Chuck Driskell

I picked up this book, not knowing what to expect. What I initially got was an authors fascination with women's rear ends and erections at the drop of a hat. There are two main characters in this book, and it seems that both of them want to become surgeons. The first one saws off his own injured leg, while the second one does facial reconstruction on himself. This was the first half of the book and I thought about giving up, but decided to plod along. I am glad that I did. The second half show more was continued excitement and I can use the phrase, "I didn't see that coming." It is well written and I recommend it. show less

Compelling storytelling, good writing that flows well and only sometimes makes me wish I had a red pen in my hand. Toward the end I really did not want to put it down. The format—alternating personal journal entries with real-time suspenseful action—was effective at developing characters and moving the story forward at a good pace. I would definitely read this author again.

Now there is a name to conjure with – Gage Nils Hartline. Doesn’t really trip off the tongue, but as he is generally referred to as simply “Gage”, it isn’t too bad. Obviously not his real name, as a former soldier he is trying to escape his past. He takes on well-paid roles, but in one of these he discovers a hidden compartment in which he finds a series of diaries written by a young girl in the mid to late 1930’s. The contents of these diaries would be explosive to say the show more least, and they attract the attention of people who will stop at nothing to try to obtain them. This despite Gage’s attempts to keep the diaries a secret until more can be found out about them, but his girlfriend’s brother, who is a book dealer in debt, and to whom they turn for help, allows information about them to become known by the criminals to whom he owes money. From that point control of the situation spirals downwards rapidly.
The information contained in the diaries is fascinating, and, if true, would have had tremendous consequences, but Gage manages in the end to come up with a very satisfying, and to my mind, appropriate way of dealing with them to the benefit of a number of people without revealing any of the secrets contained therein.
That only happens after a serious amount of toing and froing across Europe, quite an amount of violence, and a great deal of subterfuge.
I very much enjoyed this book, despite the idea of discovered diaries having become rather more commonplace in novels over the past few years. This one has sufficient difference in it to make me recommend it quite highly, and to look forward to the next novel in the series, by an author of whom I had not previously heard. show less

It's 1938 and Jewish children are in hiding in Austria. Neil Reuter is a wreck in San Francisco after the death of his wife when a letter arrives for him asking him to get the children out. Will Neil be able to pull himself together to save them?
The details and characters are excellent in this book. I wish it was a series with different characters and situations set in this time period. Excellent.