Revenge of the Wrought-Iron Flamingos, Donna Andrews (365 Books, Day 67)

[rushthatspeaks]

Yesterday's review. Wrists still bad, but bracing and heat helped. Many thanks to 17catherines and jinian for the recommendation, as this is really, really not something I would ever have picked up without a rec, and I enjoyed it.

This is I think the third? in its series, but it was a perfectly reasonable starting point that did not appear to depend heavily on the previous. The protagonist is a blacksmith who makes her living at craft fairs, which got its attention by myself, because I enjoy blacksmithery. The awesome one of my two fathers-in-law is a blacksmith, and this book got the preoccupations right, although the protagonist is slightly less obsessed with making her own tools to do things to iron than my father-in-law is. (He says that when you buy a forge, you fill a bowl with marbles, and then every time you forge yourself a new tool you remove a marble from the bowl, and when you've lost all your marbles you're a master blacksmith. He hit that point years ago.) But some of the speeches she makes about various metal-related things could have come out of his mouth, so I approve.

Also, this book took place entirely at a reenactment of the Battle of Yorktown, and I recognized that too. One of the funnier things in the book is that the protagonist's boyfriend's mother is, for those of you who read Connie Willis, essentially Lady Schrapnell by way of the Anachronism Police-- there will be no cell phones here on her watch!-- and it is consistently well-timed and well-implemented screwball comedy in the old sense.

Honestly, that's most of what I have to say about this: consistently well-done old-style character-based comedy which manages not to annoy me about gender or race, which neither has the book break under the weight of the nastiness of having a corpse turn up nor has everyone be all right with a corpse turning up to a psychologically unrealistic extent, and which is not intending to be deep in any sense and is therefore profoundly relaxing. It is exactly what I was looking for for a tired reading day, and is better than it had to be. These go in the mental slot labeled 'ideal beach reading'.

I could have opened the book just about anywhere and found something amusing, but this bit stuck with me because it is a conversation that in its general outlines I have had with people repeatedly:

"That's not accurate," someone said behind me.

I turned to see a woman wearing a Town Watch badge frowning down at the table where I kept the small iron goods.

"I said, that's not accurate," she repeated, taking a sheet of paper out of her haversack. "They didn't have nails in colonial times."

"Actually, they did," I said, picking up one of the nails on display. "They looked different from our modern nails, of course, since they were made by hand. The shaft was usually square, and the head was either square or pyramid-shaped because--"

"Nonsense," she said. She had taken out a quill pen and a bottle of ink-- ready to write me up a summons for anachronisms. "They didn't have nails at all; they just used wooden pegs to hold things together."

"Well, maybe you should tell that to the blacksmiths up in Colonial Williamsburg," I said, with growing irritation. "I spent quite some time up there, learning about eighteenth-century hardware, and I can tell you--"

"They're wrong," she insisted. "Wooden pegs. That's all they ever used. Wooden pegs."

"Look, lady," I said, losing my temper completely. "They had nails long before 1781. How do you think they put shoes on horses-- with Scotch tape?"

Her mouth fell open as she pondered this. Then she recovered.

"Well, I never!" she exclaimed, storming out. "Just for that I'm going to double your fine!"

As I was counting to ten, I heard someone slowly clapping. I turned to see Jess, the artillery captain.

"Good job," he said. "She doesn't believe you, of course. You should have reminded her they had nails at Calvary."

I don't know about you, but the last time I had this conversation it was about buttons and the time before that about knitted socks. Therefore I was happy to see it. The rest of the book is fairly similar, and therefore I recommend it.

Comments

[oyceter]

Relaxing without terrible fail is sadly hard to find! Definitely putting this on my TBR list, thanks!

[jinian.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately this is the only time there's a substantial amount of blacksmithing in the whole series. I kept looking for it!

[ashnistrike.livejournal.com]

This sounds like it would be extremely funny to a relatively small population--definitely including me. Thanks for the rec!

[erinlin.livejournal.com]

I don't read many mysteries, but I really like Donna Andrews. "We'll Always Have Parrots" "Crouching Buzzard, Hidden Loon" and "Owls Well That Ends Well" are also good.

[deliasherman.livejournal.com]

Going to read this one for sure. Once I find it. Looks like a perfect airplane book.

[17catherines.livejournal.com]

I am so pleased you enjoyed this! Donna Andrews is my favourite 'flu reading' - perfect when I'm not feeling well or when I'm feeling otherwise fragile, as she never does anything truly horrible to characters you have bonded with, and she is hilarious at all times...