Buried Prey

Buried Prey
by John Sandford
Recommended Ages: 14+

This book shows how a long-running series can become new again, ironically, by looking backward at where it all started, if not farther back. When the bodies of twin girls turn up under a foundation during a large-scale demolition project, Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension Agent Lucas Davenport flashes back to his first case as a plainclothes detective, when the girls first went missing 30 years ago. It's a case that brings back guilty memories of a failure that perhaps led to more deaths during the years between; a case that first saw Lucas paired with his longtime Minneapolis Police partner Sloan, and with his current BCA buddy Del Capslock; a case that haunts him even more after the female detective on the case, with whom he had an affair years ago, becomes one of the killer's latter-day victims; a case in which the police investigation, then and now, was jerked around by a killer with an intimate connection with one of the detectives; a case in which mayhem and death abound, and in which Lucas is in more danger than ever of becoming a murderer himself.

I can keep this review very brief by confirming that it is, I think, the most spiritually disturbing and viscerally moving installment in this series, as far as I have read it; and by noting that, in spite of the mindblowing way the killer eludes capture, and the equally mindblowing way Davenport closes in on him, what really grabs me about it is the interplay of the characters - climaxing in a sort of intervention, with his BCA buddies gathering around Lucas and refusing to let him destroy himself. It is a case whose scars Lucas will carry on him, and in him, for many books to come. And if, like me, you've already read most of those books, you'll recognize it as the case that explains some of the je ne sais quoi that raises those books above the unchallenging tripe Books 22ff. of a long-running crime thriller series can become.

This is the 21st of currently 27 "Lucas Davenport" mysteries by John Sandford, a pen-name of Pulitzer-winning journalist John Camp. Click here for a mansplanation of why I'm reading this series so atrociously out of canon order; sorry, I'm just tired of repeating it. Next on deck is Book 22, Stolen Prey.

215. Incarnation Hymn

Two months isn't much of a dry spell as a hymn-writer, unless you factor in the fact that I once wrote approximately 100 hymns in a bit over one year;
but here's a hymn that I couldn't stop writing in my head during a desperately needed naptime this afternoon - and it wasn't one of the hymns I've been brainstorming during the past two months. It just started coming out of my brain, as if writing itself; but that was a mean trick, because after I gave up on the nap and sat up to write it,
the rest came out only with much effort and many crossings-out. I have no particular hymn-tune in mind at this time. If that changes, I'll update you.

Incarnation Hymn

Come, praise with songs of priestly joy
God's holy Son and Mary's boy:
Begotten ere the world's first morn,
Now at the end of ages born.
If from our flesh God does not shrink,
What cup for us will He not drink?

Now He who shaped the fiery spheres
In puny, infant flesh appears;
A virgin's breast, a workman's hands
Embrace Him who the cosmos spans.
So far committed for our sake,
What will our God not undertake?

Befuddled shepherd, heathen sage,
Your worship warms the holy page;
While He whom seer and angel sing
Is marked for death by priest and king.
If they so treat the tender shoot,
What will befall the ripened fruit?

So Christ, our All in all, was born
For all, and daring pain and scorn,
Did all that must for man be done,
And in man's place became as none.
Can God be bound in such degree
And fail to set the captive free?

Your love, O Lord, Your gracious plan
Compelled You to unite with man;
Your Word is given, sealed in blood,
Applied by washing, shared as food.
Since You have so restored the earth,
Can we but sing with heav'nly mirth?

Storm Prey

Storm Prey
by John Sandford
Recommended Ages: 14+

Sometimes, you have to read most of a book to figure out why it came to be titled so-and-so. In this installment, deep within a long series of crime thrillers that all have "Prey" in their title, the only question in a franchise fan's mind, besides "You don't mean Storm Front, do you?" (Answer: No; that's one of Sandford's "Virgil Flowers" novels) is, "What is stormy about it?" The storm might be a play on the name of Davenport's wife Weather, a surgeon at a major Twin Cities hospital, who finds herself targeted by killers while participating in a complex series of surgeries to separate a pair of conjoined twins. It might, after all, be a literal reference to the blizzard that blankets the ultra-violent ending of this book. Or it might simply be a subtle nod to the old saying, "It never rains, but it pours." The proverb seems to apply in this case, when a little crime - three small-time crooks and a drug-addicted emergency room doctor knocking over a hospital pharmacy early one winter morning - sets loose a whirlwind of betrayal, torture, kidnapping, and murder that doesn't let up until nearly all of the crooks are dead, along with several innocent people.

If you've read this whole series, and can't remember which book is which, maybe this will help. This is the book in which a hired killer rides a motorcycle up alongside Weather's car on the freeway, planning to shoot her through the side window... and she swerves into his lane, nearly running him over, then chases him. When the key witness to a crime is that tough to rub out, it's no wonder the gang starts turning against each other. In spite of the bloodbath, there always remains someone who wants to shut Weather up, even if that means dropping a grenade inside the very hospital where she is helping save the lives of two baby girls.

The whole crowd is back in this ensemble crime novel, including chick-magnet Virgil Flowers (who had his own series by the time this book broke), the hilariously thuggish Jenkins and Shrake (Who knew Shrake could play the piano?), typographically named Del Capslock (who is about due to become a father, around the time-frame of this book), and more. But as always, the one who scares the bad guys, driving them to increasingly desperate and reckless acts, is Davenport himself. He's a scary guy, and I can't guarantee that, given a chance to meet him in real life, I would like him or trust him, but there's no denying, you don't want to be the crook he's trying to catch. It just wouldn't be good for you.

This is the 20th of currently 27 "Lucas Davenport" mysteries by John Sandford, a pen-name of Pulitzer-winning journalist John Camp. Click here for a mansplanation of why I'm reading this series so atrociously out of canon order; sorry, I'm just tired of repeating it. Regrettably, I had to skip Book 19, Wicked Prey, because my local public library no longer has a copy of it; but I'm already enthusiastically into Book 21, Buried Prey - in which Davenport revisits one of his earliest cases, one that he mentions in this book. Like the whole series, this book keeps the pages turning, even to the point of causing a problem - like, by the time I get a chance to write a review of one book, I'm so deep into the next book that I get them a little mixed up. I'm not mixed up, however, when I say this is fine entertainment, albeit with a sharp edge and an adult content advisory.

Phantom Prey

Phantom Prey
by John Sandford
Recommended Ages: 14+

When Lucas Davenport, a highly successful agent of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, is on the case, the bad guys - be they living or be they dead - had better look out. This fact is put to the test in this crime thriller, in which the sleuth takes time off surveillance of an escaped gangster's gorgeous, exhibitionist wife, to help one of his wife's friends figure out who killed her daughter.

The crime is very mysterious: no body has been found, only a splash of blood on the wallpaper, and a few fragments of bloody paper towel stuck between the tiles on the kitchen floor. At first, it isn't even a sure thing a murder has taken place; but Alyssa Austin is both a tough businesswoman, good at getting her way, and a somewhat goofy new-ager who claims to have received reliable advice from the spirit world. Bottom line, Weather (that's Davenport's wife) wants him on the case. So, on the case he goes.

Naturally, bodies immediately start dropping. Someone in the Twin Cities' goth scene (you know, those folks who dress all in black and wear black-on-white makeup) is killing other goths, and in a crazy way, it's connected with the Austin girl's disappearance. If I told you how crazy, or what this has to do with villains from beyond the veil of death, I would be spoiling the whole creepy, edgy, death-and-gore-drenched plot for you. And you wouldn't want to miss all the psychological and paranormal twistedness. The shivers and goosebumps alone are worth the ride, but added to them are the thrills of a vanilla shoot-'em-up with hardened criminals.

This is the 18th of currently 27 "Lucas Davenport" mysteries by John Sandford, a pen-name of Pulitzer-winning journalist John Camp. Click here for a mansplanation of why I'm reading this series so atrociously out of canon order; sorry, I'm just tired of repeating it.

This is the type of mystery in which the reader finds out whodunit long before the detectives do; then you writhe in agonizing suspense while they pick up the trail of clues and bumble after it, trying (but never quite succeeding) in catching the bad guy before more dastardly deeds are done. And of course, while Davenport slowly but steadily closes in on his quarry, he/she/it (whatever) looks back, sees the danger, and inevitably, thinks about striking at him. If you're the type of mystery reader who, observing this is only book 18 of 27, reasons the danger the hero is in may be taken lightly, consider: he gets shot and seriously injured while working this case. But it doesn't stop him; which is good, because that means there will be more tough, smart, funny, sexy, and unusually scary (even for this series) crime-solving fun.

Broken Prey

Broken Prey
by John Sandford
Recommended Ages: 14+

In this 16th of (so far) 27 "Lucas Davenport" thrillers, award-winning journalist John Camp (who writes novels under the Sandford pseudonym) introduces the recurring character of Star Tribune writer Ruffe Ignace - about whom I have read many times, but only now learned how to pronounce his name correctly, as a consequence of starting near the end of the series, then skipping back to about the midpoint and moving forward again. (Sorry, I've already explained this off-color procedure for reading a book series in several reviews, but for the sake of future readers who will probably read my reviews in the order the books were published, I feel I must mention it again, to be clear. These explanations will get really tedious around the time I catch up to where I first joined the series, then skip back all the way to the beginning and go forward from there. Maybe I'll just bookmark this parenthetical blurb and drop links to it into future reviews, to save time. Whew!) Even more confusingly, I skipped from Book 15 to Book 17 of this series, then had to go back to catch this one. So it's been hard (or is going to be hard, depending on your point of view) to keep my reviews from spoiling books not yet read. Sorry in advance!

So, anyway, as I meant to say before I so rudely interrupted myself, Ruffe Ignace (Roo-fay Ig-nas; now you know) is this weaselly, ambitious reporter who wants like nobody's business to work for The New York Times. In spite of his shortcomings, he begins to develop into an ally of Davenport and soon-to-spin-off Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension agent Virgil Flowers; they amiably use each other to further their own agendas, and in the main, those agendas eventually prove to coincide with the public good. Ignace isn't a complete reptile; I know, I know, but that just goes to show the subtlety and depth of Sandford's characterization - not to mention the fact he was a newspaper writer himself, when he was still John Camp; so his portrait of Ignace probably has some affectionately satirical resemblance to a type of character he might have drawn from life. Ignace is perhaps more important in this book than any of his subsequent appearances, because this is the one in which the serial killer calls him up to tell his story to the press - information Ignace dutifully passes on to Davenport, who eventually discovers most of it is designed to mislead the cops.

Whoever the real killer is, he doesn't seem to care whether the people he tortures, rapes, and murders are male or female. He (or she, or even possibly they) also proves terrifyingly adept at dragging red herrings across the trail the BCA and local law enforcement are following. Slowed down by deceptions, including steering the investigation after the wrong suspect, the cops realize they are two steps behind the killer and falling farther behind, even while the race to save the life of the next victim is roaring down the roads of rural southern Minnesota at breakneck speed. Somehow, the killer is tied to the "big three" inmates at a secure mental hospital near Mankato - yet even with the suspects narrowed down that much, the killer remains elusive. Somehow, again, the killer is connected to - Sandford uses the phrase "hovering near" - an orgasmic college girl and her randy, Serbian-American surgeon lover; but in what way, I didn't guess until the explosive revelation. As Lucas & Co. get closer to identifying the real bad guy, as the killer gets closer to what he and his "Gods Down the Hall" speak of as Armageddon, the number of lives and limbs at stake, including (of course) Lucas' own, increases on a steep curve - a graph drawn in blood. Ick.

I gather this is also the last book to feature Davenport's recurring crime-solving partner Sloan as a Minneapolis police detective. Sloan reaches the burnout point while investigating the case in this book; I happen to know, again due to my non-linear reading of the series, he is featured in Book 17 as a former cop who runs a bar. I don't remember him figuring in any subsequent books in the series. So, again, I have the awkward sense that I'm going to see more of Sloan in the part of this series I should have read before this, but that is too old to be held by my local public library; awkward, because I won't see most of his character arc until long after I have seen where it ends.

Other than little continuity snarls like this, however, I find this to be a series that can be read in any order, or simply enjoyed as freestanding novels. Each one presents its own world of literary and criminal problems and solutions, and a convincingly unique twist on the crime-thriller cliche, "It started like any other homicide case, but by the time Lucas Davenport (or whoever) realizes something really sick is going on, it may already be too late to stop a disaster in which many lives, including our hero's, will be at stake." Okay, if not unique, at least distinctive enough to remember amid all the other variations on it played by this and similar authors. And part of what sells this particular variation of it, is the believable humanity of Lucas Davenport and the characters around him, taking his toughness and frailty together, his crime-detecting brilliance that makes him so dangerous to bad guy after bad guy, along with his human limitations and even moral failings that make this duel of wits a frighteningly even match.

EDIT: For future reference... This is the book in which Davenport makes a list of the 100 best songs of the rock era - an amusing fount of non sequitur banter between the characters throughout the book, as well as an actual list at the end. It's notable for including (1) no Beatles songs and (2) a waltz from Shostakovich's Jazz Suite No. 2.

Invisible Prey

Invisible Prey
by John Sandford
Recommended Ages: 14+

It is this 17th novel in the currently 27-book "Lucas Davenport" mystery-thriller series in which Virgil Flowers, a Davenport protégé whose going-on-10-book spinoff series hadn't yet spun off at the time, shoots a woman in the foot while aiming for center mass, only to see her finished off by another woman more inclined to shoot to kill. It's an incident I've already seen mentioned, in spare outline, in many other Davenport/Flowers books written after this, due to the order in which I have been reading the books being stupendously at odds with their publication order; but let's not get too far ahead of ourselves.

The case that brings together the pistol-marksmanship-challenged Flowers and the victim of his first shooting-related fatality is, after all, a Lucas Davenport mystery. It starts with a rich, politically connected old lady and her maid being beaten to death with a pipe. At first, to Davenport and the St. Paul homicide detective working the case with him, it seems like a robbery gone wrong. But there are pieces missing - pieces from the old lady's collection of antiques and paintings, that is - suggesting that the robbers/killers weren't just junkies trying to raise drug money by selling stolen stuff. The perpetrators could apparently tell the difference between really valuable stuff, items of middling value, and worthless junk - choosing what to steal, what to leave intact, and what to smash to cover their tracks, accordingly. Then the sleuths spot connections between the murders at the Bucher mansion and the unsolved killing of another rich, antique-collecting old lady in Wisconsin; and then a connection to a supposedly solved murder in Iowa, for which a suspect has already been tried and convicted. Then a young woman comes forward and claims her grandmother's seemingly accidental death must also be connected; though Davenport isn't sure, until the young woman herself disappears in ominous circumstances.

The case really gets interesting when a witness in the prosecution of a state senator who had sex with a teenage girl is targeted for kidnapping in a way that bizarrely connects the two seemingly unrelated cases. Unlike that granddaughter of one of the murder victims, the girl in question gets away from the kidnappers, thanks to the doggy heroism of a pit bull/rat terrier mix named Screw. Once bitten, the killer - who turns out to be frighteningly close to the murder investigation - goes increasingly out of control. Even stealing the really valuable objets d'art isn't his whole motive; nor is he only trying to cover up a colossal fraud. In fact, the dude is a flat-out psychopath, and he isn't acting alone. And so, as Davenport's cases so often do, what begins as a straightforward whodunit turns into a bedlam of betrayal, blackmail, frame-ups, fire-bombs, grisly (and never entirely explained) discoveries in a southern Minnesota farmyard, and a downtown St. Paul sting operation that goes completely sideways and ends with shots fired. And at the turning point of it all, a sniper has Davenport himself in his crosshairs.

I promise you, there are good reasons why I'm reading this series so ridiculously out of order - starting toward the end, jumping back to about the halfway point, and working forward from there with the occasional hop, skip, or jump in one direction or other. The fact that I skipped from Book 15 to this is apparently due to a mistake on my part, when I was trying to check out the earliest handful of books in this series held by my local public library. I'm going on (back?) to Book 16 next; it's titled Broken Prey. I've got five more Lucas Davenport novels to read after that; and then I'll be in the awkward position of having to skip back again and try to find copies of earlier installments that my library doesn't have.

I'm not saying these are the best books I've read in this decade, but I'll tell you this much: I'm not getting much else read while I stumble and weave through the John Sandford oeuvre (or John Camp, if you want his real name). A hard-core critic would probably describe it rather as an hors d'oeuvre, but I'm just a humble book booster, so I'll bear witness that this series of books has sufficed to keep me reading during every spare moment so far this summer. It's as good as a season of a TV crime show on DVD; it's so good, if someone turned it into a crime show, I would get that DVD. But when you're all about keeping the TV unplugged and stashed in the front closet, I have to give this series credit for keeping my couch time devoted to the joy of books.

Hidden Prey

Hidden Prey
by John Sandford
Recommended Ages: 14+

To continue reading the 27-book "Lucas Davenport" series, without springing for the latest hardcover, I had to skip backward in the series. This 15th installment is as far back as my local public library goes. It depicts the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension's top agent at the height of his career, solving a murder on the Duluth waterfront that leads him to unearth a circle of Soviet-era spies, dating back to World War II, stretched out among Iron Range towns such as Virginia, Hibbing, and Eveleth. It finds him partnering with a Russian counterintelligence agent, witnessing the slaughter of a local policeman, and receiving a key clue from an eyewitness who is as determined to disappear as - and more successful at doing so than - the killers themselves.

The killers, plural, are an elderly man and the teenaged great-grandson in whom he has instilled a passion for Communism. Together they carry out a series of reckless yet infuriatingly successful stealth killings, fighting to protect their aging spy cell from post-Soviet Russian intelligence, from the Russian mafia, and from discovery by the American authorities. But as good as they are at covering their tracks, Lucas is even better at sniffing them out - realizing, for example, that the physically wrecked suspect they have framed for the murders would never have been able to outrun him in the hilly streets of Duluth.

This mystery hops back and forth between the sleuths' and the killers' points of view, building sympathy for both sides of their deadly game, and ultimately leading to the type of ending that reminds one of real life - bitterly short on satisfying resolution, but with the characters' frustration felt by the reader, and their compromises with their consciences sitting uneasily on ours. It's a grim, gruesome, sometimes shockingly violent, heartbreaking, occasionally sexy, not infrequently funny, fascinating exercise in the arts of committing and solving a series of crimes that stir up memories of revolutionary fervor. It is a glimpse into a type of extremism that could, and perhaps does, hide under the guise of ordinary citizenship. And it comes to one of those climaxes in which you bite your nails, in part, out of concern for what will happen to the bad guy. So, it's a most interesting cocktail of crime thriller and tragedy, set in a part of Minnesota not far from where I went to high school. I could have known the junior killer in this tale. The thought gives me chills.

John Sandford, in case you just tuned in, is the pen-name of sometime Pulitzer-winning journalist John Camp. His fiction also includes the Virgil Flowers novels, a spinoff of this series.