Blades upon Books - Traditionals

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Will Power said:
The West German govt. obviously thought Baader-Meinhof were serious and not just cosmetic radicals...They and the RAF may have spouted the then trendy Marxist-Leninist line, as most do about Globalization today ;) But in many ways the faction was much more like c19th Anarchists: direct overthrow of the state by force. Unlike contemporary terror groups who target civilians, B-M and RAF carried out bank raids, kidnapping, assassination of top politicians, bankers, police, military, judges, taking over embassies, targeting military bases etc. Most of the leaders were captured, some committed 'suicide', three of them Baader, Raspe, Enßlin were found dead in their cells. 2 had shot themselves the other hanged, rather mysterious as they had been in total solitary confinement for 2 years but had apparently hidden pistols and hanging aparatus...some said it was judicial murder. Other members repented but some not, in February of this year the German govt arrested a pensioner in her late 70s in a Berlin suburb on suspicion of her having been 'sympathetic' to the movement.

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I don't remember those deaths in custody, but I wouldn't have given them a lot of thought at the time.
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Bruckmann.
 
I recently read the 4th novel in the Jack Reacher series in my attempt to re-read all the Reacher novels in the order in which they were published. In Running Blind, the FBI essentially blackmails Reacher into investigating a series of murders of women, Army veterans, who had made sexual harassment complaints against fellow soldiers during their military service. I remember being completely confused about what was going on in the book the first time I read it. Although I remembered very few details during my second read, I DID remember who the serial killer was, and there were lots of little hints throughout the book that I just didn't catch, or didn't understand, when I originally read the book.


- GT
 
black mamba said:
GT, I like the folding butter knife. Do you have peanut butter at lunch every day at work??

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Jeff, I wouldn't mind peanut butter at lunch every day, but I usually go for some fruit and cheese for most lunches.
Victorinox calls that "folding butter knife" a folding paring knife, and it's one of my favorite knives. The lack of a point on the blade is my only complaint. It's big, but light, and, as J jackknife says about Opinels, it cuts like the dickens! It even has a liner lock for the blade, even though the knife has no liners. There's a serrated version, too, that I'll probably get.


I like that pearl knife with your Bible. Here's another photo of my horn Bruckmann on a book that depends heavily on contents of the Bible. I need to check it out from the library again one of these days. I had to return it before I finished it the first time I borrowed it.


- GT
 
Here are a couple of books my wife checked out of the library, and I decided I would read them, too.
Secret Prey is about a bank CEO who gets killed in his tree stand the first day of deer season by a person unknown. There were 4 of his subordinates from the bank out hunting with him (in separate tree stands of their own) who make fine initial suspects. But the bank-related body count just keeps growing!


Certain Prey has one villain who is a hit woman with a heart of gold, and another villain who is a female lawyer who seems to have no heart at all! I've never seen a Sandford book with a cover like this one, but maybe it's because the book is a large print version. I once saw a TV movie based on this book, with the actor Mark Harmon playing police detective Lucas Davenport. My recollection is that the movie wasn't nearly as good as the book, but it had basically a simplified version of the book's plot.


- GT
 
I recently read The Art of Fielding, written by Chad Harbach. I'd recommend it, with reservations.
Pros: there's quite a bit of baseball in the novel, including a star college shortstop named Henry Skrimshander who seems destined to be chosen in the first round of the MLB draft, but then he suddenly can't control his throws any more (something that has happened to a number of pro baseball players over the course of my life as a fan; a couple of the main characters use a book titled The Art of Fielding, written by a famous MLB shortstop named Aparicio Rodriguez as their "baseball Bible" - I'm always a sucker for that kind of self-referential stuff; the fictional Westish College where most of the action in the novel takes place has a cool/weird connection to Herman Melville and Moby Dick (that's why I put a marlinspike knife in the photo of the book's cover, and see the red harpoon at the bottom of the cover?).
Cons: there are at least 5 main characters in the novel (shortstop Skrimshander, catcher Mike Schwartz, "gay, mulatto" roommate/right fielder Owen Dunne, college president Guert Affenlight, and his daughter Pella Affenlight) and it was hard for me to keep track of and "root for" all of them as they each faced at least one major challenge/setback; the sexual shenanigans in the book, especially a May/December gay romance and a psychically devastated Henry shacking up with Pella, made no sense to me; the book needed over 500 pages to tell the story, but I'd have probably enjoyed it more if it were more like 300 pages.


- GT
 
I finished the 5th novel in the Jack Reacher series a few weeks ago. It was quite interesting, especially regarding whether the woman who picked up Reacher and took him home to protect her from her abusive husband, soon to be released from prison, was actually telling the truth. There were also mysterious "watchers" and a separate team of professional "hit people" whose roles weren't fully revealed for quite a while.


- GT
 
I read this at least a month ago, but haven't posted it here until now. The Hunting Wind is the 3rd novel in Steve Hamilton's Alex McKnight series about a guy who makes his living renting cabins his father built in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Seems like quite a low-key life, but poor Alex is always getting caught up in other people's dangerous troubles!

Here's the publisher's (I think that's the source) plot description:
"Before he became a private investigator, before he served in the Detroit police, and long before he retreated to the wintry reaches of Michigan's Upper Peninsula, Alex McKnight played ball in the minor leagues. He doesn't spend much time thinking about those days, at least not until a former teammate comes looking for him.

The man is here to ask a favor. He wants Alex to help him find the woman with whom he had a brief, passionate affair three decades ago. Who is Alex to deny his friend a chance to ward off a classic midlife chill by rekindling an old flame? But as the search deepens, McKnight begins to suspect that he hasn't been told the full story. And there might just be a reason why this mysterious woman is so hard to find."

As usual, lots of unsavory characters in this book.



- GT
 
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