The Word is Murder

 It always amazes me when I run across yet another prolific mystery writer that I’ve never heard of. Anthony Horowitz is one such person, a British novelist and screenplay writer. He has a 14-book series about a teenage spy named Alex Rider, but that’s not the one I just finished. He has written about 50 novels in total. I saw a recommendation in the New York Times Book Review for his 6-books called the Hawthorne & Horowitz series. These are detective novels in which he writes himself into the story. It is the authors intention to create a series in which he becomes the best friend of a great detective like Sherlock Holmes and his buddy, Dr. Watson. The detective in Horotwitz's story is Daniel Hawthorne.

The first book, The Word is Murder, is available in audiobook format, so I jumped on that. The books are Narrated by Rory Kinnear, and he is an exceptional interpreter and creator of the multiple figures about whom Horowitz writes. In this story, the characters get to know each other, but they hardly achieve anything close to friendship until the very end of the novel. The story takes place around the horrible car accident in which one of two young brothers is killed, and the other is left permanently damaged, requiring lifelong care. Even though the woman, Diana Cowper, who was driving the car that struck the boys fled the scene of the accident, she was only given a sentence, the equivalent of only a slap of the wrist. It was 10 years later that Horowitz & Hawthorne enter the scene of the death of the woman who had struck the boys. She had expected to die in the immediate future. The reader meets her as she enters the funeral home owned by funeral director Robert Cornwallis where Diana announced her detailed plans for her own funeral. Meanwhile, although Hawthorne will reveal nearly nothing about himself to Horowitz, it is Hawthorne who challenges Horowitz to write a novel about his detective wizardry. 

As with all great writers, I did not see the end coming until the very end. This book is filled with rich characters and a fascinating main plot and multiple subplots. While I loved the audiobook, surely this would be a wonderful read. I’ve already downloaded the second book, The Sentence is Death.

Harvest Season

 

It has happened again, unfortunately. I read the first book in the series The Seasons of Carnage, the book having been Tourist Season. I liked that book well enough to read the second one, Harvest Season. However, I did not get very far with this audiobook. Perhaps the best part was the prologue in which the author warned the reader about the multiple kinds of trauma that would be involved in the story. Really, it was an invitation for voyerism, which of course is a part of the character of this reviewer. Clearly, the author has vast knowledge of those subjects, or at least, a great imagination. 

The story in Harvest Season has to do with the romantic relationship of two serial killers. Admittedly, I did not get very far with the story. While I did not find the two readers to be problematic, the material was just too silly and almost flap stick. There are times when I like wisecracking detectives, but somehow, this story just did not grab me. I felt nothing in common with the primary characters, and I did not care what was going to happen to them. I was only into the book a short way when I chose to abandon the effort, and I'm not interested in reading the third novel that has been promised.

Ironwood

 

Connelly is the king of thrillers and the men at MenReadingBooks have read most of his 40+ novels. Just one year ago, I read and reviewed the first book in a new series, Nightshade, which I rated very highly. The author is able to keep his stories and characters very interesting and believable.

In Ironwood, Detective Stilwell suspects that one of his new deputies on Catalina Island is a serial killer. A murder has occurred, but it happened a few years earlier, and this became a thing when the woman's bones were uncovered in a remote area of Catalina Island. It turned out that there have been a series of murders of women who were hiking alone through wilderness trails in California. Stilwell continues to get flack from his captain who works out of his office in Long Beach. When the protagonist is trying to set a trap, another one of his new deputies is murdered, and a second officer is shot in the throat but survives. It seems corruption is rampant on Catalina.

Once again, Stilwell, or "Stil" as he is called by most people he knows, has found life on Catalina as highly desirable, compared to his life on the mainland, or "overland" as the people on Catalina call it. Usually, as was initially the case with Stil, a transfer to Catalina was a punishment for having done something wrong. However, he began to realize that being sent to the island was just what he needed. His girlfriend Tasha has been promoted to acting Harbor Master, and their relationship is evolving. The story involves corruption, cartel murders, small crime, and Stil's relentless pursuit of clues in the face of a captain who is mostly focused on any publicity that would make his operation look bad. 

I consumed this story in audiobook format, and the reader was excellent. Like nearly all of Connelly's books, it gets a highly favorable review from me. You won't be disappointed.

The Keeper

 

I should start by saying I've not been attracted to Tana French's writing for many years. I have reviewed six of her books, but none lately. My reaction to her is suprising to me since she has been revered by so many readers, and she obviously has a huge following. I got this book in audioformat and I tried to listen to it twice, about two weeks apart, and I simply could not concentrate on the material. When my mind wonders to the grocery list or some item on my to-do list, it's not a good sign. I did not get far in the book, probably less than 30 pages. I found the audiobook's reader to be a bit too melodramatic, so maybe it was the reader, maybe it was the material - I suspect it was a little of both. I can't give this successful author a good review or recommendation for purchase of this novel. I decided the book would not get a third try, so I'm returning it unfinished to Libby.

Judge Stone

Judge Stone was co-authored by James Patterson and Viola Davis. There are at least a dozen reviews in this blog of Patterson’s prolific works, but most of those have been written by other reviewers. I tend not to seek out his books. However, because Viola Davis, an incredible actress, was his co-author and because she was reading the entire story for the audiobook, I chose to take it on. Those were good decisions.

The novel is about a 13-year-old black girl, Nova, who was raped in Alabama, and then she became pregnant. She knew her mother did not believe in abortion. At the young of age 28, her mother had already birthed four children, and Nova was the oldest who was immediately given responsibilities to help raise her siblings. Feeling caught between her own wish to abort the child and her fear of her mother’s reaction to learning she was pregnant, and when was having significant first trimester symptoms, Nova went to the school nurse who then discovered her pregnancy. At the time, Alabama had the most strict anti-abortion laws in the country. Anyone who was found to have assisted another person to get an abortion was guilty of a Class A felony, meaning a long jail term. The nurse then took her to a local doctor who knew the law, but who disagreed with denying this child an abortion.

Viola played the role of Judge Stone who then contended with the controversy when the abortion became public news.  The doctor was arrested. The DA was relentless in pursuing the doctor’s punishment. The case landed on Judge Stone's docket. She was under assault by the town people, as well as the thousands of people that descended on the small town to protest with religious fervor.

I thought this book addressed all of the social issues involved in this story with compassion. The cast of characters, those that supported Judge Stone and those who hated her, was a very rich and powerful novel. While some of the details were predictable, the ending was not what I expected. Although heartending, it was so enjoyable to hear Viola address this most important topic with depth and wisdom. This was a 5/5 read.

 

The Silver Fish

 The Silver Fish by Connor Martin is an espionage story that mostly place in West Africa, mostly in Ghana. It caught my interest based on the location. I’ve not often seen a thriller novel based in West Africa. I was in both Senegal and the Ivory Coast several decades ago, and my daughter just returned from a work project in Ghana. I remember eagerly listening to a professor who had moved to a remote area of Nigeria in the 1930’s. I hoped that this novel would live up to the spellbinding experience I felt in those lectures. Unfortunately, the quality and vitality of the story simply didn’t measure up to my expectation. The book opened in Ghana with the assassination of a Nigerian telecommunications executive, and then quickly turned to the efforts by both China and the United States to have controlling interest in Ghana’s local politics.

Primarily, this novel was based on the location of Ghana being where undersea high speed telecommunication cables came together. Thus, whatever information the United States was sending overseas would have to pass through these fiber optic cables. The Chinese were trying to tap into the cables in order to know what the U.S. was doing, and the U.S. was trying to keep them from doing so. Various spies, including double agents were involved in this effort, and large bribes were being paid to local politicians as well as operators of these systems. A journalist was trying to get information about this high profit enterprise for the story of her lifetime. 

Although I did finish the book, I never got particularly interested in the outcome for the protagonist, Danielle Moreau. While James Aidoo, a young male Ghanian was sometimes interesting, his presence had an uncertain importance as he interacted with both Chinese and American agents. So, as the book wore on, it just never led me to be excited about the material. I can’t give a favorable recommendation for this novel.

Seldom Seen Road

Seldom Seen Road by John Degen (Latitude 46 Press)

I just finished Seldom Seen Road, a new murder mystery by John Degen. This is Mr. Degen’s third novel and the first featuring Mark Roth as a widower amateur detective. 

The setting of rural Ontario north of Toronto allows Degen to use his detailed knowledge of the area to immerse the reader into Mark’s daily life. The local color, especially the diner where everyone knows your business (even if they don’t know your name), compliments the narrative. I appreciated the balance of detail and action; I rarely skipped ahead to get with the story. 

The murder of Paul Robichaud, a local environmental activist, is the hub of the wheel with excellent choices of spokes to support a complex but not too burdensome storyline. Mark Roth is assisted by his cousin Jeremy Roth who works as a constable and his daughter Stephanie, a criminologist in Thunder Bay. These characters serve as solid counterweights both in solving the murder and supporting Mark as he struggles to find his way after the unexpected death of his beloved wife. The plot has a nice proportion of lines including a uranium mine, aggressive real estate development, and an evolving marijuana trade. 

I really enjoyed reading this one. Not as much “can’t put it down” as “this was so engaging I didn’t want to”.