A New Quest

Readers of my book reviews on this blog will be nodding their heads when I say that I need to find a new genre or two to read. I’ve sampled the best writers fantasy has to offer, and found them not to my taste. Science fiction isn’t really much better. One of the reasons I started writing was that I couldn’t find modern books that appealed to me, and that hasn’t changed. While I still follow science fiction blogs and YouTubers, I really don’t know why since I haven’t found anything that really interests me in years. It is time to move on.

But to what? I had been reading James Calvell’s Tai-Pan, which was okay, but failed to seal the deal, largely because of my need to have a comfortable companion in the story to tag along with. I didn’t click with Mr Tai-Pan. Still, it seemed that historical fiction of some sort might be a good starting point, so that’s what I have started my quest. To be more specific, “Free Historical Fiction” on Amazon. It was less daunting that trying to select a book off of a half dozen rows of books at the library.

Free historical fiction on Amazon will deliver a grab bag of genre and story lengths, from short stories to full novels, many of them teasers for series. Romance is a key element of at least the ones I selected. But I like a bit of romance in all my stories, so why not? I’ve read three so far. All of these books are published by some sort of traditional publishers of one sort or another.

First off was Liar’s Dice, A Lotus Palace Mystery by Jeannie Lin, a novella of historical romance set in China’s Tang Dynasty period, that would be around 849 A.D. which teases a four book series. While the author claims to have extensively researched the period, that research is not to be found in this book, at least as far as making the world of the Tang Dynasty visible to this reader. Perhaps it is developed in greater detail and color in the novels. Like all three of the books I’ve read, this is written from a female point of view aimed primarily at female readers. I found it interesting enough just for that aspect alone, though as a mystery, our point of view character, the unmarried daughter of a wealthy family is not (yet) anyway, a Sherlock Holmes as she is involved in a murder that might involve her brother as well. There is, of course, a love interest that remains unresolved. I’d give it a “C” (on the curve).

Next up was A Deal with the Rakish Duke, A Steamy Historical Regency Romance Novel by Sally Vixen. A determined “spinster” makes a deal with an infamous rake to pretend that they are a couple in order to dissuade a woman who insists on marrying the infamous rake. Of course he falls in love with her, and she him – and we find that the spinster is only 23 years old… Note that “steamy” means soft-core porn, erotica, so you get a couple of steamy scenes in your 163 pages. Porn Erotica from the woman’s point of view was interesting. It made me wonder what my wife thought of me – forty-five years ago… I suppose if you are named “Sally Vixen” you would probably be fated to write this sort of stuff. Like Liar’s Dice, there is not much of an attempt to set the story in Regency Era England except to have balls and dukes everywhere. I’d give it a “C” (again on the curve, as I am not its target audience)

The third book is Murder at the Dolphin Hotel by Helena Dixon. This one is set in 1933 Dartmouth England. A young woman is put in charge of her grandmother’s hotel while gram goes to Scotland to tend to her elderly sister. The grandmother hires a rather mysterious man, to look after her hotel and granddaughter because someone is sending threatening letters about getting “what is rightfully theirs.” Unlike the first two books, Dixon does make an attempt to paint a picture of 1933 Dartmouth, though to be honest, I didn’t get much of authentic vibe.

Here is a most amusing passage: Kitty sighed and pulled out the visitor’s register. In a few seconds she beckoned Matt to come around to her side of the desk and view the page.

‘This is the man. Mr Briand Smith from Essex, room twenty-one on the second floor.’

He stood behind her to peer at the details. ‘Can you make me a copy of the register entry?’ He was close enough to smell the fresh soapy scent on her skin and to notice the tiny mole below her earlobe. Matt forced his attention to the screen and tried not to think about his proximity to Kitty or why she ruffled his senses so much. If you didn’t find it amusing, read it again.

It is my understanding that readers of historical fiction are pretty demanding when it comes to historical accuracy, and I have to admit that I’m with them there. If you are going to put your story into real history, it needs to be entirely immersed in it. In the case of this story, the author made a conscious to make the setting real – with less than complete success, at least for me. It had the flavor of a Google street view setting, which is to say, she tossed in a lot of details about Dartmouth, but they seemed superficial, things you might note looking at a modern street in street view. And, she had an elderly character apparently driving to Scotland in a motor car. This being 1933, there is no way an elderly lady would drive a car all the way to Scotland – driving was still a bit of an adventure in those days – plus the most common way to travel any distance in those days was by train. This, like the “screen” above show that the author has not been able to put the present day world entirely aside when writing this novel.

My other complaint, and this applies to almost all mysteries, is the number of murders mystery writers seemed compelled to include in their stories. I don’t know if writers are compelled to always write about murder – and add a few more as the story goes along – by readers, editors, or simply by laziness, since murder is, as the ultimate stakes, is an easy way to make things matter, and raise the stakes, as the story goes along. I stopped reading mysteries because this began to really annoy me. This story has three murders – three too many – in my opinion. An none of them at the Dolphin Hotel. One is off screen, before the story commences, and maybe could be justified by setting the stake, but the other two are clearly just tossed in an attempt to raise the stakes. One is of a long time employee of the hotel where the main character has lived since she was six years old, and her death seems to have had no effect on this character other than it is “horrible” or some such thing, which I found to be totally unrealistic, indicating t me that this murder was simply part of the formula, as understood by the author.

And just to be fair, I grabbed a copy of Dorothy L Sayers Clouds of Witness off my book shelf and read a page or two of it. It was, as I suspected, an order of magnitude better written. While Dixson uses language, Sayers commands it. That said, going in with low expectations, I guess it met them, so once again I have a grade of a “C” on a curve, but I won’t be reading further stories.

I’m almost tempted to keep reading the Sayers’ book, but perhaps I should continue on with my quest. The next one up is Impossible Dream by Gemma Jackson, an Irish writer.