The Late Show by Michael Connelly: A review

Harry Bosch is now well into his second - and mandatory - retirement from the LAPD. How will Michael Connelly continue his writing of police procedurals about that flawed agency without his main man? The answer, of course, is to create a new and younger detective whose exploits we can follow, maybe for many years to come.

Enter Renée Ballard. 

Ballard is a thirty-something veteran detective with the LAPD. She is from Hawaii originally, but had been brought to California to live with her grandmother after the death of her father in a surfing accident and the abdication of parenthood by her mother. She has a degree in journalism and worked briefly as a journalist before finding her calling with the police. She's had a checkered career with the LAPD, not because of a lack of ability, dedication, and character, but because she is a rocker of the boat.

Five years before, while she was working in Homicide, Ballard filed a sexual harassment complaint against her lieutenant, Robert Olivas. Her partner at the time, Kenny Chastain, had witnessed the harassment and could have backed up her complaint, but for whatever reason - possibly fear of harming his career - he failed to do so. Ballard's complaint was found to be invalid and she was kicked off the elite homicide team and relegated to the late shift, 11:00 pm to 7:00 am. The late show.

Detectives assigned to the late show do the initial write-up on cases that come in during their shift, but then they pass off to one of the day teams, robbery, homicide, sex crimes, etc. They never get to follow through on an investigation. This rankles Ballard considerably, because, like that other now-retired LAPD detective that we know so well, she is dedicated to "her" victims, dedicated to bringing justice for them.

On the night when we meet her, Ballard and her partner, Jenkins, catch three cases. There is a robbery by credit card that eventually turns out to be quite a bit more complicated than it seems at first. Then there is a case involving a brutal assault on a transgender which lands the victim in the hospital near death. Finally, a mass shooting at a club leaves five people dead, including two employees at the bar. Jenkins and Ballard are supposed to write up their initial findings to be passed on to the appropriate unit, but Ballard just can't bring herself to let these cases go, particularly the one with the transgender victim. She manages to stall and delay so that she can continue to work on the case. In the end, that almost costs her her life.

At the scene of the club shooting, she observes her old partner, Chastain, whose skill she respects, doing something odd and secretive. Later, Chastain is shot dead in his own driveway and Ballard finds that he has left a message for her, evidence in the club shooting that he could not trust to anyone else. Ballard ends up working practically around the clock following up on the cases that she was supposed to let go, even though her superiors keep warning her off.

I think a lot of women readers will be nodding their heads in recognition as Ballard faces the effects of the departmental shunning that resulted from her failed sexual harassment complaint. Her career has stalled but she is determined to make the best of it and to continue to take pride in her work and to do it to the best of her ability. Renée Ballard is a very stubborn woman.

Moreover, she has an interesting lifestyle which mostly seems to involve living on the beach with her dog and paddleboarding to clear her head and center herself. I think this new detective has distinct possibilities.

Incidentally, one of the things that I always look for in a Connelly novel are his little "inside baseball" asides. In this instance, one of the "ancillary" victims at the club shooting was a waitress who was a wannabe actress. She had had bit parts in some shows. One of her bit parts was as a waitress on a television show called Bosch about an LAPD detective who is now retired! Fun stuff.

Who knows? There may some day be a television show about a kick-ass female LAPD detective called Ballard.  

My rating: 4 of 5 stars 

  

The darkening of 2017

There have been many dark days so far in 2017, but today is the day when the firmament finally aligns with human experience and even the sun will hide its face in shame.

This map shows where the eclipse will be total and where it will be only partial in the United States. I'm in that lower 50% area so my sun will not go completely dark. Even at 50% though it should be an impressive event.

Image from The Guardian. 

Yes, that is what you think it is - the "moon" is covering the sun. 

Poetry Sunday: That Sacred Closet When You Sweep

I've spent the past week clearing out closets, sorting things to donate or pass on to others and filling trash bags with items which no longer have any use to me, if they ever did. It's a task that I try to do once a year and it always surprises me that, even though I cleaned that closet a few months ago, here it is filled to the rafters once again.

So, closets have been much on my mind, and when I went looking for a poem to feature this week, what should I find but this weird little verse by Emily Dickinson.

It seems that she is speaking metaphorically, not of an actual closet but of the closet of "Memory" and she urges us to sweep carefully, reverentially. One can see that it might not be such a good idea to toss memories in the trash like so much refuse.

I tried to be a lot more ruthless in my sorting of the closets, but there, too, I found lots of memories - pictures, mementoes of my daughters' childhoods, and of my own and my husband's and even of our parents and other ancestors. Memories that invite reverence and reflection and made me slow down and sweep carefully because august is the dust of that domain.


That Sacred Closet When You Sweep

by Emily Dickinson

That sacred Closet when you sweep —
Entitled "Memory" —
Select a reverential Broom —
And do it silently.

'Twill be a Labor of surprise —
Besides Identity
Of other Interlocutors
A probability —

August the Dust of that Domain —
Unchallenged — let it lie —
You cannot supersede itself
But it can silence you —

This week in birds - #268

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

Rock Wren, photographed at Big Bend National Park.

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Here's a somewhat unexpected story: It seems that birding is becoming more popular among millennials! That is a hopeful sign for the future.

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In a less hopeful vein, The Guardian has a story about how college-educated young conservationists are having a hard time finding paying jobs and many are giving up and turning to other professions.

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The average temperature of the contiguous 48 United States in July was the 10th warmest in 123 years of record-keeping. In addition, the year-to-date (January - July) is the second warmest on record. In July, there were significant climate events in some parts of the country, with much above average temperatures in parts of the West, Mid-Atlantic, and Southeast and above average precipitation in the Southwest, Midwest, and Northeast.

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The Eurasian Curlew, native to Ireland, has been declining for decades in that country due to the loss of habitat in the uplands. The steady deterioration in population means that this species, storied in Irish literature, could be extirpated in Ireland. It is an avoidable tragedy and Irish conservationists are trying to make sure it does not happen.

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The original purpose of that bizarre presidential news conference this week was to boast about the fact that the president was signing another executive order repealing an action by President Obama to protect the environment. This one required that bridges, schools, fire stations, roads, and other public infrastructures be built to standards that would take into account rising flood risks. Contractors will no longer have to build structures to withstand the rising waters caused by climate change.

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In related news, a series of emails shows that staff of the U.S. Department of Agriculture have been told to avoid the use of the term "climate change". Instead, they are supposed to refer to "weather extremes". Problem solved!

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A coalition of business leaders from western states is lobbying the Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke to keep his hands off the boundaries of national monuments. These federal lands are a significant tourist draw that pump millions of dollars into the area each year. Shrinking them or rescinding protections for the lands, which Zinke and his boss are eager to do, could cost local governments and businesses much-needed cash.

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A study of the effect on grassland birds of developing wind energy facilities on the prairies indicates that such facilities have little effect on the birds and are less detrimental to them than the construction of roads and the grazing of cattle on their nesting grounds.

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Cities along our coasts, even where governments deny that climate change is happening, are already having to deal with rising tides and the damage they can cause. The traditional solution has been to build a seawall, but such walls can be breached and they are very disruptive to native habitats. Environmental engineers offer more natural, greener alternatives that can use the qualities of the landscape to provide protection.

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A new study shows that bird populations flourish in stable environments. Thus, environments with less variability in their climates - i.e., tropics - are more likely to have a larger diversity of species.

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Birders and others who are concerned about the environment continue to be appalled by the possibility that a wall will be built through Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge on the Texas-Mexico border. The 10,000 Birds blog discusses the options for stopping the project and determines that, sadly, environmental laws will probably not save the refuge since those laws can be so easily ignored or rescinded by a hostile government. The key to saving the refuge - if it can be done - will be political. 

*~*~*~*

The population of the Monarch butterfly of North America has plummeted from a billion to 33 million in two decades. Now, a plan to help the butterfly proposes using the interstate highway system, namely I-35. This highway cuts through the heart of the country and the eastern Monarch's migratory path. Restoring habitat along the highway, planting it with milkweed for caterpillar nurseries and other plants for nectar could go a long way toward aiding a comeback for the butterfly.

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The increasing heat in the desert Southwest presents a significant challenge to the continued survival of songbirds there. They must struggle to find enough moisture to stave off dehydration in an increasingly hostile environment.

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The wonderfully-named Pepper Trail is an ornithologist, essayist, and poet living in Oregon. He makes the case for the importance of learning the proper names of plants and animals. It is only by knowing their true names that we can begin to know them and to appreciate the habitat of which they are a part.

*~*~*~*

The Environmental Protection Agency, under the direction of Scott Pruitt, is scrapping a measure instituted by the Obama Administration that limited the water pollution that could be released by coal-fired power plants. Now, those plants will be able to pollute away, content in the knowledge that the agency that is supposed to protect the environment is protecting them instead.

The English Assassin by Daniel Silva: A review

Summer seems the perfect time for reading mysteries and thrillers. As the summer doldrums set in - as they definitely have in my neck of the woods - we need something to stir the blood a bit and make the heart race. Thriller/mysteries seem just the ticket for that.

With that thought in mind, I turned to the second book in Daniel Silva's Gabriel Allon series. I had read the first book in that series, The Kill Artist, last summer, just over a year ago. I was impressed enough to put the series on my reading list and so here I sit, The English Assassin in hand.

Gabriel Allon, for those who may be unaware, is an Israeli art restorer who lives in Cornwall, England. Restoring art is his day job but he also has a second and secret life as an agent of the Israeli government. As such, he is, from time to time, called into service on special assignments.

His secret life has cost him much. Most notably, it cost him the life of his baby son whose body was blown to bits by a car bomb set by a Palestinian agent in Venice several years ago. In that same attack, his beloved wife was horribly injured. She lived but is terribly scarred both physically and emotionally and does not communicate with Gabriel. She lives in a nursing home in England.

Gabriel Allon is a very reluctant agent. He maintains a respect/hate relationship with his handler but it seems he is incapable of refusing an assignment, so when he is asked to go to Zurich to visit a private banker who has information to share, potentially about art or treasure stolen by the Nazis during World War II, he is soon on his way.

His cover for the trip is that he is being asked to restore a Raphael owned by the banker. He arrives at the banker's villa and enters using the codes he has been given. He goes to the room where the Raphael hangs and finds himself standing in blood - the blood of the dead Swiss banker whose body is on the floor.

Realizing his vulnerability and that he may be framed for murder, he leaves but is soon stopped by the Zurich police and arrested. He is soon released but is warned never to return to Zurich.

The thriller unfolds from this event. It turns out that the dead banker has a beautiful blonde daughter who is a famous violinist and Gabriel is assigned to work with her to try to discover what it was that her father wanted to share with the Israelis. Since father and daughter were estranged and she had not been in communication with him, that might prove difficult.

The plot revolves around the art treasures that were stolen from Jews during the Holocaust and the effort to track them down, recover them, and return them to their rightful owners. It's a complicated effort made more difficult by the fact that so many of them are held in private "banks" in Switzerland which seem to be untouched by the rule of international law.

I was fascinated by this exposition of the insular culture of Switzerland and the secretive world of banking there. As one of the characters expostulates at one point, "the whole country is a bank!" I'm not sure that is entirely fair and accurate, but, making allowances for hyperbole, it does seem to go to the heart of explaining how the Swiss see themselves.

Though there was a fair amount of intellectual exposition in the book, there were enough shootings, stabbings, kidnappings, beatings, and torture to keep the most bloodthirsty thriller fan happy. On the whole, it was a good mix and made for a compelling read.

My rating: 4 of 5 stars   

   

It's a mad, mad, mad world

Mad magazine gets it right and speaks (screams) for all of us.

Dead I Well May Be by Adrian McKinty: A review

So Michael Forsythe is an Irish bad boy in the time of "The Troubles". He joined the British army essentially to get out of Northern Ireland but he couldn't stay within the lines prescribed by that estimable organization and kept getting into trouble until finally the army kicked him to the curb.  

Back home in Belfast, he continues his bad boy ways and is constantly getting into more trouble until finally he's used up all his chances. With no further prospects in sight, he takes what's on offer - a ticket to America and work with the Irish mafia there. New York here he comes.

Michael assures us that he didn't want to go to America and he didn't want to work for Darkey White, the memorably named mafia chieftain, but he had not yet seen his twentieth birthday and what other choices did he have? He had entered the country illegally and so his job options were limited.

He settles into his routine with the Darkey White crew. He's a kind of enforcer and it is sometimes violent work. Unfortunately for Michael, even here he finds it difficult to toe the line, especially when it comes to women. He has a wandering eye for the female sex and when his eye settles onto Darkey White's mistress, the reader knows that this is not going to end well. 

Michael Forsythe is the sole narrator of this very noir story, told with a strong Irish lilt in the voice. He gives us a strictly straightforward narration; first this happened, then this. But we are also privy to his dreams and his memories, all of which occasionally makes for some dark reading. 

It seems that people tended to underestimate Michael's toughness and resilience. Certainly Darkey White did, much to his dismay. The retribution he planned for his employee as payback for his having seduced his mistress does not quite work out as intended. Michael is a survivor. After all, this is the first book in a trilogy, so how could it be otherwise?

I had never read any of Adrian McKinty's work, but he certainly has a flair for storytelling. The plot rolls along relentlessly, only stalling a bit during an interlude in Mexico. And his main character is an interesting chap of the "bad boy with a heart of gold" genre. Moreover, during his travels, Michael relies very heavily on the kindness of strangers. Fortuitously, there always seems to be another stranger willing to help him out. 

What does the future hold for young Michael? Two more volumes hold the answers.

My rating: 4 of 5 stars