Green by Sam Graham-Felsen

Published by Random House on January 2, 2018

David Greenfeld, blond and blue-eyed, is starting middle school in Boston, one of only two white kids in his class. His teacher wants her advanced class to move on to Boston Latin for seventh grade, but David sucks at standardized testing and isn’t holding out hope of escaping MLK. To their credit, David’s hippy parents believe in public schools and refuse to send him to a private school. As a consequence, David needs to find a way to deal with his lack of acceptance.

David tries to be cool, in the way that white kids emulate black kids because black kids have style and white kids are nerdish. He speaks the vernacular (you feel me?), but he doesn’t have the right gear (his sneakers are old because his parents won’t buy shoes that are made in sweatshops), he isn’t athletic, and he doesn’t rock the kind of attitude that earns the respect of his peers. His white friend Kev is a baller and fits in easily, but Kev isn’t much of a friend. Eventually David is befriended by a nerdish black kid named Mar, nerdish in ways that are similar to David’s, although their different religious backgrounds are another reason for David to feel that he doesn’t fit in.

One of the novel’s themes involves the various aspects of racism. David and Kev and Mar are all studying to take a test that might get them admitted to Latin School, which might get them admitted to Harvard. But a city council member clues them into the reality that most of them won’t get into Harvard, and even if they do, society’s white power structure will impose obstacles to advancement that white students won’t need to overcome. Mar and David are both subjected to neighborhood bullying and both are subjected to racial slurs. This is a fair and nuanced view of society in which racism goes both ways, and race is often secondary to common interests, like a fan’s love of a particular team. And while the themes of race and class are serious, the broader theme is that kids are kids. Their confusion and anxiety as they try to get a handle on life transcends race and lends itself to easy laughter.

Green would be a coming-of-age novel except that David is too young to come of age. Still, he endures the pain of growing up and earns the kind of wisdom and maturity that characterize coming-of-age novels. The plot isn’t particularly eventful but the story has an authentic feel and it’s easy to relate to David’s unrelenting angst.

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Operator Down by Brad Taylor

Published by Dutton on January 9, 2018

I think this series took a wrong turn when Brad Taylor introduced Shoshana, the “supernatural predator” who kills by instinct but has a childlike view of the world. She isn’t a credible character but, even worse, she’s become little more than a caricature. She’s supposed to be the female version of Pike Logan (he was Soshana before the love of a good woman civilized him) but even without Jennifer’s civilizing influence, Pike would be capable of subtlety, nuance, and a reasonable degree of self-control, while Soshana is a one-note character who seems desperately in need of anti-psychotic medication to contain her mindless rage. Her self-perception as a “monster that shouldn’t walk the earth” has been overplayed. Unfortunately, the series has continually gravitated toward Aaron (a former Mossad agent) and his partner Shoshana, when it was sailing along just fine with the Taskforce characters at center stage. Alas.

My Shoshana rant notwithstanding, the story delivers the action and tension that is typical of a Brad Taylor novel. Mossad has hired Aaron to track the employee of a diamond broker in Soweto to learn whether he is doing anything that might embarrass Israel. Aaron stumbles onto something bigger (although he has no idea what) and gets captured. The thugs who capture him fear that he has communicated with Shoshana, so they travel to Israel to take her out. By happy coincidence, Pike Logan has been tasked with following a shady arms merchant who also happens to be a diamond merchant. Pike follows the dealer to Israel, accompanied by Jennifer and Blood, encounters Shoshana, then makes his way to South Africa while trying to understand how his mission has intersected with Aaron’s disappearance. Somewhere along the way, Knuckles adds his presence to the team, after being assigned to make goo-goo eyes at the new Secretary of State so that she'll support whatever actions the Taskforce wants to take.

The frequent stare-down confrontations between Pike and the impetuous Shoshana become tedious, but other aspects of the story are worthwhile, nothwithstanding the silliness of Knuckles' seductive glances at a cabinet official. Despite its length, Operator Down isn’t as meaty as some other entries in the series, but I always appreciate Taylor’s efforts to avoid standard terrorist villains in standard terrorist locations. Most of this story takes place in South Africa, and a detour (which soon becomes the main plot) involves a coup in Lesotho and Pike’s decision to take sides. Taylor’s formula has Pike doing things he’s not supposed to do (as opposed to taking illegal actions that the Taskforce sanctions), and the formula works well here. There’s a bit of character development involving Pike and Jennifer (she wants him to commit, he’s a guy) but the story is mostly about action, and the action is solid.

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Happy New Year 2018

Elmet by Fiona Mozley

First published in Great Britain in 2017; published by Algonquin Books on December 5, 2017

Elmet is a gut-wrenching story of a proud family living at the edge of society, fighting for their right to be left alone. The story is narrated by Daniel, a 15-year-old boy who knows little of his absent mother because Daniel’s father is silent about Daniel’s mother and most other things. Daniel’s bond with his father is strong but their communication has little to do with language.

Daniel’s father, John, is a bare-knuckle fighter, a man of almost mythical stature, the toughest man in England and Ireland. Daniel lives with his father and his older sister, Cathy, who learns to protect herself (and Daniel) with her fists, although her school did not approve of girls who fight back. John consequently took the kids out of school and moved away from their home town. Daniel’s father trusts Vivien, a neighbor, to teach the kids things that he can’t.

John lives an isolated life with his children, eschewing the company of neighbors. He talks little about his past, but he makes clear to his children that they are his world. He works hard to toughen them, to make them strong so they can withstand the hardship they will inevitably face.

Despite his isolation, John helps people in the surrounding villages and farms. His philosophy is, “You take care of people and it always comes good in the end.” To that end, John helps people in their protest against Price, the wealthy landowner who acts as the landlord for most of the people who live nearby. He also helps them stand up to the landowners who refuse to pay fair wages for the work done by those who farm their land.

Price owns the land on which John has built his family’s home. John will no longer do the dirty work requested by Price, so the family faces an uncertain future. Helping the powerless stand up to Price only makes the family’s future more precarious. The plot builds slowly to a conflict that can’t be resolved with fists alone.

Elmet’s theme involves the resentment that members of the working class (or the barely-working class) feel when land that was once community owned is deeded to rich landowners, who rent it to the same people who have always occupied it, while refusing to make improvements or repairs. Other themes spotlight the virtues of honesty and directness, and of standing up for principles even when the battle cannot be won.

Fiona Mozley’s graceful prose contrasts with the broken dialect of the novel’s main characters. Her observant descriptions of land and scenery create a rich atmosphere that connects the present to the past: “The soil was alive with ruptured stories that cascaded and rotted then found form once more and pushed up through the undergrowth and back into our lives.” The novel’s powerful ending is as unexpected as it is inevitable.

Elmet made the longlist for the 2017 Man Booker Prize. The winner, Lincoln in the Bardo, is another fine novel. Elmet is a more traditional example of storytelling. Both books tell a moving story, but I think I would give the edge to Elmet. In any event, they are both rewarding novels

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Robicheaux by James Lee Burke

Published by Simon & Schuster on January 2, 2018

Dave Robicheaux falls off the wagon, has a blackout, and finds himself accused of murdering T.J. Dartez, the man who was responsible for his wife’s death. That’s a fairly standard thriller plot but James Lee Burke is not a standard thriller writer.

Dave’s involvement is investigated by an unlikeable colleague named Spade Labiche — unlikeable because he’s racist, sexist, and corrupt. While Dave is being investigated, he’s assigned to an investigation of his own. An acquaintance, Jimmy Nightingale, is accused of raping the wife of another acquaintance, Levon Broussard, after Dave introduced them. Nightingale is a politician who owns part of a reverse mortgage company that preys on the elderly and on Dave’s buddy Clete Purcel. He’s the kind of patrician elitist who tries to convince good old boys that he’s one of them, conning his way to election victories.

Broussard and Nightingale and Tony “Nine Ball” Nemo, who controls the southern branch of a criminal organization, are all involved in the production of a Civil War movie based on one of Broussard’s books. Broussard is a decent guy who has a blind spot about the Civil War. After Broussard shows Dave a Confederate flag carried by a 14-year-old boy at Shiloh, Dave thinks of his friend: “Yet here we stood in reverence of an iconic flag that retained the pink stain of a farm boy’s blood, and whether anybody would admit it or not, the cause it represented was the protection and furtherance of human bondage.” Dave’s daughter Alafair helps write the script, although she doesn’t have much use for Nightingale or Nemo or, for that matter, Labiche.

James Lee Burke’s discussion of the rape investigation presents a balanced view of the difficulty that fair-minded officers have when the truthfulness of a sexual assault allegation is less than clear. He also gives a harsh but unbiased account of corruption and unchecked drinking as a way of life in parts of Louisiana, while extolling the virtues of Cajun culture.

As always, Burke is a keen observer of life. He writes about what Americans do “when we lose faith in ourselves and reach out for the worst members of our species.” He unmasks hate-mongers who disguise their vile rhetoric as a protest against political correctness. All of that adds interest to the story without becoming a distraction.

Dave suspects that Nemo and a cruel character named Kevin Penney were somehow involved in the murders of eight prostitutes (the Jeff Davis Eight) that were the backdrop to The Glass Rainbow. A creepy but oddly principled killer named Chester (a/k/a Smiley) also wanders through the story, complicating Dave’s life with a string of murders.

Burke’s characters are always strong. Dave’s friend Clete plays a significant role as he tries to balance his innate goodness against his desire to destroy evil. Dave has similar problems, although his real battle is with his desire to drown his problems in alcohol, which is what caused the mess that starts the story.

The plot is intricate but credible. Burke doesn’t tidy up every loose end, but life is untidy. Robicheaux isn’t my favorite Burke novel, or even my favorite Robicheaux novel, but Burke is one of my three favorite crime writers and his books never disappoint.

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