Quicksand: An Eve Duncan Forensics Thriller

This Eve Duncan thriller can stand alone but is better understood and enjoyed if you have read "Stalemate" and "Pandora's Daughter". Eve Duncan is a forensic sculptor. She helps police departments all over the country and world to identify bodies where only a skeleton is found. Many of those she works on are children. She dedicated herself to this work when her daughter Bonnie who was only 7 years old was taken and her body and killer never found to this day. In "Stalemate" Eve helped a South American drug lord/rebel fighter by working on a skull her found to identify it as his missing wife. Eve was also aided by her longtime companion/lover Joe Quinn who is a detective with the Atlanta Police Department. Eve and Joe also have an adopted daughter Jane who they took in when she was about ten over a decade ago. Jane had graduated from college and is an artist in her own right. Montalvo had given Eve and Joe the names of 3 possible killers of Bonnie. Joe began investigating on his own and receives a call from the sheriff of a small-town who has been watching one of the suspects named Kistle. As Joe, Eve and Montalvo are drawn to the town in Illinois where Kistle lived, the small town police admit a young boy had gone missing and presumed drowned not long ago. Montalvo wants the FBI involved and uses his CIA connections and "bribes" to get the FBI to bring in someone to look for the missing boy. This is Megan Blair from "Pandora's Daughter". Megan is a "Listener" and more. How the hunt continues, who is really the hunter and who is really the prey and is Kistle Bonnie's killer and will he ever be caught leads Eve and Joe primarily into dangerous territory. Terrific story and exciting conclusion! Highly recommended.

This book was a great addition to the Eve Duncan series and I can't wait to read more about what happens next. Introducing Megan Blair from Pandora's Daughter was a great move on the part of Johansen. I am excited to see what comes in her next installment of this thrilling series.

Having read the whole Eve Duncan series I can tell you this is the best of the bunch. The introduction of Megan to this series was done perfectly. There are times when you can actually feel her pain while she is "listening". Although one could jump right in and start reading this series I would recommend starting from the beginning as it will help tie everything in together. A truly great read!!!

Iris Johansen knows her characters. She weaves characters from one book to the next with ease. You sometimes have to keep a scorecard of who's who, but it is certainly worth it. In Stalemate, we met Montalvo, the mysterious Latin who hired Eve Duncan to do a facial reconstruction in exchange for information regarding Bonnie, Eve's daughter who was kidnapped and killed. Her body was never found. Of course an event like this is life changing, but Eve put a positive spin to it - she pulled her life together, went to school, and became a forensic sculptor, helping 'find' lost people's identities and letting them 'go home' to their families for proper burial. Montalvo, and his right hand man, Miguel, are somewhat shady characters, but we see them as men of integrity, and their feelings for Eve are true. Enter a character from Pandora's Daughter,Megan Blair. She is a 'Listener'. She hears the voices of the lost souls and helps find them for the family to find closure. She also learns all the gory details of the final moments of the victims and it is horrible to relive that as she finds these lost souls... Enter Henry Thistle - a serial killer who claims he killed Bonnie, and wants Eve to be part of the hunt - to prevent other killings, while Thistle chases her in a sadistic dance of cat and mouse. Quicksand is probably one of the best of the series - I have always been fascinated by the communication between Eve and her daughter, Bonnie. At first, it was intimated that Eve dreamed of Bonnie and their conversations. I never thought that. I always envisioned Bonnie as Spirit and she comes to comfort her mother. That has proven true. Bonnie is spirit. She is an important part of this series - love never dies - she feels no animosity towards her murderer - she is beyond that - she is, however, tremendously concerned about her mother and wants to let her know she is ok. Megan, Eve, Joe, Eve's lover, Montalvo work to stop a madman from striking next. It is taut; it is heartbreaking; it is excellent. The ending is an amazing one that we didn't think would ever happen, and shows that Bonnie is a strong spirit working through the love of her family to be understood. Knowing a lot of the back story of Eve Duncan's past would be good, but I think someone new to to the series would be able to jump in with this book and become part of this excellent series. One thing - a really trivial thing - Perhaps Ms. Johansen could change her photograph for subsequent books. She is a lovely lady, and the photo used does not do her justice. The Eve Duncan series is a brilliant character study - of so many characters and so many situations you will be amazed by Ms. Johansen's writing skills to incorporate all facets of this story to a believable, workable story. Excellent.

She became a forensic sculptor to put a face on the skeletal remains to bring closure to the families of the dead victims. Eve Duncan knows what it is like not to have that closure and not a day goes by that she doesn't think of her seven year old daughter Bonnie who was taken from her years ago. Her live in lover Atlanta detective Joe Quinn has been with her whenever she searched for Bonnie's remains through a tip or a hunch but he is getting weary of seeing Eve tear herself apart whenever her search winds up in failure. Eve's friend Colonel Montalvo from South America, who is in love with her, has found three possible suspects who might have killed Bonnie. One of them Henry Thistle is located in Bloomberg and Joe goes there without telling eve to try and catch him. Montalvo contacts Eve and tells her where Thistle might be. Eve immediately goes there to be with Joe and hopefully get some answers. Thistle escapes and Joe, Montalvo and Eve mount a search for him. He has kidnapped a young girl to use as bait to lead them to his trap. Helping them is psychic Megan Blair (see PANDORA'S DAUGHTER) who hears the voices of the dead. The Eve Duncan thrillers are absolutely mesmerizing and QUICKSAND is one of the best books in the series. Almost no body can create such sympathetic characters who have endured so much pain and yet still have the strength to keep going even if it is obsessive like Eve who thinks of what she does as a mission. Montalvo inverts himself into Eve's life forging an unusual romantic triangle; but it is the action scenes that keep the audience turning the pages until they finish the thriller in one sitting. Harriet Klausner