Owen Laukkanen

Criminal Enterprise is the second Windermere and Stevens book by Owen Laukkanen, and as good as the first one is (The Professionals), this one is better. The criminals in Laukkanen’s books are not career criminals or people from disadvantaged backgrounds. They are mostly unremarkable people, some even affluent, who face a crossroad and head down a path that grows increasingly dangerous and violent.

The villain in Criminal Enterprise, Carter Tomlin, is an ordinary, affluent middle-age show more businessman who faced with job loss, turns to robbing banks. The ease at which each little decision steers him down a path from which it becomes increasingly difficult and eventually impossible to return is both fascinating and frightening. The idea that someone like this could be your neighbor, your kids’ basketball coach, and even your spouse with you not having the first clue about their secret life is shocking and makes for great drama.

The relationship between FBI agent Windermere and Minnesota State Investigator Stevens presents a likewise fascinating and unique dynamic. As a team, who are not really partners, they work incredibly well together. There’s also a quasi-romantic attraction between them that is never acted on and very complex.

The plot moves forward crisply and at a very fast-pace, aided by short chapters and alternating viewpoints that keep you reading to see what happens next. Laukkanen is especially gifted at making you feel like you have a ringside seat to watching someone’s life unravel, and even as fortuitous as they may be in evading capture, they are also unable to break free of the downward spiral and the noose that you feel inexorably tightening around their necks.

The action is well-written and thrilling. Frightening, violent and compelling. There are a number of possible outcomes that prevent you from seeing exactly how things will play out and this keeps you on the edge of your seat all the way to the end. If there is a formula to be discerned on the basis of his first two books (ordinary people turned criminals, seemingly mismatched partners who work well together, secondary bad guys racing the cops to get to the main set of criminals), it’s a formula that works well because of the very strong writing.

If you enjoyed Laukkanen’s first book, you will enjoy this one as well. If you are new to his work, you can jump in without having to have read the first book. This is an exceptionally well-written thriller and this is an author you will be hearing a lot more from in the future. Highly recommended.

I was fortunate to receive an advance copy of this book. show less

The premise of The Professionals really intrigued me. A group of friends who are graduating from college in an economy where they are unlikely to find high-paying jobs jokes about turning to kidnapping to make a living. The more they think about it, the more they think that they just need to go out and try it to see if they can pull it off. One kidnapping turns into many, each carefully plotted to stay under the radar of law enforcement. The targets are carefully studied, ransoms are kept show more low and spouses are scared into not reporting the crime for fear of future retaliation. Everything is on track until a kidnapping goes bad. They are forced to scramble for another target and that replacement target changes everything.

I thought the book was well written and quite suspenseful. I found it interesting how the author wrote both the kidnappers and law enforcement as sympathetic characters. You could understand both sides. There were some great plot twists and I did not want to put the book down. I wanted to know what was going to happen next to the characters. It is one of those plots that seemed like once things were set in motion, nothing could be done except to see it through to it's conclusion and yet I was surprised along the way by several unforseen twists. I would recommend The Professionals to anyone who likes a nicely paced, suspense-filled thriller. Very good first effort by Owen Laukkanen.

(Review based on complimentary Advance Reader copy.) show less

"The Forgotten Girls" are a sad subculture of runaways, drug addicts, prostitutes, alcoholics, and other lost souls, some of whom stow away on trains at great peril to their health and safety. Adding to their woes is a vicious and sadistic monster, who assaults, tortures, mutilates, and murders vulnerable females. He is pretty sure that the police will not expend much time and energy on these cases. The villain, nicknamed the "ghost rider," renders himself invisible until he suddenly show more reappears to claim another victim. Kirk Stevens (of Minnesota's Bureau of Criminal Apprehension) and FBI agent Carla Windermere, members of a joint task force, along with various other law enforcement personnel, brave the bitter cold of the Rocky Mountains to track down a savvy, resourceful, and elusive felon who is very much at home in his killing grounds.

Owen Laukkanen is a Canadian writer with a terrific feel for how setting can create a mood. He conveys the wind's biting chill, the snow's relentless assault, and the fear of succumbing to frostbite and exposure in such forbidding weather. We empathize with the misguided Mila Scott, a young meth addict who foolishly risks her life to avenge the slaying of a former friend. Mila, who has more spunk than common sense, has little money, craves a fix, and does not have to resources to tackle a hulking maniac. Meanwhile, Stevens and Windermere always seem to be several steps behind their quarry. They, along with others who assist in the chase, use helicopters, night-vision equipment, and heat sensors to find their target before he kills again, but they are woefully overmatched by a fiend with impressive survival skills.

This is a chilling but compulsively readable thriller about yet another lunatic who hates women (how often does this theme crop up?). Laukkanen keeps things real by showing that even experienced cops make mistakes in strategy and execution, villains may outsmart their antagonists, and innocent people do not always escape unscathed. Although "The Forgotten Girls" is violent, dark, and depressing, it is also a gritty, suspenseful, and engrossing work of fiction. show less

This is a fun and fast read that left me rooting for the "good" guys and "good" guys. Laukkanen creates ordinary likable characters with ordinary unlikable traits and cleverly parallels the agents Windmere and Stevens with the gang of recent college graduate kidnappers. The kidnappers and the agents find themselves in an unordinary chase that comes to a predicatable but satisfying end. Think of Thelma and Louise stopped in the canyon and then the car accelerates from there--the same show more inevitable momentum carries this story from page one to the final pages where you are still hoping everything will turn out okay--for everyone. The narrative flows as if made for the movie screen and a cast of attractive young hollywood actors waiting for their break out and I will be there, even if the book is always better than the movie. Windmere and Stevens will be back in Laukkanen's next work, and I will be there, too. show less