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kindkitI haven't read as much as usual this last week. My life has been basically: go to work, come home, cook and eat dinner, wash dishes, write 500 words, go to bed.
Currently reading: I'm still slowly working through Andrew Roberts' The Storm of War.
Recently finished: I happened across some mystery novels that were favorites of my mother's, namely the Grijpstra and de Gier series by Janwillem van de Wetering. I read some of the early ones from the mid-1970s: Outsider in Amsterdam, Tumbleweed, and Death of a Hawker. They're odd little books, with a reflective and doubting tone that apparently derives from Wetering's Zen Buddhist practice. They're not structured like traditional mystery novels: there's a crime which the detectives solve, but in each one I read, the solution came not from the detectives piecing together clues, but from them getting sudden information from an outside source that cleared up everything. The best thing about them is the friendship between Adjutant Grijpstra and his assistant, Sergeant de Gier, which is sometimes tense but also full of charming little moments. In one scene they skive off work together (their boss is away and they're not making progress on the case) and hang out at de Gier's apartment, listening to records and eating pancakes that de Gier cooks. Then there's this scene, from Outsider in Amsterdam, as they're about to ring someone's doorbell:
Which brings me to the books' big problem: they're racist and homophobic in a well-meaning but clueless sort of way, and they're sexist in a way that is completely inexcusable. Yes, even for the 1970s. Other mystery novels from the time, such as those by Ruth Rendell and Reginald Hill, are not remotely as faily. There's something about Wetering's writing that makes me think he was a Nice GuyTM, the sort who tells a woman how enlightened meditation has made him, with the implication that therefore she should have sex with him. Thus I have given up on the books. If you've read more, please do let me know if they get better later.
What I'm reading next: From the library today I picked up The Unreal and the Real: Selected Stories of Ursula Le Guin, volume 2 and Donald Thomas's Death on a Pale Horse: Sherlock Holmes on Her Majesty's Secret Service. Really I should know better than to read published Holmes pastiche--call it the triumph of hope over experience. At least Thomas is English rather than, like so many Holmes pastichers, American. It's not that I think Americans can't write England and English characters well (obviously I don't think that, or I wouldn't try), it's just that so few of them make an effort to get things right. Books get published that in fandom would be slammed for not being Brit-picked.
Currently reading: I'm still slowly working through Andrew Roberts' The Storm of War.
Recently finished: I happened across some mystery novels that were favorites of my mother's, namely the Grijpstra and de Gier series by Janwillem van de Wetering. I read some of the early ones from the mid-1970s: Outsider in Amsterdam, Tumbleweed, and Death of a Hawker. They're odd little books, with a reflective and doubting tone that apparently derives from Wetering's Zen Buddhist practice. They're not structured like traditional mystery novels: there's a crime which the detectives solve, but in each one I read, the solution came not from the detectives piecing together clues, but from them getting sudden information from an outside source that cleared up everything. The best thing about them is the friendship between Adjutant Grijpstra and his assistant, Sergeant de Gier, which is sometimes tense but also full of charming little moments. In one scene they skive off work together (their boss is away and they're not making progress on the case) and hang out at de Gier's apartment, listening to records and eating pancakes that de Gier cooks. Then there's this scene, from Outsider in Amsterdam, as they're about to ring someone's doorbell:
"You can ring the bell," Grijpstra said. "You have a nice index finger."They are kind of slashy, as this scene shows--Grijpstra is often noticing how physically attractive de Gier is--but they're both shown as 100% Manly Heterosexuals.
De Gier bowed from the hips and rang. His index finger was indeed nice, well-tapered, thin and powerful.
Grijpstra, as if he wanted to avoid all comparison, had hidden his hands in his pockets.
Which brings me to the books' big problem: they're racist and homophobic in a well-meaning but clueless sort of way, and they're sexist in a way that is completely inexcusable. Yes, even for the 1970s. Other mystery novels from the time, such as those by Ruth Rendell and Reginald Hill, are not remotely as faily. There's something about Wetering's writing that makes me think he was a Nice GuyTM, the sort who tells a woman how enlightened meditation has made him, with the implication that therefore she should have sex with him. Thus I have given up on the books. If you've read more, please do let me know if they get better later.
What I'm reading next: From the library today I picked up The Unreal and the Real: Selected Stories of Ursula Le Guin, volume 2 and Donald Thomas's Death on a Pale Horse: Sherlock Holmes on Her Majesty's Secret Service. Really I should know better than to read published Holmes pastiche--call it the triumph of hope over experience. At least Thomas is English rather than, like so many Holmes pastichers, American. It's not that I think Americans can't write England and English characters well (obviously I don't think that, or I wouldn't try), it's just that so few of them make an effort to get things right. Books get published that in fandom would be slammed for not being Brit-picked.
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Date: 2013-11-08 05:43 pm (UTC)