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All Suspense Coverage

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Several years ago, Canadian writer Linwood Barclay was having breakfast with his teenage daughter when she posed a question guaranteed to give any parent heart palpitations. “Dad,” she asked, “Suppose you came to pick me up at my job, and found I’d never worked there?”

It was a scenario Barclay found truly disturbing—and equally irresistible. He took the idea and ran amok with it, creating a parent’s worst nightmare and a mystery reader’s delight with his new thriller, Fear the Worst.

Barclay is a well-respected author whose success has been much greater outside the United States. Too Close to Home was a number one bestseller in England, and also won the Best Novel category of the Arthur Ellis Awards, Canada’s top prize for crime fiction. Now with Fear the Worst, which Barclay calls his “best book yet,” the writer may finally receive similar attention and acclaim from readers in the U.S.

Tim Blake is a divorced dad with a lot of charm but no head for business. His only child, a 19 year-old daughter named Sydney, lives with him during the summer. The previous year, she spent those three months working at the car dealership where Tim is a salesman; this year, Sydney has taken a job as a desk clerk at the Just Inn Time, a cinder-block budget motel where the rooms are clean but the “complimentary breakfast” is free largely because no one really wants stale muffins and bad coffee.

Tim and Sydney have an altercation over breakfast which causes her to leave in a huff for work. But when she doesn’t return that evening, a worried Tim begins calling her friends, hoping the argument is the reason Sidney hasn’t come home. When Sidney’s not back by the next morning, now frantic, he races to the Just Inn Time to see if she’s shown up for work, only to be met with blank stares. No one has seen her, no one knows her, and no, Sydney doesn’t work there. Never has.

“When I got back to the house, it was empty.
Syd did not come home that night.
Or the next night.
Or the night after that.”

These events comprise only 14 pages of this 400-page book, which has all the twists, turns and thrills of a good roller coaster ride, compelling anyone who picks it up to keep reading. In addition to its intricate plot, one of the book’s best qualities is the balance between what is and what is not important when a child goes missing. In his quest to find Sydney, Tim discovers things about his daughter that might have sent him reeling before her disappearance: she drinks when she parties, some of her friends are “wild,” and she might be pregnant. But put in the context of her disappearance—and possible murder—they pale in importance.

“At least it would mean she was okay. That she was alive. I could welcome home a pregnant daughter if there was a pregnant daughter to welcome home.”

It’s not long before a pregnant daughter would be one of the best case scenarios Tim could possibly imagine. By the book’s end, some may feel Barclay has put too many twists and turns in his story; others may be disappointed by its fairly predictable conclusion. But the majority of readers will find Fear the Worst nearly impossible to put down, savoring every bit of this satisfying suspense novel right up to the very last page.

Several years ago, Canadian writer Linwood Barclay was having breakfast with his teenage daughter when she posed a question guaranteed to give any parent heart palpitations. “Dad,” she asked, “Suppose you came to pick me up at my job, and found I’d never worked there?”

It…

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Josh Bazell landed a lucrative publishing deal for his first novel shortly after graduating from medical school. To say that he's better at writing than most writers would be at practicing medicine is to understate Bazell's talent, but it's too good a line to pass up. Beat the Reaper, his highly anticipated debut, may be a bit short on art, but it's long on page-turning action and laughs.

When it comes to the human body, Bazell knows his bones. He has an M.D. from Columbia University and is a medical resident at the University of California, San Francisco. His protagonist, Pietro Brnwa, is also a doctor—an overworked Manhattan hospital intern who goes by the name Peter Brown. Pietro took an unusual road to his Hippocratic oath, having spent his earlier years as a mob hit man nicknamed "The Bearclaw." After seeing the error of his ways—which in the mafia means he testified against his former employers and joined the witness protection program—he became a doctor as penance.

Not surprisingly, Brnwa's former life catches up with him. Mobster Eddy Squillante, in the hospital for a life-saving surgery with about a 50 percent success rate, recognizes the killer-turned-doctor. Now Brnwa must keep him alive or Squillante will hand his new knowledge over to a wannabe hit man named Skinflick.

In chapters that alternate between past and present, Bazell fills us in on how Brnwa became "The Bearclaw" while keeping the action rolling. He includes medical footnotes, mostly confirming that the craziest thing a sick person can do is check into a hospital.

Bazell doesn't waste time. In the very first paragraph, an unfortunate mugger is pointing a gun in Brnwa's face after the doctor stops to watch a rat fight a pigeon—a true Manhattan undercard. The mugger serves his purpose, however, since the pistol winds up in Brnwa's scrub pants pocket. However, it would be unwise for the reader to relax. It's chapter one, the firearm is introduced and the good doctor Bazell knows his Chekhov.

Ian Schwartz writes from San Diego.

Josh Bazell landed a lucrative publishing deal for his first novel shortly after graduating from medical school. To say that he's better at writing than most writers would be at practicing medicine is to understate Bazell's talent, but it's too good a line to pass…

Making a move that's sure to delight connoisseurs of the legal thriller, John Grisham takes something of a sentimental journey in his latest novel, The Associate, on sale January 27. The book's plot might sound strangely familiar to fans of his 1991 blockbuster, The Firm: newly minted Ivy League law school grad takes job with powerhouse firm and soon finds himself in deep trouble. That book catapulted Grisham to perennial bestsellerdom and established him as the superstar of the legal thriller genre.

The character at the heart of The Firm was Mitch McDeere, a cocky kid just out of Harvard Law who discovers that the Memphis firm that hired him is controlled by the Mob. In the successful 1993 film adaptation, McDeere was portrayed by Tom Cruise, an inspired piece of casting that gave a strong boost to Cruise's career and Grisham's film franchise. Author Photo

Grisham sets his new novel, The Associate, in New York City, the first time that one of his books has taken place entirely in the city that never sleeps. Where better to follow the dilemma facing young lawyer Kyle McAvoy, described by Grisham's publisher as "one of the outstanding legal students of his generation: he's good looking, has a brilliant mind and a glittering future ahead of him. But he has a secret from his past, a secret that threatens to destroy his fledgling career and, possibly, his entire life."

In a note posted on his UK website, Grisham comments on the similarities between the two characters: "Kyle reminds me of another young lawyer, Mitch McDeere, who was featured in one of my earlier novels, The Firm. Like Mitch, Kyle finds himself in way over his head, with no one to turn to and no place to hide."

As The Associate opens, Kyle has just graduated from Yale Law when he discovers that his dark secret has been captured on video. He's shocked when, instead of demanding money, the blackmailers put a surprising price on their secrecy: they ask Kyle to take a job at the largest law firm in the world, and one of the best in New York City. He's soon making big money and on the track to a partnership, but what his employers don't know is that he's sharing information about a crucial trial between two defense contractors with his blackmailers.

With his future on the line, Kyle is caught between the criminals and the FBI, who suspect a leak and are investigating his firm. Though he's one of the top young associates, does Kyle have what it takes to get out of this dilemma—without destroying his future? The only thing that's for certain is that readers will be turning the pages as fast as they can to find out.

Grisham's agent has already landed a film deal for The Associate with Paramount Pictures, no small feat at a time when the economic slowdown finds even best-selling authors having trouble selling their stories to studios. The film will star Shia LaBeouf, a choice that might surprise moviegoers who remember him best as the shaggy teen star of the Disney Channel and the movie Holes. At 22, however, LaBeouf has grown into a handsome young actor and bona fide Hollywood celebrity (with the arrest record to prove it). This film will be his sixth major movie for Paramount, including the 2007 hit Transformers. A director has yet to be named for The Associate, which will be the 12th film based on a Grisham book or story.

Grisham remains active in the legal world, regularly serving as host or keynote speaker at events for organizations like the Legal Aid Justice Center. At a recent benefit in Virginia, guests bid on the right to have a character in an upcoming Grisham novel named after them. Grisham has also faced legal issues of his own related to his 2006 work of nonfiction, The Innocent Man, based on the life of Ron Williamson, who was wrongly imprisoned for murder. Grisham and two other writers who've written about Williamson's case were sued for defamation of character by three of the Oklahoma law enforcement officials who prosecuted Williamson back in 1982. A U.S. District Court judge dismissed the lawsuit, saying the justice system deserved the criticism it received. George Clooney has purchased the film rights to The Innocent Man, which is currently in development. 

Making a move that's sure to delight connoisseurs of the legal thriller, John Grisham takes something of a sentimental journey in his latest novel, The Associate, on sale January 27. The book's plot might sound strangely familiar to fans of his 1991 blockbuster, The Firm:…

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On a tranquil summer night in July of 1996, a Boeing 747 on its way to Paris from Kennedy Airport with 230 passengers and crew onboard explodes in midair, then falls in fiery pieces into the Atlantic. Although more than 200 witnesses report seeing a mysterious streak of light rise into the sky toward the plane, the explosion is attributed to mechanical malfunction and the case is officially closed. Five years later, John Corey, the cynical protagonist from Nelson DeMille’s Plum Island (1997) and The Lion’s Game (2000), is drawn into the unresolved mystery by his wife, Kate Mayfield, an FBI agent who interviewed witnesses and family members after the disaster. Although Corey and Mayfield, who now both work for the Federal Anti-Terrorist Task Force, have been told in no uncertain terms to let sleeping dogs lie, Corey smells a cover-up and uses his hard-nosed detective skills to follow an extremely cold trail. That trail begins with the rumor of an anonymous couple who, while videotaping their illicit sexual escapades on a Long Island beach, accidentally recorded the crash. And while wild theories abound as to the cause of the explosion an experimental government laser weapon, an explosive underwater gas bubble, friendly fire, etc. Corey finds hard evidence that the anonymous couple might hold the key to the mystery. With the FBI and CIA after him, Corey works furiously to find the videotape and uncover the truth.

While writing a fictitious account about a tragedy like TWA Flight 800 is risky on many levels, DeMille tackles this still-volatile subject with sensitivity and class. Some readers may not agree with his conclusions, but everyone who reads Night Fall will understand the critical significance of the questions raised about national security and admire DeMille’s deft blend of serious issues and spellbinding suspense.

 

On a tranquil summer night in July of 1996, a Boeing 747 on its way to Paris from Kennedy Airport with 230 passengers and crew onboard explodes in midair, then falls in fiery pieces into the Atlantic. Although more than 200 witnesses report seeing…

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Crime fiction fans everywhere were delighted last year when Tom Rob Smith’s first thriller, Child 44, made the long-list for the Man Booker Prize. His follow-up, The Secret Speech, is a sequel to his acclaimed debut, continuing the adventures of Leo Demidov. Khrushchev has come to power, and he makes a speech—in theory, a secret speech—that reveals the corruption and horror of Stalin’s brutal reign and leads to the release of scores of prisoners from the country’s gulags.

Demidov had worked as a State Security agent and does not have a spotless past, but he’s moved on, taking a post running a homicide unit and trying to be a decent man. He loves his wife, is devoted to the daughters he adopted (after sending their parents to their deaths) and wants an ordinary life. But escaping from what he’s done isn’t so easy, especially once he’s in the sights of people whose families suffered under Stalin.

Fraera, the leader of a vicious gang, has demanded the release of her husband, a priest who was put in prison by Demidov, but it’s clear her mission is also to cause Demidov deep psychological suffering. She’s fixated on revenge. When she kidnaps one of Demidov’s daughters, the desperate father sets off on a breathtaking race to save the girl, moving from Moscow to Siberia to Budapest, facing the demons of his past at every turn.

Smith writes action relentlessly and fills The Secret Speech with vibrant descriptions of the post-Stalin Soviet Union without once letting his breakneck pace slip. The brutal violence and drab mood paint a realistic picture of a bleak era. Smith also continues to develop his wonderfully complex protagonist and torments him like few other authors could, making the reader worry about him on every page. Demidov has to face his past guilt head-on, a particularly difficult task when he goes into the prisons where those he’s arrested have spent years in agony.

Meticulously plotted and deliciously complicated, Smith’s sophomore effort doesn’t disappoint.

Tasha Alexander is the author of A Fatal Waltz. She lives in Chicago.

 

Crime fiction fans everywhere were delighted last year when Tom Rob Smith’s first thriller, Child 44, made the long-list for the Man Booker Prize. His follow-up, The Secret Speech, is a sequel to his acclaimed debut, continuing the adventures of Leo Demidov. Khrushchev has come…

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A young woman has been murdered in 1909 New York City, and one traumatized girl holds the key to finding the killer in Jed Rubenfeld’s highly anticipated literary mystery, The Interpretation of Murder. Freudian analyst Dr. Stratham Younger is called in to try to recover Nora Acton’s memories, and he receives aid from none other than Freud himself, who is visiting America with his then-protŽgŽ Carl Jung. Nora was found half-strangled and beaten in her family’s mansion, and the community is scandalized. But when Nora implicates one of her father’s friends, who has an airtight alibi for the night in question, investigators wonder whether she inflicted the wounds on herself, despite the fact that another girl was found dead from identical injuries the day before.

Freud’s involvement in solving the mystery is minimal, but those interested in his theories will find much to think about. Though Younger admires Freud and believes in psychoanalysis, he has difficulty accepting the Oedipal theory, especially when it’s applied to the beautiful Miss Acton. As Younger analyzes Nora, he falls in love (but is it transference?) and is drawn deeper into the mystery. The Interpretation of Murder is well researched, though sometimes obviously so, especially some of the lengthier passages on psychoanalysis and New York society. Still, Rubenfeld’s entertaining psychological thriller is full of enjoyable twists and turns.

A young woman has been murdered in 1909 New York City, and one traumatized girl holds the key to finding the killer in Jed Rubenfeld's highly anticipated literary mystery, The Interpretation of Murder. Freudian analyst Dr. Stratham Younger is called in to try to…
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What began as a way to cope with being snowed in with her two young sons one winter has turned into a multimillion dollar career, though J.D. Robb—a pseudonym for mega-selling author Nora Roberts—couldn’t have known where that creative solution to boredom would lead her. A voracious reader, the Maryland native decided to try her hand at fiction writing during those snowy days in 1979 and she hasn’t stopped since, with more than 100 novels to her credit and countless appearances on the New York Times bestseller list.

The In Death series was born of necessity in 1995, when the prolific Roberts had stacked up a surplus of titles awaiting print. Intentionally moving outside the romantic suspense genre, Roberts created a gritty, urban-set, three-book story arc featuring police Lt. Eve Dallas and the mysterious billionaire Roarke. The two would work jointly—and, at times, at odds—to solve unspeakable crimes in New York City, circa 2060. Her publisher agreed to take a chance on the groundbreaking concept, publishing the books under the J.D. Robb pseudonym at Roberts’ request. (Roberts used the first initials of her sons’ names for “J.D.” and “Robb” is a diminutive of “Roberts”.)

The J.D. Robb titles quickly hit bestseller lists and gained critical acclaim, both from book reviewers and fellow writers. The information that “J.D. Robb” was really Nora Roberts was originally a well-kept secret, but the series found immediate popularity, the publisher eventually revealed the woman behind the pseudonym, and the rest, as they say, is history.

In Robb’s newest futuristic thriller, Promises in Death, New York City police Lt. Eve Dallas has a murder to solve that strikes too close to home. The victim is a fellow cop and the lover of Eve’s good friend Li Morris, the city’s chief medical examiner.

Was Det. Amaryllis Coltraine murdered with her own weapon because of a case she was investigating? Did she have personal enemies who wanted her dead? Or is her death somehow connected to the mysterious man with whom she shared a serious relationship in Atlanta two years earlier?

During the investigation, Eve begins to unravel the tangled threads of Det. Coltraine’s hidden past, and even Roarke is surprised at the revelations. Previously, he and Eve had collaborated on a case that led to the conviction of master criminal Max Riker, who is currently incarcerated in an off-planet penal colony. Neither Roarke nor Eve expected their lives would intersect with Riker or his crime organization again, yet their current investigation seems inextricably linked to the dethroned crime boss. Is it possible Riker has found a way to operate his criminal empire from behind bars—to the extent that he is capable of ordering a hit on a cop in New York City?

And as if answering all these questions to solve the complicated case isn’t difficult enough, it quickly becomes clear that someone doesn’t want her digging deeper. When Eve’s police issue vehicle is boxed in at a traffic stop and deliberately T-boned by a large van, Roarke’s blood runs cold. Has Coltraine’s killer turned his sights on Eve?

The details of the futuristic New York City setting and familiar faces in the supporting cast of characters remind the reader just how minutely Robb has crafted and populated this series. This 28th installment in the wildly popular series is sure to delight dedicated fans and garner new ones for the indomitable duo of Eve and Roarke.

Lois Faye Dyer writes from Port Orchard, Washington.

What began as a way to cope with being snowed in with her two young sons one winter has turned into a multimillion dollar career, though J.D. Robb—a pseudonym for mega-selling author Nora Roberts—couldn’t have known where that creative solution to boredom would lead her.…

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Prolific author James Patterson (writing here with Peter de Jonge) delivers yet again as he takes readers to the Hamptons, one of America’s priciest seaside resorts. Attorney Tom Dunleavy has a small law practice in East Hampton and spends most of his time with his faithful dog Wingo. Though his star basketball career was cut short by injury, Tom still enjoys playing the game with some of the locals at the estate of an often absent movie star. One of his sparring partners is young Dante Halleyville, a surefire future NBA draft pick. But a game of basketball turns into a nightmare when one of Dante’s pals threatens another player with a gun. Later that night, three young white men are brutally killed, and Dante is charged with their murder. Tom agrees to defend Dante, and he enlists the help of former girlfriend Kate Costello, a superior Manhattan attorney. Kate and Tom find themselves instantly unpopular in their community and soon are threatened by those who believe in Dante’s guilt. As the evidence stacks up against Dante, Kate and Tom pull out all the stops to defend this promising athlete who vows that he had nothing to do with the murders. But will their defense succeed, and is their client truly innocent? Patterson’s fast-paced, succinctly written novel is chock-full of suspense and intrigue. Tom and Kate are fabulous protagonists, former lovers and fellow attorneys who seem to be able to rise above the pitfalls of their chosen profession. The mystery behind the murders is coupled with a renewal of their romance as their professional efforts bring them closer to one another both emotionally and physically. Yet it is the riveting conclusion, with its earth-shattering revelation, that will resonate most with readers, leaving them spellbound. Sheri Melnick writes from Pennsylvania.

Prolific author James Patterson (writing here with Peter de Jonge) delivers yet again as he takes readers to the Hamptons, one of America's priciest seaside resorts. Attorney Tom Dunleavy has a small law practice in East Hampton and spends most of his time with his…
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After five long years, Allan Folsom, author of the blockbuster thrillers The Day After Tomorrow and Day of Confession, has finally released his third novel. The Exile, arguably Folsom’s most moving novel to date, is also his bloodiest. Equal parts mystery and suspense thriller, The Exile revolves around John Barron, the youngest cop on the LAPD’s elite 5-2 squad, the hundred-year-old special situations section of the Robbery-Homicide Division. These clandestine vigilantes are judge and jury to Southern California’s most heinous criminals, and the sentence is always the same: death. When members of the 5-2 corner an escaped prisoner and his hostage in a vacant parking garage, Barron is initiated into the squad with a baptism of blood. The escapee is heartlessly assassinated and the hostage taken in for questioning. The hostage, however, turns out to be an international hitman who escapes from a jail full of police officers and leaves a trail of dead bodies in his wake. As the members of the 5-2 track this elusive killer (identified as Raymond Thorne on his passport), Barron goes against policy and tries to take in the escaped killer by the book. His seemingly scrupulous decision backfires and most of the 5-2 is killed in a vicious shootout. Shortly thereafter, the infamous squad is disbanded and Barron is told in no uncertain terms to retire and leave the area immediately or else. He takes his psychologically impaired sister, changes his name and moves to England to start a new life. But the bloody mystery surrounding Raymond Thorne won’t go away. Who was he? Why was he killing affluent Russian immigrants? When one of Thorne’s old targets is murdered in Paris, Barron takes up the case again and is led to Russia, where Thorne’s true name and ultimate mission are revealed.

While The Exile is definitely not for the faint of heart (readers will need a calculator to keep up with the ever-escalating body count), fans of Folsom’s previous works will undoubtedly put this novel on national bestseller lists. Paul Goat Allen is a freelance editor and writer in Syracuse, New York.

After five long years, Allan Folsom, author of the blockbuster thrillers The Day After Tomorrow and Day of Confession, has finally released his third novel. The Exile, arguably Folsom's most moving novel to date, is also his bloodiest. Equal parts mystery and suspense thriller, The…
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Novelist Martina Cole, has rarely been off U.K. bestseller lists for some 17 years now. I had the opportunity to talk on the phone with Cole recently, and her quick wit and street smarts were evident in every response. When her first book, Dangerous Lady, was published, she received the requisite large check from her publisher. I asked her what she did for a first-time splurge: "Well, my accountant told me if I wanted to buy a new car, I needed to do it quickly; it had something to do with English tax law and saving buckets of money. I was painting my bedroom, and had paint all over me, and I went to the BMW dealer that way. The salesman couldn't be bothered with me until I told him that I wanted to buy a new BMW and pay cash for it. I think he nearly fainted!" With the royalties from successive books she has bought a country home that dates back to Elizabethan times ("It has a resident ghost") a garage full of lovely automobiles and a motorboat ("No sailboats for me; I'm a power boat girl.").

It was not always the high life for Martina Cole. She grew up in a working-class family; at times she had to hold down three jobs at once just to make ends meet. Nowadays, that's not a problem, of course, as her books have hit the bestseller lists all over the world, and she is poised to do just that stateside as well with her newly released American debut, Close. Like Cole's previous books, Close is a tale of the London underground, gritty and harsh, not for the weak of heart (or stomach). It is a milieu with which Cole is very familiar, the hardscrabble turf of a poor urban neighborhood, where "the Wall of Silence" prevailed, and folks turned a blind eye to the violent crimes happening all around them with startling regularity. This ambitious novel spans a 40-year period in the life of Clan Brodie, a notorious London crime family, starting in the swinging '60s and moving forward to the present. Think "The Sopranos" with a Cockney accent, and you would not be far off. And like "The Sopranos," it is brutally hard-hitting, superbly crafted and deserving of a rabid fan base in America, as well as the rest of the world.

 

Novelist Martina Cole, has rarely been off U.K. bestseller lists for some 17 years now. I had the opportunity to talk on the phone with Cole recently, and her quick wit and street smarts were evident in every response. When her first book, Dangerous…

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Remember what happened when those Danish cartoonists drew caricatures of the Islamic prophet? Just imagine what could happen when an American novelist, New York Times best-selling author Brad Thor, does roughly the same in The Last Patriot.

Ex-Navy SEAL turned Homeland Security operative Scot Harvath (who Thor fans will recall from The First Commandment), is enjoying a little R&andR in gay Paree with his slightly damaged but healing girlfriend, Tracy Hastings (herself a Naval Explosive Ordinance Disposal tech) when things turn, well, not so gay. After a bungled car bomb blast and a narrow escape with an Islamic scholar in tow, the bodies begin to stack up like cordwood.

Why all the fuss? Seems that an addendum to the Koran, allegedly written by the prophet himself, makes an unexpected – and to a group of jihadists, entirely unwelcome – appearance. If allowed to become public, it could "stop militant Islam dead in its tracks." Tough times demand a tough hero, and they don't come any grittier than Thor's. Facing down a recalcitrant target who stands between him and the French pokey, Harvath employs Jack Bauer-like tactics to persuade his captive that confession is good for the soul. With not just a license to kill, but a license to wound, disrupt, maim and explode, Harvath is, virtually single-handedly, more than a match for any who would seek to overthrow our republic by means of force or violence. The only things he's missing are a cape and vulnerability to Kryptonite.

Fans of "24" and other high-adrenaline escapist fare will find Thor's latest cinematic page-turner a must-pack for this summer's vacation.

Remember what happened when those Danish cartoonists drew caricatures of the Islamic prophet? Just imagine what could happen when an American novelist, New York Times best-selling author Brad Thor, does roughly the same in The Last Patriot.

Ex-Navy SEAL turned Homeland Security operative Scot Harvath…

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My brother-in-law has noticed that most weather-related place names are more indicative than whimsical: if it is the middle of January and you are visiting a place called Snowshoe, you had better be prepared for deep drifts. A corollary for the male characters in Sabina Murray’s A Carnivore’s Inquiry might be that if you meet a young woman who makes a great deal of casual conversation about cannibalism, it may be a very mixed blessing if she regards you as a “hunk.” “Hunk,” after all, derives from the Flemish word hunke, which means “a piece of food.” My observation, not Murray’s, though etymological curiosities related to her subject are among the few she doesn’t seem to have investigated.

For A Carnivore’s Inquiry is full of all sorts of unusual information from knowledgeable analyses of macabre paintings by Goya and Gericault to detailed accounts of the real events that served as sources for Poe and Melville, to imaginative reconstructions of historical events ranging from the demise of the Donner party to the disappearance of Michael Rockefeller. All of this discursive but fascinating exposition is linked in some way to the picaresque experiences of the main character, Katherine Shea, in whose wake men are found not only dead but also horribly mutilated.

A Carnivore’s Inquiry is told in the first person, and so it is easy for the reader to understand what attracts men to Katherine. She is eccentrically attractive, disarmingly direct, acutely perceptive and genuinely witty. Through her narrative, the other characters emerge as fully realized (I am tempted to say “full-bodied and full-blooded”) individuals especially her successful father, whom she regards as irredeemably strange, and her deranged mother, whom she regards as a soul mate.

Murray’s first novel, Slow Burn, was a sort of Tama Jamowitz story set in Manila, and her PEN-Faulkner award-winning collection of stories, The Caprices, treated characters on the margins of the Pacific theater of World War II. This neo-Gothic tale, which recalls the style of Nicholson Baker, is a considerably different sort of work but an extremely enjoyable ride nonetheless. Martin Kich is a professor of English at Wright State University.

My brother-in-law has noticed that most weather-related place names are more indicative than whimsical: if it is the middle of January and you are visiting a place called Snowshoe, you had better be prepared for deep drifts. A corollary for the male characters in Sabina…
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A chance encounter on the pier of Magic Beach, California, launches the newest adventure of Dean Koontz’s singular hero, Odd Thomas, who has starred in three previous bestsellers. Wise beyond his 20-something years, Odd evokes the homespun wisdom of Forrest Gump amid the mind-spinning adventures of a Jack Bauer.

The ultimate Everyman, the one-time fry cook is ostensibly just a jack-of-all-trades for an aging actor. Yet a prophetic vision triggers a manhunt for Odd by the Magic Beach police. While on the run, he puts his trust in the mysterious Annamaria and people like Reverend Moran, who betrays him by revealing him to the police. Odd also trusts his own instincts and one of his “oddest” companions: Francis Albert Sinatra, Ol’ Blue Eyes, haunts Odd, and goes ballistic with such descriptive finesse it’s a joy to read.

Canine relationships are a hallmark of Koontz’s writing, and they’re sublimely apparent in this tale. Odd’s companions include a ghost dog and new dog who intertwine in time and memory, much as Odd’s encounters with people and with danger. Throughout Odd Hours, there is the threat of a nuclear terror attack that would affect hundreds of thousands of people. But it’s with his descriptions of the personal terror that circles Odd as he confronts a world that blends life and death . . . and lingering death . . . where Koontz is at his zenith.

In the creation of the character Odd Thomas, with his prophetic dreams and psychic encounters and plain-spoken philosophizing, Koontz may have intended an avatar for himself, a voice to opine on everything from the two-way therapeutic interrelationship of man and dog to the global state of distress, but he’s transcended that to provide an avatar of hope and honor and courage for all of us – the linchpin of a rollicking good tale.

Sandy Huseby writes from Fargo, North Dakota, and lakeside in northern Minnesota.

Wise beyond his 20-something years, Odd evokes the homespun wisdom of Forrest Gump amid the mind-spinning adventures of a Jack Bauer.

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