Strange Valley (Paperback)

by Darrell Bain (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review
"An excellent sci fi suspense thriller that will have the reader wondering what normal really means. Tight, fast paced, fun..." -- Dinah Roseberry.

"An excellent sci fi suspense thriller that will have the reader wondering what normal really means. Tight, fast paced, fun..." --Dinah Roseberry.

"Darrell Bain has written a fabulous eye-opening tale." -- Harriet Klausner for Baryon.

"Darrell Bain has written a fabulous eye-opening tale." --Harriet Klausner for Baryon.

"Strange Valley" is a thrilling adventure that you will be hard-pressed to put down." -- Annette Gisby, editor of Twisted Tales.

"Strange Valley" is a thrilling adventure that you will be hard-pressed to put down." --Annette Gisby, editor of Twisted Tales.

Product Description
A clerk working in the census bureau discovers a series of anomalies in the population of a small city located in the Ozark Mountains. Intrigued, the clerk continues to investigate. He finds that, on average, the people of the city and surrounding valley, are a little smarter, less religious, more thrifty, marry less, have a higher level of education, are more sexually liberated and have fewer illnesses. The city also refuses government money for schools and roads, has little crime and no sign of racial unrest. None of these factors would mean much taken alone, but together, they spell out a population that is distinctly skewed from the normal. Surprisingly, hardly anyone in the valley realizes that most of them are different from the average. They simply think they live in a good place among good people. Then the investigation starts...

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Product Details

• Paperback: 219 pages
• Publisher: Twilight Times Books (October 30, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1931201234
• ISBN-13: 978-1931201230
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.5 x 0.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #3,267,848 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A fun read with a few flaws, October 12, 2006

By	Christian McCallister "dr dolphin" (The waters of the Great Lakes) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Premise: The United States has an ultra-conservative, fundamentalist Christian ex-preacher as a President, and he gets upset with a Census Bureau analyst discovers that Masterville, Arkansas and the surrounding valley features a population that is markedly non-religious and features few marriages and many voters registered as Independents. The President chooses to overlook many of the other statistical anomalies in this valley: very low crime rate, very low usage of government funding, high life expectancy, large number of children, low unemployment, high percentage of intact families (even if the parents seldom are married), low divorce rate. The President only sees a valley of citizens who are not religious and who did not vote for him. His response: send in the National Security Agency to investigate the Godless mutants!

The N.S.A. sends in Shirley Rostervik and Daniel Stenning, who quickly find that Masterville is a great place to live. There is no apparent conspiracy, and no hint of danger to the national security. But, Masterville is quite different, in a positive and quite intriguing manner. It is definitely worth investigating, for intellectual curiosity, but not a place that is dangerous.

As the President and the Director of the N.S.A. continue to not find the conspiracy they are convinced is there, they escalate their efforts to ferret out what surely be a government-threatening rebellion in the making.

It eventually comes out that one of the N.S.A. agents is one of "them" (a Godless free-loving mutant), and begins to look at resigning from the N.S.A. and taking up residence in Masterville. The N.S.A. helps him make up his mind, through very direct and unpleasant means, and the agent is plunged into the true secret of Masterville. Is that secret a threat to national security, or a boon to all Humankind?

This is a very fast-paced thriller with a science-fiction component. It is definitely a page-turner, and I enjoyed reading it. Mr. Bain knows how to turn out an entertaining tale. But, there are several flaws that, for me, cost the story one of the five stars it could have earned, and came close to costing it another star.

There were several sex scenes that seemed unnecessarily explicit to me. The social mores of the valley had to be communicated to the reader, but I felt that the level of detail given was excessive. Robert Heinlein depicted similar attitudes and relationships in "Stranger in a Strange Land" or "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" without need of the play-by-play account given in "Strange Valley."

The extremes of the politicians in Washington, D.C. and of the residents of the valley are so polarized, that I could not identify with either one, and I think that many readers will be in the same situation. All of the "good (valley) guys" were caricatures, with no significant flaws, and all of the "bad (government) guys" were corrupt, rigid, narrow-minded, and authoritarian, with few redeeming qualities. In essence, only Shirley Rostervik came off as a fairly rounded, three-dimension character. "Strange Valley" thus ends up sharing that trait of Extreme-A-versus-Extreme-B that can also be found in Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged."

"Strange Valley" shares another flaw with "Atlas Shrugged": they both needed better editing. I'm talking about words with missing letters, sentences with missing words, and instances of mis-chosen words (e.g., "they" instead of "the").

The "science" component of "science-fiction" is also not well-explained here. The author covers this by having the genius behind the science be so caught up in his jargon that he cannot explain it in lay terms. The reader finally gets some idea of the science being described, but it was enough for me to buy the concepts.

So, after all these complaints, why still four stars? With a sufficient dose of suspension-of-disbelief, and an ability to overlook weak editing, "Strange Valley" is still a very fun read.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Strange Valley, September 12, 2004

By	Charlene Austin (Las Vegas, NV United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Only a few of Masterville's citizens are aware of the anomalies and uniqueness of their behaviors and lifestyle, but with the NSA sending agents to investigate them and their valley will they have time to find the cause and prove they are not aliens, monsters, or a threat?

Harry Beales' work in the Census office is routine if not boring, until he comes across some unusual findings about the small town of Masterville.

NSA Agent, Daniel Stenning, is a bit confused by the NSA's interest in a small town on the Arkansas, Missouri borders. Why are a few unusual statistics and lifestyle choices considered a threat to national security?

When he arrives in the valley with his partner, Shirley, who is posing as his wife on this assignment, he finds a back-in-the-fifties, clean town, and Lisa. The minute she opens
the door of the B&B where Shirley and Daniel are registered for their stay in Masterville, the attraction between Daniel and Lisa is obvious. Impossible to hide, impossible to fight.
Daniel has no desire to fight it, and begins to suspect he has a lot in common with the unique residents of this pleasant valley town.

Someone else has discovered Daniels similarities to the valley residents too, and he finds himself marked as a target by the agency he used to work for.

Daniel must work with Tyrone and the Masterville council and prove they offer no threat before powerful and corrupt government officials use terrorist tactics to wipe out a small part of the homeland.

Darrell Bain keeps the questions and suspense flowing through the action packed pages of Strange Valley. Thought provoking, this story stirs the imagination with what may at times seem exaggerated and extreme, but then, the extreme and those who err on the side of it is where the danger lies.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Strange Valley by Darrell Bain, August 23, 2004

By	April May Rollins (Ashuelot, NH) - See all my reviews

As nature abhors a vacuum, most folks abhor those who are different. And differences usually generate suspicion. In, "A Strange Valley," author Darrell Bain has taken those truths and, like a train slowly gathering speed and momentum until it's shrieking through the dark night, begins to weave a futuristic and fast-paced tale of suspense.
After a census bureau employee discovers a series of anomalies in a small valley in the Ozark Mountains, a power hungry president and his crumb-snatching director of the National Security Agency recognize the threat to their power base.
The residents of Masterville, Arkansas are a little smarter, less religious, thriftier, and marry less. They have a higher level of education, are more sexually liberated, and have fewer illnesses than the rest of the country. And, people don't bother to lock their doors at night in this quiet and serene community because crime is almost non-existent. Unfortunately, the administration's obsessive right-wing beliefs run counter to the peaceful residents.
Bain has taken current events and projected them into the future where the far right claims dominance over everything it doesn't agree with and abuses its power to try and keep these mutants, as they've labeled them, from influencing the rest of the country.
NSA Field Agent Daniel Stenning and his partner are sent to investigate the anomalies in Masterville but are hard pressed to conclude anything sinister. Nevertheless, the President seizes the opportunity of using an atheistic community to strengthen his upcoming election and is determined to prevent anything from getting in his way.
While Bain does well in building a believable biotechnical thriller, the ending doesn't quite justify the quality of the author's excellent skill in a mesmerizing plot and creating believable characters. Maybe it's that the ever-increasing intrigue hints at something more to come - something much more sinister than the sum of its parts. While not giving away the plot, and certainly not discouraging both suspense and science fiction aficionados from reading "A Strange Valley," I felt a little disappointed when I read the last page.

Reviewed by Francine Biere for The Coffee Cramp Reviews