Today’s Post by Joe Farace
“There are few finer or more innocent pleasures than talking books to one who knows. There may be joy in heaven- I am told there is but the evidence is not conclusive, and I’ll take mine here in my library.” ― This Book Collecting Game
For some reason my book reading year started slower than normal. Part of it may be caused by the snowy cold weather we’ve been having here in Colorado and far from creating a cozy-by-the-fireplace reading environment, it’s left me down in the dumps. On the other hand, I’ve been watching more films than before as I struggle to come to grips with whether or not to continue creating videos about movies (or anything else) for my YouTube channel. Right now I have 185 subscribers to the channel and my most recent video about movies was “Godzilla 4K and More” and, as I write this, it has 74 views and five likes, By comparison, my recent blog post about the 2001 Jim Carrey film The Majestic received many thousands of page views. Producing these videos is challenging for me because. other than a good microphone (that was a gift from Barry Staver,) the gear and software I use is like working with bear claws and rocks. Unless something changes, I’m going to pause creating any new videos and focus on writing more blog posts about movies.
OK, I was talking about books…
So far this year, I have only read two books, I attempted to read more but gave up on one of them that showed promise in it’s premise but was bogged down by a sloth-like pace and its every other chapter jump into human misery—and you know how I feel about that. I don’t like this in movies either as I discussed in my review of The Fabelmans. that was tacked onto the end of my YouTube review of Casablanca 4K.
The two books that I have read this year, so far, are Ed McBain’s The Last Dance and Vermilion Drift by William Kent Krueger. So you can see I’ve been finding my “comfort food” in books by some of my favorite authors. Continuing that trend, a book I’m almost finished is Kreuger’s Tamarack County.
My friend Barry Staver gave me a gift certificate for Barnes & Noble for Christmas and I picked up two books with it including Only The Wicked by Gary Phillips, who was the author of One Shot Harry, a mystery book about a photographer that both Barry and myself enjoyed immensely. I just added his 2024 book about Harry, at the library and I typically read them before any of the books I’ve purchased because they have to be returned in a timely fashion.
Books Read, Book to Read
As I mentioned, I am just getting through my book “comfort zone” period having read the McBain book and two books by William Kent Krueger, Vermilion Drift (2010) and Tamarack County (2013.) One of the best gifts Mary gave me was a signed copy of Kreuger’s latest book, Spirit Crossing. (Tip: new hardback copies are available on Amazon for less that fifteen bucks.) Not only was Spirit Crossing a great read, it introduced me to the world and writings of Mr, Krueger and I have been enjoying going back to the library and reading some of his early books.
I have really enjoyed the plunge into his protagonist, Cork O’Connor and his extended family that seems so real to me that when I was reading Tamarack County the other day and Cork was facing a dilemma in social situation, it felt like I was stuck with the same decision and was pulling for him to make the right choice. He didn’t. And that’s what so great about O’Connor as the focal point of this book series; He feels so human and real. In the earlier books he’s a bit hot-headed but mellows as he gets older. Yes. all the characters in the series age if not in real time at least in a timely manner. McBain, on the other hand, only made Steve Carrella reach 40 years of age after McBain had been writing his 87th Precinct mysteries for 40 years!
Krueger is a terrific writer too. His description of the fictional small town of Aurora, Minnesota and the wilderness of Northern Minnesota range from you-are-there to poetic. I’ve often said that there are great story tellers and there are great writers. Few authors manage to combine both attributes but William Kent Krueger, is certainly one of them. if you enjoy a good mystery, pick up any one of his books. As Mr,. Monk always says, “you’ll thank me later.”