Looking For Rachel Wallace by Robert B. Parker
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

"I always had the sense that when I came upon her suddenly in a slightly unusual setting, a pride of trumpets ought to play alarms and flourishes. I stepped up to the bar next to her and said, 'I beg your pardon, but the very sight of you makes my heart sing like an April day on the wings of spring.'
She turned toward me and smiled and said, 'Everyone tells me that.'"
(The 'she' is Susan Silverman, of course.)

Let's begin with a brief summary of the setup of Robert B. Parker's Looking for Rachel Wallace (1980), the sixth novel in the Spenser series. An executive of a publishing company hires Spenser to protect Rachel Wallace, a writer, whose new book about "tyrants in high places who discriminate against gay women" is just about to be published. Being outspoken in her feminist views, Ms. Wallace has received death threats.

Spenser meets with Ms. Wallace: while she is a serious and earnest yet rather humorless person, Spenser persists with his trademark wisecracking, which makes the meeting pretty tense. The tension in their relationship keeps building up until Ms. Wallace disappears.

In a clear contrast with the previous five novels, where Spenser is invincible, he gets severely beaten by four assailants:

"I took a deep breath. It hurt my ribcage. I exhaled, inhaled again, inched my arms under me, and pushed myself up onto my hands and knees. My head swam. I felt my stomach tighten, and I threw up, which hurt the ribs some more. I stayed that way for a bit, on my hands and knees with my head hanging, like a winded horse."

In general, this sixth novel in the Spencer series is a tiny bit more realistic than all the previous installments. It does not read as a pastiche or parody. The psychological portrait of Ms. Wallace even has a degree of plausibility.

The usual banter between Spenser and Susan adds some humor to the novel:

"'Where does it say that cooking steaks is man's work?' I said.
Her eyes crinkled and her face brightened. 'Right above the section on what sexual activity one can look forward to after steaks and mushrooms.'
'I'll get right on the steaks,' I said."

"Chronologically enriched" readers will also notice how social mores have changed in just 41 years since the novel was published. If the book were to be published today, it would unfortunately have to be edited for several impolitic passages, to meet today's exacting standards.

Anyway, I will keep reading Spenser novels in their chronological order; I find this installment a bit better than the previous ones, so things are looking up!

Two-and-a-half stars.

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Inside Out: A Personal History of Pink Floyd (Reading Edition): by Nick Mason
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"Pink Floyd emerged from two overlapping sets of friends: one was based around Cambridge, where Roger [Waters], Syd Barrett, David Gilmour and many future Floyd affiliates hailed from. The other - Roger, Rick and myself - came together in the first year of an architecture course at the Regents Street Polytechnic in London, which is where my recollections of our common history begin."

When I talk with people about Pink Floyd, everybody seems to like them. "Yes, yes, a great band," I invariably hear. And then most people drop the names of albums, such as The Dark Side of the Moon (one of the best-selling records in the history of music) or The Wall. My problem is that I do not like these records; I find them cheap, completely commercial, and musically limited. I love Pink Floyd's early oeuvre, roughly until their Atom Heart Mother album (1970). Basically, I am only into their psychedelic and sort of avant-garde rock music.

I find Nick Mason's Inside out. A Personal History of Pink Floyd an excellent read. Mr. Mason, the band drummer, has been the only constant member of the band for their entire 56-year history. Inside Out (2017) is an extremely detailed and thorough history of the band, a comprehensive account of all their recordings, major performances, and personnel changes, all shown on the backdrop of the music scene evolution between the mid-1960s and the late 2010s.

Obviously, for me, the most interesting are the beginning chapters of the book that focus on the mid- and late 1960s, particularly the times of the intellectual underground movement centered around the Indica Bookshop and the London Free School. These were the times of joint performance with Soft Machine, the times of recording Pink Floyd's first album, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, the times when Syd Barrett was the most important member of the band.

In 1967, Syd Barrett begins to unravel, likely an effect of psychedelic drugs overuse. David Gilmour replaces Barrett in 1968, and, as Mr. Mason writes:

"[...] there was, and still is, a school of thought that Syd's departure marked the end of the 'real' Pink Floyd, a point of view I can understand, even if I don't concede it."

Then come two other great albums, A Saucerful of Secrets and Ummagumma, and the band closes their psychedelic, Barrett-influenced period with Atom Heart Mother:

"[...] an ambitious piece we have [...] recorded complete with French horns, tuba, trumpets, trombones, a solo cello and a twenty-strong choir - the kitchen sink must have been unavailable for session work."

The fans of Dark Side will find detailed analyses of individual pieces on this album. The fans of rock music presented as a theatrical spectacle will find detailed accounts of various opulently staged performances and descriptions of the band's famous stage decorations (flying pigs, etc.)

I like the author's muted, balanced, and unsensationalistic coverage of the well-publicized conflict between Roger Waters, one of the founding members, and David Gilmour. In general, I admire the author for omitting the so-called juicy details so characteristic of any famous rock band's history. Almost nothing about debauchery, and precious little about drugs. Well done!

I love Mr. Mason's admission that there existed many bands with better musicianship than Pink Floyd (oh yes; Soft Machine immediately comes to mind!) I love the generous helpings of understated, British humor, very helpful in reading the rather dense text. But most of all, I commend the author for displaying an unusually sympathetic attitude toward everybody featured in the story, toward every single person he writes about. No personal sniping; all criticisms are expressed nicely and with a dose of humor, whenever possible.

Very highly recommended book, for all fans of rock music.

Four stars.

(I also recommend my review of Saucerful of Secrets: The Pink Floyd Odyssey by Nicholas Schaffner.)


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The Judas Goat by Robert B. Parker
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

"I put on jeans, a white Levi shirt, and white Adidas Roms with blue stripes. I didn't want the goddamned limeys to think an American sleuth didn't know color coordination."

The reader will also learn how to remove blood stains from fabric:

"I got a can of Spot-lifter off the top closet shelf and sprayed the blood stains on the rug.
'That stuff work?'
'Works on my suits,' I said. 'When it dries I just brush it away.'"

Such a handy yet simple hack! Oh, and raw herring!

"Hawk bought a raw herring from the stand. The woman at the stand cut it up, sprinled with raw onions and handed it to him. Hawk tried a bite.
He smiled. 'Not bad,' he said. 'Ain't chitlins, but it ain't bad.'"

I wholeheartedly agree with Hawk! These three nice passages plus vignettes from Amsterdam, Copenhagen, and Montreal during the Olympics are, to me, the highpoints of Robert B. Parker's The Judas Goat (1978), the fifth installment in the Spenser series. The rest of the novel is utterly unremarkable.

Spenser's client is Mr. Dixon, a very rich lawyer, an international-scale genius for business and finance. His wife and two daughters were killed in a terrorist bombing in London, while he himself was horribly maimed. He hires Spenser as a bounty hunter, to deliver at least some of the terrorists dead or alive.

Most of the plot happens in London: thanks to Mr. Dixon's wide-ranging influence, not only are Spenser's activities tolerated, but also the local police share all information with him. To ensure success, Spenser hires Hawk, whom Mr. Parker introduced in the fourth installment ( Promised Land ) (It's fun to see how Hawk, painted mostly as a "baddie" in the previous novel, morphs into an almost half-good guy here.)

Spenser puts an ad in the Times to lure a member of the terrorist group to serve as the "Judas goat," an animal that leads the entire flock to slaughter (by the way, what an apt metaphor for people spreading misinformation in times of the pandemic!)

The novel is strong on brawl and violence and very weak on characterization. The terrorists are pure paper caricatures. Spenser is the usual pastiche of a witty, manly, charming, wise, and strong arm of justice. Even Susan's portrayal is weaker than in the previous novels.

Well, onto the next installment, in the - so far unsuccessful - search for quality.

One-and-three-quarter stars.

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Behind the Oval Office: Winning the Presidency in the Nineties by Dick Morris
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

"This is a report of an overwhelming experience, two years working with President Clinton as he struggled to save his presidency and win the support of the American people for a second term. But it is also the story of how a presidential campaign operates in the nineties and how a new moderate consensus has formed in America."

I did not have to look very far to find a suitable epigraph for the review of Dick Morris's Behind the Oval Office (1997). The quote uses the very first two sentences of the book. The first one is the shortest possible summary of the book, while the second one shows how tremendously things changed in just 25 years. "Moderate consensus in America" characterizes the situation in 1996 pretty well. 25 years later, in the beginning of the Twenties, things are completely different! From moderate consensus to utter polarization! Anyway, back to the book.

Dick Morris, now a political commentator and author, used to be a pollster and political consultant. Although before working as the chief strategist of President Clinton's 1996 campaign, he had also advised Bill Clinton during his term as the governor of Arkansas, he mainly worked for the Republican politicians. He explains:

"I have worked for both Democrats and Republicans, which strikes some people as the height of cynicism. I would refute that. I do have political convictions , as will become apparent in this narrative, but I am not an ideologue in search of a candidate. I am happiest when I can put my technical skills at the service of someone I admire, [...] "

The most famous word related to President Clinton's 1996 re-election campaign is Mr. Morris's concept of "triangulation." Here's the author's version of what he told Clinton:

"Triangulate, create a third position, not just in between the old positions of the two parties but above them as well. Identify a new course that accommodates the needs the Republican address but does it in a way that is uniquely yours."

(I have some trouble seeing the "above the two positions" part in Mr. Morris's election strategy; I just see it as a "mixed strategy" as known in the mathematical game theory, but then I am just a mathematician...)

The reader will find great many insightful (yet often specific to the given times in the American history) observations in the book. I like the bold statement:

"If the GOP was laying claim to 'I,' Bill Clinton was advocating 'we.'"

In my view, this is still one of the main differences between the two parties' political philosophies. On the other hand, here's what the author says about populism, as he summarizes Michael Kazin's work The Populist Persuasion:

"Democrats base their party on economic populism while Republicans use social populism instead. Kazin's basic point is that economic populism is declining, while social populism is rising. The enemy of economic populism is wealth and privilege. The enemy of social populism is the intellectual and cultural elite."

While this was true a quarter of century ago, I am not sure it is still true these days.

The reader will also find accounts of perpetual infighting in the campaign, jockeying for power and influence in advising President Clinton, and ugly intrigues like the story of Mr. Morris's memo to Bob Dole. The author's contempt for some people clearly shows despite his attempts to sound balanced and fair. What a contrast with the masterly neutral tone of Bob Woodward in The Choice that I reviewed here last week!

For me, the worst aspect of the book is the author's insistence of interlacing the interesting and worthwhile political analyses with the story of his personal downfall, caused by a flagrant form of marital infidelity. While I understand that this should have been mentioned to explain certain events, I don't believe the author should have returned to it so many times. Yet, even with that flaw, I recommend the book. A good, thought-provoking read!

Three-and-a-quarter stars.


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Never Look Away by Linwood Barclay
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

"'What happened?' I asked quickly. 'What the hell happened?'
'I told you. I looked away for a second and --'
'How could you do that? How could you take your eyes of him?'
Jan tried to speak but no words came out. I was about to ask a third time how she could have allowed this to happen, but realized I was wasting time."

Good advice: when in crowds, never look away from your child! Linwood Barclay's thriller Never Look Away (2010) begins with a half-page teaser that mentions handcuffs and alludes to sawing off someone's hand. I guess this is the author's way of alerting the reader that the plot will be full of twists and turns, and that nothing what one keeps assuming while reading the novel will end up to be true.

I love the Prologue - it may well be the most captivating ten-page passage in any thriller I have ever read. I love the earliest (already on page 7) twist in the plot: just when we sympathize with frantic parents whose four-year old son suddenly disappears in a theme park, we learn that it is not the child who has disappeared. A really masterful setup of the plot!

I find the entire Part One of the novel (until about page 70 in the hardcover edition) outstanding. The narrator, a journalist employed by a local paper, is working on a story about a business scam that involves plans to build a private prison; what's more, he discovers that the scam may be related to assuring the continued existence of the paper. He gradually gets to learn that things are not as they seem, including things about people closest to him.

The author effectively ratchets the tension and suspense in Parts Two and Three of the novel. Although I do not particularly enjoy the constantly changing direction of the plot, I am sure that many readers will be riveted by the surprising twists. However, the last two parts of the novel are, to me, a disappointment. The extremely weak ending - implausible, theatrical, and histrionic - spoils the great promise of the setup.

Unfortunately, Mr. Barclay's work follows the pattern typical for a great majority of thrillers, where a second-rate denouement ruins a good setup of the plot (in this particular case - an outstanding setup!). It is as if, having constructed a top-notch premise, the author did not have energy to work on a satisfactory conclusion.

Five stars for the beginning, barely one star for the ending. Which yields the average of

Three stars.


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The Choice: How Bill Clinton Won by Bob Woodward
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"Lots of names would be applied to Morris's strategy. The most common was 'triangulation,' an alternative to the rigid orthodoxy of either conservatism or liberalism. The political spectrum was conventionally thought of as a line running from left to right, and political figures fell somewhere along that straight line. Morris argued that an innovative leader had to move out of the linear dimension to a point at the center but also above the conventional spectrum. That point then formed a triangle with the left and right."

This quote from Bob Woodward's The Choice. How Clinton won (1996) resonates with me not only because I have a strong dislike for orthodoxy of any kind. In mathematics, I am interested in the issues of dimensionality, thus moving from a one-dimensional straight line to a two-dimensional triangle makes me happier. OK, now seriously.

I am continuing my recent reading project that could be entitled "Politics and the media in the US". Mr. Woodward's work is the fourth in the series of my reads, and the fifth one is in the works (I am including the list below the review).

The book begins with the midterm elections of November 8, 1994 - a disaster for the incumbent president, Bill Clinton, a Democrat, as the Republicans capture both the Senate and the House. The reader will find a detailed chronicle of the presidential campaign between the late fall of 1994 and May of 1996. In my view, the coverage is fair and balanced: both sides are covered with a similar degree of depth and detail, and both sides are given comparable amount of space.

I am amazed how sympathetic the portrayals of both main candidates are: Bill Clinton's and Bob Dole's. They come across as well-intentioned, yet very human in their weaknesses and limitations. The faults of both sides and their errors in strategy and tactics are shown with quite some degree of sympathy. The book is also very well written; one of the examples of the literary skill may be how the author implicitly ridicules some minor candidates, without really saying anything negative about them.

On the Democratic side, the author focuses on the critical role of Dick Morris, Clinton's chief political strategist. Mr. Woodward writes:

"Morris was exultant. He had broken the system. He had broken Panetta, and Ickes, and Stephanopoulos. He figured now he could get control of the White House staff, place his people in key positions."

Despite Mr. Morris's ruthlessness in prosecuting his election strategy, he is also painted with a somewhat sympathetic brush. On the Republican side, the glowing portrayal of General Colin Powell, the almost-candidate, stands out, and the vignette about his extended decision-making process is riveting.

The Afterword, written in 1997, is very interesting. True, it benefits from hindsight, yet while the analysis of the election results is brief, I find it insightful. The reader will find there Mr. Woodward's list of ten political fundamentals for a winning presidential campaign.

The Choice is a masterclass work in political reportage. An interesting, captivating read, yet - at the same time - detailed, deep, and comprehensive. It manages to avoid most trivialities, and focuses instead on the important things - the so-called "Big Picture."

Four-and-a-half stars.

Other books on the US presidential elections and politics that I have reviewed on Goodreads:
H.R. Haldeman, The Ends of Power,
Lesley Stahl, Reporting Live,
Tom Rosenstiel, Strange Bedfellows.


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Promised Land by Robert B. Parker
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

"'[...] She believes some very destructive things. What's that Frost line, 'He will not go behind his father's saying'?'
' 'Mending Wall,' ' Susan said.
'Yeah, she's like that [...]' "

Here's another one for our favorite poetry lover, Spenser. Not only does he have an opportunity to dazzle Susan - as well as the reader - with his familiarity with poems of Robert Frost, but in this novel he also displays superb boxing skills in several fights with bad guys. Love of poetry, professional-level boxing prowess, intelligence, wit, and extraordinary manly charm do not exhaust the list of Spenser's superhuman features. But first about the plot of Promised Land (1976), the fourth novel in Robert B. Parker's Spenser series.

A businessman hires Spenser to find his wife, who ran away from him and from her three children. As soon as Spenser begins working on the case, we meet Hawk. This is his first appearance; he will become one of the main characters in the series. The reader, who has never read later Spenser novels, will likely develop, at least at the beginning, somewhat negative impression of Hawk's character.

Before I start ridiculing the novel, let me first say what I like - not much, so it will go fast. I like the author's realistic account of the marital problems that made the businessman's wife run away. I also like the portrayal of Susan Silverman. In particular, I like her words

" 'What kind of man does the kinds of things you do? What kind of man gets up in the morning and showers and shaves and checks the cartridges in his gun?' "

All the rest is bad. Or very bad. Like the author's attempts to legitimize Spenser's godlike powers to judge people on their actions and to absolve them of their wrongdoings. Like the infantile take on 1970s feminism. Like the embarrassing pop psychology bits. Like the totally implausible plot developments, such as, for instance, Spenser arranging illegal deals with police and FBI.

It is now time to disclose the magnitude of my ignorance. Promised Land won the Edgar Award for the best novel in 1977. This is the first time my opinion differs so much from that of the literary critics. I do not understand how anyone can see greatness in this book. I must have missed a lot of good stuff when reading the novel; it's either this or senility...

I will keep reading Spenser's novels in order in which they have been written since I am curious when the author finds the voice of the later installments, which tend to be much more to my liking.

One-and-three-quarter stars.

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