Tag Archives: novel

N is for Noose by Sue Grafton (1998) – BR00077 (1999) – 🐸🐸🐸🐸⚪

The PolyBlog
October 10 1999

Plot or Premise

Kinsey Milhone takes a case in a small town. Dead is a cop, apparently of a heart attack. But his wife, unloved by the community and perhaps deservedly so, knows that something had been bothering her husband before he died, and now she wants to know what, for her own peace of mind. So she hires Kinsey to find out what was going on, but not everyone shares the wife’s desire to know. Kinsey finds out relatively quickly that the cop had been investigating a year-old murder case, that originally looked like a suicide by hanging (hence the title). However, the method of suicide exactly matched another case, so he knew it wasn’t suicide — hence an investigation that had been going nowhere. Worse still, the only suspects were in the small town, and most of them were friends. Kinsey searches, finds the original path of inquiry and starts digging. In the process, she gets beat up, warned off, almost fired, belittled by her client, and pretty much treated badly by everyone in the town when they find out she isn’t the innocent little camper people mistook her for at the beginning.

What I Liked

The story is pretty linear, although Grafton takes her own sweet time bringing Kinsey to see it. There’s a short intro to some problems with Rosey back home, obviously something to come up again in a later book, but most of it is just Kinsey alone in the small town getting nowhere. Once she cottons on to the real path, the investigation is pretty straight-forward, but she doesn’t see the result until it is almost too late. There’s some really weird stuff at the end to do with some drugged-out hallucinations, and it makes for an interesting incapacitation plotline.

What I Didn’t Like

Grafton takes a little too long to get to the investigation, almost like the story started out as a short story, with all the stuff at the start added to expand the length. Although the tightness of the ending makes the story move along, it all wrapped up too quickly.

The Bottom Line

Solid entry, a different location than most of the stories.

Striking Out by Alison Gordon (1995) – BR00062 (1999) – 🐸🐸🐸🐸🐸

The PolyBlog
October 10 1999

Plot or Premise

This is the fourth in the Kate Henry series and is the best so far. Kate is bored — there is a strike in the major leagues and she doesn’t know what to do with herself. So she focuses on her home life. Then Andy Munro gets shot in the line of duty, and Kate is pretty much on her own while Andy recuperates. Lots of tension as Andy deals with the aftermath of being shot.

What I Liked

The focus of the story is on a homeless woman named Maggie who has disappeared, and one of her favorite resting places is covered in blood. On top of that, a mutilated corpse turns up with a very large knife that Maggie used to own. A corpse of someone who knew who Maggie really was, knew her past, and was therefore a threat to Maggie’s security. Some really seedy characters populate the story, including a two-bit child pornographer who has a heart of gold for helping street people.

What I Didn’t Like

Of course, there is the requisite protagonist-in-jeopardy part, but at least Andy isn’t automatically there to save the day.

Disclosure

I was am not personal friends with the author, but I did do interact with her online.

The Bottom Line

Well done and the best so far

The Corpse at the Haworth Tandoori by Robert Barnard (1998) – BR00066 (1999) – 🐸🐸🐸🐸⚪

The PolyBlog
October 10 1999

Plot or Premise

A young man goes to work for an artist in an artist commune, helping the aging artist by mixing the paints and holding the palette, as well as general valet duties. The painter begins a new painting and it is better than anything he has done in a long time, but with his resurgence in art comes a growth in a sense of foreboding around the relationship with the young man. Numerous references are made to the fact that there are unspecified things that the man just wouldn’t do. As the painting nears completion, the young man senses a change coming. A nude body of a young man is found in the trunk of a car parked behind a restaurant (hence the name of the book), and the police begin to investigate the boy’s identity.

What I Liked

The book is really well-written, and it is done out of linear time. The book opens with the police finding the body, and then just as they trace the young man to the artist’s commune, the story switches back in time to several months before when the young man first arrived at the commune. Then it follows the young man through his arrival at the commune, his integration into the community, and his relationship with the artist, right up until the impending change. Then it switches back to the police who finish off the investigation. A major twist at the end was easily seen beforehand, but there was still a second twist within the twist.

What I Didn’t Like

The second part of the twist opened up a lot of doors but the police never go through any of them, unfortunately. For example, the twist opens up a lot of avenues related to the psychology around the death of a child, the loss of a loved one, the loss of a friend, etc. As well, there is the end of one part of the story, a key ingredient, which is never touched upon at all. I found a lot of loose threads that could have been really interesting; instead, the book is wrapped up quickly, almost like the author was afraid to go near the deeper issues.

The Bottom Line

An excellent mystery but a few threads were left hanging.

The Eleventh Commandment by Jeffrey Archer (1998) – BR00057 (1999) – 🐸🐸🐸⚪⚪

The PolyBlog
June 5 1999

Plot or Premise

Connor Fitzgerald is an assassin for the CIA. Black ops at its best. But when the CIA director orders a hit, and then wants to hide her involvement from the President, she tries to send Fitzgerald on a one-way futile assignment to Russia to prepare an assassination of the Russian Premier. Fitzgerald’s ex-mentor gets involved and figures out the plan, but too late to save CF from getting caught. A couple of twists later, however, and Fitzgerald is back in the States with the same mission — kill the Premier while he sits next to the President.

What I Liked

The storylines were inventive and well done. Not quite at the level of Clancy or De Mille, but well done still. The writing is first-rate and the story moves along at a good clip.

What I Didn’t Like

The relations between the CIA and Fitzgerald, and between the CIA and the Oval Office are not sufficiently fleshed out, leaving the story as having a little too light touch for the genre. Also, a couple of the twists are too well-telegraphed and you see them a mile off. And a small twist at the end, although expected, is handled far too lightly for the likely reality of the situation.

The Bottom Line

The story moves along at a good clip.

Riding the Snake by Stephen J. Cannell (1998) – BR00054 (1999) – 🐸🐸🐸⚪⚪

The PolyBlog
June 5 1999

Plot or Premise

Stephen J. Cannell is a writing success on TV and this book is no exception. It takes a wealthy playboy (who never measured up to his father’s standards) and a black female cop (who came from the streets) and throws them together to investigate a crime committed by Asian tongs. About the only thing missing from the demographics are gays because we also have Russians and international intrigue. The short plot summary is that playboy Wheeler Cassidy loses his seemingly straight-laced brother to an Asian tong war involving immigrants “riding the snake” to America and the “free” elections in Hong Kong as it reverts to Chinese rule. Along as his investigative partner is a black cop, Tanisha Williams, being investigated for having ties still to her “hood”, and therefore assigned to a desk in the Asian bureau of the LAPD. She investigates the death of Cassidy’s brother and the brother’s secretary, and it all leads to Hong Kong — taxi to the airport!

What I Liked

A weird series of events leads from Hong Kong back to L.A. and more fights with the tongs, and a Russian nuclear bomb that has been smuggled into L.A.

What I Didn’t Like

Basically, the writing is fine, but the book is what happens when you take a Tom Clancy-type story, replace the spooks with characters from your average cop story on TV, and run it along the same TV format plot lines. No depth here, but it hits all the major story headlines from the popular press.

The Bottom Line

Holes all over the place but a fun ride.