Nothing to Lose——by Lee Child

Jack Reacher is a former Marine M.P who is a drifter, traveling from Maine to California for no particular reason, in no particular hurry. He finds himself at the outskirts of Despair, Colorado, having passed through Hope, which is 17 miles behind him. He travels light, with only a toothbrush and an ATM card, buying clothing from thrift shops when his become soiled, occasionally staying in cheap motels, but often washing in gas station restrooms and sleeping under the stars. He seeks out a restaurant for a cup of coffee. The waitress ignores him. He waits. For quite awhile as other patrons eat. Nobody seems to notice him. Finally a car pulls up outside the restaurant and four men emerge, moving into the restaurant and to his side. He speaks to them, stating he needs no company with his breakfast. They tell him that he’s not going to get any breakfast. He’s not welcome here. They don’t like strangers in this town. Reacher could have just returned to the highway and walked the 17 miles back to Hope, eaten there and taken another route west, but he didn’t like being pushed around so he refused to leave. This led to his arrest and subsequent conviction for vagrancy. He was escorted to the edge of town and told not to return or he would be incarcerated.

As Reacher walked on the highway away from town, he was picked up by a police officer from Hope, who gave him a ride and some advice. She explained that she’d come this way to save him another long walk and to warn him that strangers were not welcome in Despair. He should take another route. Questions posed to her regarding the reasons for such treatment met with unsatisfactory responses and his curiosity was piqued.

It seemed that Despair was a company town. Everybody who lived there worked for the same man, who owned a recycling plant and most of the real estate and the businesses in the town. It was a closed society; visitors were unwelcome, but why? What was so interesting about recycling? Being Reacher, he decided not to go the other way, but to investigate what was going on. The sheriff from Hope let herself get more involved than she should have as he attempted to solve the mystery.

It’s easy to get involved. I did. I found the book to be well written and a good mystery.

Swan Peak——–by James Lee Burke

Louisiana lawman Dave Robicheaux and his wife Molly and their friend Clete Purcell travel to a friend’s Montana ranch to spend some time fishing and relaxing, away from the hectic pace of post-Katrina New Orleans. Rather than spending peaceful time enjoying the beautiful scenery and resting, they find themselves involved in the mystery of the murder of two college students in the area. Another murder, that of a couple found at an Interstate rest stop nearby, promotes speculation that a serial killer is preying on the area.

Dave and Clete offer their assistance to the local sheriff in investigating the deaths. As they begin to delve into the lives of the deceased, they find connections to an evangelical preacher and to an extremely rich family, who live like feudal lords on a huge estate in the Swan River Valley, protected by unsavory men who could have connections to the mob. The wife of one of the family members was a professional singer prior to their marriage and had been engaged to a man who was sent to prison in Louisiana for the death of a man who was beating a woman. While in prison, Jimmy Dale was sodomized by a guard and attempted to kill the guard with a shank before escaping, only to turn up in Montana seeking his former fiancée. The guard travels to Montana seeking revenge, believing Jimmy Dale would turn up there looking for Jamie Sue.

The plot has many twists and turns, involving the FBI as well as local law enforcement and the descriptions of the locale are both accurate and often breathtaking. Insights into the behavior and motivation of humanity are thought provoking. This is an excellent story.

Plague Ship ————-by Clive Cussler with Jack Du Brul

The ship Oregon is in the Persian Gulf, returning from a secret mission against Iran, when it discovers a cruise ship, adrift, with no signs of life. Upon inspection they find that everyone on the ship, hundreds of people, are dead. No apparent cause can be discovered, but one lone survivor may be the key to the mystery. Before a thorough inspection of the ship can be completed, the ship explodes and sinks.

Investigative efforts reveal that the passengers on the ship had all been part of a mysterious cabal known as Responsivists, who claim to be aiming to save the planet by reducing the birthrate drastically over a short time period. Their followers are committed to voluntary sterilization, but this alone will not solve world population numbers. Their leaders have discovered an ancient secret in a cave in the center of a seven thousand plus archipelago in the south Pacific. This secret will enable them to set loose an easily transmitted, deadly plague that will kill a huge proportion of the world’s population. The idea is to save the planet from destruction. It would be delivered by infecting the passengers and crews of cruise ships, where it would be transmitted through the air vents. The germination period would be about two weeks, so they would not become ill until they returned home and infected many others.

The perpetrators of this scheme were not really interested in saving the planet, but acquiring wealth and power. It was up to Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo and his crew to discover the nature of the killing plague and to prevent the Responsivists from decimating the planet.

The plot was interesting and the story held my interest. I recommend it.

Portrait of an Unknown Woman

by Vanora Bennett

Portrait of an Unknown Woman, by Vanora Bennett, explores life surrounding Sir Thomas More and painter Hans Holbein, through the eyes of a young woman in the household.

For art lovers and fans of historical fiction, Vanora Bennett’s Portrait of an Unknown Woman (HarperCollins, 2007) is a fascinating read.

The 1520s and 1530s are filled with religious upheaval, with Martin Luther’s Protestant reformation sweeping across Europe, and King Henry VIII eventually leaving the Catholic church to obtain a divorce and marry Anne Boleyn.

Life in Sir Thomas More’s household

The novel is centered around Hans Holbein’s nearly identical portraits of Sir Thomas More’s family, painted five years apart.

The intricacies of family life are shown through the eyes of Meg Giggs, the adopted daughter of Thomas More. She is intelligent, observant, and schooled in healing, but she doesn’t seem to have the love she wants from her adoptive father, and he seems to be doing nothing about arranging a marriage for her.

She has fallen in love with her former tutor, John Clement, who has opened her mind and shares a talent for the healing arts. He loves her also, but says that More won’t give permission for them to marry until John establishes himself in the physician’s college.

Hans Holbein

While she is longing for John, painter Hans Holbein arrives from Germany to create a family portrait. With danger and upheaval over the new Protestant religion at home, there aren’t many people commissioning portraits. Holbein has come to England to build his career, leaving behind a wife (pregnant again!) and children. He is rough and homely, but very perceptive of others’ feelings, and Meg feels herself drawn to him as well.

Problems and Secrets

There are secrets in the household, however. Is the tortured heretic hidden in the gatehouse really there for his protection? What is John Clement’s true identity, and what other secrets does he carry? What is Elizabeth, Meg’s foster sister, hiding? And how much does Thomas More know about the goings-on in his household?

Early in the novel, More is high in the court of King Henry VIII, and moving higher. He is a devout Catholic, though, dedicated to wiping out heresy wherever he finds it. When More places his faith above his king’s desire for a divorce, he falls from grace. Plague also visits the city, and the More’s aren’t as isolated at the family manor as they thought.

For art lovers

Holbein returns again to paint a nearly identical family portrait. Art lovers will enjoy the historic details about Holbein, painting, and technique, but especially the symbolic differences between the two paintings. The second version is shown on the back endpapers. The first was lost to fire in the 18th century, but a sketched plan is included in the front of the book. Readers will find themselves flipping back and forth as seemingly minor details become significant through the story.

Bennett has included a number of surprising plot/character twists (no spoilers here). Readers will finish the book fascinated with 16th century life, pleased with the depth of characters and Meg’s growth as a woman, and possibly asking a few more “what ifs” than before.

Bennett is an accomplished British journalist. Portrait of an Unknown Woman is her first novel.

Blasphemy

by Douglas Preston

Deep underground in a mountain in the Arizona desert a select group of scientists work in secret on a supercollider that is primed to investigate the Big Bang theory. None of them is particularly religious, but there are questions about what the ramifications might be if they are able to unlock the mysteries of the universe. What if they create a black hole that could potentially destroy the earth?

The land has been leased from the Navajo tribe, who have misgivings about the sanctity of their nearby burial grounds. A mission church nearby is headed by an oddball preacher, who believes the mission of the scientists is to destroy religious belief.

Wyman Ford is sent by the science advisor to the President of the United States to secretly check on the project and determine its progress, or lack thereof for the enhancement of the upcoming election battle.

Upon his arrival at the site, Wyman decides that something strange is going on there, but he can’t quite decide what. The man in charge is charming and appears to welcome Wyman into the group, but remains circumspect as to their progress. Meanwhile the strange preacher has been posting warnings on the Internet that the project is going to produce Armageddon and that people must join him at Red Mesa to protest the project and shut it down. The suicide of one of the scientists seems to give some more credence to the idea that something is amiss in the project.

The preacher reaches a televangelist who takes up the preacher’s ravings and produces mass hysteria nationwide. Wyman is still trying to decipher what is going on inside the mountain on the computers, but with little progress. What he discovers could be life changing—if it’s true. He believes not and seeks to prove it.

Very interesting plot that keeps the reader involved to the end.

Killer Heat

by Linda Fairstein

Assistant District Attorney Alexandra Cooper is the special prosecutor for sex crimes and crimes against women. Much progress has been made in the last 30 years in prosecuting rapes in the United States. Alex is involved in a trial of a man who had escaped from a rape trial 35 years prior, when he would probably have been acquitted and had subsequently committed many more rapes over the next twenty years. He had been brought in after a cold case was reviewed and DNA evidence connected him to the case from 35 years prior.

Concurrent with her prosecution of Warren, Alex becomes involved in a series of recent murders of young women that appear to be connected. These crimes appear to have been committed by someone who leaves no clues, or DNA. The victims seem to have nothing in common and no motive is apparent. The police are considering the possibility of a serial killer.

The plot involves the New York mob syndicate and a connection is finally made to a Manhattan bar where at least two of the young women have been patrons. Good sleuthing and many interesting plot twists occur. It’s a well-written thriller and I enjoyed it.

Sail

by James Patterson

Katherine Dunne decided to take her three children, Carrie —a college student, Mark—a high schooler, and Ernie, age 10, for a vacation on the family’s sailboat in order to try to improve her relationship with her children. Ever since the death of their father, things had not been good with the family. Katherine worked too much at her profession as a heart surgeon and the children resented their new stepfather. She talked her former brother-in-law, Jake, into captaining the boat for the trip that was to cement the relationship between mother and offspring.

From the beginning the trip got off to a poor start, with the children bickering and complaining. The boat developed mechanical trouble and they ran into a fierce storm, which threatened to sink the boat. They sent out a signal to the Coast Guard giving their location and requesting help. After being battered by the storm, they determined that help was not forthcoming. In celebration of their survival from the storm, their uncle tossed the kids into the sea and they were all swimming and playing in the water when the ship blew up. Jake was severely burned in the explosion. They began to suspect that this was not all coincidence when the Coast Guard never did respond to their SOS. After spending days in the water, Jake died of his burns and the family finally drifted to an uninhabited island.

Who would stand to benefit if they were never found? Who would inherit the millions left to the family from her first husband? These and other questions will be answered as the story continues.

This was a good, quick read and was well written in the enjoyable style of James Patterson, one of my favorite authors.

The Dark Tide

by Andrew Gross

The story begins when Karen Friedman learns that her husband has doubtless died in a commuter train explosion. She is shocked and horrified at becoming a widow in her 40’s after 18 years of marriage. She was now the single parent of two young children, who needed her comfort and support, when she felt she could hardly function, herself, in her grief. No body was ever found; therefore closure was made more difficult. Identifying the victims was nearly impossible the explosion was so devastating. The family was trying to cope with their loss when a detective comes to the home inquiring about a bicycler who was killed in a hit-and-run accident the same day as the explosion. The detective implies that it may not have been an accident and asks if Karen knows the man. It seems that a slip of paper in the man’s pocket had her husband’s name and phone number on it. He seems to think there may be some connection between the two deaths.

As the plot plays out, the connection proves out and leads to many twist and turns revealing that Karen never really knew her hedge fund manager husband or the people he did business with to provide the family with the luxuries they enjoyed.

Gross has co-authored several books with James Patterson and the pacing and plot twists are reminiscent of Patterson’s style. A very good mystery.

Blue Heaven

by C.J. Box

Twelve-year-old Annie and her ten-year-old brother, William, go fishing near their small northern Idaho community and accidentally see a murder in process. The children are spotted by the shooters and pursued. They narrowly escape into the thick woods and continue to evade their pursuers, who turn out to be retired L. A. policemen gone bad. The entire community is searching for the reportedly lost children, unaware that they are fleeing for their lives. The retired cops convince the local sheriff to allow them to “help” them in the search, but use the sheriff’s trust to give them free reign to silence the children before they can tell what they saw.

Another retired policeman arrives in the area seeking information about some marked bills from a California robbery/homicide some years back , his only unsolved death case. The case has bothered him and he wants to try to resolve it before he can enjoy his retirement.

A local rancher finds the two children hiding on his ranch and trusts their story enough to get involved.

Many twists and turns provide plenty of tension to keep the reader involved. A good read.

Time Is A River
by Mary Alice Monroe

This is a story within a story, of a survivor, Mia, who goes to a retreat in the Appalachian Mountains to gain some perspective after her battle with breast cancer. Its aim was to teach women the art of fly-fishing, but the opportunity to bond with other cancer survivors and create a support group was implied. The teacher was a warm and empathic woman named Belle.

When Mia returns early to her home in Charleston, she finds her husband has been unfaithful and she return to the mountains seeking a place to hide out and regroup. Belle allows her the use of her fishing cabin for the summer and Mia begins to rediscover some of her past interests that had been set aside during her marriage, as well as continuing her new interest in fly fishing. Before she left for the summer, Belle’s only request for the free use of the cabin had been that Mia not delve into the family scandal surrounding her grandmother. Very soon Mia finds herself fascinated with a diary she finds in the cabin that was written by Belle’s grandmother. Unable to keep her word to Belle, she begins to try to unravel the truth of a 70-year-old mystery, feeling great affinity with the grandmother, who is deceased.

Mia meets a man while she is fishing and forms a friendship with him around their common interest.

The story is well written and interesting on several levels; Mia’s self exploration, the mystery surrounding Belle’s grandmother and the tentative steps toward intimacy after mastectomy. I recommend it.