Chanticleer Book Reviews

Tag: Political Thriller Suspense

UNTIL DEAD: A Cold Case Suspense by Donnell Ann Bell – Murder Mystery, Suspense, Police Procedural

If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does anyone care? If the tree has connections to the rich and powerful, they just might. In Until Dead, Donnell Ann Bell suggests the many ways “elites” – those with seemingly limitless wealth and power – can manipulate the world to their wishes.

Events that might otherwise go unnoticed take on great importance when they affect the powerful elites. With subtlety and skill, Bell reveals this as she takes the reader from an odd encounter in 2017 to an assassination attempt in Colorado two years later.

Until Dead begins when Mark Rafferty, an up-and-comer in a general practice Denver law firm, well on his way to full equity, dies in a one-car accident at the beginning of rush hour in the fall of 2017. He leaves behind several open cases and his widow, Theresa O’Neil, an Assistant United States Attorney. Theresa has a lot of support behind her, including her boss, the Colorado U.S. Attorney, and an aunt who is a U.S. Senator.

After Theresa survives an assassination attempt clearly set up by a knowledgeable killer, law enforcement realizes that she has a target on her back. Someone wants her dead, but who, and why?

The Senator’s powerful connections push the issue until a multi-agency task force forms to investigate—the same multi-agency that brought the Black Pearl Killer to justice. Everett Pope, a Denver police investigator, works with agents from the FBI and ATF to bring the would-be-killer to justice and learn who hired him for the hit.

Pride, greed, envy, and perhaps even a smattering of lust make for a tantalizing set of motives. The story is told from multiple points of view, even getting into the hit man’s head. The reader can develop rapport with these relatable, multi-dimensional characters.

Bell’s familiarity with the city of Denver and the mountainous regions of Colorado shines in her imagery. Her knowledge of the structures and workings of U.S. government agencies is impressive, suggesting a lot of research went into this story. Until Dead is a deep dive into a complex web of government hierarchies, power brokers, cybercriminals, and cyber security combined with drones and C-4. It will keep you on the edge of your seat.

The specificity of government structures works for and against the narrative, as the numerous acronyms attached to those government entities. But such is the nature of bureaucracies. Aside from this, the complex plot maintains its suspense, with an ending that hits like a destructive Colorado derecho.

The second book in the Cold Case Suspense Series has launched Donnell Ann Bell into a spot as one of our favorite authors. Highly Recommended!

August 29, 2022
CARNAGE in SINGAPORE (The Bedlam Series Book 3) by Randall Krzak – Global Thriller, Political Thriller, Political Suspense

Carnage in Singapore, the third volume in Randall Krzak’s Bedlam counterterrorism thriller series, takes the team to the Far East for action against Muslim terrorists with a ripped-from-the-headlines plot to destroy Western influence by any means.

The terrorists’ idea unfolds as simple, even ingenious. Terrify residents and non-Muslims in major cities such as Jakarta and Singapore with a series of spectacular bombings designed to kill as many people as possible. Follow up with kidnapping ambassadors from Great Britain, Australia, and the United States – with such ruthlessness that Western-leaning nations will cease repression of Muslims, curtail training police and soldiers who hunt Muslim terrorists, and end support for anti-terrorism activities around the world.

The plot grows into actionable items among different Indonesian terrorist groups working together – if somewhat uneasily – with a common goal.

Their scheme calls for launching near-simultaneous multiple attacks against unsuspecting citizens, destroying the illusion of safety in daily life. By making the attacks in this way, they cripple the police and other civic services. The first strike uses rockets launched from a small obscure offshore island. The rockets explode in a crowded grandstand watching a Formula One Grand Prix auto race in Singapore. Other sites bombed or strafed include an amusement park, a traffic-laden bridge, and a Chinese cathedral.

All schemes execute without a hitch. All hit their targets with devastating accuracy. Hundreds are either lost or become hostages. Next comes the kidnapping of the ambassadors.

Some Indonesian groups come under suspicion. The ruthless Detachment 88 interrogates the suspects, but their brutality yields dead suspects instead of interrogated suspects.

Into the melee comes Bedlam Charlie, an international team of anti-terrorist experts trained in all phases of investigation and apprehension. Their mission? Simple – to stop the bombings and free various prisoners in the attacks. They must deal with a mélange of bad investigations and spies within the police ranks who thwart their moves and even place team members in mortal danger.

The political motives behind the governments involved in deploying Bedlam Charlie don’t lack complexity. Will the Indonesian police accept their help? Will the governments behind Bedlam Charlie allow the team to get involved and risk the political outfall if they fail?

The terrorists come well-armed and tactically highly skilled, able to break through even the most sophisticated protection schemes to kidnap their high-profile targets.

Naming real sites as the intended targets of the terrorist attacks helps to separate this book from several others of this genre.

If a novel about terrorism in New York City named the Marriott Hotel on Times Square, Nathan’s Hot Dogs, and Yankee Stadium as successful targets, the gut-level effect here would be similar. The fictional terrorists’ logic matches actual attacks on cities and nations around the world including our own.

The novel also explores the aspirations and the politics within the terrorists’ ranks. Various factions and individuals find themselves looking for their own moment of glory as they both complete their missions and compete for attention.

Thriller fans will devour Krzak’s modern us-against-them take on storytelling. Of course, what makes Carnage in Singapore such a strong novel is its plausibility. It’s terrifying and terrific at the same time – and definitely holds its own among modern thriller authors of today. Randall Krzak took home 1st Place for Carnage in Singapore in the 2019 CIBAs Global Thrillers Book Awards.

Read our review for Dangerous Alliance, here.

August 14, 2021
DOUBT and DEBT by John Feist – Political Thriller, Suspense/Thriller, High-Stakes Global Thriller

Pipelines—large industrial pipelines through which pour oil, gas, and other natural elements—are not the usual stuff that writers tackle for intelligent, sophisticated international high-stakes spy novels. But then again, most writers aren’t John Feist, whose lawyering background in, yes, global pipelines and related industries such as steel, coal, and shipping companies make him the perfect choice to turn these typically pedestrian subjects into absorbing books. His work introduces us to complex issues involving international trade at the highest level, greed, murder, and above all, the intricacies and rewards of multinational, prominent, and sometimes multiracial families.

In Doubt and Debt, lawyer Brad Oaks is now the president and CEO of California-based Elgar Steel.

He and his wife Amaya have adopted an 11-year-old Canadian girl, Kozue, whose parents died in a mass shooting in Toronto. She is a perfect fit for the Oakes, both in their mid-40s, both in business and personal relations in Japan. Amaya is the half-sister of the two sisters who own the steel company which manufactures high-grade steel pipes through which the mineral wealth of nations pours. She is half-Japanese, grew up with the racial issues of her home country, and is also best friends with Japan’s current woman premier.

In the first two books, the family-owned business was vital in developing the Wishbone Pipeline that brings water and oil from Canada to the U.S. (Any similarity to the now real-world defunct Keystone XL pipeline is purely coincidental.) That project, and the international consortium necessary to build it, involved players including Oaks, the chief architect of the complex trade pact, Japan’s prime minister, her steel-manufacturing brother, secret agents from China, a red-headed femme fatale who is also an engineering brainiac, etc.

Brad Oaks is once again the target of a murder attempt.

In this third volume, the same players face a new challenge: a proposed pipeline that would send Iranian oil money to North Korea, both blacklisted players on the international scene, and violate sanctions imposed by the United States and Japan. Brad’s life is threatened—he thinks by someone involved in the new pipeline negotiations. In other words, if he’s out of the way, then a potential block to the illicit deal disappears.

As the investigation commences, one of the Elgar sisters, June, becomes involved with a scheming, unscrupulous businessman, Bob Hager. He charms her into a business decision that puts her in debt, positioning her to potentially delivering her significant portion of the company to Hager and his greedy associates and thus wresting control of the family-owned business into the hands of absolutely the wrong people. Can there be a solution that will keep the Elgar business in the family and not subject to the business predators that want to tear it apart?

Feist pays attention to the importance of multi-cultural understanding in business.

Underlying it all, Feist delivers a multi-part dialog that runs through all three books about family, commitment, cultural differences, and ethics. Virtually every central character in the series finds him or herself conscious of the morality of their decisions, whether it be Brad’s wife’s constant tug between her new life in America and her old life in Japan, Japanese Prime Minister Yuko Kagono relationship with her steel-magnate brother Iseo, Iseo’s secret relationship with red-headed American Cynthia and his clinging to the glory of old Japan, and June’s flakiness and twin sister Sarah-Jane’s steadfastness.

The business negotiations between the various parties are of a high order, both complex and yet intriguing. They offer insights into how the Great Game between multinational companies and governments plays out, written clearly from the position of someone who has been there as a player. The multiple discussions between the characters, whether American to Japanese or American to American or Japanese to Japanese, have the ring of truth.

In parallel to all this are the intricate relations between the various characters on a personal and business basis. These are people whose lives require thinking on multiple levels, as their decisions about how they live affect them personally, socially, and globally. They live a three-dimensional chess-world life and must live up to the standards of the game.

Do yourself a favor and pick up the first two books in the series, Night Rain, Tokyo, and Blind Trust before you dive into Doubt and Debt, and find out for yourself why John Feist writes novels we love.

March 29, 2021