The House of Secrets by Brad Meltzer and Tod Goldberg

Published by Grand Central Publishing on June 7, 2016

Hazel Nash grew up with a famous father who had a television show -- The House of Secrets -- that appealed to the gullible, particularly those who believe in Sasquatch and implausible conspiracies. Her brother, Skip, was also on the show and is also famous. Hazel is not famous. At the age of 35, she is an anthropology professor who studies death rituals. She manages to escape her own death in an accident that scrambles her brain. Hazel now finds herself at the center of her own conspiracy, one that involves a dead man who had a bible sewn into his chest.

Hazel’s accident has caused her to lose her emotional memories, her attachments to people and things. She doesn’t recognize or remember having relationships with the people in her past. At the same time, she doesn’t remember the kind of person she used to be -- perhaps for the better, since she might have been something of a sociopath before the accident. She doesn’t remember all the details of her old life, but she remembers how to be dangerously violent.

Someone called The Bear has taken an interest in Hazel and Skip. So has an FBI agent named Trevor Rabkin, who thinks Hazel’s father was up to no good. All of this ties in to people who are turning up dead in foreign countries while wearing Revolutionary War uniforms (American side). It also turns into a search for Benedict Arnold’s bible -- something that Hazel’s father spent the clandestine part of his career trying to find. Why? You need to read the book to find out. No spoilers here.

I’m not fond of the contrived “lost memory” device, which writers use as a convenient way to conceal important facts from the reader in the hope of building suspense. Unfortunately, The House of Secrets isn’t very suspenseful. Hazel and Skip are reasonably sympathetic but not fully rounded. The House of Secrets certainly isn’t a character-driven novel, so the question is whether the plot makes it worth reading.

At best, I would answer that question with a qualified maybe. The story holds a few surprises, including the nature of Benedict Arnold’s bible, but it is needlessly convoluted. Occasional action scenes keep the story lurching forward but when she isn’t fighting or fleeing, Hazel engages in a lot of hand-wringing and pointless speculating. Information dumps at the end finally explain the plot, but I’m not sure they are worth waiting for. This could have been a much tighter novel, and by the time the truth about the bibles is revealed, it isanti-climactic and a little too goofy.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS

Admiral by Sean Danker

Published by Roc (Berkley Group) on May 3, 2016

Four people wake up in the sleeping pods on a ship. The ship has crashed on a creepy planet. One of the survivors is wearing an Admiral’s uniform. He claims to be an honorary admiral but the others are suspicious. The ship’s only two crew members have burned to death in an airlock.

A harrowing escape from a perilous situation is followed by a series of harrowing escapes. In between escapes the four characters get to know each other.

Characterization isn’t bad, but Admiral is ultimately a “humans chased around by alien monsters” novel. I’ve read enough novels (and seen enough movies) with that plot to last a lifetime. The intriguing background (which involves a couple of recently warring groups) is more interesting than the action story that follows the setup.

I liked parts of the novel but was indifferent to most of it, so my recommendation is filled with reservations. The most interesting part of the story -- the Admiral’s identity and mission -- is too far removed from the alien monster story. Unfortunately, by the time the story reveals which side the Admiral is on, I no longer cared. Had the novel’s focus been on the backstory that is told in the last pages rather than alien monsters, Admiral might have been more engaging.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS

Seven Days Dead by John Farrow

Published by Minotaur Books (Thomas Dunne) on May 24, 2016

Seven Days Dead is a fun, engrossing novel. It has a peculiar, meandering plot that invites the reader to speculate about how the characters and their stories will come together. The story has the charm of a well-conceived mystery but the novel’s characters are its strength.

Alfred Orrock, the major property owner on Grand Manan, has arranged to die. Simon Lescavage is present and not happy about it. Alfred’s daughter Maddy is on her way but, as always, her father doesn’t wait for her. Shortly after Alfred’s death, a popular island resident comes to a violent end. A third death follows.

The Canadian island of Grand Manan is populated by eccentrics, busybodies, and tourists. The locals regularly set each other’s property on fire or dangle someone over a cliff to resolve a quarrel, but they draw the line at murder. Wade Louwagie, a burnt-out Mountie who has is coping with panic attacks, isn’t sure he’s capable of dealing with a disemboweled corpse. That body was discovered by Aaron Roadcap, the son of a convicted murderer whose heritage makes him a suspect in the death.

Rounding out the cast are a retired police officer, Émile Cinq-Mars, and his wife Sandra, who are attempting to vacation on the island. Sandra and Émile are trying to sort out their lives, to decide what they want and whether they are capable of change. For Émile to become involved in murder investigations seems contrary to their attempt at a fresh start, but they both know that solving crime is in Émile’s blood.

The primary characters are constantly evolving as they deal with their pasts and find the courage to address the future. Colorful background characters are drawn with the kind of quirkiness that makes them seem real. Selecting the murderer is as challenging for the reader as it is for Émile.

Seven Days Dead is marketed as a thriller but I would classify it as a crime novel. A single action scene that places Émile and Sandra at risk generates a surprising amount of suspense, but the novel focuses on solving the mystery rather than generating excitement. It is a quick and compulsive read. The story is tight; every scene has a purpose. Émile solves the crime with a Sherlockian flair. This is an old-fashioned mystery that combines an intricate yet credible plot with fetching characters, a refreshing change from the outrageous plots and cartoonish characters that dominate modern crime fiction.

RECOMMENDED

The Fat Artist by Benjamin Hale

Published by Simon & Schuster on May 17, 2016

The Fat Artist is a collection of stories that (with one exception) range from good to excellent. Starting with excellent:

“If I Had Possession Over Judgment Day” follows a man who is scraping by, working two jobs with a wife and baby and a truck that won’t start, a man who can never get ahead because his bank charges him fees for having no money, a man who wants to kill his wife’s former boyfriend. The story also follows a man who wants to make artistic porn with his teenage niece. Clearly, nothing will ever go well for any of the sharply drawn characters. The story is gritty and funny and infused with the blues.

“The Fat Artist” is about a (fat) artist who has made his body into an art object. He puts himself on display as an ode to consumption. The story is written as an autobiographical meditation on what it means to live one’s art, to crave fame, to personify Oscar Wilde’s observation that all art is useless. The story can be read as an allegory of, or as satirizing, artistic creation, or as a meditation on the meaning of art. Readers who aren’t grossed out by the story should be amused, but I think the story’s best moment is a brief tribute to the life and art of Franz Kafka, whose story “The Hunger Artist” is here turned upside down as self-indulgence replaces self-abnegation.

“The Minus World” is alternately funny and gloomy as it tells of a young man who is trying, without much motivation or success, to get over his drug addiction and make something of himself. His new job -- collecting squid from fishermen for marine biologists at MIT -- gives him a chance to feel both good and bad about himself, another chance to mess up a fresh start. If only life were a video game, he could conquer it. The story has an unfinished feel, but that’s consistent with the young man’s unfinished life.

Three other stories are quite good:

The protagonist in “Leftovers” is good at rationalizing -- his affairs, his drug addicted son, his career advancing the interests of an uncaring corporation -- but isn’t good at compassion. The plot is conventional but the story is very funny in a morbid way.

A Congressman dies in the arms of his long-term BDSM provider in “Venus at Her Mirror.” Rebecca (a/k/a Mistress Delilah) then plans her response the Congressman’s death. The story is interesting, but more a character sketch than a story with a plot.

“Beautiful Boy” is another character sketch. It might also be read as a celebration of New York City drag queens, or to New York City architecture, or to the beatification of celebrities who die violently.

Only one story failed to impress me. In “Don’t Worry, Baby” stoners get stoned and fly on a plane while their baby cries. They are wanted for crimes of protest. The crying baby triggers an epiphany in the mother. If the story had a point, it eluded me.

On the whole, the stories take a bright look at the dark side of life. Benjamin Hale’s prose is creative and energetic. The stories showcase a writer of great promise.

RECOMMENDED

Widowmaker by Paul Doiron

Published by St. Martin's/Minotaur Books on June 14, 2016

I have to start with a rant about the protagonist because he’s just ridiculous. Mike Bowditch is a game warden in Maine who is paranoid about the risks that face game wardens. As far as I can tell, no game warden has been murdered in the line of duty in Maine since 1886, so when Bowditch sneaks up on a car parked outside his house in broad daylight because he fears the unknown driver wants to kill him -- and continues to keep his hand on his gun because the unarmed woman behind the wheel makes the suspicious claim that she needs to pee -- I had to think it might be time for Bowditch to retire.

Bowditch is happy that he’s been issued an assault rifle because wardens are “in serious danger of being outgunned in every firefight.” Are scofflaws who fish without a license a serious threat to get into shootouts with wardens? I guess Paul Doiron didn’t read the “North Woods Lawless” series in the Portland Press Herald about Maine game wardens who “padded evidence, provided alcohol to people who were being investigated and invented events that did not occur” in their investigations of game violations. Nothing in there about shootouts.

Bowditch also has disturbing ideas about his powers as a law enforcement officer. He seems to believe that he would have the right to kill an unconscious person who (while still conscious) tried to stab him. Even for a cop, the right to use deadly force in self-defense ends when the threat ends, but Bowditch must have skipped that class. He also believes the myth propogated by law enforcement that “Where there are drugs, there are almost always guns,” which statistically isn’t even close to being true. He has the typical moralizer’s inability to understand, or to feel compassion for, people who come out on the wrong side of his harsh judgment. Bowditch is, in short, narrow-minded, simplistic, and dull. On the other hand, he likes dogs, so he can’t be all bad.

The mediocre plot did not overcome my dislike of the protagonist. A woman wants Bowditch to find her son, who disappeared after being required to register as a sex offender because his girlfriend was a minor. Bowditch doesn’t want to play private investigator but the woman drops a bombshell on him that he can’t ignore. Eventually Bowditch tumbles to an improbable conspiracy that involves sex offender assassinations, leading to the shootout he craves.

Doiron’s prose is smooth and the novel’s mountainous setting is convincing. The plot is less convincing, but it’s not as outlandish as many modern thrillers. The novel’s steady pace makes Widowmaker easy to read. Widowmaker therefore has positive attributes, and readers who think Bowditch is interesting or heroic might like this more than I did. Still, I cannot recommend Widowmaker without significant reservations.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS