Book List for March, 2023

 

It's the final day of March and the time has come for another list if the books I've read since the posting of my last monthly reading list.

The first in the list is The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara by David I. Kertzer. I first learned of the book and the story it told was from my reading of Richard Dawkins' book, The God Delusion. Kertzer's book tells the true story of the the Vatican's kidnapping seizure of a six-year-old boy from his Jewish family in Bologna, Italy, on the basis of the family's former servant's testimony that she had secretly baptized the boy as an infant.

Prefecture D is a collection of novellas by Hideo Yokoyama dealing with the internal politics of a large metropolitan in Japan.

In The Girl in the Spider's Web, David Lagercrantz continues Stieg Larsson's Millennium series.

Metropolis is a 1925 science fiction novel by the German writer Thea von Harbou. The novel was the basis for and written in tandem with Fritz Lang's 1927 film of the same name. Oddly enough, reading the novel makes the film more understandable....and vice versa. Each one helps the other.

In Just Babies, psychologist Paul Bloom explores our innate sense of morality.

For my thoughts on Highsmith's novel, check out my earlier blog post.

The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara     by David I. Kertzer
Prefecture D         by Hideo Yokoyama
The Girl in the Spider's Web    by David Lagercrantz
Metropolis    by Thea von Harbou
Just Babies: The Origins of Good and Evil    by Paul Bloom
Strangers in a Train     by Patricia Highsmith

The February 2023 Reading List

 

At the beginning of this year, it looked as if 2023 might be the year of mystery/detective novels for me. The eight books in my January, 2023 reading list fall into that category. February looked to be going in the same direction.

The first book on my list for February was A Great Deliverance by Elizabeth George. This was George's first published novel and introduces Detective Inspector Thomas Lynley. The novel won the Agatha Award for Best First Novel in 1988 and the 1989 Anthony Award in the same category.

Staying with the mystery/detective genre, the second novel for February was The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey - a modern police officer's investigation into the alleged crimes of King Richard III of England. In 1990 the book was voted number one in The Top 100 Crime Novels of All Time list compiled by the British Crime Writers' Association. If one enjoys reading books covering history in general and English history in particular then this book is for you. I did enjoy the book, but I thought putting it as #1 on the list of the Top 100 Crime Novels of All Time a bit much.

Books 3 and 4 for February were books 2 and 3 in Stieg Larsson's Millennium series - The Girl Who Played with Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest .

In January, I read Hideo Yokoyama's mystery Six Four. Hideo Yokoyama has two other books translated into English - Seventeen and Prefecture D. I had wrongly assumed that the 2nd and 3rd novels would be mystery novels as well. I haven't gotten around to Prefecture D. yet but - Seventeen is most definitely not a detective story. The novel centers on a newspaper's coverage of the 1985 Japan Airlines flight that crashed into a mountainside in Gunma Prefecture, Japan killing 520 people and leaving only four survivors. An excellent novel, but again, not a detective story.

Since I had strayed away from the mystery genre, I thought I'd end the month with a book that doesn't fit the category, but one I'd been thinking of reading. The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. This is the first book I've read by Dawkins and I had expected him to be a nasty, cynical S.O.B.. You may or may not agree with Dawkins views on God, but Dawkins is a talented writer and not nearly as obnoxious as I had believed he would be.

The list

A Great Deliverance         by Elizabeth George
The Daughter of Time       by Josephine Tey
The Girl Who Played with Fire     by Stieg Larsson
The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest    by Stieg Larsson
Seventeen           by Hideo Yokoyama
The God Delusion    by Richard Dawkins

The January 2023 Reading List

Today is the last day of January and the time has come for another list of books read during the past month. I'm not likely to finish reading an eight book for January.

The first two books for January follow a theme from December - these books are the 3rd and 4th I've read that were written by the Japanese mystery writer, Seishi Yokomizo. It is my understanding that there are five novels by Yokomizo translated into English, although # five isn't scheduled to be published until later this year.

According to an article on wikipedia, Soji Shimada has more work translated into English than the two I read in January, but unfortunately, I haven't been able to locate copies.

In addition to Six Four, Hideo Yokoyama has two other novels translated into English - Seventeen and Prefecture D. Both of these novels have been placed into the queue.

The final two books for this month were not easy reading, to say the least. Both deal with serial killers who are also sexually perverse. To lighten the mood, my first two books for February will be by mystery writers mentioned in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - Sue Grafton and Elizabeth George - who should fit in with the more tamer elements of the mystery/detective genre.

NOTE: It is now 10:00 PM  January 31. I had not expected to have finished another book for this month, but it seems that I have after all. An 8th book will be added to the list, although the cover of that book will not be added to the jpg. at the beginning of this post.

The Village of Eight Graves          by Seishi Yokomizo
The Inugami Curse                        by Seishi Yokomizo
The Tokyo Zodiac Murders            by Soji Shimada
Murder in the Crooked House       by Soji Shimada
Six Four                                         by Hideo Yokoyama
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo   by Stieg Larsson
The Mermaids Singing                  by Val McDermid
'A' Is For Alibi                               by Sue Grafton