Mysteries Galore.com

Archive for June, 2010

Reviewed by Allen Hott

Plots, subplots, nuances, thrills, and chills. That just about aptly describes Just One Look by Harlan Coben. Coben is one of the best at what he does and this is one of his best. Mystery lovers have to love this one.

Grace Lawson finds a very strange photo mixed in with a group that she picked up at the photo mart. The photo shows what she believes to be her husband with a group of other people from quite a while back. The photo definitely was not in the roll of film that she had turned in for developing.

When she shows the photo that evening to her husband he disclaims it but then later in the evening he leaves without telling her where he is going or why. And then he doesn’t return the following day. Grace goes to the police to report him missing but the police do not take it seriously as they feel her husband for one reason or another wanted to take some time off. Read the rest of this entry »

Reviewed by Teri Davis

Back in the middle ages, King Edward in England sent one of his trusted advisors to take a census of those within his boundaries for the purpose of discovering all the taxable income. This was knows as Domesday Book. Oddly, a few areas that were visited were listed as “wasted”. Why? What did wasted mean? Why would any area be listed as that?

Also listed in the book was the prophesy listing all the future popes until the end of time. Each was properly named and described in the book. Unfortunately, the book has been misplaced or hidden. What other secrets do the book hold?

Sigma (the good guys) and The Guild (the bad guys) are racing to discover the secrets in The Domesday Book and the two follow no rules in keeping the other from discovering what is in the book. Added to that are challenges of today such as overpopulation and world hunger. Read the rest of this entry »

Reviewed by Nancy Eaton

Emma Cross left her position as a CIA agent and accepted a job with St. Kilda’s consulting firm. The new position should be much less dangerous. At least, that is what Emma had hoped.

St. Kilda and Emma begin to track a yacht, Blackbird. Blackbird is almost identical to a ship that disappeared a year ago. The frightening thing is that Blackbird is going to be used in a very nasty way against an American city. MacKenzie Durand is a special ops leader who has been through a very rough time in Afghanistan and as a result, ended up the only survivor. He joins Emma in trying to find Blackbird.

Mac and Emma are not the only interested parties in the yacht. There happens to be several interested parties out there. Who are they and what do they want? Read the rest of this entry »

Reviewed by Nancy Eaton

When I was a young child, I loved to read mystery books like Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys. Well, The Tilting House would have fit right in with these great books.

The real estate agent showed the Peshik Family a house on 1418 North Holly Street. The house was the cheapest in the neighborhood and also the largest. Why was it so cheap?

Once inside the house, the family was in for many surprises. Brothers Josh and Aaron could not believe their eyes when they saw certain things about the house. Their father was very taken with the house. He was really intrigued with what he saw on the walls. Words, numbers, diagrams and drawings were scribbled in pen and pencil all over the walls, railings and most of the floor. What did all of these symbols mean? Well, the father would not think of painting over all of this. He considered it to be a work of art. Read the rest of this entry »

Reviewed by Caryn St. Clair

When readers were introduced to Iris Oakley in Nightkill, she was a keeper in the big cat area of the Finley Memorial Zoo in Vancouver, Washington. Because she is now pregnant, she is not allowed to work around the cats and so readers find Iris in the bird department when Did Not Survive opens. Readers might assume then that the mystery in this book would involve birds. They would be wrong. Although readers do get a close up of the behind the scenes action in the zoo’s bird exhibit, elephants are the primary storyline in this second entry in the series. But cat fans will not be disappointed either as the Clouded Leopard figures into this book’s plot as well.

While the pacing of the book reflects the day in and day out routine of a zoo, the plot is stuffed full of action. It starts when Iris finds Kevin Wallace, one of the zoo administrators, unconscious and bleeding on the floor of the elephant barn cornered by Damrey, the zoo’s older elephant. While everyone except Sam the head elephant keeper is convinced Damrey is the culprit behind Wallace’s injures, no one can figure out why was he in the elephant exhibit in the first place. In the meantime, things at the Big Cat heats up. The Clouded Leopard gives birth and the staff if forced to say goodbye to one of its oldest and favorite animals. But then things get really strange. Someone begins snatching some of the animals-including the corpse of one recently departed! Read the rest of this entry »

Reviewed by Allen Hott

The title is certainly appropriate! Although The Chinese Fire Drill is in fact a very short novel it is about as complicated as the proverbial Chinese fire drills we have all heard of or witnessed.

Anthony Holton is a fairly well known writer who has won a Pulitzer Prize and now resides in Bangkok. He receives a disturbing phone call from a friend of his friend, Jake McKay. McKay is a character actor who has been acting in movies for many, many years and moved to Hong Kong to enjoy life and be able to act if and when he chose.

However, the phone call informs Holton that (a) McKay’s boat (which is his most prized possession) had been stolen several weeks ago and (b) now McKay, himself, is missing. The caller is Kate Longley who along with Boomer Crane resides in a house rented by Jake McKay. The arrangement is strictly financial as rents are so high in Hong Kong that quite often roommates are needed to pay the rent. She does however stress to Holton that McKay had asked her to contact Holton and ask him to come to Hong Kong prior to his turning up missing. Read the rest of this entry »

Reviewed by Russell Ilg

Jon Land, by far one of the greatest thriller writers of our time, returns to the shelves with the second novel in the Caitlin Strong series, STRONG JUSTICE. These days, with seemingly everybody writing thriller novels, Jon Land has set himself apart from all the rest with a novel that is so different that none of them can compare to his genius.

Caitlin Strong is a fifth generation Texas Ranger who has teamed up with one of the greatest bad guys of her time to take you on the ride of your life. The story sweeps back and forth though between the lives and legends of her father and grandfather, two of the greatest Rangers who ever lived. They inspire her to be the very best of the best and to always do the right thing no matter what the outcome or cost.

Written well before the headlines of today, Land prophetically includes all that is happening along the Mexico border, and reveals that these are not new headlines at all, but actually go back to the very time when the Texas Rangers were formed. She remains involved with Cort Wesley Masters, the most notorious outlaw in modern Texas history, and his sons who she has taken on as her own, the older of which finds himself targeted by a serial killer with over 400 victims to his deadly credit. Caitlin and Cort Wesley chase that serial killer and drug lords back and forth across the border in a nonstop, no-holds-barred trill ride that will keep the lights on till you finish this amazing novel. Land throws a few surprises into the mix just to make sure you never think of putting the book down. And anyone who does will miss out on the return of the prequel’s most fascinating character, a former Venezuelan assassin who is now the protector of the poor Mexicans he sees as his redemption. But Guillermo Paz has his own agenda as well, which includes uncovering secrets in Caitlin’s past that were never supposed to come to light. Read the rest of this entry »

Reviewed by Douglas R. Cobb

A mysterious ring engraved with an undecipherable message that people are willing to die for…a laptop computer that contains information that can unlock untold wealth, if one only has the proper key…and, revenge, sweet, sweet, revenge. No, I’m not describing a new Fox reality television show–these are some of the plot elements of the newest thrilling Jason Bourne novel, The Bourne Objective. It’s by author Eric Van Lustbader, who took over Robert Ludlum’s series and has written four Bourne novels previous to this one, the eighth in all. I have not read any of the novels until The Bourne Objective, and have only seen the first movie based on the series starring Matt Damon; but, I gotta say, this novel rocks–it’s filled with action, adventure, and has plenty of plot twists and turns.

I’m not sure how the Jason Bourne series has lasted this long, because it is about a man–Jason Bourne–who is the product of the covert Central Intelligence program Treadstone, which was intended to create soldiers and/or assassins who were highly skilled in subjects like languages, and especially in martial arts, and weapons–and a big part of his appeal is that he has no memories of his former life. Well, rather, he has occasional, fleeting memories, triggered by seemingly random sorts of things, like seeing certain pictures, being in certain places, or meeting people from his past life, or seeing people who resemble them. So, how can the series have reached its eighth book, without Bourne remembering by now everything from his earliest traumatic toilet training episodes on to the present?

Don’t be like me and ask silly, foolish questions like that one–just accept the fact that, though Bourne is a man who knows very little about his past (still), he knows enough about how to kick some ass to do it about a million different ways, and that’s the main reason why the Bourne series, like Ian Fleming’s James Bond novels, continues to be immensely popular. Read the rest of this entry »

Reviewed by Patricia Reid

A small sip of mineral water bottled years and years ago sends Eric Shaw on a terrifying journey into the past and into the mind of Campbell Bradford, long dead but not forgotten.

Eric worked in films in Hollywood and returned to Chicago when things began to unravel in Hollywood. His current occupation is doing video life portraits that consist of preparing video montages for memorial services. At the memorial service of Eve Harrelson, Eric meets Alyssa Bradford, Eve’s younger sister. Alyssa is impressed with Eric’s work and hires him to travel to French Lick and West Baden, Indiana to discover the meaning of a light green glass bottle with etching that said Pluto Water, America’s Physic. The bottom of the bottle had an etching of a devil with one hand raised. Alyssa’s 95 year-old father-in-law had brought the bottle with him when he ran away from home some 80 years ago. Read the rest of this entry »

Reviewed by Caryn St. Clair

There exists in the Southwestern United States, an exotic flower called the Night Blooming Cereus. The bloom, a magnificently scented white flower, lasts for only a few hours one night during the early summer. This flower is often referred to as the Queen of the Night. So it’s only fitting that a book in which the anticipation of the yearly event figures heavily in the plot would be called Queen of the Night.

This, the fourth Walker Family book by Jance, has a very “current events” feel to it. Dan Pardee and his dog Bozo are part of the Shadow Wolf, a group of ex-military Native Americans who work under the border patrol keeping watch along the part of the Mexican-United States border that is on the reservation. While they are supposedly part of the anti terrorism unit, the only action Dan has seen involve drug smuggling and illegal immigration. So when he comes across a massacre of four people while out on patrol, his first thought is that it’s a drug deal gone bad. But several things at the scene just don’t add up, and soon Dan is working with Brian Fellows, the Pima County homicide investigator to figure out what caused this horrible crime. When Fellows became involved, little did he realize it would tie into a cold case. That link to the cold case brought Brandon Walker, a retired cop now working with cold cases in to the investigation as well. What Walker didn’t know was that the cold case was ultimately tied to Walker’s family. Read the rest of this entry »