Review by New York Times Review
"Subtle" is an inadequate word for Ruth Rendell. So are "crafty," "cunning," "clever" and "sly." Although these are accurate descriptions of her confounding technique, a better word would be "surprising." Whatever it is you might think Rendell is up to, especially when she's writing as Barbara Vine - that's not it. THE CHILD'S CHILD (Scribner, $26) is doubly deceptive because its narrative turns on two parallel plots about sexual taboos, each set in a different time frame but dealing with identical themes of love, loyalty, betrayal and murder. The contemporary story is told by Grace Easton, who takes up companionable residence with her older brother, Andrew, a "fashion-conscious gay man," in the spacious house left them by their grandmother. But what seemed a smart move proves otherwise when Andrew falls in love with an exquisite but neurotic young man who moves in and disrupts the household by tangling with Grace, who dismisses him as "one of those gay men who disliked women, all women." He's particularly offended by her Ph.D. thesis on the stigma once attached to "unmarried mothers," enraged that she dares to compare their social condemnation to the persecution of gay men who were "ostracized, attacked, killed." Although it's awkwardly introduced, an unpublished novel written decades earlier provides the parallel plot about another brother and sister who share a home. John Goodwin, a teacher both ashamed of and repelled by his own "homosexualism," resigns himself to a life of celibacy by moving to the Devon countryside and establishing a sham marriage to protect his pregnant unmarried 15-year-old sister, Maud. Just as Andrew Easton is undone by love, John Goodwin becomes infatuated with a beautiful but dangerous hustler who torments him for what remains of his unhappy life. Exercising her discreet skills of misdirection, Rendell keeps so tight a focus on John's suffering that we're scarcely aware of what havoc social deprivation has wreaked on Maud. After years of living a secret life, she emerges as "the kind of woman common in their family, narrow, censorious, quick to pass judgment," the same kind of disapproving person, in other words, who drove her and her brother from the family home. In Rendell's chilling view, what goes around comes around, and the injustices of one age are bound to have horrid repercussions, even in supposedly enlightened societies like our own. Not to be crass, but Ed Kovacs owes a lot to Hurricane Katrina. Picking up from his novel "Storm Damage," GOOD JUNK (Minotaur, $25.99) finds the fractured city of New Orleans struggling to put itself back together a year after the storm. Cliff St. James, who plays the smart-aleck private eye in these stories, feels terrible because he has killed a man during a sparring session in a fight cage. But it's hard to feel the pain of a noir action hero who might have emerged from a toy box. Not only does this guy have a history as a cop, he's also a martial-arts expert and the "cuddle-buddy" of a homicide detective named Honey Baybee, who implausibly manages to get St. James assigned to a murder investigation as a freelance investigator. But if the characters are animated dolls and the plot about the theft of futuristic weapons being designed at a local military facility is less than credible, the scenes of New Orleans are rich and real. Kovacs's hopeless, elegiac vision of the city is touching, and his quick studies of hidden landmarks like the outré bar in the French Quarter that calls itself Pravda, and Pampy's, a purveyor of soul food to politicians, are written with true affection and terrific humor. In NOT DEAD YET (Minotaur, $25.99), Peter James smartly captures the giddy insanity that descends on the English seaside resort of Brighton when it's invaded by a film company bringing home a local girl, Gaia Lafayette, who went off to Hollywood and was transformed into a flamboyant rock star diva. But when Gaia returns to Brighton, two scary people are waiting: a disgruntled screenwriter with murder on his mind and an unstable fan who could kill her with love. James really knows how to plot a procedural thriller, and he enjoys a sly joke, like casting Gaia as Mother Teresa in a West End musical called "Sainted!" But his droll wit deserts him when it comes to the Hollywood natives, caricatured in an overblown style that's wildly at odds with the earnest manner of his series's sleuth, Detective Superintendent Roy Grace. Although, come to think of it, Grace is so batty about the prospect of becoming a father that he too seems to have gone off the edge. Aside from the castle of your father, the king, the safest place for a woman in the Middle Ages was a well-run religious institution like the one that figures in Priscilla Royal's enthralling medieval mysteries. Tyndal Priory has long thrived under the progressive policies of the aristocratic Eleanor, so there's no accounting for the murder and mayhem that seem to plague this holy retreat - except for the opportunity they offer for Royal's insights into the upheavals of the period. The vividly drawn characters in THE SANCTITY OF HATE (Poisoned Pen, cloth, $24.95; paper, $14.95) enlighten us on many details of monastic life. But it's the harrowing scene of a Jewish woman suffering the agonies of a difficult childbirth while a howling mob threatens violence that sums up Royal's two dark themes: the lowly status and cruel treatment of women, and the persecution of England's Jewish population. Whatever you think Ruth Rendell is up to, especially when she's writing as Barbara Vine - that's not it.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [December 23, 2012]
Review by Booklist Review
A year after Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans PI and mixed-martial-arts instructor Cliff St. James is hired by NOPD to help investigate the murder of an engineer who worked on black projects for the U.S. government. St. James and the woman in his life, homicide detective Honey Baybee, soon find a small mountain of cash in the victim's luxurious home, prompting suspicions that he had been selling military secrets to the Chinese. Their investigation also leads them to a shady group of arms merchants and the possibility that FBI agents, military officers, and other feds are abetting treason. Kovacs (Storm Damage, 2011) maintains a fast pace, and his descriptions of a steamy, seamy, badly managed city that is failing to recover from Katrina are jolting and plausible. Good Junk has plenty of action and high-tech gadgetry, too but discerning crime fans might wish for more fully fleshed characters.--Gaughan, Thomas Copyright 2010 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Set a year after Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans, Kovacs's outstanding second Cliff St. James novel (after 2011's Storm Damage) finds St. James, a private investigator who's also a mixed martial arts instructor, distraught over accidentally killing his opponent during a sparring session. The self-doubt St. James now feels proves a handicap when his close friend and not quite lover, NOPD homicide detective Honey Baybee, recruits him to officially assist with what she believes is a murder/suicide case. Two dead men, possibly gay lovers, have turned up in a grubby parking lot, one of them with his brains blown out in the passenger seat of a Mercedes S550. As both victims did sensitive work for the Defense Department at the local NASA assembly facility, St. James and Baybee encounter more than a little federal interference with the case. St. James may fit the familiar wiseass detective mold, but powerful prose that evokes a city still struggling to recover its infrastructure and identity elevates this well beyond most other contemporary PI novels. Agent: Richard Curtis, Richard Curtis Associates. (Dec.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Haunted by his past (he accidentally killed a mixed-martial-arts opponent), former New Orleans cop Cliff St. James is barely eking out a living as a PI. But when his best friend, homicide detective Honey Baybee, requests James's help, he's all in. Initially, two dead gay men in an alley suggest a lover's tiff, but instead the victims lead the cops and Cliff (as a consultant) into a far more sinister situation. Secretly hanging onto one victim's much-sought-after laptop, Cliff digs into the back story. Turns out both men had covert defense-department connections (think stealth bombers and secret black ops) and Cliff unveils a convoluted weapons-smuggling ring involving rogue retired military brass. Now both the Chinese and the Russians are quite interested in what he knows. VERDICT Kovacs evokes post-Katrina New Orleans particularly well in his sophomore entry (after his highly lauded Storm Damage), and the city may be the strongest character in the book. Unfortunately, a labyrinthine plot slows down the thriller's momentum midstream, just when it should be escalating. (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
More hangs in the balance than he imagines when a private eye signs on to help a police friend solve her latest case. New Orleans cop-turned-shamus Cliff St. James has been lying low since a routine mixed martial arts fight in his dojo ended with the accidental death of Bobby Perdue, his opponent. When asked by closest friend (and maybe more) Detective Honey Baybee to help out as an unpaid consultant to a hot case she's working on, St. James can't say no even though he'd rather be holed up at home. Mainly, he can't believe that Chief Pointer would give him any power in the department after their long history together. Honey's case involves the murder of two employees of local NASA federal offshoot Michoud. Because of all the government clearances involved, it's hard to find out exactly what they did. What follows is a frequently murky but always compelling investigation into the world of a high-end "Buyers Club" of black projects goods that mixes a healthy dose of government agents with rogues from around the world. Kovacs (Storm Damage, 2011, etc.) lovingly paints a portrait of post-Katrina New Orleans as St. James tries to flush the perps out of wherever they might be hiding. His targets include people like Decon, who's been implicated by some higher-ups and spends his nights sleeping in a graveyard crypt. By the time St. James is ready to solve the case, he's bruised, battered and well aware that he may be a pawn in a game much bigger than he realized. With so many twists and turns, even the most devoted noir fans may wish they had a map. But it's well worth trying to find the way.]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Review by New York Times Review
Review by Booklist Review
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Review by Library Journal Review
Review by Kirkus Book Review
