In IRON RIVER, picking up after the events of T. Jefferson Parker’s THE RENEGADES, we find hero Charlie Hood teamed up with an ATF task force dealing with illegal gun sales. The title refers to the gun shops that populate the Mexican border, and how easily guns can be smuggled and sold.
Things take a turn for the worse early on when an innocent bystander is killed during a shootout. It turns out the victim is the son of a Mexican cartel leader, so of course, there is to be retribution, in the form of snatching one of the members of the task force. But as the story progress, this seems to not be as important as it should, feeling like a reason to populate the pages with grotesque scenes.
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NECESSARY AS BLOOD is Deborah Crombie’s 13th novel featuring Scotland Yard detectives Duncan Kincaid and Gemma James, but it is far from an unlucky outing. Her masterful mix of thorough policing and the convoluted family life of Kincaid, James and their two boys is always a joy to read, bouncing from the rough-and-tumble of a London that seems to get more brutish by the day, to the playful romping of a loving and intimate clan.
And this book’s central tale is about family: an extended one of Bangladeshi immigrants trying to make their way in a sometimes difficult and expensive land, and the tragedy of Sandra Gilles; her husband, Nasir Malik; and their very young daughter, Charlotte. One day, Sandra simply disappears from view and is never heard from again.
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Joe Hill’s sophomore novel, HORNS, is a thriller of psychological and supernatural suspense. Its protagonist is Ignatius Perrish, who wakes up one day to discover horns growing from temples. They’re not a hallucination, which would’ve be natural, given the rape and murder of his beloved, Merrin Williams. He was the only suspect in that crime, but never charged or tried. Everyone has abandoned him since. Everyone except for the devil inside. We have two copies to give away.
To enter:
1. E-mail us your name and mailing address (U.S. only; no P.O. boxes) with “Me so horny” as the subject line, to editor at bookgasm dot com.
2. Await Friday, Feb. 12, when we announce the randomly chosen winners.
3. Or, just buy it at Amazon.
Robin Hobb’s DRAGON KEEPER: VOLUME ONE OF THE RAIN WILDS CHRONICLES involves an arduous journey that holds no promise of return, as a band of humans and dragons must make their way along the toxic and inhospitable Rain Wild River to Kelsingra, their ancient, mythical homeland whose mysterious location is locked deep within the dragons’ uncertain ancestral memories. Here’s the first chapter.
It was supposed to be spring. Damn cold for spring. Damn cold to be sleeping out on the deck instead of inside the deckhouse. Last night,with the rum in him and a belt of distant stars twinkling through an opening in the rain forest canopy, it had seemed like a fine idea.The night hadn’t seemed so chilly, and the insects had been chirring in the treetops and the night birds calling to one an¬other while the bats squeaked and darted out in the open air over the river. It had seemed a fine night to lie back on the deck of his barge and look up at the wide world all around him and savor the river and the Rain Wilds and his proper place in the world.Tarman had rocked him gently and all had been right.
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Finally, here’s a stunt book whose stunt I wouldn’t mind doing myself. Every day, for 365 days, Aussie EMPIRE magazine critic Michael Adams watched at least one bad movie, in hopes of finding a flick worthy of the dubious honor as cinema’s all-time stinker. His efforts are chronicled in SHOWGIRLS, TEEN WOLVES, AND ASTRO ZOMBIES: A FILM CRITIC’S YEAR-LONG QUEST TO FIND THE WORST MOVIE EVER MADE.
Mining the bottom 100 on the IMDB and taking recommendations from well-versed industry folks like John Landis, Joe Dante and a couple of MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATER 3000 vets, Adams assembled a list, grouped them into niche batches, and let a bingo game determine what he’d watch next.
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