Mini-Review: “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot” by David Shafer (Mulholland)

August 8, 2014 Civilian Reader Review Mulholland Books, Sci-Fi, Thriller

A peculiar, but well-written novel

The Committee, an international cabal of industrialists and media barons, is on the verge of privatizing all information. Dear Diary, an idealistic online Underground, stands in the way of that takeover, using radical politics, classic spycraft, and technology that makes Big Data look like dial-up. Into this secret battle stumbles an unlikely trio: Leila Majnoun, a disillusioned non-profit worker; Leo Crane, an unhinged trustafarian; and Mark Deveraux, a phony self-betterment guru who works for the Committee.

Leo and Mark were best friends in college, but early adulthood has set them on diverging paths. Growing increasingly disdainful of Mark’s platitudes, Leo publishes a withering takedown of his ideas online. But the Committee is reading – and erasing – Leo’s words. On the other side of the world, Leila’s discoveries about the Committee’s far-reaching ambitions threaten to ruin those who are closest to her.

This novel was on my radar for quite some time before I managed to get my mitts on a review copy. When I did, it shot to the top of my TBR pile, and I eagerly dove in. What I found was not what I’d expected – in both good and odd ways (not bad, though). Did I enjoy it? Absolutely. Is it well written? Absolutely. Is the story expertly crafted and gripping? Well, sort of.

First thing’s first: Shafer’s prose is excellent. He offers a mixture of tightly-written passages that move the story forward, but also plenty of great turns of phrase and interesting metaphors. The humour is well-deployed and well-written. It’s gentle, I don’t remember any laugh-out-loud moments, and the delivery is wry. His characters are very well-written, and I liked the internal monologues and observations. Their feelings of ennui felt realistic and not adolescent (unless they’re meant to). Shafer offers a mature take on these characters’ sometimes-immature issues.

The story. This is the tricky bit, for me. It sometimes felt like the story was secondary to the characters’ observations of society and surveillance. And, sure, the plot is taken right out of today’s headlines – the consolidation of data, the erosion of privacy, cybersecurity and so forth. All of these issues are well-presented and Shafer offers (though his characters) some well-thought-out observations. And yet… the actually plot only really emerges late in the story, and generally seems tacked on. I’ve seen so many laudatory reviews that gush over the story and so forth – but actually, the story is a little bland.

And yet (again)… I kept reading. Usually, I need the story to be front and centre, or at least as important as the characters. Here, though, I felt quite comfortable reading about these characters and their struggles with finding their places in today’s world.* Shafer writes very well, his prose is fluid and well-crafted. But, for his next novel, I hope he focuses a little more on the story. Bring that up to par with characterisation and prose, and he could be writing some of the best stuff available, I think.

So, a cautious recommendation – if you like novels that focus on its characters, then Whiskey Tango Foxtrot should appeal. If you prefer a story-focused novel, then this might come across as incomplete.

* Probably a result of my own, navel-gazing projections…

New Books… (July/August)

July 28, 2014 Civilian Reader Uncategorized Books Received, Fantasy, Gollancz, Mulholland Books, Penguin, Random House, Sci-Fi, Thriller

Featuring: Guy Adams, Scott K. Andrews, Edward Cox, Matthew Dunn, Maria & Sergey Dyachenko, Ian C. Esslemont, William Gibson, Bill Granger, Lev Grossman, Marc Guggenheim, Jim C. Hines, Mark Hodder, James Lovegrove, Andy Miller, Fredrik T. Olsson, Gaie Sebold, Tricia Sullivan, David Shafer

Guy Adams, The Rain-Soaked Bride (Del Rey UK)

How do you stop an assassin that can’t be killed?

When several members of the diplomatic service die in seemingly innocent, yet strangely similar

circumstances, it seems a unique form of murder is being used.

Toby Greene is part of Section 37, known as The Clown Service, a mostly forgotten branch of British Intelligence tasked with fighting exactly this kind of threat.

However, the Rain-Soaked Bride is no ordinary assassin. Relentless, inexorable and part of a larger game, merely stopping this impossible killer may not be enough to save the day…

This is the sequel to Adams’s The Clown Service, which I have not yet read. It sounds pretty interesting, though.

Scott K. Andrews, Timebomb (Hodder)

New York City, 2141: Yojana Patel throws herself off a skyscraper, but never hits the ground.

Cornwall, 1640: gentle young Dora Predennick, newly come to Sweetclover Hall to work, discovers a badly-burnt woman at the bottom of a flight of stairs. When she reaches out to comfort the dying woman, she’s knocked unconscious, only to wake, centuries later, in empty laboratory room.

On a rainy night in present-day Cornwall, seventeen-year-old Kaz Cecka sneaks into the long-abandoned Sweetclover Hall, determined to secure a dry place to sleep. Instead he finds a frightened housemaid who believes Charles I is king and an angry girl who claims to come from the future.

Thrust into the centre of an adventure that spans millennia, Dora, Kaz and Jana must learn to harness powers they barely understand to escape not only villainous Lord Sweetclover but the forces of a fanatical army… all the while staying one step ahead of a mysterious woman known only as Quil.

Sounds interesting. Looks like it hops back-and-forth in time quite frequently. Could work. Or could not. We’ll see.

Edward Cox, The Relic Guild (Gollancz)

In the sealed Labyrinth, a young woman must find a way to control her magic and escape her prison in this remarkable debut fantasy.

Magic caused the war. Magic is forbidden. Magic will save us.

It was said the Labyrinth had once been the great meeting place, a sprawling city at the heart of an endless maze where a million humans hosted the Houses of the Aelfir. The Aelfir who had brought trade and riches, and a future full of promise. But when the Thaumaturgists, overlords of human and Aelfir alike, went to war, everything was ruined and the Labyrinth became an abandoned forbidden zone, where humans were trapped behind boundary walls a hundred feet high.

Now the Aelfir are a distant memory and the Thaumaturgists have faded into myth. Young Clara struggles to survive in a dangerous and dysfunctional city, where eyes are keen, nights are long, and the use of magic is punishable by death. She hides in the shadows, fearful that someone will discover she is touched by magic. She knows her days are numbered. But when a strange man named Fabian Moor returns to the Labyrinth, Clara learns that magic serves a higher purpose and that some myths are much more deadly in the flesh.

The only people Clara can trust are the Relic Guild, a secret band of magickers sworn to protect the Labyrinth. But the Relic Guild are now too few. To truly defeat their old nemesis Moor, mightier help will be required. To save the Labyrinth – and the lives of one million humans – Clara and the Relic Guild must find a way to contact the worlds beyond their walls.

I read an early draft of this, and I’m very eager to get stuck in to read this final, fully-edited version of the story. I have very high hopes for this novel and series.

Also on CR: Interview with Edward Cox

Matthew Dunn, Dark Spies (William Morrow)

On the run from the CIA, intelligence operative Will Cochrane heads to the U.S. to uncover a diabolical spymaster at the center of an international conspiracy in this thrilling follow up to Slingshot.

When Will Cochrane encounters a Russian spymaster – codenamed Antaeus – who everyone believes is dead, he is thrust into a deadly game set in motion by powerful players deep inside the U.S. intelligence community. Will has worked with the CIA for years and knows them all. But now he knows there’s no one he can trust.

His orders from Langley are clear: ANTAEUS MUST NOT BE TOUCHED. FURTHER INQUIRIES REQUIRE PROJECT FERRYMAN CLEARANCE. But as Antaeus and his men then attempt to execute the CIA’s best agents, Will decides to take his own shot at the spymaster, knowing it will make him a marked man.

Now, the only way to save his career – and his life – is to get into the U.S. and expose the truth about Project Ferryman. But to accomplish that he’s got to outmaneuver four deadly Russian assassins and an elite FBI team controlled by shadowy officials who will stop at nothing to keep their sins and secrets safe.

This is the fourth novel in Dunn’s Spycatcher series. A series I have not actually yet read. It has, however, been on my radar for a very long time, and so I’ve bought the first three books in the series to catch up on – I’m hoping to do a number of thriller-series-binges over the next few months. So, expect these to feature soon. (I also received the novella for review, which falls between books three and four.)

Maria & Sergey Dyachenko, Vita Nostra

The words VITA NOSTRA, or “our life,” come from an old Latin student anthem Gaudeamus : “Vita nostra brevis est, Brevi finietur” or “Our life is brief, It will shortly end …”

The heroine of the novel has been forced into a seemingly inconceivable situation. Against her will, she must enter the Institute of Special Technologies. A slightest misstep or failure at school – and the students’ loved ones pay a price. Governed by fear and coercion, Sasha will learn the meaning of the phrase “In the beginning was the word …”

VITA NOSTRA is a thrilling journey into the deepest mysteries of existence, a dizzying adventure, an opening into a world that no one has ever described, a world that frightens and attracts the readers of the novel.

The novel combines the seemingly incongruous aspects – spectacular adventures and philosophical depth, incredible transformations and psychological accuracy, complexity of ethical issues and mundane details of urban life.

VITA NOSTRA enjoyed a considerable critical acclaim in Russia. It has received eight major literary prizes and has been named the best novel of the twenty first century in the sci-fi/fantasy genre (Prize of Prizes, Eurocon-2008, Moscow). It has been translated into several languages.

Information about this novel is pretty limited in the English-speaking world. I heard about it via Aliette de Bodard’s Twitter feed and a short blog post she wrote about it. More a press release than a synopsis, what it above is pretty much all I’ve been able to find outside of other review. (Lev Grossman provided the blurb on the cover, which further increased my interest.) It does sound pretty interesting. I picked it up for my Kindle (it’s very cheap for a new, 500+ page novel) and also The Scar – the authors’ previous novel, an epic fantasy that was published in the US by Tor Books.

Ian C. Esslemont, Assail (Transworld)

Tens of thousands of years of ice is melting, and the land of Assail, long a byword for menace and inaccessibility, is at last yielding its secrets. Tales of gold discovered in the region’s north circulate in every waterfront dive and sailor’s tavern and now adventurers and fortune-seekers have set sail in search of riches. And all they have to guide them are legends and garbled tales of the dangers that lie in wait – hostile coasts, fields of ice, impassable barriers and strange, terrifying creatures. But all accounts concur that the people of the north meet all trespassers with the sword – and should you make it, beyond are rumoured to lurk Elder monsters out of history’s very beginnings.

Into this turmoil ventures the mercenary company, the Crimson Guard. Not drawn by contract, but by the promise of answers: answers that Shimmer, second in command, feels should not be sought. Also heading north, as part of an uneasy alliance of Malazan fortune-hunters and Letherii soldiery, comes the bard Fisher kel Tath. With him is a Tiste Andii who was found washed ashore and cannot remember his past and yet commands far more power than he really should. It is also rumoured that a warrior, bearer of a sword that slays gods and who once fought for the Malazans, is also journeying that way. But far to the south, a woman patiently guards the shore. She awaits both allies and enemies. She is Silverfox, newly incarnate Summoner of the undying army of the T’lan Imass, and she will do anything to stop the renewal of an ages-old crusade that could lay waste to the entire continent and beyond. Casting light on mysteries spanning the Malazan empire, and offering a glimpse of the storied and epic history that shaped it, Assail brings the epic story of the Empire of Malaz to a thrilling close.

The final book in the Malazan world, I believe. A series I have not read. Still. Now that the epic is complete – both Esslemont’s and Erikson’s novels – maybe I’ll give it a try.

William Gibson, Distrust That Particular Flavour (Putnam)

“The future’s already here: it’s just not evenly distributed.”

William Gibson was writing fiction when he predicted the internet. And as his stories bled into reality so he became one of the first to report on the real-world consequences of cyberspace’s growth and development.

Now, with the dust settling on the first internet revolution, comes Gibson’s first collection of non-fiction – essays from the technological and cultural frontiers of this new world.

Covering a variety of subjects, they include: Metrophagy – the Art and Science of Digesting Great Cities; An account of obsession in “the world’s attic” – eBay; Reasons why “The Net is a Waste of Time”; Singapore as “Disneyland with the Death Penalty”; A primer on Japan, our default setting for the future…

These and many other pieces, collected for the first time in Distrust that Particular Flavour, are studded with revealing autobiographical fragments and map the development of Gibson’s acute perceptions about modern life. Readers of Neal Stephenson, Ray Bradbury and Iain M. Banks will love this book.

Some non-fiction by William Gibson. Should be interesting.

Bill Granger, November Man Series #1-3 (Grand Central)

The president learned long ago that the CIA could not be trusted. And so he created his own group of deadly efficient men to gather independent intelligence: a watchdog organization to keep the CIA in check. R Section was born.

“There are no spies…”

Until he heard those four simple words, Devereaux thought he’d left his days in R Section behind. He was no longer The November Man, an American field officer in the vice-grip of duty and danger – and the most brilliant agent R Section had ever produced. When he receives the cryptic message from Hanley, his former handler, Devereaux has no idea he’s about to be reactivated into a mission to save both his life and R Section itself. He’s not aware that a beautiful KGB agent has been ordered to stalk and kill him-or that Hanley is now in a government-subsidized asylum for people with too many secrets. And he doesn’t know that zero hour ticks closer for an operation to catch a master spy… with Devereaux the designated pawn.

What The November Man doesn’t know can kill him.

Code Name November, Schism, and The Shattered Eye are the first three novels in Bill Granger’s long-running November Man series, which is being re-issued to celebrate the upcoming release of the Pierce Brosnan-starring movie based on the first book. I’m quite intrigued, I must say. It sounds like a classic espionage thriller. High hopes.

~~Confusingly,~~ Code Name November was ~~previously published as The November Man, and~~ originally published as There Are No Spies.

CORRECTION: I actually have The November Man, which is the seventh title in the November Man series – that is the novel that has been adapted into a movie starring Pierce Brosnan.

Lev Grossman, The Magician Land (Penguin)

Quentin Coldwater has lost everything. He has been cast out of Fillory, the secret magical land of his childhood dreams that he once ruled. Everything he had fought so hard for, not to mention his closest friends, is sealed away in a land Quentin may never again visit. With nothing left to lose he returns to where his story began, the Brakebills Preparatory College of Magic. But he can’t hide from his past, and it’s not long before it comes looking for him. Meanwhile, the magical barriers that keep Fillory safe are failing, and barbarians from the north have invaded. Eliot and Janet, the rulers of Fillory, embark on a final quest to save their beloved world, only to discover a situation far more complex – and far more dire – than anyone had envisioned.

Along with Plum, a brilliant young magician with a dark secret of her own, Quentin sets out on a crooked path through a magical demimonde of gray magic and desperate characters. His new life takes him back to old haunts, like Antarctica and the Neitherlands, and old friends he thought were lost forever. He uncovers buried secrets and hidden evils and ultimately the key to a sorcerous masterwork, a spell that could create a magical utopia. But all roads lead back to Fillory, where Quentin must face his fears and put things right or die trying.

I just finished The Magician King, which was excellent (if a tad slow to get going). I’m taking a short break from this setting, but will hopefully get this reviewed for the week of release. If you haven’t tried Grossman’s series, yet, then you really should – it does a wonderful job of deconstructing the fantasy genre (especially that pioneered by C.S. Lewis).

Also on CR: Interview with Lev Grossman

Marc Guggenheim, Overwatch (Mulholland)

A young CIA lawyer uncovers a dangerous worldwide conspiracy, masterminded by forces within the US intelligence community.

Alex Garnett has spent his life in the shadow of his father, a former Chief of Staff and Solicitor General to two presidents who’s been responsible for getting Alex every job he ever had, including his latest: attorney for the CIA. However, a seemingly routine litigation leads to a series of unexpected events, including poison, kidnapping, torture and murder. As casualties pile up, it becomes clear Alex is the final target in someone’s blood-soaked attempts to cover their tracks.

With the help of a neurotic hacker, Alex unravels a conspiracy older than the CIA itself. The trail of clues reveals the presence of unseen forces that are bringing this nation to the brink of war – and Alex’s life is only one of many in danger.

This novel has been on my radar for a while, and I’m very happy that I finally have my hands on it. Guggenheim is quite the accomplished writer of TV (Law & Order, Brothers & Sisters) and comics (Spider-Man, Wolverine, etc.), not to mention the fact that he is also a co-creator of Arrow, one of my favourite new TV shows. And this is a political thriller. So I’m really looking forward to reading this. It may have to be my next read, after I finish Whiskey Tango Foxtrot (another Mulholland title – details below).

Jim C. Hines, Codex Born (Del Rey UK)

They’re back. And they want revenge…

Sent to investigate the brutal slaughter of a wendigo in the north Michigan town of Tamarack, Isaac Vainio and his companions find they have wandered into something far more dangerous than a simple killing.

A long established werewolf territory, Tamarack is rife with ancient enemies of Libriomancy who quest for revenge. Isaac has the help of Lena Greenwood, his dryad bodyguard born from the pages of a pulp fantasy novel, but he is not the only one in need of her unique and formidable powers…

The second novel in Hines’s Magic El Libris series. I enjoyed the first one, Libriomancer – though it was slightly flawed, it was a lot of fun, especially for genre fans and fantasy bibliophiles.

Mark Hodder, The Return of the Discontinued Man (Del Rey UK)

Burton and Swinburne return in a new wildly imaginative steampunk adventure, and this time they’re facing their greatest foe…

Leicester Square, London. Blood red snow falls from the sky and a strange creature, disorientated and apparently insane, materialises out of thin air. Spring Heeled Jack has returned, and he is intent on one thing: hunting Sir Richard Francis Burton.

Burton is experiencing one hallucination after another; visions of parallel realities and future history plague his every thought. These send him, and his companions, on an unimaginable expedition – a voyage through time itself…

An author I have never got around to reading, this is the latest in Hodder’s Burton & Swinburne steampunk series. I have never really been taken with steampunk. But, given how popular this series is, I may just have to give it a go.

James Lovegrove, World of Fire (Solaris)

Dev Harmer, reluctant agent of Interstellar Security Solutions, wakes up in a newly cloned host body on the planet Alighieri, ready for action. It’s an infernal world, so close to its sun that its surface is regularly baked to 1000 degrees centigrade, hot enough to turn rock to lava. But deep underground there are networks of tunnels connecting colonies of miners who dig for the precious helium-3 regolith deposits in Alighieri’s crust.

Polis+, the AI race who are humankind’s great galactic rivals, want to claim the fiery planet’s mineral wealth for their own. All that stands between them and this goal is Dev. But as well as Polis+’s agents, there are giant moleworms to contend with, and a spate of mysterious earthquakes, and the perils of the surface where a man can be burned to cinders if he gets caught unprotected on the day side…

Sounds a little like Richard Morgan’s Altered Carbon, only set on a really hot planet. Could be cool – Lovegrove is a great author, after all.

Also on CR: Interview with James Lovegrove; Guest Posts – Age of Godpunk, Pantheon Inspirations; Excerpt from Age of Shiva

Andy Miller, The Year of Reading Dangerously (William Morrow)

An editor and writer’s vivaciously entertaining, and often moving, chronicle of his year-long adventure with fifty great books (and two not-so-great ones) – a true story about reading that reminds us why we should all make time in our lives for books.

Nearing his fortieth birthday, author and critic Andy Miller realized he’s not nearly as well read as he’d like to be. A devout book lover who somehow fell out of the habit of reading, he began to ponder the power of books to change an individual life – including his own – and to the define the sort of person he would like to be. Beginning with a copy of Bulgakov’s Master and Margarita that he happens to find one day in a bookstore, he embarks on a literary odyssey of mindful reading and wry introspection. From Middlemarch to Anna Karenina to A Confederacy of Dunces, these are books Miller felt he should read; books he’d always wanted to read; books he’d previously started but hadn’t finished; and books he’d lied about having read to impress people.

Combining memoir and literary criticism, The Year of Reading Dangerously is Miller’s heartfelt, humorous, and honest examination of what it means to be a reader. Passionately believing that books deserve to be read, enjoyed, and debated in the real world, Miller documents his reading experiences and how they resonated in his daily life and ultimately his very sense of self. The result is a witty and insightful journey of discovery and soul-searching that celebrates the abiding miracle of the book and the power of reading.

Why this book is interesting probably doesn’t need an explanation.

Fredrik T. Olsson, Chain of Events (Sphere)

Nothing would make me keep a diary.

Except for one thing.

The realisation that soon there won’t be anyone around to read it.

William Sandberg. A broken genius, snatched from his home.

Christina Sandberg, his ex-wife. She does not believe their lies.

Our future hangs on their survival. If they fail, we are all lost.

To be honest, I don’t know much about this novel, but it has been on my radar for some time. It’s created a fair bit of stir and seems to be picking up international publishers left and right. As I’m going to be reading and featuring more thrillers in the coming months, this should fit in very nicely. Expect more pretty soon.

Gaie Sebold, Shanghai Sparrow (Solaris)

The British Empire is at war, both within and without. Eveline Duchen was once a country child, touched by the magic that clings to the woods. Now she is a street urchin in a London where brutal poverty and glittering new inventions exist side by side, living as a thief and a con-artist. Caught in an act of deception, Eveline is faced with Mr Holmfirth, who offers her a stark choice. Transportation, or an education – at Madam Cairngrim’s school for female spies.

The school’s regime is harsh, but she plans to take advantage of everything they can teach her, then go her own way. But in the fury of the Opium Wars, the British Empire is about to make a devil’s bargain. Eveline’s choices will change the future of her world, and reveal the truth about the death of her sister Charlotte. Shaghai Sparrow is set in an alternative England and China.

I finally got around to buying this. I loved Sebold’s debut novel, Babylon Steel, and this sounds even more like something I’d like (being a Chinese history fan). Hopefully get to this pretty soon.

Also on CR: Interview with Gaie Sebold

David Shafer, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot (Mulholland)

The Committee, an international cabal of industrialists and media barons, is on the verge of privatizing all information. Dear Diary, an idealistic online Underground, stands in the way of that takeover, using radical politics, classic spycraft, and technology that makes Big Data look like dial-up. Into this secret battle stumbles an unlikely trio: Leila Majnoun, a disillusioned non-profit worker; Leo Crane, an unhinged trustafarian; and Mark Deveraux, a phony self-betterment guru who works for the Committee.

Leo and Mark were best friends in college, but early adulthood has set them on diverging paths. Growing increasingly disdainful of Mark’s platitudes, Leo publishes a withering takedown of his ideas online. But the Committee is reading – and erasing – Leo’s words. On the other side of the world, Leila’s discoveries about the Committee’s far-reaching ambitions threaten to ruin those who are closest to her.

In the spirit of William Gibson and Chuck Palahniuk, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot is both a suspenseful global thriller and an emotionally truthful novel about the struggle to change the world in- and outside your head.

I’ve heard and read a lot of positive murmers about this novel. I’m reading it at the moment, and enjoying it a good deal. Shafer writes very well, and, while I’m not entirely sure where the story is headed, it’s well-paced and engaging. Very good characters, too.

Tricia Sullivan, Shadowboxer (Solaris / Ravenstone)

Jade Barrera is a 17-year-old champion martial arts fighter; when she’s in the cage she dominates her opponents – but in real life she’s out of control. After a confrontation with a Hollywood star that threatens her gym’s reputation, Jade’s coach sends her to a training camp in Thailand for an attitude adjustment.

Hoping to discover herself, she instead uncovers a shocking conspiracy. In a world just beyond our own, a man is stealing the souls of children to try and live forever.

As Jade’s world collides with that of ten-year-old refugee Mya, can she keep her cool and remember the training camp’s lessons when she enters the ring for the fight of her life? A fight that will seal not only her own fate, but Mya’s too…

Sounds like an interesting novel. Not sure if it’s the first of a series or a stand-alone, but I hope to get to it soon.

Upcoming Re-Issues: KATHY MALLORY Series by Carol O’Connell (Headline)

July 22, 2014 Civilian Reader Uncategorized Crime, Headline, New York, Thriller, Upcoming

I received a press release this morning that really piqued my interest. Over the course of this year (and maybe some of early 2015), Headline will be re-jacketing and re-issuing Carol O’Connell’s Kathy Mallory crime series. I have never read any of the series, I’m sad to say. However, one of the things I love is finding established series on which to binge. I’ve found two ‘new’ series that I was going to start working my way through (Matthew Dunn’s Spycatcher and Daniel Silva’s Gabriel Allon series), but this one has to be added to the list, too. And may even be the first I try. I’m really looking forward to these re-issues.

Here’s the release scheduled:

Mallory’s Oracle – 14th August 2014

The Man Who Lied to Women – 14th August 2014

Killing Critics – 11th September 2014

Flight of the Stone Angel – 11th September 2014

Shell Game – 9th October 2014

Crime School – 9th October 2014

Dead Famous – 6th November 2014

Winter House – 6th November 2014

Shark Music – 4th December 2014

The Chalk Girl – Pub. Date TBC

It Happens in the Dark – Pub. Date TBC

Here’s the synopsis for the first novel, Mallory’s Oracle:

Mallory Book 1: the first NYPD detective Kathy Mallory novel from New York Times bestseller Carol O’Connell, master of knife-edge suspense and intricate plotting.

Detective Kathy Mallory. New York’s darkest. You only underestimate her once.

When NYPD Sergeant Kathy Mallory was an eleven-year-old street kid, she got caught stealing. The detective who found her was Louis Markowitz. He should have arrested her. Instead he adopted her, and raised her as his own, in the best tradition of New York’s finest.

Now Markowitz is dead, and Mallory the first officer on the scene. She knows any criminal who could outsmart her father is no ordinary human. This is a ruthless serial killer, a freak from the night-side of the mind.

And one question troubles her more than any other: why did he go in there alone?

Quick Reviews: THE CUCKOO’S CALLING and THE SILKWORM by Robert Galbraith (Sphere/Mulholland)

July 19, 2014June 11, 2015 Civilian Reader Review Cormoran Strike, Crime, Cuckoo's Calling, JK Rowling, Robert Galbraith, Silkworm, Sphere, Thriller

J.K. Rowling’s new series of London-based PI novels are fantastic.

When a troubled model falls to her death from a snow-covered Mayfair balcony, it is assumed that she has committed suicide. However, her brother has his doubts, and calls in private investigator Cormoran Strike to look into the case.

Strike is a war veteran – wounded both physically and psychologically – and his life is in disarray. The case gives him a financial lifeline, but it comes at a personal cost: the more he delves into the young model’s complex world, the darker things get – and the closer he gets to terrible danger…

I am not entirely sure how to review these novels. To discuss their plots at any length would ruin the plots – something that’s normal, but for some reason feels even more so the case here. The characters, however, are superb – and it is Cormoran Strike, Robin and their supporting cast that make these novels so good. If you haven’t read this series, yet, I strongly urge you to do so. Continue reading →

A Quick Chat with CARRIE PATEL

July 9, 2014 Civilian Reader Interview Angry Robot, Fantasy, Thriller, Urban Fantasy

Let’s start with an introduction: Who is Carrie Patel?

I’m an expatriate Texan living in California where I work as a narrative designer for Obsidian Entertainment. In my free time, I write books!

Your debut novel, The Buried Life, is due to be published by Angry Robot Books in July 2014. How would you introduce the novel to a new reader? Is it part of a series?

It’s the first in a series about a stratified underground society that forms after a world-shaking catastrophe. The Buried Life follows two different characters – an inspector and a laundress – trying to unravel a series of murders surrounding the wealthy and powerful.

What inspired you to write the series? And where do you draw your inspiration from in general?

For me, inspiration is about taking these quick, impressionistic mental snapshots of different places, moments, and people, and remixing them into something different. A lot of the inspiration for The Buried Life came from a study trip to Argentina, but it’s not the kind of thing that would necessarily be apparent from reading the book.

How were you introduced to reading and genre fiction?

My parents are both readers, so I developed a habit early. They always encouraged leisure reading when I was young, and having a good school library went a long way, too. Picking out the books I wanted to read was an important act of expression and freedom at that age.

How do you enjoy being a writer and working within the publishing industry?

Now that I have external deadlines, balancing writing with everything else is a greater challenge, but it’s rewarding, too. After spending years as an unpublished author, selling work feels incredible.

Do you have any specific working, writing, researching practices?

Scheduling time is key. I’m a morning person, so I make regular time before work every day to write. Research is important, but I’ve found that it can also be a convenient way to put off the actual writing, so I make sure that I spend some of my time every day actually drafting and revising.

When did you realize you wanted to be an author, and what was your first foray into writing? Do you still look back on it fondly?

As a reader, writing was always in the back of my mind, but working myself up to committing to a story in 90,000 words was another matter!

My very first effort was a short story about a medieval battle that I wrote in sixth grade. It’s not something I’d want to put up on the refrigerator now, but I had a blast writing it back then. For an early effort, the thrill and satisfaction are probably what matter most.

What’s your opinion of the genre today, and where do you see your work fitting into it?

Speculative fiction is expanding and bringing us a wider set of stories from a wider array of authors, which is wonderful. We’ve got more novels like Saladin Ahmed’s Throne of the Crescent Moon that tell great adventure stories in settings that aren’t explored as often. And then we’ve got novels like China Miéville’s The City and the City, which is also a fantasy but unlike anything else in the genre. It’s an exciting time to be writing!

I’d like to see my work push at the boundaries of the genre, too, which is one reason I’m thrilled to be published by Angry Robot. The Buried Life is part fantasy, part mystery, and part something else, and it’s not something that would traditionally fit in a really clear subcategory of speculative fiction, either.

What other projects are you working on, and what do you have currently in the pipeline?

Right now, I’m working on Cities and Thrones, which is the sequel to The Buried Life. I’ve got another project on hiatus right now that’s very different but that I’m also very excited about – it’s a near-future science fiction novel about colonizing Mars with “bare branches” youths from India and China.

What are you reading at the moment (fiction, non-fiction)?

Since I can never make up my mind between fantasy and sci-fi, I’m reading N.K. Jemisin’s The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms and George Wright Padgett’s Spindown.

What’s something readers might be surprised to learn about you?

I have gone bungee jumping from the Bloukrans Bridge in South Africa, which is the highest bungee bridge in the world! I did it hours before my phone interview with Obsidian.

***

For more on Carrie Patel’s writing, be sure to check out her website and follow her on Twitter. You can also check out an extract from The Buried Life here.

Review: THE TARGET by David Baldacci (Macmillan/Grand Central)

June 30, 2014August 3, 2015 Civilian Reader Review Assassins, David Baldacci, Espionage, Grand Central Publishing, Macmillan, Politics, The Target, Thriller, Washington DC, Will Robie Series

The third Will Robie thriller sets him and Jessica Reel on a collision courts with the Hermit Kingdom…

The President knows it’s a perilous, high-risk assignment. If he gives the order, he has the opportunity to take down a global menace, once and for all. If the mission fails, he would face certain impeachment, and the threats against the nation would multiply. So the president turns to the one team that can pull off the impossible: Will Robie and his partner, Jessica Reel.

Together, Robie and Reel’s talents as assassins are unmatched. But there are some in power who don’t trust the pair. They doubt their willingness to follow orders. And they will do anything to see that the two assassins succeed, but that they do not survive.

As they prepare for their mission, Reel faces a personal crisis that could well lead old enemies right to her doorstep, resurrecting the ghosts of her earlier life and bringing stark danger to all those close to her. And all the while, Robie and Reel are stalked by a new adversary: an unknown and unlikely assassin, a woman who has trained her entire life to kill, and who has her own list of targets – a list that includes Will Robie and Jessica Reel.

The Target is another great addition to this relatively-new series from Baldacci. Taking the popular central character of government assassin, the author has managed to forge a somewhat original path. The novel is gripping, excellently-paced, and well-researched. As has become the norm with Baldacci’s novels, I really enjoyed reading this. Continue reading →

Books Received… (June)

June 28, 2014 Civilian Reader Uncategorized Books Received, Corvus, Del Rey, Dystopia, Fantasy, Fiction, Gollancz, Hodder, Orbit, Pyr Books, Sci-Fi, Sphere, Thriller, Transworld, Voyager

Featuring: Megan Abbott, Robert Galbraith, Robert Goddard, Carl Hiaasen, Stephen King, J.F. Lewis, Richard K. Morgan, Warren Murphy, M.C. Planck, Kim Stanley Robinson, Thomas Sweterlitsch, Jon Wallace, Jo Walton

Megan Abbott, Dare Me (Reagan Arthur Books)

Addy Hanlon has always been Beth Cassidy’s best friend and trusted lieutenant. Beth calls the shots and Addy carries them out, a long-established order of things that has brought them to the pinnacle of their high-school careers. Now they’re seniors who rule the intensely competitive cheer squad, feared and followed by the other girls – until the young new coach arrives.

Cool and commanding, an emissary from the adult world just beyond their reach, Coach Colette French draws Addy and the other cheerleaders into her life. Only Beth, unsettled by the new regime, remains outside Coach’s golden circle, waging a subtle but vicious campaign to regain her position as “top girl” – both with the team and with Addy herself.

Then a suicide focuses a police investigation on Coach and her squad. After the first wave of shock and grief, Addy tries to uncover the truth behind the death – and learns that the boundary between loyalty and love can be dangerous terrain.

This came out when I was in the States last, and I thought it looked pretty interesting. I’m not sure why I didn’t pick it up at the time, though. Regardless, I picked it up last week, and have been hearing very good things about this and Abbott’s latest novel, The Fever, which I’d also like to read.

Robert Galbraith, The Silkworm (Sphere)

When novelist Owen Quine goes missing, his wife calls in private detective Cormoran Strike. At first, Mrs. Quine just thinks her husband has gone off by himself for a few days – as he has done before – and she wants Strike to find him and bring him home.

But as Strike investigates, it becomes clear that there is more to Quine’s disappearance than his wife realizes. The novelist has just completed a manuscript featuring poisonous pen-portraits of almost everyone he knows. If the novel were to be published, it would ruin lives – meaning that there are a lot of people who might want him silenced.

When Quine is found brutally murdered under bizarre circumstances, it becomes a race against time to understand the motivation of a ruthless killer, a killer unlike any Strike has encountered before…

Finished The Cuckoo’s Calling over the weekend, and really enjoyed it. I received this for review from Sainsbury’s eBook division (a pleasant surprise), and intend to read it very soon.

Robert Goddard, The Corners of the Globe (Bantam Press)

Spring, 1919. James ‘Max’ Maxted, former Great War flying ace, returns to the trail of murder, treachery and half-buried secrets he set out on in The Ways of the World. He left Paris after avenging the murder of his father, Sir Henry Maxted, a senior member of the British delegation to the post-war peace conference. But he was convinced there was more – much more – to be discovered about what Sir Henry had been trying to accomplish. And he suspected elusive German spymaster Fritz Lemmer knew the truth of it.

Now, enlisted under false colours in Lemmer’s service but with his loyalty pledged to the British Secret Service, Max sets out on his first – and possibly last – mission for Lemmer. It takes him to the far north of Scotland – to the Orkney Isles, where the German High Seas Fleet has been impounded in Scapa Flow, its fate to be decided at the conference-table in Paris. Max has been sent to recover a document held aboard one of the German ships. What that document contains forces him to break cover sooner than he would have wished and to embark on a desperate race south, towards London, with information that could destroy Lemmer – if Max, as seems unlikely, lives to deliver it

The sequel to The Ways of the World, this is a series I really want to read. But have been slow about getting around to. Hopefully I’ll address this very soon.

Carl Hiaasen, Bad Monkey (Sphere)

When a severed arm is discovered by a couple on honeymoon in the Florida Keys, former police detective – now reluctant restaurant inspector – Andrew Yancy senses that something doesn’t add up. Determined to get his badge back, he undertakes an unofficial investigation of his own.

Andrew’s search for the truth takes him to the Bahamas, where a local man, with the help of a very bad monkey (who allegedly worked on the Pirates of the Caribbean movies) is doing everything in his power to prevent a developer from building a new tourist resort on the island, with deadly consequences…

Outrageous, hilarious and addictive, this is the unique Carl Hiaasen at his absolute best. Bad Monkey will have you on the edge of your seat and laughing out loud.

It’s been a long time since I last read a novel by Carl Hiaasen. His novels are uniformly strange and amusing, although they haven’t always hit the mark for me. It’ll be interesting to return to his zany approach to crime stories after so long, and this could make a nice change from the more-serious-in-tone thrillers I usually read.

Stephen King, Mr. Mercedes (Hodder)

A cat-and-mouse suspense thriller featuring a retired homicide detective who’s haunted by the few cases he left open, and by one in particular – the pre-dawn slaughter of eight people among hundreds gathered in line for the opening of a jobs fair when the economy was guttering out. Without warning, a lone driver ploughed through the crowd in a stolen Mercedes. The plot is kicked into gear when Bill Hodges receives a letter in the mail, from a man claiming to be the perpetrator. He taunts Hodges with the notion that he will strike again.

Hodges wakes up from his depressed and vacant retirement, hell-bent on preventing that from happening.

Brady Hartsfield lives with his alcoholic mother in the house where he was born. And he’s preparing to kill again.

Only Hodges, with a couple of misfit friends, can apprehend the killer in this high-stakes race against time. Because Brady’s next mission, if it succeeds, will kill or maim hundreds, even thousands.

I bought the eBook from Sainsbury’s after creating an account with them and getting a 20% off voucher. Last year was the first time I read one of King’s novels all the way through (The Shining), and this one sounds really interesting.

J.F. Lewis, Grudgebearer (Pyr)

Kholster is the first born of the practically immortal Aern, a race created by the Eldrennai as warrior-slaves to defend them from the magic-resistant reptilian Zaur. Unable to break an oath without breaking their connection with each other, the Aern served the Eldrennai faithfully for thousands of years until the Sundering. Now, the Aern, Vael, and Eldrennai meet every hundred years for a Grand Conjunction to renew their tenuous peace.

While the tortures of slavery remain fresh in Kholster’s mind, most of the rest of the world has moved on. Almost six hundred years after the Sundering, an Eldrennai prince carelessly breaks the truce by setting up a surprise museum exhibit containing sentient suits of Aernese armor left behind, never to be touched, lest Kholster kill every last Eldrennai. Through their still-existing connection with their ancient armor, the Aern know instantly, and Kholster must find a way to keep his oaths, even those made in haste and anger. While Kholster travels to the Grand Conjunction with his Freeborn daughter and chosen successor Rae’en, his troops travel by sea, heading for war.

I’d never heard of this novel before it dropped through the mailbox. Sounds interesting, but also a little familiar. Not sure when I’ll get to this.

Richard K. Morgan, The Dark Defiles (Del Rey)

Ringil Eskiath, a reluctant hero viewed as a corrupt degenerate by the very people who demand his help, has traveled far in search of the Illwrack Changeling, a deathless human sorcerer-warrior raised by the bloodthirsty Aldrain, former rulers of the world. Separated from his companions – Egar the Dragonbane and Archeth – Ringil risks his soul to master a deadly magic that alone can challenge the might of the Changeling. While Archeth and the Dragonbane embark on a trail of blood and tears that ends up exposing long-buried secrets, Ringil finds himself tested as never before, with his life and all existence hanging in the balance.

It feels like an absolute age since I read The Steel Remains. And even longer since I read Altered Carbon, which blew me away. This series has been met with a very wide array of criticism and praise. I’ve heard people say it’s ruined fantasy, or taken grimdark too far. Others sing its praises for breaking the boundaries of the (sub-)genre, being daring and forging a new path. I enjoyed The Steel Remains, and bought The Cold Commands (but haven’t read it yet – that may suggest something about how much I enjoyed the first novel, compared to other series I’ll buy and read each new installment as soon as possible). I hope to get caught up with this series pretty soon, given that this is the final volume. The series is published in the UK by Gollancz.

Warren Murphy, Created the Destroyer (Orbit)

When you’re on death row, minutes from the electric chair, and a hook-handed monk offers to save your life if you’ll just swallow a simple little pill… what’ve you got to lose? You take the pill. Then you wake up, officially “dead,” in the back of an ambulance, headed for an undisclosed location. Welcome to your new life, working for CURE, the most secret, most deniable, most extra-judicial government agency ever to exist. Only the President knows about it, and even he doesn’t control it.

That’s what happened to Remo Williams, a New Jersey cop framed for a murder he didn’t commit. Framed by the very people who saved him, in fact. And now, trained in esoteric martial arts by Chiun, master of Sinanju, he’s going to become the ultimate killing machine. Remo will be America’s last line of defense against mad scientists, organized crime, ancient undead gods, and anything else that threatens the Constitution. Remo Williams is the Destroyer.

The first in a long-running thriller series, Orbit will be bringing it to the UK in the very near future. It sounds fun. So I’ll be reading this very soon.

M.C. Planck, Sword of the Bright Lady (Pyr)

Christopher Sinclair goes out for a walk on a mild Arizona evening and never comes back. He stumbles into a freezing winter under an impossible night sky, where magic is real-but bought at a terrible price.

A misplaced act of decency lands him in a brawl with an arrogant nobleman and puts him under a death sentence. In desperation he agrees to be drafted into an eternal war, serving as a priest of the Bright Lady, Goddess of Healing. But when Marcius, god of war, offers the only hope of a way home to his wife, Christopher pledges to him instead, plunging the church into turmoil and setting him on a path of violence and notoriety.

To win enough power to open a path home, this mild-mannered mechanical engineer must survive duelists, assassins, and the never-ending threat of monsters, with only his makeshift technology to compete with swords and magic.

But the gods and demons have other plans. Christopher’s fate will save the world… or destroy it.

First heard about this novel via Staffer’s Book Review, as Justin was taking a look at the cover art. It sounds intriguing.

Robin Sloan, Ajax Penumbra, 1969 (Atlantic Books)

It is August 1969. The Summer of Love is a fading memory. The streets of San Francisco pulse to the sounds of Led Zeppelin and Marvin Gaye. And of jackhammers: A futuristic pyramid of a skyscraper is rising a few blocks from City Lights bookstore and an unprecedented subway tunnel is being built under the bay. Meanwhile, south of the city, orchards are quickly giving way to a brand-new industry built on silicon.

But young Ajax Penumbra has not arrived in San Francisco looking for free love or a glimpse of the technological future. He is seeking a book – the single surviving copy of the Techne Tycheon, a mysterious volume that has brought and lost great fortune for anyone who has owned it. The last record of the book locates it in the San Francisco of more than a century earlier, and on that scant bit of evidence, Penumbra’s university has dispatched him west to acquire it for their library. After a few weeks of rigorous hunting, Penumbra feels no closer to his goal than when he started. But late one night, after another day of dispiriting dead ends, he stumbles across a 24-hour bookstore, and the possibilities before him expand exponentially…

I really enjoyed Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore, and so when I saw that Sloan had written this novella-length prequel, I knew I wanted to read it ASAP. It just took a little longer than normal for me to buy it. May read it as soon as I finish my current read.

Kim Stanley Robinson, Fifty Degrees Below and Sixty Days & Counting (Voyager)

FDB: After years of denial and non-action, a near-future Earth faces a crossroad when it is threatened with the dire implications of global warming, an environmental crisis that ironically could unleash a devastating Ice Age on the planet.

SD&C: By the time Phil Chase is elected president, the world’s climate is far on its way to irreversible change. Food scarcity, housing shortages, diminishing medical care, and vanishing species are just some of the consequences. The erratic winter the Washington, D.C., area is experiencing is another grim reminder of a global weather pattern gone haywire: bone-chilling cold one day, balmy weather the next.

But the president-elect remains optimistic and doesn’t intend to give up without a fight. A maverick in every sense of the word, Chase starts organizing the most ambitious plan to save the world from disaster since FDR – and assembling a team of top scientists and advisers to implement it.

For Charlie Quibler, this means reentering the political fray full-time and giving up full-time care of his young son, Joe. For Frank Vanderwal, hampered by a brain injury, it means trying to protect the woman he loves from a vengeful ex and a rogue “black ops” agency not even the president can control – a task for which neither Frank’s work at the National Science Foundation nor his study of Tibetan Buddhism can prepare him.

In a world where time is running out as quickly as its natural resources, where surveillance is almost total and freedom nearly nonexistent, the forecast for the Chase administration looks darker each passing day. For as the last – and most terrible – of natural disasters looms on the horizon, it will take a miracle to stop the clock… the kind of miracle that only dedicated men and women can bring about.

The second and third novels in Robinson’s Science in the Capitol series (for some reason, Forty Days of Rain is not available as an eBook). They’ve been on my Kindle Wish List for ages, and when I checked this morning they had dropped to just 99p. So, naturally, I bought them. Hope to read them soon. I also picked up Red Mars, which was also knocked down to 99p, but these two are higher on my priority list.

Thomas Sweterlitsch, Tomorrow and Tomorrow (Putnam)

A decade has passed since the city of Pittsburgh was reduced to ash.

While the rest of the world has moved on, losing itself in the noise of a media-glutted future, survivor John Dominic Blaxton remains obsessed with the past. Grieving for his wife and unborn child who perished in the blast, Dominic relives his lost life by immersing in the Archive – a fully interactive digital reconstruction of Pittsburgh, accessible to anyone who wants to visit the places they remember and the people they loved.

Dominic investigates deaths recorded in the Archive to help close cases long since grown cold, but when he discovers glitches in the code surrounding a crime scene – the body of a beautiful woman abandoned in a muddy park that he’s convinced someone tried to delete from the Archive – his cycle of grief is shattered.

With nothing left to lose, Dominic tracks the murder through a web of deceit that takes him from the darkest corners of the Archive to the ruins of the city itself, leading him into the heart of a nightmare more horrific than anything he could have imagined.

This has been described as a follower in the footsteps of William Gibson’s cyberpunk, which certainly caught my eye. Pretty intrigued by this.

Jon Wallace, Barricade (Gollancz)

Kenstibec was genetically engineered to build a new world, but the apocalypse forced a career change. These days he drives a taxi instead.

A fast-paced, droll and disturbing novel, BARRICADE is a savage road trip across the dystopian landscape of post-apocalypse Britain; narrated by the cold-blooded yet magnetic antihero, Kenstibec.

Kenstibec is a member of the “Ficial” race, a breed of merciless super-humans. Their war on humanity has left Britain a wasteland, where Ficials hide in barricaded cities, besieged by tribes of human survivors. Originally optimised for construction, Kenstibec earns his keep as a taxi driver, running any Ficial who will pay from one surrounded city to another.

The trips are always eventful, but this will be his toughest yet. His fare is a narcissistic journalist who’s touchy about her luggage. His human guide is constantly plotting to kill him. And that’s just the start of his troubles.

On his journey he encounters ten-foot killer rats, a mutant king with a TV fixation, a drug-crazed army, and even the creator of the Ficial race. He also finds time to uncover a terrible plot to destroy his species for good – and humanity too.

One of Gollancz’s 2014 debuts, I picked this up on the eBook promotion. His recent guest post for CR has caused a bit of a stir, too, and I really want to see what all the fuss is about (if, indeed, there’s something to cause a fuss about – I think his guest post has suffered from poor structuring and wording, which has led to some of the criticism he’s receiving. Can’t be sure until I read the novel, though). Will read this soon.

Jo Walton, My Real Children (Corsair)

What if you could remember two versions of your life? My Real Children is an alternate history, in which a woman with dementia struggles to remember her two contradictory lives. It’s a book about life and love and choices and moonbases. The day Mark called, Patricia Cowan’s world split in two.

The phone call.

His question.

Her answer.

A single word.

“Yes.”

“No.”

It is 2015 and Patricia Cowan is very old. “Confused today” read the notes clipped to the end of her bed. Her childhood, her years at Oxford during the Second World War – those things are solid in her memory. Then that phone call and… her memory splits in two.

She was Trish, a housewife and mother of four.

She was Pat, a successful travel writer and mother of three.

She remembers living her life as both women, so very clearly. Which memory is real – or are both just tricks of time and light?

My Real Children is the story of both of Patricia Cowan’s lives – each with its loves and losses, sorrows and triumphs, its possible consequences. It is a novel about how every life means the entire world.

Another new book in the UK from Walton (she’s been enjoying a string of re-issues over here), and it sounds really interesting. I still haven’t got around to reading anything by her. Hope to do so soon.

Quick Review: “The Innocent” by Taylor Stevens (Arrow)

June 27, 2014 Civilian Reader Review Arrow, Taylor Stevens, Thriller

Reviewed by H.

The second Vanessa Michael Munroe thriller

Eight years ago, a man walked five-year-old Hannah out the front doors of her school and spirited her over the Mexican border, taking her into the world of a cult known as The Chosen.

Now, after years of searching, childhood survivors of the group have found the girl in Argentina. But getting her out is a whole new challenge.

For the rescue they need someone who is brilliant, fearless and utterly ruthless.

They need Vanessa Michael Munroe.

This is the second novel featuring the tough, highly-competent private detective Vanessa Michael Munroe (after The Informationist). It’s a great, gripping read – fast-paced and thought-provoking, this should certainly appeal to fans of Stieg Larsson and Robert Ludlum, and anyone looking for a thriller series with a strong female protagonist.

Drawing on her own experiences with a cult, Stevens does a fantastic job of highlighting the sinister influence and nature of such groups. The novel also fleshes out Munroe’s own past, expands and deepens the relationships she has with her friends and colleagues. The coersive tactics, the brainwashing that make those taken in… It’s very well explained and brought to creepy life on the page.

Stevens does a really fantastic job, here. Her prose is tightly-written, the plot very well-paced (I read this very quickly), and her characters three-dimensional, realistic and developing well. This is a superb series, and if you haven’t discovered Munroe’s adventures, yet, then I strongly urge you do so. It’s not necessary to start with The Informationist, though, as this is an independently intelligible sequel. There are more novels to come, and also an eBook novella available. I can’t wait to read the third novel, The Doll.

Very highly recommended.

Also on CR: Interview with Taylor Stevens

News: Vince Flynn’s MITCH RAPP Series to Continue!

June 26, 2014 Civilian Reader Uncategorized Crime, Espionage, International Relations, Mitch Rapp, News, Simon and Schuster, Terrorism, Thriller, Vince Flynn

Last September, I wrote a piece about how the movie Olympus Has Fallen bore some incredible similarities to Vince Flynn’s Transfer of Power. The piece was pretty short, but I also mentioned in it the fact that Flynn passed away in June 2013. It was also reported, through Flynn’s newsletter, that the planned next novel in the series, The Survivor, had been indefinitely suspended.

Since then, however, some very interesting news has arrived in my inbox! On June 22nd, Flynn’s Newsletter announced that “Mitch Rapp series will continue; The Survivor Tentatively Scheduled for 2015”!

As it turns out, one of my favourite thriller authors, Kyle Mills, has been selected to continue the series by Flynn’s estate and Emily Bestler, Senior VP and Editor-in-Chief of Emily Bestler Books. From the press release:

Mills will complete The Survivor, the book Flynn was writing at the time of his death on June 19, 2013, and then write two additional Mitch Rapp novels. The Survivor is tentatively scheduled to release in the fall of 2015.

“I’m really honored to have been asked to continue the Mitch Rapp series,” Mills said, “Vince was a great guy who helped me out in my career and as a diehard Rapp fan, I know how devastated his readers are. They’re big shoes to fill, but I’m looking forward to the challenge of continuing an iconic thriller character.”

“Vince and Mitch Rapp are so beloved by readers,” Bestler said, “It’s wonderful that we’ve found just the right partner to uphold the legacy of both.”

“To Vince’s wonderful fans, thank you for your love, support and patience,” Vince’s widow, Lysa Flynn said, “Vince was very proud of his team and we are confident that Kyle Mills will be a great addition. God bless and keep the faith!”

Mills is the author of the Mark Beamon thrillers and a handful of stand-alone thrillers. Most recently, he wrote The Immortalists (which, I am ashamed to admit, I have not read yet) and also The Ares Decision, The Utopia Experiment, and the upcoming The Von Neumann Machine – books 8, 10 and 1? of Tom Clancy’s Covert-One series. Many of Mills’s novels are very hard to find in the UK, which I think is a crime. It is also why it has always taken me a long time to get around to reading them – I discovered his novels well before CR was ever a thing.

Mark Beamon Series: Rising Phoenix, Storming Heaven, Free Fall, Sphere of Influence and Darkness Falls

Stand-Alone Novels: Burn Factor, Smoke Screen, Fade, The Second Horseman, Lords of Corruption, The Immortalists

Upcoming: “Gray Mountain” by John Grisham (Doubleday)

June 26, 2014 Civilian Reader Uncategorized Doubleday, John Grisham, Thriller, Upcoming

I’m a big fan of John Grisham’s novels. They don’t all click for me, but many of them have been thoroughly enjoyable and entertaining. Today, details of his next thriller were unveiled! The novel, Gray Mountain, is due to be published in the US in October 2014 (not sure about the UK, yet). Here’s the description from Grisham’s website:

The Great Recession of 2008 left many young professionals out of work. Promising careers were suddenly ended as banks, hedge funds, and law firms engaged in mass lay-offs and brutal belt tightening. Samantha Kofer was a third year associate at Scully & Pershing, New York City’s largest law firm. Two weeks after Lehman Brothers collapsed, she lost her job, her security, and her future. A week later she was working as an unpaid intern in a legal aid clinic deep in small town Appalachia. There, for the first time in her career, she was confronted with real clients with real problems. She also stumbled across secrets that should have remained buried deep in the mountains forever.