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A review by rhganci
Plum Island by Nelson DeMille
4.0
PLUM ISLAND is the first real detective novel I've read in quite some time, and as a character introduction, a later-day treasure hunting novel, and as a fairly procedural murder mystery with an anything-but conclusion, it succeeds in reintroducing me to the genre and its merits.
The character/setting relationship is a fail-safe combination: NYC detective on medical leave due to three gunshot wounds suffered in the line of duty goes to stay in the Hamptons where he gets drawn into a bizarre and mysterious investigation of the double homicide of his two new friends there. Mystery abounds as DeMille takes us all over the eastern half of Long Island, from the wine fields to three century old pirate coves to a secret military installation known for its research on bioweapons. Anthropology and archaeology meet in the form of the alluring Emma Whitestone, and the story gets a really great bad guy in the form of the avaricious, debt-ridden vintner Frederic Tobin, whom you hate immediately, and about whom you feel really good about being the perp. Gunshots, wisecracks, one-liners, and observations about how Midwesterners might react to having to ask a New Yorker for directions to the Empire State Building abound, and as the plot moves it is informed by that rich texture, a hardened New York cop and the rich privilege of the Hamptons.
What makes this whodunnit different from others is that DeMille doesn't go all in the who, but rather spends a good chunk of the sizable 700 pages of text explaining exactly the what and the why. Tobin is deplorable from the second you meet him, and Corey was so fond of the Gordons that you can't help but want to pair a nasty guy like that with the nice memory of Corey's friends. In this, DeMille offers more satisfaction than shock value, but I found that it did not detract from the plot in any way. Rather, in enhanced it, so when Corey literally guts Tobin (!) after finally confronting him, the resultant effect is more emotional than intellectual. It's a more savage side of Corey, in that scene and a few others a cop with a grudge rather than a good-natured freelancer, that complements the wittiness that never turns off, even when a raging sea battle in the middle of a hurricane is taking place--and this the most remarkably exciting sequence of the book. I'll certainly be checking in with John Corey in the other books by DeMille that feature him, as he's a great lead that offers the reader anything that he or she could ask for in a detective novel.
The character/setting relationship is a fail-safe combination: NYC detective on medical leave due to three gunshot wounds suffered in the line of duty goes to stay in the Hamptons where he gets drawn into a bizarre and mysterious investigation of the double homicide of his two new friends there. Mystery abounds as DeMille takes us all over the eastern half of Long Island, from the wine fields to three century old pirate coves to a secret military installation known for its research on bioweapons. Anthropology and archaeology meet in the form of the alluring Emma Whitestone, and the story gets a really great bad guy in the form of the avaricious, debt-ridden vintner Frederic Tobin, whom you hate immediately, and about whom you feel really good about being the perp. Gunshots, wisecracks, one-liners, and observations about how Midwesterners might react to having to ask a New Yorker for directions to the Empire State Building abound, and as the plot moves it is informed by that rich texture, a hardened New York cop and the rich privilege of the Hamptons.
What makes this whodunnit different from others is that DeMille doesn't go all in the who, but rather spends a good chunk of the sizable 700 pages of text explaining exactly the what and the why. Tobin is deplorable from the second you meet him, and Corey was so fond of the Gordons that you can't help but want to pair a nasty guy like that with the nice memory of Corey's friends. In this, DeMille offers more satisfaction than shock value, but I found that it did not detract from the plot in any way. Rather, in enhanced it, so when Corey literally guts Tobin (!) after finally confronting him, the resultant effect is more emotional than intellectual. It's a more savage side of Corey, in that scene and a few others a cop with a grudge rather than a good-natured freelancer, that complements the wittiness that never turns off, even when a raging sea battle in the middle of a hurricane is taking place--and this the most remarkably exciting sequence of the book. I'll certainly be checking in with John Corey in the other books by DeMille that feature him, as he's a great lead that offers the reader anything that he or she could ask for in a detective novel.