Buried Prey is another book club offering. I joined a book club to get some free books, so now I have to buy a certain number of their titles before I can quit. So far, I've gotten mostly crime novels such as this one. I guess crime novels beat romances, but whatever happened to that old category "general fiction"? (One Summer was general fiction, but written by an author known for thrillers.)
The first chapter of Buried Prey was intense--the discovery of the bodies of two little girls who had gone missing 15 years earlier. However, from there the book took a lengthy detour into the past, following the main character (Lucas) as he investigated the initial disappearance--and helped convict the wrong man against his own instincts. This section of the book is detailed to a fault, like a "Law & Order" episode that lasts 4 hours and never gets past the police procedural part of the show.
It is when the book returns to the present that the book gets good. The pace quickens and by the last 100 pages, I couldn't read fast enough. Lucas gets progressively closer to the perpetrator, but some form of misdirection keeps sending him off on tangents. He refocuses over and over, consulting with a sterling group of friends and co-workers. When the final assault is planned, I was riveted. The procedural stuff was golden--who would go in which door, timing issues, even a discussion of whether or not the group was truly planning an assassination under the guise of taking down the fugitive. The pressure was on, door kicked in...well, get the book and find out what happened!
There is a weird amount of family interaction in this book, which would be absent from a typical detective book. I think some of this is from my old bugaboo--the need to catch readers up with recurring characters. But I rather liked it. Lucas was a person who ate and slept and worried about his fitness for his work. Hard boiled detectives smoke, drink too much coffee and whiskey and never sleep. The crime is their life. Not Lucas. He continally evaluated the impact his actions would/might have on his family. That's cool. He drew strength from his wife and daughters.
So, I guess I would recommend this book as a good getaway vehicle for a quiet weekend. You can tough it through that slow early stuff. I did. Trust me, the payoff will be there for you.
Best Bits: I loved the community of friends that coalesced and strengthened over the course of the book. They were looking out for each other in life and death settings, really supporting each other. Nice to see in such a manly book.
Main Complaint: The text tried to run off the bottom of the page, while a horsey header took up too much space at the top of the page. I read with the book propped on my stomach and I'm sorry to say that my bosom obstructed the last 2-3 lines of type. Margins! That's what it's all about. Anyway, this is shoddy bookmaking.
Petty Complaint: I thought the author photo on the back was absurd, like beefcake for the senior set. The whole focus is on Mr. Sandford's crotch! (OK, maybe I have a dirty mind, but really...) (See photo below.)
Physical Description: Book-shaped; little front matter and no end matter; 390 pages; 25 chapters (I like a good divisible number of chapters--how can an author write a book with, like, 31 chapters or somesuch?); awkward design and faulty layout (see Main Complaint).
Typos: None found.
Well? What do YOUR eyes focus on?
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