Mosaic Books - Kelowna
Willow
made bad due to computer glitches between the travel agent and the
airline, but back at last after two extra days!
Mosaic Books is a wonderful bookstore in central Kelowna. Always an
excellent selection of remainders. So I tucked LeHane's latest (his
attempt to do Galsworthy) and a book on the Gardner Heist, another of
Thai adventures, John Sandford''s latest and a few more.
The Gardner Heist history is true crime and a very good read. While
still unsolved, it has enough meat to be a wonderful addition to my
shelf of art thefts, fakes and forgeries, and cons. I continue to be
attracted to this strange type of burglery, stemming (I think) from an
early read of "The Discriminating Thief" or "The Chateau Gang" years
ago.
Normally I like Denis Lehane. Not so much his book of short stories
and a play, but the novels that came earlier. This book, The Given
Day, is a family history with two main characters, an Irish dop
(second generation) and a black baseball player . Cameo chapters
featuring Babe Ruth seem to provide some linkage to the overall story
line, but with the Spanish Flu, the great Molasses explosion, and the
Red Scare, there is enough interest due to the times. Lehane gets to
demonstrate his facility with Boston and Black speech, the man can
indeed write. But this is no more and no less than a family history
cut shorter than most. Lehane deals with only one generation. To me,
the book was interesting but plodding, at times pushing the envelope
of racial harmony (for the times) too far indeed.
Sandford's latest is another adventure for Virgil Flowers. Now, I
love Sandford's Prey series, not his Kidd books, and the stand alones
are a bit mixed. The Flowers series is a winner thus far and this
book does not disappoint one bit. Unlike other wirters of series
(Parker in particular comes to mind) Sandford does not cut his readers
short with large fonts and thick paper. Recommended.