Michael Connelly, Daniel Silva, C. J. Box , Louise Penny - a second look at various books

Various books listened to:

I’ve continued listening to audiobooks which we’ve already reviewed just for the pleasure of listening to old mystery/thriller masters like Daniel Silva and Michael Connelly. 

For Silva, I just finished listening to both The Unlikely Spy and The English Assassin which were the first two books in the Gabriel Allon series.  In the second one, Silva broadens the picture of the international ring of assassins with the character Michael Keller. These books were among the first ones that were reviewed by me in 2009 when this blog began, and ECD reviewed the second one more thoroughly in 2011. And now I've added The Confessor to the list, and this one might be Silva at his very best. Silva takes us back through the history of the Catholic church's lack of action during the holocaust when the church essentially supported the slaughter of jews by the Germans and helped hundreds to thousands escape punishment by hiding in convents and gaining passage to South America. A new pope is intent on correcting those wrongs, but Crux Veritas, a secret corrupt society within the papacy which was bent on assassinating the pope before his planned appearance for an apology at the synagogue in Rome (an apology that happened by John Paul II in 1998). In April 2023, I reviewed A Death in Vienna again, the fourth one in the Allon series. In Chapter 17, the account of Allon's mother of her survival experiences in the Holocaust was told in audio form for Vad Yashem, the memorial in Jerusalem for the survivors of that horror. Now, I find myself debating which was really the best of Silva's novel, and this book deserves mention in that debate.

For Michael Connelly, I’ve recently listened to The Black Echo, The Black Ice, The Poet, The Narrows, Echo Park, and The Overlook. Given that those books have already reviewed, sometimes by more than one of the men at Men Reading Books, it is unnecessary to review them again.

I've added C. J. Box's first Joe Pickett book to the list of audiobooks revisited: Open Season, which I reviewed in 2011, thanks to Midwest Dave. Listening to the book was a great way to remember Pickett and his introduction of the main characters he would follow over the course of his books. I think I'll get the second Pickett book, Savage Run, just for more fun. (See my original review from 2011, and the addendum written now, in 2023.)

I listened to the Louise Penny novella, The Hangman, reviewed here in 2015, during my morning walk. One hour and 22 minutes of such a skillful story told in audiobook form. What a delight. The second Gamache novel was A Fatal Grace, originally reviewed here on 12/1/13. I've listened again, and I'll restate, "what a pleasure." I just got through The Cruelest Month, which was reviewed in 2014, and I've added to that time review. Please search for that. This story was masterful. The book in Penny's series was The Brutal Telling was originally read for this blog in 12/13. It may have the most complex plot as Penny shows her skill at taking the reader down one rabbit hole after another as she writes about  Gamache's efforts to solve the murder of a woman with a bow and arrow. She also perfectly describe the struggle that painter Peter Marrow has with his narcissism and the damage it causes to his relationships.

My point is merely that there’s a reason certain authors have made it to the top of our list of great 

 story tellers, and it’s a pleasure to take the time to read them again.