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Daily Article for 2010-06-17
Between Literature and Trash: Top Fun, Guilt-free Reads by Jessica Mullan
Sure we all love to buy those lovely editions of the classics and leave them on our coffee-tables to impress our friends. But the truth is that we read for fun and because we want to be entertained. And while, sometimes, we all enjoy the guilty-pleasure of a trashy book, we still crave the joy of a well-crafted story.
The secret of that balance between fluffy pulp and those unopened weighty tomes lies in the author’s treatment of their subject. A good writer who digs into a great subject translates their joy into our enjoyment.
So if you crave a great, well-told read without the burden of heavy lit and the sickly aftertaste of pure pulp, read on for a list of some of the best writers of great, fun, well-written fiction.
1) The Grand-pappy
Who doesn’t love a mystery? Sir Arthur Conan Doyle created the first serial “star” with his Great Detective, Sherlock Holmes. While there are book-length Holmes mysteries, most are neat 45 to hour long reads that follow a formula (invented by Doyle) that has become familiar to us all through its use in TV crime dramas.
Replete with foggy London streets, exotic back stories of Indian intrigues, witty dialogue, opium dens full of seedy criminals with dastardly intentions, and the thrill of the investigative chase, Holmes mysteries move along at a rollicking pace that turns a work commute into high adventure.
Newcomers to the forebear of forensics and the role model for Dr. House should check out A Study in Scarlet to learn how Holmes and Watson met and learn the detective’s ground-breaking methods. From there, try the two volume Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, featuring Holmes in top form as told by the steady voice of his best friend, Dr. Watson.
2) The Chiller
While Holmes mysteries stand apart for their, well, mysteriousness and the sheer pleasure of watching a master detective work his craft, the so-called “Lector” books, by Thomas Harris, go for pure creep-out value. Although Lector himself doesn’t take up too much page space in all but the final book, Hannibal, his presence lurks in the pages like a stalker in the bushes.
But he is not the only raiser of goose bumps in the series. Harris writes from the point of view of each of his main characters. We feel the fear, confusion, strength, and courage of Clarice, while also spending time in the tortured, twisted, and terrifying mind of Francis Dolarhyde, the horrifying vacuum of Jame Gumb, and their helpless victims as well.
Red Dragon, the first of the three books, may be the most straightforward and gritty crime story, following the maddening details and difficulties of investigation, told with Harris’s journalistic style. It boasts a super-scary bad guy and hard-boiled detective with a past. Silence of the Lambs pulses with the emergent heroine Clarice Starling’s essence, the heinous crimes of a true psychopath, and the meatier, juicier experience of Dr. Lector himself. Hannibal, the third book, is not so much a mystery as it is a bloody tale of revenge, spending a lot of time with the doctor, and giving fans a plenty-satisfying “dessert” of an ending of which even Hannibal Lector would approve.
3) The History Weavers
James Mitchner and Edward Rutherfurd make grand historical fiction epics. Spanning the story of a place from its geologic formation and first human settlements to the present-day, both of these authors intertwine the lives of everyday people with historic events both great and small.
Set in the ancient Salisbury plain that is home to Stonehenge, Sarum, by Rutherfurd sets the changing fortunes and dramas of a half dozen families on the grand stage of British history. Moments both poignant and comic are placed against the rich tapestry that is England’s past, from the earliest hunter/gatherers, to the Celts, Romans, Saxons, Normans, knights, and Empire, up until the present day.
With Chesapeake, Mitchner weaves together the New World of the Native Americans with the Old of the European settlers, focusing on the interactions and blending of cultures that formed a new nation, all while retaining the intimacy of the personal lives and trials of his characters.
4) Techno Terror
Michael Crichton sets technology as God in his fabulously well-thought techno-thrillers. Using his background in science and medicine, he takes the latest scientific breakthroughs and casts them in “what if mankind’s messing around with science went terribly wrong?” scenarios.
Perhaps his most well-known work, Jurassic Park, explores the potential disaster when man decides to play God. Set on a fictional island of the coast of Costa Rica, Crichton lets loose a team of scientists in a theme-park of genetically engineered dinosaurs. Like a modern-day Frankenstein, Crichton explores the implications of human hubris in attempting to control nature. Nature, of course, bites back.
5) The Advocate
Real-life attorney and one-time politician, John Grisham writes legal thrillers that turn you into a speed-reader. While grounding his work in real cases, Grisham manages to turn the tedium of law into page-turning best-sellers.
While, like Crichton, many of his books have been turned into films, they are worth reading in their own right. Any of his legal dramas make an exciting read, from early work such as A Time to Kill, which follows a Southern black man’s trial for the murder of his daughter’s rapists to intrigues such as The Firm or The Pelican Brief.
Obviously this list couldn’t include every writer of a good read. More light-hearted fare can be found in the comic local-color of James Herriot’s Yorkshire in his All Creatures Great and Small books. And when you yearn for the sexy culture of international espionage, how could you beat Ian Fleming’s Bond series? Fanny Flag, Maeve Binchey, and Amy Tan all set family, and particularly, female dramas amongst their different cultures, making for funny, heart-breaking, and intimate reads.
And, of course, the list could go on, but I cannot. At least I have a word-limit on my writing. But, the best I can say is that all of these authors and their work share one thing in common, they make good fun. So whether you are on the train, the couch, or at the doctor’s office, turn off the TV, blackberry, etc, and pick up one of these. I promise you will both learn a little something while enjoying the pleasure of a good book.
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Past Articles
The Most Powerful Actors in Hollywood by Leslie Kelly
The Bit (History's Most Influential Stand-up Comedians) by Jessica Mullan
Court TV: the Original Reality Televison by Xina V.
Celebrities whose Faces I Never want to see Again by Jessica Mullan
Best Unusual Foreign Travel Destinations (part 2 of 2) by Xina V
Best Unusual Foreign Travel Destinations (part 1 of 2) by Xina V
Dreamgirls: Did Berry Gordy Turn Florence Ballard's Dream into a Nightmare? by Patricia Martin
Has Cable News Made Us Better Citizens? by Jessica Mullan
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