Patriot Games by Tom Clancy

This is the best book I've read by Clancy. I've only read 3 in total, so that may not be a fair judgment of his body of work. I started with THE SUM OF ALL OUR FEARS and thought it pretty good but too long, and the bad guys were poorly drawn and unbelievable. THE HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER I barely remember, buried with so much technical detail about sonar and submarines.

But this book focuses on Jack Ryan and his personal life (albeit intersecting with nasty Irish terrorists), nicely unified by the pregnancy of his son. The middle could be tightened somewhat, but it's overall fast-paced and about the right length for the material.

The terrorist attack on his wife and daughter is harrowing stuff. I'd fault the finale because it depends on a subsidiary character being in the bathroom at the right time. Also, he leaves a thread hanging -- what happened to the terrorist's plot to simultaneously kill off rival leaders in the IRA while he was kidnapping Prince Charles and Lady Di in America?

It was odd to feel such outrage about terrorists who're not Muslims, especially since the IRA threat has died down. And truly odd to see French security forces acting so decisively against a threat and actually helping the U.S.

The other 2 Clancy books I read made me feel like I didn't want to read any more for about a year or so -- but this one makes me feel like picking up some more soon.

Congo by Michael Crichton

Here's a pretty good book which will never be optioned for the movies, despite the author's many other filmed novels. It reeks of unforgiveable political incorrectness.

The surface events involve a team of scientists exploring the Congo for diamonds. They're suddenly killed in a mysterious way, so the company launches another expedition.

The events are a pretty good, modern Africa adventure. Rough landscape and jungle, encounters with animals, river rapids, bad weather, they're racing a similar group from a rival company and so on.

Plus, Crichton had the smart idea of making a language using ape, a fictional versio of Koko, as a character. She goes along with the expedition and is one of the interesting parts of the book.

The final solution to the mystery is a let down, at least to me. I'm not sure I buy the basic thesis.

Below the surface, it's an interesting exploration of what it means to be humans. When apes can learn to talk and people eat each other (Crichton's portrait of tribal fighting in the Congo will certainly never be filmed!) and plan to fight war by computer, where is the line properly drawn?

Also, he hits upon his recurring theme of people doing things that have unexpected consequences. This was the backbone theme of JURASSIC PARK. Here, it buries the ruins of an ancient lost city under tons of volcanic lava.

Deep in the Woods by Nicholas Conde

DEEP IN THE WOODS by Nicholas Conde was an early serial killer novel. And deep in the woods is where it belongs. It's mostly competent. I did care enough about the main character -- a children's book author and illustrator, and to keep reading. Plus, there was a lot of material hinting at depths that ultimately weren't there.

Once you learn the puzzle, you realize it doesn't fit together.

Why did the mysterious private detective hunting the serial killer focus so much on the book writer? Yes, she was the killer's sister, but she knew nothing of value to him.

Aside from getting us hooked at the beginning, the killing of author's best friend is gratuitous and an unnecessary coincidence, since killer knew her.

I can't detail the violations of police procedures, but I'm sure a professional would total scoff at the lack of detail and organization.

The ultimate psychological/family secret which supposedly explained the serial killer doesn't even make sense. OK, his real father was mother's husband's good friend. So what? How did that play a role in making him a serial killer. Mother acted seductively toward him and didn't love sister as much? Why? Did she really love the family friend and not her husband? So how did that make boy a serial killer? How did the "seductiveness" (actual incestual acts not included) make him a serial killer? In final murders he's describing as raping the women, but that's not mentioned in regard to early murders. Why?

The author worked with some heavy material but was nowhere near up to it. Threw some good pieces into a stew pot but couldn't make them into an organized, emotional novel.

If you see this in a used book store and you're tempted to buy it . . . re-read THE RED DRAGON instead.

The Mind Thing by Fredric Brown

I've actually finished more fiction books in the past 1 1/2 weeks than in the past 8 months, thanks to riding the bus thanks to a blown out transmission.

Most recent -- THE MIND THING by Fredric Brown. Hey, I didn't promise that I'm reading contemporary books.

Fredric Brown is more or less forgotten now in both fields, but he used to be a pretty big name in both the mystery and science fiction genres. Say, during the 30s thru 50s. I'm not sure when he died. He was one of those guys who trained in the pulps and paperbacks and could always be relied upon for a good yarn -- and sometimes he reached for heights.

Once he wrote a thriller that started out something like, "John (main character) wanted to spend the night with Jane (beautiful woman)." By the end of the book, he'd gotten his wish, but of course it was nothing like he expected or wanted. (Jane was a homicidal maniac and he wound up having to spend a night keeping an armed watch on her. If his attention wavered, she'd have killed him.)

In science fiction he's known mostly for his short stories -- he put out many collections of them. THE MIND THING is one of his few sf novels. Maybe the only one.

It's a fairly good story of an alien stranded on Earth who can take over the bodies of other living creatures, but can't get out without killing them.

This alien's eventually done in by not understanding that a series of both human and animal suicides would attract attention.

Also, there's the happy coincidence that a satellite electronics engineer happens to be spending the summer in that tiny rural area, and needs typing done by the local spinster schoolmarm who does typing and bookkeeping during summer months and just happens to be a science fiction fan who guess there's an alien involved -- that is not very likely now and was even less likely during the 1950s. Plus, I wonder why an electronics expert who does work on satellite could take off for an entire summer. Small wonder the Soviets go ahead of us.

Anyway, nothing outstanding but Fredric Brown was always a good pro.

Dedicated to reading

This blog is dedicated to writing about books I read. I used to read a lot of books. Now I have cut way back, especially on fiction, due to working so much. But I still enjoy reading, thinking about the books and also reading book reviews. Heck, I published a few book reviews in a local newspaper when I was much younger. Also, I published book reviews in various science fiction fanzines what seems like a million years ago.

So, although I can't promise this blog will be updated regularly, or that I will stay on the topic of books I've read (since many other things of interest come to my attention), that is the basic purpose here.