It’s a Mystery: Memory Man, by David Baldacci

Memory Man by David Baldacci

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Giving this book 4 stars, even though I was not able to finish it. The concept of a man who cannot forget absolutely anything is very intriguing, but this poor main character was afflicted with this condition after discovering the bodies of his murdered family. The writing was competent, but this character’s life was so terribly miserable and depressing that I found myself unable to read to the end. Empaths beware. Otherwise, if you don’t mind this sort of thing, this could be a great story.



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Modern Lit: The Child Finder, by Rene Denfeld

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Naomi Cottle is a civilian investigator specializing in finding children who are missing and presumed by police to have been abducted. Like many PIs in this genre, she is dedicated to her work to the point of obsession, driven by her own personal demons. Naomi’s unique set of experience, insight, and motivation stems from her own childhood, when she made an escape from the clutches of a pedophile. Her current case centers on Madison, a little girl who disappeared 3 years ago into the wilds of Oregon when her family ventured out to find the perfect Christmas tree.
While most mysteries focus on procedural details, The Child Finder is quite different. Readers do follow Naomi’s search, but her reactions and thought processes are the focus. Interestingly, those of Madison and her abductor are also revealed in chapters describing how she tries to adapt to her strange, frightening new life. Her abductor is a trapper, a loner who has learned how to live under the radar, his point of view is also presented.
Though very dark, this is a novel about the resilience of the human spirit and its ability to survive terrible, incomprehensible circumstances. The writing is intelligent, controlled, and frequently luminous. As Naomi begins to recall more of her own horrific past, as the abductor recalls his own fearful childhood, and as Madison finds creative ways to sustain herself through her own fear, it becomes possible for the reader to develop a glimmer of understanding about how and why crimes such as this occur.
Not an easy read, but a worthwhile one.

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It’s a Mystery: Pieces of Her, by Karin Slaughter

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Andrea Cooper has never wondered much about her mom, Laura, a respected speech pathologist living in a cottage by the shore. Like most of us, from time to time she’d question her about her past, in a general sort of way, always pretty sure about the woman Laura was. Then came the day when their mother-daughter birthday lunch was interrupted by gunshots which take down two customers. Understandably terrified, Andrea cowers helplessly behind Laura, and is stunned to witness her mom coolly take charge of the scene by killing the shooter before he can murder anyone else. As the media frenzy and the police investigation ramp up, Laura forces her daughter to go on the run, providing her with a detailed plan, a burner phone, and a handgun. Don’t, she warns Andrea, even think about returning to the state until she calls her with the all clear.

Thus begins a saga in which a hapless, badly frightened, and insecure young woman embarks on a harrowing mission to discover who her mother really is, and, in the painful process, discovers herself. This enthralling tale bounces between two separate narratives, one gradually revealing the shocking details of Laura’s past, and the other chronicling Andrea’s own coming of age in the present. There are countless heart stopping, heart breaking moments for each as they grapple with and dodge the deadly fallout from events that occurred thirty two years ago, shortly before Andrea’s own birth.

In an era in which strong female protagonists are valued in novels, Karin Slaughter comes in with two. While Pieces has a complicated plot, the complexities of their personalities are just as engrossing, as are the positive changes that we witness evolving within them. What fills the novel with topical relevance is that the themes over which the decades-old conflict of the plot was waged are still threatening ordinary citizens in the present day. It’s always heartening when a best selling thriller author    writes cogently about things that really matter, in addition to providing good  entertainment.

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It’s a Mystery: Under a Dark Sky, by Lori Rader-Day

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Still reeling from her husband’s death nine months earlier, Eden Wallace finds among his papers a reservation for the lodge at Michigan’s Dark Sky Park, a star gazing resort, scheduled for what would have been their wedding anniversary. Eden is petrified by darkness, but decides to face her fears by keeping the reservation and facing up to them at the park. She’s dismayed and disheartened from the moment she arrives and discovers that the accommodation is comprised of individual suites with shared public spaces. A mini college reunion has also been booked, by a 6-member coterie of former students seeking to rekindle their once-close friendships. They’re no happier than Eden is about the situation, and while they must accept her, they treat her with undisguised hostility. Eden chooses to stay overnight and depart for home early the next morning. Sounds like a plan, until, in the middle of the night, she is awakened by screams emanating from the kitchen. One of the men is lying dead on the floor with a screwdriver protruding from his neck. Now, no one is free to leave.

This is a small town with a small police force inexperienced in investigating murder. They are suspicious of all of the lodge’s residents, who are all suspicious of one another. During the course of their inquiries, it will become apparent that all of them have their own deep, disturbing secrets, Eden included. Watching the cat and mouse game unfold provides surprises for the reader and for the characters themselves. This is an intriguing mystery, narrated solely in first person by Eden, who arrived overwrought and grows ever more so as the tension ratchets up. Each character, whether police or suspects, are finely drawn, believable in their actions and reactions, with personalities all their own, and this is the strength of this novel. The suspects in particular must come to terms with their pasts, which, of course, some accomplish better than others. Parts of the narrative grow repetitive and verge on hysteria, and probably could have been edited down a bit, but otherwise, this is a reasonably tight, well crafted plot that holds attention right to its ending.

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It’s a Mystery: The Colony, by F. G. Cottam

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

There’s nothing like an enigmatic, unsolved mystery, especially a true one, to excite public (or private) interest. Hoping to inject new life into his ailing newspaper, fabulously wealthy media mogul Alexander McIntyre mounts an expedition to New Hope Island, planning  to get to the bottom of the abrupt disappearance of a fringe religious cult that settled there more than a hundred years ago.  McIntyre believes that aliens were involved (really!), but he  hires the best experts in the fields of archaeology, ufology, epidemiology, parapsychology,  and security, building them a state of the art base camp on the barren island, to uncover the truth, whatever it is.  He also sends his star reporter along, to file up to the minute reports on the team’s progress, thereby increasing circulation among spellbound readers.  But serious, unexplained problems arise from the moment the team sets foot on the island, not the least of which is that their communications center simply will not function, leaving them marooned in the presence of some very malevolent forces. Very soon, some of team are dead and gone — literally.

F. G. Cottam is skilled at combining the genres of thriller and paranormal, and The Colony is right up there when it comes to meeting his readers’ expectations. I would describe this one as disconcerting rather than horrifying, but subtlety is something I much prefer to graphic gore. What I particularly enjoyed was the in depth viewpoints provided by the various experts, and subplot  involving the young daughter of the team’s psychic and a maritime marine museum curator. Some of the characters were one dimensional, but others were more developed, depending upon their importance in the plot. When the deaths occurred, it would have been interesting to  know what became of their bodies, but perhaps that’s to be revealed in sequels to The Colony. Overall, this is a well presented paranormal mystery, but……

Evidently, this book was initially released only in a digital version. I acquired a print copy published somewhat later, by Ipso Books. Perhaps The Colony was spookier and more suspenseful than I found it to be. The reason I’m not certain is that my attention was constantly disrupted by what appear to be a very poorly edited text. Did you know that churches have “knaves”, photos can be “matt”, and punctuation can be omitted in very long sentences? My favorite gaffe is as follows: “They were helpless, no more any of them really he feared, than prey. (Bit of a weird sentence here, doesn’t really make sense.)”

Enough said. Despite all the annoying errors, The Colony was a pretty good story, sufficient to make me ignore my irritation to soldier on to the end. Properly published, it probably would have been even better.

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It’s a Mystery: The Janus Stone, by Elly Griffiths

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Ruth Galloway is a skilled forensic archaeologist working in Norfolk, England, the site of many iron age and Roman settlements. Ruth is single, stubborn, and tough, and now, she’s pregnant. The father is Detective Harry Nelson, as stubborn and tough as Ruth, and married. As she’s struggling to decide if and when to tell him, Ruth is called to examine the skeleton of a child found buried under a doorway at a demolition site where Roman ruins have been uncovered. An ancient sacrifice to the god Janus, or the more recent burial of a murder victim? The case gets even more perplexing when a second child skeleton is unearthed, this one without its head, and when the skull is found in an old well, things become downright sinister.

Elly Griffiths has turned out a complex plot rich with intriguing characters, some recurrent and others case-related. Her Norfolk is a watery, frequently misty county with just the right atmosphere for a murder mystery and she seamlessly works in lots of mythology and folklore. The tension ramps up incrementally for both Ruth and Harry, personally and professionally, and there is no shortage of possible perpetrators with viable motives. The final chase scene is masterful. The book has one major flaw, in that even after being on the receiving end of multiple threats, the usually intelligent and rational Ruth continues to return to the dig site alone at odd hours of the day. But it’s worth overlooking in favor of enjoying a gripping first rate mystery.

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It’s a Mystery: The Nature of the Beast, by Louise Penny

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, reeling from the traumatic outcomes of his last few cases, has retired and moved to the insulated country village of Three Pines with his wife, Reine Marie. (It makes one wonder why he’d choose a spot where murder happens on a ongoing basis, but there you have it.) Their peace and joy are suddenly marred, however, when a young boy is found murdered in the woods. Gamache takes on a mystery of global proportions as the facts of the death come to light, in his unaccustomed role of consultant to his successor, Chief Inspector Isabelle LaCoste. What they find is a huge rocket launcher, buried in the underbrush, and etched with a horrific image of the Biblical Whore of Babylon. And it’s aimed at the United States.

How do an imaginative child, two secret service clerks, a retired physics professor, a Vietnam era draft dodger, and a serial killer figure into this story? As is usual in a Louise Penny novel, time will reveal all, with a lot of input from Gamache and company. There are some chilling scenes in this novel, as when he interviews the fiendish serial killer, as well as some additional murders. And as usual, the ending is satisfying, leaving no pesky loose ends, but it also leaves some disturbing moral ambiguities. Thought provoking as always and well worth reading, based upon a true situation.

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It’s a Mystery: The Fabric of Sin, by Phil Rickman

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

It’s a mystery to me why Phil Rickman remains largely unknown in America, seeing as how he’s a very talented writer who combines the mystery, paranormal, and historical fiction genres like nobody else. His Merrily Watkins series, set in present day England, features a female vicar charged with being the “deliverance” (read “exorcism”) minister in her parish and its environs. Merrily has a daughter, a young teen in the earlier novels and a young woman in the latest, and a significant other, former rock legend Lol Turner, who play prominent roles in all her deliverance activities. Other colorful characters from the church and the village round out the cast. Rickman’s characters are always richly developed, whether they are pro-or-an-tagonists.

In The Fabric of Sin, the action is placed in the Duchy of Cornwall, the province of Prince Charles, who looms large in the background of this investigation. The Reverend Mrs. Watkins is called out to look into a frightening paranormal incident that took place at the Master House in remote Garway. The Duchy owns this ancient property, rumored to have been inhabited by none other than the Knights Templar, and wants to clear matters up so that its restoration can continue unencumbered. Merrily finds this easier said than done, since the church, the villagers, and the Duchy all have their own hidden agendas. As usual, Mr. Rickman incorporates authentic and vivid atmosphere, historical background, psychological suspense, and subtle supernatural elements to produce an engrossing set of mysteries and murders for Merrily to tackle. This is a series that never disappoints.

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It’s a Mystery: Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn

Fatal attraction, two ways

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Nick and Amy approached their marriage in the same way most Americans do, by trying their hardest to please each other and submerging any personality traits or personal desires that might be viewed as negative. According to comedian Yakov Smirnoff, who also has a master’s degree in psychology, “Falling in love is a chemical reaction. But it wears off in a year. That’s why you need a strong line of communication… which includes laughter.” Like many couples, Nick and Amy never considered the possibility that the chemistry would change, and when it did, they checked out of their relationship without ever trying to adapt. This story is related by two supremely unreliable, self absorbed narrators, Nick and Amy themselves, who haven’t the faintest clue how to confront and resolve their problems. When they reach the end of the rope during their 5th year together, Nick plunges into a secret affair and Amy devises a diabolical way to teach her husband the lesson she believes he needs to learn.

The plot of Gone Girl is a like the one in the old movie, Fatal Attraction, but Amy is a much smarter avenger than the Glenn Close character. As in Fatal Attraction, Amy has ample reason for her fury against her lying, cheating husband, which is certainly justifiable, but she goes way over the top in the way she expresses it without ever recognizing her own role in their crash and burn. Throughout the first three quarters of Gone Girl, Amy is far and away the crazy one. Then the pathology deep in Nick’s character begins to assert itself, and by the denouement, many other people undeservedly become collateral damage in their catastrophe. This is a creepy, amoral couple who clearly deserve each other. Gillian Flynn handles all this mayhem with flair and elegance. Her presentation of Nick’s take on the marriage when juxtaposed with Amy’s makes the reader wonder if she’s talking about the same relationship; there is not a breath of honesty to be found. And the suspense, which at times is agonizing, never comes to an end , not even when the book does. What starts out slowly becomes un-put-downable. Noir fiction at its best.

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Thriller: The Whisperer, by Donato Carrisi

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Italian screen writer Donato Carrisi enters the serial killer genre with his first novel, The Whisperer, which has won multiple, well deserved literary prizes and has been published in multiple languages. The angle in which he presents this case is a fresh one, in which two criminology specialists join local police to track down a killer who has murdered 5 young girls and appears to have abducted an 6th. The perpetrator knows much more about the police than they do about him, and he delights in tormenting them with severed arms, dolled up corpses, and dead end leads. This main theme is surrounded by multiple subplots which involve individual investigators on the team, each as compelling and important as the main plot, and just as surprising. As a result, the reader experiences pretty much what the investigators experience. Furthermore, we are never informed as to where these crimes are taking place, though the atmosphere is more European than American; it’s easy, therefore, to understand the fact that this type of evil is universal. This is a tough book to enjoy, because of its horrific chain of evidence, but the constant cycle of dashed hopes, uncertainty, and psychological discoveries make it impossible to abandon. It could easily be the stuff of nightmares, but the writing is controlled enough to avoid turning it into a slasher movie. I wish I could have read The Whisperer in the original Italian, because while the translation is competent enough, you can tell that the translator is not a native speaker of English, and I suspect that some of Carrisi’s polish is dulled in places.

Recommended for readers interested in mysteries that challenge the intellect as well as grab and hold one’s interest. Not an easy book to forget, on par with The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.

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