Dark Light (Doc Ford Novels) [Hardcover]

Randy Wayne White (Author)

Book Description

Series: Doc Ford Novels | Publication Date: March 16, 2006

I magine hurricane winds over the Sahara Desert, preceded by a cavalry of tornadoes. Imagine dunes flattened, then resculpted. Then imagine all that at the bottom of the sea.

A Category Four hurricane has swept the west coast of Florida, creating havoc, changing lives, and reshaping the ocean bottom. Well-known reefs and wrecks have been covered up-and new ones have emerged. The old woman who visits Doc Ford's lab late one night has a haunting story, of a loved one lost while rendezvousing with a German submarine off the coast of Florida sixty years earlier, of her belief that he was being blackmailed and that the storm has given her a second chance to prove his innocence by uncovering the wreck of his boat-and the truth-if only Ford would look for it. Intrigued, Ford agrees, and sets in motion a chain of events that will change his life forever. For there are other things in that wreck as well, and other men want those things, men willing to commit terrible acts to get them. And the woman herself-the woman is not what she seems. . . .

Rich with passion and vivid, pungent prose, and some of the best characters found in suspense fiction today, Dark Light is a thriller of uncommon intensity.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The 13th installment of bestseller White's aging but still solid series featuring Doc Ford (after 2005's Dead of Night) finds the retired CIA operative picking up in the aftermath of a hurricane that's ravaged the Florida coast. Hired to sift through the old wreck of a pleasure craft, the Dark Light, that's been spotted after the huge storm, Ford and his salvage team discover items inside the boat that stir deadly vengeance—Nazi artifacts. Ford runs into trouble immediately from Bern Heller, a nearby marina owner who claims his company has rights to the wreck site and doesn't hesitate employing violence to get his way. At issue, Ford soon discovers, is more than just old Lugers, war medals and a few gold bars. The real prize lies in the ownership of thousands of acres of Florida beachfront property. While the novel peaks in a typical burst of satisfying action, the plot takes too long to get underway and lacks the overall crispness of the author's best work. 80,000 first printing; author tour. (Mar. 16)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Lately, the ongoing drama in White's justly celebrated Doc Ford series, set on Florida's Sanibel Island, has come from marine biologist Ford's deal with the devil: he will continue to work as a covert government operative, assassinating bad guys around the globe, if his bosses keep their hands off his ex-hippie pal, Tomlinson, whose long-ago involvement in a '60s bombing has targeted him for retribution. This time, though, that plotline takes a rest, as Ford deals with more immediate threats: the aftereffects of a category 4 hurricane that swept across the island, leaving in its wake a lot of angry marina dwellers ("shit on by God, by nature, by government, by insurance agencies"). Among those aftereffects is the discovery of a ship long buried at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico, the victim of a similar hurricane in 1944. Ford is asked to restore various artifacts found on the vessel, and when one of them turns out to be a Nazi medal, a new mystery is afoot, involving an alluring older woman living in a nearby gabled mansion. White attempts to juggle a lot of storylines in this one--the Nazi angle; the 1944 hurricane; the mysterious woman; a psycho marina owner out to claim the artifacts for his own--and while he occasionally seems on the verge of losing control, he keeps all the balls in the air through the finale. Not one of the series' high-water marks, perhaps, but still a compellingly readable tale by one of this country's premier crime novelists. Bill Ott
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 352 pages
• Publisher: Putnam Adult; 1ST edition (March 16, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0399153365
• ISBN-13: 978-0399153365
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.2 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (34 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,005,315 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Randy Wayne White is the author of sixteen previous Doc Ford novels and four collections of nonfiction. He lives in an old house built on an Indian mound in Pineland, Florida.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Hurricanes and Sunken Treasure, June 7, 2008

By 

J. E. Stephens "Jeanne" (Florida) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Dark Light (Doc Ford Novels) (Hardcover)

This tale had lots of things Florida is famous for like hurricanes and sunken treasure.

I live in Florida and this book brought back lots of memories of Hurricane Charley. RWW accurately describes dealing with the government and insurance companies after a hurricane.

I'd never thought much about WWII and the possibility of shipwrecks from the era. This book kept my interest with its interesting plot.

The bad guy, Bern Heller, was so evil I had to take breaks after reading about him. I read on RWW's website, [...], that he will be in his newest novel.

Doc Ford fans and all people who love Florida will enjoy this book.

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best Doc Ford mystery in a while, April 24, 2006

By 

doc peterson (Portland, Oregon USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

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This review is from: Dark Light (Doc Ford Novels) (Hardcover)

Wow - I was surprised at the negative reactions from some reviewers, but I understand where they are coming from. In _Dark Light_ White takes readers in another direction than from the previous 2 or 3 installments of his series. However I found the change refreshing and much more reminiscent of the earlier books in the series.

Rather than concentrating on Doc's dark, violent past or the looming conflict between his former covert life and his friendship with aging hippie Tomlinson, _Dark Light_ focuses on lost treasure... a metaphor not only for the diamond encrusted Nazi death's head found in a wreck after a hurricane, but also for the development and changes to the Florida the author loves so dearly.

White does a tremendous job of weaving a story of sunken Nazi treasure, devious entrepeneurs and hints at a ghost story with the the familiar characters from Dinkin's Bay. For readers not familiar with the series, _Dark Light_ wouldn't be my recommendation to be introduced to the characters - but I do strongly recommend it, even over the last few books written in the series.

17 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Worst Doc Ford book ever!, April 16, 2006

By 

Sarah C. Truax "young at heart" (Bellevue, NE) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Dark Light (Doc Ford Novels) (Hardcover)

I have read nearly all of the Doc Ford novels, the only exceptions being North of Havanna and The Mangrove Coast.
"Dark Light" takes place in the aftermath of a devastating hurricane. And it is so bad that I wondered if Mr. White hired a ghost writer to help him meet his deadline during the aftermath of the real-life hurricane.
There seems to be no real dominant plot, in fact, the book seems to jump wildly from idea to event to extremely vague flashback so often that it makes very little sense at all.

The Doc/Tomlinson death contract issue that ended Tampa Burn, and cropped back up in Dead of Night with a seemingly grudging resolution, is back on the table.
In a number of very vague and confusing flashbacks during Dark Light, one is led to believe that Doc did "something" before the hurricane hit that got Tomlinson's neck off the chopping block. What that "something" exactly was, and whether or not it is a final solution is never discussed.

The book delves so heavily into supernatural mumbo jumbo, most of which Doc is the focus, that you will find yourself wondering, Which one of you is Tomlinson again?

The ending makes very little sense, and leaves many bizarre unanswered questions.
The tertiary characters dominate the story, and are poorly written to the point of being charicatures. Also, the hurricane-related destruction of Dinkins Bay and deaths/tragedies involving long time residents are heartbreaking. There are also a number of distressing continuity errors. Tomlinsons former lover, and mother of their daughter is referred to as his "ex-wife" despite the fact that they were never married.
Tucker Gattrel's long time residence, and Sally Carmel's hometown of Mango FL is referred to as "Coconut," and there are more typographical errors than I can count.

Sorry to all the die-hard fans out there, but it seems that Mr. White has grown tired of Doc and Dinkin's Bay. It would not surprise me if this is the last Doc Ford novel. However, if there is another, I expect it to contain:
1. The murder of Tomlinson
2. The subsequent berserker rage on Doc's part, and
3. The borderline-criminal destruction of one of the finest crime series I have ever read.

I only hope that if Mr. White continues to make such a half-hearted effort, that he will let the series die with the dignity that it deserves.

By the time I finished "Dark Light," I was so disappointed that I was near tears. If I could "unread" it, I would. I wish that I could give it 0 stars, but Amazon makes you give at least one.