The Bottom Line: A slow starter with an unlikeable protagonists finishes in a heck of a rush (and chances are you'll have changed your mind about Carol Starkey).
scmrak's Full Review: Robert Crais - Demolition Angel
Once upon a time, there was a little girl who thought it great fun to solve puzzles -- and she was very good at it. When she grew up, that little girl became a policewoman, and the place where she found not just mental puzzles (solving crimes and catching crooks) but also physical puzzles (like the jigsaw variety) was the bomb squad. You see, after a bomb explodes, you have to collect all the pieces and put them back together, a perfect job for someone who likes puzzles. It's a little nerve-wracking at times, for sure, but rewarding in its own peculiar way. This woman's name, by the way, was Carol Starkey.
Carol Starkey died three years ago, the result of a massive trauma from an exploding bomb. Her partner -- who also happened to be her lover -- died, too; only he stayed dead. Carol was only "on the other side," the EMTs said, for a bit more than two minutes; but those two minutes certainly made an impression on her. In the aftermath, a woman who bore immense physical and emotional scars became an emotionless robot, fueled by generous servings of gin, an endless chain of cigarettes, and a steady diet of Tagamet.
Enter Mr. Red, Stage Right
When a massive radio-controlled bomb blows one of Carol's former bomb-squad co-workers to bits, the investigation falls to Carol in her current job as a conspiracy squad detective. It's only a day or two, though, before an ATF agent appears in her lieutenant's office. Leery of the Feds' taking over her case, Carol is even more sullen and taciturn than usual -- which is already a lot. The death of Charlie Riggio, it appears, is the latest in a series of bombings by the mysterious Mr. Red.
Mr. Red has a job he loves, so much so that it's also his hobby. He's a bomber for hire: sort of an extreme arsonist, who takes out his clients' rivals or failing businesses. Explosively. In his spare time, he builds more bombs. His hobby, you see, is killing bomb squad members who've made the news. To make things more personal, he etches the name of his intended victim on the casing of their bombs, and then detonates them by radio when the luckless victim is at his closest.
All this is news the ATF agent shares with Carol and her teammates. What Jack Pell doesn't share with anyone is the name etched into the bomb that killed Charlie Riggio... Carol Starkey
The Plot Thickens
Fed or not, Pell seems inclined to let Carol and her team keep the case. An uneasy partnership between Starkey and Pell concentrates on tracking Mr. Red though his only known contact point, the chat room on a website for explosives enthusiasts. Once signed on as HOTLOAD, the two lay what Pell hopes will be an elaborate trap. Sharing that laptop, though, puts them in a physical proximity that frightens the wounded Starkey.
When Mr. Red rises to the bait - as we, who've been watching him all along, knew he would - he's even more formidable a foe than Starkey or Pell had imagined. Mr. Red, of course, has a secret (although we know he's really twenty-eight-year-old John Michael Fowles). But Pell has his own secrets, and soon Starkey finds herself caught in the middle of a case that's far less simple than she had thought. Further complications inevitably arise as Pell and Starkey dance around an ever-increasing mutual attraction. There is more to both cops than meets the eye, you can ber sure.
John Michael Fowles proves adept not only at his chosen craft, but also at the type of manipulation that keeps everyone in thrall right up to the final countdown. Don't miss his explosive finale!
Has Elvis Left the Building?
With a handful of detective novels starring Hawaiian-shirt fancier Elvis Cole and Joe Pike - the toughest, coolest ex-cop ever to strut the LA streets - already on the shelves, Robert Crais has abandoned his go-to guy and taken a stab at writing a female character. Is everybody doing that these days? Maybe Grafton, Barnes, Cornwell and Paretsky ought to write some crime novels with male protagonists...
Carol Starkey is introduced as one of the most unlikable protagonists to come down the pike in quite a while. Bad dreams about her death limit her sleep to two hours or so a night, although it's also possible that the massive quantities of gin she ingests aren't helping much. Either way, she's b*tchy in the extreme from lack of sleep. Her chain smoking knows no limits (anti-smoking ordinances be damned), but most of all she's carrying around a chip on her shoulder the size of Kobe Bryant and a "badditude" that also knows no limits. She's on her fourth shrink in three years - actually she's back to her first - and nothing seems to help. Crais writes her obnoxious and obstinate, and tosses in a few literary devices to make her uncomfortable to read as well. For one, Starkey seems constitutionally unable to say the word "breathe," preferring instead "blow" - a reference to "blowing a 0.11 on the breathalyzer," I'd guess.
Yet as the presence of Jack Pell catalyzes Carol's re-entry to the land of the living, her hard edges erode and she becomes increasingly likable: not just to Pell and the members of her squad, but also to the reader. While we breathlessly watch Mr. Red set up and launch his ultimate coup, fascinated much as we would be mesmerized by a swaying cobra, we find ourselves rooting for the woman we couldn't stand in the first few pages. If that ain't character development, I don't know what is.
Overall
Fans of Elvis Cole may initially be disappointed by his absence here, but Crais has left Cole behind for at least one book. Instead of the insouciant PI with a loud wardrobe, Crais has chosen to work with a "broken toy." He did his research here, creating a brilliant and believable plot, full of twists and turns (but no coincidences). At the same time, he's taken his protagonist on a psychological journey from emotional death back to life. Not bad for a day's work!
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