Customer Reviews

Escape Clause

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James Born is on a roll. Following up on his first two novels, Walking Money and Shock Wave, Born goes on to hit three in a row with his main man, James Tasker of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE)and an assortment of new charactter, plus some returning characters from the previous novels.

After stopping a bank robbery while there as a customer, Tasker is given a job during his cooling off period of investigating the death of a prisoner at Manatee Prison. The prisoner is the son of a well connected citizen and the governor has asked FDLE to look into it.

On his way to the prison, he is stopped for speeding by a state trooper named Miko which sets up an interesting piece of dialogue about FDLE people which seems to haunt Tasker throughout all three novels:

"I'm a cop."
"Do you have any ID?"
"Yes,Sir."
"Slowly reach for it and show it to me."

Upon showing him his badge the trooper says:

"I thought you said you were a cop."
"I am. Look, with FDLE."
"You guys have uniforms?"
"Nope."
"Work shifts?"
"Nope."
"Drive marked cars?"
"Obviously not."
"Then how can you call yourselves cops?"

Well, as the story unfolds involving correctional people, local police, lunatic inmates, some very attractive ladies and others in the area of Gladesville, Florida it becomes apparent that Tasker is very much a cop and that he is sticking his nose into things that will become hazardous to his health.

When he first broke on to the literary scene I mentioned that Florida had produced some well known and very successful novelists who use the Florida scene and lifestyle and that if he continued in this vein he would be joining some select company. Suffice it to say that Mr. Born is no longer an aspiring novelist in this genre...he has arrived.

As this novel concludes and all of the questions are answered and all of the bad guys are brought to heel, the guarantee of a fourth novel is set out with the meeting of two characters from novels one and two. What antics these two will cook up for Bill Tasker and others is just so delicioius to contemplate, but in the meantime, this book is a keeper. All of them are!!

This book takes a slight departure from the norm in the life of FDLE special agent Bill Tasker when he temporarily leaves Miami to investigate a death at Manatee Correctional near Gladesville. His boss feels he needs a break from his usual high-stress life of chasing dangerous criminals, plus an investigation at the prison will quiet any board of inquiry investigation into Tasker's last high-profile case. Tasker settles into his tiny, government-issue apartment, expecting a quiet idyll, but instead finds himself the victim of violent attacks by prison inmates, a blend of apathy and animosity from the prison staff, and a major attraction to the prison's investigator, Renee Chin. Tasker's next-door neighbor, Professor Klingman, is a likeable guy on an archaeological dig, accompanied by an attractive young female assistant, Billie Towers. Manatee Correctional is run with an iron fist by Captain Sam Norton and his portly sidekick, Sergeant Henry Janzig, who enforce discipline through unorthodox ways, and who want Bill Tasker gone as quickly as possible. Too bad the tenacious agent can't take a hint. At the same time, inmate Luther Williams a/k/a Cole Hodges, who was put away because of Tasker, has managed to gain trustee status and is hatching a few plans of his own while he keeps a spotless prison library.

Tasker suspects something more than a suspicious death at the prison is afoot when he's accosted first by an inmate in the psych ward, then former inmates at a bar, and again by a group of Aryan Knights, and when Professor Klingman is murdered, the Gladesville detective seems uninterested in doing anything to solve the crime. When Luther Williams escapes and calls Tasker with a tip while he's on the run, Tasker starts to put it all together.

Though Born's third effort is as good as his first two, it is not quite as much fun. There seem to be fewer characters and a lot less going on, though he makes good use of characters from the earlier novels in a way that ties them all together and makes me anxious to get my hands on the fourth. Born keeps his stories entertaining by changing the point of view often. Even though Luther Williams is a bad guy, I inexplicably wanted him to succeed in his escape because there's something likeable about him. Even Elmore Leonard doesn't draw his villains that well.

Jim Born is the best thing to happen to crime fiction so far in the new millennium. Anyone who loves crime novels, especially those set in Florida, should be reading him.

James Born has south Florida down hot! He brings the area vividly to life with an authenticity developed by someone who has apparently served his time on the streets as an investigator at the bottom of the pyramid, a guy who knows what it means to be doing the grunt work.

To that he adds a finely tuned sense of how organizational politics work, from the local level through the state and federal cops and on to the big hitters in Tallahassee. His hero, Tasker, is an idealist in a cynical world and you can't help root for a guy with such "ah shucks" optimism, honesty and sincerity.

Born is a student of human behavior and knows what motivates people, he hones in on the essence of his characters, which makes them interesting, real and alive. There are plenty of plot twists to keep one turning the pages. The dialogue is "spot on" and flows effortlessly, the characters are real because each one is dented and bruised by life, including the hero, Tasker, but each tries to manage with what he/she has to bring to the game, and what the game brings to them. His assortment of DOC oddballs, on both sides of the barbed wire, range from comical to vicious. While leaving no loose ends to ponder he also skillfully leaves the door open for some interesting future entanglements.

Looking forward to Born's next romp in the slightly screwy, but never dull world of Bill Tasker.

It's always exciting to pick up a novel by an author who started off with great work and who keeps getting better with each new book. Jim Born fits that description. ESCAPE CLAUSE, his third novel featuring Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) agent Bill Tasker, is easily his best, not an easy mark to reach considering the high quality of WALKING MONEY and SHOCK WAVE, his first two novels.

Tasker is, it would seem, a natural creation for Born, given Born's FDLE status as a special agent, his former membership of the FDLE special-ops team, and his duty as a DEA agent and as a deputy U.S. Marshal. Born's background, however, constitutes only half of the equation, which results in the addictive nature of his novels. Along with his real-world background, Born can write.

While reading ESCAPE CLAUSE, one gets the feeling that they are not so much turning pages as looking at scenes unfurl across a canvas, or, better yet, watching the private screening of a riveting film. Born infuses a real-world setting into his narrative, eschewing dramatic exaggeration and concentrating on the believability of his characters to move his story along. Tasker accordingly is a likable, not perfect guy, smart but not brilliant, tough but not indestructible. He has real-world domestic problems as a single dad, which he resolves well if not perfectly. Tasker is also a bit of a babe-magnet, but they aren't falling into his bed within an hour of meeting him. And when he shoots someone, even in self-defense, Tasker has the grace to feel bad about it.

When Tasker is involved in a shooting incident while breaking up a bank robbery, his supervisor sends him on what is supposedly a restful assignment: investigating what appears to be an inmate homicide at the ill-named Manatee Correctional Facility. Born, while introducing Tasker into Manatee, subtly makes the facility a secondary character in ESCAPE CLAUSE, and a realistic one. The prison is not a hell hole, though it is certainly not one in which you would choose to spend an evening. And, it seems, there is as much to fear from the administration of the facility as there is from the inmates.

It becomes clear that at least some guards --- from the bottom on up --- are trying to stymie Tasker's investigation, if not scare him off entirely. The resistance, however, only causes Tasker to dig in deeper, and when his next-door neighbor comes to harm, Tasker begins to take the resistance personally. His biggest problem though is finding someone he can trust --- his list keeps getting shorter, even as the methods used to stymie his investigation become more and more deadly. Events reach a cataclysmic and ultimately ironic end, from which Tasker learns who his friends, and enemies, truly are.

Born is nothing less than a marvel, a writer who in the short space of a few novels has made a multitude of must-read lists. And, speaking of must-reads, ESCAPE CLAUSE sets up a possible plot line for the next Tasker novel, which hopefully we will see sooner rather than later. Highly recommended.

--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub

Some people are always in the right place at the right time; others aren't. Florida lawman Bill Trasker is the latter. Just off a stressful case, he was standing in line at the bank with his 8-year-old daughter when a bank robbery ensued. To help him unwind, his boss sent him to do a review on an inmate homicide at a secluded prison. Bill's trouble magnet, however, continued working at high capacity. Murder, attempted murder (of Bill), kidnapping, and a prison break move Bill's temporary duty from simple to complex and dangerous. Those same complications make for a compelling, fast-paced thriller! James O. Born is now on my must-be-read list.

The author has worked in law enforcement for years and it shows. The book is a well-done, fast paced mystery with enough twists and turns to keep it interesting. The nuanced protagonist makes for an interesting read. I look forward to reading more books by this author.

Really not that type of series here but as always start at the beginning with WALKING MONEY and then SHOCK WAVE to really meet Bill Tasker, Florida Department of Law Enforcement. This detective is a really good character and I enjoy Born's work. I live in Palm Beach County Florida and this makes lots of the storyline very personal. This story is not quite up to the par of the other two books but well worth your time. A great beach read. RECOMMENDED. Born is seventeen years in the FDLE in the real world so he writes with real and intimate knowledge.

This was the first of author Born's books I read. It was excellent and spurred me to get the other two Billy Tasker novels. Great characters, great setting... lots of detail. I'm a big Born fan! If you like cop books, you love James O. Born.

This author is remarkably knowledgeable from his past on the FDLE (Florida Department of Law Enforcement) and uses this experience to really captivate the reader as Born creates so many compex but easy to follow interactions between his large cast of characters. It was a book that kept me hooked until the last in wanting to find out which of the bad guys did it. The conclusion was both riveting and satisfying.

James Born's third effort in the Bill Tasker series (see "Walking Money" and "Shock Wave") is an enjoyable read but somewhat short of earning the deification described by other reviewers here. Born has a way to go before his character is in the same room as Doc Ford, Jack Reacher, Bobby Lee Swagger, or Dave Robicheaux. That being said, Tasker, a special agent for the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE), is an engaging protagonist. He is smart yet misses the obvious at times. He can be explosively decisive at times yet is smart enough to seek a simpler way out. He attracts beautiful women yet is somewhat insecure around them and is still recovering from an unwanted divorce.

Born is a master of characterization and dialogue--elements that seem to go hand-in-hand in his books. His characters are fleshed out and credible; indeed. He makes you think you know them by books end. His dialogue is snappy, appropriate, and never causes you to stop and say--"nah, he wouldn't have said that". Born also is adept at describing his environment and his scenes are believable and well described.

In "Escape Clause", Tasker kills a bank robber with his young daughter watching. To help him get back to normal and escape media attention, his director sends him on what seems a easy case of discovering who killed a wealthy land developer's son while incarcerated in Manatee Correctional in Gladesville. Tasker settles in state housing near the prison, makes some friends (and enemies), and quickly finds himself attracted to two local females...the assistant to an archiver and researcher who lives next door and an enigmatic inspector at Manatee Correctional.

Quickly, Tasker is threatened both inside and outside the prison walls, several dead bodies turn up, a prison break occurs, and it becomes clear that no one wants him around. He gets little help from Captain Norton or his stooge Sgt. Janzig from inside the prison and more surprisingly, no help at all from the local Gladesville detective, Rufus Goodwin.

He finds himself falling hard for Renee Chin, the inspector at Manatee, but has trouble following through on his feelings. As the plot unfolds, Tasker finds himself questioning everyone's loyalty around him. Clearly, his biggest task is to find out who he can believe and trust. Surprisingly, it is Cole Hodges (now known as Luther Williams), an inmate who was sent to Manatee by Tasker in a previous novel, who becomes the catalyst for helping Tasker solve the multi-faceted case.

The pacing is brisk at times, yet there were also periods where things seemed to languish a bit. A particular bit of information by Born regarding where Tasker keeps his gun was reiterated enough times that even the densest reader could see it coming, a point that just seemed unnecessarily cheesy to this reader. All-in-all, "Escape Clause" is an effective addition to the Bill Tasker series.