Finished: "Mr Monk Goes to Germany" by Lee Goldberg

Finished: Mr Monk Goes to Germany by Lee Goldberg, 2008, 9780451220998.

The second darn good novel in a row for me.

I have always had a negative opinion of novels that are tie-ins to movies or television. I've always figured they were commissioned hack jobs aimed at reluctant readers and imbeciles. But, after Bill Crider recommended several Monk novels I decided to give one a try. Crider does not appear to be an imbecile and the book sure was good.

Monk is going through his usual, daily difficulties. Monk loses a sock and is convinced his new neighbor stole it. The new neighbor has only one leg and Monk is greatly upset about the lack of symmetry. When Monk hears that the neighbor had his leg caught in a hiking trip and had to cut the leg off, and then eat it, Monk goes more bonkers than usual; he is convinced the neighbor is a cannibal. But, Monk's psychiatrist is at a conference in Germany and unable to see Monk for his twice weekly appointments. Monk does the only logical Monk thing and flies to Germany.

Natalie accompanies Monk, of course. Natalie is, in fact, the first person narrator throughout the story and she is a very good character. I got a lot of Natalie's of personality and more background on Monk and herself that really filled out the story. There is no need to be acquainted with the tv series itself (something Crider mentioned before).

Natalie and Monk fly to Germany and drive to Lohr. Monk is upset about the uneven houses and cobblestones. Natalie tries to enjoy the trip. Monk sees a six-fingered man like the one who was supposed to have killed Monk's wife. Natalie and Monk hassle the shrink. Monk hassles the cop about six-fingered man. Monk is asked by local cops for assistance in suicide investigation. Monk sees a murder scene. No one but Natalie believes Monk that a murder occurred. Monk proves six-fingered man is the killer in local murder case.

A fun novel with a lot of laughs. I saw Monk and Natalie differently than on the tv show. Goldberg has the space to show what Monk and Natalie's relationship is like and how difficult Monk can be. Heck, Goldberg shows how crazy Monk is. During the 44 minutes of each tv episode you laugh at the kooky Monk but do not get the everyday, all day insanity of the man.

EDIT: Boy, that reads like a rough insult of Crider. Not intended.
ANOTHER EDIT: I've found any recommendation by Crider to be worth a try.

Read: "Cottonwood" by Scott Phillips

Read: Cottonwood by Scott Phillips, 2004, 9780345461002.

I previously read Phillip's Ice Harvest and Walkaway. Both those books were well above average and the Wichita settings were fun for me. Both were period pieces and the sex angle ofWalkaway and Wichita history were quite neat. I had no idea Phillips had a third book out until I saw a reference to Phillips in a picture caption on Anthony Neil Smith's blog. Just goes to show that Smith is good for something after all. That and he did a piece on rural noir not too long ago that plugged my current read, Give Us A Kiss, which I am enjoying.

This one was damn good. One of the best books I have read in a while. And I have been sceraming through books this year. Set in 1873 and 1890 in the fictional Kansas town of Cottonwood.

Plot: Bill Ogden came out to Cottonwood with his wife a few years before 1973 to farm. Bill hated farming and started a saloon while a hired man helped work the farm. Bill still works the farm in the mornings but has mostly abandoned his wife and young son and lives in the city to work the saloon and sometimes do photographic portraits.

A rich guy from Chicago, Marc Leval, starts building a mansion in town with the hope that a new rail line coming through town will make Cottonwood a cattle train destination and make Leval even richer. Bill partners with Leval for a bigger saloon in anticipation of the coming boom. Meanwhile Bill gets the hots for Marc's wife, Maggie. Bill starts plugging Maggie. Bill avoids a local slut. Local slut's family, the Benders, turn out to be mass murderers who kill and steal from travelers. Family flees after being found out.

Bill joins the Bender posse and is partnered with Leval. Leval tries to shoot Bill in the back and misses. Bill shoots Leval in chest and leaves him for dead. Bill skulks out of town with Maggie. Bill and Maggie flee to CO and have an acrimonious split after a couple years. Bill ends up in San Francisco in 1890 after a 13 year break in the narrative. Bill sees newspaper article that the Bender women may have been caught. Bill decides to head back to Cottonwood for the trial. Bill finds that Marc Leval is still alive. Bill finds that Maggie had a son by Bill. Bill is convinced the two women are not the Benders. Bender women convicted anyway. Bill finds out that Leval and a couple others killed the Bender family, connived with the Bender's fence, and took all the loot. Bill kills the unrepentant scumbag who was in cahoots with the Benders. Bill and Maggie get back together in the end.

Bill is a self absorbed prick. Maybe it is due to a rough upbringing and Army service in the Civil War. He's more concerned with getting laid and making money than caring about others. He's mostly abandoned his wife in Cottonwood and barely interacts with his son. He runs off with another man's wife and then abandons the woman in CO when he moves to another town. When in San Francisco he lowers his rent by fucking his landlady. When he gets returns to Cottonwood he screws that landlady as well.

But, Bill does have a strong side towards justice. He tries to intervene in a town lynching in 1873. He owns a building in San Francisco that he won in a poker game and tries to help out the tenant running the rotgut saloon in it. Bill joins the posse to get the Bloody Benders. Bill ultimately kills the last remaining member of the Bender clan in 1890 and tries to force intervention on behalf of the suspected Bender women. He ultimately "redeems" himself in the end by reconnecting with his children and taking care of his family.

All in all a great book with a great lead character. Great period touch for SE KS. Good characters in the local bigwigs of Cottonwood from their starts in 1873 to their wealthy status in 1890.

EDIT: Forgot to mention that Phillips took a true story, the Benders, and incorporated the tale into the novel. He mentions al source in the author's note that would be worthwhile checking out, The Benders of Kansas.

Listened to: "The Good Guy" by Dean Koontz

Listened to: The Good Guy by Dean Koontz, downloaded from Overdrive.com.

Koontz is a good writer but I don't like his characters very much. They always engage in snappy patter and witty comebacks. I read that 2-3 book series with the guy who has a light sensitivity disorder (Fear Nothing, etc.) and I had the same dislike for those characters. The Fear books read like extended episodes of Friends with violence and mystery included.

Koontz's characters also seem to have all sorts secret skills and backgrounds. For instance, the main character in Good is Tim. Tim is presented as a regular dude who works as a mason during the day and hangs out in his friend's bar in the evening. But, Tim has all sorts of skills and bravery a normal guy doesn't.

One evening Tim strikes up a conversation with a fellow bar goer and gets handed an envelope with $10k and a woman's photo. The other guy wants Linda, the woman in the photo, dead and has mistook Tim for a hired killer. The first guy leaves and a second guy comes in the bar and talks to Tim. The second guy is the real hired killer and assumes Tim is the buyer. Tim tells the killer to forget the job and then Tim goes to tell Linda she is in danger.

Linda and Tim flee the seemingly psychic killer who finds them most anywhere. Of course, the reader knows the killer - a man with multiple aliases - is using some high tech methods and the assistance of a support team to guide him along. Tim and Linda have close calls. Masonry love ensues. Tim calls on a cop friend for help. Killer is part of a dark conspiracy. Tim uses mysterious yet amazing skills and methods to avoid the killer. Kahr love ensues. Linda gets hot for Tim, Tim gets hot for Linda. Tim kills killer and conspiracy people warn him off. Tim tells the President about the conspiracy and the conspiracy is taken down while Tim and Linda enjoy their life together.

A big annoyance is how Tim turns out to be a super-duper war hero. Not just any war hero though, he is a Medal of Honor winner who saved his fellow Marines and a few hundred civilians who were about to be slaughtered. Yeah, right. Of course, he uses the connection of having met the President's mom to parlay a private meeting with the President to present some evidence on the evil conspiracy. Yeah, sure.

My not liking the two main characters is usually a real deal breaker for me. But, Koontz created a real nasty villain and knows how to drive the plot and story along.

Quit Reading: "Ambush" by Paul Carson

Quit Reading: Ambush by Paul Carson, 2004, 9780312367114

I was reading this during vacation. I gave up about a 1/4 of the way through because it was just not all that exciting. I did not like the writing all that much and the main characters are annoying.

Scott Nolan is a doctor in Dublin. Nolan followed his Irish wife there but he does not like the urban crime he has found. Nolan has become nationally famous after being picked to assist the government's anti-drug campaign by appearing on television to show the effects of drugs on society.

That anti-drug campaign has been wreaking havoc on Irish dealers and some weaselly guys see an opportunity to step in and take over the drug trade. Since many dealers are going out of business or going to jail the Weasels plan assassination of both the Minister for Justice and Scott. Both assassination attempts fail but kill a couple cops and Scott's wife.

Scott goes into grief with round-the-clock police protection. His cop brother-in-law blames him. Scott is asked to pretty much quit his job because people are afraid of a second attack on Scott happening at work. Scott plans to dump his protection and make himself a target in an attempt to catch the killers.

A neat idea and a neat setting. But, I did not like the execution.

Listened to: "The Prosecution of George Bush for Murder" by Vincent Bugliosi

Listened to: The Prosecution of George Bush for Murder by Vincent Bugliosi, 2009, downloaded from Overdrive.com.

Boy oh boy. Bugliosi really hates Bush and Cheney and the all the rest. Bugliosi cuts no corners on this one. I did not agree with everything he said but he gives some very strong arguments.

Incompetence before 9/11. Failure in Afghanistan to catch or kill bin Laden. Bailing from Afghanistan to go to Iraq. Falsifying evidence about Sadam. Lying the country into Iraq and then fucking up the war anyway. Refusing to even get the needed equipment in place. What a fucking disaster.

I won't recap the book and add comments since I finished listening to it about a month ago. Bugliosi contends that Bush could be tried in any local jurisdiction from which a local soldier could have been killed due to Bush's falsifications.

Read: "Trial by Fire" by James Reasoner

Read: Trial by Fire by James Reasoner, 2002, 0312873468.

The second book in Reasoner's Last Good War series. If the third book is like this one I know why a fourth book was never requested by the publisher. This one just kind of dragged along and runs 445 pages. I have the third one at home and may as well try it. If it drags too much I'll bail on it since I assume there will not be much of a resolution in the end.

Dale and Joe are training British tankers in England for the U.S. Army and then sent to Egypt. Adam is a Marine on Wake Island. Adam's wife Catherine is a Navy nurse in Pearl Harbor and then on a hospital ship. Adam gets sent to San Diego and becomes an officer. Secondary characters live and die while fighting at Wake, Coral Sea, and Midway. Dale sneaks out on a mission to the Egyptian desert. Joe meets a Brit intelligence officer. Both are obviously intended to join up with the LRDG or SAS.

The first in the series was a neat look at pre-war life in Chicago and the political and military build up to war. This had a lot of slow parts and lacked the insight of that first book. The storyline about Wake Island was neat. Reasoner keeps Adam on Wake all through the defensive preparations by the Army and the first attacks by the Japs. Dale and Joe barely seem to make it into the story.

Finally Found the Dang Book: "Eddie's World" by Charlie Stella

Finally Found the Dang Book: Eddie's World by Charlie Stella, 2001, 078670893X

I grabbed this to take on vacation after Crider did a plug on a different Stella book. I finished this book a couple weeks ago but could not find the damn thing. It showed up when my wife was cleaning. This is Stella's first novel and is pretty good.

Eddie is a former full-time crook who still has one foot in the crime world as a loanshark. The rest of his work is temping as a word processor for different places in Manhattan. Eddie is connected to a mob boss but Eddie was never a "made" guy or even a whatevertheycallguyswhoworkitfulltimeforthemob. Eddie got into the word processing career as a way out of crime. But, Eddie likes certain aspects of that life: he has friends in the there, there is money there, he has always done it, there is some excitement, etc.

Eddie's marriage to a flaky gal is in trouble and he is planning a burglary with his pal Tommy. Eddie doesn't need the money but 15k is 15k and the burglary is a favor to a friend, Sarah. Eddie met Sarah while on a temp job and she offered the burglary as a way to get even with her boss. Eddie and Tommy hope to score about 15,000 bucks out of the boss's desk before he uses the cash for an illicit diamond deal.

Meanwhile, Sarah is boinking a recently released con who is on an FBI tether. The Con is working for the FBI to set-up other crooks (a minor drug dealer for instance) for the FBI and figures to make a buck by stealing Eddie's score by grabbing the cash and the diamonds.

Eddie doesn't get the cash because the Boss, the diamond salesmen, and Sarah meet for the sale and are all murdered by the Con who takes the diamonds as well. The triple murder happens in an upscale area and the heat is on to catch the killer. Eddie and Tommy steal some computers in the burglary and the cops connect the murder to the burglary to the computers to Tommy.

Eddie already knew of the Con's existence and goes looking for him. The cops go looking for Eddie. Tommy panics. Eddie's wife sleeps with her boss. Con tries to set-up Eddie to get killed by some Russians looking to buy the diamonds. Eddie's wife and his teenage son are in danger. Scummy FBI guys look the other way when Con does bad. Tommy is killed. Eddie comes to the rescue of wife when Con shows up. Eddie gets away with a minor charge and six months county time.

The books is much better than my woeful description; there is more to the story and the characters and plot are all interesting. No dull moments.

A good bit of humor between Eddie and Tommy, Eddie and his nutso wife.