Book Review: Billy Summers by Stephen King @StephenKing @ScribnerBooks

Billy Summers
Stephen King
Scribner, August 2021
ISBN 978-1-9821-7361-6
Hardcover

I’ve been a Stephen King fan for a long time but over the past few years I’ve drifted away from reading his work. I’m not too sure if it was simply because I wasn’t altogether fond of his darker novels.  I used to say I’d rather read the scary stuff than watch it in a movie or television series, but I’ve found I’m not enjoying reading anything too dark with too much graphic scenes of murder and mayhem.

With a title like Billy Summers  (everyone knows a guy named Billy who can generally be a friendly helpful individual and of course Summers gives the impression of a warm, lazy, easy-going guy who is well-liked).  And after reading a few positive reviews and comments regarding King’s latest offering, I became intrigued and decided to check it out.  I’m so glad I did.

Billy Summers is an intriguing character. He’s a hired killer and has been for a number of years.  He’s also a decorated Iraq war vet and one of the best snipers in the world. So says the inside flap on the hardcover.  He has one rule, however, when it comes to a proposed victim, he must be a truly bad guy. Billy has been paid well for his skill and for the fact that he manages to successfully slip away unnoticed from these ‘jobs’.

Getting on in years Billy has plans to retire, but after much thought he accepts this latest and, as far as he’s concerned, last job.  There is much planning and possibly weeks of waiting.  Billy moves to an apartment while he waits for final instructions re the ‘job’ and spends his time reading, a favourite pastime. Told to keep a low profile he soon gets bored, and decides to pass the time writing his own life story, but changing his name.

So there are two stories now running parallel.  Slowly but surely you grow to like and even admire this man, learning how his early life played out and influenced the choices he made, adding a depth of understanding to just how he became a hired killer.

But Billy is also a careful, thoughtful, and smart guy who begins to doubt the motives and plans of the men who have hired him.  Billy has tended over the years to cultivate the impression he is a quiet guy and one who is a little simple-minded. And as an added precaution, decides to make plans of his own, a backup, for when the job is done.

And there’s more! Much more!  And  if you want to find out how Billy fares, my advice is to grab a copy and read Billy Summers, one of King‘s best novels to date….

Trust me you won’t regret it…

Respectfully submitted.

Reviewed by guest reviewer Moyra Tarling, January 2022.

Book Review: The Spoils of Avalon by Mary F. Burns

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Title: The Spoils of Avalon
Series: A John Singer Sargent/Violet Paget Mystery Book One
Author: Mary F. Burns
Publisher: Sand Hill Review Press
Publication Date: November 1, 2014
Genre: Historical Mystery

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“An artist, a writer, a murder, a mysterious tome, a dissolving time, a crime,
Arthurian legends, ancient saints books and bones. Burns’ prose drives and
is sublime, with characters and settings that live on in your mind. This is an
original historical mystery connecting the Age of Industry with the Age of Miracles.”
– Stephanie Renée dos Santos, forthcoming novel: Cut From The Earth

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The Spoils of Avalon
A John Singer Sargent/Violet Paget Mystery Book One
Mary F. Burns
Sand Hill Review Press, November 2014
ISBN 978-1-937818-28-9
Trade Paperback

From the publisher—

The death of a humble clergyman in 1877 leads amateur sleuths Violet Paget and John Singer Sargent into a medieval world of saints and kings—including the legendary Arthur—as they follow a trail of relics and antiquities lost since the destruction of Glastonbury Abbey in 1539. Written in alternating chapters between the two time periods, The Spoils of Avalon creates a sparkling, magical mystery that bridges the gap between two worlds that could hardly be more different—the industrialized, Darwinian, materialistic Victorian Age and the agricultural, faith-infused life of a medieval abbey on the brink of violent change at the hands of Henry VIII and Thomas Cromwell.

First in a new series of historical mysteries, The Spoils of Avalon introduces two unlikely detectives and life-long friends—beginning as young people on the verge of making their names famous for the next several decades throughout Europe and America: the brilliant and brittle Violet Paget, known as the writer Vernon Lee, and the talented, genial portrait painter John Singer Sargent.

Writing a novel in two different time periods is nothing new but doing it really well is not so easy. The Spoils of Avalon is, to my way of thinking, a prime example of doing it oh, so very well. I was intrigued when offered the chance to read and review this because I’m fond of both the Arthurian legend and its time and the Victorian period for historical fiction and historical mysteries (not to mention pure historical nonfiction). Ms. Burns not only didn’t fail me, she gave me one of the best reads I’ve had all year.

The first thing I have to mention is the tone of the alternating chapters. By that, I mean there is no mistaking whether it’s 1539 or 1877 because the author has such a fine sense of the language and the syntax of each time and the events that were occurring, historically speaking. Henry VIII and Thomas Cromwell were in the midst of destroying the monasteries in 1539 and the fear and disillusionment felt by the Abbot, the young monk, Arthur, and other abbey monks who gave their loyalty to the Church is palpable. Looking back from today, we know how Henry and Cromwell rampaged through all the church holdings, taking their wealth for the Crown and leaving the English Church in ruins. Contrasted with that time is the Victorian era and it’s industrialization and the beginnings of women’s freedoms. Violet and John speak in the mode of language you would anticipate and show the signs of modernity that would have certainly been evident in 1877 England.

The characters, primarily Arthur, John and Violet, all came to life for me. I felt the Abbot’s distress and Arthur’s devotion to the man while he was having doubts about his own future as a monk. Seeing Arthur in a teenaged role was interesting, lending a new facet to the king he was to become. John’s love of art, in this time before he gained fame, runs throughout the story and it’s his eye for detail that makes him such a good sleuth. Then there’s Violet, a woman I had not heard of before who made a name for herself as a writer in a man’s world. In Ms. Burns’ hands, Violet is incredibly engaging and intelligent with a wit that enlivens her conversations. She has joined the small group of Victorian sleuths I call my favorites.

Getting to the bottom of how Reverend Crickley met his untimely end is, of course, the core of the tale and it’s a very pleasing bit of sleuthing that John and Violet take on. Is the less-than-totally-charming Lord Parke somehow involved? The housekeeper, Mrs. Barnstable? The lawyer Wattendall? And what is the motive behind the death?

Anyone in search of a truly engaging mystery with depth of character and plot and interesting historical settings would do well to pick up The Spoils of Avalon, first in what I hope will be a very long series.

Reviewed by Lelia Taylor, November 2014.

About the Author

Mary F. Burns is the author of PORTRAITS OF AN ARTIST (Sand Hill Review Press, February 2013), a member of and book reviewer for the Historical Novel Society and a former member of the HNS Conference board of directors. A novella-length book, ISAAC AND ISHMAEL, is also being published by Sand Hill Review Press in 2014. Ms. Burns’ debut historical novel J-THE WOMAN WHO WROTE THE BIBLE was published in July 2010 by O-Books (John Hunt Publishers, UK). She has also written two cozy-village mysteries in a series titled The West Portal Mysteries (The Lucky Dog Lottery and The Tarot Card Murders).

Ms. Burns was born in Chicago, Illinois and attended Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, where she earned both Bachelors and Masters degrees in English, along with a high school teaching certificate. She relocated to San Francisco in 1976 where she now lives with her husband Stuart in the West Portal neighborhood. Ms. Burns has a law degree from Golden Gate University, has been president of her neighborhood association and is active in citywide issues. During most of her working career she was employed as a director of employee communications, public relations and issues management at various San Francisco Bay Area corporations, was an editor and manager of the Books on Tape department for Ignatius Press, and has managed her own communications/PR consulting business, producing written communications, websites and video productions for numerous corporate and non-profit clients.

Ms. Burns may be contacted by email at maryfburns@att.net. For more information please visit Mary Burns’s website. You can also connect with Mary on Facebook, Twitter, and Goodreads, or read her blog posts at:

www.jthewomanwhowrotethebible.com
www.literarygracenotes.blogspot.com
www.portraitsofanartist.blogspot.com
www.sargent-pagetmysteries.blogspot.com
www.genesisnovel.blogspot.com

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Follow the tour here.

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Book Review: The Avalon Chanter by Lillian Stewart Carl

The Avalon Chanter
Lillian Stewart Carl
Five Star, January 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4328-2804-2
Hardcover

I’ve never been a fan of the supernatural or paranormal novel. Too many times, in my reading experience, the authors allow defiance of corporal laws of physics to surmount plot difficulties or intellectual quandaries to be solved by the convenient appearance of an apparition. That being said, I have no difficulty believing in spirits or strange manifestations and in this novel, author Carl may have converted me.

In the English world there is hardly another set of legends that can match those of the Authurian. Sir Lancelot, King Arthur, Queen Guinevere, and Merlin and Mordred. Add the waves of religious recruitment and conversions. Then add the brooding, unforgiving land, peopled by hardy residents who remain close to the land and all that means.

To the legendary island of Small Farnaby off the coast of Northumberland comes American writer Jean Fairbairn with her retired Scot policeman, Alasdair Cameron. She is drawn there by a native-born archeologist who is planning to open a tomb in a medieval chapel and thereby prove her contention that the little island could very well be the Avalon of legend and thus solve some of England’s most enduring historical questions. When the tomb is opened, however, mysteries only deepen. Murder, chicanery, deep passions all rise from past to present and Jean Fairbairn’s husband is forced out of retirement to take control of an isolated police investigation.

The novel is beautifully written and whether you believe the ethereal singing of ancient Priory nuns is real or mere wisps from the fog-shrouded sea only enhances the brooding atmosphere of danger that pervades the pages of this novel. The family complications and old passions are complicated and carefully worked out to logical conclusions so that in the end, the resolution to mystery and murder is solidly satisfying. An  excellent novel that comes strongly recommended.

Reviewed by Carl Brookins, December 2013.
Author of Red Sky, Devils Island, Hard Cheese, Reunion.