Unbridled Cowboy, by Joseph B. Fussell, edited by E.R. Fussell
Jo Fussell is a hell of a storyteller – this account of a life as a cowboy and railwayman in Texas and the rest of the American south is rich in period detail and gives a great insight in to the changes that took place in America during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Joseph Fussell was born in a country where memories of the Civil War were still vivid, and lived through the Great Depression as well as the Spanish-American War and two world wars. As grandson and editor Bob Fussell says, the greatest dilemma facing him when reviewing the memoirs was deciding whether his grandfather was a murderer or an embellisher. He chose to believe the former.
Fussell’s life was characterised by itchy feet and an unwillingness to stay in one place for very long. Leaving school in his early teens, he worked as cattleman, ‘cow puncher’, stable hand and many other jobs besides. Moving around the south hitching rides on the railroads, he worked numerous jobs, some of which took him in to the lawless borderlands between Texas and Mexico. While there, the death of a friend at the hands of nine Mexican ranchers led him on to a quest for vengeance which he planned and executed with ruthless precision – he describes the events, though spares us gory details. Later, Fussell finds himself commissioned as a Texas Ranger and clearly implies that he took the law in to his own hands on a number of other occasions.
The Crossroads, by Niccolò Ammaniti
With The Crossroads, translated from the Italian by Jonathon Hunt, Niccolò Ammaniti has given us a genuinely thrilling novel, populated with a cast of unfortunates whose lives are far from easy, yet some of who we come to care for deeply. The apparent focal point for the narrative is the bank raid planned by three unemployed misfits: Rino Zina, who harbours right-wing views that would make Mussolini blush; the apparent simpleton Corrado Rumitz, known to everyone as Quattro Formaggi after his fondness for pizzas; and Danilo, the architect of the heist. A less well-equiped gang of criminals it’s hard to imagine. However, the raid turns out to be a distraction from a much darker and more distressing storyline.
The real focus of the book is Rino’s son, Christiano – in the prologue, we come to understand that he does not enjoy anything like a normal existence for a thirteen year old boy, when his father hands him a gun and sends him off on a mission to shoot the dog in the neighbouring factory that’s keeping them awake. Rino is a drunk and a womanizer, and yet his relationship with Christiano is quite affecting in many ways, for instance in their little conspiracy to deceive the social worker (they are always playing Monopoly when he visits). Danilo and Quattro Formaggi are Christiano’s beloved uncles, and he is in on their robbery plan, though not expected to take part. The degree to which Christiano is accustomed to such notions tells you a lot about the life he has lived.
The Requiem Shark, by Nicholas Griffin
A reader who exhausts the joys of Aubrey-Maturin (all 20 volumes of it) may sail the seas of historical fiction from the Southern Oceans to the Gulf of Finland in search of a nautical yarn of similar quality and literary merit. Acting on a rumour picked up in a nameless smuggling port, I pursued The Requiem Shark hither and yon before finally tracking down a copy, and I can report that, while not exactly up to O’Brian’s amazingly high standards, it’s certainly a significant threat to shipping.
OK, enough pseudo-nautical claptrap. The Requiem Shark is the tale of William Williams, a young, educated man, musically trained and trying to make his way in the world on a slave ship; he experiences a forced change of career when he is taken aboard the pirate ship of the infamous Captain Bartholemew Roberts, aka Black Bart. Believing that as a musician he would be exempt from hanging if the crew were ever apprehended, Williams’ ability to read and write and his language skills give him a unique position among the crew. He quickly becomes a confidante of Black Bart, whose desperation for some kind of immortality leads him to authorise Williams to keep a journal, which he does, in code.
The SF and Fantasy Review Website Meme
Time for Bookgeeks to join in with this – a list of speculative fiction and fantasy review blogs started by John at Grasping for the Wind which has grown hugely in the last week as people have added themselves and other blogs to it.
- 7 Foot Shelves
- The Accidental Bard
- A Boy Goes on a Journey
- A Dribble Of Ink
- A Hoyden’s Look at Literature
- Adventures in Reading
- The Agony Column
- Andromeda Spaceways
- The Antick Musings of G.B.H. Hornswoggler, Gent.
- Ask Daphne
- aurealisXpress
- Australia Specfic in Focus
- Author 2 Author
- Barbara Martin
- Bees (and Books) on the Knob
Loads more after the jump…
Churchill’s Wizards, by Nicholas Rankin
Through the course of two world wars, the British developed an amazing facility for all kinds of deception and deceit, and Nicholas Rankin has written a fine overview of the tactics, strategies, techniques and personalities involved. It’s really a book of two halves, reflecting the emerging art of camouflage during the Great War, and the development of a whole range of deception and propaganda techniques in the Second World War, which were fully integrated in to the management of the Allied war effort.
At the beginning of the Great War, the armies of Europe were in no way equipped for the coming conflict – concealment and disguise were not an accepted part of war on land. It took artists like Solomon J. Solomon to recognise the potential for using paint and readily available materials to hide artilley observation posts, disguise sniper positions and hide guns and troop movements. By the end of the war, all sides had seriously embraced camouflage – the development of ‘dazzle’ painting on ships, not attempting to hide them but to confuse observers, is particular fascinating. Rankin also documents the career of Laurence of Arabia, who recognised the value of what we now call ‘asymetric’ warfare, and indulged in deception of his Turkish opponents as a key component of his strategy. We also explore the beginnings of signals interception and codebreaking, from which Winston Churchill developed a fascination with intelligence that lasted the rest of his career.
Simon A’s Books of the Year 2008
Here’s my selection of the books I have enjoyed most in 2008 (not necessarily books published in 2008).
The Pavarotti-Bot Award for Best Space Opera
Loads of candidates for this cherished award – the first new Culture novel of Iain M Banks for seven years, Matter, was pretty fine, and Peter F. Hamilton’s The Dreaming Void reminded me just how much I enjoy his forest-busting tomes. But for sheer enjoyment, I would have to pick Alastair Reynolds, both for the breadth of vision of House of Suns and the taut plotting of The Prefect. I can’t wait for his next offering.
Best Use of a Shrew in a Humorous Context
This coveted prize can only go to Nick Harkaway’s sublime The Gone-Away World, which offers a futuristic romp that I described as ‘Mad Max meets Catch-22 meets Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy‘ (actually, I didn’t, but I should have). I don’t think any other book has made me laugh as much this year, and the author continues to amuse me in his blogging and his other writing (look out for our interview with him in the New Year). The fact that Harkaway is John Le Carre’s son is genuinely incidental – his is a very different talent.
Competition: Win a limited edition of Tolkien’s Tales of the Perilous Realm, signed by Alan Lee [closed]
Well, fantasy geeks, we’ve got a treat in store for you. To celebrate the launch of the new Official J.R.R. Tolkien Bookstore website, those lovely hobbitses over at HarperCollins are giving one lucky reader the chance to win a copy of their new Special Edition of Tales Of The Perilous Realm, signed by the artist Alan Lee. This is a limited edition of 500 copies, and retails at £60, so this is a lovely prize indeed. Here’s some info about the special edition for you book fetishists:
This de-luxe collector’s edition includes the first edition text and features an exclusive colour frontispiece illustration on a fold-out sheet. The book is quarterbound, with a specially commissioned motif stamped in three foils on the front board, and is presented in a matching slipcase. The five tales are written with the same skill, quality and charm that made The Hobbit a classic. Largely overlooked because of their short lengths, they are finally together in a volume which reaffirms Tolkien’s place as a master storyteller for readers young and old.
Michael Kimball, author of Dear Everybody
Michael Kimball’s first two novels are The Way The Family Got Away (2000) and How Much of Us There Was (2005), both of which have been translated (or are being translated) into many languages. His third novel, Dear Everybody, has just been published in the US, UK, and Canada, and here on Bookgeeks we really loved it. Time Out New York calls the writing “stunning” and the Los Angeles Times says the book is “funny and warm and sad and heartbreaking.” Kimball is also responsible for the collaborative art project–Michael Kimball Writes Your Life Story (on a postcard)–and the documentary film, I Will Smash You (2009).
We asked Michael for his answers on a postcard to our cunning questions about books and writing…
Competition: Win a Faber Diary and get 2009 off to a great start [closed]
Whether you’re a design aficionado, or you’re just looking to stay organised in 2009, the Faber and Faber Diary 2009 is what you need, and we’ve got three of them as prizes for anyone who can answer a simple question. Being published as part of Faber’s 80th birthday celebrations in 2009, we can confirm that the diary is an object of desire that you may not be able to bring yourself to write in!
The Faber and Faber Diary 2009 marks eighty years of independent publishing. Displaying a week to a view and illustrated in colour throughout with book designs, letters and poems, the diary reflects the changing face of Faber’s publishing over the years since Geoffrey Faber founded the company in Bloomsbury in 1929.
From T. S. Eliot’s charming illustrations for the 1939 edition of Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats to the iconic work of in-house designer Berthold Wolpe, there is a huge diversity and richness of material to accompany each week of the year.
Bookgeek link love (1)
First in an occasional series of links to other book-related stuff that we have enjoyed and think you might enjoy too:
- Austenbook is a clever re-telling of Pride and Prejudice as seen through the Facebook news feed
- HarperCollins literary imprint 4th Estate have a new animated short to celebrate their impending 25th birthday – and it’s rather wonderful (though perhaps slightly too long). You can see it on www.25thestate.com
If there is anything you think we should feature in future link round-ups, contact us.
Saturn’s Children, by Charles Stross
No-one could ever accuse Charles Stross of being short of ideas, and with Saturn’s Children he demonstrates once again why he is one of our most compelling writers of SF. Set in a universe where humanity has expired, the victim of indolence and under-breeding, Saturn’s Children is dominated entirely by a cast of robots. Nothing especially innovative there, but it’s the lengths to which Stross takes his speculations about how robot-kind would cope in the absence of their creators that is so fascinating. Their hard-coded instinct to obey humankind creates issues hundreds of years after the death of the last human, and overshadows their entire, almost feudal, galactic society.
On the surface, it’s a society that is strongly reminiscent of many space opera setups – but the numerous subtle differences all add up to a convincing alternative future, in which an aristo class of owner robots, mostly humanoid and designed to interact with their extinct masters, has come to dominate the rest, mostly designed as they are for specialised, menial functions. There are explicit references to Isaac Asimov’s three laws of robotics, though it is made clear that the programming required in practice is rather more complicated. The books’s heroine, Freya, is from a production line of ‘female’, humanoid robots known as Rhea’s Get, designed as courtesans for human males. In accordance with her design, Freya is utterly incapable of resisting real men – the only problem is she was activated sixty years after the death of the final specimen. Talk about redundant.
Simon P’s Books Of The Year 2008
It’s time for a bit of self indulgent nonsense and my nominations for Books of the Year 2008 – or at least those books that for one reason or another have struck a chord over the last twelve months.
Surprise of the Year
Things To Teach Your Grandchildren by Mark Oliver Everett
A moving and amusingly wry coming of age account featuring suicide, death, cancer, teenage awkwardness, more death, pop stardom and quantum physics. I don’t love books about makers of music but this not only had me reaching for the CD shelves but actually had me look at life in a different light for a week or two. I will be giving a few copies of this as presents this Christmas.
The Timing Is Everything-Uncanny Prescience of the Year
The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable – by Nassem Nicholas Taleb
In which the myriad false premises beloved of otherwise super clever people in the field of economics are laid bare as the pseudo science they are. Or how the cleverest people in our society are also the most dangerously stupid. In any other year this would be a very funny book.
Take part in the first Bookgeeks Virtual Reading Group – we’ll even give you the book!
Reading groups and book groups are all the rage at the moment. Never ones to buck the trend, we at Bookgeeks thought it would be fun to try an online reading group. Here’s how it will work:
- Participants will read the chosen book – The Bird Room by Chris Killen, which is published on January 22nd 2009. To get things rolling, publishers Canongate will give ten copies away to UK readers, which will be sent out several weeks before publication. If you don’t snag a free copy, you can still join in, we will wait until two weeks after the book is published before we kick things off.
- Once we have all had time to read the book (I will be reading it too), we will get things started with a review – and then that’s where you come in. We want your comments, your thoughts, your questions, here on Bookgeeks – and then Chris Killen will be logging on to answer them! It’s not everyday you get the author drop in to your reading group, is it?
The Second Bookgeeks SF and Fantasy Author Panel – Science and Magic
Welcome to the second Bookgeeks SF and Fantasy Author panel. Once again, we asked some of the leading lights of SF and Fantasy to give us their thoughts on a specific issue that affects them all as both writers and fans – and they said they would! Second time around, here’s what we asked our authors to ruminate on:
It was of course Arthur C. Clarke who said “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”
- How much do you think the technology of SF and the magic of fantasy have in common?
- How do you develop your system of future technology / magic?
- How important are the rules and underlying principles, and how far are you willing to deviate from them (rewrite the rules, if you like) to accommodate the plot.
Meet the Panel
| Stephen Baxter |
Pamela Freeman |
 Stephen Baxter was born in Liverpool, England, and now livea in Northumberland. Since 1987 he has published somewhere over forty books, mostly science fiction novels, and over a hundred short stories. Having worked in teaching and engineering, Stephen has been a full-time author since 1995.
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 Pamela Freeman is an Australian author of books for both adults and children. Most of her work is fantasy but she has also written science fiction, mystery stories, family dramas and non-fiction. Her first adult series, the Castings Trilogy (Blood Ties, Deep Water and Full Circle) is being published globally by Orbit Books. Blood Ties came out earlier this year and Deep Water, out in Australia and the UK, appeared in the US in November.
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| Sean Williams |
Patrick Rothfuss |
 New York Times-bestselling speculative fiction author Sean Williams lives in Adelaide, South Australia. He is the author of over sixty published short stories and twenty-two novels, including the Books of the Cataclysm and The Resurrected Man, and is a multiple recipient of both the Ditmar & Aurealis Awards. As well as his original work, he has written several novels in the Star Wars universe. For a change of pace, he likes to DJ and cook curries.
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 Patrick Rothfuss was born in Madison Wisconsin, blessed with parents who allowed him to make his own mistakes. Pat began college intending to study chemical engineering, only to graduate nine years later with a degree in English and minors in history, philosophy, anthropology, psychology, and writing.Pat currently lives in central Wisconsin where he occasionally teaches at the local university. In his free time he writes satirical humor, practices civil disobedience, and dabbles in alchemy. He loves words, laughs often, and refuses to dance. The Name of the Wind is his first novel. There will be more.
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Toll the Hounds (Malazan Book the of the Fallen), by Steven Erikson
It’s only a matter of time, probably after Steven Erikson finishes the ten book epic that is the Malazan Book of the Fallen, before someone publishes an entire encyclopedia devoted to helping his readers (or at least those like me who don’t have photographic memories) remember who is who, what is what and when it happened, and who changed their name to what and when. When that book arrives, only then will I commit to re-read the entire saga. As I have said before, it’s perfectly usual to spend the first third of a Malazan book trying to work out what’s going on and how it relates to previous volumes. That’s especially the case here, because although I read the preceding volume, Reaper’s Gale, earlier this year, the events in Toll the Hounds mostly reference events in much earlier books in the series: the main setting and focus, the city of Darujhistan, was the stage for much of the first book, Gardens of the Moon, and a key location in the third book, Memories of Ice – but the reader, with little prompting from the author, needs to remember much of what transpired in those volumes. Converging on the city are many other characters, some of whom have not been seen for a long while. The decision not to have any kind of recap or prologue in this context seems almost deliberately perverse.
If this seems like I’m whinging, that I don’t like being made to work for my enjoyment, well I am a bit, but this is still an amazing, jaw-dropping piece of work, so let me tell you what I love about it and why I won’t hesitate to read the next book as soon as I can. Erikson’s depth of world, the potency of the mythology, the sheer bloody ambition of the whole thing, continues to astound. I would have to re-read the early volumes to be sure, but I think Erikson is also getting even better as a writer. His comic characters – the thief Kruppe, the deranged priest Iskaral Pust with his habit of voicing his thoughts aloud – are simply brilliant, yet the pathos of other characters can be almost overwhelming at times. Erkison’s ability to combine humour and menace is impressive – witness Shadowthrone, the god who was the Emperor Kellanved, who can exude threat and dark purpose one moment and come across as vaguely senile the next. Erikson’s gods are certainly not immune from flaws of any kind.
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The Bookgeeks Interview
Kat Falls
Kat Falls grew up in Silver Spring, Maryland and now teaches at NU, where she is continually inspired by her students’ creativity. She started writing Dark Life as a writing exercise. Knowing that her 12-year-old son loved reading about the ocean, Wild West pioneers and, of course, the X-Men, she combined his interests and created the premise for a story that kept her up nights plotting and world-building.
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The Book That...
Robert Lloyd Parry: The Book I Would Like To Be Buried With…
This special twentieth Bury Me… features grand panjandrum and actor Robert Lloyd Parry, the man behind the Nunkie Theatre Company, responsible for many an uneasy evening with the master of English supernatural stories…
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The Bookgeeks Competition
The Richard T. Kelly Column
Richard T. Kelly
Richard T. Kelly’s exclusive monthly column, in which he addresses various matters literary, writers and their books, the publishing business and his own experiences as a writer. Richard is a novelist, screenwriter, biographer and journalist, and you can read his column exclusively on our sister site, Bookhugger.co.uk.Connect with Bookgeeks
Bookgeek Chic
