From the Bureau of Best Intentions

We invited a bunch of people over for Thanksgiving--too many really to fit in our old dining room.  Which to be fair would classify as a breakfast nook.   So Mrs. 8 had the great idea to blow out a bearing wall in between the kitchen and living room.  Of course it is going to be wonderful for the house....but, it has now taken 3 weeks, we relocated Thanksgiving to a friend's house, and we're still working on it.  I think we'll be done in 10 days.... 

Anarchy and Old Dogs

Next up on the world book tour:  Anarchy and Old Dogs, by Colin Cotterill. 

4th book in the series, and by now I am a little embarrassed that I've read them all.  It started out innocently enough--a compelling little story about a elderly communist doctor in 1970s Laos becomes the only State coroner, and then discovers he is also actually temporary housing for a thousand year old shaman spirit.  So the dead show him their fates, which greatly improves his chances of solving their murders.  A cross of Ghost Whisperer and Quincy, ME.  

Now after 4 books, the author is coasting, and although I'll recommend the first 2, I'm too let down to hat tip the rest.  

The Power and the Glory, Graham Greene

Next up on the World Book Tour, The Power and the Glory, by Graham Greene.  

Set in Mexico in the 1930s, religion has been outlawed by the oppressive state, and the countryside's church have been destroyed and the priests are either forced to give up their vestments and marry or face execution.  One priest has turned fugitive, but not for the noble cause that has turned some virtuous priests into martyrs.   He is as bad a priest as they come:  he is a drunk, incredibly vain, corrupt, and, most damning, has fathered a child.   He is on the run because he is afraid of death, one because he is a coward, two, because he doesn't feel he is deserving of the martyr label, and three, because he knows he is going to face God without any good deeds.  He is a believer, but a broken man, and that makes him an intriguing, paradoxical anti-hero.  

He is being pursued by the Lieutenant, symbol of the oppressive government. By outward appearances, he is the law and order, and his motivation for persecuting the clergy has more to do freeing the people from the excessing of the church.  But in his quest to find the priest, he chooses to kidnap and murder peasants to force them to give up the fugitive. 

Neither the Power or the Glory are reflected in a shining light in this book, but again, Greene's tight prose, builds up a cast of complex characters, and a critique of the pragmatic machinations of power under the cover of virtuous intent. 

Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made--Immanuel Kant.