I Never Read Thoreau: A Mystery Novel [Paperback]

Karen Saum (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

After discovering the body of an immigration officer on a small island off the coast of Maine that is used as a religious retreat, Alexandra Adler tells how the island and its spiritual retreat came into existence, how she became emotionally involved with its co-founder, Sister Santa Clara, and how its members smuggled illegal aliens into Canada. More introspection than mystery, Saum's latest meanders and lacks suspense; however, it does offer a fan-worthy alternate version of her Murder Is Germaine (New Victoria, 1991).
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

Hearing news of an impending raid by Immigration officials, Jill-of-all-trades Alex Adler rushes to Monte Cassino, an island retreat off the Maine coast known for harboring South American refugees. She finds the island deserted and, trapped by the tide as a fierce Nor'easter hits, she stumbles into a cabin for shelter - only to discover the body of a vaguely familiar man. Waiting out the storm she puzzles over the murderer. Was it the charismatic but eccentric Santa Clara (an expelled nun and the hub of the community's universe, as well as Alex's ex-lover and many other women as well)? Or another of the refugees, drifters and quirky locals who make up this unusual community. I Never Read Thoreau is an engaging, page-turner of a novel! -- Midwest Book Review

Product Details

• Paperback: 188 pages
• Publisher: New Victoria Publishers (October 1, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0934678766
• ISBN-13: 978-0934678766
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.2 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,721,511 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Karen was a colonial child, second generation American born in Panama. Her childhood growing up colonial, learning racism and chauvinism, was captured in short stories that were brought together in a collection named "El Valle Panama" and published by the St. Francis Press, Orland, Maine. It is available through h.o.m.e., Inc., Orland.

Despite some success in publishing poetry and short stories, Karen's attempts to publish her first serious novel, "A Midsummer Night's Dream", set on an island off the coast of Maine, failed to do better than to be seriously considered before being rejected. She then decided to try her hand at murder mysteries. She succeeded with her first try.

Losing her position as a professor at the University of Maine after being outed in 1973 by a Unitarian minister in Augusta, Maine, Karen took to earning her living at various occupations, none of them paying well, but all considerably more interesting than teaching history. And all of them providing rich material for story telling.

In 1981, at age forty-five, Karen started to work at an unusual non-profit called h.o.m.e., Inc. in Orland, Maine. There she helped found a printing press called The St. Francis Press, which publishes a couple titles a year. It was through this press that Karen finally saw her more serious work in print.

At present, retired and spending half the year in the land of her birth, Panama, and half in her adopted land, Maine, Karen is working at something which she finds somewhat scary. She is calling the pieces Fables.