Marilyn's Mystery Reads

About Marilyn

True to my promise in the April 22^nd post, I’m still refusing to post reviews of books I’ve read but haven’t enjoyed or thought worth recommending. That doesn’t mean, however, that I don’t think about those books and why I didn’t like them.  So now I’m going to vent a bit.  Okay, a lot.

I read three books in the last couple of weeks, all of which featured serial killers.  Honestly, I am really tired of serial killers. It’s so easy for an author to make a S.K. the villain.  You don’t need any motive, or at least any realistic motive, if your killer just keeps killing seemingly random people—sort of like the Energizer Bunny on steroids.

The author can blame everything on the killer’s childhood, which is what these three authors seemed to do, without actually explaining what it was in their childhoods that caused the man (the S.K. is almost always a man, almost always white, almost always in his 30s or 40s).  Actually, after I read these three books, I thought I could quit my day job and become a profiler for the FBI. Once the authorities have decided a S.K. is on the loose, they turn to S.K. 101 in their textbooks and come up with the above description, a one size fits all label.

So your parents made you eat all your veggies before you got dessert?  So you couldn’t have your own television/computer/car and all the other kids did?  So you got punished for coming home ten minutes past curfew?  That explains your compulsion to slice and dice women who are runners, men with beards, women over 50 with bleached hair the color of your late mother’s.  It’s easy, simplistic, and not at all convincing, at least to me.

I want a motive that’s realistic—love, hate, greed—all the old standbyes that make a person commit the unforgivable crime.

Do you feel the same?

Marilyn

Perhaps some readers of this blog have noticed that all my reviews are positive.  Are you asking yourself, “Is Marilyn so fortunate in the books she chooses to review that all of them are winners?” or “Does the woman like everything she reads?”

Well, the answer to both questions  is negative.  I’ve read plenty of mysteries that I don’t enjoy.  But I decided to write reviews only of books that I believe are worth reading. Maybe it’s just me, but I’m exasperated when I read a review and at the very end I find that the reviewer tells me not to bother reading the book.  I don’t want to find out what not to read–there are too many novels in the world that aren’t worth the time it takes to turn the pages.  I want to find out what I should read, or at least what someone whose opinion I respect suggests that I read.

This past week I read two mysteries that were so poorly written and so completely unconvincing that I was amazed that they were published.  I’m sure that this has happened to everyone at one time or another.  But I don’t want to waste valuable internet space and your time by reviewing them.  I’ll just chalk it up to a waste of time (my time, not yours) and pick up another book and hope for the best.

I used to have a sweat shirt with the logo, “So many books, so little time.” So let’s not waste time reading about mysteries that aren’t worth reading.  Our time is more valuable than that.

Marilyn

In my March 9th post I talked about wanting to know as much as possible about the lives of the protagonists in the mysteries I read. I said I felt most strongly about knowing about female protagonists, but really it applies to males also.

In the April 5th issue of TIME magazine (magazines always are dated a week ahead of the actual date of issue) there’s a Q & A column interview of Walter Mosley, creator of the Easy Rawlins and Leonid McGill series.  Two of Mosley’s comments seem to me to support what I wrote.

The interviewer asked if Mosley tries to focus on character over plot.  Mosley’s partial response:  “With the original hard-boiled detectives, there was no connection to the world.  No mother, no father, no friends, no dog.  With a person like that, there can’t be character development.” My sentiments exactly.  If I know nothing about the back story of a detective (such as Sam Spade or the Continental Op, to name two classic dicks), my personal involvement is limited.  I don’t know why they behave the way they do, what propels them, why they keep involving themselves in such dangerous situations (assuming it’s not just because it’s their job), so I somehow don’t fully relate to them.  But when I know more about the detective (V. I. Warshawski, Kinsey Milhone), I feel personally connected and more able to understand their motivations.  I know these books are works of fiction but a good author draws you in, and for the time you are reading, these heroes or heroines are as real to you as your family and friends.  That’s the mark of a true novelist.

The other comment that Mosley made that resonated with me was when he was asked how much of a character’s life was apparent to him when he first started to write about him.  Mosley said, “I just finished the first chapter of the third Leonid McGill book.  And I’m still learning about him.  And I will be learning about him until I come to the last book.” To me that means that McGill is as real to Mosley as if he were an actual person, not merely a character in a mystery novel.

My hat is off to Walter Mosley for so eloquently expressing what I feel, that regardless of the genre the novelist’s duty is to make his character believable and ever-changing works in progress.  Just the way “real people” are.

You can learn more about Walter Mosley at his web site.

Marilyn

I was talking to my sister tonight about my strong feeling regarding character development in mysteries.  One of the reasons I enjoy series mysteries rather than stand alone books is that I like to follow the heroine/hero from the beginning of the series to the latest book. When I pick up a book that has had several before it in a series, I feel as if I’m coming into a movie in the middle and there’s lots of back story I should know but don’t.

For some reason this is more important to me in books with female protagonists.  Not knowing the histories of Elvis Cole, Travis McGee, or Spenser is mildly annoying but doesn’t impact on my admiration for the authors’ works.  But I feel differently about female characters.  I want to know everything about them–where they were born, who their family is, why they’ve remained single or have been married four times.  Is this because I’m a woman and identify more with female characters?  Is it that women (warning:  big generalization follows) are more open about their lives than men?

I don’t know the answer, but in starting this blog I realize that my favorite women characters are those I know the most about–V. I. Warshawski, Kinsey Milhone, Deborah Knott, among others, which I something I’d never thought about before.  But with male detectives, this doesn’t seem to matter much.

Does the back story matter to you?  Or am I the only one who cares?

Marilyn

Based on my son Rich’s urgings, I’ve decided to start a blog reviewing mystery novels.  According to my mother, I’ve been reading since the age of two, but you know how mothers are.  In truth, I can’t remember a time when I didn’t read, and mysteries have always been my favorite genre. Like most girls, I started with Nancy Drew, Cherry Ames, Vicki Barr, the usual pre-teen mystery novels.  Then I moved to adult mysteries.

I started a book club in 1970 that was featured in an article in The Boston Globe about clubs that were started way before Amazon.com’s reviews and Oprah’s recommendation became must-reads.  Although the Birch Street Book Club has never achieved that level of fame, we’re still ten members strong nearly forty years later.

We read novels, biographies, and non-fiction, but very few mysteries.  This blog will be my attempt to spread the word about my favorite mysteries, mostly new but some classics as well.

My son, who blogs on his web site www.flyteblog.com, as well as connecting on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook, tells me that one of the best parts of blogging comes from feedback from readers.

So I hope that people who find my blog, as you have, will respond to my reviews and give me your opinions on what I’ve written, make suggestions for future reviews, or direct me to your blog.  Hope to hear from you soon.

I’ve started off with a number of reviews to arouse your interest; my goal is to review a novel a week.  So here goes….

Marilyn