White Fang (Jack London)

Henry and Bill are mushing with their dog team in the frozen snow-blanketed wilds of the frosty Northland. Six dogs, six fish, except they're one fish short. How can that be? Then, seven dogs, and how can THAT be? Then five, then four, then three.

There are starving wolves about, a dozen at least, stalking them, growing hungrier by the hour. One more dog is lured by a she-wolf and devoured, along with Bill. Soon, only Henry remains. The pack disperses, eventually only the she-wolf Kiche and her mate, Old One Eye, remain. Eventually, there are five more ... little bundles of fur; one, the fiercest of the litter, as gray as the old one.

He is White Fang. In time, only he and his mother are left, the other pups claimed by famine and the old one by a hungry lynx. The older he gets, the braver he becomes, first breaking through that white wall of light at the end of the den, then experiencing the thrill of his first kill, the deception of water's surface, and the value of caution. He grows, and he learns.

Comes the time when they stumble upon Gray Beaver, the Indian who once owned Kiche, and who now reclaims her, along with White Fang, as his own. Adjusting to a domesticated life, he encounters Lip-Lip, a bully pup who uses him as his personal whipping boy. When Kiche is sent away as debt repayment, White Fang loses his personal protector.

Through the harsh realities of living with humans, White Fang develops his values – devotion to his master, obedience, protection of his master's child, bravery and dominance. When Grey Beaver succumbs to the clench of alcohol, White Fang has to a deal with two new masters, one cruel, the other every canine's dream.

White Fang and master move to California, where he proves his worth to his master's father, and a female sheepdog to whom he offers his troth. Life, as they say, is good at last.

Jack London writes about White Fang through the use of anthropomorphism, aka personification, in which human qualities are conferred upon non-human creatures. Thus, we are able to discern the wolf-dog's state of mind through its very thoughts. This technique adds so much to the story, helping us identify with the animal character instead of simply observing it from afar.

It was most enjoyable to re-read White Fang, having first read it when I was a lad in intermediate school. It was gripping then, and it’s gripping today.

Although the publication date of this eBook edition is noted as 2012, White Fang was first published as a 1906 serial in Outing magazine. It is a companion novel to Jack London's Call of the Wild.

White Fang (2012)

Jack London

Amazon Digital Services, Kindle edition (.99 list)

ASIN: B0084AVKZ2

Fast Track (Lee Goldberg)

It's a world you and I probably will never see. At least, not me. It's a world exploding with noise and excitement, a battle of egos and muscle, a world of high competition. It's street racing – down and dirty, sometimes in the open, more likely hidden from view.

Lee Goldberg takes us into that world, where 20-something car whiz Katie Reed plies her magic at her garage in Reseda, nestled in the San Fernando Valley north of Los Angeles. Katie's lover is Eric Visnjic, a racer who just happens to be a cop, a detective in the Los Angeles Police Dept.

Mike Cassidy delivers pizza by day, zipping around town on his Vespa scooter. But by night, he transforms into a racing stud, mixing it up in a world of hot cars, muscle machines with names like Mustang Shelby GT500, Nissan 370Z, Camaro SS, Mazda RX-8 and Subaru WRX. He hooks up with a mobster who agrees to build him a racer.

The stakes and risks are higher now. One loss and Katie can lose her garage to foreclosure. But she knows how to stall that, how to play the bank rep. Then, into her life comes an angel by the name of Nicole Devereaux, rich and hot to trot (in a car race, that is). Lots of cash, wanting to buy a car, willing to let Katie inflate the costs.

It's never a good idea to mix business with pleasure, but Eric, Katie and Mike seem to thrive doing just that – especially Mike, whose talents tangle with Eric's cop business.

Fast Track is action-packed novella based on a Goldberg screenplay, and a "can't put down" exciting read, with explosive racing scenes.  It would make a good movie. In fact, it IS a movie, available at Amazon.com as an instant view, or on DVD.

See you later, I've gotta go check out the movie now.

Fast Track (2013)

Lee Goldberg

Publisher: Adventures in Television ($2.99 digital list)

ASIN: B00BDB5Z1O

Building a Life Out of Words (Shawn Smucker)

With a name like Smucker's, it's gotta be good. Right? Not necessarily, not if you're Shawn Smucker. He was feeling like a nobody after he returned to the United States from a stay in England, moving from a trendy London suburb to small town Pennsylvania. Where he was once a small but successful fish in a large pond, he was now a small and insignificant fish in a small pond.

What to do? Then, his aunt asked him to help her write her life story. And it changed his life. If he had taken a $15,000 job that was offered to him earlier, a job that would have alleviated his money woes, and spent three months away from home, he might have missed his chance to become a writer.

So 35-year-old Shawn Smucker is now a writer. And as such, he talks to us about turning points in his life, his inner revelations, his battles with depression and self-doubt, his mornings spent in a local cafe writing until lunchtime, then going home for lunch. Come again? Say that again about going home for lunch?

As a writer myself, I can identify with some of his thoughts, many of which I formulated on my own over the years. What I don't care for is his inclusion of verbatim articles by others – blog entries, primarily. That niggles at me. His falling back on the words of others to rationalize his philosophy on writing somehow seems like cheating. I got the book to read about how HE coped with his new life work, not how others did. Quotes, okay; not entire blog essays.

For a professional writer, Smucker sure has a problem using the correct word at times. He uses "further" incorrectly; he uses the subjective "I" when he should use the objective "me," and he doesn't capitalize “Realtor” (shame, shame, that's a big no-no, a trademark violation).

Actually, I think that instead of turning this into a small book, he should have run it as a series in his (now discontinued) blog. Building a Life Out of Words was offered free from Amazon.com on Facebook.

The takeaways from Building a Life Out of Words: Commit, work hard, be creative, persevere, promote, develop friendships, and court good-luck opportunities. Hey! That's what my boss told me at my going-away luncheon when I left my job in 1977 to open my own PR consultancy at age 32.

Nothing is new. The more things change, the more they remain the same.

Building a Life Out of Words (2012)

Shawn Smucker

Amazon Digital Services, Inc. (ebook, $3.00 list)

ASIN: B007JWIM16

Temporarily Closed for Maintenance

Bitter Nothings (Vicki Tyley)

I'd been waiting quite some time for Vicki Tyley's newest book to be published, after finishing Fatal Liaison more than a year ago. To confess, I had forgotten to check – until a week or so ago when seeing Ms. Tyley comment on one of my recent reviews poked me in my tickle file memory.

Graphic designer Dervla Johns' half-sister and half-brother are found dead in their beds, along with their mother, Lucinda. The police have a prime suspect – her father, Warren. Dervla tangles with the investigating officer, Det. Sr. Sgt. Todd Gleeson, more than once before they settle into an uneasy truce.

Characters keep popping up, making it a little difficult to keep track of who's who, unless one pays attention. In fact, I had to make a list as I went along. Get ready to be introduced to a list of suspects galore: Warren, of course, but there's also Lucinda's ex-husband, Warren's secret lover, his personal assistant, Dervla's druggie half-sister and her "toxic" boyfriend, or perhaps, another of Warren's secret lovers.

As if that weren't enough, Dervla has to cope with others – her two warring brothers who are constantly at each other's throats, her sleazy ex-fiancé whose zipper is always open at the ready, her father's PR consultant who's a good friend in an abusive relationship, and a freelance reporter who's playing her for an exclusive.

Unable to reconcile answers she's given (or more accurately, not given) to the myriad questions effervescing in her mind, Dervla plays detective on her own. She juggles matters and her thoughts, and finds out a few things for us to mull over.

Once again, Vicky Tyley had me guessing, right from the start, trying to figure out who dunnit. I've enjoyed reading all her books, paying particular attention to her maturing style. And in the process, I've learned quite a bit about contemporary Australian society.

Bitter Nothings (2012)

Vicki Tyley

Patmay Press, Kindle Edition ($0.99 list)

ASIN: B00A9652JE

Revenge (A Travis Mays Novel) (Mark Young)

A former California cop with the Santa Rosa Police Department (hey, what a coincidence, same as the author), Travis Mays teaches criminology at Washington State University, just over the border from his summer cabin in Idaho.

Travis meets river guide Jessie White Eagle, whose father, Frank, is the Nez Perce tribal Chief of Police and whose brother, Tommy, an attorney, had gone missing two days ago. As they challenge the Lochsa River rapids, they are unaware that they are being watched by a killer named Creasy.

We learn he's after Travis – a revenge stalk reaching 'way back to Travis's days as a cop. One by one, Creasy's taking out those who worked with Travis when a beautiful informant (someone he'd fallen in love with) was killed.

Having left law enforcement behind because of this, Travis demurs when Chief Frank asks him to help with the case. When circumstances change, Frank pulls strings and Travis joins the investigation. It's a tough row to hoe, battling obnoxious FBI, juggling emotional involvement, puzzling over the whys of the case.

In Revenge, Young utilizes the same ol' plot outline you've seen time and again: Disillusioned cop quits force, becomes a private eye or teacher, gets pulled reluctantly into a case, has to cope with other antagonistic lawmen and a leak in their midst, and solves the crime. Inside of that is the ubiquitous boy meets girl factor.

In his acknowledgements, Young thanks his wife for her careful editing. I regret to say she missed a few things.

Several errors popped out at me: (1) The Nez Perce Tribe Police Department's female secretary is named Francis. Francis is a man's name; her name should have been Frances, with an "e." (2) Quoting from the story, "Sam [Travis's dog] came over and rested his head on Sam's leg." It should be Travis' leg. (3) And of course, there are quite a few of the ubiquitous (and in my opinion, unprofessional) "further/farther," "your/you're," and "lay/lie" wrong word choices.

Other than that, Revenge is pretty tightly written and moves along at a nice clip. The plot is well-thought out, the characters believable, and the conclusion very satisfying.

Revenge is Mark Young's first Travis Mays mystery. At least, it will be the first if he comes out with another.

Revenge (2011)

Mark Young

Self-Published by Author (Paperback, $12.99 list)

ISBN-13: 978-0983266310

Wool Omnibus Edition (Hugh Howey)

There's a gray, dusty world outside the hermetically sealed Silos, where mankind has hidden itself since the world went to hell. The title, "Wool," refers to ... well, you'll find out, but only if you read the book, because you won't hear it from me.

Wool

For Holston, Silo 18's sheriff, it's a dreary world – a post-apocalyptic world. A world where children were permitted only if you won a lottery after someone has died, a world where children's books were the only ones to survive the uprising 150 years ago. Holston's tired, a broken man, and he wants to go outside, out of the silo.

There is a routine when someone goes out, a job to do: Suit up in protective gear, exit through the airlock, scrub the viewing lenses, admire your work, and become part of the "out-group."

But before he goes, he reflects on life three years previous, when his wife, Allison, was still with him. That's when they learned there wasn't just one uprising, there were many, and that the computer servers had been wiped clean. Allison had gone outside, convinced she'd uncovered a great, big secret. Today, Holston follows.

Proper Gauge

Mayor Jahns enjoys knitting; it calms her, serving as a reminder and allegory to the continuing  survival of each successive silo generation. Today, she and Deputy Marnes are descending deep down into the depths of Silo 18 to interview Juliette (she prefers "Jules"), a shift foreman in Mechanical on the short list to replace Sheriff Holston.

Stairs, stairs, and more stairs. Spiraling ever downward, 140 levels. Hard enough to descend, torture to walk back up. A short respite midway down to talk with Juliette's father. Then a stop at IT that doesn't go well. Jules? She's naturally reluctant.

The up-down silo adventure turns out to be more than just a walk. It becomes a retrospective journey through Mayor Jahn's life – a treacherous endeavor with society-altering implications.

Casting Off

Six days after becoming sheriff, Juliette is about to step out of the argon airlock into the world outside. But first, we go back a few days to learn why this is happening. It starts with her trying to understand why her predecessor went outside.

(By the way, there is a subtle reminder that everything ... EVERYTHING ... that appears on your computer screen at work is stored on the company's hard drive. There is NO privacy. Everything you write or read or view is the property of the company. Be forewarned.)

And then, she finds herself having to deal with death – two deaths, actually ... a murder, and a suicide. Not exactly a comfortable orientation to her new job. In addition, the new acting mayor, Bernard Holland, is a meddler to the highest degree. With help, Jules uncovers a computer program that validates what Holston and Allison had uncovered, the reason why they ended up becoming outside cleaners.

Things go from bad to worse, and we discover why Jules is sentenced to cleaning and about to step outside. Will she be vindicated? Maybe.

The Unraveling

Something different happened during Juliette's cleaning. Sketchy speculations are dribbled by messenger porters, creating whispers in their wakes. The news? It's stunning, all right – unprecedented. Juliette had made sure of that before stepping through the portal into the world outside.

There are other silos, of course, and Jules is perhaps the first from Silo 18 to enter another, a silo where "Others" are strewn around, Others who had tried unsuccessfully to reenter. The silo is musty, dark, and abandoned. Yet it feels like ... home. She sets about making it MORE home. But, she is not alone. Solo is there.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, an uprising is simmering on the back burner down there in Silo 18's Mechanical. Soon, the dissatisfaction boils over, with workers rising up the levels to confront IT.

The Stranded

The battle has been joined; things aren't going well – IT has recovered from the initial surge, Mechanical is on the run, having fallen back and barricading themselves from counterattack. They are forced to defend their turf for weeks, unaware that IT has something drastic in store for them. Still, the fight rages on.

Back at neighboring Silo 17, Jules works to repair its systems and make it livable and life-sustaining once again. That includes establishing communication between the two silos, between her and Lukas, one of Bernard's chosen ones. Oddly enough, it involves a lot of jury-rigged "deep sea diving."

We learn who was responsible for sending the world into its apocalyptic tailspin, and now we know why. At least pretty much so. But maybe that doesn't matter much anymore, for Juliette has found something – a new hope.

* * * * *

Little by little, one story after another, Howey paints an intriguing picture of life in the silos, the hierarchy of its people, filling in the details of history like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. There's lots to be discovered about that isolated society. After all, ideas are contagious.

Wool Omnibus (aka The Silo Saga) brings together the first five books in Hugh Howley's Wool series. The sixth through eighth books (a prequel trilogy – First Shift, Second Shift and Third Shift) have already been published (Shift Omnibus), and the ninth and final installment (Dust, probably in a series as well) is planned. Film rights to the entire series have been sold to 20th Century Fox.

Wool – Omnibus Edition (2012)

Hugh Howey

CreateSpace  (ebook edition, $5.99)

ISBN-13: 978-146998420