March 4, 2006

Book(s) of the Week: Moon Called by Patricia Briggs and Poison Study by Maria V. Snyder

I’ve read two books in the past couple of weeks that I can cheerfully recommend. The first has been mentioned so often on the “What I’m Reading While Waiting . . .” thread that I’ll just second all the people who have praised it. “Moon Called” by Patricia Briggs is just as good as many other readers have claimed. I enjoyed every page. Mercy Thompson, mechanic and many other things, is tough but realistic, brave but not suicidal. I loved the character, I loved the action, and I admired the plot. Mercy’s back-door neighbor is the packmaster for the area werewolves, and she has a vampire’s van in the shop. That’s just a taste of her world. In passing, I liked Briggs’s “The Hobb’s Bargain” just as much.

“Poison Study” (Maria V. Snyder) is a quite different book. It’s set in a different world, one in which the Commander rules Ixia, having taken the country over from its dissolute royal family. The Commander is rigid like iron is hard; his rules are inflexible and his judgments absolute. Nonetheless, he’s fair and not unkind. His right-hand man, Valek, is in charge of finding realiable poison tasters for the Commander’s food, a job that keeps Valek fairly busy, since poison tasters have a short life span. Valek’s choice in “Poison Study” falls on Yelena, a young woman in jail awaiting execution for having killed her benefactor’s son. I think most of us, having heard Yelena’s story, would consider the death justifiable homicide. But there’s no such defense under the Commander’s system of justice.

Yelena proves to be an excellent food taster, and she brings more to the job than just the ability to detect poisons; Yelena has talents that Valek is delighted to discover. Though food tasters are not supposed to make many friends, Yelena also has a talent for attracting good people to her side, and this stands her in good stead as her life grows more and more dangerous. This is a book that’s hard to put down.

BLOG

It’s been a jagged week, with so much incident and so many have-tos that I’m just glad it’s over. My sons are home from college, and their friends are in and out; I had forgotten how chaotic the house could get with so many faces, and dirty shoes, and mountains of dirty clothes and lots of extra dishes. But that’s a happy kind of problem, and one I hope I often have.

My daughter started her school softball season, and we went to two games and a tournament. She played well, but that’s all I can say on that topic.

More sadly, my mother called me early one morning to tell me that one of her caregivers had died in a head-on collision, a young woman of 42 who had a beautiful spirit and a lovely voice. Her name was Geraldine Moody, and she and her sister took care of my father until his death, and then began caring for my mother. Geri was a person who could make you both exasperated and happy, sometimes in the same moment. She was chronically late, for one thing, which had cost her many good jobs. She was also the kind of person who locks herself out of her apartment and her car and anything else with a lock. She broke a lot of plates.

At the same time, she was the kind of woman who took in a little boy and raised him to be a good young man, though she herself never married. She also fretted endlessly over her diabetic father; she was determined to make him eat the right food and take the right medicine. Geri wrote poetry. Geri thought about things. Geri was curious, and observant. Geri had a lovely singing voice. Geri could put up with my dad on his difficult days, and make him smile. Geri prayed with me and my mother’s minister the day my mother had a stroke.

It’s very hard to believe that the next time I visit my mother, Geri won’t be there. I’ll keep expecting her to walk in the back door, apologizing for being late.

This is all I can do for Geri; to tell you about her, and her life, and the difference she made.