The Anomaly by Hervé Le Telllier

Other Press, 400 pages, $16.99

Wow! What a roller coaster ride!

I’ve noticed that other reviews reveal quite a bit of the plot of “The Anomaly.” Forgive me, but I am choosing not to reveal so much. If you’ve come here for spoilers, seek elsewhere, wayfarer.

Author Hervé Le Tellier begins his book with short chapters, each dealing with a different character. There are about a dozen of them. At first, it is not obvious what they have in common. You begin to guess after a few chapters, but when that commonality is baldly stated, it is bizarre and so very intriguing. This is both a book I’ve read before and also one no one has ever written before. Le Tellier puts together pieces of plot which are like plot lines in others’ books. It is not plagiarism; it is a unique re-assembling of writing blocks.

The first chapter is about an assassin. He has an identity as a “normal” French man. He has a family and a bland job. The assassin part of him is all business. Got a problem, contact “Blake.” Pfft. Problem gone.

Blake was the character who was different from the other characters in a couple of huge respects. When you read this book, you will know what I am talking about when you reach those elements. I decided at first that he was going to assassinate all the other characters. I will break my own rule and tell you that no, that is not it. The resolution to his story is unusual. It is hard to find enough synonyms for bizarre, unique, unexpected, unusual, different, but that is what a review of this book needs. 

Even when the book veers off into philosophy, Le Tellier keeps the tension high. I also will say this, his characters are very human, knowable, you and me in many respects. (Except the assassin.)

“The Anomaly” was just released in English. Le Tellier, a French resident, has sold a million copies in Europe. 

Here’s an MBTB star for a book I cannot explain.

The Start of Everything by Emily Winslow

Delacorte Press, 272 pages, $26

The person whom I thought would solve the mystery — a great character — turns out not to be “the one.” But I loved Mathilde Oliver anyway. Mathilde is a young woman who is on the spectrum, although that is never said outright. She works handling dead letters at a college in Cambridge, England. That is, she tries to unite ostensibly undeliverable mail with their recipients. She is also the narrator of some of the chapters. Initially, it is confusing being in her brain without any back story. Emily Winslow makes you work to know Mathilde.

Then the police characters are introduced, and they have problems of their own. Detective Inspector Chloe Frohmann is sick to her stomach. Her partner and superior, DCI Morris Keene, has just returned to work after an incident in which he received serious injuries. He is still suffering from damage to his dominant hand. It is painful to watch him navigate the world. Frohmann tries to accommodate Keene’s new difficulties, but she realizes he needs more help than she can provide. Nevertheless, they must solve the mystery of the dead body discovered in a fen after its waters receded. The victim is a young woman, unidentifiable, but gradually additional pieces of information come to light.

For her part of the story, Mathilde is trying to find the “Katja” of one of her “dead letters.” The writer, “Stephen,” leaves vague clues about his identity and simply addresses his letter to “Katja” at Mathilde’s college. In the latest letter, he tells Katja he is about to arrive in her city and would like to see her. Mathilde has an obsessive need to find Stephen. There is no Katja at the college, and she needs more clues from him to find her. She goes to meet his train.

Both Frohmann and Keene take their turns doing first-person narratives. Keene’s emotional fragility compromises everything he does. Frohmann is struggling to handle all the work once shared between the two of them. Then a bloody hammer is found. The head of the hammer matches the indentation in the victim’s skull. 

The storylines eventually merge and the hunt is on for the killer. That leads to some painful individual stories. Killers and victims do not exist in a vacuum, and there are usually many people dragged into the whirlpool of murder. There are no winners, only moral choices.

There are some stories which should not be reviewed in depth. I think this is one of them, because it’s important that the reader make the discoveries along with the detectives. As a pertinent aside, I just read a letter of complaint to the New York Times Book Review from a reader who said reviewers gave too much information away in their write-ups of books. I try not to divulge too much, but sometimes praise is given and elements must be revealed. But not in this case.

I am looking forward to the next book in the series, apparently titled, “The Red House.”

MBTB's Best Books of 2021 (updated 11/30/21)

 Most of us will be glad when 2021 rings its sorry self out the door. The year 2022 has to be better, right? Here in Portland, as long as you are masked and observe basic safety measures, you can wander in bookstores again. Readers rock!

We didn’t read all the mysteries published in 2021. We didn’t even read close to half of them. We read reviews, read promo material, talked to other mystery fans, examined new offerings, checked out cover art (yes, we do judge a book by its cover) and picked the ones that sounded the most intriguing. Of the ones we did read, here are our favorites for 2021:

 

In the Company of Killers, by Bryan Christy

G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 368 pages, $27

A special investigator for National Geographic, Bryan Christy, wrote a book about a special investigator for a “global nonprofit organization committed to exploring and protecting our planet.”* Tom Klay is a complex character with a lot of past tragedies and worries shaken up into a ticking psychological bomb. Only, Klay won’t let the problems own him; he will own his life and will use the past to harden him into what he needs to be for his assignments. His best weapons are not guns, but his words and his work for his magazine. (For those who think this sounds too tame: There is a lot of bang-bang as well.)

The Windsor Knot, by S. J. Bennett

William Morrow, 288 pages, $27.99

Lilibet — Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain to you — is a smart cookie. With the help of her new assistant, Rozie Oshodi,  she attempts to solve the murder of a Russian who had the temerity to expire in her palace. Come for the murder, stay for the behind-the-scenes look at palace life, fictionally speaking of course.

Project Hail Mary, by Andy Weir

Ballantine Books, 496 pages, $28.99

I enjoyed “The Martian,” Weir’s first book. I really enjoyed “Project Hail Mary.” There is problem-solving galore, as in, solve this problem or die in space. Reluctant astronaut Ryland Grace has two problems: 1) When he awakens from a deep sleep aboard his ship hurtling toward Tau Ceti, he can’t remember a thing about who he is or why he is in space, and 2) eventually he realizes there is an alien presence on another ship. What a set-up for an apocalyptic thriller!

  

The Plot, by Jean Hanff Korelitz

Celadon Books, 336 pages, $28

Author Jean Hanff Korelitz has pulled off a thrilling mystery, rich with plot and character and twisty insides. Author “Finch” Bonner had a hit with his first book, but for the life of him, he can’t come up with another. He teaches a writing class while he waits for inspiration to hit. One of his students, a smug, arrogant man named Evan Parker, claims he has a guaranteed hit novel. What will happen when fate intervenes and … oops, can’t give away too much of this surprising book.

Smoke, by Joe Ide

Mulholland Books, 336 pages, $28

Here’s another winner of an I.Q. book! Isaiah Quintabe is the local private eye. He has graduated from solving little problems for the neighborhood old ladies to running from (or toward) serial killers, PTSD, gangs, dead people. He is joined by the usual quirky crew of Dodson, Cherise, Gloria, and Deronda. “Smoke” is meant to be loved. And the book after that (not yet released) is meant to be deeply anticipated.

Exit, by Belinda Bauer

Atlantic Monthly Press, 336 pages, $26

Belinda Bauer is another author who consistently offers twisty, well-written thrillers. This time, she has a story laced with humor. It’s not a fast-paced book; it is a well-paced one. There are quite a few characters, but you’ll sort them out. (Take notes!) Belinda Bauer is an author with kindness to spare. Her characters are quirky but human, mean but human, smart or average or sly but human. Before you know it, Belinda Bauer has packed a whole lot of story into her book. Felix Pink ushers people with terminal ailments into the the Great Beyond. When he is partnered by first-timer Amanda, things go wonky. Now Felix is on the run from the police.

 

Bryant & May: Oranges and Lemons, by Christopher Fowler

Bantam, 464 pages, $28.99

How often can an author turn out the nineteenth book in their series and pull out surprises and captivating characters? Fowler doesn’t do same old, same old. Bryant and May are the mainstays of Britain’s Peculiar Crimes Unit of the police. May is recuperating from a gunshot wound, but he still wants to be involved in the latest odd case of the PCU. That means solving the murders of people set to the nursery rhyme about the bells of London.

Pickard County Atlas, by Chris Harding Thornton

Bantam, 464 pages, $28.99

Harley Jensen grew up in the small town of Madson, Nebraska, and now he’s back as its deputy sheriff. Not only is his life complicated by the tragedies that happened while he was growing up, now he has to unravel the mystery surrounding two other local men, Paul and Rick Reddick, and their complicated family. Their younger brother was presumably murdered when he was seven, although his body was never recovered. Their mother has been slowly deteriorating over the years, and now she has disappeared. Harley must face his own past while he tries to remedy the tragedies from the Reddicks’ past.

Later additions:

Added 11/30/21:

The Wonder Test,  Michelle Richmond

Atlantic Monthly Press, 448 pages, $25.99

It has a propulsive main story, it has quirky asides, it has a strong lead character, it has little and big stories. An FBI profiler on leave after the death of her husband moves herself and her son to her late father’s home in a town near San Francisco. Lina Connerly thought she had left her shadowy NYC profiler life behind, but the well-to-do town of Greenfield has its own mystery that cries for a solution. A few teenagers have disappeared from the town, only to reappear disoriented and confused much later. What’s going on?

The Anomaly, by Hervé Le Tellier

Other Press, 400 pages, $16.99

A fork sits in a drawer with other forks. A spoon nestles among other spoons. Where does the spork fit in? So too, we ask, where does “The Anomaly” fit with other books. It is the spork of books. When are random characters not so random; when is the common factor pretty bizarre; what communal mythology will emerge? And where is the assassin in all this?

Added: 12/18/21:

Five Decembers, by James Kestrel

Hard Case Crime, 432 pages, $22.99

James Grady is a poor sap who gets to go on a wide-ranging adventure to solve the murder of two young people in a dirty shack in 1940s Hawai'i, on the cusp of the bombing of Pearl Harbor. He's a cop, and he has seen the brutality of war and misplaced passion.

Happy reading in 2022!

* The mission statement for National Geographic!

A Brush With Death by Ali Carter

Point Blank, 320 pages, $14.99, c2018

“A Brush With Death” gives you a chance to see how the rich (not “wealthy” — tsk, such a common word) in Britain’s upper-crust world live. Author Ali Carter uses the vehicle of a young artist who has fallen into doing pet portraits for a living. It may be a stereotype that the landed gentry love their animals more than their children, but it’s useful premise for setting artist Susie Mahl in among the aristocrats. Although Susie’s family is of modest means, her ancestors once walked among the mighty. And Susie has hung around with enough of their kind to be able to mind her manners expertly.

Two of Susie’s friends, the Earl and Countess of Greengrass, are much older than she, but she has spent several pleasant weekends over the years in their mansion. This mansion comes complete with servants, including a nanny and a butler. Lord and Lady Greengrass (Alexander and Diana, when they’re at home) are elitists, privileged, and old-school. It’s hard to envision why Susie has such a fondness for them. In her first-person narrative, she tries to explain about their kindnesses extended to her, especially by Diana. But it is worth noting that Diana accepts Susie as an impecunious member of her class.

Susie silently criticizes the Greengrasses’ sense of entitlement, but she is also an enabler. That becomes clear when Lord Greengrass is found dead among the tombstones of the old village (the very twee Spire) churchyard, and Susie becomes involved. At first, it is believed he suffered from dizziness, fell, and accidentally banged his head on a stone. Inspector Grey, who probably would prefer rubber-stamping the cause of death as an accident, soon determines Alexander was murdered. 

Everyone becomes a suspect, including Susie, who was staying up the road in Ben and Antonia Codrington’s quaint cottage. It was Diana who introduced Susie to the Codringtons in the hope that Susie would be asked to do their dog’s portrait. And so they did.

It was Ben Codrington, Susie, and another weekend guest, Henry Dunstan-Sherbet —these names, so British! — who discovered Alexander’s still-warm body among the graves. They had walked the short distance from the Codringtons’ home to the church, where a commemoration service, attended by Alexander, was in progress. In fact, Carter’s book begins with the scene of Alexander finding a place to relieve himself (“spend a penny”) in the graveyard and falling instead. In that short introduction, we also learn that Alexander has shadows in his past that “would come back to haunt him.” The main story, however, begins with Alexander alive. That scene is revisited from a different angle when the body is discovered in its proper time.

Diana is the imperious widow who refuses to believe what the police investigation begins to reveal. She has asked Susie to move back to her manor down the road, to stay and keep her company. It turns out it is less like friend-company than personal assistant-company. But that’s okay, because Susie is determined to find out who murdered her friend. Ah, how little she realizes she knows about her “friend”!

Susie gets to sit in on all the pertinent family meetings with the police and the estate attorney. She is privy to how much Diana loathes her daughter-in-law Asquintha because she is lowly born. And most of all, Susie heard Alexander’s death rattle as he lay in the graveyard. Her ascendance to the inner sanctum seems to be stretching plausibility. She was friendly with Alexander and Diana, but she hardly ran around in their circles. Although Arthur, their son, and his wife are more Susie’s age, she barely knows them.

If you can accept the premise that all doors are opened to Susie and it’s a-okay if she doesn’t immediately share everything she discovers with the police, then you will find this book enjoyable.

Here is Susie translating upper-class culture for us:

What you have to be clear on with the Greengrasses, who run and own Beckenstale Manor and its estate, is that the family surname is Russell. At the head of the family are Alexander and Diana, the Earl and Countess of Greengrass. Their eldest son Arthur and his wife, Asquintha, use one of his father’s courtesy titles, Viscount and Viscountess Cornfield, ‘Lord and Lady Cornfield’ in conversation. All sons and daughters of a viscount put ‘The Honourable’ before their names. So Arthur and Asquintha’s sons, so far, are The Honourable Michael Russell and The Honourable James Russell.

Ali Carter’s whisperings to us about all the goings on in the upper levels of class are fetching. The whodunnit isn’t meant to be a brainteaser. There are strong elements of romance and how to draw good doggies, if those are good inducements to read this book.

Carter’s third book in her series, “A Trick of Light,” was released in March 2021.

The Bloodless Boy by Robert J. Lloyd

Melville House, 416 pages, $29.99

Want a little story with your history lesson? Want a lot of history with your story? “The Bloodless Boy,” by Robert J. Lloyd, provides a gruesome tale to wrap around a lesson in the “New Philosophy” of King Charles II’s England in 1678.

Remember Robert Hooke from your science lessons? He discovered Hooke’s Law. (Actually, he discovered properties of elasticity, for which he received the accolade of having his name bestowed upon the formula.) He was an engineer, an architect, a scientist with a wide-ranging eye. He looked down upon the earth and up at the stars. Nothing was too small or great for his notice.

Author Robert J. Lloyd did extensive research on this great era of British scientific innovation and enlightenment. Boyle, Newton, Wren, and Pepys were contemporaries. Hooke was a major light in the Royal Society of London.

When Lloyd’s story starts, London is being rebuilt after the Great Fire. Although it rates no more than a couple of mentions, Hooke is involved as engineer and architect for some of the restoration projects. Britain is also recovering from the Civil Wars of 1642-1651, Oliver Cromwell’s leadership of the new Parliament, and King Charles I’s execution, and then Cromwell’s execution after his death (he was exhumed and then beheaded) and King Charles II’s assumption of the throne.

The story opens with the suicide of the current Secretary of the Royal Society of London for the Improving of Natural Knowledge. Hooke covets that position and Henry Oldenburg’s body is hardly cool before Hooke is politicking to be his replacement. That leaves the solution to a mystery brought to his doorstep in the hands of Hooke’s former assistant, Henry “Harry” Hunt, currently an Observator with the London Society. 

The body of a very young boy has been discovered at the base of a bridge near a river. There are curious holes in his legs. His body has been drained of blood. Sir Edmund Bury Godfrey, Justice of the Peace for Westminster, has asked Hooke to preserve the boy’s body in his vacuum contraption at Gresham College, where Hooke lives and works. 

Since Hooke is too involved in other matters, Harry exceeds Hooke’s remit and attempts to find the boy’s murderer. That leads Harry to dark streets and the discussion of dark matters. He sees first-hand how the physical and psychological wounds inflicted by the Civil Wars are still festering. Harry eventually discovers the depths of the problem the bloodless boy has brought into his life after a couple of attempts to kill him. Who is trying to discourage him from investigating? And, mind, at this point Hooke is attempting to get him to stop as well, as it seems too dangerous to continue the process. Nevertheless, Harry persists.

Although Harry is the hero of the story, he is also a creature of the times. He glories in studying science and knowledge for its own sake. It is disturbing to think there are political and philosophical undercurrents to contend with as well. He is constrained by the many levels of social, legal, and academic hierarchy above him.

Author Lloyd takes pains to describe London at that time. He introduces major historical elements in brief spaces. His is a grand story squeezed into a little bitty bite. There is the looming potential of political intrigue stamped onto the story of the dead boy. Soon, two dead boys. How about three dead boys? Are there more? Is this similar to the Jack the Ripper story, in which a royal is suspected of being the villain? Or is it a scientist with lofty goals but an amoral heart? Or are these boys just more victims of the squalor and degradation of London at the time?

“The Bloodless Boy” is a hefty novel, weighted by its detailing of the history and personages of the time. Do we really need to know “The walls of the corridor were a dark salmon colour, with a faded floral pattern on the peeling flock paper”? Probably not. (But I bet there are a lot of history geeks — not meant pejoratively at all — who will excitedly grok all this stuff.)

Bet there will be more Harry Hunt books.

Never Saw Me Coming by Vera Kurian

Park Row, 400 pages, $27.99

I had just finished reading “The Man Who Died Twice,” the second in the Thursday Murder Club series, before I started “Never Saw Me Coming.” The Thursday Murder Club books have senior citizens as the main characters. In many ways, “Never Saw Me Coming” provides the antithesis to those senior characters. The protagonists of “Never Saw Me Coming” are college students. The Thursday gang are quirky and oddly talented. The students are diagnosed psychopaths taking part in a study by a college professor, and they are quirky and oddly talented. The psychopaths may have committed crimes in their past, but now they must identify someone who is trying to kill them. It is the Thursday Murder Club seen through a warped glass to produce the Psychopaths of John Adams University.

I remember swearing I’d never read another book about a group of college students as the main characters. Why? Because the stories all seemed to be about someone betraying someone else, probably because one of the someones was sleeping with the other someone’s boyfriend, or someone was drunk and accidentally killed another student, or some deep, somber secret casts a pall over everyone and everything. Dark passions, guilty thoughts, gloom. Some of those books are good, but there is a general tone of pall-casting that became more than I could endure without a major break in reading books of that nature.

So why did I begin reading “Never Saw Me Coming”? I read a favorable review. There were psychopaths. That’s all I needed to try at least a few pages, which became a few more pages. Et voilà!

John Adams University is in Washington, D.C. The action takes place at the time of the Lafayette Square and other protests. The January 6th insurrection has not yet happened, but the atmosphere around the country, as manifested by the several D.C. protests, is ramping up. The book, I hasten to add, is not about politics or about the protests. That is the backdrop author Vera Kurian cleverly uses to encase her story. As the tenor of the protests becomes more frenetic, so does the violence and fear surrounding the on-campus murders.

“Fear” is the wrong word there. Psychopaths do not feel fear per se. According to the book, they do not have affect, they are narcissistic, they have no empathy, they are smart. Professor of psychology Leonard Wyman has a long-term study going in which he tries to help psychopaths overcome these social shortcomings. Promising young people are identified and offered scholarships to attend Adams University. For several of the current group in Wyman’s study, this is a life saver.

Chloe Sevre, we soon find out, is a made-up name. She is a freshman at Adams because of Wyman’s scholarship offer. She also is on a mission to kill another Adams student, Will. The why of that is tantalizingly teased out through the first few chapters. She treats her goal as a Mission: Impossible venture. At the end of sixty days, Will will be dead and Chloe will have killed him. The chapter headings are a countdown of those dwindling days.

Although the seven students in Wyman’s study are not supposed to know each other, they each have to wear a black Apple watch to provide information for research. And that’s one way smart psychopaths identify each other.

Chloe initially befriends (but do psychopaths truly have “friends”) Charles, a rich kid who could have gotten into an Ivy League school but is instead at second-tier Adams. Charles, we are led to believe, is there because he wants to modify his psychopathic tendencies and learn to live as a “normal” person. Charles belongs to the same fraternity as Will. The plot thickens.

Andre is another student in the study, but we learn early on that he is not a true psychopath. He has read up on the disorder and is smart enough to have gamed the tests. This was the only way a poor kid like Andre could get a full ride to Adams. He and Chloe have an uneasy relationship. There is a lot of back and forth about trust. When the two join forces with Charles, the resulting bonds break, reorganize, break again, and again. All on the basis of who can trust whom. 

Trust is everything, because one of them might be the killer.

Who has been killed? So far, two students in the study. Definitely murdered. Were they killed because they were in the study or because the wheel of fate chose them at random and they coincidentally were both psychopaths?

Kurian is adept at producing precocious teenage voices, psychopathic teenage voices. Chloe’s voice is especially endearing because of its quirkiness and single-mindedness. Yes, this potential murderer is endearing.

I’m not sure what a sequel would look like, but the door remains open, even if a prison door or two were to be slammed shut.

The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman

Pamela Dorman Books, 368 pages, $26

“The Man Who Died Twice” sort of made me feel the same way I felt when author Robert Crais gave one of his characters, Joe Pike, his own book and we learned way too much about Joe. Up until that point, Joe had mainly (and wisely) been a cipher. That is what made him so intriguing and the object of cult-like affection. (Or so I’ve been told. I wouldn’t know personally. I’m shutting up now.) Crais ripped the Band-Aid right off. Obviously not everyone agreed with me, because Crais has gone on to create a few more Pike-centric books. Those books may have been nominated for awards. Maybe. Probably. Okay, yes, they have.

Richard Osman created “The Thursday Murder Club,” and I loved it. “The Man Who Died Twice” is the follow-up. The founding members of The Thursday Murder Club are Elizabeth, Joyce, Ron, and Ibrahim. We met quite a few other characters in the first book, and there is now a loose agglomeration of friends and relatives who assist them. The four central characters live in a retirement complex in Coopers Chase, England. They were not true friends when the first book began — they went to great lengths to describe how they were not friends — but certainly they were then and are more fastly so now as the second story begins.

There are some bare facts worth repeating — and don’t worry, Osman does a great job giving you the bare bones of their genesis and camaraderie. Elizabeth is a retired spy (MI5), Joyce was a nurse (and is not easily deflected from viewing gore and viscera), Ron was and is a shady character, Ibrahim was a successful psychotherapist who now has some crippling mental issues himself. That’s the gang. Elizabeth’s husband has Alzheimer’s but contributes occasionally, Ron’s son has a shady business, and Joyce has a daughter who may or may not be useful. Then there’s Bogdan and his muscles (the arm kind, not the bodyguard kind), and Donna and Chris and their police badges. They are the most important auxiliary members.

One fine day, Elizabeth and the others are getting set to tackle a new cold case, which is what the members of The Thursday Murder Club was formed to do. However, Elizabeth has been rendered pensive by a message. Douglas has moved into the same retirement facility and has invited her for a drink. Who is Douglas? Exactly. You are meant to wonder, but I have to drop the curtain obscuring his identity if I am to get on with this review. He is Elizabeth’s ex-husband. He, like Elizabeth, was MI5. Why, in the name of trench coats and wide-brimmed hats, has Douglas settled down in Coopers Chase? Does he still pine for Elizabeth? Is he suffering from a fatal illness? Does he want Elizabeth to care for him? (If so, he must not remember Elizabeth very well, although Elizabeth does a most excellent job nursing her husband, Stephen, he of the diminishing perceptions.) Elizabeth remembers clearly being married to and working with Douglas. Not all of it was bad, but there is a reason he is her ex-husband.

It turns out Douglas is in the retirement facility because of Elizabeth, but not for any romantic reason. He has been accused by a local heavy-duty criminal broker of stealing twenty million pounds worth of diamonds. Douglas has sworn up and down that he is not responsible. What he was actually guilty of was snooping — on behalf of MI5, of course — in the man’s home, although that was not part of his remit. In the process, the diamonds disappeared. Your diamonds or your life, the broker threatens. Help, says Douglas to Elizabeth. Elizabeth is cool and calm. She is a quick and creative thinker, an ideal spy. Douglas and Poppy, his MI5 bodyguard, are hiding out in her neck of the woods because Elizabeth was and still is the best.

It is now up to the Thursday Murder Club to find the diamonds, avert the slaughter of many people, and thwart any bad-faith dealing among world-class criminals. At least Joyce will have a rollicking good time doing that. She rambles on sometimes when she shouldn’t, but she pulls through in a pinch with humor and an unexpected perspective. She and Elizabeth are besties.

This book entertained me immensely. Perhaps I would have enjoyed it more if only I hadn’t really loved the secrecy that enveloped Elizabeth’s character in the first book. If only she hadn’t been the Thursday Murder Club’s Joe Pike. Nevertheless, I enjoyed watching Elizabeth flex her mental muscles. She’s not really Joe Pike, and I am grateful for that.