The Rook by Steven James

Reviewed By Nike Chillemi –

FBI agent Patrick Bowers is an environmental criminologist who specializes in the use of spacial factors to hunt criminals who commit major serial crimes. He’s been called to assist the San Diego police investigate a series of seventeen unusual fires. This is the second book in the Patrick Bowers series. The first one was THE PAWN.

What Bowers discovers is a well-orchestrated plot to steal a new top-secret prototype for a new weapon the navy is working on. The planned use for this weapon, explained later in the story, is a mind boggler. This novel examines an area that the author delights in exploring: who are the good guys and who are the bad guys…and what does it take to make a good guy go bad?

A mastermind fiend named Shade has recruited an equally evil ex-con named Creighton Melice to help pull off his grand scheme. But what do they have to do with Project Rukh? This novel is chock full of violence and there’s no shortage of evil, although it’s not as gory as the first book in the series. The plot has a lot of twists and turns and covers a wide spectrum: from the inner city homeless population, to kidnap, to a rare disease, to spiders, to sharks.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Agent Bowers is struggling to be a father to his moody teenage stepdaughter. To further complicate this relationship, Tessa’s intelligence quotient is way higher than Patrick’s. So he not only has a smarmy kid to deal with, she’s also a lot smarter than he is, but has little practical experience or common sense. There were times I wished Tessa would just go away…not leave the novel. It’s just that she reminded me too much of my own at times whiny and annoying fourteen year-old daughter. Just a mom being honest here.

Add into the mix, a budding relationship with Agent Lien-hua Jiang a profiler Bowers often spars with professionally. In this novel, they must work together to save a exquisite young woman Creighton Melice has kidnapped and is torturing in the most diabolical manner. Time is short if they plan to save the beauty’s life.

This is a high-paced suspense, plot-driven story and the ride is terrifying at times. The Patrick Bowers character is the most sympathetic and the easiest to bond with but I can’t say I absolutely loved him. He’s interesting and I liked seeing his mind work on the case. The relationship between Patrick and Lien-hua to my mind lacked passion. When she’s in danger, of course he sets out to save her, but I was confused by how desperate and driven he became. I thought where did these deep feelings come from?

If I didn’t already know, would I be able to tell Steven James is a Christian author? Yes, I think so, but the Christian message is very subtle, a fine thread woven throughout as Bowers struggles to figure out the meaning of life and come to terms with evil.

Come The Shadows by Wendy L. Young

Reviewed By Nike Chillemi

Officer Will Harmon is called out to a homicide at the abandoned bread factory in Campbell Creek, NC. When he gets to the scene (with Rookie cop Ricky Rogers along) he’s immediately challenged by Officer Michael Peterson, a very territorial colleague.

When the sheriff and mayor declare the death to be accidental one day before the medical examiner is due to make her report, Will knows something smells bad. The ME is Will’s sister and she tells him she’s being pressured to declare the death inconclusive, but she’s sure it’s murder due to high levels of cyanide in the tissue. She caves in to the pressure to save her job and the case is officially closed.

I liked the Will Harmon character from the get go. He’s afraid there might be corruption within the police department and the mayor’s office and he’s determined to fight to preserve the way of life of his town and to protect his family. However, he’s got one little problem. Police Chief David Lanier is his wife’s brother. He is investigating family, albeit extended family. However, his easygoing personality gets him over the rough patches, even as he’s deep into a semi-covert operation. He’s got a great sense of humor, and a strange attraction to pie. The guy loves to eat his pie.

Someone is paying exorbitant sums of money to buy resident’s homes near the lake in town. Then acreage that’s been torched is deemed definite arson. About this time, the DNA evidence on the body found in the old bread factory is analyzed revealing the name of the murder victim.

Meanwhile, Will’s wife Laura is against all the development planned for the town. She feels it will destroy the small town feeling of Campbell Creek. She rallies a group of local citizens to protest what she sees as the sneaky buying up of homes and property. She organizes a sit in at the mayor’s office, which doesn’t make her brother the sheriff too happy. The character of Laura intrigues me. She’s got a lot of energy and drive. She sees that things don’t add up in this land deal and wants to know why. She’s got an investigative mind and she’s not afraid to pursue an issue. My only problem with Laura is her constant interference in Will’s job. Once resulting in him getting a reprimand and desk duty handling tons of paperwork. All to the delight of Officer Michael Peterson. But that’s just one tiny issue. The Laura character is wonderful.

Laura arranges to meet a woman reporter who has dirt on the land development group. Only the reporter is killed before Laura can get the information. Then Laura gets a bomb threat.

About that time, Will discovers the mayor and his wife murdered in their home. It looks as if they were packing up quickly to get out of town but were killed before they could make their escape. Then things really start getting dicey. Chased by killers, Will and Laura make a run to Washington, D.C. to find hard evidence of corruption and murder.

The author has put together a carefully crafted story of intrigue, greed, and corruption in a small town and also in higher places. Inspirational themes are woven throughout the story within the lives of the characters. I didn’t find any author preaching, which is the way I prefer it. This is the first installment of the Campbell Creek series, which promises to be a winner.

Book Review: The Kevlar Heart

Written By Janice Cantore
Reviewed By Nike Chillemi

In Janice Cantore’s THE KEVLAR HEART, Police Officer Brinna Caruso keeps flashing back to her childhood. She was six years old, alone, having been tied to a post and left in the middle of the California desert by a predator. Finally, she was saved by TJ, a cop with a search dog. She still recalls the words to the song she sang all night. “Jesus loves me this I know for the Bible tells me so.”

Now she’s the cop with her own search dog, named Hero. She’s been given the nickname Kid Crusader because she’s passionate about saving children from perverts. Only she has no idea that her old nemesis is back. He’s read a newspaper article about her passion to save all victimized children and to put all twisted predators who harm kids in jail. The man who abducted Brinna all those years ago takes this as a personal challenge. He’s cooking up a diabolical plot whereby he intends for Brianna to be his victim again.

What’s really getting on her nerves is that her mentor TJ, now retired, is looking in the Bible for answers. Her mom did that and it bugged her to no end. She can’t figure this out. Her mom was weak, but TJ is strong. Later, at her dad’s deathbed, she finds out that TJ had been in contact with her mom. This somehow feels like a betrayal. She doesn’t want to have anything to do with this religious stuff.

When a guy who stole a car pulls a gun on Brianna, she winds up shooting him. When it’s discovered he was a very tall minor, a high profile attorney takes the case against Brianna. She’s taken off of search and rescue and assigned to patrol with a partner she doesn’t want. Jack O’Rielly has been burned out since his wife was killed by a drunk driver. He’s turned his back on the God he and his wife once fervently believed in. He isn’t any more pleased with Brinna than she is with him. In fact he doesn’t care about much at all.

When she’s tense, Brinna likes to take her kayak out into the ocean. The marina owner where she sets sail has two gorgeous twin grandchildren. You guessed it, Brinna’s old nemesis had decided to kidnap them to publicly taunt the dog cop.

I’m very intrigued with the author’s voice. I felt as if a cop were telling me the story. Oh, yes, I forgot to mention the author is a former police officer. The predator in this story doesn’t seem to be a sexual predator. He simply loves to scare kids to their very core, and leave them tied in a secluded place and see if the authorities can find them before they die. If I had any nitpicking to do, I’d like it made clear that most predators who prey on children are sexual predators.

This novel is a page-turner. Brinna is a well-crafted main character, as if Jack O’Rielly. They seem to have flesh and blood. Their thoughts and feelings ring true. All in all a very good suspenseful read. I’m looking forward to reading more of Janice Cantore’s work.

Book Review: The Pawn

Written by Seven James
Reviewed by Nike Chillemi

This one starts all the mayhem — as FBI Agent Patrick Bowers relentlessly uses geospacial-environmental techniques to hunt serial killers. He’s not interested in what the killers’ motives are. He only wants to catch them. Bowers reads like a flesh and blood hero. If you prick him, will he bleed? The answer is a resounding, YES! He’s trying to cope with his new bride’s death from cancer, deal with parenting his understandably resentful teenage stepdaughter, while wondering if Special Agent Lien-hua Jiang is getting under his skin. In his relationships, he seems to plod along in his unassuming way, trying to sort out all the broken pieces of his life.

Meanwhile, bodies of young women are piling up in the Asheville, NC area with yellow ribbons tied to their hair and a chess piece at each crime scene. Patrick Bowers is called in only to find his supervisor has it in for him due to a rocky past working relationship. He develops his theories mapping the time and place where the previous murders took place and then using complicated mathematics tries to determine where the next murder is likely to occur. All the while, this supervisor does her best to thwart his efforts.

This serial killer calls himself the Illusionist, his methods are particularly heinous, and the story does get graphic and gory. There are several concurrent stories going on within the larger story and the author blends them masterfully. Agent Bowers suspects the governor of North Carolina, now a presidential hopeful, may be the Illusionist. As the story unfolds, the reader discovers the governor was at one time a US government black ops assassin who was involved in the Jonestown mass murder. Except, as the author tells it, one teenage boy got away. This boy is now grown and is the leader of a new cult, and he has a deadly agenda of his own.

When Bowers brings his distraught stepdaughter Tessa to North Carolina, I wanted to scream, bad move. The author set it up well enough. Tessa felt abandoned, was at her wits end and driving her grandparents crazy. And yes, she did need the love of her step-father who is the best connection she has to her dead mother. Still, it felt a bit contrived. Bowers had to know the killer, who is toying with him, will go after her. And of course the Illusionist does exactly that. Bowers did a few other things that bugged me, like not having a working cell phone at critical times.

All things considered, the reader might not figure out this is Christian fiction. Bowers’ wife converted to Christianity, but when she dies of cancer, he doubts the existence and the goodness of God. Significant portions of this novel are gory and terrifying. However, the author does pose deep questions about the nature of evil. At one point Bowers tries to explain to his stepdaughter how evil operates in the world and how close good people can sometimes come to committing evil acts. This book is not for the squeamish, and I did cringe at times. However, it made me purchase the next two books in the series.

 

Book Review: REVENGE by Mark Young

Review by Nike Chillemi –

If you want a surprise ending, as in one you really can’t figure out no matter how your try — even if you create charts and graphs — then Mark Young’s debut novel, REVENGE is for you!

Travis Mays, a former northern California police detective now teaching criminology in college, is trying to escape his painful past. The guilt of having sent Michelle Scarborough, a beautiful snitch to her death — the woman he loved.

Five years later when visiting his weekend/summer cabin on the Lochsa River in Idaho he meets up with feisty Jessie White Eagle, a Nez Perce white-water rafting guide whose brother Tommy has gone missing. She pleads and Travis gets roped into helping with the case. And thus, the reader plunges headlong into a story with a multi-faceted plot. One that will keep the pages turning.

Author Mark Young does well with character descriptions. I loved the one of Frank White Eagle, Jessie’s dad and the Nez Perce police chief…”his face seemed weathered by life without too much erosion.” The chief is one of the few Christians in the novel and he represents the faith well.

Tribal deputy, Baptiste, had a chip on his shoulder. Clay Lafata, a FBI special agent with jurisdiction issues, is running what turns into a murder investigation when Thomas White Eagle, Esq.’s body is found. Either one of these two lawmen could be playing both sides of the fence and could’ve passed information to the killer that puts Tommy’s friend on the run.

Travis is unexpectedly called back to Washington State University, where he teaches, because there’s going to be a security audit of the campus and the college higher ups want him to meet with John Ares, the school’s new security consultant. Ares, who moves with the agility of a cat, raises Travis’s hackles.

Just when I thought I had things figured out, another twist is thrown into the mix. Out of the blue, an old northern California police associate and an FBI special agent show up at WSU to warn Travis somebody might be out to kill him. As it turns out Frank Lafata was the FBI supervisor who insisted Michelle Scarborough go back into the criminal cartel to get more information resulting in her murder. Being a former lawman, Mark Young pays special attention to accuracy in presenting police procedure. Something I appreciate in a crime fiction novel.

The novel is primarily one of suspense, but there is a subtheme of romance. I love the way Travis catches himself thinking about Jessie, having to admit she’s disturbing his well-arranged life, pulling him out of hiding, and that most of the time she’s mad at him.

Creasy is one of a wall of aliases the killer uses as he takes out, one-by-one, everyone associated with that painful event in Travis’s past…the case in which the beautiful snitch died. Last on his hit list if Travis Mays. He wants Travis to pay dearly for his past sins.

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