Customer Reviews

Under the Beetle's Cellar

5 star:		(33)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Anna Fields does an amazing job of reading the unabridged version of this Texas-based thriller. Actually, I suspect a born storyteller. The cast of characters is a most unlikely arrangement - our "Lone Star Monthly" reporter, involved with policeman ex-husband, a pyscho dog, a double amputee Veteran, an artist/poet/busdriver, a David Koresh style fundamentalist lunatic, a nun turned assassin, a homeless alcoholic, pregnant sorority girl, a requiste number of men in suits and some incredibly strong children -- somehow it works. The school bus is highjacked, and the clock is ticking. Suspenseful and very believable, full of Austin area landmarks, thoughtful commentary on religion (IMPORTANT, if true), and a bit of middle aged romance, this especially clever novel will not disappoint. I will definitely hunt down the other books written by this author. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

Note: I really did not care for the name of the book, which surprisingly evolves from an Emily Dickinson poem - it seemed trite or silly until I got into the story.

Mesmerizing thriller about a crazy cult leader and his followers who kidnap a bus driver and 11 of his young passengers (all under the age of 11) and bury them underground in a school bus for 50 days. The story has two setttings -- the outside world, featuring a reporter who is trying to find out as much as possible about the cult leader's past so she can figure out a way to convince him to let the children go -- and the world inside the bus, where the bus driver, a Vietnam vet with no experience with children, overcomes his own fear to try to keep the kids calm and safe. He starts telling them a story in installments, one chapter a day, and also begins working on a way to barracade themselves in the bus in preparation for the day he knows is coming, the day the cult leader will try to sacrifice them all. Something about these kids and that bus driver's story (about a turkey vulture named Jacksonville) really drew me in. This is probably the first time a stock thriller has ever reduced me to tears by the end (of course, I did have a fever of 102 at the time). Highly recommended!

This books amazing. The plot was original and the characters engrossing.

Molly Cates is back on the scene when her connection with Samuel Mordecai, a fanatical cult leader, becomes known. Molly, a reporter in Texas, wrote about Mordecai for her piece on religious cults. Now Mordecai has kidnapped a school bus with children, and the bus driver, and is holding them hostage on his compound.

This book should be read by all mystery and thriller fans. Mary Willis Walker has no parallel when it comes to involved plots that could become convoluted and ridiculous in less capable hands. She tells the story of a boy turned cult leader who was terribly abused as a child, but never uses that fact to excuse his behavior, rather to understand how a boy emotionally and physically abadoned comes to such a horrific and devastating point. The scences between the bus driver and the school children are some of the best in fiction. You feel their terror and resentment of Mordecai and cheer when they outwit him.

A great read!

I loved this one! The level of suspense is thrilling. I never wanted to put it down & promptly purchased all the other books by this author! It seemed so real, like it came straight from the news!

This book features a charismatic cult leader in Texas whokidnaps a bus full of children. The book's jacket said ithas a villian similar to Hannibal Lecter, but I am happy to say it is not gross or disgusting like Hannibal. Rather, I am Unhappy to say Mary W. W.'s villian is startlingly real. One knows something like this could well happen, and there are some post-Waco TX allusions. I've been reading Patricia Cornwell's books and I have to say, none of them were as riveting as this book, "Under the Beetle's Cellar".

Under the Beetle's Cellar could have been so run of the mill but with Mary Willis Walker behind the wheel (no pun intended) it was eerie. She was really able to write from the mind set of someone in a cult.

Walker writes of a fanatical cult leader so real that it could have been a story ripped from the headlines of any paper in the USA. Molly Cates is back and better than ever.

Hopefully, Walker will write another one soon!

In the past seven days, I have been priviledged to read two of the best contemporary, yet believably realistic books, I have come across as of yet in many a moon. One was Bernice McFadden's sad and beautiful The Warmest December, and also this gripping saga by Mary Willis Walker. I expect she was heavily influenced by the Waco tragedy as this was published not long afterward. We don't know much about the victims of the real tragedy, but here Walker takes and breathes amazing life into her victims, a bus driver who served in Vietnam, and 11 children who are hidden underground beneath a barn for a 50-day "earth purification" before the world ends--at least according to religious fanatical cult leader Samuel Mordecai.

This is also the story of reporter Molly Cates, an incredibly brave and determined journalist who truly cares about the victims, and all the people tied to both the predator and his prey, beginning on day 46 of the 50-day torture.

Walker has the ability to take you into a nightmarish world that's hell on the cops and feds who know Mordecai is never going to let his hostages go, and she also shows you the resilience of young children in a hopeless and frightening situation. I was extraordinarily moved by their ability to keep up a sense of humor and sheer resolve alternately with low, hopeless moments of despair, and the reluctant heroism of bus driver Walter as he kept the kids calm with his soap operatic story of the turkey vulture named Jacksonville and the armadillo named Lopez that reflected his and a friend's time in captivity back in Vietnam.

Amazingly powerful and moving, this is a story that shows both the cruelty of the human animal that man can be, and also the tireless, selfless dedication of others as the opposing force. More than that, it shows that humans can be stronger than they ever thought themselves capable in a seemingly hopeless situation. This is a truly amazing book that had me winded by the time the climax arrived, and that's a very good thing!

Walter Demming - bus driver and Vietnam vet - and eleven schoolkids have been incarcerated in an underground hole for forty six days. They are the hostages of a biazarre fundamentalist cult, kidnapped at gunpoint whilst driving along the road to school. The leader of the cult - who call themselves the Hearth Jezreelites - is the charismatic Samuel Mordecai, the terrifying self-proclaimed Prophet, and every day the captives must endure his garbled religious sermons and rants on the evils of modern life. He has taken them for a very specific and ominous reason, in preparation for the coming Apocalypse, which he foretells will arrive in just five days time.

After 46 days, the negotiations have reached a dead-lock. Mordecai will not even listen, let alone concede anything, and he threatens to kill the hostages if even one person steps onto Jezreeelite soil. It is now that crime reporter Molly Cates enters the scenario. She interviewed Mordecai once before and did not like the experience at all. Now, if she can possibly unearth more about Mordecai's past that the FBI can use as a lever in the negotiations, she may well be their last remaining hope. But she does have just five days time...

This is an excellent thriller. There's nothing particularly wonderful about Willis Walker's prose-style - it tends towards the pedestrian, the very normal; it certainly doesn't sing - or anything riveting about protagonist Molly Cates - she is real and human, but there isn't a great deal save from her humanity and stubbornness to make her stand out from many other gutsy female protagonists - but this is still one terrific thriller, which definitely deserves to be more widely read. It's intelligent and though-provoking (but not too much) and tackles well issues of religion and faith and religious mania, as well as having some snappy dialogue and a cracker of a plot. It marries three elements absolutely brilliantly: cults, hostage negotiating, and good old investigating. The Prophet Samuel Mordecai is a particularly delicious villain, chilling and, of course, mad, as well as having a brilliant name. Mordecai. Mordecai. My, i could just roll that one about on my tongue for ages. Isn't it just great?

Anyway...Under the Beetle's Cellar is a tense, suspenseful thriller with a dramatic and moving conclusion that does not disappoint. In terms of plot, you'll notice that this book is strikingly similar to Jeffery Deaver's brilliant A Maiden's Grave, (group of children of a bus kidnapped and held hostage), which was published in the same year. But, this book still retains some very original, different elements which make it another must-read thriller.

I din't fully buy into this book until after the first two chapters, but then I was hooked. The investigation held together nicely (so many 'thrillers' these days have haphazard and/or unbelievable investigations). The characterizations were wonderful. I kept asking myself, "What would a 'real life' person do under these circumstances?" and found that the actions of the characters were very believable. My favorite thing about the book was how it pointed out the logical and frightening end result of abandoning reason for faith. We saw it on September 11, and we see it here. And, thankfully, the author doesn't make the unforgivable mistake of defending a 'softer' version of faith/religion in the end.

This was the first MWW book I picked up after a friend had mentioned The Red Scream. A really original and exciting premise. Walker has an amazing ability to get into the minds of a number of unique characters from different walks of life. I loved the relationship between the kids and busdriver. Looking forward to more suspense and rewarding reading as I make my way through the rest of MWW offerings.