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THE GARDEN OF WEAPONS

Name: THE GARDEN OF WEAPONS
Author: John E. Gardner
ISBN: 0892960973

by John E. Gardner ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 15, 1981

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Another enjoyably complicated, modestly engaging spy-arama for British agent Herbie Kruger (The Nostradamus Traitor, 1979), that Mahler-loving, hard-drinking, Nazi-bred teddy bear of a spy. The labyrinth begins when Herbie is alerted that KGB spymaster Jacob Vascovsky has killed himself and that his aide-de-camp Capt. Pavel Mistochenkov has defected to Berlin and will speak only to Big Herbie. So Herbie conducts a long interrogation of Mistochenkov—which sometimes verges on ale Carre parody—and learns with horror that back in the 1960s his six-man spy team, the Schnitzer Group, was no secret to the Russians, was feeding back Russian disinformation, and included two double-agents! Furthermore, Herbie learns that his current top spy system includes a traitor and source of fake information: his own former mistress, Luzia Gabell, is a double agent (and was the late KGB spymaster's mistress!) So Herbie now leaves for Berlin, to save what's left of his team from the Gabell woman. And the search for answers leads to triple-crosses, to East Berlin, to another ex-mistress, and to suspicions that the whole shebang (from the KGB spymaster's suicide on) may have been a fantastical set-up. Le Carre fans may not take too well to Gardner's tongue-in-cheeky touches; and straight-suspense addicts will find the convolutions here beyond the pale. But Herbie brings out the best in Gardner—and those with a taste for spy-mazes, erudite cartooning, and/or Mahler (Herbie's addiction) will find this a special sort of espionage treat.

Pub Date: March 15, 1981

ISBN: 0892960973

Page Count: -

Publisher: McGraw-Hill

Review Posted Online: March 30, 2012

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1981

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
NO HUMAN ENEMY
by John E. Gardner

- BOOK REVIEW
TROUBLED MIDNIGHT
by John E. Gardner

- BOOK REVIEW
UNKNOWN FEARS
by John E. Gardner

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CARRIE

by Stephen King ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 8, 1974

King handles his first novel with considerable accomplishment and very little hokum—it's only too easy to believe that these...

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Figuratively and literally shattering moments of hoRRRRRipilication in Chamberlain, Maine where stones fly from the sky rather than from the hands of the villagers (as they did in "The Lottery," although the latter are equal to other forms of persecution).

All beginning when Carrie White discovers a gift with telekinetic powers (later established as a genetic fact), after she menstruates in full ignorance of the process and thinks she is bleeding to death while the other monsters in the high school locker room bait and bully her mercilessly. Carrie is the only child of a fundamentalist freak mother who has brought her up with a concept of sin which no blood of the Lamb can wash clean. In addition to a sympathetic principal and gym teacher, there's one girl who wishes to atone and turns her date for the spring ball over to Carrie who for the first time is happy, beautiful and acknowledged as such. But there will be hell to pay for this success—not only her mother but two youngsters who douse her in buckets of fresh-killed pig blood so that Carrie once again uses her "wild talent," flexes her mind and a complete catastrophe (explosion and an uncontrolled fire) virtually destroys the town.

King handles his first novel with considerable accomplishment and very little hokum—it's only too easy to believe that these youngsters who once ate peanut butter now scrawl "Carrie White eats shit." But as they still say around here, "Sit a spell and collect yourself."

Pub Date: April 8, 1974

ISBN: 0385086954

Page Count: 216

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: Sept. 26, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1974

Categories:

GENERAL FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
OTHER WORLDS THAN THESE
by Stephen King & Peter Straub

- BOOK REVIEW
NEVER FLINCH
by Stephen King

- BOOK REVIEW
YOU LIKE IT DARKER
by Stephen King

- PERSPECTIVES
Appreciations: Carrie Turns 40

- SEEN & HEARD
Stephen King Used ‘Carrie’ Advance To Support Mom

- BOOK TO SCREEN
New ‘Carrie’ Series in the Works at Amazon

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TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

by Harper Lee ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 11, 1960

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A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.