JEFFERY DEAVER AND COLTER SHAW

This incredibly brilliant story teller and plotter has engrossed me yet again. If you want to step outside of the normal then these four books will take you into another world full of plot turns and surprises. The pedigree of Mr Deaver is listed within each book and, I ask, how can one man write so many. Obviously he can.

The series is now of four books starting with The Never Game (2019). The family and life of Colter Shaw has been studiously set out and as the story progresses we get more and more. There is reference to the father Ashton Shaw, his way of living and beliefs, that create a mystery which continues through the first book and into The Goodbye Man (2020).  And it has to go beyond that one too for after two books the mystery is still there and eventually the end must come. 

Each book contains a new story. Colter Shaw with his fathers training has exceptional talents. He is a reward seeker in the sense of tracking people who have walked away, become lost and are the victims in a kidnapping. He does it for money but he displays values and high ethics. It can be said that he is a hero? There is fantasy here too and I enjoyed it. 

The Never Game takes the reader into ‘gamers’, into Silicon Valley and the corporate world. What is really real or not. The second, The Goodbye Man, is different, apart from the continuing family matter of Mr Shaw senior. This later one deals with injustice and the search for what really did happen. Colter Shaw has high ideals and they are displayed here. There are seriously nasty people out there and Deaver takes us into the cult world. 

No plot spoilers allowed in my reviews but the endings are worth reading. I never read the blurb as I don’t want to spoil what I can find out for myself. Generally speaking this series is in the crime genre, can be termed thrillers and even travel into fantasy. Any reader should have some idea what they will get from this writer. Why bother with the marketing spiel when the real thing is to read and to be entertained. 

Third in the series is The Final Twist, published in 2021 and lastly, Hunting Time, in 2022. I have these two to get stuck into. Jeffery Deaver will again be at Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writers Festival in Harrogate in July. Listening to him is worth an hour of my time.