Careless in Red
By Elizabeth George  
Recommended by Jim DeYoung   

Elizabeth George's latest novel, Careless in Red, finds Detective Superintendent Thomas Lynley struggling with the aftermath of his pregnant wife's brutal murder, which occurred in With No One As Witness.  An intervening work, What Came Before He Shot Her,  chronicled the background of his wife’s youthful assassin.  Given that I and many other readers found that book rather sordid and unappealing, it was a joy for me to get Thomas Lynley back in some form even if still reeling from the shock of the murder. 

Careless in Red finds our detective trudging alone along Cornwall’s South Coast  carrying little, sleeping rough, and floundering in depression. Luckily Ms. George writes crime novels and her hero is conveniently pushed back toward his old  profession by the discovery of the body of a young man at the base of a lonely cliff.  Lynley, without an ID  and looking for all the world like an itinerant tramp rather than an Earl of the Realm,  initially becomes a potential suspect in the death. 

The investigation then gathers speed and in short order introduces a group of angst-ridden families all conflicted by rebellious children and/or controlling parents. There is a  mysterious veterinarian,   a family trying to re-open an old hotel as an outdoor adventure venue,  a surfboard manufacturer,  and a hard nosed female Detective Inspector with pressing relationship issues. You quickly realize that most of the characters are, like Lynley,  trying to keep the past at bay while coping with the waves of an onrushing present.  As one character puts it,  "And life continued. A bloke didn't get what he wanted all the time, and that's just how it was. One could thrash around and hate that fact, or one could cope".  Easy advice to give; a bit harder to practice.

Coping for Lynley is based on the shortage of investigative muscle in the outer reaches of Cornwall,  He is pressured into assisting the local constabulary and when more help is needed reliable old partner, Detective Sergeant Barbara Havers,  arrives from London.  From there on the tangled backgrounds of the participants and Lynley's own crises of the soul carry you on to a finish that doesn’t quite resolve everything,  but does leave you waiting eagerly for the next installment.

For a look at how Ms. George sees her last three works, including the killing off of Helen Lynley,  I recommend a peek at the author's web site at http://www.elizabethgeorgeonline.com/essay_whatcame.htm

Shakespeare
By Bill Bryson
822.3 Bryson
Recommended by Jim DeYoung

Bill Bryson, native born Iowan and Anglophile,  is best known for his travel books like Notes From a Small Country  (England),  A Sunburned  Country  (Australia), or his musings on language (The Mother Tongue).   His latest effort looks at the life and times of the world’s most famous playwright and is titled simply Shakespeare.  It’s a slim, breezy read that covers  most of the bases in  clear non-scholarly prose. For frosting there’s a nice layer of genial humor that often pokes fun at some of the literary excesses offered in other Bardic biographies.  Overall this entertaining book might be an ideal introduction for the neophyte or the high school student who gets a case of the iambic pentameter blues whenever the name of Shakespeare is mentioned.  

While providing a readable introduction to Shakespeare’s life for an unspecialized audience,  Bryson's book also offers some tidbits to the more experienced reader. He makes an apt observation when he notes that only 230 complete plays survive from Shakespeare's day and an astounding fifteen per cent of them are found only in the justly famous First Folio.  He adds delightful sensory information when he describes the odorific industries that were centered in the Bankside area of London in the early 17th century. Going to the Globe was a lot of things, but, according to Bryson,  it was always smelly.  An item that was new to me was the story of how the American Showman P.T. Barnum  influenced the  turning of Shakespeare's Birthplace in Stratford-Upon-Avon into a National Shrine.  It seems that in the early 1840's Barnum had a plan to dismantle and ship the entire building to the USA,  put it on wheels, and tour it around the country.  This shook up the English public so much that it galvanized a plan to purchase and save the site for the British nation.  As a result you will still need an expensive airline ticket to see Shakespeare’s Birthplace for real, but only your library card to let Bill Bryson give you a personalized tour.