The Night Agent by Matthew Quirk

The book opens with an obviously pissed off FBI agent Peter Sutherland walking up the path to a DC mansion carrying a long handle axe.

Got your attention?

Sutherland works the emergency phone desk in the White House’s situation room complex. When someone connected to the White House is in trouble, they call, and these ‘night agents’ direct the call to the best possible source of help. A job with months of nothing until 'that call' comes in.

He was hired by Diane Farr, the chief of staff of President Travers; an outsider whose good fortune (or not, depending on your outlook) ended up winning the job in a colossal upset. Peter had impressed Farr when both were working in Boston and she filed his name away . . . just in case.

Peter has some baggage. Serious baggage. Seems his father was also FBI, but on his watch, some secrets were leaked to the Russians than resulted in a lot of dead assets. The death of his father, under suspicious circumstances, did little to prove innocence or guilt. Peter’s whole life in and out of the FBI has been a race to prove he is not his father’s son.

'That call' comes in. The caller says her aunt and uncle told her to call the number, give a code, and act on instructions given. Turns out auntie and uncle have been undercover assets for the FBI for decades. And dang good at it. So good, that the Russians are at the door, guns blazing, to kill both and obtain a red ledger full of incriminating information on how the Russians were manipulating the US system in order to get assets of their own into power and into the White House.

While specifically told to stay away from the crime scene, Peter goes and stands at the periphery to watch the beginning of the investigation. When headed back to his car, the caller, Rose, intuitively catches his eye and she realizes it was he with whom she talked.

This sets off an ever escalating chain of events as both sides want this red ledger. Over the next week, every safe house, every cop, every Escalade, every fed is a potential threat. No matter who tells Peter to bring her in, he ignores the command and takes her deeper and deeper into the depths of DC to protect her from danger and the multitude of twists and deceptions. His only loyalty is to her safety, not to that which he swore an oath.

Learned about this book from The Real Book Spy who listed it as one of the best political thrillers of 2019. Have to say if I was savvy enough to make up such a list, The Night Agent would certainly be on it. Think of it as a more modern take on the classic Six Days of the Condor. An agent trapped and hunted by both sides with no where to hide from both sides that have reason to stop an innocent from making information public. This books adds a treatment of whether the sins of the father are also the sins of the son. Top drawer political thriller with only one issue: you’ll want to keep reading just one more chapter each night and end up getting too little sleep.

East Coast Don

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Going Dark by Jolene Grace

Amelia Sinclair was once on the front lines as an embedded journalist in one of the Gulf

wars. Now, she works for some network covering the UN. One morning, she gets a poor quality video clip showing 4 American journalists being kidnapped in Syria. They went over there to bag an interview with the current Syrian President.

She takes it to her editor who freaks and drags her off to an apartment of his in Brooklyn to try and look deeper into the clip. He then calls on a source of his, Gabriel Jets to come in and look it over. Editor wants to get a few burner phones and heads off to a corner market about the same time Jets arrives via an alley entrance. Loud screams tip off Amelia and Gabriel to the editor being killed on the sidewalk. When they look out the window, a sniper tries to take Amelia out. Jets and Amelia escape using a fire escape and a wild chase ensues. A chase that jumps around between NYC, Philly, lots of DC locations (including the Oval Office), Syria, Kuwait, and Turkey.

It appears that the abduction is an ISIS attempt at swaying public opinion. But in reality, it’s really just the first step in an attempted coup within the US. The goal was to make the President look weak and open up an avenue for those who truly want the US to stay as the one true megapower to take over.

OK, a coup is an interesting take on the political thriller genre and the premise has promise. For me, the problem in the presentation was that there seemed to be some liberties made with the proverbial space-time continuum as well as with grammar:

1.     People seemed to jump back and forth across the Atlantic as though they were using the Enterprise’s transporter. The time and location issues could have been alleviated had the author used day/time/location headings between and within chapters.

2.     There are a lot of speaking parts in this drama. Would’ve helped the reader keep up with each if they were identified maybe every 2^nd or 3^rd chapter. Instead of just saying ‘McKaine’, it might’ve help to occasionally remind the reader that he is the Chief of Staff. Especially for the numerous minor characters.

3.     I sure hope the NetGalley copy I had was still a work in progress because there were so many issues with wording, grammar, sentence structure, and general clarity. Especially in the 2^nd half of the book. The multitude of errors distracted me from being fully vested in the plot.

4.     Character development could’ve been fleshed out better with some backstory as to the why behind everyone’s motivation.

All in all, that’s too bad because the premise is pretty good. My best suggestion to the publisher would be to keep the book in the development process and let an experienced editor work with the author to make the story more coherent and readable.

ECD

Won’t Back Down by J.D. Rhoades

Jack Keller just can’t catch a break. Iraq war vet. Former skip tracer. Bit of a temper and a real sense of right and wrong. Think of him as a pony-tailed redneck Jack Reacher. He’s recently been paroled from an Arizona prison and he’s come back to North Carolina to be near girlfriend Marie, their 5yo son Francis and Marie’s teenage son Ben. Marie lives in rural Harnett County south of Raleigh; probably the primary ethnicity of the county is Redneck. She is a county cop serving as the high school resource officer.

[Jack and Marie have a history beyond Francis. Back when Ben was about 5 or 6yo, Ben’s dad was hooked up with some really bad people. Jack stepped in to help. In the final confrontation, Jack ended up killing Ben’s dad and then executed the main bad guy. Ben watched both. Yeah, teenage Ben’s a little messed up.]

Now back in NC, Jack is headed to the local high school to interview for a job as the school custodian. On the way in, he sees Brandon, a real turd, bullying Alia Khoury (and her little brother Bassim), steps in to help just before Marie arrives to cool things off. When Jack interviews with the vice-principal, he’s turned away. Convicted felons not wanted.

Adnan Khoury and his children are Iraqi and managed to get out right before Saddam fell. When Adnan finds out that Jack had helped his kids, he offers Jack a job to watch over them. As Jack soon finds out, other folks are also interested in the Khoury family.

The threads of treachery reach back to Iraq. It’s never quite clear if the CIA or Homeland Security want him or are protecting him, adding to the ‘just who is the bad guy’ debate. Two mercs have been contracted to find Adnan and the contractor decides to bring in a second set . . . from Chechnya.

And for what? Probably money, and if that many folks are after it, the final count must be substantial.

Rhoades has put together perhaps his most taught thriller to date involving political issues, murder, and sadistic torture. And he put it not in some third world shithole, but right here in our backyard (and I mean that literally. I write this from the Raleigh area. Harnett County may be the next county south of us, but it’s a world away from living in the capitol’s county. Besides, Rhoades lives in Carthage in the next county west. He knows the people and the lay of the land). I mentioned about that Keller is a Tar Heel Jack Reacher. Has the same sense of right and wrong, the law be damned. He just doesn't ride around on a bus like Reacher. Those who mess with Keller’s family and friends do so at their own risk. The setting, the characters, the action all cement Rhoades in the throne of one of my favorite literary genres as the Crown Prince of Redneck Noir. Rhoades is a bit under the radar and you are unlikely to find his books in the supermarket or the front table at Barnes and Noble. Seriously, if backwoods country crime is your bag and you’ve not read J.D. Rhoades, you are really missing out. This is the 7th Jack Keller book, so get moving. 

East Coast Don

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Lethal Agent by Kyle Mills

Remote village in Yemen. A small Doctors Without Borders team is trying to care for a small village that has been afflicted with a SARS-like virus. An American Doctor, a German nurse, and a French microbiologist can only treat the villagers symptomatically. No cure. No hope.

ISIS is on the ropes. Command and control is failing. Leadership is dying faster than they can be replaced. Sayid Halabi is one of the few remaining, now hiding in a northern Iraq set of caves. ISIS leadership has nightmares: the bearded face of Mitch Rapp. When Rapp’s team tracks down Halabi, the cave is brought down by massive number of grenades killing all within. Except Halabi. Despite considerable injury, he crawls out an exit tunnel known only to him. After action reports find plenty of bodies and blood, but not 100% proof that Halabi was killed. Assumption by the media was that no one could’ve survived.

Rapp returns to his home in rural Virginia to a country fractured by partisanship politics of hate. He wonders if this is the same country to which he has risked his life for the past 20 years. President Alexander is coming to the end of his 2^nd term and the chair of the senate intelligence committee, Christine Barnett, is the opposition’s front running candidate. She despises everything Rapp and CIA chief Irene Kennedy stand for and have done. 

Barnett is an expert at the blame game. Kennedy and Rapp are her prime targets. Her hated is all-consuming. Perceived offenses committed by Rapp have pushed him off the CIA payroll and into the role of a contractor. Even more off the books than usual. And while he still communicates with Irene Kennedy, he has an even longer leash than usual. He frequently thinks that cutting it altogether would be best.

The medical community knows about that village in Yemen. So do the Saudis who want to firebomb the village to stop the virus in its tracks. But if Saudi intelligence knows, you can bet what’s remaining of ISIS does, too. Halabi gathers a few trusted troops, goes to the village, captures the medical team, herds any remaining villagers into a building and burns it. He has plans for the medical group. Especially the microbiologist.

Halabi is a planner. Of big things. Plans that he feels his God has given him and only him to carry out. He manages to negotiate with a rising cartel leader in Mexico to transport middle east heroin into the US. But he changes the deal. He wants a specific package to be smuggled in with the pure heroin to be delivered to a specific recipient in southern California.

The special task for the microbiologist? Anthrax. Getting across the border should’ve been the easy part. Unfortunately, a random test of a NASA satellite shows the tunnel and the shipment is intercepted. A second misfortune was the when a few of the bricks of product are pulled for examination, the anthrax brick was also selected. Dumb luck. Bad for the cartel/Halabi, but good for the DEA.

The delivery guys were captured, but they are hardened coyotes and the DEA isn’t getting anything out of them. The chain of command in Washington can’t seem to get things done so Mitch goes to the safe house where the drivers are being held and shows the DEA what real interrogation means. Which forces him to run to Mexico to avoid prosecution and the media storm that would follow.

Using long perfected skills, he manages to insert himself into the cartel (that one sentence is about 25% of the book). He wants to stop another anthrax delivery, but convinces the cartel he is in it for the money because the US has shit on him one time too many.

When Halabi’s next shipment arrives in Mexico, it’s not anthrax. It’s six devotees to the cause. Seems Halabi didn’t kill everyone in the village. He isolated a couple and used a group of suicide bombers, not to wear a vest, but to be exposed to the virus, get transported across the border and infect population and transportation centers in the US. Halabi’s goal is to make it look like his God has struck directly at the Great Satan.

This 18^th installment combines Rapp’s battles in the middle east with cartel-based trafficking. And it kicks some serious butt. Not just in the deserts, but in Mexico and the halls of the Senate. Rapp and Kennedy are faced with multiple fronts with no military or political support either from the US or any other country be it friend of foe. A no-win situation. Little probability of success. Rapp really is out on the weakest of limbs. Terrific thriller. Absolutely terrific. You have to wonder how many more villains Kyle Mills can dream up. But fans can only hope he keeps doing just that.My favorite parts were the push-pull in Washington, DC.

East Coast Don

p.s. buried in the book is the very best job description of those elected to the House and Senate: do anything to ‘enhance their status, increase personal wealth, and destroy the careers of rivals. Everything else is just noise.” Sure seems like it applies to Rapp's world as much as our own.

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Trained to Hunt by Simon Gervais

Pierce Hunt has been fired by the DEA (In the previous book). He went off the rails in response to a cartel's kidnapping his daughter and her friend. Despite a successful resolution, his daughter is still seriously shook up. Doesn't help that Hunt was helped out by the daughter of the Garcia cartel's boss.

Hunt and Anna Garcia have since become an item as she makes the steady move to legitimize the Garcia's business. Some underlings, still loyal to daddy Garcia's criminal ways, don't like the direction taken by Anna and are plotting to return things to the way they were. And they have a new product. A heroin-derivative that promises performance enhancing effects. Local Florida high school football players are turning up critically incapacitated or dead. Including the star QB of the high school where Hunt's daughter attends.

Hunt and his team weren't unemployed for long. As soon as the President demanded Hunt's head (previous book), the DEA quietly hired the team as contractors. Tracing that heroin-derivative back to Afghanistan takes Hunt's team to the small villages that is the source of the unique variant of poppy. Anna is dealing with her disloyal younger brother who is trying to kill her. When it turns out that the old Garcia distribution network is where this new drug has hit Florida, the DEA then tells her to stop the subversive network or all previously promised protections will cease immediately.  After Afghanistan, Hunt heads back to the US before being inserted into Venezuela before finally returning back to Tampa to help Anna deal with her brother.

Gervais' reputation is that of a quality thriller/action author whose pre-literary life dealt with the military, intelligence, and law enforcement. He knows of what he writes. Earlier books of his have been reviewed here. What ensues is a highly believable and realistic presentation of the investigation and subsequent battles. Good old testosterone-based thriller. Doubt many women will pick this up. Need a suggestion for a holiday gift for the (male) reader in your life? This would be a good place to start.

Available November 2019.

East Coast Don

The League of Orbis Novus by C.C. Prestel

An alcoholic molecular biologist who does some contract work for the CDC is sent to Central America in response to a puzzling virus. Blood and tissue samples are sent back to Atlanta, but further analysis isn’t fast tracked by the CDC.

 

Struggling actor Sam finally realizes the stage isn’t in his future so he ‘falls back’ on his college major, journalism. He accepts a position at a Las Vegas paper starting out doing mostly fluff pieces. He’s assigned to do some research on the concept of the internet hoax. If the piece pans out, then maybe a bigger assignment on fake news.

It’s autumn in the Nevada desert. In his research, he stumbles across a single item saying that if society fails to address the opioid crises, they will. He tosses it off as a nuisance. A few weeks later, another web threat appears as does what appears to be random billboards in the US and elsewhere around the world. This 2^nd mention also adds a deadline. Do something now or on December 1, The League of Orbis Novus will.

From here, the book is one-part medical mystery and one-part a study in investigative journalism. The FBI takes a bit of an interest assigning a novice agent from the Las Vegas bureau because of the potential terrorist connection. Lots of interviews with computer hackers (to track down the source of the internet posts), media types (those billboards), and medical researchers (the science behind the threats). The investigations are being helped a bit by what they think is an Orbis Novus insider.

December 1 arrives. The stream of addicts showing up at emergency departments begins with a trickle, but the daily rates rise throughout the month and the sense of urgency by the media, medicine, and law enforcement ramps up to high gear to find out how are addicts being targeted, how to treat/save opioid abusers that are affected, and how to find the principles in Orbis Novus behind the focused attacks on users. While the deaths mount up, Big Pharma shuts down production, insurance stops payments, big surgeries are postponed. The scope of the (intended or unintended) consequences keeps expanding.

An interesting concept that requires the reader to accept some leaps in faith regarding practical issues in physiology and medicine. Once Sam takes the bit and runs with the story, this book really flies. Easily read in a single sitting . . . just get past the first 3 to 4 chapters of backstory. All in all, an entertaining, if somewhat implausible, escape from the December crush.

East Coast Don

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The Last Tourist by Olen Steinhauer

#4 in the Milo Weaver/Tourist trilogy. Yes, that’s correct.

The Tourist, The Nearest Exit and An American Spy chronicled Milo Weaver’s career in the blackest of black op departments within the CIA. The Office of Tourism was the sharpest point of America’s clandestine spear. They go in. They kill. They leave.

But a Chinese intelligence officer figured it all out, got his hands on the proverbial roster of Tourists and effectively wiped them all out. All except Milo and his boss. Together, in the aftermath, they have taken over an independent intelligence gathering operation that had been set up by Milo’s father (guess the spy trade runs in his family as Milo’s sister is also involved). This operation is is the subject of The Last Tourist and is called The Library, which provides its clients (selected nation-states that have deep pockets) with high level intelligence that might directly or indirectly affect each country.

The Last Tourist details a vast, complex, and secretive conspiracy and its attempts to wipe out The Library, which is viewed as a threat. Think the Bilderberg Group is something to be feared? They don’t hold a candle to the group dreamed up by Steinhauer.

Steinhauer’s vivid imagination has crafted a conspiracy that is not about geopolitics, nation states, governments, or laws. That’s child’s play. The ultimate source of power and control is simply money. And currency knows no borders or boundaries, no elected officials or tinpot despots. It just is. The primary participants include a former CIA higher-up who stumbled across all the (supposedly) hidden files about their Office of Tourism that dated well back onto the Cold War era. She is (or was) married to the CEO of Northwell (a Halliburtan-ish conglomerate) that has used that information to secretly set up its own Office of Tourism that is now tasked with taking out Milo Weaver, his Librarians (country-specific information magnets) and all the genius programmers that hide, store, and encrypt the Library’s information.   

Other players determined to develop a new world order are MirGaz (Russian natural gas company; world’s largest), IfW (Germany’s massive investment bank), Touzi (middle eastern venture capitalists), Said Logistics (Omani shipping and transportation), and most importantly, Nexus (texting and messaging service with a reach beyond that of Facebook that guarantees anonymity and state of the art encryption). And they all meet each year to recruit clients at the annual World Economic Summit that meets in Davos.

Weaver is driven by two things. One is keeping the Library afloat and the other is protecting his wife and teenage daughter. They put up with and survived Milo’s career so far, but these new Tourists are even more ruthless. He’s not doing too well keeping The Library alive. Librarians and programmers are systematically being taken out even after they've all been told to go dark dark dark. And he's not just trying to stay a step ahead of these new Tourists. He doesn’t know who he can trust. Old friends may be against him and old enemies may be of some assistance - a scorecard would be helpful.

I’ve read (and reviewed here) most everything Steinhauer has written; search his name. you'll see. He is more from the Le Carre end of the espionage spectrum than he is from the Brad Thor or Vince Flynn end. While there is plenty of death and mayhem, the storyline and the exquisite presentation isn’t overwhelmed by violence. Pick this up because you really want it. Lightweight readers will get lost in the plot’s intricate complexity. Wouldn’t hurt to use a bookmark on which you can jot notes so you can keep track of the players and their fluid loyalties.

The challenge of The Last Tourist, if you choose to accept, will be best attacked by reading the Milo Weaver series in order. The Last Tourist will be really confusing for those reading it as a standalone. Having read the previous three, I was rewarded with a deep, thoughtful, multifaceted, layered, and successful conclusion (I think) to the Milo Weaver saga. But based on Steinhauer’s history, one never knows.

BTW, for those who don’t know, Steinhauer is the creative force behind the on-going series, Berlin Station, now on the EPIX Network, (season 1 in available on Amazon Prime). Haven’t watched it, but I will. With any luck, he’ll be able to get this Milo Weaver narrative on video.

East Coast Don

Available March 2020 (Thanx NetGalley). So mark your calendars.

Blue Moon by Lee Child

Jack Reacher #25.

Begins on a bus.

Reacher notices an old guy, mostly asleep, carrying a fat teller's envelope in his jacket pocket. Fat=full of money. Also notices that a skinny low life sees a potential score. Bus stops in a medium sized unnamed city, probably in the midwest. The punk stalks the vic and takes him down. Reacher was following and encourages the chump to seek a score elsewhere. 

The vic is gracious. Invites Reacher to his home for coffee and maybe a bite. The guy and his wife appear one day short of being destitute. Reacher finds out they own money to a loan shark - they've been borrowing money to help pay their adult daughter's medical bills. 

Said daughter worked for a dot.com entrepreneur. A real genius. Lots of startup backing to bring jobs to town. But the genius was skimming off the top, stopped paying the company's health insurance premiums, thus the daughter was caught off guard with a cancer diagnosis. Business is gone. The CEO has disappeared. The hospital wants payment up front. And cancer ain't cheap. Neither are the loan sharks. Reacher's sense of right and wrong sees someone being wronged. 

The town is run by two rival gangs. Ukrainians and Albanians have sort of split the town in half and exist is a shaky truce divided by the main north-south street. Reacher wants to get the debt settled. Problem is he is an unknown. Each side thinks the other is trying to take over. So Reacher just sort of helps things along as only Reacher can. In the background is the failed CEO . . . who just happens to be Ukrainian. Ex-CEO may not be much of a businessman, but he is still a computer genius with skills that some might value.

And that includes a lot of deductive reasoning and a little manipulation, both physical and mental. The physical includes I-lost-count-of-how-many-thugs he maims, tortures, or kills. Remember that Reacher's idea of the best way to enter a building is to knock with a bazooka and then waltz in through the smoking hole.

Problems get solved, bad guys get dead. Reacher ends up back on a bus.

Lee Child has a winning formula and he knows his audience. Reacher is a drifter/Robin Hood who always seems to find someone being wronged and he does whatever is necessary to fix things. And his way of fixing things usually involves hand-to-hand combat, excessive gun play, and the requisite  high body count. I really did try to keep track of the dead, but eventually lost count. I'm guessing 40-50, but could be more.

It's really hard to go wrong with Child. After 25 consecutive hits (all of which have been optioned to Hollywood), it's hard to doubt him. And it makes for some good pre-Christmas reading as Reacher books are released annually in the fall. That makes Child and Reacher uniquely similar. Reliable, predictable, and successful. Reacher fans won't be disappointed.

East Coast Don

Hymns of the Republic

I just finished Hymns of the Republic, a fabulous Civil War history by S. C. Gwynne, the second time the author has been reviewed in this blog. I raved about Empire of the Summer Moon, and I had a similar positive feeling about this one. Although this book is a bit off-genre because it’s nonfiction, the action of the story which focuses on the fourth and final year of the Civil War is incredible. Lincoln’s run for reelection in 1864 was in deep trouble, and until Ulysses Grant arrived on the scene, Lincoln's generals were not making progress in the war against the South despite having significantly favorable population numbers and factory production of weapons. The public was growing tired of the high cost of the war.

In a graphic manner, Gwynne captured the essence of having been a soldier during the pre-antibiotic era, as well as the generally miserable soldier’s life. Gwynne also told the story of Clara Barton, “the Battlefield Angel.” She had a major impact on the treatment of soldiers both during and after the war, and she was a remarkable woman who took care of the injured troops despite significant prejudice against her presence in the war theater. He also captured the horrors of Sherman’s march to the sea in a way that I had not fully grasped before. Both sides had generals who were making big mistakes which costs the lives of thousands of men.

Near the end of the book, Gwynne addressed both the events which led to the war’s end at Appomattox and the assassination of Lincoln. I love American history and I’m thrilled that I got to read this book. Thanks to Simon & Schuster for providing me with a prepublication copy, and I believe that this nonfiction work has only been released for purchase in the last few days. If you are a fan of this period of American history, then reading this book is a must. Gwynne is clearly a master of nonfiction writing.

Land of Wolves by Craig Johnson

Episode #15 in the Walt Longmire series.

(warning: I've reviewed them all here. Safe to assume that if I keep coming back,  I must be a fan)

In Depth of Winter (#14), Walt took a helluva beating when rescuing his kidnapped daughter, Cady, from the home-base of a Mexican drug cartel. He's back in body, but not in spirit. Scars are slowly healing, but being the modern day embodiment of the stoic loner of the old west, he grits his teeth and deals silently with continuing physical and emotional pains. 

He and a couple WY Game officials are investigating the remains of a sheep found near the camp of a seasonal herd shepherded by a Chilean hired to watch over them in the high pastures during the summer. Predators abound in the mountains, but some evidence suggests a wolf. Unusual because the closest wolf population is in far away Yellowstone, according to a representative of the Wolf Conservancy situated in the Rocky Mountains. 

The obvious question is where is the shepherd? A search of the area finds his wagon near a treeline where the shepherd has been hung from a tree limb. There is evidence that some critter has been gnawing at feet of the deceased. The sheep takes a back seat to the death of a human.

Walt has a couple fronts to address. One is the potential public panic about their new 'wolf problem.' This is a problem that an elected sheriff isn't responsible for. That's the purview of the state's Game authority. But for some reason, the citizens think it's up to Walt, meaning that hunters are coming out of the boonies wanted to be contracted to kill the wolf. The other front is the death of the shepherd. Murder or suicide? Got to settle that first.

What he really needs to settle is his post traumatic stress from Mexico. Blackouts. Unexplained outbursts. Uncharacteristic behaviors toward his staff and the public. If this continues, it may affect his ability to serve as sheriff. Something he rarely has time to consider, retirement, becomes an ongoing internal debate. At least Dog is still there to keep him on course.

Based on the contents of the shepherd's wagon, the guy was pretty well-read, especially revolutionary literature. It's possible he took the job to avoid authorities in South America. The shepherd also had a bit of a relationship with the lady from the Wolf Conservancy. And the shepherd's US employer (a 3rd generation Basque expat), his family and his in-laws have all have had some run-ins with Walt. They've also perturbed the Conservancy lady as well. A more complex puzzle that takes Walt well beyond simply trying to decide if this was or wasn't a suicide.

Full disclosure: Craig Johnson is firmly entrenched in my power rotation. I will read everything he puts out and have no doubt that I will like any Longmire story. Period.  'Nuff said. Yep.

The Netflix series 'Longmire' (6 seasons of binge-worthy quality) is based on the Johnson's characters. Normally, any TV show or movie that comes from published books never do the book(s) any justice. But in this case, I say the TV series is pretty dang close (Come on now. 6 seasons for a total of 65-70 episodes? They must've been getting it right. Fans of the show are fans of the books and vice versa. That rarely happens). When asked, I say that the TV series is perhaps the best casting of fictional characters - Walt Longmire in particular. My suggestion is to watch some (all?) of the Netflix series. Get Walt, Vic, Ruby, the Ferg, Henry Standing Bear, Lucian, and Cady firmly entrenched in your mind's eye. As you read the books, you'll see the characters and story played out in your mind using friends from the TV series. Makes for some first rate, entertaining, and satisfying reading of stories dreamed up by an experience storyteller who consistently delivers the goods.

East Coast Don

The Guardians by John Grisham

Cullen Post, just call me Post, is a lawyer turned minister whose goal in life is to free innocent inmates from prison.  His nonprofit organization, The Guardians is based in Savannah, GA where his staff of only a handful of do-gooders frees on average about one innocent prisoner a year.  Reinvestigating crimes and trials for innocent inmates who have exhausted all other options is time consuming and sometimes dangerous work... especially when the real perpetrators are still around. 

One prisoner, Quincy Miller is convicted of murdering a lawyer in the small town of Seabrook Florida.  The police after finding no clues, no witnesses and no serious suspects arrest Quincy, a disgruntled former client.  Quincy is convicted with planted evidence and junk science from bogus expert witnesses.  Twenty-two years later his appeals have run out and Post decides to take his case.  But as Post turns over rocks and finds proof of foul play, the real murderer intervenes to squelch Post’s investigation by whatever means possible.

Grisham is the legal thriller master of our time.  He has written a book a year since 1991, all number one best sellers and several made into movies, and has sold over three hundred million copies.  The word “prolific” falls short in describing his literary accomplishments.  The Guardians is his latest and maybe one of his best.  He uses his masterful storytelling talent to highlight both racial injustice and the misuse of “junk science” in our country’s law enforcement process… very thought provoking and entertaining… a must read.