Murder Under a Red Moon by Harini Nagendra: A review

This is the second book in the Bangalore Detectives Club series and the second book by Harini Nagendra that I have read. The books feature newly wed amateur sleuth Kaveri Murthy. The events of this book take place a few weeks after Kaveri has solved her first case and become well-known as a lady detective in 1920s Bangalore.

As the new bride of the local doctor, Kaveri is trying to work out her relationship with her mother-in-law and so when the mother-in-law's cousin, Shanti Sharma, wants to enlist her help in finding out who has been embezzling money from her husband's factory, Kaveri feels she cannot refuse. But when she goes to the factory at the appointed time to meet with Mr. Sharma, she finds him dead. Not only has he been murdered but he is holding a chain belonging to Kaveri in his hands.

Obviously, someone is trying to implicate Kaveri in his murder, but why? And who could it be? Has Shanti rid herself of an unwanted husband and set up Kaveri to take the fall? Or could it be her stepdaughter Chitra who was being forced against her will to get married? And then there is that very suspicious swami who Kaveri believes cannot be trusted. There seems to be no shortage of possible suspects.

Kaveri is Hindu but she has become good friends with the local policeman, a Muslim named Ismail. Nagendra manages to include colorful descriptions of the culture of the region and to explore the differences between Hinduism and Islam which later caused so much conflict. 

She is able to reveal the culture and the differences through her descriptions of the people whom Kaveri enlists in her "posse" which includes such diverse people as a prostitute and a policeman's wife. There are even a couple of street urchins who seem to have appointed themselves as her helpers. 

Kaveri has also assumed the role of teacher to help her women neighbors learn how to read and write. There are, in fact, several subplots playing out here which added interest and complications to the main story. 

In the Bangalore of the 1920s, anti-British sentiment is on the rise, the women's suffrage movement is growing in influence, and a religious leader's sway over his followers continues to expand. It makes for an unpredictable and dangerous atmosphere, but Kaveri is undeterred! Her curiosity and her determination will not let her give up on any mystery until she has solved it. I foresee an interesting future as a detective for her.

Poetry Sunday: The Unknown by E.O. Laughlin

Tomorrow is our Memorial Day, a day to remember those who are no longer with us, especially those who fell in battle. There are, of course, many quite well-known poems that were written for this occasion. This one is perhaps not so well-known but it spoke to me when I chanced to find it in my search for a poem to feature today and so here it is. I hope you find it meaningful.

The Unknown

by E. O. Laughlin

I do not understand...
    They bring so many, many flowers to me–
Rainbows of roses, wreaths from every land;
    And hosts of solemn strangers come to see
My tomb here on these quiet, wooded heights.
    My tomb here seems to be
One of the sights.

The low-voiced men, who speak
    Of me quite fondly, call me "The Unknown":
But now and then at dusk, Madonna-meek,
    Bent, mournful mothers come to me alone
And whisper down–the flowers and grasses through–
    Such names as "Jim" and "John"...
I wish they knew.

And once my sweetheart came.
    She did not–nay, of course she could not–know,
But thought of me and crooned to me the name
    She called me by–how many years ago?
A very precious name. Her eyes were wet,
    Yet glowing, flaming so...
She won't forget.

This week in birds - #551

A roundup of the week's news of birds and the environment: 

A Black-throated Sparrow feeding on the ground, photographed during a trip to West Texas. 

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Super Typhoon Mawar hit Guam this week, creating devastation over a wide area.

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A breakthrough agreement to protect the drought-strained Colorado River was reached this week.

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Orcas seem to have finally had it with us humans and they are fighting back! It started off the coast of Spain and Portugal and the behavior may be spreading.

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The current iteration of the Supreme Court seems intent on destroying our hard-won environmental protections. This week it was the Clean Water Act.

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The Bahamas are facing an existential threat as the sea levels continue to rise.

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It seems that climatologists are finding this hurricane season particularly unpredictable.

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Attempting to climb Mount Everest has always been a perilous adventure but this week has been particularly deadly.

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I confess a fondness for these (to me) lovely spiders, maybe partially because they are persecuted. They are Joro spiders and if you see one, please do not harm it.

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Deep-sea mining poses significant hazards for the environment and these activists are trying to stop it. 

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Recycling plastics, thought to be a good thing, can itself carry some unintended consequences.

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Recent discoveries in northern Guatemala suggest that the ancient Maya civilization was far more advanced than previously thought.

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Meanwhile in southern Mexico, a controversial megaproject known as the Maya Train is generating significant protests.

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An armored mouse? Nature is full of marvels.

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Reducing the plastic pollution of the oceans may actually be easier than one might think.

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The spring migration of hummingbirds is just about complete and the little guys are shifting into breeding mode.

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Toronto's Don River was pronounced dead in 1969, but thankfully its obituary was a bit premature.

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We've all probably heard of saber-toothed tigers but it seems there were other saber-toothed critters wandering across the Permian landscapes.

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Certain countries are believed to be most likely to become dangerously hot during the next century.

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I love toads and I hope you do, too. They are indeed "heroes of the garden."

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America's need for green energy is running up against the need to preserve and conserve areas that are rich in ice-age fossils.

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Solar farms may solve one problem by creating others.

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Zoo Miami managed to offend the entire nation of New Zealand by allowing members of the public to pet their kiwi. And why in the world would they have ever thought that was a good idea?

The Rabbit Hutch by Tess Gunty: A review

Set in the dying (fictional) town of Vacca Vale, Indiana, The Rabbit Hutch introduces us to four teenagers who share an apartment in the housing development officially named La Lapiniere Affordable Housing Complex but more familiarly known as "The Rabbit Hutch." They are Blandine, Jack, Todd, and Malik, all 18 or 19 and recently aged out of the state's foster care system. 

As a bit of an aside, we also get to know of a plan to develop an area adjoining Vacca Vale, a place called Chastity Valley. As a further aside, we learn about a child star from a 1960s sitcom. But always at the center of the story is Blandine, once known as Tiffany.

Blandine is a brilliant and talented high school dropout who is fixated on the lives of female mystics and saints. The events of her story take place over five days from July 15 through July 19 in some unstated year. The book is divided into five parts and the various chapters in each part are told from the perspective of one of the characters.

We see Blandine as very much alone in the world in spite of all the people around her. Moreover, she is obsessed with the idea of saving that world. She is essentially a very idealistic and hopeful character. Her hero is Hildegard of Bingen, "prophet, composer, botanist, abbess, theologian, doctor, preacher, philosopher, writer, saint, Doctor of the Church. A veritable polymath." She strives to live up to that image.

There were a lot of characters in this book and I found it a bit difficult to keep up with them all and to keep them all separate in my mind. Some of the guys just seemed to blend together. Those guys were part of several different storylines, and again, I found it hard to follow them all while keeping these characters individualized in my mind. (I admit that may be a shortcoming of my mind!)

This book was well-written. Tess Gunty definitely has a way with words. My only criticism really is that it felt to me as if she was trying to do too much here. Maybe she could stick to one storyline and a smaller cast of characters next time. I would definitely like to read that book!   

 

Symphony of Secrets by Brendan Slocumb: A review

Bern Hendricks is well known as one of the world's preeminent experts on the music of twentieth-century composer Frederick Delaney. When the board of the Delaney Foundation asks him to help authenticate some recently found music that may be Delaney's lost opera, Red, it is a dream come true for him. He happily gets to work on the project and gets help with it from his tech-savvy acquaintance Eboni.

But soon Bern and Eboni begin to uncover information that leads them to believe that Delaney may not have, in fact, composed this music or much, if not all, of the music attributed to him. They discover that it may instead have been composed by a young Black woman named Josephine Reed.

It was the 1920s and Josephine was living on the streets of New York and frequenting jazz clubs. In one of those clubs, she met Frederick Delaney. Delaney was trying to establish himself as a musician but it was not going well for him. His music was not making the impact that he hoped for. But once he met Josephine, he took her music as his own and his career took off.

Josephine was a prodigy who heard music in all the sounds of the world around her and she was able to translate that into her own compositions. Josephine and Delaney worked in a kind of uneven partnership. It was a partnership in which one of the partners was never acknowledged, but it was that partner whose talent and creativity made Delaney a success.

As Bern and Eboni continue digging, they become convinced of their discoveries and they pursue their own quest to right the wrongs of history and give Josephine Reed the credit she deserved. But they are working for the Delaney Foundation. Will that entity ever allow them to go public with their newly found information?

Brendan Slocumb writes a rousing good tale, one that easily held my interest throughout. His book gives a realistic picture (at least to the best of my understanding) of life in the 1920s and of the way that women and minorities and their music were perceived and were treated during that period. This is Slocumb's second novel. The first was The Violin Conspiracy. Based on the evidence so far, I would say he has a bright future as a novelist.

 

Poetry Sunday: May Night by Sara Teasdale

Sara Teasdale wrote this poem in 1915, but it still feels just as fresh today.

 

May Night

by Sara Teasdale

The spring is fresh and fearless
And every leaf is new,

The world is brimmed with moonlight,
The lilac brimmed with dew.

Here in the moving shadows
I catch my breath and sing--
My heart is fresh and fearless
And over-brimmed with spring.

This week in birds - #550

 A roundup of the week's news of birds and the environment:

A Herring Gull stands in the middle of a duck convention featuring several species.

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Does the Ivory Bill Woodpecker still exist? Though thought to be extinct, there is new evidence that its obituary might have been premature. 

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There's no doubt that bird flu still exists and is still killing animals. Moreover, it could become the next human pandemic.

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A heat dome weather system in western Canada threatens to push temperatures to new record highs and worsen the incidence of wildfires in the region.

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A new study assessed the economic burden imposed by fossil fuel companies and found that they owe reparations of $209 billion a year.

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Honeybees are essential to the production of healthy crops and to the protection of the environment.

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A proposed sanctuary on the California coast would be six times the size of Yosemite.

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Recent studies have reached a consensus that massive prehistoric stone structures, so-called desert kites found from Saudi Arabia to Kazakhstan, were built by ancient hunters to trap and kill wild animal herds.

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A new analysis has concluded that heat is likely to soar to record highs within the next five years.

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The consensus is that humans evolved in Africa but there is new information about just how and where they emerged.

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A Florida university professor is living undersea and plans to continue to do so until he reaches one hundred days and completes a research mission.

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Large parts of the Pacific Northwest are in the grip of an early and rare heat wave.

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Meet the American Bird Conservancy's Bird of the Week. It's the conifer-loving Hermit Warbler.

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For the first time since 2010, an endangered Mediterranean monk seal has landed on an Israeli shore causing a sensation among local residents.

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Wild boars have reappeared in Kashmir after being absent for decades and their presence is not being welcomed. 

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Research shows that birds and their songs are good for our mental health, to which my response is, "Well, duh!"

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Scientists have warned that a rise of 1.5 degrees Centigrade in Earth's temperature could have dire consequences and it is now predicted that we may pass that threshold as early as 2027. 

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The opportunity to watch tens of thousands of Sandhill Cranes take off simultaneously draws tourists to Nebraska in March and April every year.

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Yakama Nation hunters hunt the bison of Yellowstone.

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California's "ghost lake," Tulare, has reappeared after a wet winter.

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A new species of shark, one having bright, white eyes, has been discovered in the deep waters off Australia.

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I need this! There is now a "smart bird feeder." It's a feeder that takes pictures of the birds that come to feed and sends them to your phone. 

Poetry Sunday: The Crazy Woman by Gwendolyn Brooks

So I went looking for poems about May and this one popped up. I looked at the title and thought, "Hmm...Gwendolyn Brooks wrote a poem about me?" It made me smile. I hope it does the same for you.

The Crazy Woman

by Gwendolyn Brooks

I shall not sing a May song.
A May song should be gay.

I'll wait until November
And sing a song of gray.

I'll wait until November
That is the time for me.
I'll go out in the frosty dark
And sing most terribly.

And all the little people
Will stare at me and say,
'That is the Crazy Woman
Who would not sing in May.'

This week in birds - #549

 A roundup of the week's news of birds and the environment:

An Orange-crowned Warbler enjoys a taste of orange.

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"Murder hornets" have a (somewhat undeserved) fearsome reputation but would you recognize one if you saw it?

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The iconic mountain lion known as P-22 no longer stalks the hills of Los Angeles but he lives on in the hearts of Angelenos.

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Today is World Migratory Bird Day and all across the continent birds are on the move to their summer homes and that includes the smallest of them, the hummingbirds.

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"Statistically impossible" heat waves are becoming more of the norm every year.

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The profits of the four highest-polluting investor-owned companies in the world - Exxon, Chevron, Shell, and BP - are almost inconceivably large.

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Many outdoor brands are phasing out "forever chemicals" in their products ahead of an expected ban of the substances. 

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This beauty is the aptly named Yellow Warbler and it is the American Bird Conservancy's Bird of the Week.

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Recent research indicates that it took three tries before Homo sapiens was able to supplant the Neanderthals in Europe.

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This is the Saurona triangula, a newly discovered species of butterfly named for Sauron, the evil ruler of Mordor in Lord of the Rings. It was so named because it is "rimmed with fire" like Sauron's kingdom.

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Rex Brasher may indeed be the "greatest bird artist you never heard of."

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Ecuador has come up with a record-setting plan to preserve and protect the Galápagos Islands.

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What should you do if you are attacked by a swarm of bees?

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The Greenland glacier is being eaten away by the warm tides stoked by global climate change.

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A proposed liquefied natural gas plant in the Florida Panhandle poses a threat to the plans for development in a Black community there.

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The unique pink river dolphins of the Amazon provide an early warning system for us in regard to the condition of the environment.

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The destruction of some ancient trees in western Canada has highlighted the porous nature of the plans to protect the old-growth forest.

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As I sit at my desk tonight, I can hear the frogs in my yard in their amphibian chorus, but are they singing at a higher pitch because of global warming? That I cannot tell. 

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Thanks to melting snowpack, Lake Powell is rising more than a foot a day but that will not be enough to repair the effects of the megadrought.

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This is Chonk, a giant snapping turtle that lives in the Chicago River. As he is seen lounging by the waterside, his presence gives hope that the river may be becoming less polluted.

The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware: A review

 

I read this book about a week ago and when I finally sat down today to write a review, I found that I could barely remember it. That's probably not the best recommendation for a book that I have ever made. Now, in my defense, I must say that I was sick during this period and so that could have affected my perceptions and memory. Still...

The Woman in Cabin 10 introduces us to Lo Blacklock and I hate her already just on the basis of that name. Lo has a somewhat faltering relationship with a boyfriend and one night while he is away from their apartment, the place is burgled and she is attacked. This, for obvious reasons, leaves her in a somewhat fragile state. 

Lo is a journalist who works for a travel magazine and her new assignment is to spend time on a cruise ship, the Aurora, traveling in the North Sea. The weather is pleasant. The ship's cabins are plush and luxurious. There are only a few guests and they are all elegant and jovial. So not exactly a sentence to hard labor.

But then the changeable North Sea weather turns frigid and gray, stormy skies close in, and in the midst of this, Lo witnesses a horror scene; she sees a woman being thrown overboard. 

Or did she? Lo Blacklock is the very definition of an unreliable narrator. I can understand why the other passengers and the ship's crew would have a hard time believing her. 

So what is really going on here? Is Lo being gaslighted? Is she truly delusional and just imagining it all? She's been taking antidepressants and drinking quite a lot so it definitely seems likely that her sense of reality is somewhat impaired. Moreover, there is no documented passenger missing from the boat. Was there ever actually a woman in cabin 10?

The plot and tone of this book brought pleasurable memories of my days as a teenager reading Agatha Christie mysteries. (Yes, I can actually remember that far back!) Those were the days and the books that made me a confirmed reader and especially a confirmed reader of mysteries. I think Ruth Ware must have enjoyed those books as well. 

This is the classic locked-door mystery. It's a ship in the middle of the North Sea so we know the killer is on board. And what, if anything, does any of this have to do with the original mystery of the break-in at Lo's apartment? 

I would have enjoyed the book more if I could have found the main character a bit more likable. As it was, I just found Lo irritating, especially the constant emphasis on her emotional state and her overindulgence in alcohol. But overall, it was a pleasant way to spend some downtime while I recovered from illness.  

Poetry Sunday : It Is Not Always May by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

May has arrived. The queen of months - maybe the most perfect month of the year, so let us rejoice in it and enjoy it while it lasts.

It is not always May

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

- No hay pajaros en los nidos de antano.
Spanish Proverb - 

The sun is bright,--the air is clear,
  The darting swallows soar and sing.
And from the stately elms I hear
  The bluebird prophesying Spring. 
So blue yon winding river flows,
  It seems an outlet from the sky,
Where waiting till the west-wind blows,
  The freighted clouds at anchor lie. 
All things are new;--the buds, the leaves,
  That gild the elm-tree's nodding crest,
And even the nest beneath the eaves;--
   There are no birds in last year's nest! 
All things rejoice in youth and love,
   The fulness of their first delight!
And learn from the soft heavens above
   The melting tenderness of night. 
Maiden, that read'st this simple rhyme,
   Enjoy thy youth, it will not stay;
Enjoy the fragrance of thy prime,
   For oh, it is not always May! 
Enjoy the Spring of Love and Youth,
   To some good angel leave the rest;
For Time will teach thee soon the truth,
  There are no birds in last year's nest! 

This week in birds - #548

 A roundup of the week's news of birds and the environment:

The warblers are passing through. This Black-throated Green stopped for a drink and a wash at my backyard fountain. 

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It seems if it's not one thing it's another when it comes to challenges to the continued survival of the endangered California Condor. The latest is an outbreak of avian flu.

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And speaking of condors, a place called Molok Luyuk, or "condor ridge" in the Patwin language, may soon become a federally protected area if California environmentalists and the Yocha Dehe Wintun tribal nation have their way.

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Climate change is contributing to the melting of glaciers in the Alps and that is a threat to the biodiversity of invertebrates in the alpine ecosystem.

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Partisanship has thwarted Congress's attempts to curb the use of "forever chemicals" but some states are attempting to fill the breech.

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The Wollemi pine is one of the world's oldest and rarest trees. It hovers continually on the brink of extinction. Can it be saved?

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Northern lights of the aurora borealis are being seen farther south than usual at the moment. Why is that?

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The United Nations is warning that the chance of an El Niño weather pattern developing in the next few months is rising and that could trigger higher global temperatures that break heat records.

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California's landscape has been transformed by a "super bloom" and that is drawing revelers from far and near who have come to witness it.

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Light pollution is a serious issue as Dana Milbank learned.

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A fossil-rich quarry in central Wales may help to plug some gaps in our understanding of how evolution proceeded after the Cambrian explosion.

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The western Mediterranean has been experiencing record-shattering temperatures that would not have occurred without climate change.

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The Loggerhead Shrike, or "butcherbird" as it is sometimes called, is a predatory songbird. It is known for its habit of skewering its prey on barbed wire or other sharp objects before devouring it. It is the American Bird Conservancy's Bird of the Week.

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The irises of Gannets that survive avian flu turn from blue to black. No one yet understands why but scientists are intrigued.

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Climate change is having an effect on farming practices - not surprising since it is an occupation largely dependent upon the influence of weather and climate.

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A concerning surge in ocean temperatures has the potential for shifting weather patterns and accelerating global warming.

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Conservationists in Mauritius are faced with a conundrum: how to eradicate an invasive plant, the traveler's tree, without harming the seriously endangered Mauritius Kestrel whose continued survival is aided by the tree.

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The Bi-state Sage Grouse, found only along the California-Nevada state line, is being considered for protection under the Endangered Species Act.

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Another adverse effect of the climate crisis is the increase in damage being caused by crop-destroying fungi.

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The Anhinga is a very common water bird here in southeast Texas but the bird has now made its way to Brooklyn. Yes, that would be Brooklyn, New York where I'm sure it is thrilling birders.

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Why did the Vikings leave Greenland? A new theory points to rising seas as the primary cause.

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Why is the cannibalistic lancetfish that spends most of its time at the bottom of the ocean finding its way to West Coast shores?  

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Grizzly bears are a federally protected species and that has led to an investigation of one that was found dead, possibly killed by humans, near Yellowstone National Park.

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Cargill, the world's largest grain trader, faces a legal challenge in the United States over its failure to remove deforestation and human rights abuses in its supply chain of soya that comes from Brazil.

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Satellite cameras are catching methane emissions polluters in the act.

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Artificial intelligence cameras are helping to document how Australian animals survive bushfires. 

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Here are some pictures of birds of the Cayman Islands.

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And here's the week in wildlife pictures.

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And, of course, I couldn't resist including this picture of a phallic-shaped iceberg in my round-up. Needless to say, it has caused quite a bit of comment this week!

Vera Wong's Unsolicited Advice for Murderers by Jesse Q. Sutanto: A review

 

This book was an absolute joy for me to read. Vera Wong is a wonderful character and I wholly identified with her, although I suspect I lack her talent as an investigator.

Vera is a teashop owner in San Francisco. It is not a popular teashop and in fact is rather dilapidated and without much charm but Vera takes pride in it nonetheless. She is a sixty-year-old widow with one grown son whom she rarely sees.

Vera lives above her teashop and one morning when she goes downstairs she finds the dead body of a man in her shop. The man lies with his arms outstretched and in one hand she finds a flash drive. On an impulse, she takes the flash drive and puts it in her pocket, and only then does she call the police. 

The dead man had obviously been murdered and Vera is quite convinced that she will be more capable than the police of discovering his killer. After all, she reasons that it must be someone who comes to her shop and so all she has to do is be alert and investigate her customers and the truth will reveal itself. 

In addition to Vera, there is a strong cast of supporting characters and we come to know the opinions and points of view of five of those characters while the main focus of the story always stays on Vera. There are twists and turns in the plot but we get to experience the culture of this group of Asian Americans and the importance to them of family relationships and personal boundaries. 

The story was written with a light touch and a lot of humor. I often found myself smiling while reading it and sometimes laughing out loud. I don't know if the author has plans for a series featuring Vera, but a reader can hope!