Category: Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller Page 124 of 154

The Watcher in the Wall by Owen Laukkanen

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On April 6, 2016

In Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

The Watcher in the WallThe Watcher in the Wall

by Owen Laukkanen
Series: Stevens & Windermere, #5

Hardcover, 354 pg.
G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 2016

Read:April 4 – 5, 2016


Not too long after the events of The Stolen Ones, a classmate of Kirk Stevens’ daughter, Andrea, a victim of bullying and neglect, kills himself. Andrea wants justice for the classmate — she wants the bullies punished, she wants the message to go forth that this kind of thing can’t happen, and she wants her father to insure that happens. He sympathizes, he even empathizes, but he really can’t do anything. But he pokes around a little bit — and he and Carla Windermere discover that there was a suicide pact — that some girl in Philly is supposed to be killing herself now, too.

They may not be able to do anything for the dead boy, but they can try to keep this girl alive.

Only . . . there is no girl. Or at least, she isn’t who she said she was. Mental alarm bells start going off, and the two agent soon figure out that there’s one person out there online, posing as a concerned stranger, helping others to commit suicide — maybe even talking them into it, for whatever reason they might have. Once you start to learn the reason, you become convinced that this person is a certain level of despicable.

The original suicide brought up a lot of memories for Carla — things she’d tried to forget from her school days. She throws herself into this investigation, putting even more pressure on herself than usual. She talks to her partner and her boyfriend less, develops a shorter fuse, and drinks and smokes worse than she usually does. She also refuses to tell anyone what’s going on == she’ll only say she’s trying to save kids’ lives.

The two start traveling the country, learning more about certain types of online forums than anyone should know, trying to hunt down their suspect before he/she gets talks another teen into making a mortal choice. The novel has breakneck pace, and enough twists to keep you engaged — all of which is good.

Because of the focus on Windermere, and the pressing nature of the investigation (not that their other cases have been leisurely), we spent absolutely no time with the Stevens family after Andrea brought a witness to her father. That’s just strange — granted, it wasn’t until after I was finished with the novel that I realized we hadn’t spent time with them — but I knew something was missing. The Stevens gang has been such a fixture for at least a few chapters in these books, to not have them is jarring. But we did get a lot of time with Carla and Mathers — actually about the same as usual (maybe less). But in comparison, we got a lot more. Still, the lack of personal lives in this novel drove home two things — the urgency Carla felt, and the weight of the rest of the emotions/regrets/anger she was dealing with.

This is the second novel in the last half-year that I’ve read dealing with people being talked into suicide. Both very different, both compelling in their own rights — this was a tad more believable, really. Still, I hope this isn’t a trend that continues.

I couldn’t believe how quickly I sped through this — not just because Laukkanen writes with lean, confident prose, but it was the characters, the plot — you read this and you just have to know how it turns out (okay, sure, you are rightly convinced that Kirk and Carla will get their man — but how, and what the body count will be along the way, that’s the question). Yeah, the weakest of the 5, but it was satisfying, entertaining and engaging. Good enough for me, and enough to keep me coming back for more.

—–

3 Stars

A Devil in Hong Kong by David Harris Lang

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On March 31, 2016

In Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

I’m going to be brief here, thanks to my away-from-home-readathon last week, I’m very behind, and I don’t have much to say about this one. I’m going to be vague, too — because I just can’t muster up enough enthusiasm to get too specific about the book (and if I did, I’d end up not being brief…)

A Devil in Hong KongA Devil in Hong Kong

by David Harris Lang

Kindle Edition, 312 pg.
Merrimack Media, 2016

Read: March 19 – 22, 2016

This started off with a slightly disturbing and intriguing chapter involving torture, a distinctively tattooed man and an ancient artifact — a white jade burial suit. Which was enough to get me interested, even if the scene was a told in a heavy-handed manner (and, for the record, I’m not that into torture scenes, but it does work at getting a reader’s attention).

Sadly, the start was wasted by then turning to an uninteresting historical tour following the suit from its creation in the year 889 through its discovery by amateur archaeologists and eventual disappearance — there was decent material there in a pulp-y sense, but Lang just didn’t sell it. The suit shows up on the black market in the late 20th century, and that starts the dominoes falling to get us to the first scene.

When we return to the modern time, we meet a loser video game player who is “recruited” to join a private intelligence/criminal enterprise. Nothing about this storyline, the characters involved, or the way that the Chinese government uses them for Black Ops was believable, well-told, or interesting. Nothing.

We then get to the Hong Kong detectives investigating the brutal murder that happened following the initial torture scene. These guys are so clichéd, the interaction between them is so stiff, and the way they do their business is — well, I just didn’t like it.

Do you sense a trend?

There’s not one character here that I want to spend any more time with — strike that. The tattooed man has promise — give me a book focusing on him — or the hunt for him in other contexts — I’d probably indulge in it (I might end up regretting the indulgence, but you never know)

The writing here was mediocre at best. The plotlines, the “twists”, the incredible coincidences, etc. were pure melodrama — and don’t get me started on the denouement, I could do 500+ words on it alone, and I’d end up dropping my rating. The dialogue? Painful. Really painful — like the kind of thing that Joel and the Bots (or Mike and the Bots, or Jonah and the Bots) should be mocking. Still, you give this one decent edit from someone with an ear for dialogue and another edit by someone focusing on cleaning out the plotlines and I can see where this would appeal to fans of Dan Brown and/or James Patterson.

There’s a hint of a decent novel buried under a lot of nonsense here, I guess that’s the best I can say. Your mileage may vary, but I wouldn’t recommend it.

Disclaimer: I was provided with a copy of this by a friend of the author in exchange for this post, which was half-baked, I realize, and I feel bad for that. On the other hand, he may not want to see the fully-baked version.

—–

2 1/2 Stars

Dead is Better by Jo Perry

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On March 16, 2016

In Charlie & Rose Investigate, Dogs, Fiction, Jo Perry, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

Dead is BetterDead is Better

by Jo Perry
Series: Charlie & Rose Investigate, #1

Kindle, 282 pg.
Fahrenheit Press, 2016

Read: March 12 – 14, 2016

In its young life, Fahrenheit Press has put out some great looking titles, not your typical mystery fare. I’ve only read 2 (bought 1 other), so far — but they’ve shared the off-kilter flavor that the Press’ twitter feed/publicity displays (and descriptions for the other books indicate). I don’t typically talk about publishers when I’m talking about books, but there’s something about Fahrenheit’s project — and the books they put out — that draws your attention. Dead is Better is typical of FP — a mix of darkness and light, unlikely protagonists, unlikely crime-solvers, and atypical crimes (at least as far as crime fiction goes).

Charles Stone is our protagonist, but he’s not really the character that will grab your imagination. That’d be Rose — but we’ll get to her in a moment. Charles is dead — very dead, shot several times. His ghost carries the wounds, as well as the clothing, even the hospital ID bracelet, from the time he died. He can’t remember the shooting however, and can’t think of a reason why he’d be shot. He’s (to his reckoning) no one important, and it doesn’t seem anyone around him even cares enough to kill him/arrange for his killing. After a little bit, he starts to come up with a possible motive or two. But his murder doesn’t seem to be the thing he’s most curious about. What he’d really like to know is, why does he have a constant companion?

Rose is a dog. Well, technically, she was a dog, now she’s the ghost of one. We don’t know why she’s alongside Charles, but she’s been with him the entire time he’s been a ghost. It seems that she had a really unpleasant life; and at last, in Charles, has someone caring for her. Rose is not going to challenge Crais’ Maggie, Quinn’s Chet, or Hearne’s Oberon anytime soon as the greatest dog in fiction — which is not a dig. Rose is great, she’s just not legendary. Rose does have one thing going for her that the other’s don’t — she’s pretty realistic (not that the others don’t have their moments — but even Maggie gets Point-of-View chapters), she can only communicate through suggestion — and even then, the people around her have to guess. Sometimes, they guess wrong.

The two begin investigating Charles’ murder — with the occasional glance at his family and former life. But before long, Charles becomes convinced he’s not around to look into his death, but something else. Rose, somehow, seems to know more about what’s going on than Charles, but he’s the one who needs to do the work. The pair do uncover some answers — and others uncover some others (I’m not convinced that all the answers the readers/Charles are given about anything beyond the main crime are correct, but . . . ).

More importantly, Charles finds a measure of redemption — sure, it might be too late, but nevertheless, there is some. You get the idea that if he maybe had a dog while living, he might’ve turned out to be a better person. Sure, that describes most of humanity to me, so I responded to that, but I think Perry sells it well enough that just about anyone would.

I’ve often thought of trying to do an Urban Fantasy for NaNoWriMo featuring a ghost, but I’ve never figured how to bridge the communication gap between the living and the dead without it feeling like a cheat. I liked Perry’s solution to this (I worry about the sequel repeating it — but that’s not my problem, is it?). I’m not convinced that the police could’ve/would’ve used the information that Charles got to them, but in the moment — you don’t care, you’re just glad that someone did something.

This is a fast and lean read — Perry doesn’t waste a word (actually leaves a couple of them out, but nothing too distracting). You’ll grow to like Charles, you’ll want to adopt Rose, and you’ll want to finds out what happens to them next. Thankfully, their story will continue in Dead is Best.

—–

4 Stars

Cover Reveal: Hard Court by Robert Germaux

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On March 7, 2016

In Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller, News/Misc.

Author Robert Germaux is releasing his third novel, Hard Court, on April 11, 2016, and we have the Cover Reveal here!

About Hard Court:

Miles Bradshaw, the dot-com billionaire owner of Pittsburgh’s first NBA franchise, hires private detective Jeremy Barnes to look into what appears to be a simple case of harassment of one of the team’s players. But when Jeremy (JB to his friends) begins his investigation, the case proves to be anything but simple, eventually involving a local businessman with suspected criminal ties, a major FBI task force, a computer geek in California and a mob boss in Erie.

Along the way, JB, who can quote Shakespeare as quickly and easily as he can land a solid left jab, uses his wits and his ever-present sense of humor to wend his way through a cast of characters who range from the ridiculously inept to the ruthlessly lethal.

As Hard Court unfolds, there are numerous surprises and plot twists, culminating in a dramatic confrontation that neither JB nor the reader could have predicted.

About Robert Germaux

Both my parents were readers. I’m talking stacks-of-books-on-their-nightstands readers. So it’s no surprise that at an early age, I, too, became an avid reader. Everything from sports books (especially baseball) to Nancy Drew to the Hardy Boys to almost anything about distant and exotic places.

Although I’ve always enjoyed putting words on paper, the writer in me didn’t fully emerge until I retired after three decades of teaching high school English. I quickly wrote two books aimed at middle school readers, at which point my wife urged me to try a novel for adults. As is usually the case, Cynthia’s idea was a good one.

Over the next few years, I wrote several books about Pittsburgh private eye Jeremy Barnes. I took a brief hiatus from the detective genre to write Small Talk and The Backup Husband. Now I’m back and will be releasing my first Jeremy Barnes novel, Hard Court, on April 11.

In our spare time, Cynthia and I enjoy reading (of course), going to live theater productions, watching reruns of favorite TV shows such as “Sports Night” and “Gilmore Girls,” and traveling to some of those distant and exotic places I used to read about as a child. So far, we’ve been fortunate enough to walk in the sands of Waikiki, swim in the warm waters of the South Pacific and share a romantic dinner in Paris.

I love interacting with my readers and getting their input on my characters and stories. Please feel free to contact me via my website.

—
*Cover Reveal media prepared by Susan Barton, My Book Tour

Freedom’s Child by Jax Miller

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On February 23, 2016

In Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

Freedom's Child Freedom’s Child

by Jax Miller

Trade Paperback, 308 pg.
Broadway Books, 2015

Read: February 19 – 20, 2016

The open road gives you ample opportunity to think; in fact, the road forces reflection on a man . . . or woman, in my case. And it’s a terrifying thing, my thoughts. With each thought, each idea, each regret that makes my blood curdle, I accelerate, I race fast enough on the motorcycle so my demons can’t catch me, but they always seem just a step ahead of the game, always there to entertain my sin.

Ugh. This book set my teeth on edge from the get-go. Yet another story with a Prologue that puts our narrator in a life-or-death situation, so you can turn the page to get “X period if time earlier” (two weeks ago, in this case) to create suspense, or a sense of anticipation, or whatever. I hate those beginnings, books, movies, TV – – hate ’em all. They’re almost never worth it. This is one of those times, Chapter 1 is a much better starting point.

Once we get past that nonsense, we meet Freedom. She’s a tough-as-nails bartender outside of Portland, OR, working in a bar that’s been adopted by a biker gang. The first thing we see Freedom do, is save a girl from being raped by a large biker in a way that will keep you nervous around McIlhenny Co.’s signature product for awhile. So you know it’s not just bluster, it’s not just attitude and language — Freedom is not someone to mess around with. It turns out that Freedom’s in the Witness Protection Program, and the same Marshals that come by to tell her to stay out of trouble, are also here to let her know that the man she put away just got out on a technicality after 18 years.

It’s almost like they know that someone had gained access to their records and that her new identity is known by all the people she doesn’t want to know. Namely, her murdered husband’s family, including his newly released brother and his non-incarcerated brothers. The destruction and violence that come to Oregon are a clear sign to Freedom that the Delaney brothers are here for her and the Feds can’t help her. So she takes matters into her own hands, because it’s not just her that they’re after. She had two children with her husband, and had been forced to give them up. If her new identity is known, their identities would be, too. So she’s off to the other side of the country to try to keep them safe, although there’s enough drama in their lives without their uncles coming for them.

That’s enough of the plot to whet your appetite. It gets better from there — more twists and turns than the Publisher’s Description suggests. I can’t imagine that Miller could’ve fit in one more twist without needing to add a couple of chapters. But before you get to all that, you have to endure a lot of Miller setting up her dominoes. It was hard to slog through it all without enough context and many perspective changes (I think we could’ve just used a smidgen more context with each perspective). But you watched her set them all up, because you could tell all along that when they started to fall, things were going to be wild.

I don’t want to talk about the characters — seeing them revealed was a lot of the fun. There’s one exception to that: Freedom’s Mother-in-Law, Lynn. I felt like I needed a shower after reading the first 2 pages of with Lynn — one of the nastiest characters you’ll come across in 2016. I hoped right away that Lynn would get what’s coming to her (and that feeling only intensified). But you could tell straight-away that this was the kind of book where just desserts weren’t on the menu for everyone (oh man, when did I become Horatio Caine?), and I had to deal with this sense of dread that she’d make it. There’s a certain amount of pleasure you get from Hannibal surviving The Silence of the Lambs (but not Hannibal — while waiting Lynn’s fate, you feel the exact opposite.

This next paragraph, I’m a little apprehensive about, but I’m going to go ahead and write it: There’s a cult involved, and I have a little trouble with it (as I write it, I’m sure with some research every one of my objections can be brushed aside by someone, and I’m hoping Jax Miller is one such person). The cult reminded me of a phenomena I ran into with Flannery O’Connor in college — her Southern Protestants may have sounded like typical Baptists/Methodists/etc., but their thinking was awfully Roman Catholic. These cultists looked, sounded, and acted like Pentecostal Christians, but they were infused with an odd amount of Roman Catholic practices. So much so that it was hard to swallow. It almost felt like someone took a bunch of noticeably religious practices and terms and mixed together, assuming the reader would just accept the blend, whether or not it was consistent. I’d absolutely believe it if someone could point to a Group Z and said that Miller just ripped them off, but absent that these guys were too much to believe.

This was a well-constructed and satisfying read with characters that leapt off the pages (except for the minor Delaney brothers and a couple of other miscellaneous people). It didn’t end anything like I expected it would, but superior. I spent the whole time thinking it was a book about X, when it was about Y all along (although, it was kind of about X). The novel makes you think it’s about revenge (or the escaping from it), but at the end of the day, that’s just not what it’s concerned with. This was an entertaining read, maybe not as good as it could’ve been, but enough to make me to keep my eyes peeled for Jax Miller’s future work.

Disclaimer: I received this book from the good people at Blogging for Books for this review.

—–

3 Stars

Talking to the Dead by Harry Bingham

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On February 18, 2016

In Fiction, Fiona Griffiths, Harry Bingham, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

Talking to the DeadTalking to the Dead

by Harry Bingham
Series: Fiona Griffiths, #1

Hardcover, 337 pg.
Delacorte Press, 2012

Read: February 16 – 17, 2016

One thing I need to do a better job of is remembering how I found out about a book/series/author that I need to try, this novel is a great example of why. I remember putting it on my TBR, and that there was something about it that made me move it ahead of the others — but I can’t tell you when or why I did so. Sometimes, like with this book, that drives me crazy. I just had to trust that I knew what I was doing when I picked it up. Thankfully, it didn’t take long to convince me that Fi Griffiths had something special going on — mostly it was the voice, the attitude, her humor as seen when she’s going through stacks and stacks of financial documents to make a case air-tight (before the inevitable guilty plea for ripping off a private school):

My desk is covered with paper. I loathe all banks and credit card companies. I hate every digit between 0 and 9. I despise every dopily run Catholic boys’ school in South Wales. If Brian Penry were in front of me now, I would try to force-feed him my calculator, which is as large and chewable as Bakelite phone.

It didn’t take too long before the merits of the case drew me in (not the drudgery of the case above, but the one that drove the novel’s action), and would have even without Fi’s narration. But it was a lock with her as a character. The grim nature of the killings grip the reader, the way they do Griffiths’ colleagues and superiors. What really impressed me was that it is one of the sickest, grossest descriptions of a corpse this side of a Bones episode — and Bingham doesn’t dwell on it — oh, he could’ve, and most authors would have. It’s there stark enough to give the reader the willies, in a just-the-facts-fashion, but Bingham doesn’t exploit the nature of the killing or the state of the body.

To put it charitably, Fi is quirky. To be more accurate, she’s suffering from a serious mental condition — she’s (mostly) got it under control, however. Social skills aren’t really in her wheelhouse — at least not automatically — which presents an additional challenge for her work. Early on, I kept picturing Diane Kruger’s performance from The Bridge, it diminished eventually, but I think Fi will always be Kruger-esque to me. We do eventually get actual information about her condition — which is nice, but we don’t need it to understand her enough to empathize with her. There’s an Author’s Note at the end with more details about the actual condition — don’t read it until the end. Get to know her absent the condition first.

Bingham creates a good bench of supporting characters — a potential boyfriend, a couple of supervisors (who have differing levels of concern for her), a former therapist, an old friend (former trainer/sensei-type), parents, sisters, and a few other detectives. One or more of these can be summoned from the bench with ease in the future, but we don’t get to spend a lot of time with any of them here — just enough to establish them. We spend some good time with her potential boyfriend, old friend/trainer/sensei and dad — I like them all and want to see more of them. But this is really Fi’s book and the narrative weight falls on her troubled, yet capable shoulders.

We hardly get an idea for what kind of men the bad guys are here — it’s just shadowy criminals, up to shadowy criminal things. I like the idea that we only get things through law enforcement eyes, not through the killer’s — that happens far too often for my taste. Like Fi says, I know this way we don’t get the full story, but I prefer not being in the mind of the sickos at work here. We, and the police, get most of the story in the end, and that’s good enough for me.

The book closes with a couple of the most heartfelt, moving scenes that I can think of in Detective Fiction (give me time, and I could probably make a decent list of competitors, still pretty sure this would be near the top — sure, that scene in Gone, Baby, Gone has this beat, but not many others would). I had a hard time believing that it would work as effectively given the fact this is a first novel for the character — but Bingham has laid a lot of ground work to get us ready for these moments, and it paid off well.

Talking to Strangers grabbed me in just the right way. I want to devote the next few days to just reading the rest if this series (I won’t, I know I need to pace myself, but… Oh, I really want to just binge). Fi is an early leader for favorite character of the year (a thing I just decided to do).

—–

4 Stars

Some Assembly Required by Kevin Smith, Phil Hester and Jonathan Lau

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On February 17, 2016

In Comics, Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

Some Assembly RequiredThe Bionic Man, Vol 1: Some Assembly Required

by Kevin Smith, Phil Hester and Jonathan Lau (Artist)

Trade Paperback, 248 pg.
Dynamite Comics, 2012

Read: February 16, 2016


I was a big fan of The Six Million Dollar Man as a kid, and when I got a little older I stumbled onto — and devoured (repeatedly) — Martin Caidin’s Cyborg. Throw in a strong appreciation for Smith’s work? And I’m clearly the target audience for this (so why did it take me 3+ years to read it? Good question).

The main story hasn’t changed: Steve Austin is a test-pilot, horrifically injured — almost killed — when a test flight goes wrong. A team of experts save his life, rebuild him with bionics, and set him loose fighting for truth, justice, and the American way and so on.

The story was nothing special — good, solid action/adventure story. There were a couple of nice twists on the TV show’s story/characters. Just enough to keep it updated and fresh. I’d have appreciated something closer to Cyborg, but I understand why they made the choices they made. Austin goes up against his bionic predecessor, who has gone rogue and now is running around attacking and raiding technology companies. The battle scenes may have been a bit too big and epic — but they fit in with the current cinema trends, so, I guess they worked.

I was sure I’d seen Jonathan Lau’s art somewhere before, but from what I can tell, I haven’t. Which is a shame — it’s great. I’m not going to say that it’s my favorite comic art — but it’s exactly what I want comic art to look like. Which seems like a contradiction, but let’s move on. Yeah, some of the gestures are over-done, and a couple of the men are just too huge. But otherwise, dynamic, easy to tell character-from-character, nice detail, overall very attractive. I’d be willing to give a book a second look just because of his art in the future.

There are some nice references — visual and verbal — to the TV series that are pretty seamlessly worked in. Which I appreciated — looks like the next volume will be less subtle about it (which is not necessarily bad). I’m not going to say this was a great comic that leaves me chomping at the bit for the next, but it was worth the time and entertaining. Not much more to ask for.

—–

3 Stars

Missing Mona by Joe Klingler

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On February 5, 2016

In Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

Missing MonaMissing Mona

by Joe Klingler
Series: Tommy Cuda, #1

Kindle Edition, 400 pg.
Cartosi, LLC, 2015

Read: January 30, 2016

I can’t put my finger on precisely why (at the very least, I probably needed to take a few more minutes between books), but the first page or two of this book really turned me off — five or six paragraphs in, and I was already groaning at the length of this book. And then I hit the line:

Where could I find a life as exciting as a detective novel? Or at least a pop song?

Nothing special, but the second question got my attention. Tommy Kelsey might be my kind of guy after all — the reference to The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy at the bottom of the page just sealed the deal.

Tommy’s tired of being tethered to his smart phone, he’s not entirely sure he wants to continue with the lady in his life, needs a break from his friends and his job, he — actually, let me let his mother sum it up:

She held my shoulder with her right hand. “You just celebrated your last twenty-something birthday. You see the big three-oh coming at you down the long highway of life, so you want to run away to find something before old age pins you to the mat.” She smiled and let go. “And makes you cry uncle.”

Mom was okay. I didn’t think so back in high school, but she seemed smarter now.

Tommy grabs a few essentials (his guitar, some records, clothing, etc.), throws them in the trunk of his restored Plymouth Barracuda (with a 426 Hemi V8 ) and hits the road to some unknown destination. He’s not on the road before too long before he picks up a hitchhiker — a potentially dangerous move, but he’s clearly in an impulsive mood — and he’s clearly attracted to her. In an attempt to impress Mona Meyers, he says that he’s a Private Investigator named Tommy Cuda (Kelsey didn’t seem like a name worthy of her, and the nearby dashboard provided the inspiration he needed). Mona’s intrigued by that and hires him to find someone for her once they reach Chicago.

She disappears the next day, leaving behind some money and a photograph of herself, with a note on the back:

Find me, Tommy— M.

Finding Mona ends up being pretty easy — the challenge is in figuring out what to do with her once that’s been accomplished. Not only that, but finding her lands Tommy in the middle of a web of crime, one that leads him into investigations that will involve a shooting, grand theft auto, and several other things that I can’t say because they’d be spoilers, and you have to read the book anyway to believe my list — outlandish, strange, and yet totally logical in this world.

As interesting as that all is — and it was quite the knot to untie — what sold this book for me was the characters, starting with the people that Tommy ends up surrounding himself with — there’s the waitress/aspiring criminologist who helps Tommy enough that you could almost say he tags along with her; the librarian/artist/personal stylist who helps him around town; the B&B employee (yeah, typical hard-boiled P.I. stays at a B&B); the coat girl who wants to be a police officer, the eccentric mechanic, a hotel valet/blues musician who can connect you with anything on the street that you need; and of course, Mona. Almost any one of these would be enough of a pal/associate for a P. I., but Klingler gives us all of these in an embarrassment of riches. I would willingly, maybe eagerly, read another 100-200 pages with any of them.

And then there’s Tommy — the poor guy who is clearly in over his head, but knows it and is doing whatever he can to find the girl, earn his money, maybe save the girl — and play a little guitar while enjoying his new friends. Tommy reminded me a lot of Harry Lockhart, from Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, especially when he said things like,

Now I knew why private eyes in novels were always smoking a cigarette: it was nerve-wracking having no idea what was going on.

I enjoyed watching him flounder around, trying to figure out how to do this thing that he’s read about and watched movies about, but is honestly clueless. about. Yet somehow — with a little help from his friends — he gets the job done. Sure, the ladies threw themselves at him in a way that was tough to believe, but that goes with the genre territory.

I will read better books this year, though this was a good one — but I will not read many that will be more fun. Missing Mona was a great ride, and I’m hoping that Tommy Cuda gets behind the wheel of his Barracuda again soon. Klingler has a couple of other books on his résumé that I’ll be getting my hands on pronto, too, just to see if he has the same touch there. Check this one out, folks, you’ll thank me.
—
Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book from the author in exchange for a fair review, which was awfully generous of him, and it’s really appreciated.

—–

4 Stars

The Intern by Dale Wiley

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On February 2, 2016

In Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

The InternThe Intern

by Dale Wiley

PDF, 200 pg.
Vintage Burn, LLC, 2014

Read: January 30, 2016

So I went to the Watergate. I did it because it seemed the thing to do when one was just getting embroiled in some amazing Washington scandal. You don’t hide out at the Hampton Inn; you go straight to the source, the same place Howard Hunt and G. Gordon
Liddy did.

There were other reasons for choosing the Watergate as well. I didn’t want to drive far, and increase the chance of being pulled over and found out. Even if I had wanted to drive, I didn’t know the suburbs that well, and the hotels probably weren’t that much cheaper anyway. I knew of hotels I assumed to be cheaper in the city, but they were in such wonderful neighborhoods that I didn’t want to take the chance of avoiding my pursuers only to succumb to some random mugging. I also knew right where it was, and could get there without wasting a minute of time. I had been to the Watergate once before, to drink with my college friend Susan, so, along with remembering their overpriced gin and tonics, I knew it had a parking garage the size of Philadelphia, which would probably keep my car from being discovered during the night. And most importantly, I thought it would be really cool to stay at the Watergate.

Trent Norris is not crazy about living in Washington, D. C. He’s working as an intern at the National Endowment for the Arts , which isn’t horrible — but the general atmosphere, the parking, the expenses and so on — it’s just not for him. He has a plan for what to do to get out, but we’re not really told what that might be (later, there’s discussion of an unsuccessful novel — that might be part of it). He likes his job well enough, he’s started dating someone that he could see himself falling for in a big way — so life’s not all bad.

The day after one of the best dates of his life, Norris is covering the desk and phone for a higher-up’s secretary, and is in the right place at the wrong time to take the wrong phone call. Then, because he’s just that kind of guy, he plays a silly prank as a feeble act of protest for a decision the same higher-up just made that will impact people all over the country. As pranks are wont to do, this one is mis-interpreted and Norris finds himself framed for heinous crimes he didn’t commit — and plenty of media coverage demonstrating that he did. He enlists the help of an escort, Tabitha, to help him in his time of need — which she more than does.

Running from the Law — he’s out to prove he didn’t do it, clear his name, not get killed by law enforcement…and hopefully still have a shot at getting the girl.

As disinterested as I was in the crime (which was sensational, but seemed almost tertiary to everything), as much as I cared nothing for the protagonist, once I got to the part where things are falling apart for Norris, when he’s starting to see the accusations pile up, I really admired the way Wiley had set everything up. It was very well constructed and executed.

Until I was typing this post up and read the Publisher’s Description, I had no idea when this was set. A reference to Borders Bookstore threw me, and little later, I noticed the utter lack of cell and/or smartphones. A few chapters later the protagonists ordered a laptop with a Zip drive and floppy disks! Wow. I didn’t realize I was reading historical fiction. Taking me out of the action long enough to flip back and forth through the pages looking for time references . A little more text on page 1 would’ve gone a long way to help the reader (or, at least, me).

Early on, Norris rubbed me the wrong way, and while I didn’t like him, I found the situation he was in interesting enough to keep going. Some of his redeeming — humanizing — qualities were brought out late in the book, but by that point it was hard to overcome my initial misgivings. Stephanie was nice enough — not that we got to spend much time with her. Tabitha was the only character I really liked at all — even if she seemed to serve as a shortcut more often than not for Trent to get what he needs — oh, you need a hacker? Let me make a call. How do we bypass a security system? I have just the client willing to do me a favor? And so on. (and maybe the large amount of gold content in her heart was difficult to believe). Still, she was more interesting and likable than anyone else around.

This was a great depiction of the havoc that the media (especially in a 24-hour news cycle) can wreak on an individual with very little evidence — see Richard Jewell, for example. Wiley seemed to capture the impotent rage and disbelief at how quickly one’s whole life can be turned upside down in hours when the media decides you’re the villain.

Just entertaining enough, just well-written enough, with characters just intersesting enough to keep the pages turning — Wiley gives the reader just enough to entertain, and be open to reading more from him. I do want to stress, how well constructed this was — every seemingly stray detail is there for a reason, and no strings are left untied. I’ve read novels from seasoned authors that can’t pull off that level of construction, and Wiley doing so in his first time to bat is no small thing.

—
Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this book from the author in exchange for a fair review.

—–

3 Stars

Opening Lines – Staked by Kevin Hearne

By

On January 27, 2016

In Blog Series, Currently Reading, Fiction, General Fiction/Literature, News/Misc., Opening Lines, Quotations, Spenser

Head & Shoulders used to tell us that, “You never get a second chance to make a first impression.” That’s true for wearing dark shirts, and it’s especially true for books. Sometimes the characters will hook the reader, sometimes the premise, sometimes it’s just knowing the author — but nothing beats a great opening for getting a reader to commit. This is one of the better openings I’ve read recently. Would it make you commit?

I didn’t have time to pull off the heist with a proper sense of theatre. I didn’t even have a cool pair of shades. All I had was a soundtrack curated by Tarantino playing in my head, one of those songs with horns and a fat bass track and a guitar going waka-chaka-waka-chaka as I padded on asphalt with the uncomfortable feeling that someone was enjoying a voyeuristic close-up of my feet.

from Staked by Kevin Hearne

Page 124 of 154

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