Library Limelights 276

 

Erin Young. The Fields. USA: Flatiron Books, 2022.

Black Hawk County, Iowa, is like a poster scene for the corn-producing belt of America. But all is not well, with a woman found savagely murdered in a cornfield. Squeamish readers, beware! ... not for everyone. Chloe Miller’s husband James, devastated by her death, is a bio-engineer working for Agri-Co seeds and chemicals company. If you suspect that Big Ag will end up being a villain here, you would be partly right. Detective Riley Fisher works with County Sheriff Reed’s office to coordinate the investigation, but it turns uglier with three more similarly mutilated bodies. Not only a serial killer, but apparently a cannibal. A peek into his macabre thoughts is more than chilling. Chloe had been a school friend of Riley. Local corn co-op, Zephyr Farms, was formed to withstand the widespread takeovers by Agri-Co, but seems involved in some otherwise sinister events.

As so often with the good guys, Riley has her own domestic problems. Her irresponsible brother Ethan lives with her; his troubled teenage daughter Maddie spends time with them. In addition, Riley has an old secret haunting her, surfacing from the current murders. Author Young pulls in elements of social or political awareness: state Governor Hamilton is making a quiet deal with China; “Mission Earth” eco-warriors are protesting; Senator Jess Cook is campaigning against Hamilton in the upcoming election; homeless people say some of them are being kidnapped; and profilers from the FBI’s Behavior Analysis Unit (BAU) enter the picture. Then Maddie’s disappearance sparks the climax. The bizarre crimes are ultimately explained away scientifically. Gruesome moments, and a tricky mystery.

P.S. What’s with the recent fiction trend for women to bear men’s names, or just plain surnames?! Riley, Madison, Thorne, and a crop of characters in books past? Morven, Julian, Harper, Billie, Charlie, Aubrey, etc.

One-liners

▪ “Just a handful of firms now control America’s food supply.” (14)

▪ China, lacking the research and the arable land on which to grow enough crops to support the livestock their burgeoning middle classes feed upon, was ravenous for American corn. (62)

▪ She knew of the old Bible camp, miles out of town, its cabins abandoned to nature. (90)

▪ “I said before if I thought your association with Miller’s wife was affecting your ability to do your job in any way, I would take action.” (110)

▪ Riley felt shock prickle her skin as she stared at the ring: a silver skull with two red crystals for eyes. (189)

Multi-liners

▪ If Reed knew about her past—about California―she had no doubt she’d be stripped of her badge. A badge that had brought her back to life. A job that was her life. (34-5)

▪ She withdrew the hacking device carefully and leaned into the cupboard, easing it into the router’s free socket. Easy as pie, as her grandmother would have said. (101)

▪ “It’s the fact she’s really going after the big boys, you know? Agri-Co and the like. Stripping their tax breaks and subsidies. Fining the polluters.” (161)

▪ “The girl is trouble. That mother of hers? And her father—arrested for drugs? The apple don’t fall far from the tree.” (198)

▪ “Sergeant Riley Fisher, requesting immediate assistance. Two armed men leaving my property.” (295)

Big Ag

It was true that the bigger these companies became the more they were able to pull into their orbit—land and research grants, government subsidies and political support. But those weren’t the only things these giants sucked up. Across the country, whole communities were being left as ghost towns as local firms and families, unable to compete, were forced to close down. The lifeblood of rural America was being drained, leaving husks of cities, where poverty and crime rushed in to fill the void. (27)

Ethan

She didn’t tell her brother she’d been suspended. She hadn’t told Logan that yet either. “I’ll join you shortly.”

There was a long pause. “This feels like karma, Riley. God punishing me for being a shit father. If something happens to her—?”

“Maddie was upset, Ethan. I think this is an act of rebellion. Nothing sinister.” But you know what can happen to a lost girl. She ignored the voice. “Why don’t you come home? Sleep for a couple of hours? I can take over.” (279-80)

Urgency

“OK,” she said, loading the shotgun. “Let’s go.”

“Riley. I have to tell you something.”

“Not here, sweetheart. We need to leave.” Riley didn’t expect the men would return, but she wasn’t going to take any chances. “Stay behind me.”

“But—”

“We’ve got to go. Now.” (295)

Lars Kepler. The Mirror Man. Sweden 2020. Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 2022.

I would not recommend this book except to the diehard crime fiction fan. Parts of it are unpalatable. Kepler is an acclaimed master of crime fiction, heavy on what could be called psychodrama with slices of horror. A husband-and-wife team actually pen the Kepler books that appear every few years. Crimes and evil are graphically portrayed but the expertise in both the psychological underpinning and plot twists are compelling. Character development is razor sharp and realistic. Swedish police detective Joona Linna has been the protagonist in many Kepler novels—compulsive, impulsive, dedicated, and willing to die for his investigative choices. His new boss can barely restrain him when he makes connections related to a recent hanging. They are up against a fiendish, invisible killer.

If girls and children in Sweden disappeared as often as they do in fiction, the country would be drastically depopulated. Pamela and Martin lost their daughter Alice in an accident; years later they lose Mia, the teen they want to adopt. Inasmuch as the average reader knows about complex PTSD, trauma psychology, acute personality disorder, or the benefits of hypnotism, it’s safe to say we buy into Kepler’s entire premise heedless of possible holes or flaws. Joona’s breakneck action at times ensures the problems will resolve in the end, but at great cost of life, limb, and resources. From the first page it’s almost impossible to put the book down. And that’s all I’m going to say. You’ve had your warning.

Very Selective Bits

▪ Jenny knows she has to pretend that she’s sleeping deeply, that she has no idea Frida has attempted to escape. (40)

▪ He doesn’t have to watch the CCTV footage again to know that the man with the dog could be their killer. (94)

▪ She knows that Martin hasn’t asserted his right to a lawyer. The police probably manipulated him into saying things he doesn’t know anything about. (118)

▪ By dragging Mia into this mess, she has done nothing but let her down. And she has also let down Alice by fooling herself. (119)

▪ Pamela thinks to herself that she should go out onto the balcony, wrap the old string of fairy lights around her neck, and jump. (120)

▪ Erik feels a pleasurable tingle in his gut as he lowers Martin into a deep state of hypnosis, approaching the limits of catalepsy. (196)

▪ “I’m saying no to an undercover operation tonight.” (268)

▪ Joona moves past the loader, feeling his heart working hard to compensate for his falling blood pressure. (298)

▪ “I mean I’m not a psychologist or a psychiatrist, so I can’t speak for his methods ... but Dad’s primary area of focus was depersonalization and dissociative identity disorders.” (333)

Lucy Foley. The Paris Apartment. Ebook download from TPL. UK: HarperFiction/HarperCollins UK, 2022.

Foley has produced some very popular books the last few years and this one follows suit with plenty of perplexing elements to the mystery. Jess arrives at her half-brother Ben’s third-floor apartment in Paris only to see that he is missing. Most of the neighbours, and the concierge in the courtyard, are unhelpful or downright rude to her. Each floor of the grand five-storey building, in a horseshoe shape, is one apartment. On the second floor is Nick, an old friend of Ben; they hadn’t seen each other for years, but Nick finagled getting the apartment for him. As Jess gets more and more frantic to find Ben, we learn about a hidden staircase, a sumptuous wine cellar in the basement, and the dubious origins of Sophie Meunier who occupies the penthouse with her important, wealthy husband. We have what look like party girls on the fourth floor, and a feuding husband-wife situation on the first.

I’m treading carefully not to spoil a big reveal that comes about halfway through. Jess wonders if Ben, a journalist, had been working on a dangerous exposé of some sort. Meeting his editor Theo didn’t help. Jess won’t go to the police because they could uncover her own unsavoury past. But now I have to say that the device of moving swiftly from the stealthy thoughts or movements of one occupant to another—intended to increase suspense―eventually becomes fracturing. Annoying. The main episode is deliberately murky. Jess’s character is not fully developed. More whine: Do we have to be told so often that red wine stains the teeth? How could some apartments be bigger than others? Do Parisians customarily eat salted butter? Unfortunately, my credibility in the whole premise was slipping right down and through the climax.

Jess

▪ I got so good at it I can unpick a simple pin tumbler mechanism in less than a minute. (32)

▪ As I said, my brother’s always been good at getting people to fall in love with him. (76)

▪ Another girl might have left then or never come back. Another girl might have called the police. But I’m not that girl. (116)

▪ I have to pretend to know nothing. (202)

▪ I forgot everything apart from the horror of what I’m looking at. I scream and scream and scream. (385)

Others

▪ Before him I thought all Englishmen were sunburnt, no elegance, bad teeth. I did not know they could be so ... so beautiful, so charmante, so soigné. (46)

▪ Our new neighbour was dangerous. I thought of the notes. My mystery blackmailer. (159)

▪ “Well, you have to ask if anyone really knows the real Benjamin Daniels.” (176)

▪ “Ne merdes pas. Do not mess this up.” (215)

▪ He knew too much. Had so much he could use against me. (265)