The Reapers - John Connolly

JC and the slightly different tack

John Connolly's forte is in the supernatural mixed with a typical crime thriller. For me, it's what sets him apart form other similar mainstream thriller authors. Following along the lines of similar authors, he has created a group of characters who feature in his books - the series featuring private detective Charlie Parker (naturally, nicknamed 'Bird') has lasted for a few books up to this point, and Connolly has more recently taken a slightly different line with this, focusing somewhat more on Parker's criminal associates: lovers Angel and Louis, thief and assassin respectively.

All about Louis

The Black Angel and The Unquiet, Connolly's previous books in the series, saw the limits of the friendship and trust between Parker and his associates stretched almost to the limit, and now, with The Reapers, we get to see a bit more of Louis and Angel, as they feature with Louis' history having its turn to be developed. Connolly writes in two forms, regular text and italics, as the current story unfolds as well as providing forays into Louis' history and being found by a contractor to become one of the most feared of a group of cold blooded assassins for whom everything is business, and nothing (or nearly nothing) is personal: The Reapers.

But this is not a historical tale: the main focus is set very much in the present, with one of Louis and Angel's business interest, a motor repair garage, being the target of a group of thugs whose employer is treading very much on Louis' toes. When the tall, black assassin investigates further, he finds himself contracted through the contractor, the now ageing Gabriel, to head north and infiltrate a shady businessman multi-million pound complex and exact revenge as a job. However, he soon realises that nothing is above board in this job, and that there is more than meets the eye in this job.....there's something personal hidden beneath the professional facade.

Building the tale

What Connolly does very well here and build the tension. The book is very slow to get going, but it develops the characters that until this point we have had limited knowledge of. Current character development through previous books has been ample enough to provide the support for Parker's own troubled past, but now that Louis is the main protagonist in a book, there needs something a bit deeper, with a bit more gap filling than before. And it's interesting. If you have read the previous books in order, like I have, then it's a really riveting insight into a character who has always remained mysterious. If you haven't read the books, there's still enough here to gain a really good grasp of things, but you don't get the benefit of a handful of previous books' plot and character elements that, at times, really push the boat out and come into play.

There's a lot of planning in the book, and I think this is where the tension comes into play. Previous books in the series have focused on Parker, and he is the one with a certain supernatural element about him that has always unsettled the majority of people around him. However, this doesn't apply to Louis and Angel, who are almost like a sarcastic and dry comedy couple as opposed to the hard nosed 'crims with morals' that most people are afraid of. The building and development of how events unfold lend themselves to military strategy, and the lack of trust and the mutually consistent background checking of all characters when faced with someone unknown is a good way of Connolly giving us the characters and scene setting that we need for most books. It provides a depth to the book that is a good replacement for the lack of supernatural element that is often in place to set the author's work aside from his contemporaries.

Comparison to other works

Can I draw comparisons? Of course. You'd be a fool to think that there's anything completely unique about the writing here, and there are similarities on a regular basis to other authors. The difference is that while Connolly's previous books have been reminiscent of a cross between Stephen King and various crime thriller authors, the King element has been dropped here but only in terms of the supernatural. King's effortless scope for dragging out detail with riveting effects is certainly what sets him apart, but Connolly's writing is just as patient and determined, and still incorporates some of the more action packed elements of current thriller writers such as Michael Connelly, Lee Child, and even faster, quicker read authors such as James Patterson. Across the Pond, the plot developments hark of such writings as Rankin's Rebus and Robinson's Banks, with a smidgeon of McDermid's eye for detail in her crime thriller writing.

Style and final thoughts

Connolly's style is like a cross between all of this, thus carving itself out in its own niche. Of all his books, it's certainly the better written one, the previous ones being very good, but feeling a little less memorable than his contemporaries. Now, though, with this book, he's emerging as a leader and not just one of the fold. His next book, The Lovers, is sitting there on my shelf, ready to read after Rankin's Doors Open. I'm going to give it a bit of a rest, though, as The Reapers is a book very much still on my mind, wit various elements of the plot and characterisation still on my mind. The way the story unfolds, with a few small twists that don't announce themselves in quite such an obvious and early fashion as a Linwood Barclay novel, has meant further thought after reading it, and this for me harks of a great book. I hope that The Lovers can continue that, as Parker comes back into the fray somewhat, mingled with the now established characters of Louis and Angel. Something's got to give, and I can't wait............