I Will Ruin You by Linwood Barclay
“I was steering my students through a discussion on hope and mortality in Cormac McCarthy's novel The Road , getting bogged down in a debate over whether the reader needed to know what had brought about the apocalyptic conditions depicted in the book, when I happened to glance out the window and see, running across the staff parking lot, a young man wearing a vest that appeared to be loaded with sticks of dynamite.”
This would be English teacher Richard Boyle's day to shine. The situation with the kid and the dynamite would be quickly resolved, making Boyle the town hero for a week or so. Then things seem to settle down a bit, until a would-be blackmailer pops out of the past and threatens to ruin Boyle and his otherwise serene, sedate, and mostly successful life.
Linwood Barclay was born in Connecticut in 1955 but moved to Canada in 1959, stayed here, graduated from Ontario's Trent University in Peterborough, worked at a number of small provincial newspapers before catching on with the Toronto Star in 1981. Barclay ditched a newspaper career for the tenuous task of trying to be a successful novelist back in the early years of this century, struck gold in 2007 when No time for Goodbye became a big hit, and he hasn't since had to look back or even return to the newspaper business.
Subsequent to his smashing debut on the best seller charts in 07, Barclay has released almost a book a year, with now nearly two dozen megahits to his name. I Will Ruin You came out in 2024 under the Morrow imprint. You can track him down at , and watch for his newest work – Whistle – coming out in a few weeks.
The Long Goodbye by Raymond Chandler
“The first time I laid eyes on Terry Lennox he was drunk inside a Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith outside the terrace of The Dancers. The parking lot attendant had brought the car out and he was still holding the door open because Terry Lennox’s left foot was still dangling outside, as if he had forgotten he had one.”
If you are familiar with the works of Raymond Chandler then you'll recognize these words as the voice of Phillip Marlowe, the epitome of the hard boiled, cynical private detective with the somewhat ambiguous moral outlook and the need to make things right, no matter the cost.
Born in 1888, Chandler began writing fiction as a way to make a living after losing his job as an executive with an oil company at the beginning of what we now know as the Great Depression. The Big Sleep was his first novel, first published in 1939, and was followed by six others until the author's death in 1959.
Back to The Long Goodbye, published in 1955: - after the chance meeting outside that nightclub, Lennox and Marlowe strike up an uneasy friendship, which then involves Lennox fleeing to Mexico, the death of his wife, a murder accusation, a hookup with an alcoholic writer named Roger Wade, a gun battle, a suicide attempt, a five-thousand dollar bill, interference from a gangster named Mendy Menendez, the return of Lennox and a sad farewell.
Said to be Chandler's most personal novel, The Long Goodbye is joined by such other Chandler works as The Big Sleep and Farewell, My Lovely as some of the finest works of detective fiction ever created.
Your best way to find all of Chandler's books is to prowl every used bookstore you can find, buy what you can, and enjoy them, now and always.
East Grand Lake by Tim Ryan
“Two seconds. That's what Mr. Burns told us in the last science class of the year. He told us the year would have two seconds more than any other year in history.
The longest year ever, he told us. I already knew that.”
This how we meet Shayne. The year in question is 1972. Shayne and the entire family head to Grandpa Murphy's cottage at the lake for their annual trip. Three generations are already there when Shayne's group arrives, and Shayne won't get out of the car.
You could look at East Grand Lake as a collection of short stories. Or you could regard it as a novel told in fourteen chapters. Or it could be both. Spanning just one day in the Murphy clan's summer vacation, East Grand Lake captures the many tiny but important dramas that occur when one large family gets together for what could be the very last time.
East Grand Lake by Tim Ryan came out in the spring of 2023 from the University of Calgary Press, with a listed cover price of $24.99. The author works and plays in and around Calgary with his wife and daughter, a bossy cat, and a curious rabbit. You can reach the University of Calgary Press with a quick internet search.
