GIVEAWAY: Murder in the High Himalaya

Murder in the High Himalaya: Loyalty, Tragedy, and Escape from Tibet by Jonathan Green.

Here is a synopsis from the Publisher's Weekly review:

In 2006, an impulsive, naïve young Tibetan nun and her best friend, both yearning for religious freedom from Chinese rule, joined a group of fellow Tibetans desperate to escape to India, where the Dalai Lama has lived since the 1950 annexation of Tibet by China. Kelsang Namtso and Dolma Palkyi embarked on the brutal journey over the Himalayas. Smuggled by illegal guides past Chinese border police, the group braved freezing temperatures and snow, the high altitude, and perilous crevasses. Green alternates the refugees' trek with that of Luis Benitez, an American celebrity mountain guide leading a rich group of international clients to the Himalayan peak Cho Oyu. The two groups met on the peak as Chinese guards, alerted to the refugees' presence, chased after the escapees with machine guns ablaze, and Kelsang was killed in full view of the Westerners. One of Benitez's clients filmed the incident, which gained worldwide notoriety.

GIVEAWAY:

Thanks to Mary Bisbee-Beek, intrepid book publicist, I have an extra copy of this book to give away.  Even better, Mary has another giveaway copy for the person who wins -- it's a leapfrog giveaway!

THE RULES: The contest is open until Sunday, June 19, 2011. To enter, do any or all of the following, but you must leave a comment for each one:

1. Leave a comment on this post. You must include a way to contact you (email or website address in your comment or available in your profile). If I can't find a way to contact you I will draw another winner. (1 entry)

2. Blog about this giveaway. (Posting the giveaway on your sidebar is also acceptable.) Leave a separate comment with a link to your post. (1 entry)

3. Subscribe to my rss feed, follow me on blogger, or subscribe via email (or tell me if you already are a subscriber or follower). Leave a separate comment for this. (1 entry)

4. Tweet this post on Twitter. Leave me a separate comment with your twitter user name. (1 entry)

5. Stumble this blog, digg it, technorati fave it, link it on facebook, or otherwise spread the internet word. Leave a separate comment. (1 entry)

There are a lot of ways to enter (maximum of five entries), but you must LEAVE A SEPARATE COMMENT for each one or they will not count. I will use random.org to pick the winners from the comments.

This contest is open to entries from the U.S. and Canada only. The deadline for entry is 9:00 PM, Pacific Time, on Sunday, June 19, 2011. I will draw and post the winner's name in my Mailbox Monday post for June 20, 2011.

Favorite Author: Donna Leon

Donna Leon is an American author living in Venice.  She writes a mystery series set in and around Venice that features Commissario Guido Brunetti. The lengthy series is listed in publication order, starting with the first book in the series.

I included her series in my list of Venice books, but I want to have a separate Favorite Author list for her too.

Those I have read are in red.  Those on my TBR shelf are in blue.

If anyone else is reading these books, please leave a comment with a link to related posts.

Death at La Fenice

Death in a Strange Country

Dressed for Death

Death and Judgment

Acqua Alta

Quietly in Their Sleep

A Noble Radiance

Fatal Remedies

Friends in High Places

A Sea of Troubles

Willful Behavior

Uniform Justice

Doctored Evidence

Blood from a Stone

Through a Glass, Darkly

Suffer the Little Children

The Girl of His Dreams

About Face

A Question of Belief

Drawing Conclusions

NOTES

Last updated on December 26, 2012.

Review of the Day: The Chatham School Affair

Thomas H. Cook channeled his inner Daphne Du Maurier for his Edgar-winning mystery, The Chatham School Affair. This modern gothic extravaganza is narrated by the now-elderly Henry Griswald, who has finally taken it on himself to explain what really happened at Black Pond 70 years ago.

Henry was a teenager in 1926 when Elizabeth Channing arrived to teach art at his father's boarding school in Chatham, Massachusetts, a provincial town on Cape Cod. Her beauty and worldly ways antagonize the puritans of the town, but captivate her fellow teacher, Leland Reed. Henry is swept away by the romance and adventure of their relationship, becoming more of an accomplice than a neutral observer.

Henry spins the story out bit by bit, each scene heavy with melodrama and ominous foreshadowing. It is difficult to keep the suspense building with this kind of "historical account" technique, but Cook handles it well, never giving away more than what is necessary to move the story forward.

If the story drags a bit in parts and some scenes are a bit overwrought, that is a reasonable price to pay for what is, overall, a rich and well-crafted novel.

OTHER REVIEWS

If you would like your review of this or any of Thomas H. Cook's other novels listed here, please leave a comment with a link and I will add it.

NOTES

Here is list of all the Edgar Award winners.  This won in 1997.

Review of the Day: Brazzeville Beach

William Boyd won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for his mesmerizing novel Brazzaville Beach.

Narrator Hope Clearwater sets out to explain why she is living on the edge of Africa, in a dead-end scrap of a village called Brazzaville Beach. Her story is two-fold: what happened to her marriage in England that drove her to Africa in the first place, and what happened at the chimpanzee research preserve afterward.

Hope had married a math genius, and then wrestled with jealousy of his monomania when her own career took time to get traction. The story has a classic X-shaped structure, with her life and career improving while her husband's falls apart.

The second story about the chimpanzees is more exciting and less theoretical. Hope discovers a violent division in the chimpanzee tribe, but must fight her boss – a world authority on chimpanzee behavior – to expose the truth. The resolution is a little subdued given the action leading up to it, but it is still an absorbing tale.

Both stories are fascinating, although they never really tie together thematically. Other than both involving science and both leading to Hope's further independence, there isn't a lot of connection between the two narratives. But Boyd knows how to tell a story and this novel is no exception. Worth the read.

OTHER REVIEWS

If you would like your review of this, or any other William Boyd book, listed here, please leave a comment with a link and I will add it.

NOTES

I read this as one of my James Tait Black Memorial Prize picks for the 2011 Battle of the Prizes, British Version, Challenge.  William Boyd is one of my favorites.

A Bibliophile Pilgrimage

It has long been a book-loving dream of mine to visit the famous Bibliothek at the Benedictine Abbey in Metten, Germany.

I first saw the library featured in a coffee table book called The Most Beautiful Libraries in the World.  Not only was there a chapter on the Metten library, but it was beautiful enough to warrant the picture on the back cover.

But what really captured my fancy was that the Metten library is part of the same "Kloster" that houses the school several of my cousins attended.  My paternal grandfather grew up in Bavaria, in a tiny village near the little village of Metten, both outside the small city of Deggendorf.  That corner of Bavaria is thick with cousins of varying degree.

When I went to one cousin's graduation in 2002, I was disappointed that the Bibliothek was not open for some reason.  I was determined to see it when I was in Bavaria last week.  It took a couple of tries, due to my inadequate German and the Kloster's inadequate signage, but Hubby and I made it to the tour Saturday morning.

Wow!

Really, wow!

Don't turn me in to the elderly woman who lead our tour, but I surreptitiously took some forbidden photos.  No flash -- I'm not a total scofflaw.  But I was not going to pass up this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.