One Good Deed by David Baldacci

After fighting in Europe during World War II, Aloysius Archer, (“just call me Archer”) is sent home to Oklahoma only to be arrested and sent to prison for a crime he didn’t commit.  Upon release he hopes to start fresh in Poca City but soon finds circumstances stacked against him.  He is hired by a rich man, Hank Pittleman to repossess a car offered as collateral for a $5000 loan.  Archer visits the man, Lucas Tuttle only to find that Tuttle will repay the loan only if his daughter, Jackie, who has taken up with Hank, returns home.  While Archer tries to negotiate her return, Hank is murdered and Archer begins seeing Jackie.  Archer becomes the number one suspect in Hank’s murder but the detective, Irving Shaw finds evidence leading another direction.  Hank is secretly broke and has a brain tumor.  Shaw sees potential in Archer’s investigative skills, appreciates his honesty, and invites him, a suspect, to help in the investigation.  Soon other associates of Hank’s are murdered including Lucas Tuttle.  Conceding to pressure from above, Shaw is forced to arrest Archer for the Pittleman and Tuttle murders.  Archer without money choses to represent himself at trial.  Contrary to popular belief, this client is no fool.

I enjoyed the flashback to the post-war period and the authenticity of cultural norms of the time.  The lead character is likable and honest to a fault and the plot is complex enough to allow for several outcomes yet simple enough to follow.  This is one of the better Baldacci novels I’ve read and the door is open for a series.

The Source

You better put on your big boy reading pants if you want to take on a James Michener novel. It’s in anticipation of a trip to Israel that I decided to reread The Source, a 1965 novel, a book that I read sometime in the late 60s when I was still a teenager. This novel is 1100 pages long. This is historical fiction at its finest. Michener mixes real figures and real locations with real historical figures and very real places. His research is always remarkable.

Through work at the fictional archeological dig Tell Makor, Michener tells the story of Israel over the last 30,000 years, taking the reader up to 1964. Cleverly, he describes the various societies which began and ended over those times while also using the archeological team to write about current day societal issues. This is a master work from a master storyteller.

Backlash by Brad Thor

#19 in the Scot Harvath series. 

In #18 (Spy Master), Harvath had started to assume the inevitable role as CEO of The Carleton Group because the old man, Reed Carlton, had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's. And while Spy Master presented Harvath in his first attempts at running the show, he was still a field operative at heart. As Carlton's condition deteriorated, Harvath, Lara (his new wife), Lydia (a former CIA boss now Carlton CFO), and a Navy corpsman caring for Carlton have gathered up in Maine to be with Carlton where he was living out his final days. Right up to when Lara screams the last words in #18: "Run!"

#19 picks up right after Lara's plea.  Maine police come upon the house to find four corpses all murdered execution-style. Harvath is missing. Given Harvath's history, the directors of both the CIA and FBI fly in. The local cops think Harvath has gone rogue. PTSD claiming another victim, but neither director buys it.

A transport plane out of Murmansk (way the hell north in the Russian wilderness bordering Finland) has mechanical trouble and is going down hard. Passengers are a team of mercs, their boss, and a single bound, gagged, and hooded passenger. Spirited out of Maine through Canada to Russia. You know who it is. 

But the US government can't really intervene, at least not overtly, even though a Russian incursion on US soil to kill and kidnap US citizens is an act of war. That doesn't stop the FBI's Hostage Rescue director and all the forces behind The Carlton Group from doing what they can to locate and then work up a rescue plan.  

From here on, Thor takes we readers on torturous ride through the Murmansk Oblast as Harvath battles against the brutal winter weather, wolves, frozen rivers, outback towns, a commercial band of mercs (The Wagner Group), helicopter gunships, waist deep blowing snow. Each encounter worse than the previous. The entire story tells we poor schlubs what SERE training (Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape) by the SEALs teaches one when down behind enemy lines.

And while this is mostly a story of chase and evasion, make no bones about it, Harvath has lost three important people in his life. During the hours and days mostly alone and cold in the brutal wintry wilderness, his focus in on two things: survival and revenge. And Thor says it succinctly:  "
Revenge was bitter medicine. It didn't cure suffering. It didn't provide closure. It only hollowed you our further." When he gets out, those responsible will pay, dearly. Harvath is seriously hollowed out.

Hopefully, you all have read a bunch of Thor's books. I started in at the beginning from a casual stroll through my local library stacks and am fully up to date. 19 for 19. And here is what is impressive.
Every one is better than the previous (OK, maybe The Athena Project was a bit of a hiccup). But the development of Thor as a masterful and mature storyteller is something future thriller writers really need to study. In the absence of Clancy and Flynn, if Thor isn't the unquestioned leader of the parade of current thriller authors, he is definitely in the Top 5.

ECD

The Raid by Steven Konkoly

This Part 2. Looks like Part 1 (The Rescue) was about megalomanic named Harcourt attempting to take over the private mercenary business using Aegis Global, his security company. He didn’t, but he did get away to hatch another plan to make him wealthy and win back his lost power.

Part 2 picks up sometime later on the USA-Mexico border. A couple border patrol agents find a half dozen young kids in the desert. And they aren’t Hispanic. European by looks. When checking out the surrounding desert, an explosion takes one agent and the other is killed. Their jeep is incinerated, and the kids are never heard from.

The loss of agents stirs up Senate and House committees. Senator Steele, who lost her husband and child at the hands of Harcourt, has her own private little army and sends Ryan Decker and Harlow McKenzie (and crew, all of whom have a history with Harcourt) to the border to look at the explosion site. What they find is unnerving.

An underground bunker with crates of Javelin anti-tank missiles that have gone missing from some Army ordinance supply. Someone is preparing for war and it ain’t the USA or Mexico. Only other option at this location is a war between the cartels that control drug, money, and human trafficking across the border.

Harcourt has somehow convinced some Army brass, a Senator and a Congressman that the problem with the drug trade is that it is uncontrolled. So why not start a war amongst the major cartels, supply one group with advanced weaponry, and sit back to watch the well-armed cartel take over and then control border crossings while laundering money to the officers and elected officials.

Almost sounds like Iran-Contra from the 1980s. Konkoly’s bio says he is former military and the plot is replete with street and desert battle details that lend considerable authenticity to the story. And he has over 20 books to his credit meaning a mature presentation. Maybe not having read The Rescue is at issue, but I really didn’t get much of a feel for Decker, Harlow, Senator Steele or any of the other supporting characters (except maybe Garza and he appears to be new to the series). The other thing that nagged me was the dialogue. We all hear about the banter that goes on in stressful situations, but to me, this ‘banter’ seemed forced, bordering on juvenile. Just before a parachute jump, Decker says to a buddy, ‘See you on the ground.” His buddy says, ‘Not if I see you first.’ That kind of stuff is all over the story. Good grief. Read some George V. Higgins or Charlie Stella or Brian Panowich or Chris Offut to see how dialogue is meant to be delivered. Having said that, I did like the story. A lot. 

East Coast Don

 

The Dead Don't Sleep by Steven Max Russo

Vietnam, 1969. A squad of hunter-killers is tracking a suspected VC courier. The hunters provide overwatch and the paired killers do what they are trained to do. The courier's throat is slit by one of the killers. A young girl exits a hut. The other killer grabs her and, to keep her from alerting anyone to their presence, slits her throat then turns to let her body fall. The first killer raises his .45 and shoots her partner in the head.

Current day. Northern NJ. Bill Thompson and his Uncle Frank are shoot traps. Frank is down from rural Maine taking some time to resolve the recent death of his wife. He is staying with Bill and his wife and 2 young sons. In the parking lot, Frank bumps into a member of this shooting club who seems to recognize Frank from somewhere, but can't place it. 

That night, Bill's house is shot up by automatic gunfire. Frank and Bill give the police their statements, but really have no chance of finding who did it. Frank thinks that accidental bump may indeed be something from his past and elects to go back home early to avoid more incidental contacts.

The guy's call sign was Jasper. His local friends from his days in 'Nam are Birdie and Pogo. Jasper is certain that Frank is Bull, their team leader who suddenly disappeared after a patrol that left one of their team dead. Despite being armed versions of The Three Stooges, they track Frank back to Maine intent on evening the score for their fallen comrade.

Frank has figured it out, too and prepares for a possible attack. Bill is also worried about his uncle and drives up to Maine. When they finally connect at Frank's old hunting shack, the Stooges attack. Stunned by the intensity of the assault, Bill is seriously spooked. But Frank seems far too calm. He tells Bill, 'Remember when I said I wasn't Rambo? Just a grunt in 'Nam? Well, I lied."

I liked this one. I liked Frank especially. Maybe a relative of Bob Lee Swagger? Sure could be. A lot of this book was from the viewpoint of the Stooges as they plan, track, and kill their way to Maine towards their appointment with fate. That it's predictable isn't the issue. It was a fun summer thriller. You should find it. This is Russo's 3rd or 4th novel. I plan to look for his earlier books.

Thanks to NetGalley. Publication date November 2019.

ECD

The Cask by Freeman Wills Crofts

Early post World War one, London dockworkers are unloading a shipment of French wine. One of the casks of wine is dropped spilling bit of its contents. Not wine. But sawdust (ok, maybe packing material), gold coins, and alarmingly, a female corpse. The import company and the local police start tracking the cargo back to Paris  . . . and I put it down.

The premise was promising. Turns out this is the republication of the original l924 copyright. Now I like 'historical fiction', but I guess what I like is a modern author trying to paint a picture of the past. Not so much to read a book actually written at that time. All I could see in my mind's eye were the all they trite stereotype of the ramrod stiff Brit and the formal dialog we associate with the time. Couldn't get past all that.

ECD

The Bitterroots by CJ Box

Bozeman-based PI Cassie Dewell is hired by a defense attorney to mostly verify the facts turned over during discovery. Dewell, being a former cop, doesn't really care for defense lawyers but takes on the job for a variety of reasons. She still doesn't like it, though. And that that corner of the state is in the midst of its largest wildfire in recent memory.

Blake Kleinsasser, the oldest of 3 sons born into a family that controls a small county up near the Bitterroot mountains. He's accused of abduction and rape of his niece and the evidence against him is formidable. Blake was in a blackout drunk when the alleged rape occurred. The lawyer wants the evidence verified so she can talk Blake into a plea deal. Family issues and the line of succession for the 70,000 acres of the Iron Cross ranch mean that should Blake be convicted, he would be cut out of any passing along of family assets. 

When Cassie arrives to essentially dot i's and cross t's, but runs into wall after wall after wall. She's getting fed up with being stonewalled, was even tossed into jail for a night, her Jeep was burned, her motel room bugged, and threatened most every day. Only once she tracks down a former employee of the ranch does this morass of dominoes start to organize and fall into place, which also has a tentacle to her son's interest in a new student in school back in Bozeman.

While CJ Box is well known for his Joe Pickett novels, this, his 4th Cassie Dewell book, is equal to the task. Box is more than just Joe Pickett. It's his stories and how he develops them that sets Box apart from the rest of the numerous pretenders. So go ahead and start reading CJ Box for Joe Pickett, but stick with him as he develops Cassie Dewell. You will not be disappointed.

ECD