The Rage by Gene Kerrigan

First published in the UK in 2011; published by Europa on February 5, 2013 

Initially, two stories proceed on parallel paths in The Rage. The first focuses on Bob Tidey, a detective sergeant with the Dublin garda, as he investigates a murder. The other follows Vincent Naylor's robbery of a cash delivery service. By jumping frequently from one story to the other, Gene Kerrigan assures that something is always happening to hold the reader's interest. When Tidey's work is in its plodding stages, Naylor's crime is whizzing along, while the murder investigation gains steam after the robbery ends. The energy continues to shift from one story to the other throughout the course of the novel.

The murder: Emmet Sweetman, a corrupt banker, takes two bullets to the head and a shotgun blast to the chest. One of the bullets recovered from his corpse is tied to a gun used in the unsolved murder of Oliver Snead, a case Tidey investigated. Tidey is thus assigned to the team investigating Sweetman's murder. His investigation is hampered when his superiors seem content with a convenient solution, one that overlooks leads Tidey wants to pursue.

The robbery: Vincent Naylor, freshly released from prison, recruits his brother and two other men to steal cash from the equivalent of an armored car service. The heist is carefully planned but it goes wrong, making Naylor an angry man. During much of the novel's second half, Naylor is trying to channel his anger toward revenge without knowing who should be targeted.

Kerrigan takes care to establish his characters and set up his plot in the early chapters. Once the robbery commences and the murder investigation is underway, the pace quickens. The two storylines intersect at the novel's midway point, thanks to Tidey's friendship with a nun who witnessed the robbery's violent aftermath. The story is filled with mayhem (the novel lives up to its title), but violence never becomes a substitute for intelligent plotting and effective characterization. The final chapters pull everything together in a tense, refreshingly smart burst of storytelling.

Kerrigan has a realistic attitude about people who ordinarily occupy a position of respect. Tidey is critical of the garda officers he calls "little corporals," who live for the joy of forcing others to obey their petty commands, but he isn't eager to oppose them. Tidey isn't exactly Dirty Harry, but he doesn't always obey the law when it's more expedient to ignore it. One of Kerrigan's characters is a nun who was involved in a child abuse scandal. Yet Kerrigan doesn't demonize his characters, doesn't reduce them to one-dimensional caricatures. As Tidey tells the nun, "What you did, it's not all you are." Making a reader understand and even sympathize with characters who behave badly is a skill that many writers never develop. Kerrigan does it well.

The moral question that Tidey faces -- whether to disobey his superiors, who may be protecting well-placed individuals, in order to achieve a rough measure of justice -- is common in high quality police procedurals. The Rage might in that sense be formulaic, although Kerrigan takes the dilemma a step further, forcing Tidey to choose between two untenable outcomes. The phrases that begin and end the novel -- "There was no right thing to do. But something had to be done" -- encapsulate the novel's theme. Even if The Rage can be branded as formulaic, it couples the formula with tight prose, a steady pace, and a fair amount of suspense.

RECOMMENDED

Man in the Empty Suit by Sean Ferrell

Published by Soho Press on February 5, 2013 

It's difficult to pull off a Grandfather Paradox story, although many have tried. The paradox is often resolved by having the paradox-creating event give birth to a parallel universe, which strikes me as a copout. Kudos to Sean Ferrell for constructing an intricate time travel mystery thriller that puts a fresh spin on a familiar theme. I'm not sure Man in the Empty Suit resolves the paradox (although, to be fair, a true paradox is by definition irresolvable), but Ferrell uses it to advance an interesting, offbeat story.

Ferrell's version of Dr. Who's TARDIS is a raft that floats through time. Every year on his birthday, a time traveler attends a party on April 1, 2017 at the Boltzmann Hotel in a decayed, dystopian Manhattan. He is the only person in the ballroom, but since he does this as a tradition, there are many of him, one from each year in which he has made the birthday trek. He names his different selves -- Yellow, Seventy, the Nose, the Drunk, the Inventor -- although we never learn the traveler's true name. His younger selves ("the Youngsters") mock his older selves ("the Elders") although most of his selves of every age devote the evening to drunkenness. The alcohol fueled fuzz assures that the party will seem fresh every year.

The story begins on the traveler's 39th birthday. The party proceeds as expected until the next oldest version of the traveler dies in an elevator. The Elders don't understand the paradox of their continued life after their obvious death. They do understand that their memories are becoming unreliable. The 39-year-old traveler (known at that age as the Suit) is tasked with investigating. The Elders fear that if the Suit catches up in age with his next older self -- the one who dies -- without solving the puzzle, all his older selves will cease to exist. One paradox triggers another as the Suit tries to discover the truth, and the appearance of a woman named Lily at the party only deepens the mystery.

If the first section of Man in the Empty Suit seems odd, the next section -- with a lie collector and liquid memories and books that know where they want to be shelved -- enters a whole new realm of strangeness. The section largely becomes Lily's story. It isn't conventional science fiction -- nothing about this novel is conventional -- but it contains moments that are emotionally affecting. The last act returns to the party and the paradox, leading to a conclusion that teaches the traveler something about life -- and how to live it.

Apart from telling an entertaining (if labyrinthine) story, the novel's value lies in its larger themes. Ferrell serves up a perceptive take on how we perceive ourselves at different stages of our lives. The Youngsters see the Elders as decrepit; the Elders see the Youngsters as childish. As the traveler transitions from being a Youngster to being an Elder, he appreciates that what he once saw as the slovenly appearance of the Elders is actually a sign of comfort, a version of himself that is no longer concerned with superficial appearance.

Man in the Empty Suit also addresses the need to connect with other people. The traveler attends the party every year so that he can be with himself (literally), but he's always alone, fighting to be heard in a chorus of identical voices. Both the traveler and Lily deal, in their different ways, with the burden of expectations, although the traveler's are self-imposed. How they cope with those burdens and what the traveler learns from his ordeal make this a novel of psychological growth -- almost a coming-of-age-late-in-middle-age novel. I'm not sure the story entirely makes sense, but I liked the way Ferrell played with it.

RECOMMENDED

Revenge by Yoko Ogawa

Published in Japanese in 1998; published in translation by Picador on January 29, 2013 

The short stories collected in Revenge tend to be snapshots of turmoil, slices of emotion-charged lives. A woman spends an "Afternoon at the Bakery" where she goes to buy strawberry shortcake for her son's birthday, twelve years after he died while trapped inside an abandoned refrigerator. A paranoid woman gathers the tomatoes featured in "Tomatoes and the Full Moon" from an overturned truck at the scene of a fatal accident, then befriends a travel writer who discovers that she has a surprising secret. In "The Last Hour of the Bengal Tiger," a woman who is jealous because her husband is having an affair invents games of chance that dictate her behavior. A hospital secretary who has a crush on her boss listens to her boss' shocking confession in "Lab Coats." A bagmaker in "Sewing For the Heart" is asked to make a bag that will hold a woman's heart. A woman examines instruments of torture in "Welcome to the Museum of Torture" and imagines what she might do to her boyfriend. The curator of that museum dies and, while attending his funeral, his niece recalls him as "The Man Who Sold Braces" that might as well have been torture devices.

The stories are related to each other in ways that aren't immediately apparent. A girl asks a boy she doesn't really know to join her at an uncomfortable lunch with her estranged father in "Fruit Juice." During the course of that story, the boy and girl come across an old, abandoned post office that is filled with kiwis. The kiwis are from the orchards of "Old Mrs. J," who also grows carrots shaped like human hands. That story is narrated by a tenant in one of the old woman's apartments. The tenant had been the stepmother of a boy who, in "The Little Dustman," recalls her eccentricities as he travels to her funeral. The aging woman in "Poison Plants" is fascinated by the sound of a young man's voice as he reads her a story about a post office filled with kiwis. And so on.

Yoko Ogawa writes in a minimalist style that is exquisite in its simplicity. Some of the stories seem odd but uneventful until they arrive at twisted, almost ghoulish endings. A sense of the macabre links the stories as much as the characters they share. These aren't horror stories in the traditional sense, but many of the characters are isolated or damaged, living a daily horror that outsiders can't imagine.

The stories come full circle, the last connecting to the first. Often a story's connection to another story becomes clear only at the end, a revelation that shifts the story's context just a bit. The reader gains new insight into Ogawa's characters after realizing that the character played a role in an earlier story. The interlocking nature of the stories builds a depth that is greater than the stories achieve individually. It's tempting for that reason to devour the stories all at once, although it's also rewarding to pause and savor each one, like nibbling from a box of gourmet chocolates.

RECOMMENDED

Little Elvises by Timothy Hallinan

First published digitally in 2011; published by Soho Crime on January 29, 2013 

According to a paper written by Junior Bender's thirteen-year-old daughter, dozens of Little Elvises were churned up in Philly in the wake of Elvis Presley. Notable for their looks rather than their ability to carry a tune, they each had their six weeks of fame, performed on American Bandstand, and disappeared into the archives of pop history. The man responsible for the rapid ascension of so many one-hit wonders, Vinnie DiGaudio, has been accused of murdering a tabloid journalist named Derek Bigelow. According to Vinnie, somebody else killed Bigelow before Vinnie could get around to it. Vinnie's nephew happens to be a police detective who threatens to arrest Bender for one of the few burglaries Bender didn't commit unless Bender clears Vinnie's name.

Bender is a burglar who occasionally acts like a cop for other criminals who can't go to the cops with their problems -- hence the detective's belief that Bender is perfect for the job. Bender's investigation touches on the shadier side of the music industry, the dismal state of rock-and-roll between 1959 and 1963, the history of organized crime in Philadelphia, the westward migration and changing ethnicity of organized crime, female professional wrestling, and a number of other interesting topics. Along the way, Bender gets talked into searching for the missing daughter of the woman who manages the motel where he currently resides. He also begins a romance of sorts, although he's having trouble letting go of his feelings for his daughter's mother.

Timothy Hallinan always crafts a nifty plot and Little Elvises is no exception. Bender -- like the reader -- wonders how the 1963 disappearance of Bobby Angel, the most talented of Vinnie's Little Elvises, relates to Bigelow's murder. The answer is creative, credible, and entertaining. The secondary plot, involving the missing daughter, is less of a mystery, but it takes a surprising and satisfying twist in the final chapters.

Bender's character evolves in Little Elvises in response to the prominent role his precocious daughter plays. Bender's difficult family life is an strong hook upon which to rest character development as the series progresses. Hallinan's minor characters are truly characters. If they aren't over-the-top, they're at least dancing on the edge. In a traditional thriller, that would be a drawback, but in a novel that depends so much on humor, the outrageous nature of the supporting characters makes them memorable.

Little Elvises has enough action to keep the story flowing but the real fun comes from Bender's interaction with the other characters. While Hallinan doesn't shortchange the novel's dramatic content, Little Elvises has a playful quality that is reflected in Hallinan's prose. Hallinan has a way of phrasing descriptions ("he had a natural curl in his hair, and the bangs flipped up at the ends with a twee effect that made him look like a hitman for the Campfire Girls") and summing up lives ("He'd set foot on the slippery slope, and the first thing he did was steal a pair of skis so he could get down it faster") that I can't help but admire. The Junior Bender series is a fun counterpoint to Hallinan's heavier Poke Rafferty series. Both series deserve a place on the bookshelves of crime fiction fans.

RECOMMENDED

Back From the Dead by Peter Leonard

First published in the UK in 2013; published by The Story Plant on January 22, 2013 

Back From the Dead is a sequel to Voices of the Dead. The sequel is a better book, but that's small praise given the first novel's mediocrity.

Back From the Dead begins shortly after Voices of the Dead ends. Gerhard Braun wants to find Ernst Hess, although Braun has less interest in Hess than in artwork that Hess possesses. Braun hires Albin Zeller to track Hess down. The task should be impossible since Hess died at the end of the last novel, but given the title of this novel, it is no surprise to learn that Hess isn't dead after all. His improbable survival goes largely unexplained, one of many ways in which the novel strains credulity.

Hess is still a cartoon villain and an empty shell of a character. The notion that this celebrated political figure, who is also a wanted war criminal, can go jetting around the world, entering and leaving Germany undetected -- largely due to the happy coincidence that he's a dead ringer for someone whose passport he steals -- is just impossible to swallow. Of course, Hess wants to kill Harry Levin, the star of the last novel. Harry is becoming romantically entangled with Colette, the German reporter he met in that book. Before Harry can get too comfortable with Colette, however, Zeller kidnaps her from Harry's home. Harry rescues her, only to see her captured again. What passes for a plot is Harry's ongoing effort to keep Colette out of Hess' clutches and avoid death while Hess tries to recover artwork stolen by the Nazis so he can fund a new life. That Hess feels it necessary to risk his life and freedom to seek revenge against Harry instead of disappearing to some safe sanctuary is too absurd to merit belief.

As he did in the first novel, Leonard relies on stereotypes rather than giving his secondary characters authentic personalities. In this book, Columbians have oily hair and wear white suits, two characters from Tennessee are redneck hillbillies, and the black characters are criminals. Although Leonard reprises drug dealer Cordell Sims from Voices of the Dead, he at least tones down the offensive nature of his African American stereotyping.

If there is a point to Back From the Dead, I couldn't find it. It hardly seems worthwhile to bring back such a lackluster character as Harry Levin. The novel adds no depth to his shallow character. The story is a rehash of the first novel. There's a fair amount of action but none of it is compelling.

On a more positive note, the story is coherent, even if it lacks substance. Peter Leonard is no longer mimicking his father's writing style (there's only one Elmore Leonard and it isn't Peter). Leonard's decision to craft complete sentences improves the flow of his narrative, making Back From the Dead an easy, quick read. There just isn't much reason to read it.

NOT RECOMMENDED