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After-action report: Scandinavian Fest, Moorhead, Minn.

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The Scandinavian Festival in Moorhead is over, and I am safely home. I am tired and sore but intact, as is my car – thanks be to the Lord.

The picture above shows my little bookselling booth, with Viking tent attached, set up right at the southwest corner of the stave church, a replica of the Hopperstad stave church in Norway (I met the guy who built it once, but that’s another story).

Here’s the rest of our camp, or most of the rest. I didn’t photograph everything.

There was an odd symmetry between the two days of the festival, at least for me. History did not repeat itself, but it rhymed, sort of, in very different existential modes.

Our big concern on Friday was the weather. The day was forecast to be mostly cloudy, with rain showers in the early afternoon. Our hope was that the showers would be light and quick to pass. The rain turned out to be fairly heavy, and at one point it actually started hailing on us. As it happened, the hail began just as I was in the middle of working a credit card transaction on my cell phone – fortunately, my customer was a good sport, and was not deterred. I should have asked her to come in under my awning, but my awning is not that waterproof anymore. When it rains heavily, the rain drips down in a straight line across the lowest point in the canvas. I had my books out in front of that line, while I myself stood in back of it, the Veil of Drip separating us in the fashion made popular by the veil of the temple in Jerusalem.

I sold exactly three books on Friday. We all hoped things would be better on Saturday, because the weather was supposed to be nice and, well, it would be Saturday.

My sales on Saturday, as I hinted earlier, sort of paralleled Friday’s weather. I sat for hours without a single sale, worried that the whole thing would be a bust. Then, around early afternoon, customers started streaming in (like a storm, get it?). Fully four of those customers took advantage of my Festival Discount to buy the entire Erling saga all at once. Then business passed away like the hailstorm, but I’d sold enough to satisfy me.

Everybody else seemed to enjoy the festival too. I was delighted to be stationed so close to the stave church.

I took another picture of the church, though it’s incomplete. To get a really good shot, I’d have had to stand in the blacksmith’s booth. He probably would have let me – he’s a genial fellow – but I didn’t like to ask.

I also got a picture of the Hjemkomst ship inside the museum, or at least of its prow. One of my book customers had known Bob Asp, the ship’s builder, when he was a guidance counselor in Moorhead and he himself was a teenager.

Thanks to the Clay County Historical Society for letting us participate. I hope we can do it again.

Fiction, Publishing

Book release: ‘Hans Nielsen Hauge: The Torchbearer’

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Thank you, Valued Reader. You’ve been very patient during my two-day absence from this blog, and your reward will be TWO posts from me today. I am in a benevolent mood.

This post in particular is to announce the release of the biographical novel, Hans Nielsen Hauge: The Torchbearer, a fictionalized biography of the Norwegian lay evangelist. I did not translate this work, whose original author is Inger Anna Maridal Drangsholt, but I edited the manuscript, so the marks of my genius are all over the final product.

I’ve written about Hauge many times before on this blog, having a  long family history in the Haugean movement; some of my ancestors knew the man personally. The Torchbearer is aimed at young adults, but I found it a very engaging and lively dramatization and I’m pretty excited about it. I recommend it for anyone unfamiliar with Hauge’s story.

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The saga of Bob Asp

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There probably won’t be any more posts from me this week. I’m heading up to Moorhead, Minn. tomorrow, for the upcoming Scandinavian festival at the Hjemkomst Museum.

You might be interested to watch the video above, telling the story of the strange adventure that brought the Hjemkomst Viking ship into existence. Bob Asp, a guidance counselor from Moorhead High School, conceived the idea of building a replica Viking ship (based on the Gokstad Ship) and sailing it back to Norway. It seemed like a crazy idea, but he was able to get support and build the ship. Sadly, he did not survive to actually make the voyage, but his sons, his daughter, and others did accomplish it. (I was a young man then; I wish I’d gotten the opportunity to be part of that.)

Today, replica Viking ships are fairly common in the world, but this was (I believe) the first serious attempt to build a true sailing model since the Viking ship that made it to the Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. Replica ships are archaeological experiments, and we’ve learned things since then that Bob Asp didn’t know – his ship’s example served as a corrective for later builders.

For instance, we know now that Viking ships were built with planks split out of logs in a sort of pie-slice pattern, then planed flat. Bob Asp’s ships used sawn boards, which are less resilient and crack more easily. Also, the Vikings used green wood to build, then let the planks season in place after fastening. This helped them maintain their shape (some of the planks on Asp’s ship, I have read, tended to pop out of place).

Still, Bob Asp had an epic dream and he got it finished. Not everybody can say that.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Martinez,’ by Alan Lee

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I’ve been relishing Alan Lee’s bracing thriller series starring US Marshal/secret agent Manny Martinez, a native of Puerto Rico but the most patriotic man in America. Manny generally saunters through his stories like a James Bond with better hair (and more scars). The stakes are high, but the tone is light, mostly because Manny refuses (as Stonewall Jackson put it) to take counsel of his fears.

But Martinez, the fourth book in the series, has a different tone. Manny is still Manny, but this time he’ll take a trip into his own past, brought into confrontation with his dark origins.

One day in the Marshals’ office, Manny recognizes a prisoner being interviewed. In a moment, that prisoner murders a marshal, wounds Manny, and makes a clean escape. The prisoner was not the man they thought they’d arrested. He was Manny’s own (probable) half-brother, Julian. When they were boys, they’d been inseparable partners in crime. Manny had been (we learn) the heir apparent to the main crime family in Puerto Rico. But he decided he didn’t want that life, and escaped to the US. Julian felt deeply betrayed. He rose to become one of the top assassins in the world, and now he’s decided the time has come to get his revenge on Manny. But not right away. First he’ll kill everyone Manny loves. In the end, he lures Manny home to P.R. for a final showdown.

Martinez was not as much fun as the previous Manny Martinez (code name Sinatra) novels, but it was exciting and gripping, and the great theme is mercy. I recommend it. Cautions for violence and language.

Bookselling, Uncategorized

Personal appearance alert: Scandinavian Festival, Moorhead MN

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Our Viking camp at the Hjemkomst Center, one of the last times we were there.

I have heard rumors – somewhere – that most of this country (not to mention the world) is not located in the Upper Midwest where I reside. And I’m pretty sure that most of our readers don’t live in these parts either. As a matter of fact, only half our Brandywine Books blogging staff lives anywhere near Minnesota.

Yet I do make these “personal appearances” from time to time, and feel obligated to inform you about them. Who knows? Some super fan may fly in from Florin or Guilder someday, just to meet me and get a book signed.

Hey, I’m a fantasy writer. Improbability is my wheelhouse.

Regardless, I am planning to be (with the Viking Age Club) in Moorhead, Minnesota (adjacent to Fargo) this weekend, for the Nordic Culture Clubs’ Scandinavian Festival.

The Festival will be held at the Hjemkomst Center, a museum built to house the Hjemkomst Viking ship, which was built in Hawley, Minnesota and sailed by a group of Minnesotans across the Atlantic to Norway in the 1970s. The museum’s park also features a lovely full-sized replica of the Hopperstad Stave Church. It is well worth visiting at any time.

If you’ve been reading this blog a while, you may recall that I’ve been to the Hjemkomst Center for Viking events before, but it’s been a few years. I’m looking forward to going back; it’s an excellent venue for Vikings.

If through some geographical anomaly you happen to be around Moorhead on Friday and Saturday, I’d be happy to see you.

If I’m not there, it’ll probably mean that the cold I’ve been fighting has gotten the upper hand.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Where the Bad Men Sleep,’ by Rowan Merrick

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I’ll relieve the tension right away. I did not like Where the Bad Men Sleep much.

It’s a psychological thriller, and like so many books of that subgenre, it borders on horror. Such books can be very good; think of The Silence of the Lambs.

But this book by Rowan Merrick falls far below that level.

The hero (sort of) is Ray Matthews, a former police detective who resigned under pressure. (There’s also talk about articles he wrote, as if he moonlighted as a journalist, which seems unlikely. It wasn’t really explained as far as I can recall.)

Now his old superior calls him back in to view a murder scene. The victim was tortured to death, words carved into his body. The words are from an old article of Ray’s, in which he wrote about the official malfeasance that led to the release of his (Ray’s) wife’s murderer. The present victim is one of the men culpable in the injustice.

Ray’s problem is that he can’t recall where he was at the time of death. He experiences blackouts occasionally, and it’s been happening more often recently. He’s terrified that he committed the murder and doesn’t recall it. As the first half of the book continues, his fears grow.

The second half of the book turns (mostly) to his sister Charlene. We learn their family history, how she’s been covering for Ray for most of their lives, and how she has curtailed her own life, partly out of love and partly out of fear.

The book ends with a Big Surprise.

And a cliffhanger.

I don’t like cliffhangers. I consider cliffhangers an offense to the reader.

Also, I found the psychology of this book dubious. I thought the decisions of several characters implausible. And I considered the “solution” unnecessarily complex.

In short, I was disappointed with Where the Bad Men Sleep. Not recommended.

Reviews

Old movie review: ‘Portrait of Jennie’

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YouTube, which grows more annoying as time passes, is now featuring old movies provided (for some reason) with the wrong titles. When one came up called “The Painted Memory,” featuring Joseph Cotton, I had an idea it was probably the 1948 film “Portrait of Jennie.” As is so often the case, I was right.

I watched it with great interest. I haven’t seen it since I was a kid, but it was one of those movies that stuck in my mind. When I first saw it, I was still aspiring to be a visual artist, so I identified with the main character. I little expected that the story would be formative for me in a way I never anticipated.

What do I think of it, after 60 years? Read on, if (for some reason) you care to know.

The film is based on a 1940 novella by Robert Nathan, an author who ought to be better remembered. He was a pioneer of what we call urban fantasy today, and his stuff is quite good. I found several of his books in a public library when I lived in Florida, and enjoyed them.

The plot: Joseph Cotten plays Eben Adams, a starving artist in Manhattan during the Great Depression. Dealers find his work competent but uninspired, and he doesn’t sell much. Then one day in Central Park he meets a little girl named Jennie Appleton (Jennifer Jones), who dresses strangely in old-fashioned clothes. They make friends, and he is charmed. When he looks for her the next day, however, she does not appear. He draws a sketch of her, and a gallery owner buys it immediately, saying it’s the first inspired thing he’s ever done. Throughout the year, Jennie shows up periodically, and each time she seems years older. Eben does research and discovers that she was the child of trapeze artists in old vaudeville, decades before, and was orphaned when they died in an accident. Then she went to a convent school and college. Finally she appears to him again as a young woman, and he paints her portrait.

He goes to the convent to talk to an old nun who knew her. She informs him that Jennie used to go out to a place on the coast called Land’s End, where she died in a freak tidal wave. As a present-day tidal wave builds out at sea, Eben rushes to Land’s End to meet her and – he hopes – to rescue her this time. He fails, but an epilogue tells us that Eben Adams achieved greatness as an artist after his “Portrait of Jennie.”

What did I think of it? The movie flopped on release, in spite of the popularity of the original novella. In the years since, critics have revised their opinions upward, and now it’s considered a minor classic.

For my own part, I was a little disappointed. (This is the way of things remembered from childhood. They never live up to your memories, do they?)

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Fiction, Reviews

‘Paradise Royale,’ by Alan Lee

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“You are enjoying this. Unbelievable.”

“Beck, look around. We’re in Jamaica. Our enemy is crafty and clever. She’s a beautiful former MI6 agent and chasing her has led us around the globe. This isn’t boring. This isn’t dull. We could be chasing some drug addict who skipped bail. We could be transferring prisoners, but we’re not. Ay, what else do you want out of your career?”

I can’t believe I delayed reading Alan Lee’s “Sinatra” books. Manny Martinez, code name Sinatra, US Marshal and part-time secret agent, is an over-the-top character who perfectly fits into the over-the-top world of movie-inspired thrillers. He’s unbelievable, but he’s got the ego to carry off implausibility. James Bond is never far from the reader’s mind here, and the author leans into the similarities, with tongue in cheek.

In Paradise Royale, Manny and his female partner, Beck, are assigned to intercept a defense department computer genius who’s absconding with secrets to sell to our enemies. The interception isn’t all that difficult, but a complication arises – a stunningly beautiful, rogue British Intelligence agent and her pleasant but deadly male associate. They neatly intercept the defector and carry him off. Manny, never dismayed, immediately commandeers a private jet to chase the fugitives to Jamaica, where the prisoner gets snatched back and forth like a basketball as the two rival teams grow increasingly impressed with one another. Especially Manny and Bronwen, the Englishwoman. She is Manny’s equal, just as good-looking and just as resourceful as he is. Even as they deceive and entrap one another, they fall into increasing mutual infatuation. (This is a very sexy novel, though nothing explicit happens.)

Generally, as you know, I don’t care for kick-butt female action heroines, but I liked Bronwen a lot. I hope she comes back, even though Manny (in a later book) proposes to Beck.

I can’t think of anything bad to say about Paradise Royale, except to caution you about occasional bad language. Hollywood hasn’t told an action story this much fun in many, many years.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Wild Card,’ by Alan Lee

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Since I’ve become a fan of author Alan Lee, I’ve decided to read his “Sinatra” books as well as his delightful Mac August novels. “Sinatra” is the code name of Mac’s best friend, Manny Martinez, a US Marshal who is also on call as a super-secret government agent (because why not?). Manny is an off-the-wall character, a genuine original – though, oddly, he’s kind of based on James Bond. Only in this case Bond is a Puerto Rican American (and super-patriot). He’s implausibly handsome and has impeccable fashion style. Basically, he does all the things Bond does, but in a very American and semi-parodical manner.

In Wild Card, Manny and his partner Noelle Beck (a sweet, wholesome Mormon girl) are given the case of Benjamin Curtis, governor of Maryland and brother to the vice president. Curtis has a gambling habit, and is deeply in debt to sinister people. So their job is to go to the casino, take him in hand, and get him out. Only, when they get hold of him, he explains that the situation is worse than anyone knows. The people he owes money to are more dangerous than organized crime, and killing the governor will be the least of their retaliations if they don’t get paid the millions they’re owed. Implausibly (but plausibility matters little in these stories), Manny finds himself taking the governor’s place at the poker table, first at the casino, and later on an offshore yacht. The fact that Manny has never played poker before is only a minor road bump compared to other challenges Manny and Beck will face, from international assassins to frenzied sharks.

It’s over the top, but great fun – more like a Bond movie than a Bond novel. It’s impossible (I think) to resist Manny as he strolls into the jaws of death with perfect confidence, knowing he’s the smartest, the best looking, the deadliest, and the Most American person around, and Americans always win.

I loved Wild Card. Recommended. Cautions for language and violence.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Cocktail Time,’ by P.G. Wodehouse

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P.G. Wodehouse wrote five novels (as well as a timeless short story) about the Earl of Ickenham, better known as Uncle Fred. Cocktail Time is the third in the series, placing the sequence somewhat later in time than I expected. One always envisions Wodehouse stories taking place in the 1920s or ’30s, but references here to television and World War II being in the past alert us to the fact that this one was actually published in 1958.

Instead of a précis of the plot, I think it will be more efficient to describe the story geographically. Imagine Dovetail Hammer, Berkshire, the stately home of Johnny Pearce, one of Uncle Fred’s godsons. Johnny wants very much to get married, but he doesn’t feel he can afford it. He’s not very wealthy, and upkeep on the manor is high. On top of that, he feels obligaed to pension off his imperious childhood nurse, who’s gotten accustomed to thinking of herself as major domo of the estate. He can’t expect his new bride to deal with that.

One measure he’s taken to increase his income is to turn Hammer Lodge, a smaller dwelling on the estate, into a rental house. It is now being occupied by Sir Raymond “Beefy” Bastable, the eminent London barrister. Beefy’s great secret, known to few, is that he is the author of Cocktail Time, a scandalous bestselling novel about today’s dissipated young men. (He wrote the novel after having his hat knocked off by a Brazil nut shot from a catapult (slingshot) out of a window of the Drones Club, unaware that the actual shooter was not a dissipated young man, but Uncle Fred himself). Beefy has persuaded his worthless nephew, Cosmo Wisdom, to take public credit for authorship, in order to preserve his own reputation. However, he has taken the precaution of writing a letter establishing his own authorship, in case it should be necessary. And now that his agent has started talking about film rights, Beefy is reconsidering his claim – only the letter has been stolen.

This covers only the high points. There are several cases of sundered hearts in this tale, and Uncle Fred is always keen on uniting sundered hearts, as part of his general life project of “spreading sweetness and light.” His usual method of spreading s. and l. is by telling bald-faced, shameless lies, gently shepherding the unhappy couples into proximity, and arranging for them to acquire sufficient resources to set up housekeeping. A novelty in this story is that several of the sundered couples consist of middle-aged people.

Lots of fun. Cocktail Time is about mid-level on the Wodehouse scale, which exists on an infinitely higher plane than any other humorist’s work. Recommended.