Its time to rate the Pendergasts

I can't believe its been about 12 years since I first picked up the Relic while in high school.  Relic is the first in the Pendergast series and, in my opinion, still the best to date.  I'm really fortunate to have picked up this book, in a drug store, I believe, because I was drawn in by the spine-chilling cover design.  Too bad, there is a new edition with, in my opinion, a much blander cover.  There have been so far around 10 Pendergast books and, I've actually read all but one and kudos to me for subconsciously turning into an official Preston/Child fan.  I suppose its time to rate them all...in chronological order

The Relic -- ★★★★★
Pendergast's debut, still pretty human in this one (grin).  If any of them deserves a five star, its the Relic.

 The Reliquary -- ★★★☆

Sequal to Relic.  I could not for the world of it get over the transformation of the grumpy but nice professor.  I get the feeling, P/C simply ran out of good villains to render a climactic ending.
Cabinet of Curiosities -- ★★★★
Solid, strong, creepy as hell suspense/thriller. And 891 Riverdrive mansion, what a house!!
 
Stilllife of Crows -- ★★★☆
One of the standalone cases.  I'd like to think of it as Pendergast taking a small detour while on vacation.
 
Brimstone --★★★★
First of the Diogenes series.  Pretty solid addition to the series.
 
Dance of Death  & Book of Dead -- ★★★
Should really be combined into one book.  Both rather mediocre.  Pendergast going through internal struggling and facing up to his worst fears.  I really need to re-read these two. 
 
Wheel of Darkness -- ★★★
Standalone.  This is my least favorite of the series.  Not that the writing is bad.  The writing is consistently decent.  But I find it extremely hard to accept the whole idea behind this "quest"....its morally flawed.
 
Fever Dream  -- ★★★★
This one gets 4 stars because the whole book focuses on Pendergast, and its a Pendergast we've never seen before.  He is extremely pissed off from beginning till end, on the verge of losing his otherwise steel-like self
control more than once in the book, he is ruthless and relentless after the villains.  And he definitely shows emotions.  In short, Pendergast is very human for the first time.  I was flabbergasted when I read one of the latter chapters where Pendergast had a "little fun" with those swamp guys....Is this REALLY the Pendergast we thought we know???  But overall, the story starts out very strong, and kinda falls flat towards the end.  Actually, the story doesn't really end, it beckons a sequal....

讀paper back的輕鬆時光

前段時間發瘋似的搜羅了差不多一打paperback推理小説。
我記得那天走進B&N的時候，設在書店一進門處就是nook的展示和銷售台，平時這裡是沒有人的。我向展示台上的nook多看了幾眼，那天展示台裏站著一個銷售員，有點小cute。他馬上問我，要不要"give you a nook tour"，當時我差點脫口而出，"I've been hesitating between nook and kindle"，還好及時gave myself a mental slap in the face。總之我回答“no, thanks”的速度慢了一點，誰知此男嘴角一翹笑了笑說，"you thought for a while" (did i mention he is cute?)，ah, darn it, don't tempt me!  I'm already losing this battle against e-books!  And truth be told, I'm slightly more inclined over kindles, but it was stupid of me to almost blurt that out right in B&N~~~ anyways~~~ having resisted another round of e-book attack (and that cute grin), I hurried downstairs to the paperback section (and why am I writing in English???)
總之，跑題了，今天的思緒非常散亂~~~想買一些“女性”的paperback mysteries,完全是因爲想讀一些輕鬆的書，適合在星期天下午，喝午茶的時候，在開滿鮮花的院子裏，或者海灘邊讀的那類書。所以，對於推理本身的質量，我是沒有過高期待的。還好沒有過高的期待，雖然都是paperback，但是書跟書比也確實能看出差距，我讀paperback推理小説是從Preston 和Child開始的，他們的小説應該是懸疑/驚悚類，比純推理類要更豐富，因爲起點比較高，所以現在讀大多數女性作家的推理小説，基本上都是波瀾不驚、以看個熱鬧、打發時間這類心情去讀。第一本讀完的"How to Wash a Cat"，總體感覺是，作者的文筆有點過於花俏，雖然我挺喜歡她塑造的Montgomery Carmichael這個人，但是文筆太囉嗦了一點。後面讀的兩本Bibliophile Mysteries，應該說，這不能太算推理小説，比較像言情小説，我有點懷疑作家以前是不是寫過言情劇本，因爲我發現裏面的言情橋斷挺多，寫得還不錯，我也挺喜歡讀，以至於到現在，誰是兇手我已經無所謂，但是卻很期待讀女主角周旋於幾個帥哥之間的橋斷，哦，而且裏面出現的男性角色幾乎個個都很帥（=.=)。以前上大學的時候，有段時間也瘋狂讀過中文的言情小説，我發現，無論是用英文寫，還是中文寫，好多橋斷、甚至具體的句子/用詞，都很相似，我都能在腦子裏實時把那些英文句子視譯成我非常熟悉的中文言情小説用爛的句子，所以經常會心一笑。比如說，His(the hot buck)eyes narrowed, lips thinned（他眯起了雙眸，薄唇緊抿）; his piercing, all-knowing gaze (他銳利的目光似乎可以穿透一切)；his lips curled into a sensual grin (他唇角勾起一絲性感的笑)之類的，讀到這些“久違”的句子，我都快笑翻了，看來英文讀者也吃這一套啊~~~