Tag Archives: thriller

Titles You’ll See Here Soon

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The last time I put up a preview page, it was in the midst of household chaos, and I made the post by way of apology for not having a review to put up. I was surprised by the positive feedback I got, and so today, even though I have recently posted a review and will have more soon, I thought I’d show you what’s next. There are some repeats from my last preview that I haven’t done yet, but I’m happy to say most of those are done. Here’s what you can look for between now and Thanksgiving, barring catastrophe:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Vanishing Year, by Kate Moretti****

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thevanishingyear 3.5 stars, rounded up for this one. I received my copy from Atria Books and Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.  I am impressed most by the first half of the book, and particularly with regard to character, Kate Moretti is a rock star.

Our protagonist is Zoe Whitaker, and we learn that Zoe grew up as Hilary—with one “L”, and no political baggage—and then chose to adopt “Zoe”, the name on her birth certificate prior to her adoption. There’s a lot more mess here than there needs to be, the adopted-child angst, the guilt over having not given her mother Evelyn the funeral she deserved, and fear, fear, fear.

Moretti does a wonderful job of building suspense, and part of this is the vague but real tension, the constant shoulder-checking, wondering if someone has found her. It makes us wonder who, and it makes us wonder why. Bit by bit, she unspools tidbits of the past in the way you might expect someone that needs a friend and is learning to trust a new confidant might do.

Moretti’s main character is beautifully sculpted. Some novelists that withhold information to build tension hang onto so much that we don’t get to know our protagonist, but I was perched right on Zoe’s shoulder, or hanging out with her newly discarded friend Lydia, asking her why the heck Zoe is so passive. Is fear the only language Zoe knows? I felt close to Zoe, and I wanted her to tell me more.

Meanwhile, there’s the marriage. Henry Whitaker, an immensely wealthy man, sees Zoe across a crowd and homes in on her. Those familiar with the patterns common to abusive relationships know that this is a red flag; the guy whose gaze lights on a partner and from then on wants full possession of every move, every thought, and every minute. He makes a snap decision like lightning and then never lets up. And Henry has plenty of other red flags too, but he’s not a stereotypic abuser; Moretti is too cunning to permit any caricatures into her novel.

For the first half of this story, I relished the meaty ambiguity, not only in Zoe’s life but in what it represents. Yes, Henry is too possessive, too bossy, but on the other hand, this young woman that has never been known for her remarkable beauty or extraordinary talent has the Cinderella marriage without the stepsisters.

“I might be under someone’s thumb, but I have money now.”

Zoe has no living relatives to her knowledge, apart from the birth mom she hasn’t located and that may not want her when she does. She doesn’t have a degree, and is working at a florist’s shop in Manhattan when Henry finds her and whisks her away. He is devoted to her, provides her with every small thing her heart desires. She has a car and a driver, she has servants, she has clothes, jewels, and the whole nine yards. Everyone defers to her. There’s no restaurant that won’t make room for her at the front of the queue. Tickets to a sold out event? No problem.

It is easy for us to moralize from afar, we feminists with our principles, but economic want can shorten a woman’s life significantly. As this reviewer heads into retirement, I look at the lives of the women I knew when we were school girls, and no matter how clever or talented, their material well being seems tied, more than anything, to who they married and whether they remained married. Ask any woman over age 50 who’s looking for a job and watching those past-due notices land in her mailboxes, both electronic and physical, and many of those same women would be more than happy to let someone else tell them what to wear in exchange for such a well-padded safety net.

And so as Henry’s behavior escalates, I grow more entranced with the story’s Virginia Woolfish aspect, and I expect Moretti to take us up that mountain. How much is too much? At what point does one relinquish the guarantee, if there is one, of not only the basic requirements but luxuries one may quickly grow accustomed to, in exchange for breathing room, the dignity that comes with independence, self-respect, and with apologies to Woolf, possibly a room of one’s own?

But Moretti doesn’t go in that direction; at the last minute she tosses in a tremendous amount of new information that is original yet seriously far-fetched. Those that want a white-knuckle thriller with a female protagonist may be very happy here, but I was sad, left feeling as if the waiter had decided not to serve me and abandoned me after the hors d’oeuvres.

This title was released on October 4, and so if you are eager to see what all the buzz is about, get a copy, and then let me know what you think.

One way or another, Moretti will be a novelist to watch. The subtlety and nuance that escaped her as this novel progressed are still hers to be had, if she chooses to use them. I know I can’t wait to see what she publishes next.

Combustion, by Martin J Smith*****

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combustionPaul Dwyer is dead, a floater that has only been found because his construction business diverted the water from the place where his body is dumped, and it dries up in the Southwestern desert heat, leaving his body exposed to the world.  I was lucky to be able to read this book early, thanks to an invitation from Net Galley and Diversion Publishing, in exchange for this honest review.  I am overjoyed to rate it five stars. I knew nothing at all about either Smith or Diversion, but it turned out to be a risk that worked out in my favor and the author’s.

Our detective is Ron Starke, a single man whose father has Alzheimer’s. The reader cannot help but warm to him as we see him appear in his father’s room, hamburgers in a paper bag, prepared to patiently have the same conversation with his dad that he had with him several times yesterday and most likely will have tomorrow too.

Shelby Dwyer, the victim’s widow, is a very wealthy woman now. She isn’t sorry that he’s gone, and neither is their teenage daughter Chloe. Dwyer was a violent, ugly man in private, regardless of the shine he demonstrated publicly. Naturally, Shelby is the chief suspect, a thing made more difficult by the fact that she was Starke’s girlfriend a decade ago, when they were in high school.  But it’s a small town, a tiny exurb of Los Angeles, and everyone really does know everyone, aside from Starke’s supervisor, Kerrigan, a recent transplant from the big city. To make matters even more awkward, Starke had been considered a shoo-in for the job Kerrigan now occupies, and Kerrigan knows it.

He has a feeling that his new boss is gunning for him.

The story is told from alternate points of view, and Smith creates whiplash tension by shifting between them at key points.  Character development is solid, and it makes me wonder about the possibility of a series emerging from this debut.

Shelby may be rich now, but she is in tremendous personal jeopardy. All of the lonely nights spent holed up in the study, cruising online for connections she can’t find at home, have led her to expose herself in a horrifying way. And as she is forced to confess to Chloe about the unwise things she has said to another visitor in a chat room, a person using the handle LoveSick, and despite the horror of the moment I had to smile, as the traditional tables are turned and 17 year old Chloe has to tell her mother that you should never, never provide a stranger with personal details.

Smith’s debut is hot as the desert sun, a page turner that will live in your head after the last page has turned. Those that know me are aware I finish an average of three titles weekly for review, and so months or even weeks later if I am contacted by the writer’s publicist, I sometimes have to flip back through my records to remind myself…wait, this what which book again? And this is especially true of mysteries, which no matter how unique, tend to share a certain sameness. But in this case, that didn’t happen. The settings are so resonant, the characters so well sculpted that I felt as if I were an unseen guest among them.

It’s for sale today, and I highly recommend that you read it.

Nothing Short of Dying, by Erik Storey***

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nothingshortofdying Nothing Short of Dying is Storey’s first novel, and it’s full of no-holds-barred action. Despite some inconsistencies, it’s a good read, featuring a protagonist alienated, as so many Americans are, by time spent in prison. In some ways it is very much a tale of 2016 America. I received my DRC free and in advance in exchange for my honest review; thanks go to Net Galley and Scribner.

Our protagonist is Clyde Barr, and since the novel is labeled “Clyde Barr #1”, we’ll be seeing him again. Barr is back on the outside. He’s spent so much time away, between prison and time spent in Third World nations, that the rampant consumerism he finds upon returning to US society and the vast number of choices over trivial things overwhelms him. He wants to head to the Yukon and enjoy some time in the woods, but before he can do that, he gets word that his younger sister Jen, who’s very close to him because of shared childhood trauma, is in trouble and needs to be rescued.

I’d seen evil on three continents, some of it unspeakable, but it seemed worse in this place I called home. On a different continent, everything—good and bad—can seem strange, alien. But you don’t expect to come back to places that seem too familiar and discover the greatest evil of all.

Despite the occasional moment in which a female does something proactive, Storey’s plot is full of damsels in distress, and Barr’s whole mission is to save his sister, and then later to also run to the rescue of another woman that appears along the way, but to whom he grows inexplicably attached in a really short time. Character development is shallow, but I can see that an effort is made. Storey also uses the unsavory technique of identifying a bad guy by having him use nasty, racist language. But this is not one of those books I only finish due to a deal with the publisher; I genuinely want to see where this one is going and how it will come out.

Barr is a rough and tumble type, the kind of guy that makes his truck start by kicking the side panels and door and slamming his fist on the hood. It makes me like him.

Not so appealing is his reaction to the irritated woman working in the bar: “On her the expression looked cute.”

However, the thing that resonates most for this reviewer is that when trouble comes calling and another character asks him whether they ought not to call police, Barr says no:

“’They probably have guns.’

“’So do I,” I said.’”

The fact is that Barr flies under a black flag. He doesn’t care about preserving evidence; in fact, it improves things if his fingerprints are nowhere close to any of the messes he either starts or finds himself part of. And fifteen years ago, I don’t think a book like this would’ve found a reputable publisher like Scribner. Barr is our hero, but he has no respect for officers of the law, and his inclination is to solve problems and even make a living in a way that goes around US law rather than in accord with it.

But today so many ordinary, decent people have either done time for something most countries wouldn’t consider to be a lock-up kind of offense, or have a loved one that is or was imprisoned, that alienation from cops and the sometimes the law has become the new normal. I write this from a middle class neighborhood in mellow Seattle, a place where the neighborhood association sat down with a representative from SPD to ask that they let us solve our own problems and quit sending officers here to stalk every Black kid that drives, walks, or gets off a city bus. And I know this scenario is playing out across the nation, but it’s worse in down-and-out areas where people prefer to hide from cops, or film them, because nobody from the cop shop is going to come out to have coffee and chat with the locals.

When you have no power, nobody from downtown cares what you want. And so I think a story like this one will find a receptive audience. There is really no Officer Friendly; if you can’t avoid problems, you have to deal with them yourself nine times out of ten.

This novel, the reader should know, is brutal, violent, and grim. There are torture scenes. The pacing is almost always lightning fast, with lots of fast driving and shooting; the pace only slows in one area, and that is whenever Barr has to build a campfire out in the middle of nowhere, we get a detailed lesson in how this is done.  Once I was on my second detailed campfire lesson, I made a note in my tablet. Why are we suddenly stopping for another campfire lecture? But in general, the action travels at warp speed. You have to have the stomach for it, though. But I am a retired English teacher, and there are stories I don’t want to read because they are too graphic; this one stayed inside my ick-boundary by a tiny margin. So if you’re still reading my review and considering reading this book, likely you’ll be okay.

I made a more positive note at the end of chapter 23, because it flowed really well.

A favorite passage is when Barr is hobbling up the mountainside on an injured leg, “sucking air like a sun-stroked impala.” Storey’s figurative language is strong in a number of places, and it helps keep the pages turning.

The story’s denouement left a bare thread dangling in a somewhat obvious way, but this is the writer’s first installment in the series. With strong imagery, a clear plot line, and action, action, action, I know this is a writer to watch. I look forward to seeing the next Clyde Barr novel; this one was released recently, and you can get a copy of your own right now.

With the caveats above, I recommend you read this adrenaline-coursing thriller.

A Time of Torment, by John Connolly*****

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ATimeofTormentI had never read anything by John Connolly before, but this eerie thriller has made a forever-fan of me. Thanks go to Net Galley and Atria books for the invitation to read and review.  Connolly cooks together a hair-raising thriller with a handful of horror, a smidge of fantasy and a dash of magical realism; the resulting brew is one that nobody else could possibly cook up. For those that write, reading this dark redemption tale is likely to produce both admiration and despair, because this novel is born of a talent that no creative writing workshop will ever be able to produce. You may write, and I may write, but nobody else will ever, ever be able to write like Connolly.

Our story is part of the Charlie Parker series, but I have not read any of the others and found I was able to hop into this story as a single read with no difficulty. Connolly provides just enough background to catch us up without dragging us through the book using promotional paragraphs some lesser authors might indulge in. I suspect not enough is repeated here to annoy his faithful readers.

Parker is a private detective that has been through a triple-death experience and come out the other end, but not unchanged. He’s hard enough to confront the ugliest nemesis, and it’s a good thing, because soon a trail of corpses will persuade him to leave his home in Maine for the dark place that is Plassey County, West Virginia.

The people of Plassey County have learned over the years—and centuries—to leave The Cut alone. Evil things are brewing there; it is there that the Dead King waits in an ancient building, and it is there that Oberon and Cassander struggle for dominance of this insular, cult-like community.  After all, “…the Cut looks after its own.”

This is a high voltage, hyperliterate read. Your middle-schoolers can’t read this, and it is so infused with violence that I’m not sure you’d want them to have it. But though I sometimes am put off from gory prose, I found that Connolly measured out these passages in small enough batches that my “ick” threshold, that little voice inside that tells me when a story isn’t fun anymore, wasn’t tripped. Spare but strong spots of irony and humor help lighten things up before they get dark, dark, dark again.

If I were to compare Connolly to any other writer, it would be James Lee Burke. The similarities that exist are a brilliant capacity to craft character, and the use of strongly resonant setting to reinforce character and move the story forward. The small but potent religious references are also similar. I highlighted the characters that were introduced throughout the course of this novel and found more than two dozen of them, and yet at the end of the book I still knew who each of them was without having to go back and reread. Connolly draws characters so real that by the time the book is done, the reader knows them as if they were family; yet thank goodness they aren’t.  This reviewer particularly enjoyed Parker’s assistants, Angel and Louis, as well as side characters Perry Lutter and Odell Watson.

Throughout the story, the pacing is swift and the plot absorbing. There is never a word that could be cut from the text and have the same result. If anything, the spare prose creates a sense of tension not only for that which is said, but also for that which is not.

This creepy tale was released this week, so you can have it to curl up with over the weekend if you’re quick about it. But before you commence, you’ll want to make sure that all the lights in your home are burning, and that all your doors and windows are locked.

Highly recommended.

All the Missing Girls, by Megan Miranda*****

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allthemissinggirlsI was invited to read by Net Galley and Simon and Schuster in exchange for an honest review, and I am so glad I did. It’s a juicy read that kept me transfixed through most of my Memorial Day weekend. You can order your copy now and have it when it comes out June 28.

The format is unique and very effective. We start in the present and step back to the day before, and before that, and so on, because just as is usually true when a person is missing, the most important information is what took place right at the beginning; that’s the part that has the key, and so we receive it last. It creates an electric sense of suspense I haven’t seen elsewhere in a long, long time.

We start with Nicolette Farrell driving away from her job, fiancé, and life in Philadelphia back to her hometown of Cooley Ridge, North Carolina. She couldn’t wait to get away from there when high school was over, and she isn’t eager to go back. And here, I felt her pain, urban snob that I am. Why would anyone want to return to a podunk place like that once they’d tasted life in a cosmopolitan city? But she has little choice; her father is in assisted living, his faculties fading, and Nic’s brother Daniel says they will have to sell the house in order to continue paying for Dad’s care. But Dad won’t agree to sell, and it’s up to Nic to reel him in.

But Nicolette, it turns out, had plenty of very personal reasons for needing to leave Cooley Ridge. Dark, mysterious questions about the disappearance of her best friend, Corinne, have never been answered, and once she is back, another girl disappears, this one the girlfriend of Nic’s old high school flame.  It doesn’t look good.

But Nic knows more than she’s telling; lots of people do.

“We were a town full of fear, searching for answers. But we were also a town full of liars.”

It’s been ten years since Corinne vanished, and now it’s happened again. Daniel is worried about Nic staying alone in that house, because the woods where the girls have last been seen is right behind it, and she’s there alone. He urges her to stay with him and his wife, but she doesn’t like to intrude; her relationship with Daniel hasn’t been strong since that last terrible night following graduation, and so she stays put.

This riveting psychological thriller grabbed me by the front of my shirt and didn’t let go till it was over.  Tantalizing bit by bit, Miranda takes us back to Nicolette’s earlier days, and one clue after another unspools until we sit stunned and amazed at the end. Miranda is a writer of formidable talent, and frankly, I can’t wait to see what else she has in store for us.

You can order your copy now so you can have it as soon as possible; go online, by car, by train, bus, foot, or skateboard, but reserve this book. It comes out Tuesday, and you won’t want to miss it!

The Last One, by Alexandra Oliva****

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thelastoneThose that occasionally hole up on their days off and binge on reality TV shows will love this book; those that don’t will love it too.  This reviewer has never watched a single episode of “Survivor” or any other reality-survival show, and yet once I began reading this novel, it elbowed aside all the other books I was reading till I was done. Thanks go to Net Galley and Random House Ballantine for the DRC, which I received in exchange for this honest review.

In an interesting twist, readers are told up front that part way through this competition, most of the other contestants, along with the cameraman, producer, and a number of other support staff that would ordinarily be in charge of extricating her or announcing her victory, will die. Our protagonist, whom the show’s producers call “Zoo” because she has a job involving animals in real life, won’t know that the show is over, because the people in charge of telling her will be gone.  And so the suspenseful aspect of this story for readers is at what point does the competition actually end, and once we are sure it’s over, when will Zoo figure it out? What will she find when she finally makes it home, assuming she does?

 

The production team tries to get everyone out, but they’re on Solo Challenges and widespread. There were contingency emergency plans in place, but not for this. It’s a spiral like that child’s toy; a pen on paper, guided by plastic. A pattern, then something slips and—madness. Incompetency and panic collide. Good intentions give way to self-preservation.

 

Oliva is a champ when it comes to examining media and its effect on the thinking of ordinary people living in the real world, and in this case, even in a virtual one. And as the competition begins, we see how real people are being warped and cast as characters for a viewing audience; a sympathetic  contestant’s ungentle words during a stressful moment are edited out; an introverted, serious individual is billed as arrogant, and so his small acts of kindness will be cut from the final film.

It’s an unreal sort of reality programming, stories retold to make them more saleable to the viewing audience. Oliva nails the way that mainstream media manipulates our thinking; it’s one reason I watch so little television, but it’s not a book that will ruin your favorite shows for you.

Those looking for an absorbing beach read or a thriller to curl up with at the family cabin could do a lot worse.  This guilty pleasure becomes available to the public July 12, 2016.

The Girls, by Emma Cline*****

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thegirlsThe Girls is a fictionalized account of the Manson Murders, a terrible killing spree that stunned the USA in the 1960s before any mass shootings had occurred, when Americans were still reeling from the assassinations of President Kennedy, his brother, Senator Robert Kennedy, and Dr. Martin Luther King. Manson, a career criminal with a penchant for violence yet possessed of a strange sort of charisma, attracted a number of young women and girls into a cult of his own founding. Later they would commit a series of grisly murders in the hills outside Berkeley, and it is this cult and these crimes on which Cline’s story is based. Great thanks to Net Galley and Random House for the DRC. This book will be published June 14, 2016.

Evie is an only child of the middle class; she is well provided for, but her parents have split up and her presence is getting in the way of her mother’s love life. Evie needs her mother’s attention now that she has entered her teens and so she pushes the limits in small ways, then in larger ones. When it becomes clear that her mother just doesn’t want her around, Evie looks elsewhere and finds herself drawn to a feral-looking young woman named Suzanne, who has unsuccessfully tried to shoplift something from a nearby store. Before long, Evie is sleeping on a mattress at the rural commune where Suzanne lives, eating from the communal kitchen and being used sexually by the group’s charismatic leader, and then by a man in the music industry that Russell, the founder, wants to please in the hope of having his music published.  Russell dispenses hallucinogenic drugs freely to make the girls more compliant.

We know immediately that this place, the commune, is not a good place. When we find that the babies  born to young women that live there—in this era before Roe versus Wade gave women the right to choose—are segregated from their young mothers and the pitiful way they regress and attempt to attach themselves to various females in search of a mother or mother figure, that’s a huge tell. But when Evie arrives she doesn’t want to know these things, at least not yet. All Evie wants is to be with Suzanne.

The story’s success isn’t anchored so much in the story line, a story that’s been tapped by previous writers, but in the dead-accuracy of setting, both the details of the time and in every other respect as well, from home furnishings, to slang, to clothing, to the way women were regarded by men. The women’s movement hadn’t taken root yet. This reviewer grew up during this time, and every now and then some small period bit of minutiae sparks a memory. In fact, the whole story seems almost as if a shoebox of snapshots from pre-digital days had been spilled onto the floor, then arranged in order.

The other key aspect that makes this story strong is the character development. Evie doesn’t have to live in poverty among bad people, but she feels both angry at her mother and hemmed in by the conventional expectations of her family and friends. Her boundary-testing costs her the loyalty of her best friend, really her only friend, and so she casts about for a new set of peers. Her mother prefers the fiction that she is still visiting Connie, the friend that has disowned her, and this lie provides Evie with a lot of wiggle room on evenings when her mother is with her boyfriend and finds it convenient for Evie not to be home.

As for Evie, what has started out to be an adventure, a bold experiment in branching out from the middle class suburban life she’s always known, gradually begins to darken. But the worse things get, the more important it is to her to prove her fealty to Suzanne, to not be rejected a second time as she was with Connie. Hints are dropped that probably she ought to just go back where she came from before it’s too late, but she is determined not to hear them.  I want to grab her by the sleeve and get her out of there; Evie won’t budge. Once she is in trouble at home for the things she had done on behalf of the group, her desire to avoid her home and stay with Suzanne grows even stronger, which leads her into more trouble yet. Clues are dropped that something big is going to happen, something that our protagonist maybe should avoid, but she plunges forward anyway with the bullheaded determination peculiar to adolescence.

All told, Evie’s future doesn’t look good.

Readers among the Boomer generation will love this book for its striking accuracy; those that are younger will feel as if they have traveled to a time and place they have never seen before. One way or another, Cline’s masterful storytelling weaves a powerful spell that doesn’t let go until the last page is turned. Riveting, and highly recommended.

Dark Matter, by Blake Crouch*****

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darkmatterNote: my records showed this would be published today, but they are in error. This title actually comes out in August and I have run my review earlier than I should have. You’ll see this again at a date closer to publication.

Blake Crouch is a seasoned writer, but I had never read his work before; only recently have I ventured back into science fiction, a genre I abandoned when some writers began incorporating tech jokes and algorithms into their work. Humanities oriented and gun shy, I veered back to my other favorite genres. Crouch makes it a joy to be back reading sci fi. I received this DRC free, courtesy of Net Galley and Crown Publishing Group in exchange for an honest review. It’s for sale August 2, and it will be in theaters soon too. Don’t get left out, because this one is huge.

Jason Dessen is a teacher, having abandoned a burgeoning career in research in order to become a family man. The story is infused with the question almost every adult has, the question of the road not taken. By the time we’re in our thirties or even our mid-twenties, we have made hard choices that leave us musing occasionally about what might have happened if we had pursued a different course, if the destiny we either chose or were thrust into had played out differently. It is this question that Crouch taps into.

On an ordinary evening, Jason’s old friend calls him and asks him to come to a nearby bar and celebrate a momentous event. Jason is a father and happily married, so he doesn’t spend a lot of time hanging out in bars with the guys, and tonight is family night, so it’s especially important to be at home. But this celebration is particularly important to his friend, and so he steps out for one fast beer for the sake of the friendship, with the promise to bring home ice cream on his way home.

That’s not what happens.

On his way home, he is followed by someone, a guy who jumps him not for his wallet, but for his life. He’s knocked out and awakens thus:

 

   Where the hell am I? A hanger?

I catch a glint of memory—a needle puncturing my neck. I was injected with something. This is some crazy hallucination.

A radio squawks. “Extraction team, report. Over.”

The woman says with excitement bleeding through her voice, “We have Dessen. We’re out of the box and en route. Over.”

 

Until Jason’s research funding dried up, he had been working on a cube that could penetrate the “multiverse”, and take matter from the world in which we live to a parallel reality. In another life, Jason has not only done this, but done it on a spectacular level. Here we get into string theory and other aspects of science that are over my head, and this is the type of thing that prevents me from reading more technically demanding sci fi.  Happily, the author only stays there long enough to provide the foundation for the science fiction aspect of his story:

 

Most astrophysicists believe that the force holding stars and galaxies together—the thing that makes our whole universe work—comes from a theoretical substance we can’t measure or observe directly. Something they call dark matter. And this dark matter makes up most of the known universe…Some string theorists think it might be a clue to the existence of the multiverse.

 

The idea is that every time someone hits a benchmark in his life when he must make a choice—college versus work, career versus marriage, to have a child or not, to move away or stay here—there is some parallel version of himself that does the other thing in another universe.

Once I got to the part where string theory is mentioned, I recoiled in horror—was the whole book going to be like this now? How could I even review it?—and I went to read my other books for awhile. But when I picked it up again, we quickly blew through the technical part, which for all I know may be bad science for the sake of a great story anyway, and we were back in poor Jason’s bewildering life. From that moment forward, roughly the twelve percent mark, the story grabbed me by the hair and didn’t let go till I was done.

This story packs a walloping punch, and I have at least one friend who would have made it just fine through the science blurb but then would have been unable to tolerate the emotional torrent that follows. Some people don’t want a story that will make their heart beat faster, and if that’s you, this is not your book.

But for those that enjoy a genuine thriller, this book is for you.  In fact, it’s impossible to draw a line as to whether this story is more a thriller or science fiction. It has all the qualities of a strong thriller, but the story can’t be told without the sci fi foundation. For those that are leery of reading science fiction due to a lack of proficiency in astrophysics or other aspects of science, however, you’ll be fine here. Crouch touches on science long enough to get establish the basis of his story and hook the reader, and then it’s back to Jason and his many dilemmas.

Highly recommended to anyone with a literacy level of a high school senior or beyond. Get it now!

Far From True, by Linwood Barclay****

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farfromtrueBarclay is an established writer, with a number of best sellers to his credit, but he was new to me. My thanks go to Net Galley and Berkley Publishing Group for providing me with a DRC in exchange for an honest review.

And indeed, it does take a pro to weave such an intricate plot so adroitly. But let’s take it from the top and go from there.

The story is set in Promise Falls, an ironically named town that contains more trouble than you can imagine. The initial crisis takes place at the drive-in movie theater, the last showing before the place closes up and the property is sold. But then the unthinkable happens.

Like most disasters, this one triggers a flurry of other emergencies erupt related to the victims of the theater tragedy. There are greedy relatives, heartsick loved ones, and other events and individuals that are just bizarre. And then there are more bodies, and the number “23” appears over and over again, a grim warning.

Some mystery novels are great for the classroom. This one isn’t. In fact, if I were a school librarian I wouldn’t buy it either. Leave this one for consenting adults.

For us, there is more flexibility. There are some parts that are more sexually explicit than your average detective novel, and readers know whether or not they find this appealing. If you have read Barclay’s other mysteries, perhaps you already have some notion of what is in store. But if, like me, you come to this title without having read the first book in the Promise Falls series, you can dive in as if it were a stand-alone mystery. There is no prior knowledge assumed.

I liked the story in spite of the kinky stuff that reached beyond my own perception of what is tasteful. The suspense was so palpable, and the many subplots so well woven throughout the text that I expected to rate this title five stars. I read several books at a time, and for awhile this was my “dessert” mystery, the book I reached for after I had dispatched my obligation to the publisher for a title I had not enjoyed as much. While there were a couple of situations that confused me sometimes—we have two new couples that are starting a relationship while all this unfolds, and I tended to mix them up, and which kid was whose again?—most of the characters were distinct and developed sufficiently that I knew who they were and what they were like when the story bounced back to their point of view. Frequent changes in setting, character, and point of view heightened the suspense.

I was eternally grateful not to have a protagonist agonizing over whether or not to stop at the bar, whether or not to have just one beer. Heaven save me from any more agonized alcoholic main characters. And so this was a relief.

Ultimately though, the ending left me feeling cheated, and that is where the final star fell off my rating. To be sure it was a surprise ending, but it felt dissonant and tacked on. I often can’t tell how much I like a good story until I see the ending, and that was surely true here.

Nevertheless, it’s a solid piece of fiction, and worth your time and dime. Unless you have deep, deep pockets, I don’t think I would go full hard jacket price for this one, but if you can obtain it at a discount, digitally, or in paperback, it’s a fun read for a chilly late winter weekend.

This title will be available for purchase March 8.