Sadie When She Died – Ed McBain, 1972 ★½

Sex and Death in the Big City

The 1970s were called the “Me Decade” because of its tendency for hyper-individuality. Families and communities became untethered by a personal need for self-fulfillment. At least that was the popular view. In Sadie When She Died, we meet a casualty of that culture.

At first the homicide of Sarah Fletcher appears to be the result of a burglary gone wrong. The trail from broken window to bloody corpse is straightforward enough; there’s even a junkie’s confession in Chapter 3. But for lead detective Steve Carella, it’s all too neat.

The more he investigates, the more he learns about Sarah, about a restless life lived on the edge, about a marriage that had fallen apart, about lovers meetings in strange bars. He realizes much more is at play than a simple silverware job.

Biography Of A Phantom: A Robert Johnson Blues Odyssey – Robert “Mack” McCormick, 2023 ★½

On A Guitar God's Tortuous Trail

As the years pile on, true knowledge about a dead legend often melts irretrievably into the realm of myth. If that legend toiled in relative obscurity while alive, the chance for objectivity gets thinner.

Whatever one can say about the merits or intentions of blues scholar Robert “Mack” McCormick, his posthumous account of the life of Robert Johnson makes this clear, for the author and subject.

In the early 1970s, McCormick set out to find the real Johnson by using the living memories of friends and family. In the process, he wound up creating Rashomons of both subject and himself.

Whether you see Mack as a heroic researcher or a greedy exploiter may depend as much on you as on him.

Franny And Zooey – J. D. Salinger, 1961 ★★★

Pilgrims Progress on the Upper East Side

There are books I enjoy reading that I will recommend to anyone happily, unreservedly, because I feel pretty sure you will enjoy them, too. Then there are books like this, which I find diverting and worthy, but also somewhat dubious of merit and selective in appeal.

It is one of its authors most beloved works, but is Franny And Zooey any good? I don’t know, I guess, maybe. Sure.

Essentially a novel in the form of a linked short story and novella, Franny And Zooey is where Salinger converted from writer to spiritual advisor. His fluid writing style always followed its own mystical channels, but this marks a clear break from conventional storycraft.

Merrily We Roll Along – George S. Kaufman & Moss Hart, 1934 ★½

The Backwards Journey of a Heel

The mechanics of stagecraft are fairly basic. Performers recreate moments of life heightened and condensed for dramatic/comic purposes. Events play out as if in real time, without cuts, on a raised platform where another place and time is brought to life for an audience.

But what if one of the critical elements of standard dramaturgy was altered? What if a play moved backwards? What if you start at the ending, and then rewind it all to the beginning?

That is the concept behind Merrily We Roll Along, a serious play by two comedic writers, George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart. Instead of introducing characters, then bringing them to some conflict or crisis, we first see the conflicts play out, then learn about the characters.

Where Eagles Dare – Alistair MacLean, 1967 ★★★★

Gunplay in a Lighter Vein

It took awhile to appreciate one of the great adventure novels of its day. I think I get it now. A masterclass of immersive yarnspinning, Where Eagles Dare is a clever plate-spinner emphasizing fun and thrills at every turn, a game writer’s playful take on the wartime thriller.

Does it help or hurt this book that it was made into a classic movie? After years of struggling with this question, and preferring the film, I have reached the happy conclusion that the book is its own thing, quite a different sort of entertainment, and all the better for it.

Reality takes a holiday as commandos banter over gunfire while implausible ploys find ways of succeeding in the end, but for me this time, it comes back to the plate-spinning. Alistair MacLean defies gravity and logic across 219 pages, and I found myself enjoying the ride.

Labels: A Mediterranean Journal – Evelyn Waugh, 1930 ★★★

Voyage of a Misspent Wife

While still a young man, Evelyn Waugh struck upon his method for success: it pays not only to be witty when writing, but shocking, too.

That Waugh was, not right away, but early out of the gate. Part of a celebrated circle of upper-class wastrels known as “the Bright Young Things,” he was recognized while still a student for his talent and rapier wit. After launching himself with a ruthless satire about British society, Decline And Fall, that offended many and made his name, he was left with the problem of what to do next.

His answer: Mock the rest of Europe by way of a travel book.

Stilwell And The American Experience In China 1911-1945 – Barbara Tuchman, 1971 ★★½

Anatomy of a Misadventure

A book about historic failure needs a deft hand to keep from being more than a drag for a reader. Especially when the topic is the Allied effort in World War II. During the march to final victory, who wants to dwell on an endless spiral of ignominy going on in China?

Stilwell And The American Experience In China is not easy to ignore. It was a history of great occasion when it came out, a Pulitzer Prize-winning examination of American policy in the Far East. This came out at a time when young men were being shipped home from Vietnam in body bags by the hundreds every month.

That the book would be seen as all-too-relevant to the politics of the 1970s was not something author Barbara Tuchman avoids. She makes her feelings clear enough in the book’s Foreword: