{"id":689,"date":"2012-04-10T07:58:25","date_gmt":"2012-04-10T14:58:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/?p=689"},"modified":"2012-04-10T07:58:25","modified_gmt":"2012-04-10T14:58:25","slug":"kellerman-double-the-pleasure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/?p=689","title":{"rendered":"Kellerman: Double the pleasure"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fresh from his triumph at the opening in Winston-Salem of the delightful show from his art collection, \u201cHoward Sam and Bob \u2013 A Life With Relics,\u201d Bob Moyer has written a pair of reviews of works by one of his (many) favorite authors. He takes a look at the new print novel out from Johnathan Kellerman, as well as a graphic novel adaptation of one of Kellerman\u2019s early books. In the process, he seems to draw some sort of comparison between his reaction to the graphic novel and my fondness for audio books. I don\u2019t completely follow his train of thought, and I suspect he\u2019s poking fun at me me, but I\u2019ll let him get away with it. Since he\u2019s Bob.<\/p>\n

By Robert Moyer<\/p>\n

VICTIMS. By Jonathan Kellerman. Ballantine Books. 338 pages. $28.<\/p>\n

SILENT PARTNER: The Graphic Novel. By Jonathan Kellerman. Art by Michael Gaydos. Adapted by Ande Parks. Villard Press. 180 pages. $23.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>\u00a0\u201cThis one was different.\u201d<\/p>\n

So begins the latest Alex Delaware adventure, which is, indeed, different.\u00a0No Delaware girl friend subplot, no diversion with LAPD Lt. Milo Sturgis\u2019 boyfriend, not even any lengthy meals at Milo\u2019s favorite Indian restaurant.\u00a0Just a murder so gruesome that Milo calls Dr. Alex Delaware in to view the murder scene, in order that he might plumb the depths of degradation the killer had brought about \u2013 an eviscerated corpse with internal body parts discreetly arranged around and on the body.\u00a0Everyone, including Delaware, turns away upon seeing it.\u00a0 So precise, so exacting \u2013 the killer knew what he was doing.<\/p>\n

And then he does it again. And again.<\/p>\n

Before Milo and Alex can get their usual handle on the crime, more murders occur.\u00a0The two long-time collaborators can\u2019t come up with any connection between a curmudgeonly matron, an innocuous accountant and a brusque doctor.\u00a0Pressure from police headquarters builds quickly as the bodies pile up.\u00a0In the usual formula, Milo stitches clues together with threads of supposition provided by Alex.\u00a0 As usual, premises that show some promise unravel one after the other as the narrative progresses.\u00a0Finally, Alex finds a thread that leads them through a thicket of improbabilities to a stunning revelation about the identity of the killer. Unlike the usual hidden resolution that Alex springs on us, or the slow revelation that Kellerman sometimes employs, this conclusion comes cascading down on the reader.\u00a0It\u2019s as breathtaking a ride as Kellerman has come up with in recent novels, and anyone suffering Kellerman fatigue will find it refreshing.<\/p>\n

Or they can turn to the graphic (in all senses of the word) novel version of one of Kellerman\u2019s early successes, Silent Partner<\/em>.\u00a0The story stood well on its own.\u00a0It\u2019s early in the collaboration between Milo and Alex, and the story winds its way through the sex, scandal and blood of Hollywood high life.\u00a0An old girl friend approaches Alex for help at a party. He turns her down, and she turns up dead the next day.\u00a0His guilt drives him to delve into the murder, which he doesn\u2019t understand, and their past together, which he also doesn\u2019t understand.\u00a0 Volatile, at times unavailable, at other times totally consumed by him, she is an enigma wrapped inside a bloody psychodrama.<\/p>\n

A graphic novel is actually more like a script than a book, with the adaptor turning narrative into dialogue, the artist trying to capture the mise en scene<\/em>.\u00a0 I found it a bit disappointing, unlike Linda Brinson\u2019s reaction to audio books (she enjoys voices on tape because she says they sound better than the ones in her head).\u00a0In this instance, the graphic Alex doesn\u2019t have the gravitas that I picture, and Milo isn\u2019t the crumpled rumple of a human that I fondly envision.\u00a0However, the multiple scenarios that Milo and Alex employ \u201cwith the aplomb of a pair of anthropologists observing a colony of savage baboons\u201d are well served by the frame-to-frame frenzy here.\u00a0\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cGraphic\u201d can happen in that expressionistic way that leaves so much to the imagination, a hand stroking a leg, splashes of ink suggesting blood in black and white.\u00a0 As with any good production, timing is of the essence, and the story moves right along, not holding us too long with too much narrative at any point, nor making us grimace at the gore.\u00a0 And it was a pleasure to catch up with an early novel that I hadn\u2019t perused up to this point.\u00a0Together with his latest, it was an enjoyable double dip of Kellerman.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fresh from his triumph at the opening in Winston-Salem of the delightful show from his art collection, \u201cHoward Sam and Bob \u2013 A Life With Relics,\u201d Bob Moyer has written a pair of reviews of works by one of his (many) favorite authors. He takes a look at the new print novel out from Johnathan […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,14],"tags":[70,38,235,234,53],"class_list":["post-689","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mysteries","category-thriller-suspense","tag-alex-delaware","tag-fiction","tag-graphic-novel","tag-kellerman","tag-robert-moyer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/689","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=689"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/689\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":692,"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/689\/revisions\/692"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=689"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=689"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lindabrinson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=689"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}