bibliomani

I usually don’t  worry too much about spoilers here, but the reason I thoroughly enjoyed this latest Thursday Next-adventure would be one ginormous spoiler. I think it suffices to say that  Fforde does something different (and rather cheeky) in this installment, and it really suits the series. So if you enjoyed the other TN-novels, hurry up and read this one. If you’re new to Jasper Fforde and his literary detective Thursday Next I recommend starting with the first volume, The Eyre Affaire.

There’s a new novel out in the series about the literary detective Thursday Next, and as a warm-up I re-read First Among Sequels. I first read it when it came out in 2007, and apparently I wasn’t overly thrilled with it.

I must have been a bit fed up with the whole Nextian universe, but after four years I’m not one bit so, and I thoroughly enjoyed this crazy ride. I’m starting reading the TN-6 right away.

Jeg har længe set frem til andet bind af den norske krimitrilogi, der foregår i Minnesota blandt efterkommere af norske emigranter. Første bind var fremragende. En klassisk politikrimi, men alligvel underlig rolig, nærmest meditativ.

Rolig kan man i hvert fald også kalde andet bind. Klassisk krimi? Ikke just. Hvor første bind udspillede sig over nogle uger, som den slags ofte gør, udspiller det kun 180 sider lange andet bind sig over to dage, hvor Lance og hans bror Andy går rundt i en skov på hjortejagt. Og det er måske meningen at det skal være meditativt-og-samtidig-nervepirrende, men jeg kedede mig desværre bravt de første 120 sider.

Jeg kan godt se parallellerne. Lake Superior er så stor, at man ikke lægger mærke til den, ligesom at Andy er så oplagt bims, at Lance aldrig har opdaget det. Og Lance drømmer, at han fryser til is på bunden af havet, ligesom hans forfar Thormod, hvis dagbog eller tankestrøm der krydsklippes med, nær gjorde. Og han endte som morder, og det gør Lance måske også …?

Ja, jeg kan godt se det, men bortset fra de temmelig dramatiske sidste 30 sider, var jeg faktisk skuffet. Men jeg kan også godt se det fine i en krimitrilogi, hvor første bind er en klassisk krimi, og andet bind overhovedet ikke er det, og det er grunden til, at jeg sikkert kommer til at læse tredje bind, når den udkommer som pocketbog. Jeg håber, at formeksperimentet fortsætter, men jeg håber især, at tredje bind overgår dette.

This novel is really, as Sayers says herself in the dedication, a love story with the irritating intrusion of a detective-interest (and not, as it usually is, the other way around). It begins where Gaudy Night ended and explores Peter Wimseys and Harriet Vanes relationship, wrapped up in a broad selection of quotes from Donne, Shakespeare, Marvell and goodness knows who else. It’s a very shrewd and believable portrait of a couple who are both too old, too intelligent and too desillusioned to think that it’s enough to be madly in love with each other. Not that they’re not that.

Like Gaudy Night, this novel is strikingly feminist and critical of  a society that isn’t, and the portrait of the couple that lets the stiff upperlip fall is written with great insight and sensitivity. Again, I can’t believe that these novels were written so many years ago. I for one haven’t read them for the last time.

This novel was apparently dubbed “the first feminist mystery novel”, and feminist it definitely is. It may not be much in the way of a crime novel – there is no murder, for instance – but it is an amazingly interesting novel about women’s right to and use of education and about love versus independence. Just like Sayer’s previous novel about Harriet Vane, Have his Carcase, it’s surprisingly modern, and I was thoroughly gripped by the very intellectual love story in the very intellectual setting of an Oxford college between the very intellectual couple, Vane and Peter Wimsey.

(mere…)

It’s amazing that this novel was written almost 80 years ago. It’s intelligent, witty, feminist, has a good crime plot and quite a few poignant meta-commentaries on the genre. It was such a pleasure re-reading it. I must hurry along to Gaudy Night in which Lord Peter and Harriet finally figure out their relationship. Sigh.

There’s a few pages in the Danish translation of this novel, “Annoncer der dræbte”, which I read over and over again as a teenager, and I remembered the novel as a fast-flowing stream of advertising slogans. – And back then I didn’t even know that Sayers used to work as a copywriter herself. Now I finally read it in English, and not only the slogan-bits but all of the prose is surprisingly elegant. It’s hard to think that this novel was written almost 80 years ago. As far as I recall (and I may be wrong, so I need to re-read the rest of the novels, sooner rather than later) it stands out from the other Whimsey-novels in having more of a social commentary going on, but it was always one of my favourites. Incidentally, Sayers herself didn’t like it much, her being busy writing my other favourite, The Nine Tailors.

As a teenager I harboured, as mentioned, a passion for the crime novels of Dorothy L. Sayers and Agatha Christie. Among others, I vividly remember reading (and re-reading) one about a murder hunt, a boat house, and … I didn’t remember the details of the plot, but I distincly remembered the atmosphere surrounding Poirot as he was expecting the murder to happen and then trying to solve it. It dawned on me to Google it, and I actually found and bought Dead Man’s Folly – in the original English, not the Danish of my 80′ies.

And I’m glad I did. The atmosphere was exactly as I remembered it, and the plot equally not worth remembering. It was rather rushed at the end with a bit of a deus ex machina, but nevermind. It’s a Christie classic.

Jeg skulle bare have bestilt alle tre bøger i denne prisbelønnede norsk-amerikanske krimitrilogi med det samme, men jeg var en krysteragtig forsigtigper uden overblik over den norske krimiscene (stort set begrænset til Jo Nesbø og Anne Holt), og bestilte* kun første bind. Og nu sidder jeg her og tænker på Lance Hansen. Ak ja.

Romanen mindede mig en hel del om Kerstin Ekmans Händelser vid vatten, som også er en meget lidt action-agtig krimi – faktisk nærmere en roman-med-et-mord-i. Sundstøl har dog den obligatoriske fraskilte politibetjent, men han har også et sindigt tempo, naturbeskrivelser og en indgående beskrivelse af det norsk-amerikanske miljø i Minnesota, hvor Sundstøl selv i øvrigt er bosat. Jeg håber, han kan holde det langsomme, manende tempo i de næste to bind.

*Skulle nogen være interesserede, bestiller jeg mine bøger på norsk hos adlibris.dk.

I found this novel by accident at some sale in Stockholm a few years ago, then forgot about it, and then almost bookcrossed it because I wasn’t thrilled with Mikael Niemis bestseller Populärmusik från Vittula. But then my eyes fell on the first page, and I was hooked. It simply manages to combine two things that I love: a good crime novel and linguistics.  I learnt a lot about the Swedish language Meänkieli, which is close to Finnish, but spoken in the area surrounding Torneälven/Tornionjoki/Tornionväylä in Northern Sweden, and never guessed the identity of the killer. Not bad, eh?

I picked this up in an airport in Minneapolis where I wasn’t supposed to be at the time, but Delta screwed up and … It would be rude to say that this was the most exciting thing about this novel, and  it did have some very nice language and slang in it along with a half-baked detective story. But I don’t understand where all the hype came from, and it took me far too long to finish it. Hrmpf.

As a teenager I read and re-read (and then some) Dorothy L. Sayers’ novels about Lord Peter Whimsey, first in Danish and then what I could find in the used bookstores in English. But I never read the novel in which Whimsey meets Harriet Vane, whom he marries after several years (and novels) of pursuit. But now I did, not as much to discover the particulars of their first meeting as to find out what this obsession of mine was all about.

And, lo and behold, my 13 years old self seems to have had quite a taste in literature. The story itself is a pretty straightforward and predictable, but the storytelling and the language is surprisingly sparkling and readable, even today, 80 years after it was first published. I’m sorely tempted to re-read the whole bunch…

This was by far the worst of the Hamilton-novels. I’m actually not sure that I’ll bother to read the rest of them. Several things were wrong with it:

1) It was far, far too long. I’m sure there’s a reason why crime novels aren’t usually 640 pages long. It was too long because:

1a) The language was positively rambling. Had Guillou become too successful at this point to edit at all?

1b) There were far, far too many plots, side plots, scene changes and loose ends. Plenty for two, maybe three books. Any author (or at least editor) knows that a side plot has to have some kind of relevance to the main plot. Just any relevance. And is there a rule about how many continents a crime novel can take place in?

2) The blurp was one of the worst I have ever read. It mentions things that happen within the last 50 of the 640 pages. That’s just not ok.

3) The characters were even more flat and nondescript than usual. The character of Göran Karlsson plays a significant role in this novel, and I have absolutely no idea what kind of person he is. None. Zip.

4) In the previous novels some Swedish politicians have played a role, but here it is not only “the prime minister”, but Carl Bildt, who was Sweden’s actual prime minister at the time. And Carl Bildt, in his multiple conversations with Hamilton, is a complete and utter ass. I think Guillou crosses a line there. Carl Bildt may have been a jerk, I have no idea, but to ridicule him over conversations that you make up yourself (because Hamilton is actually a ficticious person, remember?) isn’t at all fair play. Guillou abuses the novel as a medium to critisize a named politician, and he does it to the point of bashing. It has no relevance to the novel, and it belongs in a newspaper. Most unsympathetic.

It took me a long time, maybe six months, to read this, and that might have influenced my opinion. On the other hand, maybe it took me so long to read because it was bloomin’ boring.

Dinosaurens Fjer blev mig anbefalet fra flere pålidelige sider, bl.a. af MarenParen i en kommentar her på bloggen, så til trods for mine seneste dårlige erfaringer med krimier skrevet af danske kvinder, min snobbede skepsis over for dansk litteratur og de latterligt høje danske bogpriser, investerede jeg i romanen.

Og selvom jeg måske ikke ville kalde den en krimi, var den en fornøjelse at læse, især fordi den er så velskrevet, i modsætning til så meget andet på det danske bogmarked, der kalder sig krimi. Gazan kan faktisk skrive. Hun kan bruge sproget godt og korrekt, og hun kan beskrive steder og stemninger. Det alene gør bogen værd at læse. Jeg kunne nok godt have ønsket mig enten et strammere krimiplot eller bare en roman om forholdet mellem forældre og børn uden en død forsker i kulissen. Men det er nok mere en genrekvababbelse og en smagssag end noget andet.

Jeg ved ikke, om “krimi” er det bedste tag her. Et “humor”-tag ville i hvert fald også være på sin plads. Brookmyre står nok ikke forrest i Nobelpris-køen, men han er beslægtet med Jasper Fforde og Douglas Adams, og så kan man jo ikke andet end at være glad. Han er skarp, historien hænger sammen, og sproget spræller og sprudler, og det er i høj grad sådan noget som det her, der gjorde Quite Ugly One Morning værd at læse:

As oily creeps go, Clive Medway was deluxe multigrade. If he had been American, Parlabane [vores hovedperson] decided, he would have had a ponytail, even though he was losing it both at the front and on top.  He had the roundest head Parlabane had seen outside of Peanuts, above a shiny blue tie and a designer suit which conclusively proved that shelling out a fortune for your clothes doesn’t stop you looking like a complete tit. (s. 156)

Endnu en bid af Hamilton-serien, og slet ikke en dårlig bid. Men der er mange af bøgerne, og det, at hovedpersonen er temmelig mekanisk, stiller krav til en tilsvarende mere interessant handling. Guillous styrke er, at han kan sin samtidspolitik. Denne foregår til dels i Sovjetunionen i opbruddets tid i de tidlige 90′ere (slutningen af 80′erne?), og det er det, helt uafhængigt af den svenske Hamilton, der gør romanen her spændende og interessant.

Det her er ubetinget et fabelagtigt stykke historieskrivning, og det er anmelderne (altså de rigtige) jo også rørende enige med mig (sagde hunden)  i. Andet bind af sagaen fortsatte over stok og sten, lige så medrivende og krimiagtigt som det første.

Materialet er selvfølgelig rasende godt – vaskeægte, danske terrorister, der oven i købet lykkedes med deres lækkert planlagte kriminalitet, og kun blev fældet ved en tilfældighed. Der er masser af “hvis nu”‘er i historien, som en fiktionsforfatter ikke kunne have konstrueret bedre. (mere…)

Et tobinds dokumentarværk. Nej, ikke lige det første, jeg normalt ville kaste mig over. Men terrorisme er interessant i disse år, faktisk især ikke-islamistisk terrorisme. Og når nu værket kan erhverves for sølle 79 kr. pr. bind i Gyldendals pocket-udgave, og endda har modtaget Cavlingprisen, så ok, så. Jeg investerede i det, der bliver markedsført som om, det var den sidste nye femikrimi.

Blekingegadebanden (i hvert fald bind 1) er skrevet i en udpræget roman-stil, der gav mig svar på, hvordan et dokumentarisk værk kan have solgt så godt. Den er simpelthen enormt spændende, og det dokumentariske bidrager bare til min fascination af historien: Tænk at sådan noget kan have foregået i lille Danmark, oven i købet i min levetid og i min by. Samtidig er bogen fuld af historiske udredninger, fx. om situationen i Mellemøsten, men alt sammen opdelt i ret korte og mundrette kapitler. Og så bærer den præg af en utrolig grundig reseach, helt ned til bombehundenes navne, og der er en hel del billeder i.

Er der en fare i, at jeg havde det, som om jeg læste en krimi? Tja. Det er vel det, der får et stykke vigtigt samtids- og Danmarkshistorie ud til en brede befolkning. Men det er et interessant valg, både fra forfatterens og forlagets side at gå så meget under huden på de personer, der spillede en rolle i historien – terroristerne selv såvel som deres ofre.

Uanset hvad var det både medrivende og interessant læsning, som bestemt var alle de 79 kr. værd.

Der sker så meget i Hamiltonbøgerne, at der ikke har været behov for at gøre selve figuren Hamilton særlig tredimensionel. Og det må være en kæmpe fordel, når man skriver en serie, fordi man så nemt kan fylde belejlige egenskaber på figuren efterhånden som man får brug for dem. Her i bind seks åbenbarer Hamilton sig således som den fødte mafia-forhandler og i øvrigt en hård og hævntørstig hund.

Og selv om det måske er lidt svært at genkende Hamilton fra de tidligere bøger (ligesom Daniel Craigs og Roger Moores James Bonder ikke har meget til fælles) resulterer det i en spændende og action-packed roman. Og når man, som jeg, ikke er særlig godt læst ind på mafiaens forhold på Sicilien i 1990′erne, er det svært at vide, hvor plausibel historien er. Den virker til tider temmelig karikeret, men det understreger Guillou også flere gange, at den gør. Og ja, stereotypier kommer jo et sted fra.

Alt i alt en rigtig god bog. Meget mere action end krimi eller agentroman, men helt sikkert mere i publikums (og forlæggerens) smag end den foregående romans jagt gennem arkiverne.

Den her var åbenbart (ifølge det altid interessante ekstramateriale) den mindst populære bog om den svenske supermand Hamilton, som da heller ikke rigtig ruller sig ud som supermand. Til gengæld fortsætter hans umoralske handlinger og skrupler over dette i lige linje fra bind fire, og det gør ham ikke specielt sympatisk. Og det fungerer faktisk ret godt.

Historien kredser om to mord, der tilsyneladende har rødder i Anden Verdenskrig, og det giver anledning til lange udredninger om det neutrale Sveriges opførsel under krigen, herunder udlevering af jøder til Gestapo, tysk våbentransport ad svenske jernbaner osv. Meget interesssant, ret spændende men ikke særlig Hamilton-agtigt. Men det var nok et klogt valg af Guillou dengang, i stedet for bare at fortsætte i samme gænge.

Så vidt jeg kan læse af bagsideteksten (som jeg jo ellers plejer at holde mig fra), er der action på drengen igen i bind seks, som jeg – ih! – ser frem til at læse.