Daily Independent Journal from San Rafael, California • Page 40

Mb Saturday, October 13, 1973 Cop Orgy Falls Shy Of Reality 1HE KILLINGS by dark Howard; Dial, 343 pages, $7.95. Reviewed by Don Keown. The life of a big city cop is just one big sex orgy- that is, if you believe that this novel does, indeed, give a realistic portrayal. as its publisher claims, of modern police at their work and in their off-duty hours. Clark Howard's Eddie Fenner and George Cascade, Los Angeles detectives, are first on the scene at a gruesome sex killing of two young women.

The case, then, becomes theirs to follow to its conclusion. The seamy trail takes them into Southern California lesbian netherworld, and requires them to concentrate, too, upon males with records as sex offenders. And when they are not investigating the sexual mores of others, Eddie and George are doing some dilly-dallying of their own. the former with a key witness in the case, the latter with his partner's estranged wife. One result is an overdose of depravity and explicit passages of sex conduct and misconduct.

Howard, a Las Vegas advertising man who writes in his off-duty hours, is at his best in describing the separation of the two detective-friends that comes about when Fenner revolts at determination to pin the murders upon a young black rapist and rid himself finally of the case that has begun to haunt him The partners come to a parting of the ways, and Fenner works feverishly to uncover the real truth Killers" leaves a bad taste One suspects that Joseph Wambaugh's Onion based upon a real murder CLARK HOWARD looks at police work of a Los Angeles police officer and reviewed here recently, gives a more accurate picture of what the work and life of a policeman is really like than does this sensationalized treatment And tht lan Campbell and Karl Hettinger of Onion were far more authentic depictions of the metropolitan police officer than Eddie Fenner and George Cascade of Killings" THE NEW BOOKS FOR JUNIOR READERS Author Discovers Father In Tidbits From Past THE EMINENT YACHTSMAN AND THE WHOREHOUSE PIANO PLAYER by Don Asher; Coward, McCann and Geoghegan, 256 pages, $6.95. Reviewed by Francis M. Dozier Jr. The memory of his late father, Dan. had, understandably, disturbed Don Asher for many years.

He committed suicide when the author was three For Asher, now a San Francisco writer and former musician, the producing of his memoir was therefore as much a learning experience as a professional project Father and son are reunited and the mood of pre-World War II Worcester. remarkably recreated in this most commendable effort fashioned from imaginatively expanded shafds of remembrance, conversations, and newly discovered letters which were exchanged by the elder Asher and his lifelong friend. S.N. Behrman, the noted playwright. Through the correspondence, Dan Asher is revealed to have been a man of high, fanciful wit and intelligence who revelled in soaring success A success, which, incidentally, never came near obscuring love for Dan, whom he most sympathetically depicted in a posthumous play.

The author and his brother. Leonard, however, were long shielded from knowing the actual circumstances of the death. They were originally told by their mother, Daisy, that father had died of a pulmonary embolism. Which was true but a death that occurred several days DON ASHER Remtntscence Reved i after he had slashed his own wrists in a mental institution. Much of the charm of this reminiscence is generated by the family album effect of its various components.

Once the hoped for nostalgic empathy is evoked, lesser facets glisten. An enjoyable one is the humor found in the author's forays into the field of chemistry in which he holds an M.S. Considering the vantage point of 20 years though, it is suspected that they are now imbued with a comic flippancy that did not exist at the time. SLEUTHS SUSPENSE MAIGRET AND THE BUM by Georges Simenon; Harcourt Brace Jovanovich 149 pages, $5.95. Reviewed by Don Keown.

This small gem with Inspector Maigret at his cerebral best was published in French 10 years ago, and is only now reaching us in English. The passing of time has not injured its quality. Beneath one of famous bridges, an aging bum is attacked in his sleep and thrown into the Seine. He is rescued just short of death. But it is up to Maigret to determine the motive for the attack, the identity of its perpetrator, and as an integral part of the puzzle the background of the victim.

Maigret goes about the unraveling of the mystery in his own inimitable manner and pace, full of curiosity about his fellow man and given to perceptive insights. An earlier drowning at another Seine bridge figures in the plot. So do the barge people, the derelicts on the shore, and the kin of the assault victim. In a minimum of words and pages, Simenon wraps up a neat, cohesive, sound and entertaining story. And for the conclusion he holds back a special surprise for those of us who have followed Maigret admiringly to past triumphs over criminality and injustice, and who may have grown a trifle complacent and over-confident.

THE INNER STEFS by Sara Cardiff; Random House, 232 pages, $5.95. Reviewed by Maxine Keown. Sara Cardiff has the knack for easy- reading Gothic fiction, blending neatly romance with mystery in a remote and menacing atmosphere. Tor Inner she has chosen a Hudson River estate to which a young bride accompanies her husband who is heir the manor. Once there, Lily finds her happiness shattered by a past that haunts her husband, and by present-day tensions that threaten them both and their marriage.

There is nothing very original about the plot, although Miss Cardiff does give us a restless spirit from a defiled Indian burial cave for a touch of something different. But the real strength of the book is the smooth, flowing, unpretentious style with which Sara Cardiff tells her entertaining story BROWSING BOOKMAN The guy who said the pen is mightier than the sword quite probably never felt the cutting edge of the latter. At least, under certain circumstances, the fellow with a fountain pen in hand would feel himself rather poorly armed, if facing an angry antagonist armed with broadsword or epee. The collection and study of swords and other armour has acquired a growing impetus in the last decade. Hence, especially timeiy is the reappearance of Sword and the or Sword Days and Old Sword by Alfred Hutton, late captain of the Dragoon Guards, under Charles E.

Tuttle Co auspices. The original edition was published in London in 1901. THE UNDERLINES beneath the title on the dust jacket just about tell the story of the contents: being a description of the various swords used in civilized Europe during the last five centuries, and of single combats which have been fought with a delightful Victorian touch to the Hutton text, so that the book itself seems something of a collector's piece. Various weapons and combats are portrayed in drawings. And it provides insights, not only into the role of the sword and its development, but also mto the kinds of society that lived and too often, died by it.

Tuttle has priced the book at $8.50. UNUSUAL AMONG the catalogs is a new edition of Pequot Press-Random Store Guide to All New credited to an Miser and A. In an appropriately old-fashioned format and priced at $2.95 softcover, the book covers 167 factories in northeastern United States where goods from shoes to toys and braided rugs can be purchased at bargain prices from where they are made. STERLING Publishing Co. remains the undisputed champion in the field of craft and hobby books, producing a steady stream of unpretentious, small manuals that are modestly priced and truly help ful.

In the latest batch: Bird ($3.50) by Helmut Bechtel, with spectacular color photographs of the exotic little winged creatures that have learned to co-exist with man in the home. Author-photographer Bechtel provides complete data on the birds, but it is his photo work that will dazzle the non-expert and tempt him to visit the nearest pet shop. part of the Little Craft Book Series, is the collaborative effort of home economist Jo Christensen and needleworker Sonie Ashner, who have produced earlier successful books as a team, and who in this one explain the various stitches from the basics to the most complex, and provide directions on how these skills can be used to produce functional and ornamental items. ($2.95) is part of the same series and the work of Grete Petersen, who with text, photos and diagrams tells you how to create with hides projects ranging from leather hats to shoulder bags and country-style jewelry. a craft currently very popular with the younger set.

"Finger Weaving: Indian ($2.95) by Alta Turner revives an old craft that flourished with the Indian tribes in the 18th and 19th centuries, and survives today, but with less attention than it deserves. It is offered as than and with just as many exciting possibilities for finished products scarves, purses, blankets, etc. One of the happier developments in literature is the availability of good quality, low cost paperback books for the tykes. A recent batch of Read to books from Random Huse is representative of the best of these. At a bargain 95 cents per book, boys and girls can choose from among the likes of Berenstain Nursery featuring the delightful family of bruins created by Stan and Jan Berenstain; Laurent de Babar and His starring you know who; a compilation with dandy illustrations by Aurelius Battaglia; Animals from Alligator to Zebra," featuring the beautifully realistic watercolors of Arthur Singer; Richard Scarry's Your P.

D. uproarious Dog Little the tender and exquisite and Prayers for the Very chosen and illustrated wonderfully by Martha Alexander; and Are Red, Are Violets Alice and Martin ingenious introduction to the world of color. And Peter every bit as busy as its title implies. All these books are alive with color of the kind you expect in the highest quality hardcover books. All are the work of topnotch writers and artists.

Also priced at 95 cents are Pantheon's Pinwheel Books, and here the child can pick from such as an adventure of a longtime favorite of the kindergarten set. Veronica Goes to Petunia's Farm by gifted Roger Duvoisin; Riding." Jean Merrill and Ronni original treatment of an old classic; Biggest House in the a delightful fable by popular Leo Lionni; Day of Autumn by Betty Miles, with illustrations in appropriate fall hues by Marjorie Auerbach, and Barbara Brenner's entertaining Five Then Juliet very different artwork in is a thicker $1.45 softcover Golden Book from Western Publishing Co. of Racine, and its Golden Press. Hilary Knight has packed the pages with lively, droll, amusing illustrations to accompany the familiar and beloved nursery rhymes. And the 64 pages should represent hours of repeated delight for the small ones.

Richard Scarry and other top writers and illustrators have also been repre- sentd in the Golden Books series of outstanding values. For its Owlet Books, yet another series of high quality paperbacks for youngsters, Holt, Rinehart and Winston has issued a guide to promote the most effective use of its editions. Yeager. THE CHECKER PLAYERS, by Alan Venable, (Lippincott), is the story of a meticulous carpenter and a carefree tinker, whose checker games always end in either squabbles or disasters until they learn to pool their talents. a native of Sebastopol, a teacher of Waldo Rohnert School in Rohnert Park, has done the guide, cover the Owlet Books alphabetically to assist teacher, parent or librarian in making the of the picture book a learning exercise as well as recreation.

The guide, itself a paperback, sells for $2.95. THERE IS something about the humor of America that reflects the country' at its best and seems to be especially appealing to the youngsters. Alvin Schwartz has put together an excellent collection of time- tested rib-ticklcrs, Jokes and Jests from American (Lippincott, and Glen Rounds has done some appropriate drawings For example, in the riddle category: does a cow wear a bell? Its horns donl And: did the baby porcupine say when it backed into the cactus? Is that you. Not the most sophisticated kind of humor, to be sure, but the kiddies want laughs and fun. not sophistication And so do a good many of the rest of us.

am, a Santa Barbara resident, tells it ith the flourish of the balladeers of old YOUNG READERS interested in oceanography will not find any better introduction to the fast growing science than that given by Howard Pennington in New Ocean Little, Brown, 282 pages, $5.95. This book, with plenty of photos and a solid index will interest adults as well IN HER Treasure Is The Rose," (Pantheon, Julia Cunningham has created the kind of story of another time tht has captivated small girls for generations. The period is the 12th Century, the heroine the widow' Ariane, the villain tht Baron de Rincon, and the scene, the Chateau de Mon Coeur in France. And naturally, a hero. Knights and damsels in distress and derring-do are an old, old formula that has lost none of its charm when well done.

Miss Cunningh- American Penal System Under Fire In Mitford's Lates Social Study Kind and Usual Punishment bv Jessica Mitford; AH red A. Knopf, 340 pages, $7.95. Reviewed by John Boessenecker. In KIND AND USUAL PUNISHMENT, Jessica Mitford, author of Amen can Way of unleashes the fury' of her pen in a new direction: the American penal system. Her latest book is a long and in-depth look at the numerous abuses and injustices in our prisons, particularly those of California These include prison wages averaging two to 16 cents per hour; medical tests, frequently carelessly supervised, of the effects on prisoner subjects of dangerous experimental drugs; apparent mismanagement of money in Inmate Welfare Fund; and use of drugs on convicts, often with adverse and potentially disastrous side effects, such as glaucoma, bladder paralysis, or cessation of respiration for several minutes.

Many other abuses are chronicled in Kind and Usual Punishment." One example is the questionable operations of the Solano Institute for Medical and Psychiatric Research at the Vacaville JESSICA MITFORD Criticizes prison system Medical Facility which hires convicts to take experimental drugs, work as laboratory aides, technicians, clerks, spite the fact that the contracting out of convict labor is illegal in California. Despite the impressive research Jessica Mitford has done on American corrections, and Usual is hardly an objective work. For example, in a chapter entitled Lawlessness of she charges prison officials with many illegal acts but mentions nothing of rampant crime among the convict population nor of organized gangs such as the Mexican Mafia which are flourishing in California prisons The book contains numerous handed comparisons of American prisons with Nazi concentration camps and inmate uprisings with slave revolts. Mitford believes that convicts are in prison not for committing crimes but because they are victims of social and economic repression. She writes, prison system, inherently unjust and inhumane, is the ultimate expression of injustice and inhumanity in the society at Jessica Mitford's conclusion is that are intrinsically evil and should be abolished.

Whether or not one agrees with her. those who are interested in the American penal system would be well advised to read and Usual Compassionate View Of General Through Victory And Defeat THE LAST ENCOUNTER by Robin Maugham; McGraw-Hill Book 176 pogos, $6.95. Reviewed by John D. Khartoum is relieved I shall go down as a hero If Khartoum falls shall be presented to the public as a general who defied his thus wrote Major General Charles George Gordon in his journal as he waited for the final attack of ihe forces. Actually he was wrong in his predictions Khartoum did fall but due to the bungling of Pro-Consul in Cairo, Sir Evelyn Baring, and to the reluctant inheritor of new and expanding Empire, Prime Minister William Gladstone.

greatest champion was Victoria herself who upon the fall of Khartoum and the death of Gordon unleashed a withering blast against her Prime Minister from which he barely recovered, and Gordon became the peerless hero. Much has been written about Gordon the soldier the greatest commander of irregular troops of all times who formed miracles at the head of his Chinese army in the dodging bullets and cannon balls and armed only with his bamboo cane (and innumerable brandies and sodas). Much has been written about Gordon the mystic, but nothing has been written before as compassionate as this novel about Gordon the man. Robin Maugham, nephew of the old master story teller, Somerset, using material gathered over a period of twenty years, has created a story based upon the supposed discovery of missing last journal. Gordon is revealed under seige both physically and emotionally as he questions his ambivalent sexuality, and his motives for accepting the job as Governor General of the Sudan.

He records how he adopted several boys of poor families when he was stationed near the slums of London: I am still in the bondage of my despicable temptations I loved the boys I adopted, I desired them and that was sin enough However tardily a relief expedition was prepared to rescue Gordon after he had been given an opportunity to leave. He receives this information with little emotion and then with horror that he has involved his country in what might really be an inherent death wish: Did I come out here to Khartoum only because I was yearning for death, but was afraid of accepting my nature and because I was afraid of committing the crime before God of killing myself? novel adds to the legend, gives a stark and moving picture of the last days of Khartoum, and leaves us wondering whether Empire could have ever survived the Victorian era without these strange saintly misfits who were so frequently to be found in the officer corps, and who would not be tolerated in world. Robin Maugham is a peer of the realm, his title from his father who was Lord Chancellor of England (and brother of Somerset). Robin Maugham has written many books of fiction and non-fiction, and one of his most successful was his recent autobiography, Escape from the Shadows, in which his famous Uncle plays a most prominent part..