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Timely tale of terrorism
REVIEWS BY BRUCE TIERNEY
By G.M. Ford Morrow, $23.95 320 pages, ISBN 0060554800
Mysterious moose mutilations
By C. J. Box Putnam, $24.95 384 pages, ISBN 0399152008
Mystery of the month
By Walter Mosley Little, Brown, $24.95 320 pages, ISBN 0316073032
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G.M. Ford's latest novel, Red Tide, begins innocuously enough in Seattle's Pioneer Square bus station at rush hour. Hordes of distracted homebound commuters line the concourse. A puff of smoke rises from the platform. In mere moments, the station erupts in pandemonium as passengers crash one by one to the floor, writhing in pain. The scene is eerily reminiscent of the 1995 Tokyo subway poisoning, in which deadly sarin gas took the lives of 11 people and injured hundreds more, but it quickly becomes obvious that this new attack eclipses anything that has gone before. A short distance away in a downtown hotel, experts from around the world gather for a symposium on chemical and biological weapons; it can be no coincidence that the perpetrators have chosen this particular time and place for their strike. Red Tide features reclusive crime writer Frank Corso, appearing here in his fourth outing. Corso operates at the edges of the law, his unofficial standing giving him investigative latitude not enjoyed by the more conventional members of the law enforcement community. He displays a ferret-like ability to stick his nose in places where it is not welcome, a complaint registered in equal measure by law enforcement and lawbreakers. It will take all of his considerable talents to get to the bottom of the Seattle horror before countless more lives are lost. In Red Tide, Ford has crafted a novel as timely as today's headlines, and as scary as tomorrow's.
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Author C. J. Box mines Hillerman territory in Trophy Hunt, his fourth novel featuring Wyoming game warden Joe Pickett. While on a fly-fishing outing with his young daughters, Pickett is brought up short by the sighting of a dead moose. The death of a majestic animal is bad enough by any measure, but this one is particularly horrific: the animal's genitals have been surgically removed, and the flesh of its face stripped off. The moose is bloated to almost twice its normal size; it appears ready to explode. Stranger still, there are no tracks leading away from the moose, and predators have given the animal wide berth. Pickett is a very down-to-earth sort, but he can find no sensible explanation for what he sees. It will not be long, he realizes, until there are wild rumors of aliens (or worse) in Big Sky Country. Any hopes of keeping a lid on the story are dashed as the mutilations spread to the cattle population. The locals, normally a rugged and independent bunch, live in fear of leaving their homes after dark; they want answers, and they expect Joe Pickett to provide them (or die trying). Trophy Hunt offers a new dimension to Pickett's character: the dilemma of a rational man confronted by the inexplicable. The story is drawn from real-life incidents, as yet unexplained, of cattle mutilations in Montana.
It is almost a foregone conclusion that each new Walter Mosley book will win the Tip of the Ice Pick award,
and Little Scarlet is no exception to the rule. Summer, 1965: Los Angeles is in the throes of the Watts riots, which have set the city afire for weeks. A white man is dragged from his car by a mob of angry black youths. He manages to escape into a nearby apartment, where he is cared for and protected by a young black woman known as Little Scarlet. Shortly thereafter, she lies dead, apparently murdered, and he is nowhere to be found. Enter Easy Rawlins, unlicensed private investigator, summoned by the police to investigate the homicide because he has the ability to mix in the black community in a way that no policeman ever could, particularly in the tense aftermath of the riots. Easy Rawlins serves as a metaphor for the black experience in America: in the 1950s, he is expected to be seen but not heard; by the mid-1960s, he is at the cusp of recognizing his power, both in terms of personal street credentials and in the larger sense as a member of an up-and-coming minority group. Mosley captures the nuance of atmosphere and time better than any mystery author since Raymond Chandler; he is the unchallenged modern master of the craft.