Shadow Season

So I read a review of SHADOW SEASON in one of my favorite magazines, Cemetery Dance, and thought it might be interesting. I enjoyed THE COLD SPOT and THE COLDEST MILE, but felt a little detached from the characters. Still I felt I should give this book a try. And it was interesting. Our hero, Finn, is a blind ex-cop teaching English at a private boarding school. How he got blind and what brought him to this job are the reason for the story.

Tom Piccirilli is a different sort of a thriller writer. His style is more introspective than most and he allows his readers to draw their own pictures and conclusions. The pacing of this book was slow but steady. I was a full hundred pages in before I asked my self where this was going. But there was something about it that wouldn't let me just put the book aside. I wanted to know what happened to Finn and what was going to happen to him. Piccirilli didn't insult my intelligence by telegraphing everything. I was never sure of what was happening or why until I got there. I wasn't exactly trying to intuit the details before reaching the conclusion, but they weren't thrown at me either.

All that put together makes a good read. Everything about the book clicked just right. The characters were a little more approachable than past works and the plot was not overdone. Even the crimes fit the story perfectly. I think that is where most authors overreach - the crimes/criminals are too big, too perfect or too bad to be believable. Banality is the soul of evil. If I had to compare, I would say that Piccirilli is the author that Marcus Sakey wants to be.