I finished my audiobook of Agatha Christie’s Death on the Nile (1937), read by David Suchet, who played detective Hercule Poirot for many years on TV, and does the voices of the many characters here (including Poirot), male and female, mostly convincingly. I foresaw who the murder victim on the river cruise was going to be, but not how and by whom that person would be done in. A fine whodunnit.
Next up: The Trials of Harry S. Truman: The Extraordinary Presidency of an Ordinary Man, 1945-1953 by Jeffrey Frank, which I like so far. It seems to be a more balanced portrayal than David McCullough’s more-famous bio, but Frank isn’t nearly as good a writer as McCullough.
I just can’t. The misogyny, domestic abuse, racism and hinted at animal abuse just doesn’t work for me. I have the same feeling as I had for “The Shining” it was a dull plodding mess of domestic abuse and male control, horrifying if you’re living it but boring as hell to read. Life is too short to be bored to death by a vampire…
I re-read all of Robert Crais’ Elvis Coke and Joe Pike novels in order, then reread the extras. Demolition Angel was especially good; the Carol Starky story.
His new book will be out in a few days……my timing was off, but that was a bunch of books. ETA: 23 novels. All worth reading in order.
Finished The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Set in the summer of 1922, it is the definitive novel about the Jazz Age. Deservedly considered a classic. But sales when it came out were disappointing, and at the time of Fitzgerald’s death in 1940 it had all but disappeared. He would never have guessed how highly regarded it would become.
I have a volume of Fitzgerald’s short stories to take up, but it will have to wait. We’ll be hitting the casinos and Vegas soon, then traipsing around here with friends from Thailand. This will be a very busy month.
The widespread distribution of the book during WWII in a special Armed Forces edition is credited by many historians with giving the book a second chance.