WORLD OF TROUBLE, literally gone with the choking cloud of Apocalypsy dirt, thank goodness

WORLD OF TROUBLE
BEN H. WINTERS The Last Policeman series #3
Quirk Books
$14.95 trade paper, available now

12 JULY 2021 UPDATE THE TRILOGY'S BEEN OPTIONED FOR TV by Fox...Read all about it!!

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Publisher Says: There are just 14 days until a deadly asteroid hits the planet, and America has fallen into chaos. Citizens have barricaded themselves inside basements, emergency shelters, and big-box retail stores. Cash is worthless; bottled water is valuable beyond measure. All over the world, everyone is bracing for the end.

But Detective Hank Palace still has one last case to solve. His beloved sister Nico was last seen in the company of suspicious radicals, armed with heavy artillery and a plan to save humanity. Hank's search for Nico takes him from Massachusetts to Ohio, from abandoned zoos and fast food restaurants to a deserted police station where he uncovers evidence of a brutal crime. With time running out, Hank follows the clues to a series of earth-shattering revelations.

The third novel in the Last Policeman trilogy, World of Trouble presents one final pre-apocalyptic mystery – and Hank Palace confronts questions way beyond whodunit: How far would you go to protect a loved one? And how would you choose to spend your last days on Earth?

—FIRST REVIEW HERE—SECOND REVIEW HERE—THIRD REVIEW HERE—

My Review: If there is one series I can *COUNT*ON* not to have extra volumes, it's this one. I can't imagine I'm spoilering this for anyone. The world ends the same time the book does.

Leading up to that finale to end all finales is our buddy Hank doin' his Hankly duty: Looking for his sister Nico and finding the odds and sods of wherever he is in his way. Of course, he has erstwhile baddie Cortez and poor, sick Houdini the dog in tow. Each presents Hank with different kinds of drags on his none-too-swift progress. Each has some claim on him. All the way through these three novels, Hank Palace has been on the Hero's Journey, with all the trappings. It's more stark in this concluding (!) volume.

But there's a reason humans have kept this storyline around so long: It's riveting. Even with the literal end of the world looming, it matters, matters, that Hank finds his sister. We want him to succeed in his quest! What possible meaning can a quest have to people who will be discrete atoms in a matter of weeks, days, finally hours.

Put something in a pressure cooker and, when the lid's open, it's very obvious what it's made of. It's the same with people. Hank? He's made of stern, strong stuff. He's taken on the pain and the fear of each person he's met and he's done his level best to rid them of it; even when he can't he's changed the others to better fit around their pain.

In his own last hours, suffering mightily the curse of the strong to bear more burdens than their own, Hank seeks out the last human he knows whose strength matches his own. As Life ends, Hank holds the hand of a girl whose burdens are as his own, and they know that moment of glad sharing we all seek after for all our lives.

COUNTDOWN CITY, winner of 2014 Philip K. Dick Award, gets 4 de-grimed stars from me

COUNTDOWN CITY
BEN H. WINTERS (The Last Policeman series #2)
Quirk Books
$14.95 trade paper, available now

12 JULY 2021 UPDATE THE TRILOGY'S BEEN OPTIONED FOR TV by Fox...Read all about it!!

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: There are just 77 days to go before a deadly asteroid collides with Earth, and Detective Hank Palace is out of a job. With the Concord police force operating under the auspices of the U.S. Justice Department, Hank's days of solving crimes are over...until a woman from his past begs for help finding her missing husband.

Brett Cavatone disappeared without a trace – an easy feat in a world with no phones, no cars, and no way to tell whether someone’s gone “bucket list” or just gone. With society falling to shambles, Hank pieces together what few clues he can, on a search that leads him from a college-campus-turned-anarchist-encampment to a crumbling coastal landscape where anti-immigrant militia fend off “impact zone” refugees.

The second novel in the critically acclaimed Last Policeman trilogy, Countdown City presents a fascinating mystery set on brink of an apocalypse – and once again, Hank Palace confronts questions way beyond "whodunit." What do we as human beings owe to one another? And what does it mean to be civilized when civilization is collapsing all around you?

—FIRST REVIEW HERE—SECOND REVIEW HERE—THIRD REVIEW HERE—

My Review: This book has a helluva gut-punch in it. It has a gigantic eye-opening take on what catastrophe brings out...the apocalypse before the holocaust has surprising actors on its ever-darkening stage.

It gave my poor roommate a sleepless night or two as my light stayed on way past his comfort zone. Sorry, dude, there's books to be read!

I think, though I'm not sure, that one big reason our detective is developing and making his exit meaningful for as many as possible is that this series is a trilogy. The motivating factor being the annihilation of the planet and its people automatically limits the time available for anyone to act! It also allows Winters to load us up with telling details without making it feel like force-feeding a goose for a richer liver.

A point I'm appreciating more as the series goes on is the author's use of astronomical coordinates for the asteroid. It isn't something I saw right away, but it has slowly become a drumbeat of worry behind the plentiful action in the book. I particularly like the fact that, even though it's there from the beginning, its effect is cumulative. Sneakily so.

Off to book three!

THE LAST POLICEMAN by Ben Winters...Apocalypses are no excuse for not doing your job

THE LAST POLICEMAN
BEN H. WINTERS
Quirk Books
$14.95 trade paper, available now

Y'know how you've been flip-flip-flipping through your Kindlebrary but nothing looks appealing?
Author Winters (a lovely human as well as talented writer) gotcha covered: THE LAST POLICEMAN is only $1.99 today!

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: What’s the point in solving murders if we’re all going to die soon, anyway?

Detective Hank Palace has faced this question ever since asteroid 2011GV1 hovered into view. There’s no chance left. No hope. Just six precious months until impact.

The Last Policeman presents a fascinating portrait of a pre-apocalyptic United States. The economy spirals downward while crops rot in the fields. Churches and synagogues are packed. People all over the world are walking off the job—but not Hank Palace. He’s investigating a death by hanging in a city that sees a dozen suicides every week—except this one feels suspicious, and Palace is the only cop who cares.

The first in a trilogy, The Last Policeman offers a mystery set on the brink of an apocalypse. As Palace’s investigation plays out under the shadow of 2011GV1, we’re confronted by hard questions way beyond “whodunit.” What basis does civilization rest upon? What is life worth? What would any of us do, what would we really do, if our days were numbered?

—FIRST REVIEW HERE—SECOND REVIEW HERE—THIRD REVIEW HERE—

My Review: I just loooooooooove it when the author, while playing fair with me, still surprises me with the solution to the crime(s). Mr. Winters has done this, and to a very satisfying T.

As apocalyptic tales go, this is one of the few that doesn't make me wrinkle my nose and schplurgle my lips in distaste. I completely buy that, facing extinction, the privileged population of the US would go all Bucket List and do all the stuff they didn't or couldn't before The End was writ large across the skies. It seems solipsistic, selfish, and inconsiderate...pure-D Murrikin behavior. But even with The End coming, gun-hoarders are seen as nutballs, just like they are now. I can believe this.

I also completely understand Henry Palace, our detective, staying on the job. He loves the job. He needs a challenge so he doesn't go nuts. He believes in a large, abstract greater good called "Justice" and he doesn't think that a little detail like the impending end of the world diminishes the need for and the right to Justice.

Gag...I'm making him sound like some kind of Eagle Scout...if it helps dispel some of that distasteful miasma, he also sleeps with a key witness. What ensues from that has to be read to be absorbed, especially in light of the killer's identity.

Off to pick up book two for some bedtime reading!