Nature Noir by Jordan Fisher Smith

Nature Noir: A Park Ranger's Patrol in the Sierra by Jordan Fisher Smith. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2005. ISBN: 0-618-22416-5

Here's a fun book for the nature crowd. Environmentalists will probably enjoy it too. The “noir” part comes from the crime aspects of the book. Park rangers do function as policemen at least part of the time, and that's one of the significant themes of the book. Recounting the most interesting and quirky of the law enforcement experiences of his time as a park ranger is a big part of what keeps your interest as you're reading the book.

Most of the book is set in the American River canyons of the Sierra Nevada, which are located right about where the state of California makes its bend to the north. The river was supposed to be dammed back in the late 70's, with the entire canyon going under water. But the dam never got built, and the rangers there find themselves patrolling a kind of no-man's land, thought to be temporary, but never quite getting there.

Smith can write beautiful nature prose with the best of them. Here's a sample:

In our hot dry summers and in the sort of dry, scrubby vegetation you see on our south-facing canyon walls, this country belongs to the great Southwest—dusty, parched, and baking, the leaves of its prickly brush and tree species coated with layers of waxy stuff to seal in their moisture. But in the rainy winters and in the lush coniferous forests of our north-facing slopes and shady side canyons, the American River country pledges allegiance to the Pacific Northwest, that nation of Douglas fir, thimbleberry, black bear, salmon, and rain, which stretches from here to southeast Alaska.

By late September, the first thing to change is the wind. Absent for most of the summer, it begins to blow again. One day thin clouds streak the sky, then lower to form a thick, featureless blanket. A little rain falls on a warm night, and when the weather clears the days are still warm but people begin to feel like putting up firewood. By October the nights grow chill and the black oaks on the ridges are tinged with yellow and orange. By November the rains come in earnest. In the woods, the carpet of moss covering rocks and tree trunks that has been brittle and apparently lifeless for months becomes vibrant green again. Bug-eyed orange salamanders and newts make jerky slow-motion patrols across the forest floor. Ferns tremble with drips from the trees. Mushrooms come up. Water falls in diamond ribbons from moss- and fern-covered cliffs and skeins together into creeks, seeking the river. And the roads we rangers travel, which for months have hemorrhaged clouds of soil behind every car, turn to mud.

Who can't enjoy writing like that? If the book has a weakness, it's in Smith's occasional too obvious attempts at pulling more meaning or significance out of events than perhaps they warrant. Occasionally his end-of-chapter musings have a hint of the same feeling you get when you read the moral tacked onto the end of an Aesop's fable. Nevertheless, definitely recommended, especially for those who enjoy good nature writing, with a touch of real life police procedural thrown in just to keep life interesting.

Locked Rooms by Laurie R. King

Locked Rooms by Laurie R. King. New York: Bantam Books, 2005. ISBN: 0-553-80197-X

Alas, having read this book, I've finally reached the end of the published works of my favorite current mystery author, Ms. Laurie King. Now I'll have to wait for new titles as they're written and published. Fortunately, a new Kate Martinelli novel, The Art of Detection, is due out in May, so I won't have too long to wait. Although there are likely to be lots of holds on it at the library, so I may have to wait my turn.

Locked Rooms is the latest in King's series of Sherlock Holmes/Mary Russell novels. And one of the most psychologically intriguing. On their way back from India (the scene of The Game, the previous novel in the series), they stop off in San Francisco, Mary's childhood home, ostensibly to tie up a few loose ends regarding her legal estate.

But instead, they become involved in solving a decades old murder mystery, involving the rest of Mary's family: her parents and brother, who died when she was 14 years of age. Mary has always blamed herself for the “accident,” in which she was thrown from the car just before it plunged off a cliff onto the ocean rocks below. Psychologically, Mary goes through much of the story in a state of denial, her mind literally refusing to come to grips with the events of her childhood, she having blocked most of those memories away from her consciousness.

The only disappointment in the book is the relatively prosaic nature of the original crime that is eventually discovered, although it certainly had far-reaching significance so far as the fate of the Russell family was concerned. The psychological aspects, with Holmes trying unsuccessfully to penetrate his wife and partner's mental blind spot, provides a fascinating and gripping subplot, lending the book much of its suspense and flavor.

King likes to have her fun by mixing up the Holmes universe with those of other famous detective milieus. Mary casually encounters Lord Peter Wimsey in an earlier volume; the tubercular Dashiell Hammett plays a somewhat more significant role here, hired by Holmes to assist him in smoking out the villains. As usual, highly recommended.

Be sure to check out the Tillabooks Mystery and Suspense Author Index for entries on many of the other Laurie King mysteries.

The Traveler by John Twelve Hawks

The Traveler by John Twelve Hawks. New York: Doubleday, 2005. ISBN: 0-385-51428-X

This is science fiction with a new-age twist, a war between good and evil, with ties to conspiracy theories. Maya, our protagonist, is, almost against her will, a Harlequin, a modern day knight, a protector of the Travelers, those unique human beings that can travel to other planes of existence. Buddha, Jesus, these are examples of Travelers from previous centuries. The Harlequins are the heirs of the Knights Templar, fighting the evil Tabula, whose goal is the elimination of both the Travelers AND the Harlequin and the subjugation of the masses to the mind control of television and consumerism.

Although raised by her father to continue the Harlequin tradition, at the outset of our tale Maya has given up that life, and joined the ranks of the ordinary citizenry. But her father recruits her for one last mission, to go to America to find and protect two young men who may have the capacity to become the last Travelers known to exist.

The Tabula, too, have decided on a new strategy. They wish to capture a Traveler or two, and study their brains directly, learning how to “Travel” in order to contact a shadowy race that exists only on another plane of existence.

Carnage and mayhem ensue, with Maya in the thick of the battle. A taut, suspenseful tale, somewhat along the lines of Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code, but with a much better storyline, and without most of the overtly Christian trappings. Recommended.

Keeping Watch by Laurie R. King

Keeping Watch by Laurie R. King. New York: Bantam Books, 2003. ISBN: 0-553-80191-0

This book is almost, but not quite, a sequel to Folly. Keeping Watch stands alone, however, and need not be read in connection with Folly. The connection is simply an overlap between characters and settings. Allen, the Vietnam vet protagonist of Keeping Watch eventually becomes the lover of Rae, the protagonist of Folly. But otherwise, there is very little connection between the two books and their stories.

Keeping Watch begins in Vietnam, as a young man witnesses and participates in all the horrors of that awful conflict. He comes back emotionally scarred, and unable to cope with normal life, living on the streets in a semi-insane state for several years. Finally, he wakes up enough to realize, almost by accident, that it is only in the adrenaline rush of the hunt that he can maintain his sanity. He finds a place for himself in the underground world of rescuing abused children and their mothers, by stealth, or even by force when necessary.

The suspense comes from a case in which Allen may have just bitten off more than he can chew. The abusive father turns out to be an underworld hit man and embezzler. And there is even some doubt about the boy, just barely preteen, himself. Has his father succeeded in turning him into a monster too? The father comes after the kidnappers, and the hunter becomes the hunted.

The subject matter is difficult, scary, even twisted. The book is darker than many of King's other novels. Definitely more suspense than mystery. And while it may not be to everyone's taste, it gets a thumbs up from me. Definitely recommended for all Laurie King fans.

The Year's Best Science Fiction

The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-second Annual Collection, edited by Gardner Dozois. New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 2005. ISBN: 0-312-33659-4.

Now for the truly dedicated scifi fan, here's a collection to wallow in: 652 pages of gloriously genuine science fiction. And mostly “hard” scifi, at that. We get space exploration, generation star ships, alien contact and study, nanotechnology, time travel, and much more.

Many of the authors I've never even heard of, let alone read before. Some names you might recognize include Michael F. Flynn, Kage Baker, Vernor Vinge, Stephen Baxter, Walter Jon Williams. At least, those were a few I recognized.

The incredible volume of material that is written and published in any year is simply overwhelming. That old expression, “so many books, so little time” is especially appropriate here. If one just tried to read the previously published novels by authors in this book, it would take years, unless reading is your full time occupation.

Anyhow, if hard science fiction is your thing, by all means, read this book!

Destroyer by C. J.Cherryh

Destroyer by C. J. Cherryh. New York: Daw Books, 2005. No ISBN listed.

Don't read this book unless you've been following the entire series. While I suppose you might make sense out of it after a while, to really appreciate what's going on you need the background of the previous six novels: Foreigner (1994), Invader (1995), Inheritor (1996), Precursor (1999), Defender (2001) and Explorer (2002). Coming in 2006 is the followup to Destroyer: Pretender.

The premise involves a human FTL (faster than light) ship that somehow gets lost in hyperspace, and ends up at a world inhabited by a humanoid species that are larger, more powerful physically than humans, but barely entering their first industrial age when humans arrive. Inevitably, the two species quarrel, and the humans on planet are relegated to a single island.

Meanwhile the spaceship goes off trying to find their way back to earth, or to find other possibly more suitable places within range of the atevi (as the aliens are called) planet. Much of Cherryh's work involves the attempts of alien races to understand and interact with one another, and her stories are brilliant expositions of the difficulties inherent in any such interactions.

In this case, humans are introducing technology to the atevi, since they need to establish a technological base capable of supporting their space based culture and way of life. Some of the atevi are innately conservative, and resist the more progressive views of those who realize the importance of coming to a technological par with humanity. The humans themselves are equally divided between those who wish to deal peaceably with the atevi, and those who would prefer to either dominate or ignore them. Conflict is generated on every side, and is a major theme of the series.

Cherryh is one of my top all time favorite scifi authors, and to a large degree just because of this ability to effectively portray the thought processes and differences between humans and “aliens.” Her aliens are truly alien, not just human brains stuffed into bizarrely shaped bodies as are those of many writers.

My favorite Cherryh series is the collection of Chanur novels: The Pride of Chanur (1981), Chanur's Venture (1984), The Kif Strike Back (1985), Chanur's Homecoming (1986) and Chanur's Legacy (1992). I'm also a sucker for series, and so Cherryh's work has always been high on my list. The British Fantastic Fiction web site has the best list of Cherryh's work that I've been able to find. Highly recommended for fans of scifi series.

Od Magic by Patricia A. McKillip

Od Magic by Patricia A. McKillip. New York: Ace Books, 2005. ISBN: 0-441-01248-5

When I started to read this book, I soon said to myself, “Now, THIS is how a fantasy novel is supposed to be!” Just to show you what I mean, allow me to quote the opening paragraph:

Brenden Vetch found the Od School of Magic beneath a cobbler's shoe on a busy street in the ancient city of Kelior. The sign hung over the door of a tiny shop that badly needed paint. Brenden gazed incredulously at the door, then again at the sign. Od, it insisted, in neat black letters, School of Magic. From the sign a shoe depended: a wooden clog, sturdy enough to sail, fastened to the sign with a dowel through its center like a mast.

Or how about the paragraph describing Od herself? Allow me to quote again:

She was quite tall, almost a giant, barefoot and bigboned as an ox. Her long hair, a mingling of ivory cloud and smoke, swept nearly to her ankles. Nothing in her broad, weathered face had passed anywhere near the realm of beauty. It looked plain and durable and ageless, like a good shovel or cauldron. Her long mouth lifted to one side in a friendly smile as Brenden stared at her. Any number of animals seemed to be crawling over her. Mice peered from one shoulder; a raven with a missing claw perched on the other. Lizards clung to her hair. A ferret stuck its head out of her cloak pocket. A great albino ox with a broken horn stood at a polite distance behind her, downwind, or Brenden surely would have smelled it coming. It carried an owl on its unbroken horn. A few mongrels, feral cats, and an old blind she-wolf sat waiting behind the ox.

Now if those passages don't make you want to read the rest of the book, then well, don't (read it, that is).

To be completely honest, the book doesn't entirely live up to those beginnings, but it comes fairly close. By that, I wish it could have continued to concern itself with such homely topics as those described in the passages I quote, but instead, we have to involve ourselves with a School of Magic that has gone its own way, circumscribing its goals and methods, and putting them under the influence of the king. This eventually leads to a confrontation between the rigidity of tradition, and the freer influences of Brenden, Od herself (the School's founder) and others like them. I suppose we need some source of conflict to carry the storyline, and this is it.

Nevertheless, highly recommended for lovers of fantasy, especially fantasy of the less rigidly stereotyped variety.