An observation or two

I might touch on some of the following at a bit more length at some point, but for now here are some quick impressions of a few diversions that have recently crossed my path...

I'm still quite enjoying Lawrence Block's Matthew Scudder series, and found the latest one I've read, Eight Million Ways To Die, to be the best yet. This one is pretty much equal parts Scudder trying to solve a series of prostitute murders and overcome his alcoholism.  It's longer and more nuanced than past Scudder entries, but still a fast, engrossing read.  It looks like I'll be firmly on the Scudder train through the remainder of 2021.

I picked up a copy of Michael Chabon's The Final Solution, an original Sherlock Holmes story set during World War II when the great detective has seen better, livelier days. At only 131 pages (with several of featuring full-page artworks), I thought it would be fun to read an entire novel in only a couple of days, something I haven't done in a while.  But, no.  While moody and somewhat interesting, this mostly dry and self-consciously literate take on Holmes took a little effort to get through, but I was glad that I finally finished it in a week or so. 

The plot involves a little boy's missing parrot, with said parrot somehow in the possession of missing codes used in the war effort. Prior to the bird's disappearance, the bird would often cackle the seemingly nonsensical codes aloud, until someone figured out the value of the cackling and absconded with the bird.  While in the end readable and okay, I'm making the book sound more interesting than it was.

On the streaming front, We Summon The Darkness was a perfectly watchable thriller on Netflix.  It involves three young women heading to a Metal concert (the 2020 movie is set in the 80's), the three guys they meet at the concert and eventually party with, and some satanic killers roaming the countryside. While certainly not Citizen Kane, the movie isn't as junky as it sounds and has a couple of decent twists (the first one of I guessed, though it wasn't bad).  At 90 minutes or so, the movie doesn't overstay its welcome and wouldn't be a bad choice in you're in the mood for a drive-in style horror thriller to distract yourself from the only slightly less intense horror of the outside world these days.