Posts filed under 'Thriller'
Want to read a scary book? How would it be if it was set in small town Maine? Sounds familiar? Well you’re wrong, it’s not this guy. It’s a couple of books written by someone relatively new to the horror scene, Sarah Langan.
The Keeper & The Missing both take place in the same area in Maine. In The Keeper, we are introduced to the town of Bedford, Maine. Things are not well there. The paper mill has closed down and the rain is never-ending. The town is also haunted by Susan Marley, once a good looking popular girl, now a shell of her former self. Susan wanders the streets of Bedford and also enters the dreams of the locals, with portents of doom. The Missing is a sort of sequel to The Keeper. The town of Corpus Christi was a neighboring town to Bedford. The awful thing that happened in Bedford, is now infecting Corpus Christi.
Sarah Langan is great at creating a sense of menance and foreboding in her books. You get that tingling in the back of your spine as you read. If you are only an occasional reader of horror titles, then these are the two you should read this year. If you are a fan of the genre, then you probably have already read them, but if you haven’t, do so now.
October 28th, 2009
Gregg - Sequoya
There are some books that make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside, inspired by the goodness of humanity and hopeful for the future. And then there are James M. Cain’s novels. Written in the 1930s and 1940s, Cain’s terse, bleak crime novels portray people as hard as the times in which they live. But for all the darkness at the heart of Cain’s tales, it’s hard to deny the brilliance of his writing and the deep seated humanity it invokes in his people. In a scant paragraph, Cain can sketch out a drifter’s wariness, a housewife’s prejudices or an insurance salesman’s patient plotting. Dialogue takes on a distinctive rhythm, with slang and attitude masking characters’ distrust and vulnerabilities. When the betrayal comes, it is as sharp as a stab.
In his first successful novel, The Postman Always Rings Twice, Cain tells a simple story: Frank, a drifter, comes upon a California roadside diner run by a Greek immigrant and his wife. Cora and Frank fall in love, but their efforts to dispatch the Greek prove difficult (for all their cool plotting, the two prove to be rather nervous when it comes to the actual deed). While the murder of an endearing figure (one that even Frank says he liked) is disturbing enough, it is the mix of violence and sexuality in Frank and Cora’s relationship that riled enough critics to have the book tried for obscenity in Boston.
In his later (1943) novel, Double Indemnity, Cain’s narrative feels a little more polished, as does the murder methodology. Insurance salesman Walter Huff pays a sales call on an oilman’s wife. But Phyllis has a special purpose for her husband’s new life insurance policy, and Walter willingly goes against his better judgment in plotting a convenient accident that will allow them to collect a sizeable settlement and run away together. Based on a true story, most people are familiar with Cain’s novel through the classic 1944 Billy Wilder-Raymond Chandler film adaptation. It’s worth reading the book even after seeing the film, as Cain’s ending is more satisfyingly ambigious. Of course, Walter and Phyllis may get exactly what they want, but is it really love when it’s bound up with murder and greed? Cain isn’t read as often today as his comporaries Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler, but his style is the sort that continues in today’s books by authors like Walter Mosley and James Ellroy. Just the perfect sort of cozy writing to curl up with before bed.
October 5th, 2009
Katie H.
I’ll admit it, I’m a sucker for a man in a uniform. That said I don’t go for most military shows, but something about the combination of the legal puzzles and David James Elliot in that uniform sucked me into watching JAG. At least for the first few seasons - when Harm started to go undercover on secret missions to save the world, I considered it jump the shark time. Though the show became too improbable, the combination of law and the military still trip my trigger, so to speak. In fact, it’s what made me pick up Brian Haig’s first legal/military thriller featuring former infantryman turned JAG lawyer Major Sean Drummond.
In Secret Sanction Drummond is assigned a career killer of a case. The Bosnian war is in full swing and a Green Beret A-Team has been accused of a massacre of 35 Serbian soldiers in Bosnia. Nominally the army is supposed to be providing training and support for the Kosovo Liberation Army. They are not meant to be part of the action. So Sean is faced with a complex puzzle. Did the team kill the Serbs and if they did what were they doing there in the first place? No answer will make everyone happy. If he finds the Green Berets did commit the atrocity then the whole international effort to aid the Kosovars will be in jeopardy. And if he finds that they did not commit any crime but were merely acting in self-defense then Slobodan Milosevic will have a field day claiming that there has been a cover-up. It’s a no-win situation made worse by the animosity and lack of cooperation Sean faces when he begins his investigation.
Though a few readers have found fault with some of the military details, I think Brian Haig’s (and yes he’s the son of that famous other Haig) own experience in the military shines through. The story is compelling and the puzzle about what happened before Sean arrived has plenty of twists. Adding to my enjoyment was the fact that the military mindset was offset by Sean’s often sardonic (sometimes wiseass) narration. Combine that with the tension of not knowing who’s plotting against whom and you have a great read. So great, I’ve already requested book two in the series from my friendly neighborhood library.
September 17th, 2009
Jane J. - Central Library
So says agent John Tomasetti whose been brought in to help solve the serial killer murders plaguing sleepy Painters Mill, Ohio. If you can make it through the first three pages (a description of the last torturous moments of a young victim) then you are in for a thrilling treat. Fans of Tess Gerritsen or Patricia Cornwell will love Linda Castillo’s new novel Sworn to Silence that introduces us to Police Chief Kate Burkholder.
Burkholder’s rookie cop TJ Banks discovers a body one blustery winter evening on a routine cow roundup (the normal type of Painters Mill police work). His discovery sets off a chain of events for the town that will end with two other women dead and a unraveling of Burkholder’s life. Burkholder has a suspicion of who the killer is but to pursue the suspect she’ll have to uncover her own past.
Castillo does a great job of parceling out the back story of Burkholder’s secret life and weaving it into the present investigation. Her inclusion of Amish cultural references and description of the community also really added to the story and made Burkholder’s character believable and emotional, not just some hard nosed cop with a murder to solve.
So where does Tomasetti fit into all of this story? He’s a rogue cop who’s lost his family to violence and become lost in booze and drugs. He is sent to Painters Mill by his superiors as a last ditch effort to get him to mess up one more time, but Burkholder ends up using his killer profiling experience to her advantage to figure whose responsible for the murders. Does she end up using Tomasetti in other ways? You’ll have to read it to find out. According to the book blurb Castillo is working on the next installment of Kate’s police career and that makes this another must read female cop series on my list.
August 27th, 2009
Katharine - Sequoya
Tired of those attractive, yet angst-filled teenage vampires with whom your daughter seems obsessed? In the mood for a vampire story you can (dare I say it?) sink your teeth into? Get ready to thank me. Blood Groove is the story, and it’s written by novelist Alex Bledsoe.
See, there was this vampire in an English village, Baron Rudolfo Vladimir Zginski. Long story short, he was spiked with a gold cross (it had a sharpened tip) in 1915 and entombed for 60 years, then reanimated when a medical examiner in Memphis, Tennessee, removes the spike/cross during an autopsy requested by a local museum. After feasting on the unfortunate medical examiner, the Baron must come to terms with life (existence is probably a better word) in a very different place and time. The post-Victorian England he last inhabited has been replaced with the new American South, including a resurgent African-American community newly empowered by the civil rights and black power movements after centuries of racial oppression. In addition, it turns out Memphis already has a few local vampires. The Baron, having recognized the telltale signs of one who was photographed in a crowd scene that appeared in the local paper, decides to seek them out. He feels that kindred spirits (of a sort) will be able to help him adjust more readily to the brave new world in which he has awakened.
That stranger in a strange land vibe was what appealed to me the most when I decided to dive into this story. A vampire who’s been out of circulation (ha!) for that long had some potential to flip this particular genre on its head. So I was interested. And 1975 is a year with which I had some familiarity. I”m not particularly proud of that fact, but there you go. Anyway, the local vampires turn out to be a pretty raggedy bunch. Five of them are living in an abandoned (and trashed) warehouse on the edge of town. Held somewhat together by an adult male there are four younger appearing vampires– two male and two female, two of whom happen to be black (one male and one female). But one of the younger vampires has come across a new drug, one that suppresses the need to feed on the blood of victims. Which seems to have some appeal, until that vampire suddenly dies–from no discernible cause. Turns out the drug he was using is poisonous. So, our little group of vampires must become detectives, somewhat reluctantly following the overbearing and condescending Baron, in order to find out what it is that killed their friend, who concocted it, and why.
Fans of traditionalist vampire stories should know in advance that there are some twists on established vampire conventions. Turns out they can go out in daylight, they can change into wolves, they can summon storms, they don’t really have to be invited into your home to come in, and they can even eat garlic. Actually, only the Baron knows all this stuff. He might teach it to the others. Or not. And that power vampires have to make people do their will? It turns out to be an ability to create a strong sexual attraction. Baron Rudy quickly finds an attractive young miss to serve as his minion. (No fly-catching Renfield’s for this vampire!)
Unfortunately, the story isn’t exactly great. That may be due to the main characters being blood-sucking killers. And the Baron isn’t really a sympathetic lead. A couple of the local (white) vampires had flashes of character background that could have been better developed. No such similar effort was spent in giving the younger black vampires much back-story. There’s a bit of an effort to paint the vampires into lonely individuals seeking acceptance in a familial group, after having been ostracized by a xenophobic larger society. But they’re still inhuman blood-sucking killers so that effort is pretty much wasted in my opinion. (Your mileage may vary.)
The racial undertones don’t amount to much either, although there are some racial epithets that some may find offensive. There was a scene when the Baron dragged one of the Memphis vampires into a theater showing the movie Blacula, in an attempt to find out what modern society knew/suspected/feared about vampires. But apart from some resistance to the Baron’s condescending orders to the rest of the vampires from the black male vampire, the racial issue didn’t seem to me to be that pronounced. Maybe I’m colorblind though.
Don’t let the flippant tone of this review lull you. Be aware that that the story is pretty bloody in some spots. More blood-and-guts than belly-laughs. It’s pretty sexplicit in other spots too. And probably not like the supernatural romance/fantasy novels that seem to be popular these days. Consider this fair warning.
So, I was hoping for an inspired addition to the vampire genre, but instead got one that’s only fun in spots. And yet, I read it cover to cover. And I can’t shake the nagging suspicion that a sequel might be in the works. Or that I might want to read such a sequel. Nothing to suggest one on author Bledsoe’s website as of this writing though…
August 25th, 2009
Dennis - Central
When I saw that Robert Goolrick’s debut novel A Reliable Wife was about a mail-order bride AND it was set in Wisconsin, I had to read it. Wealthy, lonely Ralph Truitt has a dark past that sets him apart from everyone in the town of Truitt, Wisconsin (named after his entrepreneur grandfather) in 1907. He places an ad in the newspaper to find a “reliable wife” to help him get through the harsh winters, but what he finds is not so reliable. Catherine Land, the woman he chooses to marry from the many responses he receives, is clearly hiding something. As Ralph and Catherine become acquainted amidst snowstorms and ice, their pasts and possible futures are slowly revealed - as is the small bottle of arsenic Catherine has tucked away in her suitcase.
Goolrick manages to incorporate elements of a gothic tale, a Dickensian tragedy, and a Harlequin romance into this suspenseful drama. If that sounds like way too much to pack into one book, well, it probably is, but somehow, Goolrick pulls it off. Though Catherine and Ralph are melodramatic characters and the events of their lives border on ludicrous, their earnestness makes them intriguing, and I was willing to set aside my skepticism just to find out what they were going to do. A word of caution, though: this book is pretty racy. Be prepared for more than one R-rated scene.
August 21st, 2009
Kylee
The Girl who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson is the second volume to feature journalist Mikael Blomkvist and brilliant sociophobe (and computer hacker) Lisbeth Salander, the protagonists from Larsson’s debut novel, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (read Mary K.’s review here). The new work picks up shortly after the conclusion of the first novel (and you should probably read that first, just so you’ll have a better idea of the character’s background/backstory, including why Salander had a falling-out with Blomkvist).
The new volume begins with Salander on vacation in the Caribbean where she finds herself in the path of an oncoming storm, which she uses to hide her rescue of a battered wife staying at her hotel. Back in Sweden, Mikael’s magazine decides to do a feature story on sex trafficking in Sweden, while simultaneously publishing a book written by a young author whose work is complimented by his fiancee’s dissertation along the same lines. The plan is to name some of the men, including government officials and members of the police, who’ve had sex with the girls, many of whom were underage. On another front, Nils Bjurman, Salander’s legal guardian, is trying to find a way out from under her threats to expose him as a rapist with an incriminating video to use as proof.
Things heat up when the young journalist and his fiancee are murdered in their apartment, on the same evening that Nils Bjurman was murdered with the same gun–a gun that has Salander’s fingerprints on it. In the ensuing rush to judgment, aided in no small part by glory-seeking police inspectors, corrupt officers, and sensation-seeking journalists, Salander’s life is suddenly thrust into the spotlight, where her sanity, sexuality, and past violent tendencies are speculated upon. Her only supporters are Blomkvist and his staff, her former employer at a private security firm, a woman friend and sometime lover, a former boxing champion, and her former legal guardian, now recovering from a stroke. Arrayed against her are most of the country, as well as some of the people who had been contracted by Bjurman to kill her.
Like the first novel, the story zooms along at a breakneck pace, with revelations and plot twists that can leave you reeling from the enormity of the horror and injustice that has taken place. I even found myself noting parallels between Salander and Hannibal Lecter, both equally brilliant, yet removed from the rest of humanity, and with a tortured past slowly being revealed to readers.
If you’re not already on the waiting list for this volume, sign up now. And if you haven’t read the previous volume, do make a point of reading that first.
Also available in large print and as an audiobook.
August 14th, 2009
Dennis - Central
The Spies of Warsaw covers those brief years in the 1930’s between the beginnings of the Nazi government in Germany and the start of the war in 1939. Alan Furst’s novel is a portrayal of unsettling times but is still filled with the hope of evading war even as politicians and governments maneuver to take advantage or control.
Colonel Jean-Francois Mercier, a decorated soldier of the Great War, is sent to Warsaw as a military attaché at the French embassy. There he circulates at the many parties and events, carefully listening for any interesting tidbits. Much to his distaste he is assigned to the running of a spy. Once he starts it becomes clear that almost everyone, within the ever intersecting circles of people he meets, is in the business of spying. Mercier must walk a careful line, even as he is drawn further into a world of espionage that crosses many a personal and political line.
Furst has been writing espionage novels for twenty years and to quote Salon magazine from an article that names him as the successor to John Le Carre, “Furst’s characters feel the exhilaration and the burden of the realization that the history of humanity depends on them.” A fitting description of the very subtle power that defines Alan Furst’s novels.
August 10th, 2009
Liz C. - Alicia Ashman
Imagine a world where you have a pretty good life. You’re moderately successful in the art world, becoming known for large sculptures made with scrap material. You’re living in a small New England community where pretty much everyone knows everyone, and you can still play your weekly game of hockey with friends. You’re in a relationship even though you can’t quite let go of the wife who died 15 years ago in a terrible accident. What if all those memories and that life you lived together is a lie? In Nerve Damage Peter Abrahams imagines just such a scenario to very scary effect.
Roy Valois isn’t sure where to go with his life. He has just finished maybe what is his best piece of work, a sculpture he has named after his deceased wife Delia, and has hopes that maybe now he can move past and forward. Almost on a dare, Roy, with the help of a young friend, hacks into the morgue of the New York Times, interested in his obituary. It doesn’t mention that major hockey goal he made, and it has wrong information about his wife and where she worked. When Roy contacts the reporter responsible for the obit, he sets off a chain of events that has him fighting for his life on two fronts: an unforseen medical condition and a powerful and secret political organization. All of which makes for an involved thriller impossible to put down.
July 21st, 2009
Liz C. - Alicia Ashman
Los Angeles Times reporter Jack McEvoy, featured in Michael Connelly’s earlier novel The Poet, returns in his latest thriller, The Scarecrow. When Jack is laid off from the newspaper with only 14 days notice, he decides to go out with a bang with one final high profile story. What starts out as an investigation into the wrongful arrest of a young gangbanger for the brutal rape of an exotic dancer turns into a case involving the sinister nature of computer technology.
The actual villain in the story is an MIT graduate Wesley Carver known as the Scarecrow. Wesley overseas security at a top-secret data storage facility in Arizona used by many law firms and businesses. His below-the-radar existence gives Carver the ability to mine for victims which he has been doing successfully for years. The reader is introduced to the Scarecrow early in the story as the action switches between his secret work at the facility and McEvoy’s hunt for the killer during his final days as a reporter. Helping Jack in his investigation is the FBI agent featured in Connelly’s previous book, Rachel Walling. As Jack and Rachel uncover information about the killer, they realize that they are also among the hunted.
Michael Connelly, a former Los Angeles Times crime reporter, delves into the state of the newspaper industry while telling a thrilling story. And while not up to the level of his ever popular Harry Bosch series, I found The Scarecrow to be an entertaining summer read.
June 30th, 2009
Lesley - Central
In Peter Robinson’s latest All the Colors of Darkness, a group of schoolboys find the body of a man hanging from an oak tree in a forest glade. Shortly thereafter police discover that his partner was murdered. For Detective Inspector Annie Cabbot and her partner Detective Sergeant Winsome Jackson it looks like a case with an easy solution, murder/suicide due to jealousy. The seeming slam dunk means they can return to a knifing case with ties to gangs and drugs in a local housing area. The problem with this plan is that the murder victim was found in a expensive suburb area. And the superintendent wants Chief Inspector Allan Banks called back from his vacation in London to make sure all the angles are covered.
Once on the case Banks tends to agree with the investigating officers, but there is something bothering him and he continues to ask questions, widening the pool of people involved. Suddenly the Superintendent tells him to drop it, that the case is closed and he can return to his aborted vacation. Banks cannot let it lie and continues to investigate, only to find himself mired in an unfamiliar world of espionage and terrorism, not knowing who he can trust and endangering not only himself but anyone close to him.
Robinson’s Banks continues to be an interesting character to read about, not perfect by any means, and struggling with some of the same issues that face everyone: love and loss, grief, aging, second guessing one’s career choice, and just what to do next in a quickly changing world. Combine that with a compelling mystery and you have another winner to read.
June 23rd, 2009
Liz C. - Alicia Ashman
James Huston has been writing political thrillers for about a decade, but he’s really hit his stride with his last few books. Marine One starts off with a bang - the president and everyone else on board the Marine One helicopter are killed when it crashes in a thunderstorm - and builds momentum as the legal and political maneuverings get underway.
The helicopter crash is immediately blamed on WorldCopter, the French company that built it. Politicians are grandstanding, the Justice Department has opened an investigation, the NTSB’s preliminary report determines the helicopter was defective, and the widowed former First Lady has hired a powerful attorney to represent her in a wrongful death suit. Enter Mike Nolan.
Mike is a civil litigator who also flies helicopters for the Marine Reserves. He is hired by WorldCopter and their insurers to defend against all comers. When he begins his own investigation into the crash, Mike becomes convinced that it was not the result of defect. Was it the highly skilled but rabidly anti-president marine pilot? The 100 year storm? A governmental agent who wants to keep the President’s intended plans for that night secret? Or something else altogether? While some of the possibilities seem far-fetched, the rush to judgment by all parties involved makes Mike very uneasy. He knows that the only way to save his client is by figuring out what made Marine One crash.
I really liked the mix of legal, political and techno thrills. Huston’s military and legal background make this a well-researched and fascinating ‘what if’ scenario. Huston handles the myriad characters well and is able to meld plot and helicopter crash details without slowing the pace. And if I thought the ultimate revelation about what caused the crash was a bit of a let down, I had a heckuva read along the way.
June 20th, 2009
Jane J. - Central Library
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