Monthly Archives: June 2016

Killing The Kind Worth Killing

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kind worth killing 2The Kind Worth Killing
Peter Swanson
William Morrow
paperback $9.99
ebook $14.99
audio

I was in the mood for a thriller and this one caught my eye. I think it was the blurb about four unreliable narrators that did the trick, although the one about three plots twists didn’t hurt.  (No, it wasn’t the nubile young woman silhouetted in the skimpy negligee. But that didn’t hurt.)

One of the blurbs compares the book to the work of Alfred Hitchcock, and I think that’s a fair comparison.  Other than the twist on the first page of the second part, which would be darn hard to pull off in a visual medium, this novel has all the elements of a Hitchcock thriller. Continue reading →

Trouble in Lamar County

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The Rock HoleThe Rock Hole
Poisoned Pen Press
Reavis Z. Wortham
paperback $14.95
ebook $0.99
audio $3.49

The Rock Hole is one of those books in which Literature goes slumming and dresses up in genre drag.  Often the results, while they may be beloved by the critics, are only embarrassing.  But then an author comes along and shows the rest of the world how it’s done.  More on this in a bit.

Young Top Parker comes to live with his grandparents in rural Lamar County, Texas, in 1964.  Top’s grandfather Ned is the constable and farmer.  When he gets there, someone is mutilating animals.  Ned fears it’s only a rehearsal for killing a person, and he’s got reason to believe that person will be a child.  What he doesn’t realize is that the killer has Top in his sights. Continue reading →