Hamish and Agatha...

I've been reading Hamish MacBeth and Agatha Raisin mysteries lately - both series written by M.C. Beaton. Agatha is a pushy, and to me admirable, retired early PR person who falls into the middle of crime, then muddles around trying to solve said crime, does a heck of a good job, all the while getting targeted herself while trying to sort out various love interests - all of whom are quirky and not at all predictable. She has several male friends who turn up to complicate matters. The intellectual level of these books is refreshing. Hamish is a rather unambitious Scottish cop who has a nose for trouble, seeing it before it even starts, or is it feeling it? After seeing the television series the BBC made of the Hamish books, I had to read some. I recommend M.C. Beaton for the droll British humor and the expert writing.

45th Reunion...

So many years? NO.....oh yes...that's right - it is. I posted here in 2004 when I went to my 42d reunion...but it was my first. So many memories and good people. Some very special people in the group, and this time was even better. More old friends, and more amazing facts about the lives of our fellows. I find we get a unique perspective from the vantage point several decades out of high school. I find it hard to put the bond into words, yet there is a something that binds us to our youthful expectations and aspirations and, yes, innocence, that again seems to permeate the air at a reunion. You can return for a moment...

Harry Potter wraps up...

Suffering sleep deprivation, I stagger to the computer even two days later to put forth an apology for my previous post. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was a wonderful end to a wonderful run. Very few authors sustain the quality of writing that J.K.Rowling has sustained all through the series. I am thinking about rereading them all now that the story is complete. No spoilers here - I'll just say that the story is complete. I laughed, I cried doesn't do it justice. For those teens who have read it - I hope you reread the series later in life as well because there is so much there that living will make manifest.

Since I am constrained from giving any examples and spoiling the pleasure of my friends who haven't finished yet, I can only say carry on.

Harry Potter ruminations...

Reading Harry Potter 7 is slow. I don't think it is the book, but I have been very involved in learning to fit pants and believe me this is a task for engineers, not me. I am soldiering through though, and should have a pattern for wearable, fitting pants any day now. As many have suspected, ready to wear clothing is not made for real people, but for some mythical creature somewhere who is even more elusive than the Yeti of the Himalayas. So pants fitting class has to come before HP. I have started the book, I have gotten to page 330 or so, but the pace isn't drawing me into the stupor in which I am supposed to be, where I sit mesmerized for hours at a time. This isn't happening.

I think J.K. Rowling's writing is still at the same high bar it was in the beginning; it is the fans who are now jaded and no longer surprised or enthralled by the magical happenings. And, who needs to read it fast? This is the last book...space it out. So, I will be taking my time, even when my reading time is freed up from sewing.

Alan Furst...

Instead of individual reviews for several of Alan Furst's latest novels, I think a general review is best, and for these reasons: they all have the same ambiance, they all deal with WWII, and pre-WWII, and they are all excellent novels. Furst's name was mentioned in reviews for both John Le Carre novels and Eric Ambler novels, and one comment was that Furst seems to have been influenced by Ambler. To lump Furst into the espionage genre would be a mistake because his writing is evocative, enthralling and always of the highest caliber. Although the main characters are involved in some espionage dealings in one way or another, most of them are caught in circumstances that have directed them into the shade rather than having made a choice. A Russian Marxist journalist who becomes disillusioned yet sees the necessity for anti-Nazi (Dark Star, 1991)activity, a Frenchman (The World at Night 1996, and Red Gold, 1999) of the upper class whose career as a movie director is wobbling already and brought down by the German occupation of Paris and his unwillingness to collaborate, and an Hungarian expatriate (Kingdom of Shadows 2000) who finds himself caught up in plotting by his own and opposing countries and factions - all these men and some of their associates seem to enter the flow of history and join fortune with an integrity and character they are surprised to find in themselves. Furst leaves his stories at a resting place rather than an end and we are satisfied because these stories couldn't have ended in their historical context.

For character and sense of place, Alan Furst's work is a gem of a find. I think we all at times have wondered how we would really act under duress of war and inhumanity, and we only hope we never find out. The characters in Furst's work find out.