Rebel Island

I just discovered this author in the past 6 months, have read all his books to date and highly recommend him as a fresh perspective on the mystery genre..

This book was fast and easy to read and kept the interest up until the end. Good description of the Texas Gulf Coast. I discovered this author and book from "booked for breakfast" mystery book club by Bantam Dell.

Rebel Island is a "mile-long, thin strip of beach and cord grass that stretches north like a comet's tail. The southern end is half a mile wide --- just big enough for the lighthouse and the rambling old hotel..." The island gets its name from Colonel Duncan Bray, a crazy rebel who fought in the final battle of the Civil War and who was convinced that Rebel Island was Confederate soil. Bray's house, now the Rebel Island Hotel, has weathered half a dozen hurricanes, but Hurricane Aiden is testing the limits of the island, the hotel and its inhabitants. When Tres Navarre, his pregnant wife Maia and wheelchair-bound brother Garrett step off the ferry at Rebel Island, they are met by U.S. Marshal Jesse Longoria, a ruthless man who is rumored to have killed six men in cold blood. There's bad blood between Longoria and Tres, and the marshal warns Tres to get back on the boat. Tres refuses to leave. Longoria turns up dead with a bullet hole in his chest, and with the approaching storm, the killer is unable to leave the island. The storm has knocked out the phone lines, there's no mobile service, cell phones won't work and the island's only shortwave radio has been smashed to pieces. In Longoria's room, the killer left behind a crumbling candy skull wrapped in plastic. The Day of the Dead candy is the calling card of Calavera. The notorious assassin is known for using explosives to blow up his victims across South Texas. Was Longoria on the island to apprehend Calavera? Is the assassin still in the hotel? As Tres tries to make sense of it all, the manager of the hotel goes missing, and a note with the words "Find Him" is slipped under Tres's door. When the manager is later found dead, stuffed in a refrigerator, the list of suspects grows, as does the velocity of the impending storm. REBEL ISLAND has a collection of characters spicier than Texas barbeque sauce. Chase, Markie and Ty are a trio of college students out for a good time --- or maybe they're looking for something more. Benjamin Lindy is an elderly Texan lawyer who keeps his gun, and his secrets, close to his chest. Alex, a childhood friend of Garrett's, served in the Army in Kuwait and is known for creating fireworks displays. Lane is running away from an abusive spouse. And there's Imelda and her husband Jose, who are caretakers for the hotel. They may know more about the murders and the whereabouts of Calavera than they are willing to tell. The end result is a heart-pounding thriller with twists and turns, and justice served up Texas-style. --- Reviewed by Donna Volkenannt ([email protected])

Rick Riordan is proving himself a master of what I've come to think of as the "claustrophobic thriller." "Cold Springs" particularly impressed me with its psychological pressure-cooker of emotions and repressed secrets. "Rebel Island" takes that a step further, with almost all the action in the story taking place inside a crumbling old hotel in the middle of a hurricane. In that sense, this story is like a classic English country-house mystery, where you know from the start that "one of us in this room is ... The Killer" (dum dum dum!). As Riordan's fans will expect, though, the author gives the genre a distinctive South Texas twist that makes "Rebel Island" one of the best Tres Navarre stories in some time. One of Riordan's storytelling distinctions has always been the twisting plot, with suspicion pointing first one way and then another. As bodies turned up in these pages, I started making a list of who I thought the killer was. By the time I finally twigged to the right answer (satisfyingly close to the end of the book), I had identified and rejected three other candidates. And even then, the author had one or two final surprises in store. Now that Riordan has been doing it for a couple of novels, I'm more used to his new convention of only narrating some of the story in Tres' first-person view. As with "Mission Road," this technique not only lets other characters participate in the story more fully (always in third-person), but also gives us a glimpse inside the mind of the still-unidentified killer. As I've noted before, telling the story this way necessarily means we get less of Tres than we might otherwise like, but it does help increase the tension and make the story more well-rounded. In addition to being entertaining and well-written mystery novels, each of the Tres Navarre books has chronicled important changes in the character's life. The changes that have occurred between the last title and this one, however, are perhaps the biggest yet. Tres' long-term fans won't find many of the familiar characters that have made up his supporting cast to this point. As always, though, the case here ends up tugging on significant strings from Tres' own life. It's satisfying to know Tres is not static for Riordan -- the character continues to evolve and mature, and there's still more for readers to learn about his past, as well as his future. After this fast moving (I read it in an afternoon and a morning) and satisfying story, I am once again looking forward to whatever the author has in store for us next.

San Antonio based private investigator Tres Navarre radically changes his life as he retires and marries his eight month pregnant girlfriend Maia. Tres' older brother wheelchair-bound Garret persuades the newlyweds to go to Rebel Island on their honeymoon; Garret and some long time pals will be at the Texas Gulf Island where the two siblings spent family vacations. At the Rebel island dock, Tres meets rumored cold blooded killer U.S. Marshal Jesse Longoria, who believes the sleuth is on a case. They last met at the grave site of the former sleuth's best friend when Jesse wanted to insure Ralph Arguello was dead. While Tres and Maia settle into their suite at Rebel House Inn, a shot is fired. They along with Garret and the manager investigate only to find someone killed Longoria. Tres makes inquires and follows clues even as others are murdered and a hurricane heads towards the island. Although hurricanes attacking the Gulf have flooded the mystery genre since Katrina, the latest Navarre thriller is an exhilarating tale as the audience learns about the lead protagonist's salad days and his current relationships. As he digs for clues and finds hidden tunnels and passageways, the killer steals the show as the villain seems always one step ahead of Tres. Readers will enjoy Rick Riordan's terrific murder caper, Texas style. Harriet Klausner