bookshelf

MESMER'S DISCIPLE

Name: MESMER'S DISCIPLE
Author: Edward Swanson
ISBN: 978-0988537064

by Edward Swanson ‧ RELEASE DATE: Dec. 11, 2012

History, action, the supernatural and intelligent discourse; this novel holds something for everyone.

bookshelf

Set in 1840s St. Louis and New York, this historical supernatural thriller pits Alvord Rawn, a vigilante-style New York cop with anger management issues, against Count Abendroth, a demonic mesmerist who has painter Charles Deas in his thrall.

Deas, a historical figure famous for frontier paintings, mysteriously went insane after becoming involved in mesmerism while in St. Louis. He returned to New York and in 1848 was committed to the Bloomingdale asylum. Swanson skillfully weaves the artist’s tale into his debut novel. Police Capt. Alvord Rawn is dismissed from the New York City Police Department for his vengeful, ruthless massacre of an Irish gang. He takes a job as a private detective working for Deas’ mother, who fears her son is losing his mind. Mrs. Deas pays Rawn well to retrieve Deas from St. Louis—by force if necessary. Swanson gives the work a 19th century feel by salting it with historical detail and imbuing characters with the manners and attitudes of the era. He also makes use of 19th century prose style to mimic period writers: “Stout was the truncheon in his belt, hickory in origin and delightfully wieldy.” This approach works, but when Swanson uses modern idioms, it jars; e.g., “shit like this”; “Damn straight I did”; “smoked his competition.” Along the way, Rawn teams up with Finnbar Fagan, a would-be Irish writer, and Marcel Durand, a true frontiersman. Both are reliable allies and thinking men, allowing Swanson to explore various ideas concerning the nature of honor, justice, race relations and art in 19th century America. As the story progresses, Deas partners with Rawn and company to bring down Abendroth as it becomes increasingly obvious the count is evil, tapping into a demonic well for his powers. Thoughtful and action-packed, with a final showdown that is both exciting and gratifying—a fine first novel.

History, action, the supernatural and intelligent discourse; this novel holds something for everyone.

Pub Date: Dec. 11, 2012

ISBN: 978-0988537064

Page Count: 386

Publisher: Riverrun Bookstore Inc

Review Posted Online: Feb. 22, 2014

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

bookshelf

TRUE BETRAYALS

by Nora Roberts ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 13, 1995

bookshelf

Thoroughbreds and Virginia blue-bloods cavort, commit murder, and fall in love in Roberts's (Hidden Riches, 1994, etc.) latest romantic thriller — this one set in the world of championship horse racing. Rich, sheltered Kelsey Byden is recovering from a recent divorce when she receives a letter from her mother, Naomi, a woman she has believed dead for over 20 years. When Kelsey confronts her genteel English professor father, though, he sheepishly confesses that, no, her mother isn't dead; throughout Kelsey's childhood, she was doing time for the murder of her lover. Kelsey meets with Naomi and not only finds her quite charming, but the owner of Three Willows, one of the most splendid horse farms in Virginia. Kelsey is further intrigued when she meets Gabe Slater, a blue-eyed gambling man who owns a neighboring horse farm; when one of Gabe's horses is mated with Naomi's, nostrils flare, flanks quiver, and the romance is on. Since both Naomi and Gabe have horses entered in the Kentucky Derby, Kelsey is soon swept into the whirlwind of the Triple Crown, in spite of her family's objections to her reconciliation with the notorious Naomi. The rivalry between the two horse farms remains friendly, but other competitors — one of them is Gabe's father, a vicious alcoholic who resents his son's success — prove less scrupulous. Bodies, horse and human, start piling up, just as Kelsey decides to investigate the murky details of her mother's crime. Is it possible she was framed? The ground is thick with no-goods, including haughty patricians, disgruntled grooms, and jockeys with tragic pasts, but despite all the distractions, the identity of the true culprit behind the mayhem — past and present — remains fairly obvious. The plot lopes rather than races to the finish. Gambling metaphors abound, and sexual doings have a distinctly equine tone. But Roberts's style has a fresh, contemporary snap that gets the story past its own worst excesses.

Pub Date: June 13, 1995

ISBN: 0-399-14059-X

Page Count: 400

Publisher: Putnam

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 1995

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
INHERITANCE
by Nora Roberts

- BOOK REVIEW
IDENTITY
by Nora Roberts

- BOOK REVIEW
THE CHOICE
by Nora Roberts

bookshelf

LAST ORDERS

by Graham Swift ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 5, 1996

bookshelf

Britisher Swift's sixth novel (Ever After, 1992 etc.) and fourth to appear here is a slow-to-start but then captivating tale of English working-class families in the four decades following WW II. When Jack Dodds dies suddenly of cancer after years of running a butcher shop in London, he leaves a strange request—namely, that his ashes be scattered off Margate pier into the sea. And who could better be suited to fulfill this wish than his three oldest drinking buddies—insurance man Ray, vegetable seller Lenny, and undertaker Vic, all of whom, like Jack himself, fought also as soldiers or sailors in the long-ago world war. Swift's narrative start, with its potential for the melodramatic, is developed instead with an economy, heart, and eye that release (through the characters' own voices, one after another) the story's humanity and depth instead of its schmaltz. The jokes may be weak and self- conscious when the three old friends meet at their local pub in the company of the urn holding Jack's ashes; but once the group gets on the road, in an expensive car driven by Jack's adoptive son, Vince, the story starts gradually to move forward, cohere, and deepen. The reader learns in time why it is that no wife comes along, why three marriages out of three broke apart, and why Vince always hated his stepfather Jack and still does—or so he thinks. There will be stories of innocent youth, suffering wives, early loves, lost daughters, secret affairs, and old antagonisms—including a fistfight over the dead on an English hilltop, and a strewing of Jack's ashes into roiling seawaves that will draw up feelings perhaps unexpectedly strong. Without affectation, Swift listens closely to the lives that are his subject and creates a songbook of voices part lyric, part epic, part working-class social realism—with, in all, the ring to it of the honest, human, and true.