The smell of smoke. The cries of fire. The whirling
stampede toward the exit only to find the doors blocked. Worst fears realized
with six left dead…only there was no fire. Now the hunt is on to track down a
killer who uses fear as a weapon to perpetrate his terrifying crimes.
Solitude
Creek is master storyteller Jeffery Deaver’s latest
installment in the Kathryn Dance series. Dance, a body language expert and
investigator with the California Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and her team are
playing beat the clock to capture a twisted killer bent on perpetrating more
attacks.
While Deaver’s character Lincoln Rhyme has a well-honed
eye for detail and a Sherlockian ability for crime solving, Dance is more of a
hoodoo guru, using a bit of pseudo-science to track her prey. While I am a fan
of the criminal minds, profiler genre I find Dance’s character a little tougher
to grip and hold my attention. Solitude
Creek didn’t serve up the usual heaping helping of Deaver twists and turn
in the plot.
Flame
Out – M P Cooley (William Morrow)
Author M P Cooley (not sure what the MP stands for)
caught the attention of mystery/thriller fans with her debut novel Ice Shear featuring former FBI Agent
June Lyons, who returned to her small town roots in Hopewell Falls, New York,
to be a cop alongside her police chief father. Ice Shear was selected by O (Oprah Winfrey) Magazine as one of the
best book of last summer and notched a starred review from Publishers Weekly.
Cooley and Lyons are back with a sophomore effort, Flame Out which finds Lyons plunged
headlong into a dual track case; a current case of a badly burned women she
rescues from a burned out factory and a mysterious body found in the
subbasement of the factory that could date back to a notorious crime her father
supposedly solved some three decades earlier.
Cooley knows how to push all the right buttons mixing a
supposedly charming small town, with its own unique, checkered, underbelly and
the loyalties of family and cops to ratchet up the story.
The
Enemy Inside – A Paul Madriani Novel - Steve Martini (William Morrow)
I’ve got to be honest; for me the so-called legal
thriller has become a tough sell. With the likes of John Grisham, Scott Turow
and Linda Fairstein as confirmed masters of the form, I have always struggled
to delve deeper into the genre and lately the masters have quite caught my
attention.
Steve Martini has carved out a strong and steady career
in the realm and is out with his latest entry, The Enemy Inside; which posits
the plotline of a young man arrested for DUI who finds himself facing kicked up
charges when the women who’s vehicle he struck ends up dead. With the current
caseload a little on the sparse side, Paul Madriani, Martini’s long time lead
character, and his team take the case. Turns out the kid wasn’t under the
influence, but her can’t explain how he came to be at the scene 50 miles from
home and involved in the wreck.
Almost on cue the evil empire types who tend to lurk in
the background of so many of these stories sink their tentacles into things and
mystery, already hard to grasp, delves deeper. While I don’t think The Enemy Inside will light the form on
fire and start a fresh stampede of legal thrillers like The Firm or Presumed Innocent,
it does offer enough hooks and interesting characters to keep you engaged.
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