Well, I finally finished Jackie Robinson, and I now know why Arnold Rampersad's biography was more than 500 pages. Jackie Robinson lived life to the fullest. It seems there wasn't a day in the man's life that wasn't dedicated to some higher purpose, despite the many setbacks and sorrows he experienced in his 53 years. And though impulsive, outspoken and quick to anger, Robinson was an admirable man, I think. I'm very glad I got a chance to learn about him and refresh my memory of the twentieth century and especially of the civil rights movement and all the people who were involved, for good or ill. Jackie Robinson was there at the center of it all, even in his final years when his health deteriorated and he struggled just to get around. I would recommend this biography highly, but if you read it, be prepared for the full meal deal!
I've now moved on to another murder mystery, Body Work, by Sara Paretsky, famous for her detective character, V.I. Warshawski. (Kathleen Turner plays her in a 1991 film by that name: V.I. Warshawski.)
Victoria Warshawski is a private investigator of the old-school, hard-boiled detective variety. I haven't read many books in this series (I think this is the second), so I don't know much of the character's history, but I remember liking the one I did read, as well as another Paretsky novel (Bleeding Kansas) that wasn't a Warshawski installment and wasn't a mystery per se.
This time, though, I'm not so sure. The plot of Body Work seems a bit complicated and so far I'm finding it cumbersome and hard to get into. As any mystery fiction reader knows, a good mystery should above all be gripping. If the writer keeps me dawdling along, unable to understand who the people are or why I should care about what happens to them, I won't enjoy the book as much as one that has me hooked from the start.
I'm afraid Body Work is shaping up to be of the non-gripping variety. The plot centers on a murdered artist who paints pictures on the nearly nude body of another artist, a woman who sits on stage in a bar and invites customers to paint on her. Both murdered woman and body artist are unpleasant characters, and I find myself not caring much about them. In fact, all the characters I've met so far, suspect or no, are unappealing, including the P.I. herself. She's been hired to find out what she can about the accused murderer of Nadia (the dead artist), but she's pretty crabby about it. The police's only suspect is an Iraq veteran suffering from PTSD. His father, V.I.'s client, thinks he's innocent, but Victoria is not so sure. Though I'm 1/3 the way through the book, neither she nor the readers have learned much about her client (she hasn't even interviewed him yet), but he might turn out to be the most sympathetic character of the bunch.
It seems that the writer is leaning a bit heavily on the titillation factor of the nude artist, hoping that will keep her reader's attention, but I find it a bit distracting, especially when we keep returning to the bar and the body artist's rather boring act night after night. All the people we meet there are hostile and I want to stop hearing about them or find out a little more quickly whether or not they're involved in the crime.
Nevertheless, I'll plug along and maybe finally get interested in who killed Nadia and why. I'll let you know how it's going in my next post.
Actually, Body Work is Paretsky's newest Warshawski mystery(2010). I've read 'em all, and agree that this one doesn't have that much to offer. Paretsky always goes for the topical, and this time I think she just misses the mark, partly because her characters aren't likeable.
ReplyDeleteI loved the earlier books, which I read as they came out. At this distance, I don't know whether they're that much better, or the hard-boiled female detective was such a new idea at the time that V.I.'s personality overshadowed any plot clunkiness. It seems like they were just better constructed in the old days, though always thick and complicated -- which is why I liked them. If you give up on this, try one of the earlier ones.
P.S. I couldn't get past the first chapter of Bleeding Kansas, so maybe we're just different readers altogether!
I think I liked Bleeding Kansas because it was about Kansas, where I've lived. There were parts of it that bogged me down, though, I must admit.
ReplyDelete