|
|
DARK CORRIDORS VOL. 3, No. 29 |
 on Harlen Coben's GONE for Good |
 |
Coben's new thriller
needs a shot of credibility
By RON MILLER
of TheColumnists.com
What would you do if the older brother you idolized was suddenly arrested and charged with raping and murdering the only girl you ever loved?
Well, I guess nobody would blame you if you felt a little conflicted, especially if your brother got away and became one of America's most wanted fugitives, claiming he was innocent of the crime, DNA evidence be damned!
That's the incredible situation that faces Will Klein, the hero of Harlan Coben's new thriller, "Gone for Good" (Delacorte Press, $23.95). Or I should say it's the first of MANY incredible situations facing Will. The emphasis here is on the word "incredible."
In fairness, I was caught up in this book and wanted to devour it as if I hadn't had anything to read but comic books for a year. But that didn't last long. Before I was a third of the way along, I began to realize this WAS a comic book that just didn't remember to put in any drawings.
Coben has a real knack for creating suspense. No doubt about that. But, in this book, he requires you to suspend your logic way too long. What's more, he creates a host of interesting characters who are more interesting than his hero, who's sort of a regular guy surrounded by superheroes and villains.
When the story begins, Will's outlaw brother, Ken, has been on the run for quite a few years. Will has put the death of his former girl friend behind him because he has fallen in love with someone else who more recently entered his life. But, not long after his mother dies from cancer, Will discovers a recent photo of the fugitive Ken behind another photo in their mom's room. In other words, Ken is still alive and their mom had been in touch with him recently!
How has Ken Klein been able to stay on the run for a decade or so, eluding the cops, the FBI and Interpol? Well, that's part of the story that doesn't sound too credible. I won't tell you everything, but I'll tell you that Ken and two other guys from their New Jersey high school all somehow wound up being very powerful "dark forces" in the world of anti-social goings on. One is a very wealthy criminal puppetmaster, another is a vicious and sadistic professional killer who goes by the nickname "The Ghost." The third one is Ken, who might be innocent of some stuff, but certainly not everything.
By the time I was into this treacherous alliance of three thug-types from the same high school, I already was wondering if I could hit the waste paper basket from across the room with the book I was reading. The absurdity gets far worse than that. At one point, I began to worry that everybody in the book was going to turn out to be somebody else in disguise or maybe some kind of undercover something or other.
Yawn, yawn, yawn.
Worse yet, Will Klein is a wuss when it comes to hero behavior. He dosen't deserve any of the girls who like him and none of the breaks that keep him from becoming a dead body the first time somebody attempts to kill him. He's boring. In a book filled with cartoon-dimenioned characters, he's too normal. It's like reading "Tarzan of the Apes" and suddenly finding the hero is somebody who's scared of apes and feels too embarrassed to go out in the jungle in just a loincloth.
Yes, I finished the book
anyway. I couldn't help myself. But I didn't like myself in the
morning for having such a weak character.
© 2002 by Ron Miller.
The Ron Miller caricature is © 2001 by Jim Hummel. The book
cover design is by Belina Huey and is © 2002 by Delacorte
Press.
Ron
Miller is the author of "Mystery! A Celebration," the
official companion book to PBS' "Mystery!" series.
He currently teaches "The Curious History of Mystery"
at Whatcom Community College in Bellingham, Washington.
| Home | About Us | Archives | Talkback | Shopping Mall |