Most Helpful Customer Reviews
31 of 34 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Did you just love Tropic of Night? You're gonna love this!, February 21, 2005
I don't know how the elves in Amazon work, but a while back this book popped up on the screen as a "recommended" book for me. Those elves know what they're doing.
I started with Gruber's first book (aside from the 16 Tannenbaum novels he ghost-wrote) Tropic of Night. Loved it. Turned around and bought this one the next day. Loved it,too.
Gruber does several things that make his books great fun to read. First, he writes a good story. Second, he includes an interesting backstory, with lots of things to learn about. Finally, he provides us with some characters to care about. And all the way through, he tosses off bits of intriguing information and poetry and literature. All of these things he wraps in a believable magical realism that makes you think, "what if?"
Recommended.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
MAKES YOU SHIVER, MAKES YOU THINK, January 12, 2005
Michael Gruber takes the title of his second novel from the Book of Ezekiel, the verse that refers to the hand of the Lord setting one down "in the midst of the valley, which was full of bones." Not a very pleasant prospect.
In this fast paced story readers will find themselves wondering precisely what it is the Lord or demonic forces can do as they are introduced to a fictional order of nuns that increased its ranks from among orphaned and disabled young girls, and meet Emmylou Dideroff, a devout Catholic woman who claims to have communion with saints - and the devil.
While Valley Of Bones is described as a thriller, it's an enormous mistake to simply pigeon hole this exhilarating page-turner. Gruber pens, if you will, a thinking man's thriller - it delves more deeply than most and his characters are both original and unique. (Not too many thriller writers create characters who quote Thomas Merton). His plots are multi-layered. His narratives send chills down your spine while they just as easily challenge you to think.
Set in Miami, Valley of Bones opens with a young policeman, Tito Morales, witnessing a fall from a hotel balcony. A fall that results in the impalement of a wealthy oilman. Morales had come to the hotel in response to a minor disturbance call, but has witnessed a death and heard a thud that he'll "remember to his grave."
Soon on the scene is homicide detective Jimmy Paz (met in "Tropic of Night"). Paz has a reputation as a crime solver, but neither of the two were prepared for what they found in the man's hotel room - Emmylou Dideroff in a trance-like state. She doesn't take long to relate her reasons for killing the oilman and asks for several notebooks so that she can explain her action and write her confession. Is she a woman truly possessed or is she pretending to be such in order to be declared unfit for trial?
Whatever the answer to that question is, psychologist Dr. Lorna Wise testifies that Dideroff is indeed mentally unable to stand trial. Wise pores over the notebooks the woman has filled in an attempt to understand what could have driven her to such an extreme. But the writings make little sense outside of references to childhood abuse, and previous crimes.
Meanwhile, Paz has a few demons of his own in the form of nightmares, frightening dreams he cannot fully comprehend. He seeks the help of his mother, a santera, to banish the dream. Wise soon finds herself caught in a web, a bicultural web woven by mysticism and Santeria. And, like all webs it's extremely dangerous.
Gruber doesn't short shift readers on romance - there's a torrid one between Wise and Paz. As a matter of fact, this author doesn't short shift readers in any area. After spending years as a speechwriter and ghostwriter for popular legal thrillers, Gruber finally wrote under his own name. He was worth waiting for.
- Gail Cooke
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
17 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A novel of character, January 17, 2005
Mysteries catch most any reader's fancy, but this book, billed as a thriller, goes way beyond the normal boundaries set by who-dunnits and shoot-em-ups. A major plus is a single character, Emmylou Dideroff. Emmylou's character is one of the most tightly woven, intriguing personalities in contemporary American fiction.
The story begins as police officer Tito Morales witnesses a spectacular murder. Morales has answered what appeared to be a routine call asking for help over a disturbance at a hotel. Huddled in the victim's room is Emmylou, speaking in a low voice that sounds like prayer. Detective Jimmy Paz teams up with Morales and freelance psychologist Lorna Wise to solve an increasingly complex crime. Interspersed with straight narrative told in third person are Emmylou's personal story in first person and also a straightforward history of a fictional Catholic group, The Society of Nursing Sisters. These three different accounts are organized smartly by setting Emmylou's story in italics, the straight narrative in regular typeface, and the history of the Society in boldface. That graphic technique makes for an interesting method for spinning the mystery.
The story line's strongest element is Emmylou. Born to a cold, detached mother and sexually abused by a stepfather, Emmylou has done it all. She has an eidetic memory and although everyone believed her a slow reader when she was small, in truth, she was an avid and advanced reader at an early age. Emmylou loves books like a junkie loves drugs. Turning to prostitution when she flees to Miami, she complains about not being able to get a library card because she has no address. "It's hard to be a street prostitute with advanced literary tastes," she writes.
Author Michael Gruber can be credited for writing a mystery that rises to the level of an epic novel. He manages to inspire the reader to think about the poetry of Jane Hirshfield, and uses lines from her poems to create elements in his tale. He tackles the great issues of philosophy, history, the sciences, and religion. From the intricacies of Santeria, a Cuban and Brazilian variation of voodoo, to the philosophies of Friedrich Nietzsche, Gruber stirs the gray matter in the reader's brain and runs this novel like a wild carnival ride. Throughout it all, Emmylou's voice is strong, clear, and fascinating. She can be humorous or philosophical. She gives an account of the impact from a bomb dropped on a church in Sudan. "I was blown out of your world, really, now that I think about it, and this makes the next part difficult to tell. Out of prose into poetry. Out of the secular into the mythos. Out of chronos into kairos, God's time."
Adding lightness to the mix, and in the tradition of the truly great mysteries of yore, is a romance that brings two unlikely people together.
A small complaint can be made regarding a fairly simplistic resolution of the plot, but never mind. Above all this is a novel of character, despite the publisher billing it as a straight thriller. And rest assured, Emmylou is a character no reader will forget. For Emmylou alone, and for the interesting fiction of The Society of Nursing Sisters, the book deserves a top rating. Novels like this shore up the quality of American fiction.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
|
