13 Hours

The story takes place across a single day. In the early Cape Town morning almost simultaneously a young girl's body is found in a churchyard and a record producer is discovered dead in his home with his alcoholic wife sleeping nearby. Both cases are high profile and require urgent action, the first because it soon becomes clear that there is another young girl, an American tourist called Rachel Anderson, on the run from the people responsible for the dead girl and the second because if the man's wife didn't kill him then the most likely suspect is a celebrated gospel singer. Two relatively new detectives, Vusumuzi Ndabeni (Vusi) and Fransman Dekker, are put in charge of one case each. Both are being mentored by Benny Griessel who is show more something of a dinosaur in 'the new South Africa' but who has lots of knowledge and experience to share if Vusi and Dekker choose to learn from him. Benny is under enormous pressure from himself and everyone around him. Can he still cut it when it matters?

A few weeks ago I described my perfect thriller. I said

If a thriller has

* A twisty, turn-y plot that clips along at a decent pace and offers a pay-off for my investment of time (e.g. family reunited/world saved/justice done)
* At least a couple of characters who, if not exactly three-dimensional, provide enough humanity that I care whether they live (or die), triumph over adversity (or fail) or right a wrong (or don’t).

it will probably get a rating of 3 (= decent/solid entertaining read) on my personal scale. There is a chance of extra points for humour, above-average excitement levels, deeper than usual exploration of a theme that interests me, a male character who doesn’t viewevery woman he meets as a potential bed mate or a female character who doesn’t look like a supermodel yet, miraculously, proves to have some value to the world anyway. Keeping the car chases short and detailed descriptions of weaponry to a minimum also scores bonus points.

Thirteen Hours gets a tick for each and every one of these points and a bonus for something I didn't include above (but should have): an ending that didn't make me roll my eyes and/or wish I'd stopped reading 30 pages beforehand. In essence it's a perfect example of its genre and I absolutely loved it.

In thrillers plot is king and here the story is fast, unpredictable and has just the right level of complication. We switch back and forth between the two cases with often breathtaking speed and there are no convenient spots at which to pause for respite. This is the kind of book that the 'page-turner' cliché should be reserved for as I literally tore pages in my haste to find out what would happen next.

What excites me even more than a great story though is characters who involve and engage me and Thirteen Hours has bunches of them. Benny Griessel is intriguing: a recovering alcoholic struggling to re-connect with his family as well as find a place for himself in the newly restructured police force. But far from being dour or melancholic he's funny and philosophical while still driven to do his job well for all the right reasons. His two mentees are equally interesting though vastly different people from Benny. Vusi is a quiet man reflecting on his mother's simple view of the new world while finding his feet in a city new to him and Dekker is angry about prejudices he has been subject to as a coloured man in a black and white South Africa. There are plenty of other deft portrayals too and never knowing who would be a minor character and who would play a larger role made them all the more interesting.

Perhaps it didn't hurt that the buzzing of the dreaded vuvuzela accompanied my reading of the last few chapters of the book (during the opening moments of the football world cup final) but another of the things that the book does beautifully is create a sense of its location. It is done more subtly than in Meyer's previous books, such as when Rachel's parents learn about South Africa's crime rate from the internet and an when an elderly man who briefly helps Rachel discusses the country's past and future, but it has no less of an impact for that. All the complications of a country in a state of great change where people of all backgrounds are both eager for and fearful of the new ways are played out in a myriad of small but fascinating details.

It's not often that I feel like describing a book as perfect but I simply cannot think of a single thing I would change about Thirteen Hours. It has everything you'd want in a thriller and loads more besides, and is the hefty object I shall be hurling at the very next person who says in my hearing that crime fiction isn't real literature. show less

Usually the second book in a series isn't as strong as the first book. This book runs against the grain as this book is better than the first in this series. This is the way a mystery/thriller should be written - tight, action packed, and moves at a fast pace. I literally could not put this book down and read it far into the night for several nights in a row when I should have been sleeping. This is easily the best thriller/mystery that I have read this year. The plot centers around South African police detective Benny Griessel and 13 hours out of one day in his life. The day starts with the murder of an American tourist and the escape of her companion from the assailants. That is murder number 1. Murder number 2 is the shooting of a show more high profile South African music mogul. From there the whodunit takes off and it never stops for the rest of the novel. It is the second in the Benny Griessel series. show less

Digital audiobook performed by Simon Vance

From the book jacket: Morning dawns in Cape Town, South Africa. A teenage girl’s body has been found on the street, her throat cut. She was an American. Somewhere in Cpae Town her friend, Rachel Anderson is, hopefully, still alive. Rachel is terrified, unsure of where to turn in the unknown city. Who can she trust? How long can she stay ahead of her relentless pursuers? Racing against the clock, Detective Benny Griessel desperately tries to solve the murder and bring Rachel home safe, all in a single day.

My reactions:
This is a hard-hitting, fast-paced, police procedural with a complicated plot, a second, unrelated (or is it?) killing, and multiple twists: drugs, human trafficking, the music show more industry, and, of course, Benny’s continuing struggle as a recovering alcoholic.

He's also been named as a mentor to a group of younger investigators, and Griessel is having a hard time with his recent assignment: Inspector Mbali Kaleni, a black woman, a Zulu, a feminist. She’s eager and intelligent, but lacks the experience of Griessel and his previous partners. And she has her own agenda: trying to equate the effort expended by the police investigating cases of dead black women with that expended in the cases of missing white women. This is an interesting pairing, and I’d like to see it continue in future books.

Simon Vance is marvelous, as usual, performing the audiobook. show less

Good thriller about a girl running for her life and a murder being investigated by Capetown detectives. Though there's a bit too much about the music industry for my taste, it's a good story, and the way the plotlines intersect is neatly done. Good ensemble cast with the very real and sympathetic Benny Griessel in the lead.

My dad recommended this to me, though I don't think he realized this was a second book in a series (this is the second time I've read a second book by mistake). Regardless, I didn't realize it until I entered it into LT that it was a second -- which bodes well for the series. The novel, set in South Africa, is about an inspector named Benny Griessel and two different cases that end up being intertwined together. Ignoring everything else, Meyer's two mysteries are fantastic and gripping, but when you add to that all the drama that make up good mysteries (police politics, family life of your detective and so on), plus multiple points of few and all the issues of race that come with a story set in South Africa, you get a truly fantastic show more mystery. It get brutal toward the end, but I didn't mind because it worked within the story and the world Griessel inhabits. I also like that Meyer gives you clues as to how the stories are connected and who might be involved, but doesn't spell anything out. The moments of brilliance that make up good crime stories are also quite well done. I've gotten a copy of the first book (Devil's Peak) and I can't wait to read it. show less

Sometimes you know when you read the first page of a book that it’s going to be a great read. Thirteen Hours by Deon Meyer is just that—a thrilling police procedural that is difficult to put down.

The story opens with Rachel Anderson, an American teenager, running for her life down the streets of Cape Town, South Africa, chased by five men who have just slit the throat of her best friend, Erin Russel. How did their backpacking trip of a lifetime all go so wrong? Detective Inspector Benny Griessel, a recovering alcoholic separated from his wife, has been assigned to oversee the unseasoned detectives investigating Erin’s death and to find and save Rachel from the same fate.

At about the same time, in another part of the city, the show more famous Afrikaans music producer, Adam Barnard, is found dead in his library. Lying nearby, awakened from her drunken sleep by the housekeeper’s screams, is his wife, Alexandra, with a pistol on the floor beside her. Now there are two murders to investigate but no additional detectives. And Rachel’s time is running out; Benny knows she can’t evade her pursuers much longer.

Thirteen Hours is a breakaway entry in a field of also-ran read-alike thrillers. In rapid-fire bursts detailing simultaneous actions occurring across the Cape Town landscape, Meyer lets you experience the events as they happen so that even as you are caught up in the questioning of Alexandra you are wondering what is happening to Rachel and whether Benny is making any progress in the race to save her. And all the principal characters are fully drawn--from white Benny with his domestic failures, to the angry black Dekker, to the eager "coloured" Vusi--Meyer paints a very vivid portrait of the cultural and political complexities in post-Apartheid South Africa. This is the most satisfying thriller I can remember reading. I can't wait to read the award-winning Meyer's other novels. show less

Well crafted police procedural set in Cape Town. Of all the 150+ crime fiction books I have read, this one ranks in the top five for its suspense, clever plotlines, and compelling characters. As a bonus, add enlightenment on South African culture (racial tensions, ethnic conflicts [such as Zulu versus Xhosa], and languages [such as Afrikaans and Zulu] and beautiful descriptions of the Cape Town cityscape.