The Devil's Punchbowl by Greg IlesMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
On 12/30/2010 I started reading this book. This is the third book in the Penn Cage series. I finished reading Book 1, "The Quiet Game" last night. "The Quiet Game" was mediocre, buried in too many coincidences and way too many subplots. Book 2 was an amazing book, "Turning Angel" was a gripping read, I just couldn't read it fast enough. Now on to Book 3 and I'm not holding out much hope for "The Devil's Punchbowl". I was worried when I read what the book was about. Cage's fiction works best when his he's writing directly about family and long time friends and cases that directly involve them.
This book's story involves a long-time friend, Tim Jessup, but so far the central mystery is beyond that. Jessup appears to be a peripheral part of the story. I hope this book gets better or I may not finish it. My running question for this book, is will I finish it? Right now I'd say doubtful. I think Cage may have peaked with "Turning Angel".
January 3rd, 2011: I've read to page 209. I don't know what it is about this book, but it's absolutely sucking me in. To this point there have been some good and bad things about it. Thankfully unlike "The Quiet Game", the subplots have been winnowed down considerably.
There aren't several women after his body. He's broken up with a lady named Libby, who was an in between books romance. He may be hooking up with Caitlyn Masters again. He seems to be moving on, as much as he can, from the death of his deceased wife. That would be a good thing for this book. So there will be established boundaries between him and his kids babysitter, he instructs her to refer to him as Mr. Cage. He came awfully close to being sexually inappropriate with a teenager in "Turning Angel".
However there are more roll your eyes moments. People call up Penn and tell him they need him wherever they are right now. This has already happened 3 or 4 times in the first 200 pages of this book. Of course he just can't talk on the phone, because the bad guys may be monitoring all phones. When Penn Cages battles with people, they are extremely powerful. Also the bad guys have the ability to block cell phone reception, it wouldn't surprise me that this technology is available. It just doesn't work for me in terms of this book. I think this is a lazy shortcut by the author. (Which reminds me what is Greg Iles favorite Christmas song? "Iles Be Home For Christmas" of course:)
I also say a silent prayer and give thanks that I've lived such a life that I don't deal with people this bad. Of course as this is a Penn Cage book, the bad guys are really bad. They are evil with a capital E. But on the flip side there are people that help him coming out of the blue. Cage is an author you have to give up logic and his writing style or read someone else.
Although this novel is sucking me in, it's still nowhere in the class of "Turning Angel". My running question is will I finish this book? At this point I definitely will and probably fairly quickly. The book is a literary sugar rush, will I feel satisfied once I finish reading the book? Am I eating a literary bag of circus peanuts or a steak? At the 2/5ths mark I'm feeling satisfied with some reservations.
January 4th, 2011, Page 280. This continues to be a very gripping, edge-of-your seat novel. But as he has done previously there's a couple of more instances where Cage needs to drop what he's doing and go someplace else immediately. It's not because Cage is the mayor of Natchez, it's because of Iles writing style. Cage does much of the heavy lifting in this series. The constant rush to be somewhere else RIGHT NOW! doesn't work very well and is very annoying. It's a literary crutch that Iles leans on way too much. This has happened about 6 times at this point.
I'm tearing through this book, obviously it's not horrible, but Iles could desperately use an editor. There are things to be praised in Iles books, there's some humor. For instance, I like how he and Caitlyn are pretending they are a couple again to provide cover for Cage. I also like the updates we get of characters from previous books like Mia Burke and Drew Elliot.
Let's set up the situation. On one hand we have Julian Sands and Seamus Quinn, Sands security man. They both work for a very bad man by the name of Edward Po. These men are behind prostitution, dog fighting, human trafficking and child solicitation in Cage's hometown.
Massed against these very bad men are the forces of better led by the immortal Penn Cage. (I say immortal tongue in cheek, because he's one of those people that can't seem to be killed.) We have returning characters Tom Cage, Penn's father. His on again/off again girlfriend Caitlyn Masters and armed friend Daniel Kelly. They might not be 100% perfect, but at least they are trying. That's why they are the forces of better, but not necessarily pure. In one of the most heated moments of the book, they are discussing whether they should take out Julian Sands. Out of the blue Cage receives a call from someone, William Hull, that says he's an attorney for Homeland Security. He tells Cage and associates to back off. Just like that they are all off the case. I'm sorry with how persistent Cage is, that's just not believable.
I also don't like how Cage has his mother and daughter come back to town, just on the word of someone who may not be who he says he is. Penn didn't ask for proof or anything. Is this a misdirection ploy by Iles? Is Cage and associates not really backing down? This whole backing down just doesn't add up. It seems obvious to me that in the remaining pages this case will be resolved. I'm just afraid with his daughter coming back, we are going to have some long, drawn out hostage situations. Obviously I have no idea what's going to happen and I hope I'm wrong.
My running question, will I finish this book? At this point, hell yes! I hope when I finish it doesn't leave me feeling deflated like a Dan Brown novel does.
January 4th, 2011 I've read to page 407. Although there's this seemingly unlikely (and to me unbelievable) truce, I'd forgotten that another character is acting independently. His name is Walt Garrity, using the cover name as J.B. Gilchrist. He doesn't know about the truce so he continues to work the case. He's trying to bring down the bad people led by Julian Sands. Unfortunately for him, Garrity has met the high class prostitute Ming. (Isn't high class prostitute an oxymoron?) I don't think that is coincidental, I'm sure Sands knows all about Garrity's true motives. Ming is part of the Sands plan to bring down Garrity. That's because Iles bad guys seem to know almost everything and have unbelievable power. It's one of Iles story ideas that drive me crazy, no one is as powerful as Iles' villians.
Cage also essentially asks Caitlyn to marry him and they can leave Natchez and go live where she wants. She basically tells him, "I'll think about it". She may or may not agree to meet him for lunch the next day. Also Cage has decided to step down from being mayor, which I think is a good idea. I think Iles realized that Cage being the mayor was a non-starter. Cage served Iles purpose in the story for being mayor. To me, Cage being the mayor is probably the least interesting thing about this book.
Cage and associates may have backed down, or at least pretending like they are. However of course the bad guys, Sands and associates, aren't backing down. They kidnap Caitlyn and show their true purpose. Of course, Cage stupidly has brought back his daughter Annie and his Mom to Natchez. Iles writes very well and its intense fiction, but it's dumb things like the above that drive me crazy. Cage is so smart, but he makes stupid errors like bringing his family back.
Page 467: Caitlyn has been kidnapped and is held prisoner with Linda Church in a kennel like room. Sands et. al is using her as a way to control Cage. However Caitlyn is her own woman and she isn't waiting until someone comes and rescues her. I like this by Iles, that's very consistent with Caitlyn's tenacious personality. She starts working on a plan to get her and Church out of there. (Cliche alert: no one left behind.)
However they have several obstacles before they can get free, including the very vicious and trained Bully Khata dogs surrounding them outside where they are being held. Cage also has another run in with the crooked D.A. Shad Johnson. He knows that Johnson is on Sands payroll, Cage is trying to use that information to get something that Johnson has. Then it's time for Kelly and Cage to go out and search for Caitlyn. But again Caitlyn is not waiting for someone to rescue her.
I finished the book on January 5th, 2011, it has 577 pages. Now do I think that Iles writing style has some weaknesses? Yes, I certainly do. However I will say he knows how to pull you into a story and not let go. I like to read a bit of a book, then let it sink in. However at about 8:00 last night I couldn't stand it anymore. I went and read the final 110 pages in one swoop.
Caitlyn manages to escape, but only after Church commits suicide. Church was too injured and broken to attempt an escape. That's good because Caitlyn had to use Church's body as a decoy to escape. That was one of a few horrific decisions that had to be made in the final 100+ pages. Caitlyn is just able to escape her captivity, however she's not completely out of danger.
Cage and Kelly and others go up in a helicopter with heat seeking equipment in order to find Caitlyn, but they can't find her. It was good that Caitlyn had the wherewithal to escape on her own. Caitlyn walks back to the outskirts of town, where she's able to call someone who comes and rescues her. It's a friend from the paper, who delivers her to Cage's home. I'm glad Caitlyn got free, she's one of my favorite characters in the series. It's also good to see that Cage and associates aren't perfect. Frankly they are so successful at so many things that it strains credibility just a bit.
Walt Garrity, as JB Gilchrist, is trying to be undercover, but instead he gets caught. The girl that's his "lady" was suppose to kill him, however she didnt. She told Gilchrist her name was Ming, but it really is Jiao. She's Sands girlfriend, she doesn't understand all the bad things that he's doing. Garrity goes and tells Cage how he had got busted and he headed back home in his RV.
Cage then uses his leverage over the DA, Shad Johnson, and gets his help. Hopefully Johnson won't be back in book 4, he's a very lame character. I know there are suppose to be bad people in the books so that the good guys can have something to play off. However when one of the bad guys is so one dimensional, I think Iles can safely get rid of him.
Caitlyn meets Jaio at a coffee place. She convinces Jaio to help Cage etc. she's going to get some mini tape recorders into places on the boat so that they can continue to build their case against Sands and Po.
The ending Sands has bombs destroy links holding the Magnolia Queen to the shore, the boat that is meant to be stationary starts going down the river. Then there's the extended finale where Sands and Quinn finally receive some justice. Then awhile later Kelly calls them and they go to meet him. He secretly has Seamus Quinn as a hostage. He wants to let Caitlyn exorcise her demons caused by what Quinn did to Linda Church. She seems to be able to do that, but how she gets there is horrific. Also what kind of physic scar,if any, will that leave later in the series? I don't know if Iles will explore that, but I'd like to see him do that.
Five days later Master's and Cage chat on a boat of a friends and they dump Church's ashes in the Mississippi. They also reconcile, agree to get married and have more kids. Caitlyn's biological clock seems to be ticking rapidly. They also are going to stay in Natchez a couple of more years and then reassess where they are at that point. Disappointingly it looks like Cage isn't going to step down early, but will remain mayor. That's too bad, because I don't think it's working. He's someone that works outside of the system better.
Then Penn's father, Tom, has a heart attack and Caitlyn and Penn rush to his office. Tom thinks he's dying and he wants to tell Cage something very important before he dies. That's the set up for Book 4 in the Penn Cage series. That book "Unwritten Laws" won't be out until August, 2011.
Overall I thought this was a good, but not amazing book. There were some things that were predictable, but there were things that caught me by surprise. If you can guess what's going to happen, I think that's the worst thing you can say about any work of fiction. Overall these are pretty good books, but they aren't quite up to Dennis Lehane's Kenzie/Gennaro novels. I will definitely read book 4 when it finally comes out.
Thankfully where Dan Brown's book leaves you feeling empty when finished, like you ate a whole box of Twinkies. When I'm done with Iles books, I feel like I just ate the literary equivalent of a steak. Overall I would give this book a semi solid B. His best book of this series still is the amazing "Turning Angel" by a long ways.
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