I've been enjoying reading the reviews here, sorry I haven't been able to join in - RL has been playing games with us for the last year or so. So this is hopelessly late but fwiw, "All these years" is not a favourite of mine, though I see that it is powerful stuff. I read it a couple of years ago and have not read it again until this rec but find I still don't enjoy it. This Doyle is just too damaged for me, in such a way that I find it difficult to imagine that he will ever be able to sustain a real relationship with anyone, not even Bodie. And we do want to finish any story with that hope, I think. And Bodie is too perfectly able to cope with both damaged Doyle and damaged Kathie, let alone the two together. "Far shores" is another matter, I love it, have read it several\times and it pulls me every time. And the Bodie and Doyle there I can fit in with my lads, and there is the glorious transporting writing which conjures up that Scottish island so vividly. And just after reading the mentions above, I happened across some photographs here ( http://www.flickr.com/photos/rich_parker/sets/72157623303657330/ ) on Flickr of this year's Up Helly Aa Festival which gave me another vivid set of images to go with the story. Just thought you might find them interesting too! Heat Trace is another one I can re-read and be caught up each time. I think the description of Doyle's downward spiral into depression and his close run thing with suicide is one of the most graphic and yes - Josh's word 'chilling' is spot on - description of utter despair that I have ever read. Better late than never, I hope.
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Date: 2010-02-13 01:37 am (UTC)So this is hopelessly late but fwiw, "All these years" is not a favourite of mine, though I see that it is powerful stuff. I read it a couple of years ago and have not read it again until this rec but find I still don't enjoy it. This Doyle is just too damaged for me, in such a way that I find it difficult to imagine that he will ever be able to sustain a real relationship with anyone, not even Bodie. And we do want to finish any story with that hope, I think. And Bodie is too perfectly able to cope with both damaged Doyle and damaged Kathie, let alone the two together.
"Far shores" is another matter, I love it, have read it several\times and it pulls me every time. And the Bodie and Doyle there I can fit in with my lads, and there is the glorious transporting writing which conjures up that Scottish island so vividly.
And just after reading the mentions above, I happened across some photographs here ( http://www.flickr.com/photos/rich_parker/sets/72157623303657330/ ) on Flickr of this year's Up Helly Aa Festival which gave me another vivid set of images to go with the story. Just thought you might find them interesting too!
Heat Trace is another one I can re-read and be caught up each time. I think the description of Doyle's downward spiral into depression and his close run thing with suicide is one of the most graphic and yes - Josh's word 'chilling' is spot on - description of utter despair that I have ever read.
Better late than never, I hope.