The Elder Statesman

I have a sweatshirt that my son, Jack and his wife, Alisa, gave to me one Christmas with the saying. "So Many Books, So Little Time." It is such a favorite piece of clothing of mine that I have literally worn off the lettering. In fact, I wore it so often that Jack and Alisa bought me a tee shirt with the same saying and wrote me a note that said for "summer wear." Each time I wear one or the other, I get comments from complete strangers, particularly if I happen to be in a bookstore shopping for more books.

I am the proverbial biblioholic suffering from a literary addiction that is described as a habitual longing to purchase, read, store, admire and consume books in excess. That probably explains why I write book reviews.

Writing book reviews means that publishers, hoping for a review, send me advance copies of books not yet available to the public.

HarperCollins Publishers sent me two books just before the end of the year in an attempt to interest American readers in two authors from Great Britain. Both books are mysteries and in my opinion, our cousins on that tight little island across the sea, are the best mystery writers in the literary world. That may be because I am a confessed Anglophile who loves the unique language that comes from what Winston Churchill said was a people of common bond, except for the language.

Neither of these authors has disappointed me in their use of that colorful, understated language.

A relativily new author, James Twining has developed a character, a reformed thief named Tom Kirk, who in this second book, "The Black Sun," takes the reader on a wild ride to find two missing train boxcars laden with gold and art works confiscated from Holocaust victims which the Nazi SS spirited out of Hungary just ahead of the advancing Russians. Twining grabs the reader in the first chapter and keeps him turning the pages until the mystery is solved. I predict Tom Kirk will be as popular as any of the sleuths from England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland that have entertained us over the years . "The Black Sun," a title taken from an elite group of the Nazi SS, is hardbound and sells for $24.95.

Ian Sansom, an Irish writer who has many successful books to his name. In his new book, "The Case of the Missing Books: A Mobile Library Mystery," he develops one of literature’s most unlikely detectives, Israel Armstrong, a librarian who is Jewish and a  vegetarian. Even the cover is one that is going to capture the eye of the reader, reminding us of library days gone by when we used the card file instead of that gawd awful computer system. The book cover has a nostalgic pocket imprinted with the name of the book and author, complete with a date due card protruding from its pocket.

I found myself Sansom’s book when he wrote:

"Israel had grown up in and around libraries. When he walked through the doors of a library it was like entering a sacred space."

I have long said one should genuflect upon entering a library.

Twining’s book is quite serious from the opening paragraph to the end, but don’t expect the same from Sansom who laces his mystery with delightful humor especially about the peculiarities of Tumdrum, Ireland and its inhabitants.

Israel believes he is coming to a job as head librarian only to discover the library is closed. Instead he is expected to run a mobile library. The mystery is that someone has stolen 15,000 books and he is out to uncover the thief. His search leads him to the First Presbyterian Church of Tumdrum and in that scene the reader gets taste of Sansom’s subtle humor:

"Inside, Tumdrum First Presbyterian, was a root-bare kind of church which looked as though the Reformation had just happened about a half an hour ago…"

He encounters the sexton, "…a black-suited man, with the face of a gargoyle, who popped up suddenly from behind the large, oak lectern…"

The language exchange here is typical of how Sansom uses dialog to present his unique characters. "The Case of the Missing Books," is a Paperback Original that sells for $12.95, but it will not be released until Jan. 9, 2007.

Biblioholic book reviewers like me get to sample books before the general public. My job is to interest you in reading the book. In this case, I recommend both.

(Bill Duncan is editor of The Senior Times. He also writes a weekly column on The News-Review opinion page every Thursday and occasionally does book reviews for Currents, the weekly arts and leisure magazine section in the Thursday News-Review.)