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This prehistorical blockbuster by the master of the genre wouldn't let me go after I'd eagerly waded through all 688 pages. It's about the genesis of Stonehenge, from Joia, a priestess who envisioned it, and Seft, a "cleverhands" designer/builder who made it happen. The challenge: the original made of wood was rotting, but how to replicate it in stone, and then how to move the huge pieces? Meanwhile, drought is stressing societal factions. Farmers, herdsmen, and nomadic woodlanders have conflicting needs; therein lie the seeds of war. Why does the story haunt me so? Because not much has changed; they also messed with nature way back then. As my late husband used to say, "we're a bum outfit!"
Bet you've never heard of The Psoad, a Greek epic that joins The Odyssey and The Iliad. In this surprising novel, the protagonist is Harlow, a Ph.D. student who travels from Canada to Oxford to study cuneiform shards. Among them he discovers an unknown writer, Psoas, who tells his epic from the point of view of a foot soldier. The text is often ignominious, surprising, and sometimes very funny. The pages are divided in half, with the Greek verse up top and Harlow's tragic personal story plus his commentary below. Both the scholarship and the poetry are very accessible. It's a heady reading experience.
Joe is tasked with interviewing an old person and writing it up for a college English class. He finds Carl in a nursing home and gets much more than he bargained for. Carl has pancreatic cancer, which is why he’s been released from decades in prison for the rape and murder of a 14-year-old girl. A Vietnam vet, Carl's wartime experiences weigh heavily on him. He says he's innocent of the crime and wants to set the record straight before he dies. Joe and Lila, who lives next door in Joe’s dorm, team up to find the truth; both have autistic siblings, which furthers their growing bond. The actual perpetrator is still around, and things get tense and dangerous as evidence mounts. A gripping mystery.
Investigator Arkady is still on the job, despite his increasing Parkinson's disease which he's managed to hide. At the eponymous Moscow hostelry, a diplomat has been stabbed and bludgeoned, but CCTV cameras only track one suspect. Meanwhile the war between Russia and Ukraine is heating up. Arkady and his journalist lover, Natalia, make the fraught journey to Bucha in Ukraine to gather evidence. There's a slam-bang ending, and that's the end of the series as well, because the beloved author died of Parkinson's last year. You get great characters, lively action, and historical perspective all in one bundle--whew!
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