alyssa
a prequel addition warping us back to when Matthew Scudder was still drinking.
i hate to be an outlier for what seems to be one of the most beloved books of the series, but i was slogging through that start. even though i like to think i'm accustomed to LB's writing style, i wish i could put my finger on what in particular had my mind wandering. that said, as always, he delivered in the last third.
[3.4~3.5] firstly, congrats to the author on their debut novel! that is no small feat, and i think the vision for this book is incredible. with its dystopian, sci-fi, and magical aptee qualities against the setting of a futuristic London facing a major water crisis and corruption running amok, it would make for one heck of a movie. the dialogue is clever and punchy, certain secondary cast members activated a deep curiosity in me (tell me more about Nick, and i'll be here to listen - while pretending Rina didn't make me want to claw my eyes out
*i tried to be vague or use spoiler tags, but proceed with caution if you were planning to go into the book completely blind!
[3.4~3.5? pending...] please do not perceive me as i don my cone of shame. this rating is by no means low on my scale, but for all the raving reviews and recommendations, i think it counts as yet another emotional must-read that left my expectations unmet and mind conflicted.
this is not a romance, but a story of flawed humans and family, of love in its numerous forms, an exploration of sexuality and sexual attraction, insatiable libidos and lust, oftentimes with incestuous undertones (or rather, overtones).
if i were to rate solely on the spellbinding quality of her prose, Suanne Laqueur would get all the stars. she's one of those authors who make you wish you could see the world from their eyes, because oh how infinitely vibrant and beautiful it must look. how many details do i miss as i go about my days?
i considered it hook, line, and sinker with how the two 9/11's were depicted in stark horror. the chillingly painful beginnings of Alex's arc, the zero punches pulled in Jav's backstory, those were the moments that left me leaning back in my seat to silently digest their journeys, their trauma, their reactions. it was everything else, the other 400 pages, the no lack of padding between those compelling passages that focused on a story different from what i foresaw in those first few chapters, that came up short.
while there's a mountain of forever quotes to ponder and chew over, i couldn't help but find the tale overly ambitious in its scope. balancing five pov characters is no easy feat and can easily compromise the structural integrity of a story's bones. that's one of the areas where the disjointed feelings seeped through: Ari's and Deane's perspectives felt redundant in the grand scheme of events. they served their purpose well as plot devices for the twists and serendipitous turn of events, but i never thought rounding out the narrative required circling back to their heads. there's a few random details like the sporadic use of affected Slavic accents (that was basically Yoda-speak LOL) or why they let Casey get so close to Deane again after her accident, among others that i didn't quite get. i won't comment directly on a certain reveal, but Val, you are much stronger than me.
the biggest disconnect i faced was how relationships and emotions were nearly always framed in the context of sexual emotions, never far from the grind and slide of bodies. as if outside that, there's not much else to say. and that is in no way true when looking at the subtext and their interior landscapes, but i'd have loved for a balance to have been struck, wished those featured more heavily in the writing itself. even if i'm likely misconstruing the intentions of thoughts like Alex's “He barely recognized their relationship without its sexual current,” gosh does it feel like downplaying the decades they've been there for each other, through thick and thin, to their chemistry in bed. the continuous tying back to some form of carnality in each and every relationship, even when i understood deep-down that there was more than meets the eye, felt limiting and cheapened what was laid before us. for such a hefty read already, i think this is a case where less would've been more.
i'm in the vast minority (again), but perhaps this is the sword i am meant to fall on (multiple times). at least i found the ending to be the perfect jump-off point for Jav's "to be continued" - i'm beginning to view this book as more of a prequel to the story i've been waiting for: happiness for Jav.
after having read some of NR Walker's other recent work and not vibing as much as i'd hoped, i was pleasantly surprised to find that the writing here, to a certain extent, felt like a return to her old-school roots. it must be the setting (and the storms brewing in the air).
the speed / depth of their relationship so far is the main thing that i could deem “concerning” in a broad sense, but clearly life-or-death situations have been shown to expedite the falling in love process
the beginning was really promising, and even though the dialogue had a rhythm of repetition to it, i can't blame these two for being hyper-excited in their honeymoon phase. but i have to agree with the sentiments re: the third act conflict - it's a real concern and i'm glad immediate steps were taken to rectify the situation, but the reactions and the act itself both felt out of place, like being forcibly pulled out of the super comfy & fluffy seat for the sake of some kind of strife.
[3.9] oh how i love a second-chance, hurt-comfort story stemming from an estranged friendship.
i'm not usually one for flashbacks, particularly chapters alternating timelines, but i loved their inclusion here (and confession: i almost preferred the glimpses of their past to the present - I KNOW, GASP
“And then one day I woke up and people I knew weren't dying anymore and I was looking at the rest of my life, a life I had not expected to have. A life I was completely unprepared to have. Does any of this make sense?”
[4.7] and that's a wrap on Henry Rios, everyone.
throws a tantrum, thrashes around the kitchen floor, cries, violently chomps on chocolate, retreats to the comfort of being a blanket burrito
after the intensity of The Burning Plain, i half-expected Michael Nava to Tokyo Drift the grand finale into a supernova explosion. instead, he expertly eased his foot on the brakes, just a little, to flip the script and present “Henry Rios” in stark limelight. the culmination of his character arc is encased in overarching themes of family and grief, and of his life-long struggle to reconcile his sexuality with his Mexican heritage. it's finding a renewed sense of direction and purpose in the aftermath of the AIDS epidemic, the calamity that left LA a cemetery.
this is Henry's resurrection.
the noir genre oft paints the world in the bleakest and grayest of tones, but never in my life have i read a tale as life affirming as this one.
it is with a heavy heart that i bid our dear Henry Rios adieu. thank you, Michael Nava, for sharing with us this literary masterpiece. you are a tour de force in every possible sense of the phrase.
⚠️ spoiler territory ⚠️
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- John + Henry = <3 (a match made in heaven, as detected early on by my GA goggles
[4.4~4.5] oh boy things are really picking back up again, but with a much more personal twist. as Scudder's alcoholism becomes an increasingly vocal & incessant devil on his shoulder, he's approaching a crossroads where he either confronts his hard drinking or keeps his eyes shut, giving into the temptation right up until his life snuffs out.
this internal battleground plays against the backdrop of an unsolved murder and the Ice Pick Prowler, a serial killer caught years ago who denies any involvement (solid alibi included) in an eighth woman's killing.
i haven't read a lot of noir crime fiction, but from my own experience, i can say that Lawrence Block is more than living up to his Grand Master of Mystery Writers of America title.
as a note for audio listeners, the books from here on out are narrated by a colorful variety of folks, so i wouldn't get too attached to one voice. the narration quality can be especially jarring if you've come from listening to the first three books (the narrator of which did a superb job). but please don't let that deter you from reading on with the series - book 5 has been so worth it.
I stopped at a poem called “The Hidden Law” and read it over and over again. It was a short work, about the inner traumas we refused to acknowledge. By refusing to face them, we empower them until, invisibly they run our lives, making us miserable. We run from that misery, trying to “escape It in a car” or “forget It in a bar” but our attempts at escape themselves are merely “the ways we're punished by/ The Hidden Law.”
[4.4~4.5] the Henry we meet after a hearty time skip is at a crossroads. breaking it down into his relationships: with his partner of the last couple of years where the mentality of us vs. them has driven a wedge between the two, with his abusive father and the lingering ravagings of rejection many years after said man's death, with himself and the state of his own mental landscape.
in isolation, it's easy to say the proceedings lacked the same driving force as our encounters thus far in its topical predictability, but in many ways, that would be fixating on the wrong message. the case's value clearly lies in highlighting the parallels in Henry's own life - the themes and intersectionality of machismo, being a minority in America, and even more so with his sexuality. the cultural trappings we choke ourselves with so we always fail to meet fabricated expectations. so we forever wade in the bath of inferiority and lash out accordingly.
there's nothing i love more in a book of this genre than the way Michael Nava weaves what could be exclusively a mystery into one inextricably linked to Henry's character arc. the raw flayings and Henry's willingness to lower his shield, if only for a moment, make for such emotionally gratifying tales. i like to think the author's legal background lends itself to the straightforward practicality, but equally quiet somberness, of Henry's thoughts and narration.
as for the quote at the top, W. H. Auden & Michael Nava teaming up to call out the unhealthy relationship i have with the roots of my persistent anxiety was not how i expected my reading of this book to go, but they're so valid for that - all par for the course as human beings trying to live our best lives. but perhaps it's time to take a page out of Henry's book and put our feet down on whether we continue to allow the rusted chains of our youth command our lives as adults or not.
[2.9] gah it pains me, but a generous 3 stars. after adoring this author's debut Never Been Kissed (acespec rep yay!) to pieces, i've found his subsequent releases to read increasingly stilted and superficial. with this book in particular, it almost felt like the author had too much fun diving into the more explicit side of writing that the relationship development took a backseat. i can get past the “playing with a
I wondered whether it was worse for men to do the wrong things for the right reason or the right things for the wrong reason. It wasn't the first time I wondered, or the last.
[4.7] what an intro to Matthew Scudder: unlicensed PI who conducts the odd [insert quotes as needed] favor for friends in exchange for gifts, 10% of which he never fails to donate to church alms boxes, and lights candles for the dead. a far-cry from the stock hardboiled detective who carries an air of macho superiority and strong arms the world for answers. he has both bark and bite, still greases palms and entertains the games that have to be played, but his actions, the way he carries himself, they're filtered through the light of a man who tries to do good as he drinks his bourbon-spiked coffee, metes out his own crafty justice, and battles with his own guilt.
it only took one book to make him a standout character in my mind.
the only qualm i have is with a particularly salient point of the case extrapolated with little to no buttressing that we're told to accept out of thin air. i have a feeling readers will immediately know what i'm referring to: the Freudian rationale was a mighty stretch for the actions taken upon seeing the dead body.
but everything else? i'm jonesing for my next Scudder book.
happy release day! when GA announced this crossover series with his first ever Kickstarter last June, little did i know how much these books would become a sort of lifeline in the chaos of adulthood. it's a true honor to be a full-time GA promobot, wholly powerless against the hold he has on my psyche and all the better for it.
until we meet our favorite 8-person sleuthing squad as a complete entity again, Hazardverse fam
as is the trend with this series, the last quarter redeemed some of the niggles i had by ending on a high, but this installment in particular struggled to develop the integral “ptsd / reversal of years of progress” cog of Bo's arc, largely due to the single pov structure and the instability of his characterization. i understand there's a level of volatility and unpredictability that comes with his trauma range, but with Lucky at a loss himself, it was near impossible to predict, let alone understand, where Bo's mind was at beyond the surface. without an epic case on hand, the next biggest fiasco came in the form of buying a house for the two of them that was drawn out in an interminable cascade of inconveniences and roadblocks - i was borderline concerned if my lifespan had enough juice to see its conclusion! (i jest but earnestly