Customer Reviews

Crisscross:: A Repairman Jack Novel

5 star:		(24)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

To those who know him, Repairman Jack is without a doubt the most beloved of the contemporary fictional figures, bar none. He has a fan club, Stephen King is a charter member, after his first book and a couple short stories, he disappeared for ten years and was bought back by popular demand.

Jack could be described as a fixer - you got problem and for a fee he can fix it, or a champion of the oppressed - you can't afford a fee, we'll work something out. To the government he doesn't exist. He has never collected a paycheck and has never paid income tax. He has no credit, no credit cards, no FICO score, has never voted, has no social security card, has never been arrested, has no driver's license or passport (at least in his real name). In short he works outside the system totally under the radar.

In Crisscross, Jack has two new clients. One is a strange elderly lady with a dog, named Herta (in the last few books there have been strange ladies with dogs, the last one of which told Jack there would be no more coincidences in his life). It seems her son had joined the fast growing Dormentalist Church and recently she has lost touch with him. The second is a moderately attractive young lady, Maggie, (whom Jack finds out later is a nun) who is being blackmailed for some compromising photos.

To get the lowdown on the Dormentalists, Jack meets with reporter Jamie Grant, who recently ran the first installment of an exposé on the Dormentalist Church. He plans on infiltrating the church by joining, to which Jamie informs him it's not that easy, proceeding to tell him why. Jack, with help from acquaintances, lays groundwork to attract the top gun of Dormentalism, one Luther Bradley by claiming to be one guy while carrying identification which purports that Jack is one Jason Amari, the wealthy son of an even wealthier businessman. Naturally the security chief discovers this and Jack finds himself in with the head honcho, Bradley because of the families apparent wealth.

On the Blackmail end, Jack finds out who the blackmailer is, a crumb named Richie Cordova, who plays at being a private investigator but in reality is a private shake down artist. Jack figures Maggies pictures and others are probably on his computer and he probably has a back up, so he makes arrangement, again with the help of an acquaintance, to introduce a virus into Cordova's computer and follow him to locate the backup.

Things are moving along swimmingly on both fronts when little by little things start to unravel. The Church security chief, a behemoth of a man named Jensen thinks there is something fishy about Amari and continues to check him out, eventually locating a photo of the reclusive Amari and after having all his blackmail files destroyed by Jack, Cordova discovers that it was done purposely by someone and Maggie was the one that hired him.

CONCLUSION

This story is a little slow getting started but about halfway through it really gets going big time. Wilson does a superb job of merging the two separate undertakings into one remarkably clever ending. As advertised the Domentalist Church is a vessel of the Otherness and Jack must find a way to stop Bradley and save humanity and life as we know it.

As usual, Wilson's writing style is very reader friendly. Wilson, a physician by trade, (or maybe it's a sideline by now) is not interested in talking down to his readers but merely telling his story. His writing is fluid and smooth without too much detail and Wilson has always been a great storyteller with some of the most ingenuous and intriguing plots I have read.

I should probably warn you, there is some brutality, though it is a fact and not described and is mild compared to some previous books by Wilson. I have been reading Wilson since he came out with the book "The Keep" twenty five years ago, which was the first of the previously mentioned Adversary Cycle and was followed closely by "The Tomb", the first Repairman Jack novel.

If you're looking for something a little different, maybe a little bizarre, this certainly fills the bill. The downside though may be that once you've read this novel you may be compelled to go back and see what you missed in previous stories.

The excellently-penned Repairman Jack series mixes action, mystery, thriller, horror, sci-fi, humor, pop culture and philosophy all together to create an alternate-universe world that works on multiple levels to keep me turning pages. I give a solid 5 stars to every book in the series!

Crisscross is another great read that furthers the RJ story along. I first read Harbingers, and have just finished reading all the RJ books, although I didn't read any of them in order, just whichever was available at the library when I finished one and needed another.

Since the story does develop with each installment I plan to buy them all in paperback and read them again in order, starting with The Tomb and including Nightworld.

BTW - I love Abe - he reminds me of my uncle :)

I'm a big F. Paul Wilson fan and a huge Repairman Jack fan. I paid the $55.00 for the limited edition book. Why? Two reasons. One, I collect books (and actually read them). Two, I did not want to want for the trade edition to come out. Crisscross was worth well worth the money and time I spent reading the book. I have all of the Gauntlet Press Repairman Jack books.

Repairman Jack is a fix-it guy. If you have a problem, he will fix it for you. He lives on the fringe of society. He does not have a social security number, nor does he pay taxes. In Crisscross, there are two story lines that tie in together. A nun, who is caught on film in a compromising position wants Jack to get back the pictures. Two, a mother wants Jack to find her son who is deeply involved in a world wide cult with sinister ties.

Crisscross is a stand alone book, but is part of Wilson's Adversary series (I think it fits into the Lovecraft Universe). Most of Wilson's books and short stories (including an anthology that he edited) tie into his Adversary Universe. His books are awesome and I'm happy that I've started reading them about four years back.

Wilson is definitely one of the best writers out there. If you don't want to spend $55 on a limited edition, you can wait until it is released in trade hardback or paperback. In the meantime, you can pick up trade hardbacks and paperbacks of the Adversary series (The Keep, The Touch, The Tomb, Reborn, Reprisal and Nightworld), and the Repairman Jack books (The Tomb, Legacies, Conspiracies, All the Rage, Hosts, Gateways, and The Haunted Air).

This is the best series out there.

F. Paul Wilson published his first horror novel, The Keep in 1981. Discussing the book in Horror: 100 Best Books, J. N. Williamson wrote, "It is difficult...to imagine anything essential to the genre's form which was omitted. Whatever a reader or reviewer of horror fiction thinks primary-necessary in the sense of originality of idea, basic to tight plotting and its progression, desirable in characterization and imperative in terms of suspense, surprise and the inexorable buildup of the total storyline from event to event, chapter to chapter-seems to me present in Dr. Wilson's work."

After The Keep, Wilson published five more books in what he came to call the "Adversary Cycle": The Tomb (1984), The Touch (1986), Reborn (1990), Reprisal (1991), and Nightworld (1992). Apocalyptic fiction at its best, the Adversary Cycle introduced several concepts that came to form the core of much of Wilson's fictional universe: the ancient, evil entity called Rasalom, his eternal opponent Glaeken, the town of Monroe, Long Island (Wilson's analog of Arkham, Oxrun Station, and Castle Rock), the wandering healing spirit known as the Dat-tay-vao (first seen in The Touch), and the modern pulp hero known as Repairman Jack.

The secretive Jack, who conceals his existence from the world, made his first appearance in The Tomb. Not wanting to be locked in to writing a series character, Wilson left him near death at the end of that novel, only to have him reappear in Nightworld, playing a key role in frustrating Rasalom's bid to enslave humanity. Jack's fans proving persistent, Wilson responded with a new Repairman Jack novel, titled Legacies in 1998, following it with Conspiracies (1999), All the Rage (2000), Hosts (2001), The Haunted Air (2002), and Gateways (2003). Set between the events in The Tomb and Nightworld, the books chronicle Jack's growing awareness of the battle between Rasalom and the entity he refers to as `the Otherness" or " the Ally." Similar to the late Isaac Asimov, Wilson is working to link the bulk of his fictional output, subtly revising the books in the Adversary Cycle to fit the new continuity he is creating through his Repairman Jack novels.

CrissCross, the latest installment in Jack's ongoing saga, finds Dr. Wilson in excellent form. As is his custom, he gives Jack two problems which inevitably converge-as Jack was told in an earlier story, there are no more coincidences for him. This time out, the repairman attempts to rescue a convert to the up and coming religion of Dortmentalism, at the same time trying to extricate a Catholic nun from a sticky blackmail situation. Rather than reveal too much of Wilson's engaging plot, let's just say that the author seems to take great pleasure in complicating Jack's already complex existence; readers, especially fans of rugged types like Travis McGee, will delight in watching Wilson extricate his creation from the deadly situations he's concocted. Their only qualm will come from the realization that as Jack draws closer to his date with destiny, the series will inevitably draw to a close. Enjoy it while it lasts.

Few know that Repairman Jack exists except his pregnant girlfriend Gia, her daughter, and a few other souls that he trusts. People turn to Jack when they need problems solved without the police involved. Jack fixes things for cash only as he has no money or paper trail to follow. Jack seeks a way out of the cold without attracting attention so that he can marry Gia.

While he ponders his problem, two cases come to him. Maggie the nun says that someone is blackmailing her with illicit pictures of her with her lover; she wants jack to destroy the pictures before the Church finds out. Maria hires Jack to learn if her son is okay since she lost contact wit him when he joined the Dormentalist Church whose founder Luther Brady believes that burying certain designated pillars in specific locations will fuse this world with its mirror realm leading to paradise regained.

Jack destroys the pictures with a little help from a hacker, but when Maggie informs her lover that they no longer have to pay the extortionist, tragedy occurs. Jack learns about the pillars and what will happen once Brady finishes planting them; he must stop the false prophet at all costs to save the world as we know it.

Repairman jack novels are always fun to read, but this thriller, though also quite entertaining and exciting, is much darker than usual. He solves the nun's problem, but the results are not what he or she expected forcing him to take an amoral position with the blackmailer. The Brady problem is simply world threatening. For those who know Jack will know that F. Paul Wilson provides another fantastic reading experience.

Harriet Klausner

In CRISSSCROSS, Wilson's Repairman Jack runs into two very different cases, the first involving blackmail, and the other a missing person's case. Sounds pretty pedestrian, until you factor in the nature of the blackmail case, the involvement of a cult very similar to another science fiction based organization with strong celebrity participation, and one more piece of the Adversary puzzle that Wilson has been developing since THE KEEP. Jack is an interesting character, brutal with a strong sense of justice, and in both cases things would have turned out much better if his plans were followed by all involved. But it is this human frailty that makes this book work so well. Jack, for all his planning and preternatural cunning, is still subject to the mistakes others make and when he has to improvise things can get very messy. This is my introduction to this character and to be able to pick up the threads of the series underlying themes without a study guide is a credit to Wilson's ability to incorporate elements from previous books seamlessly and while things do fall a bit predictably in place by the end, I definitely will be looking for the other books in the series.

Reading a new Repairman Jack story is like catching up with an old friend. And with one, maybe two exceptions, each book in the series is better than the last.

This time out Jack takes on two fixes. His first job involves the search for a wealthy widow's son who's involved himself in a questionable "religion" that mirrors Scientology. Jack's task is to find him and have him contact his mother. Sounds easy, but like all things Jack involves himself with, the task grows increasingly dangerous and complicated.

His other fix involves a nun being blackmailed by a common thug. Ritchie Cordova, a crooked private eye, has managed to take a few photos of Sister Margaret Mary in a compromising situation, and has been shaking her down for cash. Jack agrees to take on the case, waving his fee since Sister Maggie is strapped for cash. The payment he received from the rich widow on his other case more than compensates him.

Without giving away too much, both cases eventually run together, leading to some interesting plot twists. And you wind up cheering for Jack all the way as he gives the bad guys their comeuppance!

F. Paul Wilson's Repairman Jack has evolved into a great action hero who for the most part tends to be grounded in reality. While there are occasions where Jack miraculously survives, he still comes through as human. There are no Dirk Pitt moments where you find yourself rolling your eyes.

Dr. Wilson ties in several bits and pieces from his previous stories, yet the previous books don't have to be read to enjoy this novel. However, I would definitely recommend doing so. You will get a clearer picture of what's going on (The "otherness"), and further delve into the character of Repairman Jack. Start with "The Tomb" and enjoy the ride!

I am a huge fan of Repairman Jack!

Jack lives "off the grid" in New York City. He helps people with problems that cannot be solved by the police. He frequently runs across creatures that are evil and bent on destruction and manages to outwit or outfight them.

If you are new to Repairman Jack, read them in order starting with The Tomb. There is a good list on his website [...].

This 8th installment in the Repairman Jack series is a strong one, with Jack tackling a Scientology-like church, a blackmailing PI, and incipent fatherhood. The humor, suspense, and supernatural aspects that permeate the other novels in the series are here in abundance. Jack has not mellowed with age, and does what he has to to get his work done. An excellent read, and one that will leave you wanting more, and wanting it right away.

Strongly recommended for thriller fans in general, and a must for anyone who's ever enjoyed any of the Repairman Jack novels.

Repairman Jack continues to be one of the more original and interesting characters in contemporary fiction. In Crisscross, Jack criscrosses two seemingly separate fix-it cases in an attmept to settle the deadliest of scores. In typical fashion with cases Repairman Jack is involved in, they involve both the natural and supernatural, the action is continuous, and the body count is high and often brutal. If you're in the mood for pure escapist reading during your next trip to the beach or plane trip, Crisscross, as well as most of the other books in F. Paul Wilson's exciting Repairman Jack series, will keep you totally involved and make you forget everything else that is going on around you. Enjoy!