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| "How were the prostitutes?" That's what he asked me the next time I saw him. Sitting in his living room with the wraparound windows. With the gray winter sky and the gray winter river. Me on the sofa, him in a chair. "How were the prostitutes?" As if he were joking. "Young and cheap," I said with a laugh. As if I were joking. "Seems like a long way to travel just for a good time," he said. Laughing. As if he were joking. "Depends on your definition of a good time," I said. As if. "Well, whatever it is, I'm sure with your money, you could find it a lot closer to home." Laughing, he opened a folder on the glass table between us. Portfolios. Opportunities. "I, meanwhile, have been using my time more productively on your behalf..." "See, now he had tossed out his bait, his hook: You could find it a lot closer to home. And I was supposed to say: Really? Are you serious? What do you mean? And I would say it. But not today..." |
A Killer in the Wind
By Andrew Klavan
This is a strange book. If you like unique...and strange... Get this book! A psychological thriller is not necessarily something you will enjoy... But it does fascinate, doesn't it? There is indeed something thrilling when a story takes you where you've not been before. This one did for me and probably will for you, I believe.
Dan Champion is a cop who, to me, came across somewhat like Mike Hammer in telling what he's doing. He got the hard cases that, sometimes, got into his head--like the little girl who had been beaten to death, with the killer in the wind...
But it was all getting to him and his mind wouldn't stop thinking about this case--what he had to pretend to be, what he had to do to get the individuals involved to accept him...
Sure, this guy, Emory, would get him hookers, but Dan knew that he was into something much darker, something he didn't even want to think about--yet he did...
Night after night he couldn't get to sleep, yet knew he had to if he was to stay alert...
He could think of only one thing to do...and he went to a drug supplier explaining what he needed...
Sleeping was no longer a problem, but the side effects...
When he started seeing the little boy, he knew he was in trouble, but what was he going to do?
Besides, he soon disappeared...until the next time...
Caught in between reality and drug-induced visions, he nevertheless kept it together enough to keep going, until he had made his first connection. Emory had provided him...a beautiful child...
Just as the police broke in and Emory ran... Dan turned to the little girl and explained he was a policeman and no one would hurt her, quickly untying the ropes that held her...Turning her over to others...
Then he started after Emory... he didn't remember killing him... Or much of anything else that had happened...
And while the others covered for him, his boss told him he had to go. They bargained a little, Dan swearing he would get completely clean, of everything. If he did, his boss would okay him for a small-town officer position.
So now he was in a sleepy little town with three years behind him. But nothing had ever been forgotten--even the beautiful angel who'd helped him through, named Samantha, who apparently was just as unreal as the little boy who had kept appeared.
Only now, he was clean, drug-free. But when he was called to help with a body that was pulled out of the river near the little town, his nightmares were back, because that woman looked exactly like...Samantha...
And would you believe, it gets even more strange? Dan is thrown into nightmares that took him back to his childhood, living in an orphanage...and remembering his first girlfriend... Were these after effects of the drugs, still in his system? Or, was he just too far gone to know what was real and what wasn't...
Don't get me wrong, readers will follow this tale easily, but we cannot help but be fully caught into Dan Champion's life, his mind, his fears...his love. Horrible dreams, memories, or hallucinations? But was his love at least real? And who was the little boy who kept coming to haunt him?
Oh, what an ending!
Don't you dare miss this one...
GABixlerReviews
Andrew is a contributing editor to City Journal, the magazine of the Manhattan Institute. His essays and op-eds on politics, religion, movies and literature have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, The Washington Post, the LA Times, and elsewhere. His video feature, “Klavan on the Culture,” can be found at PJTV.com. Andrew is a frequent media guest on television and radio stations from coast to coast, where he is known for his quick wit, humor and commentary on politics and entertainment.
As a screenwriter, Andrew wrote the screenplay to 1990’s A Shock to the System, which starred Michael Caine, and to 2008’s One Missed Call, which stars Ed Burns and Shannyn Sossamon. He lives in Southern California.
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