An Insignificant Case by Phillip Margolin

Published by Minotaur Books on November 5, 2024

The background of An Insignificant Case features a sex trafficking ring that benefits powerful men. Think Epstein. No, think Epstein combined with Harvey Weinstein, because the man behind the sex trafficking is a movie producer. And then add a snuff film so the reader will know that the bad guys are really, really bad. Sex trafficking of the sort described in the novel is rare in the US and snuff films are urban myths, but they show up regularly in thrillers.

Fortunately, An Insignificant Case is not another pedestrian story about a heroic character saving imprisoned women before they can be raped and killed. Sensitive readers need not shirk away from the subject matter. The sex trafficking has ended and nothing that happened is described in graphic imagery. This is, in fact, a remarkably light novel, given its dark background.

Leon Golden is the producer. He promises naïve young women a part in a movie. Then his goons show the women a snuff film, promise them that they’ll be the next victim if they don’t cooperate, and force them to service the usual array of powerful men. The victim who died in the snuff film was one of the women to whom Golden promised an audition.

The novel’s action begins when Guido Sabatini breaks into a safe in the office of a restaurant and steals a flash drive. The circumstances that persuade Guido to steal the drive are silly and fun. So is Guido. His real name is Lawrence Weiss, but he believes himself to be a reincarnated Italian Renaissance painter who studied under Michaelangelo.

Guido gave a painting to a restaurant owner, Grethen Hall, but became miffed when she hung it in her office rather than a place where patrons could view it. He stole the painting and took the flash drive for insurance, thinking he could exchange it for a promise to display the painting properly. When he’s caught, Charlie Webb is assigned to represent him.

Unlike most fictional lawyers, Charlie Webb isn’t wealthy and wildly successful. He muddled his way through college with middling grades, was accepted at a bottom-tier law school where he earned middling grades, and hung out his shingle in a low-rent office in Portland. Like a lot of younger lawyers, Charlie accepts public defender overflow cases even though they don’t pay well because he needs the money. He lacks self-esteem, but he has the kind of insights into people that trial lawyers need.

When Hall’s dead body is found covered by Guido’s painting, Guido is arrested for murder. He wants Charlie to represent him, but Charlie isn’t equipped to handle a murder. To his surprise, the judge appoints the best criminal defense attorney in Oregon to second chair the case. Charlie promptly promotes the guy to first chair, but only Charlie has a rapport with Guido.

The story that springs forth from these background facts is clever and entertaining. Several people are shot to death. Guido is a suspect, but the identity of the shooter or shooters is meant to be a surprise. Seasoned thriller readers will probably piece it together before the reveal, but this isn’t a whodunit. Just as it seems that the plot has come to an end, it gives birth to a new storyline, giving Charlie another opportunity to hone his trial skills.

I want legal thrillers to captivate me with cross-examinations. The courtroom scenes in An Insignicant Case are enjoyable, if not  quite captivating. The novel asks familiar questions about the difference between vengeance and justice but the plot doesn’t bog down in heavy discussions. The tone is light and, in occasional moments, reads like an intelligent romcom.

While the plot moves crisply, the story is more character driven than most thrillers. Charlie is an easy character to like. He’s a bit hapless with women when the novel begins, flirts (or considers flirting) with two or three as he gains confidence in himself, and is batting above his average by the novel’s end. The shooter is also reasonably likable (a view the shooting victims might not have shared). A couple of motorcycle gang members add extra comic spice to the story. The ending offers a satisfying balance between vengeance and justice. All of that makes An Insignificant Case a fun choice for readers in search of a smart winter beach read.

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Ushers by Joe Hill

Published by Amazon Original Stories on November 1, 2024

“Ushers” is a short story that Amazon is marketing to Kindle users. Non-Kindle readers might find it in an anthology at some point. With its supernatural focus, the story might fit broadly into the horror genre, although by that standard, the same might be said of the Bible. Unlike horror fiction of the slasher/monster variety, the story sends a message about life rather than encouraging readers to be frightened of death.

Martin Lorenson doesn’t see dead people, but his parents ran a hospice so he has seen many people die. Just before they die, he sees something else. The clue to what he sees is in the story’s title.

Marin has been fortunate to avoid his own death. In high school, he was home with diarrhea when a school shooter killed his classmates. At least, that’s the story he tells.

As the story begins, two police detectives want to know why Martin purchased a ticket for a passenger train that he didn’t board. The train derailed and killed a bunch of people. The detectives (Duvall and Oates, not to be confused with the 1970s singing duo who gained fame by performing insipid music) think Martin’s avoidance of death is suspicious, so they interview him.

Although the story is too short to permit much character development, Duvall is more interesting than your average fictional police detective. He has an adult daughter who, in the age of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd, feels conflicted about being a Black woman whose father works in law enforcement. Duvall’s position is that cops can’t all be white or the nation would descend into apartheid. God knows there are Americans who would welcome that outcome.

Anyway, how is Martin so lucky that he twice avoided catastrophe? Joe Hill channels the creepy gene that he must have inherited from his father to provide an explanation that will appeal to fans of the supernatural.

The story’s ending has an unexpected twist, although its message — appreciate being alive while you still can — is far from original. As a short story (and this one is shorter than most of those in the Amazon Original Stories series), the story’s focus is tight, but Hill balances its focus on death with moments of humor and a message suggesting that something better awaits us on the other side. Religious readers (or those who believe in an afterlife for nonreligious reasons) might find the story comforting. I found it entertaining.

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Pike Island by Tony Wirt

Published by Thomas & Mercer on November 1, 2024

Pike Island follows a familiar structure that leads to a surprising conclusion. Two storylines, one set in the past and the other in the present, progress until they converge. As events unfold, the reader suspects that a political career in the present might be derailed by the politician’s actions in the past.

The story in the past involves four high school buddies who spend a week at a cabin on Cedar Lake in Minnesota. Jake’s grandfather owns the cabin. Andy had a talent for schmoozing adults and getting what he wanted. Of course, Andy will grow up to be a politician. Ryan and Seth are mostly along for the ride.

The kids goad each other into investigating an abandoned house on Pike Island in an isolated part of the lake. They are scolded by a DNR agent, but that’s the least of their worries. The house contains something of value and one of the kids will lure the others into trouble by allowing greed to overcome his moral sense (assuming he has one).

Andy’s full name is Harrison Andrew Harrison Leonard. As an adult, he goes by Harry. He’s serving his first term in Congress and hopes to get a career boost from a viral video in which he denounces the Supreme Court. His chief of staff, Krista Walsh, is more idealistic than Harry. She wants to get things done, while Harry just wants to climb the ladder of power.

Krista is the central protagonist in the storyline that is set in the present. She’s trying to manage Harry’s career in ways that will maximize his ability to help the less fortunate. Harry is more than willing to pay the political game, setting aside idealist goals in exchange for the possibility of running as vice president. Krista would prefer that he set Washington aside, run for governor, and seek the presidency as an outsider who might get something done.

Krista notices that Harry seems upset when he receives mysterious and vaguely threatening postcards from Cedar Lake. Krista decides to dig into his past so can try to protect him from political fallout if disclosures of sinister behavior might be on the horizon. She sets out to interview the men who went to Cedar Lake with Andy/Harry — or at least those who are still alive — and turns up facts suggesting that Harry might not be the affable progressive that she has always imagined him to be.

Tony Wirt builds an engaging mystery for Krista to unravel. Something bad happened on Pike Island, but what role did Harry play in those events? Who is sending the notes that threaten to expose Harry? (A reader might wonder why the note-sender doesn’t simply reveal what he knows to the press or police, but if he did that, there wouldn’t be story.) Misdirection keeps the reader guessing about the identity of the note sender but, more importantly, about the events that gave rise to the note.

Wirt creates a convincing atmosphere (more so in Minnesota than in D.C.). His prose is crisp. Characters have all the personality they need, which isn’t much. Readers who like to invest in characters and value those who are likable may be disappointed with the way a protagnist behaves at the story's end.

This isn’t an action novel, but the story moves quickly. Wirt builds suspense as the characters move toward a final confrontation. I credit him for crafting a surprise ending that is actually surprising. I’m not sure I buy it — it requires a key character to act completely out of character — but it’s rare that I mutter “wow, I didn’t see that coming” at the end of a novel.

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Disturbing the Bones by Andrew Davis and Jeff Biggers

Published by Melville House on October 22, 2024

Disturbing the Bones is a novel of racial injustice and an unsolved crime combined with a political thriller. The blend is interesting but it doesn’t quite work. The over-the-top plot is too unconvincing to generate suspense while the bland characters lack originality.

The story is set in Cairo, Illinois. Southern Illinois is south of the Mason-Dixon line and closer in spirit to Arkansas than northern Illinois. White business owners abandoned Cairo during the 1960s rather than obeying the law by hiring Black employees and serving Black customers. There isn’t much left of the place today. If the point of Disturbing the Bones is to remind readers of a racist history that racists would like to deny or conveniently forget, the point has merit. Maybe a novel will teach a history lesson that racists don't want their kids to learn in school. Still, a thriller needs to deliver thrills to earn a full recommendation.

The novel’s female protagonist is an archeologist named Mandy Moore. She’s been working in Vietnam (where she acquired an impressive knowledge of botany that turns out to be important for reasons that are too coincidental to be credible). Moore is called back to supervise a dig near Cairo, where plans to build a highway are temporarily halted by the discovery of ancient hunting sites. Moore has been hand selected by retired general Will Alexander, who has been a mentor and unofficial godfather to her. Both grew up in Southern Illinois. Alexander now runs a construction company that has built its wealth on government contracts for the military.

Moore discovers that the site contains the remains of villages from the Early Archaic Period. The dig unearths some human bones. The bones aren’t new, but they are far from prehistoric. Following protocol, she alerts federal officials who conduct DNA tests and identify the bones as those of Florence Jenkins, a Black civil rights reporter who went missing in 1978.

The novel’s male protagonist is Florence’s son. Randall Jenkins is now a Chicago police detective who has a troubled relationship with his adult daughter. Jenkins has always been obsessed with his mother’s disappearance and his obsession only grows when he is notified that his mother’s remains have been discovered in Cairo. The attempt to give Jenkins a personality fails to distinguish Jenkins from all the other fictional cops who give less attention to their family problems than the crime that obsesses them — in this case, a crime committed while Jenkins was still a child. Jenkins seems to hate everyone, including Moore, making him a decidedly unlikable protagonist.

The mystery of Florence’s death often moves to the background of a muddled plot that casts General Alexander as a parody of a melodramatic Bond villain. When he releases attack drones, he says “Go get them, my little darlings.” Dr. Evil of Austin Powers fame couldn’t have said it better. Alexander’s goal is to untrack worldwide arms treaty negotiations that would eliminate nuclear weapons after a little snafu in Russia turns yet another Russian city into a radioactive memory.

The authors earn credit for shrouding some supporting characters in mystery. An archeologist named Sandeep might or might not be a terrorist, given that he might or might not be flying drones over a military base, although why anyone believes a terrorist from Canada would be working on an archeological dig in Illinois is never made clear. A woman named Alison Foreman might or might not be a government agent and might or might not be a good guy or a bad guy. A clumsy reveal at the end brings her into better focus.

As an archeologist, Moore is positioned to play Indiana Jones. She must contend with evil people who want to cover up their role in Florence’s death by destroying the dig site and all the recovered artifacts. Given the unlikelihood that any evidence will be discovered that points to the truth, the coverup seems more likely to lead to imprisonment than the initial crime. The motivations of key characters just aren’t rational, even if they are necessary to keep the plot moving. Because it isn’t believable, the plot as a whole fails to build credible suspense, despite intermittent injections of mundane action scenes.

The ending is frankly depressing, although I suppose the authors deserve credit for avoiding an ending that is artificially happy. I’m not sure that substituting an ending that is artificially tragic is better, although the tragic aspect is likely meant to serve as a warning of where the nation might be heading. Really, if reading the news every morning isn’t a sufficient warning, I don’t know that a novel is going to reach you.

The story is marred by pedestrian prose. While I agree with the novel’s political viewpoint — racism is bad, the military-industrial complex is too powerful — there is little in the way of subtlety or nuance in a plot that sacrifices careful development of events and characters in favor of a story that I would expect from a bad made-for-TV movie. While the novel held my attention, it has too many flaws to earn a reservation-free recommendation.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS

Dogs and Monsters by Mark Haddon

Published by Doubleday on October 15, 2024

Mark Haddon has to be my favorite living writer of short non-genre fiction. The eight stories gathered in this collection are nearly all gems.

Haddon often grounds stories in ancient history or mythology, finding new ways to make them relevant to a modern reader. The longest and — to me — the most interesting story is “The Quiet Limit of the World.” This story follows Tithonus who has been granted eternal life but not eternal youth by Eos. He ages slowly and discovers the curse of immortality; “what might have begun as grounds for envy or congratulations is tipping into something more sinister.” He leaves home because he does not want to endure the guilt of living when he will eventually bury his wives and children. Tithonus fights wars in the ancient world, survives the plague in the Middle Ages, is astonished by the destructive power of the twentieth century. Only Eos keeps him tethered to the world after he can no longer read or hear. The story is sad and touching.

Another favorite, “The Mother’s Story,” is the oddest entry, if only because it contains the sentence “My wife has given birth to a mooncalf.” Haddon explains that the story is “a reworking of the myth of Pasiphaë and her son Asterion, otherwise known as the Minotaur.” The woman must pretend to have been made pregnant by a bull to spare her husband the shame of fathering a repellant child. A scheme to use the child to terrorize (and thus control) the kingdom depends on a simple truth: “There is nothing more terrifying than the monster that squats behind the door you dare not open.” Followed years later by another truth that explains why people allow themselves to be ruled by leaders who hold power by making them afraid of others: “I sometimes think people get a great deal of unaccountable pleasure from being absolute fools.”

“D.O.G.Z.” retells Ovid’s version of the ancient myth of Actaeon. To punish him for viewing her mysteries as she was frolicking with other naked women in the woods, Diana turns Actaeon into a stag. The scene in which Actaeon is ripped apart by his hunting dogs is fittingly gruesome. The story has barely ended before the narrator begins to dissect it, comparing it to Acusilaus’s version and asking whether the story isn’t really about the dogs before exploring other dogs of literary fame as well as offering a poignant salute to Russian doggy astronauts. This is the only story in which it seemed to me that Haddon lost the plot.

“The Wilderness” is a tense story with the feel of a thriller. A woman is bicycling around the world to avoid coping with the loss of her brother. She has an accident while riding her bike in a remote area. Her rescuer saves her from death but brings her to a fenced-in place where she stumbles upon scientists experimenting with genetic editing. After a time, she wonders whether the scientists are turning her into an animal or whether she has she always been one. A daring escape leads to an encounter with other escaped women who are primed for revenge.

“The Bunker” might be an allegorical story. The protagonist is a nurse who finds herself from time to time transported to a bunker (a repurposed Cold War fallout shelter) in a postapocalyptic world. Is she losing her mind? The answer is unclear, although an exorcist who promises to lead her home apparently leads her to a terrifying new reality.

Also high on the strangeness scale is “The Temptation of St. Anthony.” The saint resists all the usual temptations that the devil puts in front of him before abandoning his solitary life to preach, only to realize that the devil is tempting him with a new trap.

“My Old School” is a boarding school story. The protagonist saves himself from bullying by betraying a school chum’s secret. Years later, the protagonist realizes how the betrayal affected the other student’s life.

Haddon explains that the shortest entry, “St. Brides Bay,” is written to accompany Virginia Woolf’s story, “The Mark on the Wall.” I probably should have read Woolf’s story to get more out of this one, which consists of an aging woman’s rambling thoughts as she attends a lesbian wedding. She contemplates progress and her mother and a woman named Lucy with whom she had a three-month fling when same-sex love was forbidden.

Haddon is a gifted storyteller and a prose master. Readers who love a carefully constructed sentence that is driven by original thought are a good audience for Haddon’s short stories.

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