A Little Rebellion is a Good Thing

Although it is not the author’s first book, A Little Rebellion is a Good Thing is his first venture into this kind of story. Duncan L. Clarke is a professor emeritus at American University’s Department of International Relations. The title of this book comes from a quote by Thomas Jefferson. In this story, David Pritchard, a newly minted Ph.D. takes on his first post degree teaching assignment at Traymore College, an all-girls college rural Virginia. It’s 1969, when women’s rights movements were heating up in the U.S., but had not yet found its way to rural Virginia. Not everyone agreed that changing the rules was progress. Pritchard had gotten a law degree before he pursued his Ph.D., having wanted to teach and not to become a practicing lawyer. He was stunned by the old college rules about the expected behaviors of the girls and the sorts of punishment handed out for any perceived violations, including expulsion from the school for students and teachers. Pritchard was headstrong and he quickly waded into a battle with college president Elzic Barton. Barton saw his role of being the protector of the school and all the undergraduates. Prichard disagreed.

Clarke filled this book with a slew of rich characters from Barton, to the Dean of Students, Evelyn Baird, to a series of co-eds including Valerie Tavernetti, Sue Ewal, RJ McKenna, and Kim Sherman. Pritchard’s dog, Xen, a Labrador retriever, played a key role in the novel. This book is well-written and well-conceived. It gets my recommendation.

Act of Revenge

See below for an except.

Act of Revenge is my third book by John Bishop MD, and it’s third novel in the Dr. Jim Bob Brady series, an orthopedic surgeon. Brady now in his 50s, and after proving himself to be successful in a full-time practice in Houston, he has backed off to working just four days a week. That gives him a chance to enjoy his life a bit more, and it gives him some discretionary time.

The story starts with Brady going to Snowmass for a ski trip with his wonderful wife, Mary Louise. She is a much more graceful skier and he is more of a bomber – which means he aims his skies straight down the hill and hopes no one gets in his way. But, that’s not what happened on every run, and he plowed right through another skier who just happened to be a plastic surgeon in Houston. Jim Bob was okay, but the man he hit suffered a major knee injury which was skillfully managed by one of Brady’s partners. In the process of helping Dr. Lou Edwards and his wife, Mimi, they developed a quick bond of friendship. Lou and Jim Bob talked about their very different practices. Lou was particularly angry about the fact that his insurance carrier, Texas Mutual Life, had cancelled Lou’s malpractice insurance (as well as most other plastic surgeons). The failure of and difficulties with breast implants was leading to many lawsuits. Even Mimi was a victim. Mimi had developed lupus (SLE), a gradually progressive autoimmune disease that  is eventually fatal. Although never definitively proven as being causative, the insurance companies had been successfully sued for many millions of dollars. Mimi had suffered from SLE for many years and she was getting much worse from the disease and long-term use of steroids.

But this story is about Paul Thompson, the CEO of Texas Mutual Life, and the problems that the cancellation of malpractice surgery was causing for Lou and his colleagues. The doctors demonstrated in a march outside of Thompson’s office, and it was picked up by The Today Show where Lou was caught directly threatening Paul who happened to live in the same high rise building to which Jim Bob and Mary Louise had recently moved. Then Paul was murdered. I thought the weakest part of this story was that Jim Bob got involved in the murder investigation, and the Houston Police designated him to be a Special Investigator and supplied him with a gold badge. So, at least with regard to that detail, be prepared to suspend reality.

None-the-less, this story had a number of twists that I did not see coming. The main characters are easy to identify with. Basically, this may not be great literature, but it is a very enjoyable read. Bishop created some great bad men and bad women. It would keep you entertained on a flight from San Diego to Chicago.

Act of Revenge: A Medical Thriller
Chapter 2
by John Bishop, MD

Excerpted from Act of Revenge: A Doc Brady Mystery. Copyright © 2020 by John Bishop MD. All rights reserved. Published by Mantid Press.

Monday, February 10, 1997

“JIM BOB! Jim Bob? Can you hear me?”

I was stunned but not unconscious. My first concern was that I had sustained another head injury. I had been mugged a year and a half ago and had spent ten days in a coma after developing a subdural hematoma, a collection of blood between my brain and skull requiring surgery. The hair on my shaved head had taken seemingly forever to grow back out to a length and texture I could brush. I wasn’t prepared to go through all that again.

“I’m okay, I think,” I said to Mary Louise. She was kneeling down over me, skis off. “Thanks for not being in front of me. I might have hit you, too. Where’s the guy I ran into?”

“He’s up the hill. I’ll go check on him.” And with that, she headed back up the slope.

Since I had landed face down in the snow, I used my corduroy cap to clean off my goggles and face in an attempt to see what was going on. I was partially buried in the foot-high drift, but when I assessed that my extremities were intact and my vision was relatively normal, I managed to turn myself around.

I sat up and saw my wife kneeling down over the man I had run into twenty yards behind me. One ski was off, and the other was twisted about 45 degrees, half-buried in the snow. Unfortunately, his leg was still attached to it. My skis had come undone, and God only knew where they had landed. Probably in someone’s condo.

I had heard of a ski accident that occurred on the same slope wherein a crash between two skiers had resulted in a lost ski sailing down the hill and crashing through a picture window into the living room of a residence. No one was hurt, at least in the home, but I’m sure it gave them quite a start. And some decent kindling.

I abandoned my ski poles, which had still been attached to my wrists with their adjustable loops, and stepped up the hill to join Mary Louise and the unknown assailant. A thought crossed my mind that perhaps I was the unknown assailant. Whatever the situation, I hoped the man had experienced enough of a shock to render him an amnesiac but not unconscious or damaged.

“Are you okay?” Mary Louise was asking him repeatedly as I arrived on the scene. Several other skiers had gathered as well and had already placed their skis in the ground, tips up and crossed, the universal sign of an injury requiring the ski patrol’s attention.

The man was on his side. His eyes were open.

“Listen,” I said, “I’m a doctor. I need to check your pupils and your arms and legs. Don’t be frightened. Okay?”

He nodded.

His pupils reacted normally to light. I felt his neck.

“Any pain here?” I asked as I gently moved his cervical spine from side to side. “Any numbness? Arms or legs?”

He shook his head. “My leg . . . killing me.”

“I’m sure. I’ll get down there in a minute.”

The man’s arms, chest, head, spine, and right leg all seemed to be in working order. It was time to address the crucial issue.

“Listen,” I explained, “my name is Jim Brady. I’m an orthopedic surgeon from Houston. I need to check out this left leg and try to decide if you’ve got a fracture in your femur or tibia or if you’ve got a knee ligament injury. I may not be able to tell, but I’d like to try before the ski patrol arrives. Okay?”

“I don’t want you to move it. Hurts too bad.”

“Well, the medic will have to move it to get you onto the stretcher. Your leg’s kind of twisted out at an angle. If I can figure out what’s wrong, I may be able to make you more comfortable by moving it. Let me try.”

He nodded. I gently felt his femur, the thigh bone, with both hands. No pain. Same with the tibia and fibula, the two bones connecting the knee to the ankle. When I felt his knee, however, even through his bulky, waterproof ski pants, I could feel the enlarged joint. He winced.

“It’s your knee, probably a ligament tear. If I can get your ski off and straighten out the leg, you’ll feel a lot better. I want you to hang on for a minute.”

“Man, it’s killing me! Just leave it alone!”

I paused, then slid down toward his boot release, had Mary Louise support the ski to minimize the torque, and unsnapped his boot from the binding. He moaned for a second, but I quickly untwisted the leg, brought it parallel to the other, and laid it down.

“Damn it! I told you not to—huh. Feels better.”

“See,” I said, “you should have trusted me.”

“Sort of hard to trust a guy who runs you over, wouldn’t you say?”

I assumed amnesia wasn’t going to be a problem for him.

Two members of the ski patrol arrived on separate snowmobiles pulling stretchers. One of them had probably been intended for me. I was glad to decline it. I helped the medics get my victim onto the stretcher and bind him down to minimize the shock of the journey to Snowmass Ski Clinic. I felt obligated to accompany them.

“Are you by yourself? Is there anyone we can notify?” Mary Louise asked. “I’ll be glad to make a call. Whatever you need.”

“Guess you better call my wife, tell her I’m hurt. I hate to upset her, though.”

“Where are you staying?” she asked him.

“Wood Run Condos. Just down the hill. I was headed home.”

“So were we,” Mary Louise said. “Why don’t I just run by there. We’re at the Chamonix. You’re only a block or so away. How would that be?”

He nodded and sort of smiled. “That’d be real nice, ma’am. I’d appreciate

that.”

She looked at him for a minute, waiting. “I need your name and condo number,” she said patiently, like a schoolteacher waiting for a third grader to figure out the times tables.

“Oh, sure. Sorry. I’m Lou Edwards. Her name’s Mimi. We’re in 530 Wood Run. And thanks.”

“It’s the least I can do,” Mary Louise said, looking at me like she was very glad I was okay, but not happy that I had run over the poor man. I didn’t blame her.

About the Author:

John Bishop MD is the author of Act of Revenge: A Doc Brady Mystery. Dr. Bishop has practiced orthopedic surgery in Houston, Texas, for 30 years. His Doc Brady medical thriller series is set in the changing environment of medicine in the 1990s. Drawing on his years of experience as a practicing surgeon, Bishop entertains readers using his unique insights into the medical world with all its challenges, intricacies, and complexities, while at the same time revealing the compassion and dedication of health care professionals. Dr. Bishop and his wife, Joan, reside in the Texas Hill Country. For more information, please visit https://johnbishopauthor.com

The Order

The Order is the 23^rd book in Daniel Silva’s stories about Gabriel Allon, who started as an Israeli assassin who had killed six of the twelve Palestinian terrorists who murdered the Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympics in Munich. Now, Allon has progressed to being the director in charge of The Office, headquarters for Israel’s secret intelligence and undercover operations. If you’ve been following the blog, you know that Silva is my favorite author in this genre. There are so many great authors that we’ve reviewed in the blog, but he’s the best. He publishes one new book a year, which I read in a couple days and then wait impatiently for the next installment.

Silva has surrounded Allon with a great cast of characters, from his wife Chiari and heir boy-girl twins to the various personnel in The Office which have been with him since the first novel. This book may have been the most impressive plot yet as he looks at anti-Semitism and the Catholic Church. In this book, he has created the Gospel of Pilate which presents a different story about the responsibility for the death of Christ as it was revealed in Matthew and Luke, a story that prior popes have hidden, much to the detriment of Jews. Silva’s knowledge of the inner workings of the Catholic Church is impressive, and importantly, the Pope he saved in an earlier novel, has now been murdered. A new Pope is about to be elected, and the sinister forces within the Roman Curia, the body that helps the Pope administer the Vatican, become quite active in their attempt to take control of the Pope’s election.

It’s a great story based on thorough research. I’ll write nothing further, except to encourage you to read this book. But damn, now I have a whole year to wait for Silva’s next book.

 A year after the above was written, I decided to re-read The Order prior to reading Silva's next novel, The Cellist. In the review of The Order, I commented that I thought the book contained the most impressive plot yet, and I remain of that opinion. Silva's research is remarkable, and in reading this book, you'll get a good history of the world-wide antisemitic movement, as well as a snapshot of the its current status.

Payback

Lorenzo Carcaterra has written about a dozen books, but Payback is only my second Carcaterra novel and the second with protagonist Tank Rizzo, a disabled and retired New York City police detective. He was disabled following a shooting in which there were multiple deaths, and his beloved partner, “Pearl” Monroe was left a paraplegic who had been confined to a wheelchair for life. Tank was a good guy, honest, and dedicated, and two years after leaving the force, he sometimes was thrown a cold case by the Police Chief. Also, Tank was not afraid to use force to accomplish what he wanted to get done.

We are introduced to Detective Eddie Kenwood who had the opposite values from Tank. He forced some innocent people to sign confessions under threat of doing damage to them. He had put numerous suspects in prison, almost always young black men, for crimes they had not committed including Randy Jenkins. Jenkins had been accused of murder, and it was under threats from Kenwood that he felt he had no choice but to sign the false confessions. It was about two decades later that this matter fell into Tank’s lap. By that time, Kenwood was also retired and living on his pension and other ill-gotten gains. That was about the same time that Tank’s estranged brother and sister-in-law were killed in a car crash. Tank had no prior contact with his nephew, 15-year-old Chris, but since Tank was the only living relative, Chris was sent to live with him. By that time, Tank was living in his own brownstone, and he had Pearl come to live with him. So, now with Chris, three males were sharing the residence, and Chris was convinced his parents had been murdered. It was not clear if this living arrangement was going to work out. Chris was a computer whiz and he was able to hack his way into enough data that Tank thought Chris might be right about his parents’ deaths.

Carcaterra used some of the same characters as in his first book in the series including Carmine Tramonti, the restaurant owning former mobster, and Carmine’s daughter Connie with whom Tank had a longstanding relationship, and others. The author was successful at surrounding his protagonist with very interesting and believable characters. The plot was not simple, but it was also not overly complex. I was able to keep track of the good guys and bad guys without having to reread sections of the book. At no point did the author unnecessarily complicate the story in order to show the reader just how clever he is. In the course of this book, we learn about the reason Tank and his younger brother, Jack had not spoken to one another for years – a heart wrenching story. In reflecting back on the past and the loss of his brother long before death, the author wrote, “The past never leaves us. It hovers over us, hidden by the passage of time, waiting to strike when we least expect it. It can do damage or ease suffering, its path never truly known until it confronts us.”

Just as I raved about Carcaterra’s work in Tin Badges, and now I catch myself raving again about Payback. Great characters, great plot – and I highly recommend this author and this book. I loved it, and now I’ll be impatient until Carcaterra writes the next novel about Tank.

The Poe Consequence

This is the first novel by Keith Steinbaum, a supernatural thriller. He has written The Poe Consequence and if you’re a fan of the supernatural (and I am not), or if you’re willing to suspend judgment for the length of this book about what is real and what is not (which I am), then you’re in for a good ride. The book makes frequent references to the works of Edgar Allen Poe, and the subtitle of the novel is “Beware the heart as cold as ice.” You might get to know more about Poe’s stories than you knew before.

This story is about twin brothers, Kevin and Warren Palmer. Warren was waiting to hear about his application for a literature teaching job at USC in Los Angeles, a job he desperately wanted. Unlike his twin, Warren was also interested in the occult, and while visiting New Orleans, sought out a psychic, a Tarot reader, and he was hoping for reassurance about his job application. But he got something far different. Madame Sibilia obviously was able to perceive information in unconventional ways. She knew the name of his brother, as well as the names of his in-laws. Warren had already married a wonderful woman, had a child with her, and then a year before the trip to New Orleans, she had died from cancer. Rather than telling Warren about only the good things that she foresaw, Madame Sibilia unloaded information about Warren’s impending death. He was so offended by the progressive reading of his Tarot that he got up and left before the last card was revealed. Meanwhile, Kevin Palmer was a writer for the L.A. Times, and he was working on a story about the exploding gang war in L.A.

Back in L.A., Warren was killed by an errant shot in an unexpected gun battle between rival gangs. Thus, Warren’s 14-year-old son, Seth, was left to be raised by his Uncle Kevin, who just happened to be a raging alcoholic. With his last breath, Warren commented that he had promised his wife that he would always look out for Seth, and now he was committed to continue that promise from the afterlife. Seth had a huge adjustment to make, and he found himself uncomfortable with and angry at all Hispanic people. His school work fell apart. He was depressed and did not care about anything. He was also disgusted with his uncle’s drinking.

Meanwhile, the gang wars continued to rage, but after Warren’s death, there was a mystery regarding the way they were dying. For every murder by the Lobos and Diablos, the murderer died the following day at 4:00 a.m., but not of gunshot wounds. Rather, they were dying of a heart attack and it was determined at autopsy that their hearts were actually frozen inside their bodies. Meanwhile, Kevin found a tutor for Seth, but she is a Mexican-American woman and is stunningly beautiful and Kevin fell in lust for her. Seth agreed to work with her, not knowing that the tutor’s brother had been involved in the death of his father.

There were interactions with the police force, and Steinbaum created some wonderful characters. The interplay between the two enemy gangs was entirely believable. So, despite this being outside of my usual genre, I thoroughly enjoyed the story and am willing to give this a very solid recommendation.

Flash Point: The Final Conspiracy

Flash Point: The Final Conspiracy is a unique book. It is published in 2020 this year by co-authors Thomas A. Whitmire and Jacob D. Miller. Eric Anderson is the protagonist, and his partner in the efforts to figure out a conspiracy is Paul Kappas. Prior to uncovering new information, Eric and Paul were running a website called “The Smartest Guy in DC.” They were tracking a series of Washington protests that all seemed to be going nowhere. Eric was the expert at getting surveillance films. While Paul had his own computer consulting business, Eric thought he should try to land an “inside job,” so he was hired as a video expert by Senator Shelby Lamb. Lamb was clearly one of Washington’s powerful men. Eric  got sent by Lamb to a mall where another senator was scheduled to have a clandestine meeting with a woman who was too young and to whom he was not married. Lamb wanted Eric to film their encounter which he could use as future dirt to force this other senator to vote his way. But then a mall shooting broke out, and many were killed. Eric was there with his camera and got footage of the horrifying carnage that went viral.

Eric was suspicious that Lamb had set this up the slaughter as a means of passing new legislation that would bring him more power and lots of money. The authors surrounded Eric and Paul with a great cast of characters including The Wanderer, a guy who was a Vietnam Era veteran and one who was somehow tie to Lamb. There were multiple well-chosen subplots.

I’m not usually interested in conspiracy stories, but this one was more captivating, perhaps because it seems so plausible. This novel gets my strong recommendation.

Reflecting Pool

While spending a career in government, Reflecting Pool is apparently the first novel for Otho Eskin, who is an accomplished playwright. It’s my opinion that Eskin would do well to continue writing in the murder mystery genre, and perhaps he plans to make a series with his protagonist, Marko Zorn. This was a very fun read. Zorn is a detective with the Washington DC Metropolitan Police. While it is uncommon to read about an uncompromising character who is in pursuit of the truth, Eskin has taken Zorn to a new level. In the course of this story, Zorn pisses off nearly everyone he encounters, including the president’s underlings, the president himself, the president’s wife, the Secret Service, and the investigating members of the FBI and National Park Service. In his singleness of purpose, he put his rookie partner in great danger, so his own entire staff was most unhappy with him. Zorn mostly spared involvement with the CIA.

Zorn just happened to be the first person to discover a body of a young woman who had drowned in the Reflecting Pool that lies between the Lincoln Memorial and the Capital Building. Underwater and facing upwards, he was struck by the deep blue color of her eyes, and she reminded him of his older sister who had been raped and murdered nearly 20 years before. Of course, there were immediate turf wars over jurisdiction for the crime, especially with the FBI, the Secret Service because the deceased woman, Sandra Wilcox, had been part of the presidential protection brigade, and the National Park Service. Zorn was told by the president that this death was a matter of national security, that he was being ordered to drop the case, but Zorn thought it would be an injustice to do so.

By the end of the book, Zorn had figured out the surprising details that led to the death of Wilcox, but the author also added Zorn’s successful efforts to deal with a raging street war between two gangs who were competing for a huge shipment of weapons, as well as an assassin who had been hired to kill the president. This was a good story, and I hope that the author writes another book about Marko Zorn.