I noticed that Robert Crais has a new Joe Pike novel out called The Sentry and I looked for my earlier review of a Joe Pike novel and couldn’t find it on my blog, Opps – I must have forgotten to add it. So … here you are.
The First Rule
By
G.P. Putnam’s Sons
$26.95, hard cover, 308 pages, 978-0-399-15613-7 (2010)
The book starts out strong with a home invasion by Serbian organized criminals who not only invade a suburban home, but also brutally murder Frank Meyer and his family. What this criminal gang from the former
The first rule of the Serbian gang members is that other criminal gang members come before everyone else – including all family members. If any of the rules are broken, they’re punishable by death. In other words, these are serious tough guys.
Too bad for them that they killed a former friend of Joe Pike, because Pike has a first rule too: don’t mess with Joe Pike.
When Pike first goes to the scene of the murders, he is shown pictures of Frank Meyer after they found him killed. Pike doesn’t want to see pictures of Frank’s wife and children. But as Pike leaves the house, he starts looking various movie posters and pictures on the walls.
Pike found a picture of Frank and Cindy, then moved to a picture of Frank and Cindy with the two boys. Cindy was squat and sturdy, with short brown hair, happy eyes, and a crooked nose that made her pretty. Pike studied more pictures. The two boys, then the four of them together, father, mother children, family.
Pike took a breath, let it out, then found Chen back in the dining room.
“Show me the family.”
“You want to see what they did to his wife and his kids?”
Pike wanted to see. He wanted to fix them in his mind, and have them close when he found the men who killed them.
After this powerful beginning, I was expecting a lot. Unfortunately, Pike is so physically and mentally overpowering that there aren’t many surprises in the book. Pike plows ahead and destroys anyone in his way. Crais fails to imbue Pike with enough human frailties for the reader to ever believe that he’s going to fail. It’s like watching the Rambo or Steven Segal movies – plenty of action with very little tension.
In the earlier Joe Pike novel, The Watchman, what made Pike so appealing was not only his strength, but the definite signs of a soft side of Pike’s granite persona. Very little of that comes through in The First Rule. That’s too bad. It’s the contrast between hard and soft that makes fictional characters believable and entertaining.
Buy it on Amazon here. If you’ve already read it and are looking forward to reading The Sentry, buy that book here.
Hmm.. sounds good. I have few books from him.. this one is his new writings?
Posted by: Seattle dui attorney | March 03, 2020 at 03:44 AM
Pike is so psychologically and actually frustrating that there aren't many excitement in the book.
Posted by: Marriage Counseling Jacksonville FL | April 20, 2020 at 02:56 AM