Ben Sanders (1)

THE STAKES is the latest noir thriller from NZ writer Ben Sanders, and it's a standout. Set once again in the US, this time NYPD detective Miles Keller is onto what he thinks is a pretty good idea; ripping off rich New York criminals, with a view to early, anonymous retirement. I mean really, what could go wrong? Other than the NYPD investigation into his suspected shooting of a hitman and the reappearance in his life of fellow scammer Nina Stone? Or is it the tricky complication of the show more go-to-thug, Bobby Dean, brother of the aforementioned dead hitman, dispatched by Stone's estranged, gangster husband to find her? What with him being somebody with a big grudge against Keller for obvious reasons. Or is it the likelihood that his latest rip off, which netted him quite a tidy sum, but left a few bodies and some tricky consequences, is in danger of exploding all over him?

You'll find all these twists and turns laid out in an easy to follow manner here with just enough info to keep you up to date, and never enough to get in the road of the break neck pace that everything in THE STAKES operates under. Needless to say, "it's complicated" is the status update made to measure for this scenario. Delivered at lightening fast pace, it's also almost funny in places, and Miles Keller is one of those wonderfully wrong sorts of characters that you can't help but hope gets away with it all. What happens to Nina, what happens to Keller, and what happens to Nina's estranged husband are all part of the equation, as is the lurking Dean, and the chances that the last rip off that Keller perpetrated might come back to bite him in a big way.

Loved THE STAKES, it's got plenty of substance to back up the style that's always been there, with a strong plot, and some realistic, conflicted characters, all of which combine to explore a surprisingly interesting question - what happens when a supposedly good guy takes on the bad guys at their own game?

https://www.austcrimefiction.org/review/stakes-ben-sanders show less

If you're new to Ben Sanders work then you've got some catching up to do. Starting out with the Sean Deveraux books - THE FALLEN (2010) and BY ANY MEANS (2011) - Sanders announced himself as a purveyor of hard-boiled, American based, whatever it takes crime fiction, part hard-man, part lone-wolf, part sad guy against the world; always crash or crash through. From there he created the Marshall Grade series - AMERICAN BLOOD (2015) and MARSHALL'S LAW (2017) - both of which used the same sort of show more style, with a character that fitted into the hard-boiled, gun obsessed, blood soaked American lone wolf stylings (as I put it at the time) like a clenched fist in a black, leather glove. In 2019 he came out with THE STAKES which ramped everything up a notch, adding scammer to the hard-man character, incorporated a female sidekick, a hitman and enough twists and turns to engage the most jaded of thriller readers (this one I particularly enjoyed).

Now in 2021, Sanders' latest release is THE DEVILS YOU KNOW, this time with a central character who is himself a jaded, surfer ex-covert ops agent, who has sworn off violence and guns. So you'd think a job as head of security for a millionaire supermarket mogul would be a bit of a breeze. Not so, as it's not long into his new luxury living and a spot of surfing lifestyle, that Eugene Lamar is shot dead, along with most of the occupants of the Santa Barbara mansion, with Vincent barely getting himself and Lamar's daughter Erin out alive.

Fast-forward to a supermarket owner who owed a lot of money to a lot of very pissed off people, a daughter who may or may not know more than she's letting on, a US Marshall who's hard to fathom sometimes, and it looks like Vincent is all that's standing between daughter Erin, some very determined people, and the need to take up a gun despite his squeamishness.

It's easy sometimes, in the world of noir, hard-man based thrillers, to think it's all been done before. And whilst there are many elements here that have most definitely been done before, Sanders has developed a way of creating hard-men characters who are engaging, a bit fragile, and very real. There's even a touch of possible romance in this one that kind of works. Of course there's plenty of action as you'd hope in this sort of thriller, and there's a truly amazing level of violence of the kind of expect from an American gangster style story. There's a lot of rushing about, and thumbing of noses at the bad guys, all delivered in a prose style that's razor sharp, with a dry sense of humour given free rein.

Part of my more lukewarm response to the earlier novels by this author was because their predictability was, well, a bit too predictable. Competently delivered and very readable but perhaps not as new or surprising as you'd hope. On the other hand, these last couple of outings - THE STAKES and now THE DEVILS YOU KNOW - have warmed the response markedly. Both of these have taken the predictable elements, slapped them onto the page, and then twisted them around some truly good characters, some seriously impressive action, and some clever plotting to come up with something that's readable, engaging and quite exciting.

https://www.austcrimefiction.org/review/devils-you-know-ben-sanders show less

I was intrigued by the premise of this thriller, which is a former New York undercover cop in the witness protection program living in New Mexico and hiding from the mob. Warner Bros. has optioned the film rights, with Bradley Cooper tapped to produce and star in the lead role. When I took a look at the author’s bio, I was amazed to learn that this native New Zealander had his first book published when he was 20 years old, and still an engineering student at the University of Auckland. show more American Blood is the first book set in the United States; his previous three-book series is set in New Zealand and they were all national best sellers. I am amazed at the talent that a single person can possess!

Marshall Grade is living in relative anonymity in Santa Fe, New Mexico, after an undercover job gone wrong forces him into the witness protection program. He has some seriously bad guys after him, including an assassin named “The Dallas Man.” He subleases his house to a clueless tenant in order to stay even further off the grid, and is hiding from the federal marshal in charge of his case, whom he doesn’t really trust. He doesn’t really trust anyone.

One evening he sees a news story about a missing young woman who reminds him of someone from his past that he apparently could not save, so he decides to save this unknown woman instead. And….it’s off to the races!

Marshall uses his skills honed as an undercover cop and his survival instincts to track down information on the missing woman. He encounters a female detective recovering from a personal tragedy, and together they proceed to outwit the kidnappers in order to rescue the girl. Marshall is a bit of an anti-hero, as we learn he did some pretty nasty things during his undercover work, and most of the villains in this book are really, really, bad. I had to skim over some of the more gruesome scenes. But I commend the author for creating a compulsive page-turner (he was under 25 when he wrote this, folks)! He can definitely hold his own against other more mature and prolific writers out there.

This one’s not for the faint of heart, but the main characters are so well-drawn, with fully-realized back stories, that you can’t help but root for them, despite some not-quite-legal actions they take to save the missing woman. Ultimately, Marshall realizes that his actions can’t replace what he’s lost, but salvation can be found in all sorts of places. show less

The Marshall Grade series is American noir of the minimalist, dark kind, bought to you by New Zealander Ben Sanders.

The first book AMERICAN BLOOD (reviewed here http://reviewingtheevidence.com/review.html?id=10540) introduced the central character of Marshall Grade. Grade is a classic lone wolf, vigilante machine, with no discernible soft spots and a past littered with dodgy characters. Hence his long list of enemies and a contract killer on his tail. Flushed out of hiding when somebody as show more close to being a friend as you can get is kidnapped, it becomes obvious that somebody's after him. Equally as importantly, you simply don't mess with people who have helped Grade in the past. Period. (Yes I know, pathetic current day political reference...).

Leading on straight from the action in AMERICAN BLOOD, it's actually not that necessary to read the earlier book first. There are some absolute givens here - the good guys are really good, and the bad guys are really bad. Everybody's violent, everything is action packed and very few people are coming out of this upright or at the very least unscratched.

Having said that, there are some inklings of resolutions to elements from AMERICAN BLOOD in MARSHALL'S LAW, built into a conclusion that's not just action-packed, but violent, desperate, and very bloody. Needless to say it's hard boiled of the most solid kind. Violent, in your face, with little concession to explanation, or even dialogue, it's the action, the carnage that is centre-stage.

You really have to give author Ben Sanders points for his execution and control of that American styled noir environment. Everything works from the settings, to the dialogue and vernacular, all the while avoiding any feeling of contrivance or style over substance. It's very much that darker than dark, violent, hard-boiled, whatever it takes type of action thriller that will really appeal to fans of this style of novel.

http://www.austcrimefiction.org/review/review-marshall%E2%80%99s-law-ben-sanders... show less