{read: Irish thriller} Ratlines by Stuart Neville

Ireland is one of the countries that offered asylum to the Nazis after WWII, but now, just weeks before JFK is scheduled to visit, someone is killing them. Albert Ryan, a man who fought in the war and now works for Ireland's Directorate of Intelligence, is tasked with getting to the bottom of it. But what he finds is that it's not quite as simple as it seems. He gets pulled into a tangled mess of intrigue and the bodies start to pile up. Can he find a way out?

I had discovered Stuart Neville years ago with his first novel, The Ghosts of Belfast, which featured an IRA hitman who is haunted by the 12 men he killed and, once released from prison, sets out to kill those who had engineered their deaths. (That's the first of a trilogy.) This standalone didn't disappoint, and the end is especially chilling. Neville excels at creating damaged male characters who fight against right and wrong, all the while knowing that a "normal" life will always evade them and death is just around the corner.

Ratlines by Stuart Neville (Soho Crime, 2013)
My rating: 4 stars

{read: mystery from the archives} Just One Look by Harlan Coben

If you're a Harlan Coben fan, you may have read this one years ago. If you're not, this is a good intro to a popular mystery author. I discovered it thanks to my mystery book club and found it to be tightly paced, if a little confusing. 

I admit I had trouble keeping track of all the characters and eventually went with a just-keep-reading-and-it-will-all-become-clear eventually approach. (I don't believe in keeping lists of characters if I'm reading for fun.) This strategy left me a little baffled at the end, but mostly I got it.

The story starts with a U.S. attorney meeting with a mafia hit man, who confesses to killing his sister years ago. The attorney thought his sister had died in an accidental dorm fire. Fast forward three months, and Grace Lawson's world begins to unravel when she picks up her roll of pictures (yes, some people still use real film and get pictures developed) and finds an old picture with several people, one of whom appears to be her husband. Then her husband disappears without a word after she shows him the picture. No one can be trusted, everyone who wants to help her has their own agendas, and Grace is thrown into a world she doesn't understand.

Some of the secondary characters, like the next-door neighbor and the paid assassin, are just as engrossing as the main characters (and perhaps more so). While female characters often end up being the victims, the women in this book take charge and don't wait around for things to happen. They assess the situation, make a plan, and get moving. Maybe that's why I liked it.

  
Just One Look by Harlan Coben (Signet, 2005)
My rating: 3.5 stars

{read: South African psychological mystery} Dead Before Dying by Deon Meyer

The title of this book led me to expect a plot-drive, character-light, predictable mystery with a few twists and thrills. I couldn't have been more wrong. The characters were well-developed, and it was as much an exploration of why people behave as they do when they commit crimes as it is a police procedural.

Capt. Matt Joubert is still in bad shape two years after his wife, a vice cop, was killed in the line of duty. His work has suffered, and his new supervisor has laid down some clear expectations. Not only must his work improve, but he must also become healthier, losing the weight he's gained. He's also required to see a psychiatrist. Joubert complies, although not always happily, and in the meantime tries to solve a series of murders in which seemingly unconnected people are being shot point-blank. Could it be politically related? Are the Chinese involved? A series of bank robberies may be connected, and it's up to Joubert to untangle both cases while confronting his personal demons.

The style of this reminded me of the Scandanavian authors such as Jussi Adler-Olsen, and the exploration of the psychology behind the crimes reminded me of Irish author Tana French. If you like either of these writers, I'd recommend this book.

Dead Before Dying by Deon Meyer (Little, Brown and Company, 2008)
My rating: 4 stars

{read: murder and PIs, Chicago-style} We All Fall Down by Michael Kelly

This is the fourth in the series featuring Chicago private investigator Michael Kelly, a former cop. (Start with The Chicago Way if you're new to the series. It will be confusing to jump in mid-stream.) This is another great Michael Harvey read with short chapters and a fast-moving plot. A lightbulb that could be filled with anthrax falls in the subway, and the city and feds move quickly to contain any possible threat. Yet people with mysterious symptoms start showing up in the hospitals and dying. As the death tolls mount, the scientists try to uncover the threat and discover a vaccine, yet everything is not quite as it seems. Harvey does a good job of explaining the bioterroristic aspects of the plot in a way that's easy for regular people to understand, and, as always, he has a tight handle on the culture of Chicago and its seamier underside. 


I enjoy Harvey because his writing style is clean and tight and reminds me of Dennis Lehane, who as careful readers will know, is one of my favorite authors. (I'm excited to see what he does next now that Patrick and Angie seem to be retired from the PI biz. But I digress.) Harvey does for Chicago what Lehane did for Boston, although I confess that I got a bit lost on some of the political twists and turns. I guess that's Chicago.


We All Fall Down by Michael Harvey (Knopf Doubleday, 2011)
My rating: 4 stars

{read: Do you believe in miracles?} The Unspeakable by Charles L. Calia

The plotting, character development, and pacing of this debut novel make up for the writing that could still use some editing, especially after p. 50. A priest has to investigate a friend from seminary who has lost his voice (although medical experts agree he should be able to speak) and is healing people at his Minnesota church, which has a special congregation of deaf, mute, and mentally challenged people. To complicate matters, $12,000 are missing from the nonprofit he used to lead. The story flips back and forth between the past and the present and illuminates these two priests and the circumstances that have shaped their lives.

Just when you think the story is straightforward, another twist is introduced and you see another level of complexity. Nothing is quite as it seems, and you're not even sure if you can trust the priests as they look back on their pasts. What aren't they telling us? What are they making up? What have they changed? It's a testament to the power of the story in this book that I was able to look past the editing flaws, which increase as the book goes along. These usually throw me right out of the story, but I found this book hard to put down and am looking forward to finding some more work by this author.

The Unspeakable by Charles L. Calia (William Morrow, 1998)
My rating: 4 stars

{read: Swedish crime thriller} The Hypnotist by Lars Kepler

Although he (she?) is billed as the next great Swedish author, Lars Kepler (the pen name of a couple) lived up to the hype. Think Stieg Larsson minus the social commentary and history, but keep the unexpected plot turns, suspense, and believable characters, and you have Lars Kepler.

The story starts out with a gruesome massacre, and hypnotist Erik Maria Bark is called upon to hypnotize the gravely wounded son, the only witness, so that the police can try to identify and catch the killer before he find's the family's other remaining living member, the boy's sister. But what Erik finds out surprises Detective Joona Linna, who has a track record of always solving his crimes. As they begin to act upon what they learned, they discover there are unforeseen consequences of Erik's action. Ten years ago, he promised that he would never hypnotize anyone again after an incident involving one of his patients. In addition to this, he's also dealing with his own problems, including a prescription drug addiction and a marriage that's falling apart. Just like in real life, everything seems to fall apart at once for Erik.

The many layers of this complex story kept me turning the pages. Just as one plot thread seems to get resolved, another one develops and moves into the forefront. What you discover in the end isn't what you were looking for in the beginning. I'm looking forward to the next translations of Kepler's work.

The Hypnotist by Lars Kepler (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2011)
My rating: 4 stars

{read: private investigator mystery} The Cut by George Pelecanos

Although some of my mystery book club members have raved about George Pelecanos, this is the first book of his that I've picked up. He introduces a new protagonist in this one: Spero Lucas is a 30-year-old Iraq vet returned to his native D.C. area. He's picked up work as an unlicensed private investigator and specializes in finding things and taking a 40 percent cut of whatever he finds. But when he starts to investigate the burglary of some Fed Ex-ed marijuana for an imprisoned drug dealer, he finds things are more complicated than they seem.

While one of the book's promo blurbs touted Pelecanos as one of the crime thriller writers who elevates the genre into literary fiction, similar to Dennis Lehane (whose books I love), it didn't quite reach that level for me, although it was definitely entertaining and held my attention. Lucas seemed to have elements of Robert B. Parker's Spenser and Michael Harvey's Michael Kelley in him. Curiously enough, he also reminded me somewhat of Seth Quinn in Nora Robert's Chesapeake Blue, the fourth book in her Chesapeake Bay Saga.

For those interested in the local music and restaurant scene in D.C., this would also serve as an excellent travel guide.

The Cut by George Pelecanos (Hachette Book Group, 2011)
My rating: 3 stars

{read: mystery} A Very Simple Crime by Grant Jerkins

This mystery reminded me of James Patterson. That might be good for author Grant Jerkins, since Patterson is a hot author these days, but it wasn’t a hit with me. The chapters are very short, which made the story choppy, and the characters felt superficial.

A Very Simple Crime is the story of two brothers. The wife of one ends up dead after being left alone with their son, a mentally retarded man prone to violence. Throw in a prosecutor who is desperate to regain his reputation after setting free a serial child killer and being relegated to processing traffic violations, and you have all the elements you need for a great thriller mystery - but for me, it didn’t get there. There was a lot of violence against women in this book, and I thought that it seemed gratuitous. Perhaps it was supposed to show the character (or lack thereof) of the two brothers, but I thought that Jerkins got carried away. I had high expectations for this book based on its reviews, but I was disappointed.

A Very Simple Crime has been optioned as a screenplay, and it almost seems like Jerkins was writing more for Hollywood than for the reader. It will probably make a better movie than it did a book. I wouldn’t read another one by him.

A Very Simple Crime by Grant Jerkins (Berkley Trade, 2010)
My rating: 2 stars

Welcome to {th}ink!!

Welcome! {th}ink is a breath of fresh air to help you move beyond your usual work/family/life routines. We offer a fun, easy approach to craft projects that you can actually finish in your spare time, as well as candid reviews of a wide array of fiction, mysteries, and memoirs. Come {th}ink with us!

Erin Young
Hi! I'm Erin, and I'm the co-author of {th}ink. I will share my thoughts on the books I'm reading -- what's good, what's so-so, and what you shouldn't even waste time trying to read. When possible, I'll also include upcoming author appearances for books I review. I'm a magazine editor for a nonprofit educational association, and I spend my spare time reading, playing with our two mastiffs, volunteering at the Elmbrook Humane Society, and watching movies and football.




Alicia Markey
Hi! My name is Alicia and I am the co-author of {th}ink. I will run more of the crafty end of the blog. As a Graphic Designer, I spend most of my time on the computer. I enjoy crafting by hand, but have limited free time. Most of my time outside of work is spent with my adorable one year old, Aaron, and my husband, Shawn. We enjoy an active lifestyle and are always on the run. This blog will provide busy moms, or any busy individual some creative short projects. Well, the projects might not be small, but we will take our time creating them step by step! I hope you enjoy the journey.