trying to undo the evil he has done -- and somewhat succeeding -- was better than the twenty pages that led to it. Apparently this is going to be a film.  I hope they combine characters and tidy up the plot.  Both would have made the book better.

Levin goes in first on drug raid, instead of Malone, and is killed. (They were set up--gangsters thought Malone would be first.)  Wild shootout, Monty shot. Malone hadn't called for backup, trying to take out gangsters who knew the dirt on him. Bloodbath.  He has to turn in his badge. Common knowledge that he is the rat.  He goes to Russo's house. Wife screams at him. Russo comes down and tells him to get out.  Next day Malone discovers that Russo has turned on him, and that now Malone's testimony isn't needed.  He's going away for a long time. Russo says -- we do what we have to do. Flashback follows describing events leading up to murder of Piña. Starts from good motive--Piña had murdered entire family including three children. Revenge starts Danny down the slippery path. Finish tomorrow.

All Denny Malone wants is to be a good cop. He is “the King of Manhattan North,” a, highly decorated NYPD detective sergeant and the real leader of “Da Force.” Malone and his crew are the smartest, the toughest, the quickest, the bravest, and the baddest, an elite special unit given unrestricted authority to wage war on gangs, drugs and guns. Every day and every night for the eighteen years he’s spent on the Job, Malone has served on the front lines, witnessing the hurt, the dead, the victims, the perps. He’s done whatever it takes to serve and protect in a city built by ambition and corruption, where no one is clean—including Malone himself. What only a few know is that Denny Malone is dirty: he and his partners have stolen millions of dollars in drugs and cash in the wake of the biggest heroin bust in the city’s history. Now Malone is caught in a trap and being squeezed by the Feds, and he must walk the thin line between betraying his brothers and partners, the Job, his family,

George MacDonald Fraser—beloved for his series of Flashman historical novels—offers an action-packed memoir of his experiences in Burma during World War II. Fraser offers a firsthand glimpse at the camaraderie, danger, and satisfactions of service. A substantial epilogue, occasioned by the fiftieth anniversary of V-J Day in 1995, adds poignancy to a volume that eminent military historian John Keegan described as “one of the great personal memoirs of the Second World War.” In this rattling-good memoir, novelist, historian, and screenwriter Fraser vividly recounts the nerve-racking frontline action he saw while serving as a nineteen-year-old soldier during what turned out to be the last great land campaign of World War II—the British army’s ferocious campaign against the Japanese in Burma. The realism of his story, combined with the skills of a talented novelist, create a book of sentiment and excitement. This is unforgettable reading, both for fans of Fraser’s novels and for anyone inte

Not liking this much as I thought I would.  Slow start, and Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint don't have much in the way of chemistry. It's all so cool and sophisticated.  Eva says she's 26 (she was 35), and Cary Grant was 55 when the film was made.  James Mason is excellent as the villain.

Danny wears a wire to July 4th party with his team.  Russo and Monty, experienced cops, sense he's flipped on them.  "Get in the pool!" they shout, and he ends up fleeing the party.  They meet later at Morningside Park.  Monty is thinking about killing Danny (who can't deny he's a rat, but won't confirm it either.)  Then Danny's phone rings. A guy from Internal Affairs.  On speaker, with Russo and Monty listening, the IAB guy identifies Levin as the rat.  Danny reprieved, for a moment, but Monty is not convinced. (Danny turns when the Feds tell him that they can jail his wife as well because she won't be able to explain her spending, the size of her bank accounts, etc.  Tax evasion charges at the minimum.)

So, Malone is betrayed by the Feds.  The Internal Affairs Bureau is corrupt. City Hall is corrupt. The mob wants to kill him. The Dominicans want to kill him. He sells the heroin he stole for $4 million which he will split with his partners.  He's trying to stay alive, not give up his partners, get out of town somehow.  Very exciting