California lawyer Evan
Delaney has survived an insane religious cult and a death-fetishist
serial killer, and in Jericho Point, the third novel in Meg
Gardiner's crime series, she has another set of very deadly problems to
deal with. The trouble begins with the gruesome murder of a young girl at a
Santa Barbara party attended by Jesse's immature, wayward brother
P.J. Turns out the dead girl was an accomplished identity thief, and
Evan was her last victim. Sucked into a dangerous whirlpool of crime,
violence, and rock and roll, Evan and Jesse must outfight a pair of
vicious loan sharks, navigate some fresh wrinkles in their incredibly
complicated relationship, and identify a demented killer within the
ranks of Santa Barbara's would-be celebrities.
Mission Canyon, the last
Evan Delaney novel, was one of my favorite thrillers in forever (the
first installment, China Lake, had problems, but was still pretty
great overall). Jericho Point falls somewhere in between its too
predecessors. It's an extremely fun read, a propulsive hybrid of
mystery and thriller, with expertly drawn scenes of tension and
suspense and some truly fantastic character-building. And Gardiner's
spiky, sassy prose is, as ever, a delight. I do have some issues with the
novel that prevent it from reaching the heights of Mission Canyon,
though.
Problems first: Jericho
Point's Achilles Heel is that the plot keeps slipping out of
Gardiner's control. It's not poorly constructed at all, but it's
labyrinthine and convoluted to the point where the pacing gets jerky
as different parts of the story get focus and other fall into the
background. There's a lack of cohesion, especially in the middle
segments where the book – like so many mystery novels before it –
sags under the weight of so many rapidly intersecting plot points.
The final quarter of the novel really gets back on track, as things
start clicking into place in time for the action climax. I like big,
complicated plots, but they're awfully difficult to consistently
maintain over three hundred and fifty pages. My only other
significant gripe is that Gardiner's tendency to slip into
cartoonishness – the grab-bag of sneering baddies, Evan careening
from one over-the-top encounter to another – sometimes undercuts
the serious stuff a little.
A couple of plotting snarls
don't make this a bad novel, though. Not by a long shot. Jericho
Point, like all the Evan Delaney books, is inventive and funny and
quick, but there's a dark undercurrent to it that sets it apart from
other exciting thrillers. When Evan is horrifyingly assaulted by two
thugs by the side of the road, she suffers from realistic
post-traumatic stress. She doesn't shake off such a harrowing
experience and bounce fresh-faced to the next adventure like Nancy Drew. Jesse is
still haunted by the events of the last book and beyond, even to the
point where he seriously considers suicide. Evan's flirtation with
sexy fighter pilot Marc isn't a cute subplot, it's a very real and frightening threat
to Evan and Jesse's relationship. Gardiner's characters go through
insane stuff, but they remain human. That, for me, is perhaps
Gardiner's greatest strength as an author: following through on the
psychological toll that being protagonists in a crime series takes on
her characters. Evan and Jesse are rich, complex characters, and they
resonate. I do wish Evan was a bit more flawed at times; she can feel
a tiny bit Mary Sue-ish at times, always ready with the perfect quip.
The supporting cast are somewhat
flimsier than the two protagonists, but there's plenty of depth
there, too. Jesse's passive-aggressive family, for example, are so
sharply portrayed it seems like they just walked out of a Jonathan
Franzen novel (P.J. in particular will make you want to give him a hug and punch him in the face, at the same time). The book's villains are a little too uniformly
psychotic for my taste, although the vile Murphy Ming is memorably grotesque. I would have liked more of Sin Jimson, the snaky, manipulative stepdaughter of an aging rock star; she's a character I could imagine popping up again to wreak fresh havoc.
Characters aren't the only
things Gardiner can write: Evan's narration is laden with pop culture
references, playful wordplay, quirky, poetic descriptions and loads
of delicious snark. Her dialogue is usually crisp and pleasingly
screwball, although when events takes a heavy turn, it hums with tension.
And the woman can write suspense and action like nobody's business:
the huge final sequence, set on an oil rig, is a nightmarish tour de
force of escalating terror. I like my thrillers to go big and wild for the climax, and Meg Gardiner always delivers on that front. She even dispatches one of the novel's bad guys in as gruesome and creative a manner as I've ever encountered in a novel.
Jericho Point is not a perfect thriller (it's just a hair too chaotic in its plotting), but it is an absolutely top-drawer one, with strong prose and deeply compelling characters. Meg Gardiner is slowly getting more visibility as an author (particularly after Stephen King's article praising the Delaney series in Entertainment Weekly), and hopefully she'll eventually receive all the attention and accolades she deserves. With Jericho Point, the Evan Delaney series continues to delight, and I'm already looking forward to seeing what Gardiner will throw at Evan and Jesse in the next volume.
