For Professor Daniel Davis and his friend Ben Greene
this late September morning is the time for good natured give and take and a
run along some abandoned railroad tracks in the heart of the North Florida
Wildlife Preserve. The running for Daniel is not just exercise but as a means
of escape from nightmares of his past. The same is true of his job these days
as he has isolated himself by teaching online courses from his isolated home
and working on various projects.
The problem is as Ben stops and takes a breather is
that every step Daniel takes running away down the railroad tracks is taking him
closer to an old abandoned rail depot. An old depot that will contain a horrific
crime scene with a badly burned body at its center. Daniel is literally running
himself right into a murder investigation where a killer intends to make Daniel
a major player and interpreter of his horrific vision.
Florida Department of Law Enforcement Agent Samantha
Michaels can’t escape her nightmares either. The latest one has put her on leave
and at her mother’s home while she waits for her former boyfriend to get his
stuff out of her place. She has scars now and apparently what had to be done to
her was a problem for her old boss when they were in the bedroom. It was stupid
to get with Stan Winston, twenty years older than her and her boss. Instead of
the apologetic phone call she was expecting from him he quickly makes it clear that
he just wants her back to work. Seems the Sheriff of Bay County wants and needs
the help of the FDLE to investigate a case of a badly burned body. Since Agent Samantha
Michaels is physically very close to the crime scene and is the closest thing
to an expert the FDLE has on killing using fire she is the one to go.
Not only did Daniel find what was left of the body
but Daniel has expertise that may prove crucial to the case and that initially forces
Daniel and Sam to work together again. They have lots of old baggage,
individually as well as relationship wise, so any investigation is going to be
complicated and that is before Sam suspects Daniel of being the killer. The fact
a second body, burned in time before the first, is found on Daniel’s land
reinforces her suspicion that it might be him. As more bodies burn, hostages
are taken, and the killer taunts them demanding Daniel understand, Sam and
Daniel not only have to stop him but put aside their mutual suspicion and see if
anything they once had between them can reignite.
Shifting in point of view between the crazed killer
who believes he is on a religious mission and the various characters the book
moves forward at a rapid pace. Character development is limited and
occasionally clichéd as nearly all in the book have suffered some emotional
trauma in the past. Traumas that definitely impact their way of looking at life
and how they relate to others. This includes the crazed killer who appears every
few pages to explain why he does what he does.
As in Thunder Beach dialogue is not set
off by quotation marks but dashes at the beginning of sentences. While that
works the author occasionally runs the risk of reader confusion by his addition
of narration immediately following a dialogue sentence. Despite that occasional
glitch, the story telling itself as well as character motivations and scene
descriptions, etc. are all handed well in Burnt Offerings.
Despite the impression given in the opening pages it
appears this is a stand-alone novel and not part of a series. The read is a
good one that could have been better but does work well in most aspects as the
novel moves quickly towards a strong ending.
Burnt
Offerings
Michael
Lister
Pulpwood
Press
April
2012
ISBN#
978-1-88146-90-5
Paperback
(also available as an e-book and audio recording)
364
Pages
$16.99
Material supplied by publicist PJ NUNN owner of
Breakthrough Promotions in exchange for my objective review.
Kevin R. Tipple © 2012
4 comments:
Thanks for the thoughtful review, Kevin. I am a big fan of Michael Lister's DOUBLE EXPOSURE and have been wondering about a follow up...
Thank you, Jenny.
Is it a followup?
From what I could tell surfing various places, it is not unless these characters were minor characters in that one.
Not sure how reading with dashes would go. Premise of book sounds interesting
You get used to it, Jake. It works fine except for the occasional narration issue noted in the review.
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