Book Reviews

"A Last Resort" by Mark J. Okrant

            Writing a book review for a murder mystery is rather difficult without revealing the ending to potential readers.  Since I would recommend this book to any New Hampshire enthusiasts and fans of the murder mystery genre, I will try to do my best.  Mark J. Okrant did an outstanding job of creating a mystery that takes place at an actual resort in the heart of the Great North Woods called The Balsams.  Although I’ve never personally been a guest there, my wife was employed there for a few years.  Then, as I turned the pages, I read with amazement about the surrounding towns that were all so familiar to me, but even more astounding were some of the cities and towns not so close that Mr. Okrant mentioned that also have some personal meaning to me.  I felt like I must have traveled or visited every place the author did at one point.  Except the Balsams, I guess.  I’ve driven by there and even been on the grounds before, but that’s about the extent of it.  Thanks to A Last Resort, it will be a personal goal set aside for some time in my life to actually attend the premises as a guest.

            The characters seemingly jump off the pages as they each take on their own persona and the reader is left really feeling the emotions expressed by each one.  With plenty of suspects in tow, Okrant cuts the chapters off in just the right spot to tease a little bit of the ingredients in his recipe that he flavors just enough without overpowering too much spice.  This makes the book rather difficult to put down.  There’s sex, crime, and bad apples without an ounce of raunchiness and in this day and age, that’s not easy to pull off.

            Murder mysteries are not exactly my favorite genre.  I find too often many authors will pen in protagonists like the over-clichéd gumshoe or down-on-his-count-cop- about-to-lose-his-job-for-drinking-too-much get thrown into a jumbled mix of technical jargon.  Other mysteries I’ve read revealed some hidden suspect the author never bothered to tell the reader about from the get-go.  To me, that’s a cheat.  Okrant does none of these.  His main character is a professor and an author, not a police officer or private investigator at all.  But the real treat was his ability to make the mystery interesting and add bits of information.  Being as particular as I am, I made little notes in my head wondering if the author would forget to mention or clarify some of the clues or sub plots and to my delight, Okrant did an excellent job of covering all of his bases. 

            I’m not going to say that the ending of this book was my cup of tea.  It’s my own personal issues, I’m sure.  Without illuminating how the book ends, I will simply say that anyone who has read my work would certainly understand why I say that.  I will also toot my own horn and admit that I had predicted the outcome at one point almost to a tee.  Now I don’t know if that’s because I also write stories, so when I read, I have an uncanny tendency of going through the pages of the book yet to read and predict what I think will happen … or how I would have written it.  That’s just the vanity of any self-proclaimed writer, I’m sure of it.  It can’t be just me!    

            On the other hand, mystery lovers and book readers everywhere would enjoy this book for its quality writing, believable characters, proficient plot building, and not to mention the scenery of The Great North Woods.  My hats off to Mark J. Okrant and I will and would gladly purchase his next adventure in print.

J.L. Campbell 

"Into the Wild" by Jon Krakauer

            How this particular book escaped my browsing eyes for over ten years is beyond me.  If there is a section of a bookstore that I tend to invest a great deal of time in, it is one of non-fiction that involves human emotion and ordeals beyond the realm of imagination.  The description of the book itself is quite appealing to my palate and yet, I take credit where it is not due, for it was not me that noticed the book in the bookstore section.  I received it on my fourth wedding anniversary from my beloved wife.  Traditionally, books are the gift to give in the fourth year.    

            I had read Krakauer’s Into Thin Air as it was practically still warm off the printing press in hard cover and had enjoyed it.  I got a sense, by his own admission, in the context that he was/is a bit pompous and he received much negative critique of that book from the others involved in the ill-fated Mount Everest expedition, that Krakauer himself, was a significant part of.  People died on that mountain, as they do, and he was criticized for writing the book too soon before the process of those lost could be mourned properly.  In any event, I enjoyed that book for its quality and its content, and it was deemed well enough by the critics to make a television movie about.  Enough said.

            Krakauer is an excellent writer and says things quite eloquently even though I think he tends to throw his vocabulary around a little bit, beating up on the more uneducated, but one has to admit, he has a way with words. 

            Into the Wild is an account of the last few months of a young man named Chris McCandless, who in 1992, gave all his money away, abandoned his car, burned all the money in his wallet, and then hitchhiked to Alaska to live out a passionate dream in search of his own ability to survive off of the land.  Four months later, his decomposed body is discovered by a pair of moose hunters.  And don’t fret, I’m not giving away the story, I’m practically quoting the book cover word for word.  It is a journey based on Chris’s actual journals, but very little in the book actually unveils these journals and instead the reader is left to listen to Krakauer give his own opinions based on the research he did covering the story.  Interviews with McCandless’s estranged family members and some of the last few people that had the pleasure to meet McCandless are portrayed in story writing format instead of the drab interviewer, interviewee format.  I enjoyed that quality of the book and the fact that Krakauer decided to write it that way.  Perhaps it takes away from the fact that it’s a non-fiction book, but it certainly does nothing to hinder the story of McCandless. 

            As with many books of mysterious and untimely deaths, some of the book is based on speculation because there is nothing more than conjecture to base any tangible evidence to.  There are three similar examples that Krakauer dedicates a couple of chapters to and compares these other accounts and the personalities of the victims to McCandless himself.  I suppose I found that appropriate enough, but I found that I was yearning to find out more of Chris and his encounters than actually enjoying the text of reading about the other three similar accounts.

            Next, Krakauer takes a sudden turn and dedicates two chapters of the book to himself, and I’m still wondering why he decided to do this.  It was perhaps a vain attempt to self-associate himself with Chris McCandless and maybe find the reason, the answers, within himself to help himself better understand the frame of mind that the lad was in when he met his demise.  Its two chapters dedicated to Krakauer’s lone ascent of the Stikine Ice Cap when he was in his early 20’s, which is the same age McCandless was when he died.  Although I enjoyed these chapters immensely and thought perhaps it would make a good book or short story standing on its own, I once again found myself trying to hurry through them so I could find out more about the man the book was intended to investigate.  Is this Krakauer’s vanity surfacing? 

            A 203 page book published in hard cover by Villard books in 1996, it also contains a few topographical maps and considering the time invested in the chapters that steered away from the mainstream of the story, despite their effort to be associated to McCandless and his endeavors, I felt somewhat unfulfilled by the end.  This is not to pan this book in any way.  Krakauer is, in my opinion, an excellent writer and has many best sellers accredited to him.  Perhaps it’s the story itself that leaves the reader left with more questions than answers.  A mystery never to be resolved.  Life is stranger than fiction, after all and it’s these stories that rubberneckers of morbid details, like myself, probably want as much information about as possible.  With that in mind, the reader would be disappointed with this book.  However, I’m still going to recommend it for anyone, most likely in the category of the male gender, (sorry, ladies … it’s nothing personal, but I’ve yet to meet many women who have ever fantasized about such a thing) who has ever had the dream or fantasy of living off the rugged land and finding the will to survive off of his own means.

J.L. Campbell    

"Not Without Peril, by Nicholas Howe"

There were many reasons why this particular book grabbed my attention from the start. One of the more obvious ones was the fact that I spent many of my younger years climbing the very summits where the setting of the book takes place; The Heights of the Presidential Range in New Hampshire. Another reason was the macabre purpose of the book which chronicles historical and actual tragedies that have taken place up there. Twenty one victims in 17 chapters, to be exact. I’m not so sure why there is this feeling inside me that takes a certain amount of pride being a native from the state that has bragging rights to the "worst weather in the world." I’m sure that is something Freud would have fun evaluating about me. At least I can admit that there is something in me and in many people I have witnessed in my lifetime that rubberneck when passing by an accident. It seems everyone has a fascination with death and tragedy to a certain extent. That’s another reason why this book is appealing. You don’t actually need to be a "mountain climber" to appreciate its content as a form of entertainment. If you happen to be one... well, that just adds to its attraction.

It was the jacket cover of "Not Without Peril; 150 Years of Misadventure on the Presidential Range of New Hampshire," by Nicholas Howe (a fellow New Hampshirite) that grabbed my initial attention. A seemingly wispy blue sky above, shadowed by lurking rock summits that were covered in a blanket of pristine snowfall... looked innocent enough, but as I mentioned, I’d been up there and knew very well, that things can and do change in a hurry. Once I read the title, I snatched it off the shelf so quick that I bet surveillance cameras for shoplifters zoned in on me at once. I opened the cover and read the inside description of the book and a smirk of satisfaction broadened across my face. This book profiled certain deaths that had taken place on Mount Washington and the summits of its nearby sisters in chronological order. Cool. I made no time reaching the checkout and could have sworn I heard a security guard sigh a breath of relief somewhere, then I excitedly exited the bookstore.

Published by the Appalachian Mountain Club and just over 300 pages, I took no time at all diving into the history of one of my most favorite places in all of our humble state. And what an adventure. After a brief , but interesting history lesson in the beginning of the book, some facts of which I already knew from my own research and some that I learned from Mr. Howe, the book flowed like vignettes plotting different characters in different years falling victim under very similar circumstances. Victims of unpreparedness. Howe goes as far as being scientific explaining why a seemingly small range of mountains and whose stature is questioned by many mountaineers, has the potential and perfect ingredients to offer the prestigious title of "worst weather in the world." One wouldn’t even have to be a New Hampshire native or resident to find that formula interesting.

In 1784 the great summit of the Cristall hill, Agiocochook was renamed by the residents to honor General George Washington, who had won the Revolutionary War. It was the largest peak east of the Mississippi River and along the Eastern Seaboard. Its mystique and history was coveted by the settlers and the first chronicled ascent was in June of 1642 by a man named Darby Field. Prior to that, the mountain lay almost untouched by the Abenaki tribes that dwelled in its valleys. The Heights were considered "off limits" to anyone other than the gods. Despite the first recorded ascent of the mountains, the book begins its journey in 1849 with a man named Frederick Strickland and ends in 1994. There is an appendix at the end of the book which lists every documented death up until 1999 and begins with Strickland. Illustrated, topographical maps of each scenario detail where the climb began, where it went awry, and in many tragic cases, where the victim was discovered.

A "must have" for any bookshelf, "Not Without Peril" can be enjoyed for its historical value and the simple art of rubbernecking, as many of us seem to do. If you already have the book, go read it again. If you don’t own the book, take a ride down to Wonderland Bookstore and get it. Tell Gloria that J.L. sent you. After you read it, take a ride to the Notch and look up at Agiocochook aka Mount Washington and think of one of the people you just read about. Imagine how different the weather and the conditions are up there from where you’re standing. Imagine what they went through up there even though it doesn’t seem that far away. It’s hard to fathom, but it helps if you’ve been up there.

J.L. Campbell

"Cell" by Stephen King

I could have sworn that I saw Stephen King on an episode of Good Morning America claiming that he was going to retire after finishing his last book in the Dark Tower series.  I was aghast, in a way, and even more so after I read "From A Buick 8."  This was his last attempt at writing horror fiction?  From the master of macabre who wrote such masterpieces as "Misery," "Salem's Lot," "The Shining," and "The Stand?"  What a disappointment!  But I'm not reviewing "From a Buick 8" right now, which is a good thing, but I will tell anyone who hasn't read it to save their money if they absolutely must read it someday and browse the titles of the second-hand paperback bookstores.  I'm sure they'll have plenty of copies of it.

As for "Cell," it was nice to see King return a little more to his true form.  Another chance at a post-apocalyptic situation not much unlike "The Stand" except one quarter its size.  A "mini-me" version of "The Stand" perhaps, and not quite as confusing.   If you've ever read the epic, then you'd know what I was talking about.  There are several characters you're trying to keep track of and then you turn the page and he just adds a bunch more to the plot that he never bothered to intruduce to us at all.  "Cell" is much easier to keep up with as it centers on a smaller, more intimate circle of people who gather together to defend themselves against the malevolent forces of the dark side.  It follows their trek, which remains in the New England region, from Massachusetts to Maine, and not across the continent.  He rips the rug out from under our feet with a couple of characters, as he always does, and in that sense, I appreciated the book.  If I can sit there while reading and be screaming, "NO! Don't do that!" inside my head, then I consider it a good read.   

But, alas, I will not give this book a five star rating.  Nor would I "The Stand" for that matter.  I loved "The Stand," don't get me wrong.  But King builds this tension in that book as the reader bears witness to the formation of two armies, one good, and one evil, and then the two never face off in full confrontation.  And then, the reader is left to endure a couple hundred more pages of the good army having to head back to headquarters without the presence of malevolent danger, but only the conditions of the elements, like winter weather.  Zzzzzzzzz!  I almost fell asleep describing that.  For every reason I wish King had ended "The Stand" at a much earlier time then he chose to, I also wish he had extended his "Cell" just that little bit longer and give us a hint of how he actually wanted to happen to his character.  Yes... it's one of those "leave it up to the reader" to decide and if King remembers his book "Misery," I'm sure that Annie Wilkes would have considered "Cell" a cheat and hobbled his ankles and made him rewrite the ending.  I'd also like to thank King for abandoning his cantahs and cantaks of the alternate world with which he has been weaving in many of his past novels.  The King fans know what I'm talking about... "The Talisman," "Black House," world (that he collaborated on with Straub) and brought to the surface in such books as "Desperation," "Insomnia," most likely "From A Buick 8," et al.  I was getting real tired of alternate worlds being "the evil forces to deal with."  I will admit he started scaring me in "Cell" when the evil forces kept speaking gibberish and writing things on the pavement like Kashwak=No-Fo.  But then, he explains what that means without getting into all the magic of the other world.    

I must admit, being a self-procalimed writer in the horror genre, that I too have written endings of "the cheating kind" where you leave the reader hanging on the edge and they have to come up with their own conclusions.  But that's me.  I'm no King and King is no Campbell.  For that, I'm sure he's quite pleased about, but I doubt he's ever taken the time to even read me.  And all the books I've read of yours, Stephen!  Shame on you...  and I'm only a short story author for goodness sake. 

The bottom line is that I do recommend "Cell" and there may be a lot of people who give me a hard time about doing so, but then I'd say... go read "From A Buick 8" and then you'll appreciate "Cell" that much more.  In my opinion, I'm glad to see King coming back out of retirement, if in fact he ever did retire.  It could have been just my imagination playing tricks on me, I guess.  Perhaps wishful thinking that I wouldn't have him to compete with in the horror genre any more.  Not that I am any competition for the likes of The King of Horror.   

At the back of the book (at least in hard cover, because I actually dedicate King to hard cover only... yeah, I'm a fan) there's an excerpt of his next novel due out this fall called "Lisey's Story" which is printed in his hand-writing.  Although his hand writing is much better then mine, I must say I seriously hope the book isn't published this way.  I found it very hard to read and eventually gave up, (not exactly sure if what I read just wasn't grabbing me or if the hand-written format was frustrating me) satisfied with myself for reading all 350 pages of "Cell" in three days.  Hey... I have a full-time job, too, you know.  It's not like I sit around the house all day eating chocolate covered cherries, watching soap-operas, and reading novels! 

Kudo's to King for "Cell" and welcome back to print, if you did in fact ever leave.  I look forward to reviewing your next book "Lisey's Story," and I pray we don't venture into cantahs or cantaks or alternate worlds, but then if we do... I'll just give you my opinion.

J.L. Campbell 

"Tales Told in the Shadows of the White Mountains" by Charles J. Jordan  

            For a writer of macabre fiction and a fan of true to life ghost stories and the such, the title of this book appealed to me instantly.  That the contents of the book take place in my native state just added to the attraction. 

            I must admit that I wasn’t too engrossed in the beginning of the book, but since I have finished it, I’ve changed my mind and would like to apologize and give credit where it is due to Mr. Charles J. Jordan.  After all, I have a four-year-old daughter and my attention span while trying to read the beginning of the book could very well have been contributed to her demands and needs at the time.  The reason I thought otherwise was because my idea of the word tales indicates to me that I will enjoy reading some juicy campfire style stories and Mr. Jordan does not write in a language that suggests he’s sat around too many spinning eccentric yarns in layman’s terms for the sheer purpose of entertaining those of us that do. 

            In Chapter 12, entitled Northern Ghosts, he explains “no one has an easy explanation for those things that go bump in the night.  In seeking out ghost stories that had been reported within the shadows of the White Mountains, I’ve contained my accounts to recent reports.  I didn’t want to round up tales that could be chalked up to campfire stories from a more unenlightened, superstitious past.”  As if to almost challenge Mr. Jordan, I took it upon myself to look up the word tales in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary that sits to the right of my laptop on my desk.  And I will quote; “1: a relation of a series of events  2: a report of confidential matter 3: idle talk esp: harmful gossip 4: a usu. imaginative narrative 5: FALSEHOOD  6: COUNT, TALLY”  Now since we can eliminate numbers 2, 3, 5, and 6, I now understand why Mr. Jordan can not only entitle the book the way he did, but also, why he did.  Although for my own personal reasons, I would have preferred a book to contain tales that abided to the number 4 description, Mr. Jordan chose to write them using the number 1 description.  And shame on me for thinking that all tales should be written under such stringent guidelines.  As with many of the facts and tales contained in the book, I have been equally educated in yet another new version of story telling; or should I say, the telling of tales.

            Mr. Jordan conveys his knowledge and experience through his words and I learned quite a bit of my native state when in fact I thought I knew many details already.  He did cover some of the lore of the White Mountains that I knew a lot about, but he went into areas of the Great North Woods and throughout Coos County that I had no idea existed.  With that said, after finishing his book, there are many aspects of this compendium of tales that will stay with me for the rest of my life.  Indeed there is much of this book that I had never heard about nor encountered in my years of reading many tales and that is most likely due to the fact that I’ve had my nose stuck in those books that do cater to the “more unenlightened, superstitious past.”  So, here I am with egg on my face. 

            While many people from Coos County may have heard about some of these tales, I was raised near the Seacoast and have recently moved to the northern section of the state.  Although I’m considered a newbie to these parts, I am indeed a true New Hampshire native, have climbed many of the mountains across the state, and have paid my taxes when due on time my entire life.  After reading Mr. Jordan’s book, I can now consider myself more educated in the facts and local lore of the area that I knew nothing about before, nor ever had the opportunity to read in books past.  Such as the knocking under Hannah Nute’s feet everywhere she went, the Millerites and their beliefs, the downward pointing fingers that appear on a couple of antique gravestones and the possible reasons why, the possible murders of the Bugbee-Towne families of Lancaster, the forbidden waters in Dixville Notch and the Indian curses that went above and beyond the infamous Chocorua legend, the vanished woman of Gorham, and the mystery girl of Stewartstown Hollow.  Although some of these tales, I should have heard about at some point in my life through my own preferences of reading material, I will recommend this book to those with similar tastes of mine if they do indeed seek to broaden their horizons.  Perhaps it won’t be written in a style you’re expecting if you think it’s a “sit-around-the-campfire” read, but Mr. Jordan can write very well and has credentials to back up his exquisite workmanship.  If you recall the old-school textbooks, maybe they weren’t always written in the most entertaining formats, but you most certainly always learned something from them if you took to time to read them.  I won’t compare Tales Told in the Shadows of the White Mountains to an old-school textbook, but I will promise those who have not read it, will most definitely learn a thing or two about the state of New Hampshire. 

            This book will be placed proudly on my bookshelf and be recommended to those who I feel should and could broaden their horizons.

J.L. Campbell