Book #3

China Lake
By Meg Gardiner
(purchased on bookcloseouts)

I discovered this author and series via Sarah's website as well, with a brief review on the side bar and a mention of how Meg Gardiner’s situation is a bit unusual. She is a U.S. writer who lives in the UK whose books are set in California, but are only published in the UK and Canada. Thanks to bookcloseouts, I was able to purchase the first two books in the series, China Lake and Mission Canyon. The main character, Evan Delaney, is a freelancer legal researcher and part-time author with a lawyer boyfriend who has temporary custody of her nephew. Just as she is about to give her nephew back to her brother, the boy’s mother reappears, bringing along the quasi-cult she belongs to, The Remnant, a group that is preparing for The End. The action in this thriller begins right away and never stops. Evan and her family are swept up in what The Remnant has planned and meet resistant at every step when they try to stop the group. A slight suspension of belief is necessary to believe all of the interlocking elements and characters that must come together throughout the story, but that’s what makes reading books like this an escape. My only complaint, and that’s because it’s a pet peeve of mine, is the “overexplaining” of terms that I feel most people, or atleast most mystery/thriller/crime fiction readers, should be familiar with, such as acronyms like CDC and ATF. Maybe it was more for the benefit of readers in the UK, who many not know these terms. Also, a long explanation about Botox as a hot, new cosmetic procedure (and biological weapon) that Evan had never heard of didn’t hold up. Has it only been since 2002 that Botox has become a part of our everyday language? Regardless, Mission Canyon is sitting on my shelf waiting to be read.