Whose Body? by Dorothy L. Sayers
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I’ve been looking forward to diving into the Sayers Whimey stories. Gathered most of the volumes first. Now I’ll have to figure what to do with them. I might give another a try.

I found the writing style to be more than excessive with many pages of extended narrative or dialogue that was ridiculously longer than the cuteness i think Sayers was intending. The excessive didn’t add to the story, but seemed to be parts of other stories never realized. In fat, this first book in the series, is written as if there were many volumes before it.

Most of the characters are interesting, but none I found that intriguing or fascinating or drawn to want to read another book about. The settings are pretty sketchy in the writing, which is odd in that the setting is so important to the story.

The mystery has a pretty good beginning and a well written explanation in a narrative layout that could have been far better plotted.

Bottom line: I don’t recommend this book. 4 out of ten points.

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The Great Crash 1929 by John Kenneth Galbraith
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Galbraith’s account of the 1929 crash of Wall Street tells many tales of those who gambled and lost again and again and again. The book lays out his view of the entire history which lines better with known facts than what is usually presented.

Galbraith starts with an overview that helps coordinate the rest of the book. The rest follows in mostly a linear history of the before, during and after. The book is well written, which can help those not knowing much about the whole financial world find the story easy to understand. This is actually a very complex happening that Galbraith does an excellent job of presenting. There is only one point near the end, as Galbraith is trying to make a point about the financial outcome of the crash that he gets a bit bogged down.

Overall, this is a dynamic book that sharply presents a complex tale in a very readable volume

About Florida: Here Galbraith backs so much I’ve read that Florida contributed mightily to the eventual crash with all of the real estate schemes that were happening at the time.

About this edition: When i picked up this book the cover was already a bit chipped away. As was a bit of the back cover. After purchasing and taking to the car, i pulled it from the book of books and parts of the cover came apart. Soon the whole cover had come to pieces. Apparently Time Magazine published this 54 years ago. Somehow this book stayed together until I pulled it from the shelf. All I can figure is that the Florida heat and humidity and air conditioning of the store got hold of the brittle board cover and back cover. The attached photo I took of the book cover is the best i could do to present it. I couldn’t scan the cover due to how it came apart.

Bottom line: i recommend the book. Ten out of Ten points.

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Heiress: The Rich Life Of Marjorie Merriweather Post by William Wright
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

One of the best biographies I’ve ever read. The author, Wright, has done a magnificent job of objectively portraying Post’s life with a flare of imagination and insight. The writing is crisp, clear and thorough.

The first part of the book does a terrific job of telling the reader just who and what C.W. Post was. From there it whisks off to lay out the rest of Marjorie Post’s life. What an attentive reader will pick up is the drive of C.W. to create and be a genius. The same was all there for Marjorie to continue genius creations. Instead, as Wright tells us, Marjorie took all of her ingenuity to create massive parties and monster sized materialism. It saddened me to realize what a waste Marjorie made of her life. There is so much she could have done.

After the ’29 crash, Post’s life becomes mundane as her parties and structures move along. The writer does a great job here and later as she ages and the parties continue. Wright intersperses the party tales with detailed descriptions of the grand rooms involved and including pages written by daughter, Dina, and granddaughter, Mawee.

Later in the ’30s the story gets very interesting as Marjorie & husband Davies find themselves in Russia during one of the worst times in history to be there. The writer does a yeoman’s job of negotiating the narrow shoals of illustrating Marjorie’s party frenzy and Stalin’s political party executions.

There are plenty of photos and even a breakdown of Post’s staff in her later years which really helps in understanding who is who and where they belonged. I also like the little image that introduces each chapter. Each thumbnail is part of a larger photo in the gallery provided that is easy to check and understand what period of time the chapter is about. The book also clearly keeps you apprised of where you are in time throughout.

Involving Florida: The Mar-A-lago story is all here. Very interesting from construction to its fate at the time of publication in 1978. You’ll have to go elsewhere for the story of the later exchanges of the property involving the Federal government, others and, eventually, to saving the structure & full restoration by Donald Trump.

Also included are the times at the mansion with Marjorie, daughter Dina Merrill, etc. and the society stars of Palm Beach. Along with the issues of the lock & bolted closed Palm Beach society. Better handled in short prose by Wright than the extended non-objective writing by Ron Kessler later.

Bottom line: I Highly recommend this book. 10 of 10 points.

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Blood on the Divide by William W. Johnstone
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This second book of the “Preacher” series was roaring along to a top rating, until it became obvious someone forgot to put on the brakes. This book spans years and as the book lingers the reader has to wonder why. There were fine opportunities to draw the book to a close, but each time the dreaded Winter comes and the book is prolonged another 50 odd pages. Was this a request by the publisher for more pages? Did Johnstone (or whoever) not know when to stop? Was this just a missed opportunity for a good story? Or, more likely, was this an attempt to parry Michener with a sprawling story of the west?

It mostly works, if a lot can be looked past.

My larger suspicion is that this was a book with too many hands in it. It seems to me that it was, at of the time of the publication of this book, that Johnstone started pulling ghost writers in. This is based upon the amount of books with the Johnstone moniker on it and the uneven writing trend that is evident in the early 9os.

In this case, the book is well written throughout. Especially the sprinkling of flowery wording of settings that seem tacked into the places it appears. Other places the wording of travels have a certain feel and others a different approach.

One thing I love about the book are the few sprinkled bits of history of places and persons. Again, the writing of these are different from the whole, but the context is wonderful. This is the only Johnstone of the 50 or so I’ve read that has so much history in it. So who added it? I wonder just how many worked on this one book.

Then, there is the inexcusable. At one point a bad guy is shot in the head. I read it and re-read it and re-re-re-read it. Yep, a “giant hole” was placed in his head. The next page this character is talking and talking again. This happens when there are too many cooks in the kitchen.

The characters are, as always, the best part of the book. Though one bad guy travels from afar in the fray which makes no sense at all. Except to make it easier for the writer(s) to wrap up the story. It’s an unfortunate move and another problem with the book.

As much as I otherwise like this book I have to…

Bottom line: I don’t recommend this book. 4 out of ten.

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The Breakers: A Century of Grand Traditions by Charles Lockwood
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Author Lockwood does a fine job of laying out the history of Henry Flagler’s creation, ‘The Breakers’, with a ton of photos to help tell the story. Though this is a Public Relations piece for the hotel and certain parts of the story are left out, the story is otherwise complete and rich in details involving architecture, interior design and even the scheduling of tasks in a 24 hour day at the hotel.

The writing is very good. Lockwood obviously has a firm grip as to architectural terminology. He weaves it well into the history and timeline of the hotel. His writing of the captions is also above average for a book of this sort. One trouble is the layout and captions in a couple places.

As mentioned, there is an interesting few pages involving 24 hours of the hotel in a timeline. Included are all sorts of tidbits as to how a hotel is run and specifically what happens at The Breakers. A second time line is by years involving significant dates of The Breakers. Both of these will greatly aid the reader in understanding when and where so much happened. Both of these are outstanding additions.

Bottom line: I recommend this book. 10 out of 10 points.

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The Flame Tree: Florida in the Fabulous Days of the Royal Poinciana Hotel by Theodore Pratt
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is a tale more interesting in the story of developer Henry Flagler and his Royal Poinciana, than of the two main characters. The story is simple with lush details of early Palm Beach County, Florida.

Pratt continues laying our Florida history and Palm beach County with this story of a couple from Ohio who finds themselves trying to live life as one of the greatest architectural wonders of the world, the Royal Poinciana hotel, comes about. The story of the relationship and all of the troubles with it are a bit bland. Most interesting is the female’s obsession with the hotel. The obsession paves the way for Pratt to fully describe the hotel and it’s workings.

An oddity is other construction Flagler does in the area as the story takes place, like the Palm Inn and his home, Whitehall. Not a mention in the book. I guess it helped Pratt’s focus.

The characters are pretty standard for a story like this. Mostly well written, with simpler sketches of everybody else – Unless it involves the hotel.

I’d suggest the book for those interested in planning or the history of Palm Beach County. All others will find a weak story draped with way too much about everything else.

Bottom line: I recommend it with conditions above. 5 out of ten points.

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The Case of the Runaway Corpse by Erle Stanley Gardner
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This Mason novel is steeped in the typical rushed antics as other Mason books as though Mason has no other case going on. One thing different are the couple dozen pages of legal back and forth. The first set is overly lengthy for reasons given in the book. But would have been best to edit a page or two. Editing that and needless repetition of many story points.

Otherwise this is a solid murder mystery that makes little sense until the end. Also included are solid characters. The settings are also very good as these are important to the story.

Again, I believe this would have been a better story trimming it ten pages or so. It’s still a good book despite the excess.

Bottom line: I recommend this book. 6 out of ten points.

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A Talent for Genius: The Life and Times of Oscar Levant by Sam Kashner
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The authors of ‘A Talent for Genius’ do a rip roaring job of extensively unloading the very interesting life of Oscar Levant. Probably anyone who does not know of Levant would wonder why anyone would read 431 pages about an obscure wit. Those people should not read this book. I’ll go so far to add those who remember him fondly should read, at least, one of Levant’s book prior to reading this book.

This is a terrific biography! One of the best things of this book is that the reader can always know when they are in time. Dates and tears are often detailed and even other goings on at the time to further help the reader follow the Levant story. That becomes very important as nearly every year is covered and following Levant’s schedules are critical to understand why and how his life comes apart.

I admire the work of recording Levant’s early life. Most biographies leave that to a chapter or so and move one. This one does an outstanding job of placing the reader in the setting. All of which becomes important again later in his story.

As I’m most interested in Levant’s interaction with the brilliant wits of his time, I was very pleased with how much is covered of the Algonquin Round Table gang. Even better to read of stories of the gang I had never read before. Loved the writers balance of what Levant actions were and then the reactions of the affected. This is especially true of covering the Gershwin parts. There are many perspectives covered. All very enlightening.

The authors then go out of their way to write out the blow by blow story of Levant and his drug addiction and deterioration of his mental health. It’s riveting, though a bit clunky at times. I get the idea that editing this part was difficult with so much coming and going and coming and going.

There are a few dozen photographs included. Wish there had been more. Also with the outcome of the rest of the Levant family had been included. I know daughter Marcia died young and wonder if Levant’s troubles transferred to his children. History and from what i have read and experienced it typical does.

Bottom line: For those familiar with Levant- This is a book you must read. For those unfamiliar: Study first! 9 out of ten points.

Overall this is a terrific work with obvious evidence of tremendous work.

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The First Commandment by Brad Thor
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I’ve had trouble connecting to a Brad Thor novel since I first started reading them about ten years ago. After a seven year hiatus, I’m trying again and this is the second I’ve read this past month and i think i’ve figured my trouble with Thor – His novel are highly unrealistic with a very comic book quality.

In that i used to read comic books, I’ve found that extremely difficult these days as I find science fiction of any kind impossible to read. The illogical aspects gets to me. Such illogic is prevalent through this novel. Some nearly super evil villain out to destroy, who can transport himself in ways never explained. A miniature person with giant dogs that holds the secrets of the world. A secret underground private military unit that monitors the world. All more than too much. Worse is Thor tries to wrap reality in it all.

If any of that can be swallowed the rest is would be a really good tale if not for the many plot holes. How so many characters get from place to place was a problem I had with Thor’s previous book and here it is again. There are time and how transportation is done that just don’t make sense. These issues have to make sense to for the novel to work in that there are time constraints in both stories.

I could go on with further plot hole issues, but suffice it to write, the other troubles written of above are all part of the plot holes. For me, there are far too many and, again, the story resembles a comic book tale than a realistic one.

To bad about the story, because the characters are terrific, in a comic book sense. Settings are at times well written and others nearly absent.

Bottom line: I don’t recommend this book. 4 out of ten points.

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Takedown by Brad Thor
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

‘Takedown’ is the best of the six Brad Thor novels I’ve read so far. It’s more than a bit comic booky and I could have seen this as a film with Ray Harryhausen special effects. Reality is handled fast and loose.

The story is bad guys vs good guys. The bad guys are mighty ambitious and accomplish their goals. Though, how they pull off such an extensive set of actions is not explained and I’m not sure how a writer would without adding another thousand pages.

Setting that aside as being the most comic booky, I can better accept the activity involving the good guy and various government staff working to figure out and go after the bad guys. That is, if you accept nearly the entire are of Manhattan void of people. As good guys chase bad guys, there is an unreal lack of obstacles in the way, considering what the bad guys do. There is also an unreal set of circumstances as to where secret areas are and how these are hidden.

Despite the fantasy the story is a rollicking good time of death and mayhem. Harvath, as usual, makes a great hero aided by a group of fellow soldiers that go after the bad guys. Thor does a great job layering the story as all sorts of things happen simultaneously and nothing goes as planned for anyone. Lots of dead ends, surprises, secret bad guys and an enormous amount of gunfire.

The characters are mostly well written, though some were hard to figure out or care about. The setting, critical to the story, is written loosely. Best to know a bunch about New York City before reading.

Bottom line: I recommend this book. 6 out of ten points.

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