Fiction: “The Cove” by Catherine Coulter

Oh … my god. Oh, my god. So I’m not even sure why I grabbed this for my vacation. I think I had been wanting to re-read some of Catherine Coulter’s stuff, but clearly, I had been able to block out the memory of reading this the last time. Because oh my god, you guys, I found a book that’s written worse than either Twilight or anything Patricia Cornwell’s spit out.

Because look: Twilight has bad messages and bad characters. Patricia Cornwell’s Kay Scarpetta is a snobby bitch, pure and simple. But in spite of the stuff that makes me rail against them long and hard, at the end of the day I am still able to find good things to say about them: Twilight, as bad as it is, at least is able to stay true to its own canon, and the violence is pretty decent in the Scarpetta novels. But this … I’m pretty sure that if there were a rating worse than “twilight stars,” this would get it. Maybe “die in a fire stars”? I mean, I could see myself burning this at some point.

Why do I want to eradicate this from my existence through the cleansing power of fire? Because it’s badly written. And not just a couple of typos here and there like in Twilight; it’s just … awful.

The plot. Susan “Sally” St. John Brainerd escaped from a sanitarium in Washington, D.C. to hide out with her Aunt Amabel in this tiny town called The Cove, Oregon. She is hiding because she is suspected of killing her father, Amory St. John. James Quinlan ends up in The Cove as well, ostensibly to bring Sally back to DC, but he ends up falling in love with her, like, immediately, so instead he decides to protect her. Because she seems to think that her father is still after her, even though he was buried two weeks ago.

But then! James gets conked over the head and Sally gets kidnapped back to the sanitarium! And then! James enlists his FBI pal Dillon Savitch to help break her out! And when they do, Sally learns that James isn’t the private detective he said he was, but an FBI agent! So she runs away, but gets caught by James and Dillon again when she tries to escape a biker gang! So she decides to hide with James, who she is also falling in love with, until the evil Dr. Beadermeyer (not making any of this up, by the way) tries to kidnap her again, but he is thwarted. And then there’s the Poirot-esque solving of the mystery — her father wasn’t really dead! Because Beadermeyer isn’t a psychiatrist, but a plastic surgeon, and put Sally’s father’s face on a random dude so he could escape and continue to sell arms to Iraq and other naughty places. So James and Sally return to the Cove because there’s still a mystery of where some random tourists disappeared to, and it turns out that the Cove is such a perfect town because the old people citizens keep killing the tourists and stealing their money in order to beautify the town, and there are tons of mass graves in the cemetery, and when the seniors are found out, they kidnap James and Sally (again), and Sally is kidnapped by her father, who is NOT DEAD, and it turns out that he’s been sleeping with Aunt Amabel for years and also, he is NOT HER ACTUAL FATHER, which is good because when he would visit Sally in the sanitarium, he’d beat her and abuse her sexually (but not rape her, because that would be awful), and eventually all the old people die and are put in jail, and Sally’s not-father is gunned down when he tries to escape from the FBI again, and honestly, I expected Sally to be kidnapped one more fucking time before the end of the book but luckily, even Catherine Coulter has her limits.

So how, aside from the plot, is it written poorly? The entire story is told via dialogue. And look, I am notorious for telling stories via dialogue — well, maybe you guys aren’t aware, but I have numerous half-written stories in My Documents wherein the action is primarily told through dialogue between parties. Rather than have an omniscient third-person narrator (which I do employ frequently), I love when characters already have a relationship and refer to shared moments in conversation, and that is how plot points are moved along.

What Catherine Coulter does is tell the story through dialogue, but shoddily and in a disjointed manner. And boy, do I have examples. Like, she doesn’t understand that there is a balance between “Show and Tell,” and instead, she uses Telling to Show.

For example: in this scene, Sally has just fallen off her motorcycle after trying to evade both Quinlan and Dillon and a motorcycle gang, who were actually decent people after all, as one of them is a doctor:

Quinlan dropped to his knees. “Can I take off her helmet?”

[The doctor biker dude replies:] “No, let me. I guess maybe we should wear helmets. If she hadn’t had one on, she might have scrambled her brains and not necessarily left them inside her head. You’re really FBI? She’s really a criminal?”

“Of course she is. What are you doing? Okay, you’re seeing if her arms are broken. She’d better be all right or I’ll have to flatten you. You scared the shit out of her. Yeah, she’s your typical criminal type. Why isn’t she conscious yet?” [200-201]

In addition to some shitty phrasing, we are also thrown in a shitty PSA that equates to “Wear Your Helmet, Kids.” But seriously, if I were Ms. Coulter’s editor, this is how that last paragraph would sound:

“Of course she is.” The doctor started patting Sally’s arms. Quinlan reached out and grabbed his wrist. “What are you doing?”

“I’m checking to see if her arms are broken,” said the doctor, in an offended tone.

“Oh. Okay.” Quinlan sat back on his haunches, duly chastised. Sally still wasn’t waking up. “Why isn’t she conscious yet?” he asked, worried.

HOW MUCH BETTER DOES THAT SOUND? You know why? Because some of the action is being described instead of narrated, and it doesn’t feel as clunky as a ten-pound bowling ball being carried by a ballerina. (Think about it.)

AND THAT’S JUST ONE EXAMPLE. I LITERALLY HAVE 21 MORE, and those are only the WORST OF THE WORST. (I will not show all 21. But know that, at any time, I could whip one out.)

Oh, speaking of Blazing Saddles, here’s another example: Quinlan wants to get the major players together for his Poirot-dump.

He handed [Sally] the phone.

“Mom, then Scott, then Beadermeyer.”

[After hanging up with her mother ...] She started to dial Scott’s number. Quinlan lightly touched his hand to hers and shook his head. “No, I think your mom just might get the other players there.”

“He’s right,” Dillon said. “If she doesn’t, then we’ll talk to her alone. We need to anyway. We need to know exactly where she stands in all of this mess.”

“James is right,” Sally said and swallowed hard. [240-241]

Okay, first of all, who else went in their heads, “Howard Johnson is right”? Second of all, YOU JUST ASKED HER TO CALL ALL THREE PEOPLE. Thirty seconds later, you decided to let her mom do the dirty work and NO ONE QUESTIONED THE CHANGE OF MIND?! I — I –

Then, when they finally do get to see Sally’s Mother, she is just as clueless to how dialogue should sound as the rest of them:

“Mrs. St. John, we saw the car parked on Cooperton. Sally was here. Is she still here? Are you hiding her?”

Noelle St. John stared at his ID, then at Dillon’s. Finally, after an eternity, she looked up and said, “I haven’t seen my daughter for nearly seven months, Agent Quinlan. What car are you talking about?”

“A car we know she was driving, Mrs. St. John,” Dillon said.

“Why are you calling my daughter by her first name? Indeed, Sally is her nickname. Her real name is Susan. Where did you get her nickname?” [176]

Wouldn’t … if you were curious as to a stranger using your daughter’s nickname, wouldn’t that, I don’t know, immediately follow the stranger’s use of said nickname? And not remember three questions later?

And then there are the moments when characters answer the same question multiple times in the same line of dialogue. Have a few:

“Please tell me you believe me. I wouldn’t kill your father.”

“Yes, Noelle, I believe you — although if you had shot him I would have applauded you. But no, I never really believed that you did.” [174]

“You found him?”

“Not yet, but I found his footprints beneath your bedroom window and the indentations of the ladder feet. Yeah, our man was there. What size shoe does your husband wear, Sally?” [113]

“She’s going to her mother’s house. Not her husband’s house. You know my intuition, my gut. But to be honest about it, I know her. She feels something for her mother. That’s the first place she’ll go. I’ll bet you both her father and her husband put her in that sanitarium in the first place. Why? I haven’t the foggiest idea. I do know, though, that her father was a very evil man.”

“I assume you’ll tell me what you mean by that later?”

“Drive faster, Dillon. The house is number 337 on Lark. Yeah, I’ll tell you, but not now. Let’s get going.” [172-173]

You know what else I’m noticing? Catherine Coulter has never embraced the awesome punctuation mark that is the semicolon.

Which also leads me to believe that, for her original draft, she was paid by the word. Because otherwise, there’s no reason for extraneous information that doesn’t move the plot along, or come back to be recalled later. For instance:

Quinlan told him about the old couple he was looking for. He didn’t say anything about the townspeople lying to him.

“Over three years ago,” the sheriff said, looking at one of Amabel’s paintings over Sally’s head, this one all pale yellows and creams and nearly blueless blues, no shape or reason to any of it, but it was nice. [57]

Why? Why describe the painting, as if it were going to have a clue in it later on down the road? What’s the point? Or how about the bajillion times the old lady told Quinlan and Sally about the gyrowhatevers her husband What’s-His-Face made before he died of pneumonia the year Eisenhower was elected? Dudes, I didn’t have to look that up to paraphrase it, it was mentioned that frequently.

And then there’s the times when characters just get confused about what they were talking about in the middle of a scene. For your amusement, the first page I dogeared with a sigh of disgust:

Suddenly she stood up, her eyes fixed on something just off to the right. She shook her head, whispering, “No, no, it can’t be.”

He was on his feet in an instant, his hand on her shoulder. “What the hell is it?”

She pointed.

“Oh my God,” he said. “Stay here, Sally. Just stay here and I’ll go check it out.”

“Oh, go to hell, Quinlan. No, I don’t like Quinlan. I’ll call you James. I won’t stay put.” [49]

CLEARLY, Sally sees something that scares her. Instead of merely voicing her protest at being treated like a scared female (which is something else I may discuss, if I still have the energy later), she also in that moment decides what she’s going to call Quinlan. In the middle of being mad at him. That sentence does not make logical sense!

And before I get into the Sally-as-Damsel, I have to say that she’s not the only person afflicted by What Was I Talking About-Itis. Even the villain gets in on it!

“I should have known you two goons would fuck it up. Pick up the damned needle, you idiot. Jesus, it’s dark in here, but not dark enough. I knew I should have just knocked her out. Or shot the little bitch. Damn, let’s just get out of here. Forget the needle, forget her.” [233]

And just think — these aren’t even the best of the worst! I realize that, by this time and this many words, I have made my point and made it well. But when have you ever known me to stop? And besides, if this little post does anything, I’m hoping it will ensure that you, dear reader, never picks up The Cove. I was actually having a conversation about this very book last Sunday with some friends after midnight, and I was discussing what I hope this blog does. I hope it inspires people to pick up books they may not have picked up. Sometimes (and what I hope is the majority of the time), I hope it inspires the reader to pick up a book that sounds interesting. However, I admit, that there are times that it could inspire a reader to pick up a book by saying, “No way is it that bad.”

For a prime example of that, I’d like to take a moment and redirect y’all to the fun time I read Decadent, and that was all because my friend Sarah saw that I had read Bound and Determined and said “ALAINA you HAVE to read Decadent because one of the lines in it is, hand to God, ‘Fucking her ass, saving her life.’” And I said, “It can’t be that bad.”

And lo, it was. So guys, if you’ve gotten through all this and are still contemplating picking it up because it can’t be that bad, please: allow me to continue with a couple more.

Because now we get into the good stuff. The ludicrous stuff. The I Can’t Believe This Got Published Stuff.

The Melodramatic Stuff.

She waved away his words. “Someone was after me, James. Nobody was after you.”

“It didn’t matter.”

She began to laugh. “Actually there were two someones after me, and you were the second, only I was too stupid, too pathetically grateful to you, to realize it. I’m leaving, James. I don’t want to see you again. I can’t believe I thought you were a hero. God, when will I stop being such a credulous fool?” [162]

Oh, this is a good one. Here’s the quote, and it’s Sally telling James about a family incident.

“Once when I’d been visiting Noelle, after I left to go back to my apartment, I realized I’d forgotten my sweater. I went back into the house and there he was, kicking my mother. I went to the phone to dial 911. As far as I was concerned, it was the last straw. I just didn’t care anymore. He was going to pay. You won’t believe it, but my mother crawled to me, grabbed my leg, and begged me not to call the cops. My father stood there in the library doorway and dared me to do it. He dared me, all the while watching my mother sobbing and pleading, on her knees, her nails digging into my jeans. Jesus, it was horrible. I put down the phone and left. I never went back. I just couldn’t. Nothing I did mattered, not really. If I was there for a while, he just waited until I left. Then he probably beat her more viciously than if I’d never been there at all.” [238-239]

Now, if you had flipped back about fifty pages [pages 171-172, to be exact], you would have seen this exact same scene, but given with the dialogue as Sally remembers it to herself. So instead of saying something along the lines of Sally told Quinlan about the last time she had seen her father beat her mother, Ms. Coulter recounts it nearly exactly from when she had first introduced the scene fifty pages ago. I maintain: paid by the word.

So, remember that Sally was institutionalized by her father and her husband because they thought she was crazy? Here’s her husband’s rationalization for her insanity:

“Why did you believe I was sick, Scott?”

He didn’t say anything, just waved his pipe at her. “You weren’t a good wife. Your dad swore to me that your career was just something for you to do until you got married. He said you were just like your mother, a woman who really wanted a husband to take care of and children to look after. I wanted a wife to stay home and take care of me, but you wouldn’t do it. I needed you there, to help me, to understand me, but no, you never stayed there for me.” [259]

I’ve decided I’m too tired to get into the misogyny found in this novel — from Sally’s multiple kidnappings to the abuse she suffered at the hands of Dr. Beadermeyer, his assistant, and her not-father, there’s plenty enough to talk about. So I’m not even going to bring up the fact that apparently Scott only wanted Sally to be barefoot and menial in the house.

What I am going to bring up? The fact that Scott’s gay. And has a lover in London. What type of gay man would want a female beard to clean the kitchen? Because lemme tell you, that kitchen is spotless.

This … this one, I’m not going to say a word. Just read it.

She gave him a long look, and again that look was filled with quiet rage. “You are nothing more to me. None of this is any of your business. Go to hell, James.”

She turned away from him and walked down the wooden steps. It was chilly now. She wasn’t wearing anything but that too-small shirt and jeans.

“Come back, Sally. I can’t let you go. I won’t let you go. I won’t see you hurt again.”

She didn’t even slow down, just kept walking, in sneakers that were probably too small for her as well. He didn’t want her to get blisters. He’d planned to go shopping for her tomorrow, to buy her some clothes that fit her, to — damn, he was losing it.

He saw Dillon standing near the water line, unaware that she was walking away.

“Sally, you don’t know where you are. You don’t have any money.”

Then she did stop. She was smiling as she turned to face him. “You’re right, but it shouldn’t be a problem for long. I really don’t think that I’m afraid of any man anymore. Don’t worry. I’ll get enough money to get back to Washington.”

It sent him right over the edge. He slammed his hand down on the railing and vaulted over it to land lightly only three feet away from her. “No one will ever hurt you again. You will not take the chance of some asshole raping you. You will stay with me until this is over. Then I’ll let you go if you don’t want to stay.” [163]

And finally, the piece de resistance. The ultimate in Badness. You are going to be astonished, I promise you.

So Sally has been kidnapped for the umpteenth time, this time by her not-father. And her not-father is monologuing about his reasons for institutionalizing her and making her life a living hell. And here is where he brings up her gay husband:

“And, you see, I knew all about his lover. At least I made sure you didn’t get AIDS.” [316]

At least I made sure you didn’t get AIDS. THANKS, NOT MY DAD. Thanks for caring about my immune system’s health while you jacked off to the sight of my drug-addled body.

I can’t even, you guys. I can’t even. All I know is about halfway through the book, I would read a page, roll my eyes, and then proclaim loudly, “I am reading a book with substance next. I can’t take this shit anymore.”

Alaina Patterson: Reading Shit So You Don’t Have To (since 1986). You’re welcome.

Grade for The Cove: Twilight stars

Fiction: “Naked Heat” by “Richard Castle”

Dudes, after the travesty in decision-making that was “reading The Mayor of Casterbridge,” I am so proud of myself that I finished this book in, like, 48 hours. Granted, I had a big assist from my time in Boston this weekend (no, thank you, Holiday Inn Express-Saugus and the Public Garden), but this is how I’m supposed to read books: quickly and efficiently, in less than a week.

So where does the story pick up from Heat Wave? Well, for one, Jameson Rook’s article on Nikki and her team has been published, and though we don’t get to read it, we’re left to believe it’s a lot like No Doubt during Tragic Kingdom‘s huge sales. You know, the video for “Don’t Speak”? Where everyone’s trying to make a big deal out of Gwen and the boys aren’t having it? And even Gwen’s pissed that she’s become the center of attention? Well, substitute Nikki Heat for Gwen and Raley and Ochoa for Adrian, Tom and Tony, and that’s essentially how the whole situation shook out. Oh, and Heat’s pissed at Rook for making her all popular and stuff.

But the actual case is this: Cassidy Towne, one of the premier gossip hounds for one of the leading New York City papers, is stabbed in the back. And while that would be juicy enough, it turns out that Heat’s old pal Jameson Rook just happened to be doing a story on Towne, and so they’re back working together on a case.

The book still reads like a longer episode of Castle, and since that’s a show I enjoy weekly (OH SHIT I just remembered I still owe Brad five bucks for his raincheck Season One Castle he bought for me dammit), I will continue to read the Nikki Heat series.

And, much like the TV show, “Richard Castle” rewards his readers with little nuggets like these:

Heat didn’t like to bigfoot [detectives] Malcolm and Reynolds, but she wanted to check out the Dragonfly herself. [142]

I’ll admit, it took me a couple of seconds, but yes, that is a rather oblique reference to the great Malcolm Reynolds of Firefly, played by the awesome Nathan Fillion.

There weren’t as many weird grammar things in this book, which gives me hope — maybe someday, I’ll read one that has no weird grammar things. This was the only one I caught:

Detective Heat knew Soleil Gray had a music video shoot that day because her lawyer had mentioned it the afternoon before when she accused Heat of harassing her client at her places of business. [226]

It just seems that there are too many prepositional phrases in that sentence.

So while I got Naked Heat from the library, I’ll be keeping an eye out for it used, as well as the third book in the series, Heat Rises. And I think the best part about these books? Is that you don’t have to be a fan of Castle to enjoy them. I mean, yeah, that’s how I got into it, but I’d like to think that if I happened across either of these books on the shelf in the library or the now-defunct Borders or wherever, and there wasn’t an author photograph or a dot that tells me to watch Castle to tip me off, I’d enjoy it as a separate entity. So, if you don’t watch Castle, that’s okay — the books are great on their own.

Grade for Naked Heat: 3.5 stars

Fiction: “Cause of Death” by Patricia Cornwell

Why do I keep doing this to myself? Why? Oh, right: I’m a fucking masochist.

So because I have some weird, genetic disposition that requires me to read Patricia Cornwell whenever I fly on a plane, I brought the next book in the series with me to California. And it is worse than From Potter’s Field.

The scene opens with Kay Scarpetta housesitting for one of her deputy chiefs on New Year’s Eve. She receives a phone call about a dead person found at an old Navy Yard. But then the cops call later in the morning, and it’s the first time someone from the police called her, meaning the killer called her first or whatever. Turns out the dead guy is a reporter she knew and was friendly with (of course he was!), and he died while scuba diving.

It was on page 7 when I made my first dogear:

I hid a key only [her niece, Lucy] could find, then loaded medical bag and dive equipment into the trunk of my black Mercedes. [7]

DIVE EQUIPMENT?! Okay, FIRST OF ALL: who the fuck brings scuba equipment to a housesitting gig on NEW YEAR’S EVE in VIRGINIA. I might understand it if it was in the Bahamas or St. Thomas or somewhere, but VIRGINIA?! And SECOND OF ALL, since WHEN does Kay scuba-dive?! This is the seventh freaking book in the series, and this is the first time I’ve ever heard about her being able to scuba-dive. And though it doesn’t say so anywhere, I’m sure she does it perfectly.

She’s still such a snob. And lords it over everyone. For instance, she’s a superior cook:

I surveyed the kitchen, which was pitiful compared to the one I had at home. I did not seem to have forgotten anything yesterday when I had driven down to Virginia Beach to shop, although I would have to do without garlic press, pasta maker, food processor and microwave oven. I was seriously beginning to wonder if [Deputy Chief] Mant ever ate in or even stayed here. At least I had thought to bring my own cutlery and cookware, and as long as I had good knives and pots there wasn’t much I couldn’t manage. [4]

Oh, come on, Kay — we both know you’ve never used a microwave in your life.

I pulled [Lucy] over to the stove and lifted the lid from the pot. A delicious steam rose and I felt happy.

“I can’t believe you,” I said. “God bless you.”

“When you weren’t back by four I figured I’d better make the sauce or we weren’t going to be eating lasagne tonight.”

“It might need a little more red wine. And maybe more basil and a pinch of salt.” [53]

YOUR NIECE MADE LASAGNE SAUCE FOR YOU. BE NICE, KAY, JUST SAY ‘THANK YOU.’

And of course, God forbid she be an expert about just cooking.

“Do you always see indications in drownings?” he reasonably asked. “I thought drownings were notoriously difficult, explaining why expert witnesses from South Florida are often flown in to help with such cases.”

“I began my career in South Florida and am considered an expert witness in drownings,” I sharply said. [105]

But I can’t believe she didn’t take a moment to show her superiority in this tiny moment:

“Well, irregardless of what you call it, his orientation might somehow be important.” [39]

IRREGARDLESS is NOT A WORD. WHY DID YOU NOT SAY ANYTHING? In the middle of an autopsy, even? If I were you, Dr. Kay Scarpetta, as you insist on introducing yourself every damn time, I would have swung that Stryker Saw backwards towards his head yelling “IRREGARDLESS IS NOT A WORD YOU FUCKING ASSHOLE.”

It’s a pet peeve, okay?

In addition to being annoyingly superior and kind of bitchy, Kay also has a bit of an Annie Oakley-type fetish, in that she must be able to do anything better than a man:

My legs trembled as I climbed, for I was not as strong as Jerod and Ki Soo, who moved in all their [scuba] gear as if it weighed the same as skin. But I got out of my BC and tank myself and did not ask for help. [26]

And, of course, there’s her All About Me Syndrome:

“Good God. All this happened because of my car. In a sense, because of me.” [207]

So, what happens in the book? Does it matter? Oh fine. The dead reporter turns out to have gotten himself involved with this crazy whack-a-doo religious cult called the New Zionists, who have ties to Moammar Qaddafi and Libya, who want plutonium to build an atom bomb.

Three things:
1. If this stupid book causes me to get searched by the FBI for mentioning Libya in the same breath as plutonium, I will send a nasty letter to Patricia Cornwell. I may want higher blog traffic, but that is for TOTALLY the wrong reason.

2. How does a book written in 1996 have a reference to something that’s almost going on today, but not quite? I mean, come on, how weird is that?

3. NOT THE LIBYANS AND PLUTONIUM MARTY GET IN THE DeLOREAN AND GO BACK IN TIME TO SAVE DOC BROWN

My final question is: why do I keep reading these damn books? Well, I guess I have to answer with another question: why did I read all those Twilight books (and still have Breaking Dawn in my to-read pile)? Partly masochism, yes, I’ll grant you that: I take innate pleasure in groaning at some of the shit Kay Scarpetta pulls. But also, a tiny bit of curiousity. And a smidgen of hope. Hope that the books will get better, the curiosity to see if they do, and the realization that they probably won’t, but at least I’ll feel better ranting about it later.

And also: I read these on planes because you aren’t allowed to throw books on planes.

Grade for Cause of Death: 1 star

Fiction: “Conspiracy in Death” by J.D. Robb

Conspiracy in Death picks up slightly after the end of Holiday in Death. Lt. Eve Dallas is called to the scene of a homicide: a harmless homeless man has been murdered by having his heart removed. As in, he was anesthetized and then his heart was surgically removed. As Eve digs deeper into the case (and another couple of like homicides begin to stack up), she finds ties to medical centers and important doctors across the globe.

Throwing another wrinkle into her case is an altercation between herself and a subordinate from another precinct, Officer Ellen Bowers. Bowers remembers Eve from their days at the police academy (and unfortunately, it’s nothing like the Steve Guttenberg movies), and her memory is horrible. She assumes (wrongly) that Eve ascended up the ladder so quickly due to putting out and sexing up, which is so far from the truth it’s almost laughable. But Bowers is quick to file complaints (especially when Eve insults her admittedly awful crime scene perservation), so Eve gets dragged into an I.A. investigation.

When Officer Bowers ends up dead, Eve’s superiors have no choice but to suspend her. And this is the meat of the novel. Eve has spent her entire life working towards being a cop, and that’s how she primarily identifies herself. The suspension, however temporary and/or unfounded, almost destroys her. Her husband, Roarke, supports her through the ordeal, both emotionally and professionally. Once Eve snaps out of it, she uses his illegal computers to solve the case and feed information to her friends who have taken it over.

As the series continues, I’m struck and impressed by the relationships that Eve has developed. In the first book, she met Roarke and had a friend named Mavis. Now, her circle has grown to include a psychiatrist for a friend; Peabody, her aide; Mavis’s long-time boyfriend, Leonardo; Roarke’s butler, Summerset (although she hates him just to be spiteful, sometimes); and Nadine Furst, a reporter. Where the first couple of books in the series were all about the violence and the procedure and the hard-boiled cop detective (which is, again, why I picked this up as opposed to anything else on my shelves: keep the violence coming!), J.D. Robb has truly given Eve a world of people to interact with, and it makes her characterization and her interactions that much richer.

For instance, even while in the midst of a murder investigation and a suspension, Eve and Roarke are still able to function as a married couple:

“Man, I would self-terminate before I lived in a place like this. I bet all their furniture matches, and they’ve got cute little cows or something sitting around the kitchen.”

“Kittens. Fifty says it’s kittens.”

“Bet. Cows are sillier. It’s going to be cows.”  [...]

[Eve] glanced over, lifted a brow as Roarke strolled in carrying a tray loaded with cups, plates. Coffee and cookies, she mused, then struggled with a scowl as she noticed the cream pitcher in the shape of a cheerful white kitten.

The man never lost a damn bet. [276, 282]

And here’s something that I truly identified with, and let me explain how. I’ve described myself in my “real job” as being low-level management for a local-yet-internationally-known retailer. Well, this past week, my major responsibility has been to complete the year-end appraisals for my directly-reporting employees — all eighteen of them. And while I love my company and the people I work with, there are some issues that occur every day that makes me want to pull my hair out.

Like, for instance: we’re still running Office 2000. REALLY? ARE YOU SERIOUS? WE’RE A BILLION-DOLLAR COMPANY (oh crap, that narrows the field of possible employers down to, like, three) AND WE CAN’T EVEN UPGRADE TO OFFICE 2003? REALLY. YOU’RE KILLING ME, YOU GUYS.

So imagine my frustration when, in the middle of a very involved year-end, we have a power surge. And then it takes twenty minutes for the computer to a) turn back on and b) be fast enough for me to work at it comfortably.

Hence, this passage seemed like it was written just for me:

“When you’re done with this, I want you to go find a hammer.”

Peabody had taken out her memo book, nearly plugged in the order, when she stopped, frowned at Eve. “Sir? A hammer?”

“That’s right. A really big, heavy hammer. Then you take it into my office and beat that fucking useless excuse for a data spitter on my desk to dust.”

“Ah. [...] As an alternative to that action, Lieutenant, I could call maintenance.”

“Fine, you do that, and you tell them that at the very first opportunity, I’m coming down there and killing all of them. Mass murder. And after they’re all dead, I’m going to kick the bodies around, dance on top of them, and sing a happy song. No jury will convict me.” [30]

I already have a spork in a glass case on my desk, for use in case of emergency. I don’t think my bosses want me to carry around a sledgehammer, too. And this is why, when I win the lottery, after paying off my debts, the debts of my parents, buying a house, and maybe investing some for travel or something, I’m donating a large portion to both the University of Southern Maine and my employer. The money for USM will be wrapped up so tightly in codicils that they can ONLY spend the money on books for the library, because I’ll be damned if I can find a single book in that monstrosity that was published after 1984. And the money for my employer will be to UPGRADE THE SYSTEMS.

Grade for Conspiracy in Death: 2.5 stars

Fiction: “Heat Wave” by “Richard Castle”

After the interminable chore that was finishing Devil’s Bride, I was looking for something violent. The more blood and guts, the better. So I ended up going to Border’s with the roommate, but couldn’t find anything to satisfy my needs. Mainly because I would have had to include vampires and werewolves in the “disgustingly violent” category, according to the selection at Border’s, and I wasn’t in the mood for supernaturally violent. No, I wanted a mystery that involved serial killing, or psychological torture, or …

Y’know? Reading that bit back to myself just now, if I were a medical professional, I’d be worried for my mental health.

But I’m not. So.

Anyway, long story short (TOO LATE), I couldn’t find anything violent and gross enough to make me happy (I did, however, pick up a copy of True Grit, which I will read at some point, because I did enjoy that movie during my Oscar!Watch project). So I came home and found Heat Wave lying on my floor, and I shrugged to myself and said, “Well, that’ll probably work. Although it’s probably more funny than violent.”

For those not in the know, Nikki Heat is written by “Richard Castle.” Why the quotes? Because “Richard Castle” isn’t a real person — he’s the main character on the eponymous ABC dramedy, Castle, played by the always delicious and hysterical Nathan Fillion. The premise in the pilot is that Castle killed off his beloved character Derrick Storm because he was bored with writing him. At the book’s publishing party, his agent and publishers are pushing him for a new novel. Problem is, he’s got writer’s block. And then he gets a call that Det. Beckett from the NYPD is asking him for help on a case — a murderer has staged his victim to look like one of the murders from one of Castle’s novels. He assists her in solving the case, and along the way, finds inspiration in her for a new character, for she is one bad-ass mother — shut yo’ mouth! He uses his pull with the mayor’s office to be allowed to go on ‘ride-alongs’ with Beckett so he can write his novel, to Beckett’s eternal frustration.

That was three seasons ago. At first, Beckett was completely against the idea — and rightfully so. But over the next season and a half, she eventually warmed up to him, and now expects him to accompany her on almost all her cases. Which he does, with much glee. He’s a regular part of her team, which includes Dets. Ryan and Esposito, who are quick-witted partners that enjoy teasing both Beckett and Castle. There’s also Lainie Parrish, the medical examiner, possibly Beckett’s only girl friend.

I imagine Nathan Fillion is exactly like his character: spastically enthusiastic about anything geeky and protective of his loved ones to a fault, with much pining about his BAMF partner. In other words, my perfect man. In different cases, Castle has a) brought an Indiana Jones hat to a case involving archaeology; b) thought that maybe Buffy killed a vampire look-alike in a cemetary, and, best of all, c) dressed up as Mal Reynolds for Halloween. Best show ever, am I right?

This is where someone pokes me and says, “Hey, Alaina, this is a book blog. Everything you’ve said up to this point is about a TV show. What gives?” What gives, my friend, is that Heat Wave is the first book by “Richard Castle,” based on Det. Kate Beckett.

And what I really enjoyed about this book is the care and detail the ABC Studios took in keeping up with the illusion that “Richard Castle” is a real writer. Unlike on a CSI novel, for instance, where it’s written by Max Allan Collins or someone else, there is no ghost-writer listed anywhere in the book. The author picture is of Nathan Fillion, posing as Castle. The dedication is the same as it was in the series: “To the extraordinary KB and all my friends at the 12th.” The acknowledgements page thanks his mother, Martha, and his daughter, Alexis. There’s even one of those author Q&A’s in the back of the book, asking Rick how he thinks Detective Beckett will react when she learns he’s written a sex scene.

[We as watchers of the TV show know how she reacts: she takes her copy and runs to the nearest restroom to find it, only to have Castle poke his head over the top of the stall and scare the bejeezus out of her.]

Okay, so, after all that blathering, you’re probably thinking to yourself: What the fuck is the book about, Alaina? Sorry, sorry; y’all know how much I love TV. (a lot.)

Nikki Heat is called to investigate what at first glance appears to be a suicide: real estate mogul Matthew Starr has fallen to his death from his sixth-story apartment. Her team, Det. Raley and Ochoa, arrive to assist, followed by medical examiner Lauren Perry, Nikki’s close friend. And then Castle — er, I’m sorry, Jameson Rook, star magazine journalist — shows up, as he’s following Det. Heat for an expose on homicide squads in New York.

Sound familiar? Well, it should — that’s the point. It plays like an episode of Castle, except in print. They go through the suspects: maybe it’s the wife? Maybe it’s the business partner? And there are a lot of different avenues, as the murder leads to an art theft, and Mr. Starr wasn’t the mogul he projected himself to be. Meanwhile, while this is going on, Heat and Rook verbally spar like their “real”-”life” counterparts, with assists from Raley and Ochoa.

(One thing I didn’t like about the book, either because it felt to easy, or out-of-character, or just plain odd, was that the team of Raley and Ochoa was shortened to “Roach” many a time. I mean, really? ‘Roach’? I don’t — that’s weird. Castle, if you were a real person writing this for realsies, I’m surprised that Ryan and Esposito didn’t give you tons of crap about that and force you to change that in the sequal.)

Now, what happens in the book that has not yet happened on-screen, is Heat and Rook actually do fall into bed. Oh, if only art would imitate life in that instance! (C’mon, Fillion, I know you like the sexual tension, but tension needs to be relieved!)

Another thing that happens in-book but not on-screen is that more is made of the friendship between Heat and Dr. Perry:

Meeting her friend for a drink after work once a week was more than just cocktails and chill time. The two women had hit it off right away over Lauren’s first autopsy, when she started at the M.E.’s office three years ago, but their weekly after-work ritual was really fueled by their professional bond. Despite cultural differences — Lauren came out of the projects in St. Louis and Nikki grew up Manhattan middle-class — they connected on another level, as professional women navigating traditional male fields. [...] She and Lauren clung to their camaraderie and the sense of safety they had created with each other, to have a time and place to share problems at work, largely political, and, yes, to decompress and let their hair down without having it be in a meat market or at a stitch and bitch. [63-64]

On the show, we know that Lainie and Beckett are friends, but we never see it. I think it would be awesome to see that every once in a while!

As I read the book, there were a couple of grammar errors and weird syntaxes that struck out, which shows that it really wasn’t written by Richard Castle — I doubt the “real” Castle would have an errant comma splice. And this was awkward to me:

“A reporter … You’re not going to do a story about my husband, are you?”

“No. Not specifically. I’m just doing background research on this squad.”

“Good. Because my husband wouldn’t like that. He thought all reporters were assholes.”

Nikki Heat said she understood completely, but she was looking at Rook when she said it. And then she continued … [7]

I strongly feel that that should have gone like this:

“Good. Because my husband wouldn’t like that. He thought all reporters were assholes.”

“I understand completely,” Nikki said, giving Rook a long-suffering, deadpan glance. She continued …“

Doesn’t that seem better? And, almost, more in-character? I don’t know … it’s the show, don’t tell, thing.

Anyway. I really liked this book, and intend to not only keep this around for others to read, but also purchase the sequel, Naked Heat, when I can get it for the same deal I got Heat Wave: at Target, in paperback, for 25% off.

Grade for Heat Wave: 3.5 stars

Fiction: “Beat the Reaper” by Josh Bazell

When I went to the library last week to pick up A Single Man, I did the thing I always do when I go to the library: pick up like, four other books that I cannot under any circumstances read in three weeks instead of the one title that I had actually reserved. But this actually worked well: I’d seen Beat the Reaper a few times at Border’s, and every time I pick the book up, read the back, and then put it down, thinking to myself, “I’ll get it later.” So this time, I got to read it, and for free!

I have got to start doing that more often. Maybe if I didn’t tend to rack up so much guilt on overdue fees …

Anyway. Beat the Reaper was awesome. It was the first book I’ve read in a while where, when I wasn’t reading the book, I was thinking about what was going on in the book. I can’t remember the last time that happened. Now, the preoccupation with the book wasn’t anything near the preoccupation I had when I first read The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, where I was totally reading the book while in the drive-thru at Starbucks, but Beat the Reaper is one of the better books I’ve read recently.

Dr. Peter Brown is doing rounds at one of the worst hospitals in Manhattan when he runs into an old … acquaintance, let’s call him: Eddie Squillante. With a name like that, you can guess about how Dr. Brown met Squillante. If you answered “in the mob,” you’d be correct.

Turns out, Dr. Peter Brown is actually the Witness Protection alias of Pietro Brnwa, a former hit man for the mob.

Without giving away the store: Squillante ‘makes’ Brnwa, and threatens to release that information upon the event of his death. Desperate to retain his new alias and life as a doctor, Brnwa must now find a way to keep Squillante alive following a gastrectomy – that’s removing the stomach, apparently (yeah, I had to look it up. I stopped watching Grey’s Anatomy three years ago), and on top of that, he also got accidentally stuck with a needle filled of biopsy sample, so he could also die without being hit by the mob.

The chapters rotate, so one chapter will be about the present, and the next chapter will be about the past: how Brnwa became a hitman, what motivated him, et cetera.

As I said, this was a great read. If I had been able to, I would have read it much faster than I did. But I kept falling asleep! (Like I am now, at two in the morning. *eyeroll*)

And now, the quotes!

On the tiebreaker, though, sharks win. Because while we humans have our minds and our ability to transmit the contents of them down through the generations, and sharks have their big ol’ teeth and the means to use them, sharks don’t appear to agonize about the situation. [28]

Reason this was funny: I totally started reading this during Shark Week. And my car is a shark. And I won a plastic shark for my car at Palace Playland. And sharks and sharks and more sharks and SHARKS ARE THE NEW LOST.

This quote makes me think that if Brnwa hadn’t gotten involved with the Mob (and lived in Boston), he’d be a Boondock Saint:

No female targets (which was obvious), but also no targets whose misdeeds were solely in the past. Only ongoing threats. I had no way of knowing why my grandparents had let —– live, but she was a woman, and killing her brother had been enough to shut down their operation. So there you had it.

Meanwhile, if David Locano wanted to sic me on killers whose deaths would improve the world, I would verify his information and then feel free — obligated, even — to hunt them down and kill them. [108]

U2 may be a great band, and may be one of my favorite bands, but it doesn’t keep them from being wrong on occasion:

… and shortly afterwards that U2 song comes on about how Martin Luther King was shot in the early morning of April fourth. Martin Luther King was shot in the evening, even if you’re on Dublin time, but the U2 greatest-hits album is something you learn to live with in medicine. [187]

Entire chunks of the corner of the wall we’d been kneeling against just evaporated, like in one of those movies where a time traveler changes something in the future and things start to vanish in the present. [204]

He gets that TIME TRAVEL SHOULD BE LIKE IN BACK TO THE FUTURE. I love him for that.

Finally, this book’s rating was raised from a 3.5 to a 4 just for the following:

Lainie’s foxy, but she’s married. Granted, to a man who looks twelve and wears a basketball jersey long enough to be a cocktail dress, but homey don’t play that. [44]

I mean, come on: what other book that I could possibly read (aside from something by Chuck Klosterman) would ever quote Homey D. Clown?

Grade for Beat the Reaper: 4 stars

Fiction: “Holiday in Death” by J.D. Robb

J.D. Robb is the pseudonym for Nora Roberts when she writes her futuristic cop novels. Now, I have never read a Nora Roberts Nora Roberts, and I’m not sure I want to – when I go for a ‘romance’ novel, it’s usually of the Regency historical type, fraught with historical errors and anachronisms. So I’m not sure how Ms. Roberts writes one of her contemporary novels — according to her Wikipedia site, she focuses on trilogies of families and strong characters. I want to say that occasionally there’s a supernatural element in some? Maybe? I dunno.

Regardless, you won’t get any of that in a J.D. Robb. Set in the future (around 2050 or so), the main character is Lieutenant Eve Dallas, of the New York Security and Police Department. She’s tough as nails, curses like a sailor on occasion, and rarely lets people in. Holiday in Death is the seventh title in the series, so some background: Eve’s husband is Roarke — just Roarke, we’re not sure if it’s a first or a last name, and what the other one is –, and they met when she was investigating him for murder (Book #1, Naked in Death). They got married in between the third and fourth titles (Immortal… and Rapture…, respectively). Roarke is also super-rich. Like, he owns half of the planet, rich. If he had the chance to be evil, he’d be Lex Luthor (I’m guessing – my love for the Green Lantern and Wonder Woman aside, I was always more of a Marvel Girl myself).

Fiction: “Deja Dead” by Kathy Reichs

For those of you who know me in ‘real’ ‘life’, y’all know that I watch a lot of TV. One of the shows that I enjoy (though don’t particularly talk about, because there’s not really a need to?) is Bones, starring Emily Deschanel and David Boreanaz. Ms. Deschanel plays the title character, “Bones,” which is the nickname of Dr. Temperance Brennan, the premier forensic anthropologist for the Jeffersonian Institute in D.C. The series is based on the mystery series by Kathy Reichs; Deja Dead is the first in the series.

I picked up Deja Dead originally because I was intrigued by the TV show and wanted to see the similarities. (This is the second time I’ve read this book.) There are stunning differences. First, in the TV show, Brennan is very limited in terms of pop culture knowledge. In the first episode, Booth (Boreanaz) tells her that she’s the Scully to his Mulder, and her response is the almost catchphrase, “I don’t know what that means.”

The book series, on the other hand, places Brennan in the … oh crap, I have to get the book from the counter because it takes place in Montreal and everything’s in French. Ah, screw it. (I’m typing this on my mother’s laptop, and the counter is far away. Also, the keys are weird. And there’s a number pad. And I can’t always find the backspace button. I miss my laptop, but I’ve got time to kill before I go back to my apartment and I finished the book this morning, so.) ANYWAY. Brennan works for the Canadian/Quebecois version of the Jeffersonian, doing her thing as forensic anthropologist in Montreal. She has a cat, she watches TV, she is a professor in North Carolina normally (she’s on sabbatical in this book), and she is married and has a teenaged daughter. On my first read [[WHERE'S THE DELETE KEY oh there it is]], I was horrendously confused. I mean, I know television takes poetic license — I do all the time when I write my television pilot[s], but, I seriously blinked.

Fiction: “From Potter’s Field” by Patricia Cornwell

Half-way to Vegas, I continued my streaks of returning to previously-read authors and masochism by reading From Potter’s Field, the sixth Kay Scarpetta novel by Patricia Cornwell. It was weird – I was going to bring Kathy Reich’s Fatal Voyage, but decided against it because a) the mystery involved a plane crash, and I’m sorry, but that was too creepy to be reading on a plane, and b) I read Postmortem flying west to visit Emily a couple of years ago, and when I have to travel on a cross-country flight, I get the urge to read Patricia Cornwell.

Kay Scarpetta is the Chief Medical Examiner for the state of Virginia. She also consults with the FBI’s Behavioral Science Unit (and look, I don’t know what’s with this particular branch of the Bureau and me and why I continually read books involving it; nor can I explain why I can read Kay Scarpetta and Gregor Demarkian and who-knows-what-else concerning the FBI’s Behavioral Science Unit, but I can’t get into Criminal Minds, in spite of the occasional appearance by Xander from Buffy). She is not married and does not have children. She has colleagues and co-workers, but she doesn’t really have friends.

Kay Scarpetta is an arrogant ice queen with a severe superiority complex. It is not an endearing quality. I’m not sure whether it’s Ms. Cornwell’s personality coming through like a Mary Sue or what, but there are moments where you just roll your eyes heavenward and keep reading, because holy god your mother is snoring loud enough to wake the dead and your iPod’s sleep playlist doesn’t soothe if you’re listening to it at full volume, so you may as well keep reading this tripe until it puts you to sleep or the sun comes up, whichever comes first (or maybe I’m projecting).

Fiction: “The Firm” by John Grisham

This is quick, because I can’t imagine anyone who has never read a Grisham novel/watched a ‘film’ adaptation of a Grisham novel/read a book review of a Grisham novel/watched that episode of 3^rd Rock From the Sun all those years ago where the family goes into Witness Protection for some reason and they’re all reading different Grisham novels, and when they realize the plot is exactly the same, they switch books and continue reading and sure enough, the plot is exactly the same.  And yes, I’ve just spent about ten minutes searching the interwebs for the clip that apparently only I can remember, because I have an inordinate amount of brain sludge in my cerebral cortex.

ANYHOODLE.  For the four people in the world who may not have ever read a Grisham ‘legal’ novel (because sometime in the early Aughts he went and branched out), here are the requirements:

I. An idealistic lawyer – the fresher out of law school, the better; or,
II. A lawer who has become disillusioned with the system, but will give it one last try.

He/She discovers:

A. The case he’s currently working on has ties to the Mafia;
B. The case he’s currently working on has ties to the KKK;
C. The case he’s currently working on has ties to the highest of government; or
D. The case he’s currently working on has ties to the evil health care industry.

With the help of:

1. His friends;
2. The FBI; or
3. No one, because he’s an IDEALISTIC LAWYER, he:

a. Is able to win his case;
b. Is able to turn the Mafia over to the FBI;
c. Is able to prove the conspiracy.

As his life is now in danger, he must:

i. Escape to the Caribbean or South America;
ii. Enter into the Witness Protection program;
iii. Face the reporters and live to fight another case;
iv. Retire from law. 

Usually, he also manages to swindle the Mafia/Government/Whatever out of a tidy sum of:

*$10 million.

The Firm is I, A, 2, b, i, *.

Enjoy.

Grade for The Firm: 2.5 stars