Customer Reviews

The Informationist: A Vanessa Michael Munroe Novel (Vanessa Michael Munroe Novels)

5 star:		(90)
4 star:		(41)
3 star:		(17)
2 star:		(17)
1 star:		(14)

 

 

Vanessa Michael Munroe is a dangerous loner who bears emotional and physical scars, reminiscent of Stieg Larsson's Lisbeth Salander. Like Salander, Munroe is adept at acquiring information. While Salander relies upon her skills as a computer hacker, Munroe infiltrates cultures, sometimes posing as a man, working in developing countries for private businesses and organizations like the IMF. Despite her desperate need for down time and the fact that it really isn't her line of work, she accepts an assignment to locate a wealthy businessman's daughter who was last seen in Namibia four years earlier. The businessman insists that Munroe work with Miles Bradford, a mercenary whose job is to keep her safe. The search takes Munroe to Central Africa, where she has some history that she would prefer to remain buried. Yet she remains a product of her inescapable past: fierce and determined, but tormented by the preaching voices that keep her awake at night. Munroe travels to some nasty places and encounters even nastier people who would prefer that the circumstances of the young woman's disappearance remain a mystery. She also meets up with the life she left behind, including a close friend: a gunrunner from whom she walked away nine years earlier.

If the gunrunner brings to mind Humphrey Bogart, Munroe would have to be a warped composite of Jessica Alba, Angelina Jolie, Uma Thurman, and all three Charlie's Angels. She's a great character: an intuitive, intelligent action hero who speaks multiple languages, practices martial arts, and is handy with a knife; a haunted nomad with a horrific past whose understandable ferocity is barely restrained (except when it's not). She has a (largely unfulfilled) desire for romance that conflicts with her instinct for self-preservation, adding edginess to her character. Munroe has enough appeal to support a series of sequels (which is probably the author's plan). Certainly there are aspects of her persona that aren't fully developed; perhaps Stevens intends to complete the picture in future novels. The other characters have been requisitioned from central casting (Daniel Craig as the mercenary, I think) but Stevens gives them enough personality to keep them from being complete stereotypes.

The Informationist takes place in a setting that will be unfamiliar to most readers, as it was to me, but Stevens brings it alive. She paints a vivid picture of Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea. The African locale is a welcome departure from thrillers set in Uzbekistan or Los Angeles. Munroe's writing style is straightforward; her capable prose isn't stirring (that's rare in a thriller) but it is more than adequate to tell the rapidly moving story. There are times when the narrative is a bit over the top, particularly in its description of Munroe's "blood lust" as well as her tendency to bind people with duct tape and point guns at them (when one of the characters told her she had to stop doing that to him, I had to agree). The last part of the novel turns into a guessing game (just who is betraying whom?) and the unexpected resolution is satisfying.

Sensitive readers should be aware that they might be disturbed by some of the more violent scenes in the novel, particularly those involving Munroe's memories of her teenage years: readers who would be put off by graphic descriptions of abuse involving minors should stay away from this novel. For those who can cope, however, The Informationist offers a unique thriller experience that most fans of the genre should enjoy. I would give it 4 1/2 stars if that option were available.

Its not often that I can't wait to find the time to read. I looked forward to see where the story went, what new things I'd learn about African culture, what new disturbing episode the main protagonist would get involved in, and what new doublecross would present itself to be unwound.

Given that this is the authors debut novel, I was simply blown away. Its not hard to tell that she has a unique mind, and has lived through many remarkable experiences. The depth of her character exploration, the complexity of the protagonist's perspectives, and the twists and turns that deep African culture and social complexities lead to are just incredible.

The basic story is somewhat standard thriller fare. But the way its told, the way the story is constructed, and the remarkable depth of the characters is simply amazing. Layer that with how the author weaves the story, with her deep knowledge of some of Africa's more seedy cultures and the deeply lonely yet introspective characters that populate her story, and its just some of the finest fiction I have ever read.

This book is a remarkable accomplishment, by any and all measures. That is her first novel makes it even more amazing. The characters, settings, and twists are like nothing you've read, even if you're a prolific reader.

I look forward to her next novel, as I'm sure others who've read this book are. Fantastic, just fantastic

I enjoyed this book at first, and the problems I had might not bother other readers at all. I found the setting and characters compelling for the first half. But it slows down 2/3 of the way through, and it was at that point when the writing finally got to me. To be honest, I don't often judge thrillers based on the writing itself. I'm not looking for flowery prose or beautiful descriptions. I just want to know what's happening and who the characters are. But there were parts of the book where the writing was just wrong. Not clunky, or awkward, but just nonsensical. Still, even that is usually okay in a thriller. You can get a sense of what they mean, and move on. What really killed the book for me were the attempts to have every chapter end on a "deep" note. I found I was rolling my eyes every other chapter. It just didn't match the rest of the book. And when the hard-ass heroine ended a chapter talking about sex as opening her soul, well, it was one eye-roll too many.

But like I said, the action is good, and the African setting was interesting. If you enjoyed the setting here, you should check out the graphic novel series "Unknown Soldier" by Joshua Dysart. The Unknown Soldier series is set during the Lord's Resistance Army insurgency of Uganda in 2002 and is amazing.

Lisbeth Salander and Vanessa Munroe share some commonalities: both experienced traumas in adolescence that cause them to disconnect to some degree in adulthood and display a few nearly sociopathic tendencies, both are super-humanly skilled with weapons and in command the information-gathering game, both are extremely tenacious and are survivors, both share androgynous physical characteristics, both are willing to use sex as a tool but at heart do desire real intimacy, and they both have few compunctions about taking vicious vengeance when personally threatened.

The Informationist: A Thriller is a drier name for a thriller than The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (or the other two GIRL novels), and one can argue that Taylor Stevens' new novel is piggybacking success off of the Salander trilogy phenomenon. However, be that as it may, THE INFORMATIONIST is a very compelling read in an of itself. Although the early pages felt a bit perfunctory and lacking some detail about how Informationist Vanessa (also called Michael or just Essa) actually does her job, once she began her mission to find the missing young woman, Emily, and returned to Africa, the novel was very hard to put down. Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea don't often appear as locales in popular fiction and I was very drawn in by Steven's ability to describe the environs, the people (both native and not), and the hair-trigger political and economic situations. Most of all, the book really came alive when Vanessa reunited with someone from her past and the two worked first on personal rapprochement and then on dealing with the arrival (again) of another -- Vanessa's assigned partner, mercenary Miles Bradford. Vanessa becomes a person with whom one can empathize as she navigates the mortal bodily dangers and the pains and confusions of the heart.

The plot is perhaps too easily guessed concerning certain facts, but Stevens does pack a few wallops of surprise too. Still, for a woman who is supposed to be such an expert at collecting, sifting, and analyzing information, Vanessa comes up a bit short; she should have been able to pinpoint at least one perpetrator earlier.

Vanessa mentions -- but not in too much detail -- that she was raised in Africa by missionary parents from whom she is now estranged. It is worth noting that author Stevens had an apparently even more radical childhood: the thumbnail sketch of her on the back cover notes that she "was born into a religious cult and raised all over the world before breaking free of the movement." Other Internet sources explain that the cult in question was the Children of God (now called Family International). Other well-known members at one time in their lives include, River Phoenix (and his siblings), Celeste Jones, and Rose McGowan. Grim allegations of child abuse have been leveled at the organization, and by her dedication in THE INFORMATIONIST -- "To my fellow childhood survivors - you know who you are" -- Stevens makes clear her own early life was one she wanted to escape. By creating Vanessa Munroe, a woman with problems but also with exceptional power arising from her need for control, one can theorize that Stevens is using as catharsis Vanessa's living with and trying to exorcise her oft-felt-or-mentioned psychological demons.

But author analysis aside, THE INFORMATIONIST is a welcome addition to thriller fiction. Lisbeth Salander's story was cut short (the late author had intended ten books), but, fortunately, now along comes Vanessa Munroe, and you don't want to be on the receiving end of her fury and acts of vengeance either! Stevens is already writing volume two in her series, and I am already looking forward to it. This first volume is definitely recommended.

First off, The Informationist is not as good as you might think based upon all of the breathlessly positive reviews. The main problem is the disconnect between the book's extremely compelling premise and the ragged quality of the writing itself. This was ultimately very frustrating -- like going to a World Series game where the best hitters turn in a sub-par performance.

The heroine of the book -- Vanessa Michael Munroe -- is someone who is known as an "informationist." She's a hired gun of sorts who companies hire to gather intelligence on foreign markets that will aid them in their business decisions. Her skills in this arena have not come easy, but are an outgrowth of survival skills learned growing up in the wilds of Cameroon as the daughter of missionaries and then, while still under 18, as part of a team of African mercenaries.

The book begins with Munroe being hired for a different, but very complementary assignment. A business tycoon's daughter has gone missing in Equatorial Guinea and after four years of searching it is still unclear whether she is alive or dead. Enter Vanessa Michael Munroe.

It's in the execution of the writing where the experience of this book falls off with page upon page of tortuous, cliched lines. For example, "It was one thing to allow a man access to her body, another thing entirely to allow a man access to her soul." And this goes on throughout the entire book.

Also, "Michael" as she's mostly referred to is a particularly grim and not very likable character. She comes across as particularly soulless and shallow at the beginning and really doesn't change all that much through the course of the book.

If you need a diversion on a plane, this could be a good choice. Just don't go in expecting any sort of tour-de-force.

I suppose it's inevitable to compare Vanessa Michael Munroe to Lisbeth Salander, but it's not fair.

Stevens' hero is closer to Jason Bourne or Gabriel Allon than to the brooding Swede. She's all action all the time, and her vaunted information-gathering skills, which arise from her ability to read a situation and interact with people so that they see what they need to see, are light years away from the computer geek with that famous tattoo.

Evidently all action heroes of the new millennium are survivors of childhood trauma, the more gruesome the better. You'll have to read for a long time to out-grue the past Stevens constructs for Munroe. And yet the reader doesn't get bludgeoned with it. Stevens has the second greatest gift of a storyteller: patience. She sketches the dark past as an absent presence, a negative space. By the time we finally do hear about Michael's history, we believe it absolutely.

The greatest gift of a storyteller is an original voice, both for her narrator and her characters. Stevens is greatly gifted and Michael is wildly original. I read this between two of Jack Higgins' Sean Dillon thrillers and the contrast was stunning. Higgins -- whose plots I like -- never uses an adjective if he can help it. I don't know what anyone looks like, let alone what demons may be haunting the characters. And there are about a zillion guys, all with similar names and sub fusc personalities. Very stiff upper, but hard to sort out.

Stevens needs to work on her secondary characters, but her main figures are astonishing. Both Michael and Francisco will be with me for years. And I hope that Stevens really is at work on the second installment.

As an English teacher, I've got to gripe about awkward sentences -- usually misplaced phrases -- and very very odd word choices, as well as simple goofs -- mistaking "weigh anchor" for "drop anchor." But a good copy editor can fix this. The plot needs no help at all.

It's truly a thriller.

Overall I wanted very much to like this book more than I did. But the book struck a number of false notes for me. The main character (Munroe) is far too expert in too many things to be believeable -- she's all but a comic book superhero. The skills she hauls out at moments does ease a number of potentially sticky plot-points, but the disbelief becomes too much to suspend by about halfway through the book.

In a similar way, Munroe's old gun-runner buddy/soulmate is unbelievable as a character. He's too much the tender-guy-under-the-hard-shell to survive in his chosen business. In reality, he'd be a far nastier piece of work -- or he would have died long before. Same goes for the ex-special forces guy she's saddled with when the assignment starts. I'm told he's real tough, but I never get shown it.

Now very much on the plus side: the "paranoid atmospherics" of the African countries where the action happens is genuinely frightening and spookily believable. No way I'd ever set foot in that part of the world. The scene when they are taken out to the ravine to be shot is just starkly chilling.

I'll be interested to what the next Munroe book is like. Stevens has tied off or ended several threads (Munroe's "booking agent," for example) that might have proven useful in future books. More important, by story's end Munroe seems to have purged herself of several of the demons that were driving her -- how's she going to keep her edge?

Which raises a final point. Munroe, we're told over and over, has this thing about knives. But none of the knives she uses during the story is actually described. That's one of those textural details a thriller writer has to get right, and it isn't happening here. I don't mean Stevens has to litter the text with brand and model names like an issue of Blade World magazine, but a little concreteness would add a lot to the reality. The same goes for the gun-runner transaction that takes place at sea -- it all needs bit more reality through details. (Hint to the author: this is where you get in touch with an expert.)

So I'd call this a good initial effort, but next time, these naggy details have to be pulled together for me to become a steady reader.

Here's a female action figure for the record books. She speaks 22 languages, can tackle men twice her size, get fake documents for just about anywhere, shoot to kill or maim as she deems necessary, unmanacle herself, and can impersonate a male such that she can get a date and still be sensually spellbinding to the men she works with... and more.

Like Indiana Jones, Michael Westen or Rambo, Vanessa Michael Munroe was not created for realism, she was created for adventure.

The plot is pretty good, the romance schmaltzy, the setting intriguing and well described. Religious/spiritual quotations punctuate the text, but don't fit the context. This is not a page turner, but the writing moves apace. The characters are one dimensional with the exception of the heroine, `essa or Michael, who is defined by a vague loneliness/longing (stemming from past abuse) and clearly defined vengence seeking as well as superhuman skills.

You can enjoy your weekend with this book with time to spare for friends and family. When you return to your office on Monday, you'll wonder why you can't get a gig that pays in the millions whether you succeed or not.

The book is written with a movie in mind. The ending is crafted as to imply a sequel.

Summary: I think that the mystery/plot part deserves a B (some parts were a little obvious). The descriptions of Africa and the characters were A+. Overall, this was a very enjoyable read and I can't wait for more from Taylor Stevens.

This is an impressive first book. I loved the character of Michael/Vanessa. She had depth, intrigue, and interesting demons in her past. While I understand why people have drawn parallels to Lisbeth Salander (troubled pasts, super abilities, misfits, written off by society, etc), I think that Michael stands on her own. Her language ability, the way she interacts with people, how she comes to terms with her past, and the way she's revealed to the reader make her very different.

The author taunts the reader -- feeding them tidbits of information as they clamor for more, much like Michael taunts those she's manipulating in the book. For the reader, this means the good kind of frustration -- the kind that makes you want to keep reading. Usually, interesting characters and/or an intriguing storyline are enough to keep a reader on the hook. Stevens goes one step further. The picture she paints of Africa is fascinating. She gives just enough background information and history to enrich the story without boring the reader.

Cons: 1) Miles Bradford was a bit too weak given his background as a security consultant/special forces guy. Under the guise of explaining things to Miles, the author fills the reader in on the African history/local culture part. But I wish that she'd achieved that goal some other way, because his level of ignorance is a little bit unbelievable. 2) All the "B" names are easy to mix up in the beginning. 3) Some of the phrasing gets a little bit too flowery at the end of chapters. I don't need every chapter to end with a specially-crafted [over-wrought] phrase or deep thought.

Audiobook version: I thought that Hillary Huber's narration was good for the most part. Some of the phrases in other languages bothered me, but I guess it would be incredibly hard to find a good narrator with abilities in 23 languages. As a Texan, I'm usually irritated by fake Texas accents (for example, the Sarah Caufield character in Spooks was like nails on a chalkboard), but her's wasn't too bad.

This is a fast paced thriller that satisfied my desire for an entertaining and engrossing read, one that kept me turning the pages until the end, wondering what would happen next. Stevens writes a well plotted mystery, with action, danger and romance in the wilds of West Africa. The characters were not entirely believable, possessing extreme abilities and outrageous personalities, but that did not detract from my enjoyment of the story. The reader should expect the heroes and villains to be larger than life in this type of story.

Certain elements of the plot are remarkably similar to a recent popular trilogy: a young woman, terribly abused as a child, who works as an expert in gathering information, goes in search of a missing daughter for a wealthy industrialist. I almost discarded the book when I discovered this, but I am glad that I did not. The story takes new directions, and the similarities do not matter.

The action takes us to Equatorial Guinea and the surrounding area. The author's descriptions of the places, sights, smells and the feel of the place are accurate and evocative. Her knowledge of this exotic locale is important for the realism of the story. Equally important, the action sequences read well, with fast paced, nerve stretching tension, explosive violence, and narrow escapes.

The relationship between Beyard and Monroe was a strange one, and the author's descriptions of their encounters sometimes fell flat. I began to get irritated by the lover's antics about half way through. How many times can she tie him up and threaten to kill him? Wouldn't that cool things off just a bit? It would definitely be a last date for me, but, of course, I'm not an action hero. It was a weak point in an otherwise well crafted novel.

The author spends some time describing the demons that chase Monroe, demons from her past that threaten her sanity, and make her the efficient killer that she is. The description does not let the reader fully into her mind, and strikes a few puzzling notes. It was one of the most interesting aspects of this story, and I wished that the author had developed this further.

This is a good thriller from a new and innovative author. I believe we will be reading more from Taylor Stevens, and more about her, as she takes her place among the best of today's action-thriller writers.