C J Box - Blue Horizon

review by showhost
This was a new author for me, a book I picked up from a stall at the August Bank Holiday fete.
Monica Taylor lives with her 2 children, 12yr old Annie and 10yr old William in North Idaho. She has had a couple of disastrous relationships behind her and makes a promise to herself and her children that no man would stay overnight unless she was seriously thinking about marrying him. So, Annie was very hostile when mums boyfriend Tom came downstairs & joined herself and William for breakfast. Annie left for school very angry with her mum but William was happy because Tom had promised to go fishing with him after school.
It was Friday, their early finishing day but Tom didn’t show. Annie was so angry she decided she would take William fishing a decision that was to change their whole life. As they approached a clearing in the woods near the stream, they witness a murder, a man is shot several times by a group of men. Annie & William watch in stunned silence but before they have chance to flee the shooter turns and sees them. The chase is on. Annie & William don’t know who to trust or to turn to, especially after being given a lift by someone they thought was a friend of their mothers only to find out that he too is involved. The manage to evade capture but the search is now on for the missing children. Unfortunately the murderers are ex LAPD cops who live in Idaho and who are organizing the search party. They do find an ally in elderly rancher Jess Rawlins who aides and abets them.
The story told, the explanations made but with over a 100 pages yet to go all there was left was the ‘fight at the ok coral’ or ranch in this case. Just like the good old western books.
Money laundering, murder, bent cops and hogs who have a taste for human meat.
The book was gripping at times but it was too padded. It was quite predictable but a good enough holiday read that will keep you flicking over the pages without over taxing the brain.

C J Box - Blue Heaven

review by Brian Lowen live on show 24th May 2012.
Here is a book that really tugs at the heart strings, as I suppose any story would that involves lost children.

If twelve-year-old Annie hadn’t been angry with her Mother, she would never have taken her little brother William on a secret fishing trip deep into the North Idaho woods and they would never have witnessed the execution nor looked straight into the eyes of the four executioners.

Now they are running for their lives. They can’t go home because the killers know who they are and where they live. They can’t go to the law because the killers are four respected retired policeman who have volunteered as deputies to the Sheriff to try and find the missing children, but they, of course, have an ulterior motive for finding the children who are the only witnesses to their hideous crime. There’s nowhere for William and Annie to hide and there is no one they can trust, until they meet Jess Rawlins.

An old timer rancher, Rawlins knows there is something wrong with the law in Blue Heaven county, but when he is finally convinced that the children’s story is true, it is only him against four men who will stop at nothing to silence their witnesses.

The story really drags you along with the terror experienced by the children. You find yourself giving them helpful advice as you follow their frightening journey on the run from the four ex-cops, who also have another terrible secret that they are guarding against revelation

. Meanwhile their Mother, who is frantic with worry is being kept a virtual prisoner at home by one of the ex-cops, allegedly to safeguard her from intrusive journalists.

An excellent thriller, thoroughly recommended.

CJ Sansom - Sovereign

review by showhost
Another engrossing book from an acclaimed Historical Mystery Thriller Fiction writer. I have read a few of his Shardlake series now, which are all set around Tudor England and have enjoyed them all. This author brings London to life. Shardlake, the main character, is a hunchback lawyer working out of Lincolns Inn in London and at one point worked for Cromwell.

There is unrest at York, as elsewhere in the North. Monastries have been pulled down, and land has been seized by Southern merchants. The 'War of the Roses' is over as is the 'Pilgrimage of Grace' uprising but the hatred of the King and his religious reforms still harbour rebellious factions. Its 1541, the King (Henry 8th) has come to York with his present wife Catherine Howard, to meet with the King of Scotland, to find some common ground, an alliance.

Shardlake and his assistant Barak, have been asked by Archbishop Cranmer to go to York ahead of the Royal Progression. Shardlake is assured his job will simply be to help a fellow lawyer with the pleas before the King. But then he is given another task - to look after the welfare of a prisoner being held there. They want the prisoner brought back to the Tower to be tortured. The prisoner was part of the rebellion to dethrone the King.. Nobody is to question the prisoner as he has knowledge which could prove the King not to be the true successor to the throne..

During his duties Shardlake encounters the Glazier, who’s job it is to remove all the stained glass from the windows of the churches & monastries. Shardlakes problems start when the Glazier is pushed from his ladder, his last words in Shardlakes ear are about a family called Blaybourne and secret papers proving Henry (Mouldwarp) not the rightful King. Shardlake finds the box of missing papers but is knocked out & the papers stolen.

There are several attempts on Shardlakes life and once he and the Progression return to London he finds himself accused of being a ‘party’ to the knowledge of The Queens dalliance with a member of Royal court. He is put in the Tower for torture. The rack, teeth pulling with pliers & finger nails burnt off, are all in store for him.
There was just a 'tad' too much unnecessary info at times (could have been 100 pages less and still a very good read)but a great read for anyone interested in Tudor history combined with a good fictional thriller.