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Ghost Country
Sara Paretsky's genius made Chicago private eye V.I. Warshawski a household name. Now the New York Times bestselling author explores an unseen corner of the city she loves. In Ghost Country she has written a parable for the millennium, a powerful, haunting novel of magic and miracles, of four troubled people who meet beneath Chicago's shadowy streets--and of the woman whose mysterious appearance changes all of their lives forever.
They come from different worlds and meet at a time of crisis for all of them. Luisa, a drunken diva fallen on hard times, discovers on Chicago's streets a drama greater than any she has experienced onstage. Madeleine, a homeless woman, sees the Virgin Mary's blood seeping through a concrete wall beneath a luxury hotel. Mara, a rebellious adolescent cast out by her wealthy grandfather, becomes the catalyst for a war between the haves and have-nots as she searches among society's castoffs for the mother she never knew.
As the three women fight for their right to live and worship beneath the hotel, they find an ally in Hector Tammuz, an idealistic young psychiatrist risking his career to treat the homeless regardless of the cost. Tensions in the city are escalating when a mysterious woman appears during a violent storm. Erotic to some, repellent to others, she never speaks; the street people call her Starr. And as she slowly transforms their lives, miracles begin to happen in a city completely unprepared for the outcome.
In this extraordinary novel, Sara Paretsky gives voice to the dispossessed, to men and women struggling to bury the ghosts of the past, fighting for their lives in a world hungry for miracles, terrified of change. A magical, unforgettable story of myth and madness, hope and revelation, Ghost Country is Sara Paretsky's most eloquent and ambitious work yet.
They come from different worlds and meet at a time of crisis for all of them. Luisa, a drunken diva fallen on hard times, discovers on Chicago's streets a drama greater than any she has experienced onstage. Madeleine, a homeless woman, sees the Virgin Mary's blood seeping through a concrete wall beneath a luxury hotel. Mara, a rebellious adolescent cast out by her wealthy grandfather, becomes the catalyst for a war between the haves and have-nots as she searches among society's castoffs for the mother she never knew.
As the three women fight for their right to live and worship beneath the hotel, they find an ally in Hector Tammuz, an idealistic young psychiatrist risking his career to treat the homeless regardless of the cost. Tensions in the city are escalating when a mysterious woman appears during a violent storm. Erotic to some, repellent to others, she never speaks; the street people call her Starr. And as she slowly transforms their lives, miracles begin to happen in a city completely unprepared for the outcome.
In this extraordinary novel, Sara Paretsky gives voice to the dispossessed, to men and women struggling to bury the ghosts of the past, fighting for their lives in a world hungry for miracles, terrified of change. A magical, unforgettable story of myth and madness, hope and revelation, Ghost Country is Sara Paretsky's most eloquent and ambitious work yet.
386 pages, Hardcover
First published June 25, 1988
84 people are currently reading
521 people want to read
About the author
Sara Paretsky
271 books2,370 followersSara Paretsky is a modern American author of detective fiction. Paretsky was raised in Kansas, and graduated from the state university with a degree in political science. She did community service work on the south side of Chicago in 1966 and returned in 1968 to work there. She ultimately completed a Ph.D. in history at the University of Chicago, entitled The Breakdown of Moral Philosophy in New England Before the Civil War, and finally earned an MBA from the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business. Married to a professor of physics at the University of Chicago, she has lived in Chicago since 1968.
The protagonist of all but two of Paretsky's novels is V.I. Warshawski, a female private investigator. Warshawski's eclectic personality defies easy categorization. She drinks Johnnie Walker Black Label, breaks into houses looking for clues, and can hold her own in a street fight, but also she pays attention to her clothes, sings opera along with the radio, and enjoys her sex life.
Paretsky is credited with transforming the role and image of women in the crime novel. The Winter 2007 issue of Clues: A Journal of Detection is devoted to her work.
Her two books that are non-Warshawski novels are : Ghost Country (1998) and Bleeding Kansas (2008).
The protagonist of all but two of Paretsky's novels is V.I. Warshawski, a female private investigator. Warshawski's eclectic personality defies easy categorization. She drinks Johnnie Walker Black Label, breaks into houses looking for clues, and can hold her own in a street fight, but also she pays attention to her clothes, sings opera along with the radio, and enjoys her sex life.
Paretsky is credited with transforming the role and image of women in the crime novel. The Winter 2007 issue of Clues: A Journal of Detection is devoted to her work.
Her two books that are non-Warshawski novels are : Ghost Country (1998) and Bleeding Kansas (2008).
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 108 reviews
December 1, 2014
Ughhhhhh!
This was a chore to finish.
Not my cup of cocoa. :(
This was a chore to finish.
Not my cup of cocoa. :(
August 23, 2012
I picked this up at the library under the impression (because I did not bother to really look) that it was another V. I. Warshawski novel … but it turns out to be outside of that series, one of the two non-Warshawski novels Paretsky has written, manifesting a different aspect of Paretsky’s talent. The flyleaf editor calls itr a parable for the millennium, and I guess that is apt, although it is one that is likely to be troublesome for most Christians. There are several different protagonists here, all of them being women from different walks of life and ages: a long past opera diva, who refuses to acknowledge that she is now a drunken has-been; her teenaged niece, who sees her aunt through rose-colored glasses; another teenager who is rebelling against her grandfather’s autocratic ways of life; the latter’s sister, who never rebels and is a shining example of American womanhood, on a fast track to become a full partner in her law firm; a trio of homeless women, one of whom becomes convinced that the rusty water leaking through a foundation wall of a hotel represented by the lawyer lady is the blood of the Virgin Mary … and an erotic homeless woman named Starr, who transforms all their lives. There is also a doctor named Hector, who is an intern at the grandfather’s hospital, who gets drawn into the lives of homeless women and finds he cannot get out again.
September 1, 2011
I like Sara Paretsky. This is the tenth book I have read tht she has written. This book is not to my liking. I found the plot to be convoluted and mixed up. The characters were not true to life. Save your time and re-read a good V.I. Warshawski. They sparkle.
March 16, 2013
This book was selected for our February bookclub and my quick review is YUCK! I won’t deny that the book is well written or deep in metaphor or was a compelling read, but I hated the process of reading it. I almost didn’t finish it. Why is it called Ghost Country? Are they haunted by their absent mother/grandmother? Never could figure that out. Also, there’s no character for whom I felt a particular connection.
I hated the realization that the sexist, virulently anti-woman attitudes in the book exist in real life (I’ve run across them myself). I hated being reminded of how much the feminine as a whole is despised in our society. I hated the constant reminder that powerful people can stomp out any signs of hysteria that contradicts their worldview. I hated that Goddess worshippers were looked down on as unhappy women who don’t fit in and thus need a non-approved ideology, which needs to be eliminated and replaced with the appropriate, society-sanctioned version ASAP.
Most of the book was extremely depressing as each character drops deeper into her own misery of alcoholism, homelessness, insanity, delusions, abuse, rejection, emotional neglect. It’s a hard slog through difficult times with no end in sight.
The metaphors could have been more subtle as well: a bleeding crack in an underground tunnel brings forth Goddess energy. The Goddess character, Starr, is a walking Venus of Willendorf. The male energies are represented by steel pipes, by buildings, by cold detachment.
There is a such a strong rejection of the feminine in this book, it actually made it difficult to read. While I can qualify that by explaining that the book is slamming chauvinism and illustrating how this rejection is old-fashioned, sexist, power hungry, etc., there’s so much of it in the book, it grew tiresome.
In particular, the male characters cannot handle women’s power, especially supernatural power or power that might actually be theirs by divine right. In fact, when confronted with that power, they immediately accuse the women of witchcraft, stating that they must be stopped – never mind that it’s the power to heal, to repair, to bring about positive change. It’s power that they haven’t approved.
Of course, the women’s sexuality also must be suppressed – especially when it’s Starr’s enormous breasts, her lesbian love of the other women, etc. She’s immediately grabbed by men, wrestled to the ground, sedated, hospitalized, restrained, as if this uncovered sensuality must be covered up, controlled by men, kept only for their exclusive use.
There’s a meager happy ending, with negative consequences for the most egregious sexist offenders, ranging from voiceless to impotence to death, and with positive consequences for those who benefited from their connection to Starr, such as musical talent, self-confidence, self-acceptance, etc.
It’s not a book I would read again.
I hated the realization that the sexist, virulently anti-woman attitudes in the book exist in real life (I’ve run across them myself). I hated being reminded of how much the feminine as a whole is despised in our society. I hated the constant reminder that powerful people can stomp out any signs of hysteria that contradicts their worldview. I hated that Goddess worshippers were looked down on as unhappy women who don’t fit in and thus need a non-approved ideology, which needs to be eliminated and replaced with the appropriate, society-sanctioned version ASAP.
Most of the book was extremely depressing as each character drops deeper into her own misery of alcoholism, homelessness, insanity, delusions, abuse, rejection, emotional neglect. It’s a hard slog through difficult times with no end in sight.
The metaphors could have been more subtle as well: a bleeding crack in an underground tunnel brings forth Goddess energy. The Goddess character, Starr, is a walking Venus of Willendorf. The male energies are represented by steel pipes, by buildings, by cold detachment.
There is a such a strong rejection of the feminine in this book, it actually made it difficult to read. While I can qualify that by explaining that the book is slamming chauvinism and illustrating how this rejection is old-fashioned, sexist, power hungry, etc., there’s so much of it in the book, it grew tiresome.
In particular, the male characters cannot handle women’s power, especially supernatural power or power that might actually be theirs by divine right. In fact, when confronted with that power, they immediately accuse the women of witchcraft, stating that they must be stopped – never mind that it’s the power to heal, to repair, to bring about positive change. It’s power that they haven’t approved.
Of course, the women’s sexuality also must be suppressed – especially when it’s Starr’s enormous breasts, her lesbian love of the other women, etc. She’s immediately grabbed by men, wrestled to the ground, sedated, hospitalized, restrained, as if this uncovered sensuality must be covered up, controlled by men, kept only for their exclusive use.
There’s a meager happy ending, with negative consequences for the most egregious sexist offenders, ranging from voiceless to impotence to death, and with positive consequences for those who benefited from their connection to Starr, such as musical talent, self-confidence, self-acceptance, etc.
It’s not a book I would read again.
June 15, 2010
Sara Paretsky's ninth novel is one of only two which do not feature private investigator V I Warshawski. It is set in Chicago and focuses on homeless women and females raised by oppressive adults.
Mara and Harriet Stonds are half sisters (same mother, different fathers), who lost their mother soon after Mara's birth and have been raised in luxury by their grandfather. He and his housekeeper are horrid people who control these girls by a perverted sort of behavior modification. Harriet has become a successful lawyer but has no emotions. Mara is a moody, rebellious teenager.
Dr Stonds, the grandfather, is chief neurosurgeon and head of the psychiatric department at a large Chicago hospital. He believes in medication over psychoanalytic therapy and favors the use of psych wards as containment and punishment for unruly, abnormal people, including his granddaughter Mara, though he carefully excludes those with no health insurance. All of this is so Sara Paretsky.
Hector, a resident at Midwest Hospital, who prefers therapy over medication, gets himself assigned to run a clinic at a homeless shelter and becomes embroiled in a volatile scene which eventually includes Mara, Harriet, Dr Stonds, an alcoholic opera diva, and a bevy of mentally ill homeless women.
It all leads to drama, disaster and deliverance. Mara and Harriet discover the truth about their mother and grandfather. The various bad guys get what is coming to them. The strange and psychic Starr--homeless, wild, bigger than life--is like an avenging goddess.
This is a big story, ambitious and sprawling. The writing is not great but Paretsky knows how to create tension and I was turning the pages, completely involved with the characters and their fates. The author's best characters were the homeless women: she made them real, demonstrating how they are invisible yet feared by society. Behind the imagery of the city's underbelly is a deeper layer of mythical spirituality which could have been developed more but possibly at the expense of the book's pace as a thriller.
As much as I like her detective novels and V I Warshawski as a heroine, I hope that Sara Paretsky writes more novels outside the series. From Ghost Country, I got the idea that a deep well of learning and a vast understanding of human nature lies yet untapped in her psyche. Through her novels she is working out important issues about American society and I will read anything she writes.
Mara and Harriet Stonds are half sisters (same mother, different fathers), who lost their mother soon after Mara's birth and have been raised in luxury by their grandfather. He and his housekeeper are horrid people who control these girls by a perverted sort of behavior modification. Harriet has become a successful lawyer but has no emotions. Mara is a moody, rebellious teenager.
Dr Stonds, the grandfather, is chief neurosurgeon and head of the psychiatric department at a large Chicago hospital. He believes in medication over psychoanalytic therapy and favors the use of psych wards as containment and punishment for unruly, abnormal people, including his granddaughter Mara, though he carefully excludes those with no health insurance. All of this is so Sara Paretsky.
Hector, a resident at Midwest Hospital, who prefers therapy over medication, gets himself assigned to run a clinic at a homeless shelter and becomes embroiled in a volatile scene which eventually includes Mara, Harriet, Dr Stonds, an alcoholic opera diva, and a bevy of mentally ill homeless women.
It all leads to drama, disaster and deliverance. Mara and Harriet discover the truth about their mother and grandfather. The various bad guys get what is coming to them. The strange and psychic Starr--homeless, wild, bigger than life--is like an avenging goddess.
This is a big story, ambitious and sprawling. The writing is not great but Paretsky knows how to create tension and I was turning the pages, completely involved with the characters and their fates. The author's best characters were the homeless women: she made them real, demonstrating how they are invisible yet feared by society. Behind the imagery of the city's underbelly is a deeper layer of mythical spirituality which could have been developed more but possibly at the expense of the book's pace as a thriller.
As much as I like her detective novels and V I Warshawski as a heroine, I hope that Sara Paretsky writes more novels outside the series. From Ghost Country, I got the idea that a deep well of learning and a vast understanding of human nature lies yet untapped in her psyche. Through her novels she is working out important issues about American society and I will read anything she writes.
August 2, 2008
Even though some of the characters are cardboard stereotypes (Dr. Strond, for one, Rafe Lowrie, for another) and the book turns mechanical toward the end, this newest Sara Paretsky novel kept me engaged. Paretsky draws on her ability to evoke a sense of place, something she did well in Bleeding Kansas with Lawrence, Kansas, but this time she's in more familiar territory in Chicago. She seems to have more of a feel for the Chicago underbelly and its denizens than she had for the upstanding Kansans she wrote about in Bleeding Kansas.
It seems that Paretsky is trying out her wings as she leaves the mystery genre behind. A writer can away with the formulaic writing of the mystery, but that doesn't serve her well in a straight-forward novel. Unfortunately, Paretsky sometimes falls back on her formula, as well as on her liberal biases. (These biases match mine, so that's not a problem, but she often gets "preachy in her writing. That is a problem.) The riot in the church is particularly unbelievable--even the most fervent congregation wouldn't be driven to this extreme.
Given everything, though, Paretsky has come up with some fully developed characters whose lives intersect and affect each other during the novel's duration.
A side note to all my Goodreads friends: At last I have retired from teaching for good. I graded my final essays and tests and posted my final grades last week. Now I can get involved in reading some of the books I've saved for later and writing the poetry I've put on hold--that is, as soon as I get organized. Ha ha. This won't happen.
It seems that Paretsky is trying out her wings as she leaves the mystery genre behind. A writer can away with the formulaic writing of the mystery, but that doesn't serve her well in a straight-forward novel. Unfortunately, Paretsky sometimes falls back on her formula, as well as on her liberal biases. (These biases match mine, so that's not a problem, but she often gets "preachy in her writing. That is a problem.) The riot in the church is particularly unbelievable--even the most fervent congregation wouldn't be driven to this extreme.
Given everything, though, Paretsky has come up with some fully developed characters whose lives intersect and affect each other during the novel's duration.
A side note to all my Goodreads friends: At last I have retired from teaching for good. I graded my final essays and tests and posted my final grades last week. Now I can get involved in reading some of the books I've saved for later and writing the poetry I've put on hold--that is, as soon as I get organized. Ha ha. This won't happen.
August 11, 2017
This was quite an odd story - not quite fantasy, but far beyond modern novel. The story is well-written, but just so weird and far from reality. I read a LOT of science fiction, and a fair amount of fantasy, but I know what to expect from them. This book jars my expectations - and not in a good way. It starts out firmly grounded in reality, goes along for quite a bit of the book, then jumps the track into the bizarre. I enjoy the V I WARSHOWSKI novels, but not sure I would pursue other novels from this author based on this book.
June 12, 2010
I enjoyed this book. A wild, fantastical descent into madness(or is it?) and a painful look at human nature. Once I started this book, there was no putting it down and I stayed up late to finish it. The vivid characters paid me back by chasing me through my dreams.
November 4, 2012
as a big fan of Paretsky's VI Warshawski series, i this was a very different read..! I found it a little slow to get into but once i did it was a very emotional read with wonderfully written characters :D
June 3, 2025
My father told me to read this book because he recognized the author's name & told me she wrote incredible things, and I have to say, he was right.
So many awful things happen to these characters that I felt like I had to keep pausing to give myself time to process it all. Still, I find myself constantly wanting to know what was going to happen next. All the different POVs painted a really clear picture of the tragedy of abuse, and how easily that can lead to women finding themselves on the street. I appreciated seeing how Harriet slowly untangled her own feelings about her grandfather in the absence of her sister, realizing how much of his affection for her had always been transactional. Hector was really easy to pity, seeing how completely overworked he was & how badly he was being treated for being the only one to actually care about the patients he looked after.
It definitely starts a bit slow, but it's very satisfying and fascinating to watch how the lives of all these people begin to intersect and how big a very simple problem becomes because everyone with power just simply refuses to help one woman get the help she deserves. There's no magical cure for a systemic issue like that, but the ending we get is still satisfying. I feel like Starr should have had a bit more agency though
So many awful things happen to these characters that I felt like I had to keep pausing to give myself time to process it all. Still, I find myself constantly wanting to know what was going to happen next. All the different POVs painted a really clear picture of the tragedy of abuse, and how easily that can lead to women finding themselves on the street. I appreciated seeing how Harriet slowly untangled her own feelings about her grandfather in the absence of her sister, realizing how much of his affection for her had always been transactional. Hector was really easy to pity, seeing how completely overworked he was & how badly he was being treated for being the only one to actually care about the patients he looked after.
It definitely starts a bit slow, but it's very satisfying and fascinating to watch how the lives of all these people begin to intersect and how big a very simple problem becomes because everyone with power just simply refuses to help one woman get the help she deserves. There's no magical cure for a systemic issue like that, but the ending we get is still satisfying. I feel like Starr should have had a bit more agency though
March 9, 2023
Unsure of this one. I liked it until the latter half. It’s as if the story became less realistic and so much more convoluted. I guess I wanted it to be more of a true statement on the treatment of mental illnesses and the homeless. Although no fan of the pious Christians who are a reality, the murder and the healing powers of one of the characters made the book “too much “. And the missing body?? I also never did get how the title fit the story line.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 5, 2021
Definitely a different kind of story from Paretsky's V.I. Warshawski novels, but overall, I think it was just as well told. The start was slow and took me longer to get into than I expected, but after a while I started to care about the main characters and what happened to them. It does require an openness to the possibility of mystical events, unlike the Warshawski series.
July 16, 2024
I almost DNF - Slow reading for me - characters were so mixed up - not one of her better novels -
October 21, 2008
I can't remember the last time I was so relieved to be through with a book. I almost never don't finish a book, but I came close with this tedious offering. I listened to it on tape and I admit that I could have been slightly affected by the awful reading by Melissa Manchester (the singer, apparently), but I don't think overly so. Paretsky's V.I. Warshawski novels aren't usually my favorite type of mysteries - they are PI books, where I prefer cozies, but I needed a book for the car. This was a departure from the Warshawski novels and I would have MUCH preferred one of those.
This was a ridiculous book with unlikeable, unpleasant and silly characters. The language is stilted and wooden. The character that everything in the story ends up hinging on (Starr - a crazy homeless woman who may or may not be a Jesus figure)doesn't appear until very late in the book and the reader never understands why she is so instrumental in bringing about the changes that are hinted at. Honestly, I double checked to make sure that I wasn't listening to an abridged edition. One of the main characters apparently goes insane and decides that he'd be better off dead and thinks about killing himself. Yes, he's an exhausted resident in a hospital and completely stressed, but it just doesn't explain why he's seriously consider suicide - he actually removes his tie and tries to find something to hang it on. This same character inexplicably becomes obsessed/in love with Starr, without any true explanation. This is just a depressing mess of a book. Unrelievedly dark with no one to root for or care about. And then suddenly - everything works out in the end and the bad are punished and everything is going to be hunky-dory. Dumb.
This was a ridiculous book with unlikeable, unpleasant and silly characters. The language is stilted and wooden. The character that everything in the story ends up hinging on (Starr - a crazy homeless woman who may or may not be a Jesus figure)doesn't appear until very late in the book and the reader never understands why she is so instrumental in bringing about the changes that are hinted at. Honestly, I double checked to make sure that I wasn't listening to an abridged edition. One of the main characters apparently goes insane and decides that he'd be better off dead and thinks about killing himself. Yes, he's an exhausted resident in a hospital and completely stressed, but it just doesn't explain why he's seriously consider suicide - he actually removes his tie and tries to find something to hang it on. This same character inexplicably becomes obsessed/in love with Starr, without any true explanation. This is just a depressing mess of a book. Unrelievedly dark with no one to root for or care about. And then suddenly - everything works out in the end and the bad are punished and everything is going to be hunky-dory. Dumb.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 15, 2017
This book won't be for everyone. I loved it. It touches on how society values or devalues people based on wealth. The homeless, the mentally ill and dispossessed make the rest of us uncomfortable, so they are effectively ignored and become powerless and invisible. It also touches on religious hypocrisy and the many ways women are devalued. A mentally ill homeless woman believes the rusty water seeping from the crack in the wall of a high class hotel is a religious sign. Society understandably looks at her beliefs as the rantings of an unstable woman. The hotel goes to extreme lengths to drive her and her friends away from her shrine (they make the rich clients uncomfortable). A wealthy stock broker is a church lay leader who leads a religious group at his church, spouts misogynist religious screeds, bullies and beats his daughter, is so abusive his wife has left him, yet he is esteemed by society because he is financially successful. The book begs the question if the religious delusions of the homeless woman cause us to judge her as mentally unstable, why isn't the same judgment applied to the wealthy successful abusive man?
June 18, 2019
One of the strangest books I have ever read. Paretsky puts so much thought into the characters that you feel like you know them intimately, though you may shudder at their behaviors or dislike them immensely. The characters are thrown together in odd ways, with each of the main characters having distinctive qualities and voices. The beginning was a bit odd and it was difficult to figure out where the story was going, but then it all fell together and was hard to let go. Some parts were uncomfortable to read, to say the least -- quite graphic. Though we learn a bit about living in the streets, the health care system and the church were shown in a very bad light and, admittedly, some live up to those characterizations, but not all. Hopefully, readers come away remembering that this is fiction. A tale woven well.
August 13, 2015
The lives of four women intersect during one hot summer in Chicago on lower Wacker Drive: a homeless woman, a disenfranchised 20 year old, a fallen opera star and a magical, mystical specter of womanhood. Profound experiences bind them and change their lives and the lives of everyone who knows them as well as those of many across the city and around the world. The action of the novel is chaotic, intense and powerfully rendered. One cannot help but be caught up in it and at the tale's end, be left questioning what really matters, who really matters and who determines the answers for each of us.
January 31, 2018
Had I read this book before the 2016 election I might have thought it was exaggerated and pointless. Not anymore. It's very topical indeed.
The story flows well, and there's no mad effort to reach a conclusion that ties up all the loose ends. The bigots tend to remain bigots. I especially liked that we never do learn exactly who or what Starr really is. Things happen that suggest certain possibilities, but the reader is given space to make up their own mind.
The story flows well, and there's no mad effort to reach a conclusion that ties up all the loose ends. The bigots tend to remain bigots. I especially liked that we never do learn exactly who or what Starr really is. Things happen that suggest certain possibilities, but the reader is given space to make up their own mind.
December 29, 2010
I have probably read all of Sara's books and eagerly await each new one, but this has to be the worst one she has ever penned. Maybe I just didn't understand it, but I stayed with it to the bitter end and still "didn't get it." So far, this is the only book she has ever written that I cannot recommend.
August 22, 2016
I registered a book at BookCrossing.com!
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/12862574
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/12862574
October 14, 2021
While V.I. Warshawski never appears in this book Paretsky isn't straying far from well traveled comfort zones. It's still, Chicago, it's still good guys vs. bad guys, there's still lots of Italian opera arias, there's still strong women, there's a dysfunctional family with a murky history, there are evil corporations, sometimes useful media types, bumbling police, good and bad lawyers, civil rights issues. sometimes helpful doctors, hospitals, University of Chicago professors, the Lake and the beaches, impressionable teenagers, and of course clueless men, etc. One missing element was food. Food does make minimal appearances but there's nothing like major chefs.
What makes this book different is it's focus on homeless women with associated mental health issues and a church congregation that has lost it's way. Homeless characters abound. They are all women of various backgrounds. While some of them have had kids no families seem to be mixed in with them, and no males other than pimps and others that prey upon the women. The least interesting part is the alcoholic, has been diva. Only the impressionable teenagers see past her alcoholism. The most interesting part is the appearance of an out of nowhere homeless woman who only grunts but the diva becomes her translator. The question becomes is she a goddess who can perform miracles for those who believe or is she a charlatan wreaking havoc. There's lots of illusions to Jesus which is heightened by her being murdered by the unbelieving congregation incensed when their grape juice used for communion is replaced with real wine offending their teetotaling traditions. Then her body disappears from the morgue. Sound familiar?
While I would have liked to see Paretsky get out of her comfort zones it is an interesting book. The weakest part is the use of characters as signifying groups. There is too much identity politics for me, characters were too one dimensional
What makes this book different is it's focus on homeless women with associated mental health issues and a church congregation that has lost it's way. Homeless characters abound. They are all women of various backgrounds. While some of them have had kids no families seem to be mixed in with them, and no males other than pimps and others that prey upon the women. The least interesting part is the alcoholic, has been diva. Only the impressionable teenagers see past her alcoholism. The most interesting part is the appearance of an out of nowhere homeless woman who only grunts but the diva becomes her translator. The question becomes is she a goddess who can perform miracles for those who believe or is she a charlatan wreaking havoc. There's lots of illusions to Jesus which is heightened by her being murdered by the unbelieving congregation incensed when their grape juice used for communion is replaced with real wine offending their teetotaling traditions. Then her body disappears from the morgue. Sound familiar?
While I would have liked to see Paretsky get out of her comfort zones it is an interesting book. The weakest part is the use of characters as signifying groups. There is too much identity politics for me, characters were too one dimensional
April 27, 2024
This book was difficult to get through. It took me months to plod my way through the first 300 pages. It’s bloated with too many characters and everyone… and everything, including the city of Chicago itself… feels one-dimensional, like a cardboard cut out.
Little details would take me out of the story; for example, I’ve never since I moved here ever heard anyone call it “Underground Wacker”. (Perhaps it’s because it was an outdated term, but I moved here just two years after this book was published so I don’t think so. In fact, when you search for the term “underground wacker”, a very large number of the hits are descriptions of this book.)
I understand well the comments about society that the story is making… how women are treated as inferior humans prone to hysteria and incapable of any sort of leadership role, police brutality, the treatment of the homeless and those struggling with addiction, homophobia, how those with wealth can walk through this world so much differently than those without… but the way it was portrayed in this book came across as someone who has only read about these issues and chose to write a story that touches on them all after being introduced to feminine worship at a Cakes for the Queen of Heaven course. Every character (even the compassionate ones) follows some sort of stereotype. When lessons are learned and characters grow, it’s like someone flipped a switch instead of it being organic.
Honestly, it reads like a story written by a woman who grew up in a wealthy home but despised the coldness of her environment and so fantasizes about running away and teaching everyone a lesson, and in her fantasy they all either immediately repent, seeing that she was right all along, and apologize profusely or they meet some bad ending. Which is exactly what happens.
Little details would take me out of the story; for example, I’ve never since I moved here ever heard anyone call it “Underground Wacker”. (Perhaps it’s because it was an outdated term, but I moved here just two years after this book was published so I don’t think so. In fact, when you search for the term “underground wacker”, a very large number of the hits are descriptions of this book.)
I understand well the comments about society that the story is making… how women are treated as inferior humans prone to hysteria and incapable of any sort of leadership role, police brutality, the treatment of the homeless and those struggling with addiction, homophobia, how those with wealth can walk through this world so much differently than those without… but the way it was portrayed in this book came across as someone who has only read about these issues and chose to write a story that touches on them all after being introduced to feminine worship at a Cakes for the Queen of Heaven course. Every character (even the compassionate ones) follows some sort of stereotype. When lessons are learned and characters grow, it’s like someone flipped a switch instead of it being organic.
Honestly, it reads like a story written by a woman who grew up in a wealthy home but despised the coldness of her environment and so fantasizes about running away and teaching everyone a lesson, and in her fantasy they all either immediately repent, seeing that she was right all along, and apologize profusely or they meet some bad ending. Which is exactly what happens.
January 2, 2019
Great to have Paretsky take her passion and skills outside the VI Warkshawsky detective frame. Here we go into the dark underbelly of Chicago, centred around the lives of homeless and mentally unstable women whose passion and crazy wisdom drive the story.
There is real anger at the abuse of "propriety" and private property in making misery for women who don't fit the social mould. And Paretsky's passion shines through in a magical realism that has the women challenge all the norms, create loving relationships while stuck in crude underground shelters and running from all kinds of enforcers.
And there is a crazy humour to it all - wild young women ditching suburban comfort to take up with the homeless women, a male psychology resident bringing integrity and good intention as well as deep person confusion, and endless family dramas between authoritarian parents and wild offspring, and between "good" and "bad" siblings.
Paretsky entertains and makes meaning, all at the same time, in a crazy kind of way. Nice to find this book in a second hand story in Cairo and read it in Morocco: helps me remember that the sexism and misguided authoritarianism of the Arab world is not all that different from what's common in the "western" world.
There is real anger at the abuse of "propriety" and private property in making misery for women who don't fit the social mould. And Paretsky's passion shines through in a magical realism that has the women challenge all the norms, create loving relationships while stuck in crude underground shelters and running from all kinds of enforcers.
And there is a crazy humour to it all - wild young women ditching suburban comfort to take up with the homeless women, a male psychology resident bringing integrity and good intention as well as deep person confusion, and endless family dramas between authoritarian parents and wild offspring, and between "good" and "bad" siblings.
Paretsky entertains and makes meaning, all at the same time, in a crazy kind of way. Nice to find this book in a second hand story in Cairo and read it in Morocco: helps me remember that the sexism and misguided authoritarianism of the Arab world is not all that different from what's common in the "western" world.
March 23, 2018
I actually enjoyed this novel, but I'm giving it 2 stars because the writing was some of the worst I've encountered in a long time.
The themes of social disparity, gender inequality, mental illness were all extremely compelling and her use of religious metaphors was more lovely because that was satire in itself and clever.
However, the writing was structurally unsound in every aspect possible. Bad grammar. Horrible transitions. Most of the time I had to re-read paragraphs to figure out which character was speaking. Giving Dr. Tazuzz his own font to convey someone new is speaking? I felt so insulted. Had this had a lot more editing, I could've given it more stars because I did like it.
The themes of social disparity, gender inequality, mental illness were all extremely compelling and her use of religious metaphors was more lovely because that was satire in itself and clever.
However, the writing was structurally unsound in every aspect possible. Bad grammar. Horrible transitions. Most of the time I had to re-read paragraphs to figure out which character was speaking. Giving Dr. Tazuzz his own font to convey someone new is speaking? I felt so insulted. Had this had a lot more editing, I could've given it more stars because I did like it.
September 18, 2020
The conceit that drives this book is obviously intended to challenge perceptions of gods and monsters. Keywords = obviously intended. Its less than subtle attempt falls flat among two-dimensional character cliches, and naive interpretations of homelessness, mental illness and class warfare. Its plot romps and rolls along like Thelma and Louise in the “Don’t Panic” scene from Airplane. Reliably, Paretsky’s Chicago is a mix of the real and imagined, but come on – everyone knows there’s no such thing as “Underground” Wacker Drive! It’s “Lower” Wacker Drive. Google it.
October 21, 2020
Yikes! I really wanted to like this, and persevered to the very end, but so many things I did not like about it. The only reason I finished it is because I like Sara Paretsky and thought there MUST be something good at the end. I also needed to find out what happened to the main characters. If this was the first novel that I ready by Ms. P, I definitely would not read another. I did enjoy having my past knowledge of Lower Wacker in Chicago, which helped me to visualize the storyline. Sorry, Sarah!
September 15, 2023
Interesting if only because Paretsky's alter ego protagonist Warshawsky is out "on strike" . . . so Chicago (and the Chicago Police) are characters. This is a class story: uppity arrogant narcissistic surgeons and wealthy business owners, arrogant impatient hotel owners and their bosses vs. homeless hoardes; stir in some religious fervor on one side and dysfunctional family dynamics on the other, season generously with police insensitivity and the way we overwork young doctors, and you have the story. Definitely worth reading, but I look forward to V.I.'s return.
December 21, 2021
We've waited a long time for a new Paretsky. But, I was really waiting for a new V.I.Warshawski. This new book is not only NOT a Warshawski, it's not a mystery either. I'm not even sure how to describe it. There's a fallen opera diva, and her homeless friends and a strange family that is so fractured that dysfunctional doesn't even start to do it justice. The book is an interesting book to read. I'm ready for another V.I. Warshawski.
June 30, 2018
This was a fun and interesting book. I enjoyed reading every bit of it. Deals mostly with family dynamics, primarily of a well to do family. Touched of some major issues of homelessness, homosexuality, and mob violence but stood aloof from these as just side issues. Explores many feminist issues in a negative light across the board...interesting psych of the author.
June 18, 2024
2.5 stars. Not sure about the title even. Where were the ghosts? Lots of dysfunctional families, dysfunctional over generations. Homeless people. Religious zealots who kill someone during a church service and get away with it. Narcissism and patriarchy. A drunken diva and a goddess or was she a swan?
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
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