So far The Falling Away sounds like a fairly standard story. But the author is T.L. Hines and ordinary isn’t in his dictionary. Enter Quinn into Dylan’s life. She tells him a story that is incredibly hard to accept yet increasingly evident to be true. She is a member of a group she calls The Falling Away and her calling in life is to root out evil of the most insidious sort imaginable. Dylan is one of “the Chosen”, something the soldier who died for him used to say. What she doesn’t tell Dylan is her job is to keep him from falling under the influence of a cult whose leader spreads evil like a virus. She must prevent that at all costs.

Hines tackles a story line that Frank Peretti used over twenty years ago in This Present Darkness and Piercing the Darkness to practically reinvent Christian fiction. Both authors make us think about things most would rather pretend belong in horror movies rather than the real world. But as always T.L. Himes does it in his own distinctive “Noir Bizarre” style. No cross waving exorcists or Bible pounding preachers in sight. Instead, we have Quinn who amounts to a female spiritual enforcer determined to carry out her mission at all costs. That mission leads her and Dylan to a cult called The Hive which just also happens to supply wind generated electricity to much of the surrounding area along with some other darker commodities.

But in the end, it is Dylan Runs Ahead who must defeat evil or be possessed by it. And in that confrontation he finally comes to understand why his friend took his place in Iraq and why he is called a “chosen”. The Falling Away is a story about facing demons both figurative and literal. In many ways, this is one of Hines’ most spiritual stories as he uses dialogue between Dylan and the friend who died for him to explore powerful truths about life, death, and redemption. Yes, it is a strange story. Hine’s fans would be disappointed otherwise. But it is a powerful story, a tale about running to the battle rather than away from it. Only in encountering the enemy head on does Dylan find everything he has been running from.

If you have never read T.L. Hines I couldn’t think of a better place to start.

Reviewed by Tim George
Publisher – Thomas Nelson
Publication Date – September 2010

Advanced Readers Copy provided by Thomas Nelson

Toma Nicolescu and his companion Alec Cardei have seen more battles and faced more fierce enemies than either can remember in their service to their Empress, Catherine the Great. And now they have been sent on a special assignment to protect a Moldavian countess and her two daughters, Lucine and Natasha. The countess is a free spirit who has raised her daughters to live for the moment and whatever love (or lust) they care to explore. Such instantly appeals to Alec who both acknowledges being the lover of the pair. But not Toma. He is a warrior, bound by duty and honor to the will of his empress.

It doesn’t take but the first night’s banquet to make Toma realize he and his companion in arms have walked into something neither anticipated. A group of Russians have been invited and while strangely alluring, Toma senses they are also equally dangerous. It doesn’t take long for him to realize he should have paid more heed to the strange old man he and Alec met before arriving. When Toma called him a devil the shriveled character had replied, “I am not the devil … he is more beautiful than I.” But Toma does not believe in the devil or God so he did not listen. That will all change in the few days to come.

Immanuel’s Veins is in some ways a radical departure for Dekker as he tackles what appears to be a historical romance. But at its foundation, this is a return for the author to themes he so profoundly explored in The Circle series. That leads me to wonder if Toma is too closely similar to Thomas Hunter to be coincidence. And I wonder if Dekker will admit to it since he swears this isn’t a vampire novel. Yes, a vampire novel. And a testament to the power of this story is my aversion to all things vampire. It’s not that I have anything against the good vs. evil story of the legends that continue to swirl around old Vlad the Impaler of Transylvania. But this reviewer avoids band wagons and has grown tired of the modern interpretation of the legend that has turned the blood suckers into sympathetic cases driven more by 20 something angst than evil.

In a way only Dekker can, he puts the bad back into Vlad (forgive the pun). What Toma encounters in Vlad van Valerik, a Russian aristocrat, challenges everything the soldier has always been sure of. And though duty and honor are the driving force of his life it is his love for one of the daughters, Lucine, that becomes his north star. The greatest lesson Toma has to learn is that he can no longer trust in his sword and strength of will to fight every battle. Evil runs in the veins of Vlad van Valerik and only something more powerful can overcome him – the blood of Immanuel’s veins.

A warning – this is not a book for the faint of heart. Nothing is held back in drawing a picture both of the blackness of sin and evil or the effect they have on the human soul. Just as in Black, Red, White, and Green, Dekker turns the heart inside-out and shows us what wickedness looks like when it breaks beyond the veil of the hidden spiritual and shows itself in the flesh. You will never forget what Toma feels as he looks into the black pools of temptation that rest in the eyes of Valerik’s daughter. Nor will you be able to set aside how quickly the suave exterior and sweet words of Valerik transform into something akin to the very breath of hell.

Immanuel’s Veins is a story of power, lust, love, evil … and redemption. And it reminds us that redemption did not come without the greatest of costs. It is most appropriate that Toma comes to understand this in the darkest of places in the most hopeless of moments. After all, isn’t that where we come to really comprehend what redemption is?

Reviewed by Tim George
Genre: Suspense
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
Publication Date: September 2010

Advanced Reader’s Copy provided by Thomas Nelson

Thus begins the strangely jarring, often disjointed, and consistently mesmerizing tale of a young man who would love to think himself a super hero but seems consigned to merely being a freak. Arson is drawn to the lake behind his house for a reason; a fire literally burns in his bones that he fears will once again consume something or someone he loves. Raised by his mildly crazed grandmother, Arson has been reminded for years that he was most certainly the cause of his mother’s death during childbirth. In some ways he is no different than any other teenage boy: sick in love with a girl who could care less about him and desperately trying to make sense of the rules of social interaction in school. In some ways he is no different. Only in some ways.

Arson’s life becomes further complicated by the arrival of new neighbors with their own secrets. Most notable is a daughter by the name of Emery. Everyone in this story has something to hide: Arson and his proclivity to start fires, Emery’s father and his drunken escape from the ministry, and an old woman with a secret so deep she has yet to admit it even exists. But Emery serves as a picture of all of them. She too hides behind a mask – a real mask that covers the scars of some unnamed accident in her past. Together, she and Arson will ultimately be forced to face both the hurts they hide from and the hopes they fear believing in.

If Arson has any negative it is found in the abrupt way it ends. Though I am sure this is due to a set-up for a sequel it still leaves one backing up a few pages and wondering what was missed. That slight criticism quickly evaporates when one stops to remember this is a novel written by someone barely old enough to vote and already past his third novel. Though definitely leaning toward a Young Adult style, Estevan Vega writes with a clarity and focus beyond his years. Mike Dellosso is right in the book’s recommendations when he likens Vega’s characters to those in Dean Koontz’s Odd Thomas. Quirky? Yes. Unbelievable? Absolutely not!

This is a story of self-loathing and self-discovery. It asks some big questions about the nature of man and God in a powerful and yet unobtrusive way. Along the way it offers a snap-shot of teenage angst and yet something more. Something that entails all of us. What masks do we hide behind? What secrets do we fear? What hopes do we hesitate to embrace? I can’t say I understand everything about the way Arson reads or ends but of this I am sure of – it won’t be the last novel by Estevan Vega to grace my book shelf. Until then, I think I’ll pick Arson back up some time soon. There’s something about it that draws me – like a moth to the flame.

Publisher: Tate Publishing (May 2010)

Apparently Steven James missed that memo when he set out to create the world of Patrick Bowers. From Pawn, to Rook, to Knight, and now to The Bishop, James has created a story world that is a very scary place populated by fractured characters bent on proving the evil of their hearts is acceptable and perhaps even necessary. In this installment of the Patrick Bower’s Thrillers, Special Agent Dr. Patrick Bowers has moved for the summer to the F.B.I training center at Quantico near Washington, D.C. with his step-daughter, Tessa, to teach a few seminars. But no sooner have classes started than cell phones vibrate and news of a horrendous murder interrupts everything. As in my reviews of his earlier works, saying much more about the plot is self-defeating. James once again weaves such a masterful web of clues and counter-clues that I doubt I could give the plot away if I tried.

A more useful way to look at The Bishop is in terms of its characters and themes. Though there is plenty of action and some pretty unsettling acts of calculated evil they serve only as a stage for the characters to reveal a little more about themselves as each scene unfolds. The relationship between Agent Bowers and his seventeen year old step-daughter takes the spotlight. Raven, as he calls her, proves to be perhaps the strongest of all the story’s players as she has matured from a maladjusted teenager to a quick witted young lady with more insight than many of the adults around her. Patrick Bowers is the perfect wounded hero. Though the best at what he does and heroic to a fault, Bowers finds himself almost at a loss as to how to handle the tension between himself and the two past love interests of his life that appear on the scene almost simultaneously. His step-daughter has her own emotional land mines to navigate as she finds herself caught between a father she never knew and the man who has protected her with his very life. Through it all father and step-daughter forge a bond built on mutual respect and a love born through adversity.

One cannot mention characters in a Patrick Bowers novel without addressing the antagonists. And yes, that is very much meant to be plural. The Bishop reads like a Who’s Who of serial killers from the first three novels. But James has more than raised the bar with the villains in this installment. In the movie, Unbreakable, Samuel L. Jackson tells Bruce Willis that a hero is defined by his arch-nemesis. No villain – no hero. Steven James understands this dynamic perfectly. In doing so, he constructs characters that are both unthinkably evil and yet tragic. A unique method of one of the villains rehearsing her thoughts like the narrative in a screen play adds yet another layer to the suspense.

As good as the characters are it is in the area of theme development where I feel Steven James has flexed his literary muscles. Using Tessa’s love of Edgar Allen Poe, a distaste for Sherlock Holmes, and fascination with The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde we are given a fascinating look at the nature of good and evil. Tessa is not a believer but she is searching. What separates man from the animals? Are the fractures in man’s soul evidence of his fallen nature? Are we all capable of the same darkness as those who take lives in such horrendous ways in the story? And just when I felt James had strayed from his spiritual roots in The Knight, he hits me between the eyes with a most profound observation in the last pages of The Bishop. It is the reason both for the title of the book and my own hope that Tessa and her step-father are yet to solve their greatest mystery. They are almost there. Almost.

The Bishop is everything a gripping thriller should be and more. And – there are still a few pieces on the chess board that have yet to be played. Hope we can all hang in there until Summer 2011 for The Queen.

Reviewed by Tim George
Genre: Suspense
Publisher: Revell
Publication Date: August 2010

Review copy provided by Revell

Now, in The Superlative Stream, Nietz carries his readers on an adventure with Sandfly and his female companion, Hardcandy that is both dazzling and introspective. What they discover when they reach their destination challenges everything they have ever believed and known. The only way to describe the race of beings they discover is to tell you to read the book. With Dark Trench disabled, Sandfly and Hardcandy find themselves on a world of seeming blissful perfection. On this planet the beings all seem to work in perfect harmony with no laws or implants to force them to do anything. But like many things in life, Sandfly comes to wonder if there might some hidden agenda in the beings’ interest in earth. What follows is beyond description.

Once again, written in first person, one is drawn into the story until it seems no more science fiction than the changing world around us. The Superlative Stream expands this method by offering the first person experiences of Hardcandy. The twist is she wanted to become a drone of the Abduls. Seeking to escape a miserable future and ensure her place in Paradise she willing became what she is. Now Sandfly, free of his controlling masters must find a way to free his friend as well.

This is a story about discovery and redemption providing a valuable gateway into deeper issues of faith and redemption. Sandfly calls the people back on earth without implants freeheads. The irony, of course, is all are controlled in more subtle ways than some object implanted in their brain. They are still slaves of their own fallen hearts and the stifling nature of works oriented religion. There can be no doubt another chapter of this story is ahead because Sandfly and Hardcandy have heard the voice of A-A3 on the Superlative Stream and the people of earth need to know what it seems all have long forgotten.

Kerry Nietz writes in a way that makes me wonder what the masters of the genre like Asimov and Heinlein might have written had they known A-A3 (you’ll have to read the story to understand that). And The Superlative Stream also leads me to speculate what C.S. Lewis might have done differently with his Space Trilogy had he better understood the genre. All that is to say this is a masterful piece of fiction because it does what the genre should do; it paints a big picture and asks big questions through a medium that is neither boring nor hard to grasp.

Reviewed by Tim George
Genre: Science Fiction
Publisher: Marcher Lord Press
Publication Date: October 2009

Review copy provided by the author

Some evil shouts from rooftops, some scuttles in the dark. The greatest evil tips its face toward light with shining innocence.

That opening line is as vintage Brandilyn Collins as you’ll ever find. Continuing her vacation from series writing, Collins once again gives us yet another rousing story of suspense in Deceit. Collin’s tagline, Seatbelt Suspense, earns its keep as this breathless tale of one woman’s determination to prove who killed her best friend careens toward its dramatic conclusion.

At the center of the story is Joanne Weeks. Among other things Joanne loves classic rock, Jelly Bellies – lots of Jelly Bellies – and finding people who mostly don’t want to be found. Joanne is also convinced that she knows who killed her friend. The problem is no one in town would believe it. The man is her dead friend’s husband and Baxter Jackson is pretty much king of the world in their town: trusted elder of the church, successful business man, benefactor to charity, friend to all and suspected by none. Except Joanne Weeks.

When Joanne hits a hooded, masked man on a dark rainy road, his words to her revive a fire that has been burning within in her for six years. The fire to prove what no one else believes. The mysterious man’s words prompt her to use her professional skills as a skip tracer to find the one young woman who may have witnessed what happened to her friend, Linda, and finally vindicate her assertions about the most loved man in town. Before the next day is over she will have been burglarized, threatened, shot at, and brought face to face with someone she never suspected.

In past novels Collins has effectively mixed 1^st and 3^rd person points of view between the main character and his or her antagonist. In Deceit that method is taken to a new level. Alternating between the fast paced 1^st person account of Joanne Weeks in some chapters and the 3^rd person account set six years earlier of the young woman she is looking for, the author does a great job of drawing us into both character’s stories. The result is the discovery that nothing is totally as it seems. Everyone has a seed of deceit in their heart. Some will kill to conceal it.

Be warned, there are some pretty tough subjects dealt with in this story, most notably verbal and physical abuse. And you may find yourself begging the author to show no sympathy to someone as despicable as Baxter Jackson. Those who look the guiltiest usually are but Joanne also discovers the greatest evil tips its face toward light with shining innocence.

Reviewed by Tim George
Genre: Suspense
Publisher: Zondervan
Publication Date: June 2010

Review copy provided by Zondervan Publishing

So now I’m on the threshold, feeling like a paratrooper about to jump, knowing my chute was packed by people who don’t care how hard I land.

And so goes the life of Detective Roland March the not-so-loveable hero of J. Mark Bertrand’s debut solo novel, Back on Murder. March is a career homicide detective taking the last gasping breaths of a once stellar career. Personal problems, some poor career choices, and less that winning relationship skills have left him wondering how much longer he really has. Then along comes a gangland shooting and he gets one more chance, maybe his last chance, to regain his form and remind everyone in his department what made him such a good cop. But his keen detective’s sense lands him right where he doesn’t want to be, on a select task force looking for a kidnapped girl – the daughter of Houston’s most famous mega-church leader.

Everything about Back on Murder harkens back to the kind of cops I grew up with in detective novels, TV shows, and movies. Using a first person perspective (as all good detective stories did) we find ourselves inside the skin of a guy who honestly doesn’t like himself much more than anyone else around him. Not that he’s a bad guy; he just lives in a world that doesn’t make sense any more. Consider the following lines as Detective March struggles to understand an argument he has just had with his wife:

The kind of fight … that leaves me baffled, wondering how we ended up like this. …In a movie, I would take her in my arms, press my lips to hers, and after struggling for a second she’d give in, flinging her limbs around me … But that’s not how it happens … I want to hit rewind … I want things to be easy between us again .. the way I remember us being. But I don’t know how to get there.

Several supporting characters serve as a mirror in which both the main character and the readers can consider themselves: a new task-force partner who hasn’t forgotten her faith and a guilt-ridden youth pastor who is danger of losing his. But in the end, this is March’s story. Will he get it back together, solve the case, put his marriage back together, and find himself in the process? It’s a good thing this is just the first installment of the Roland March Mystery series because it doesn’t look like there are any simple answers to our hero’s deepest questions.

J. Mark Bertrand co-authored Beguiled along with Deanne Gist to great reviews and his solo should receive the same. If you like happily-ever-after stories where the characters all wear labels on their chest telling you who to cheer and who to boo, this may not be the book for you. But if you want a story where characters talk and act like real people – some resting in their faith, some having no faith all, and some struggling to regain their faith – Back on Murder is the ticket for a really good read.

Reviewed by Tim George
Genre: Suspense
Publisher: Bethany House
Publication Date: July 2010

Provided for review by Bethany House Publishing

With Jack Bauer gone from the scene (at least until the big screen return of 24) one might be asking who will take his place in the interim. After reading Danger Close by William G. Boykin and Tom Morrisey the better question might be, what would Jack be like if he was a man of faith as well as action? The answer would be someone like Blake Kershaw. Blake is a decorated Army Special Forces veteran, in his mid-twenties, and has been called on to make a sacrifice for his country few of us would be willing to consider. To tell any more would require unveiling a story that simply must be read for one’s self.

Several things work together to make this another winner from the new imprint, Fidelis Books. First among them is the believability. Author, Lieutenant General (Retired) William G. Boykin is a former Commander of the U.S. Army Special Forces and a founding member of the legendary Delta Force. Not bad credentials for someone weaving a story about the mostly unheralded heroes of the covert war against terrorism around the world. Boykin moves things along quickly with just enough detail to lend realism without bogging the reader down with too much military jargon. His co-author, Tom Morrisey, has given us a number of excellent faith-based adventure novels in the past and evidence of his excellent character development skills abound.

The key question asked in this novel is forthright. Can honorable men do dishonorable things in the interest of national security and still maintain their honor? It would be wise to read this novel before attempting to answer intelligently. The authors put a face on the men and women called to answer this question in real life in Blake Kershaw. He is a young man asked to give up far more than anyone his age should be. All with full knowledge he may never return from his mission. Added to this is the weight of knowing others may later consider him a traitor or worse. The way Blake balances such a task with his inner faith is neither preachy nor unrealistic. Instead it comes across simply as who he is.

Much of the novel follows Blake’s introduction into the covert world of the CIA, his immersion in the world of radical Islam, and his trek to places so remote even the locals aren’t sure how to get there. His decision to answer this call of duty means losing his past identity, perhaps forever. The conclusion is satisfying and leaves room for Blake to return in another incarnation. He is, after all, a man who doesn’t exist. At least not to the no-nothings in the media and the naysayers among the ill-informed. Blake Kershaw is someone’s son, friend, brother, comrade who has been willing to die to all so others can live. The next person you meet that says they don’t read faith-based fiction because it’s too sweet and unrealistic, introduce them to Danger Close. This is a real man’s book that I have a feeling more than a few women will read as well.

Reviewed by Tim George
Genre: Suspense
Publisher: Fidelis Books
Publication Date: July 2010

Review copy provided by Fidelis Books

Jonah Westfall is Police Chief for a town where next to nothing happens – until recently. Redford, Colorado is experiencing its first growth pangs as money and drugs begin to impact his peaceful village of idyllic shops and close relationships. Even more disturbing, strange animal mutilations have begun to surface along the mountain trails pointing to cultic activity or perhaps a serial killer in the making. And those are the simplest of the problems facing Redford’s chief law officer.

Karen Heitzmann, best known for her romance novels, proves she can handle suspense with the best of them in her latest outing. Indivisible is a tight mystery with suspense that would have made Alfred Hitchcock proud. Rather than offer a murder at every turn the author instead weaves an intricate story of family betrayal and villains of the heart. Who are what is behind the bizarre crimes serves to shine the light on the many fractured and tortured relationships hiding behind the peaceful façade of what appears to a perfect place to live. Everyone, it seems, has a lot of baggage. At the top of the list is the Police Chief himself. He is estranged from his mother, questions still plague him about his father’s suicide, and there are two lovers in his life from which he can’t quite break away, most notably Kentucky Bourbon.

Indivisible has a large cast of characters so it is easy to lose track of who’s who in the first few chapters and there is also at least one sub-plot that might have been left out. Apart from those minor asides, Heitzmann does a great job of weaving the back stories and too-present realities of each character into a unified tapestry of regret, hope, and redemption. These are real people who act and react in very real ways. Not a cardboard cutout of a hero or villain anywhere in sight. The mystery part of the story is measured out in such a way you will find yourself hoping that no one in Redford is the villain and then finally understanding the depth the other character’s disappointments might have just as easily found given the same circumstances.

This is the kind of story that is bound to offend some. Both the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and the Society of Easily Offended Pharisees (I made that one up) will likely share the opinion the author went too far one way or the other. Jonah Westfall battles both alcohol and past indiscretions with the woman that should have been the love of his life. A fellow officer tries to hide her pregnancy and a husband beginning to stray to the other side of the line she has sworn to protect. Another tries to pray even as she questions whether she even believes in God. And, on the plus side, a band of church ladies that wouldn’t be caught dead with the aforementioned Pharisees. You know, like people you live and work with. Maybe like people too close to what you once were. Perhaps are.

Indivisible is the kind of novel you have to hang with it first and then won’t be able to put down. Kudos to Karen Heitzmann for a story well told and our hopes there will be many more like it!

Indivisible by Kristen Heitzmann
Reviewed by Tim George
Genre: Suspense
Publisher: WaterBrook Press
Publication Date: May 2010

Review copy provided by WaterBrook Press