Saturday, October 21, 2017

The Room of White Fire by T. Jefferson Parker

Roland Ford is an ex-cop, ex-Marine, and now PI who specializes in finding people.  He still mourns the loss of his wife, who died when the plane she was piloting crashed into the Pacific Ocean.  Roland now lives on a ranch/ retreat near San Diego, landlord to a group of well-meaning and loyal misfits.

Roland latest assignment is to find Clay Hickman, an air force veteran who has escaped from a private mental hospital.  Clay suffers from PTSD and also carries the burdens of guilt and shame from the role he played in the torture of Al Qaeda prisoners.  Roland soon learns that his client, Briggs Spencer, the owner of the mental hospital from which Clay had escaped, is also Clay’s former commander in the air force… in charge of the secret torture camp in Romania where Clay had served.  Was Clay institutionalized for his mental health or to cover up some insidious behavior by his captor?

Roland soon learns that a young woman, Sequoia Baine helped Clay escape and has fallen in love with him.  She escorts Clay in his quest to retrieve information that would expose Spencer.  Yet, most allies that Clay and Sequoia locate are being watched and some end up dead.  At one point Roland views video of water boarding and other horrendous methods of torture that Spencer administered while in charge of the Romanian black ops site.  By making this video public, Clay intends to ruin Spencer. Clay decrees, ‘My mission is to bring white fire to Deimos’… Deimos being the Greek god of terror and Spencer’s nickname in Romania.  The more Roland learns the more hesitant he becomes to turn Clay over to Spencer… even if he can find Clay alive.


T. Jefferson Parker has developed an excellent protagonist in Roland Ford.  His grieving for his wife and serving as landlord for a group of misfits exemplifies his compassion.  However, I do not appreciate Parker’s flare for the gruesome (too much description of torture for my taste), but the story is well told and the characters are believable.

No comments:

Post a Comment