The Killing Hour

February 4, 2013
First published in 2007 outside the U.S., New Zealander Cleave’s second Christchurch crime thriller (after The Cleaner) opens on a strong note. When tormented Charlie Feldman, a Christchurch teacher, realizes he may have been directly involved in the deaths of two women, whose murders are leading the news, he seeks out his ex-wife, Jo. Charlie claims he almost hit one of the women with his car, but he stopped and rescued her and the other woman from the savage assaults of a crazy man, whom he thought he killed. Charlie safely returned the women to their respective homes, where their not-quite-dead assailant later impaled them to death. Jo, who left Charlie after witnessing him lose control, has a hard time believing his wild account, and an even harder time believing it after he abducts her to protect her from the “real killer.” Over-the-top developments mar what otherwise is a nicely ambiguous suspense novel. Agent: Jane Gregory, Gregory and Company.

March 15, 2013
Charlie Feldman's really bad week starts when he wakes up late Mondaywith a bump on his head, cuts on his face, and blood on his shortsto news of the identical, brutal murders of two women, knowing he was somehow involved. But although details of events come back to him gradually, along with sightings of the ghosts of the victims, Charlie is certain that the real killer was a man named Cyris. As Charlie abducts his estranged wife to protect her from Cyris, Detective Bill Landry, who has just received a cancer diagnosis giving him six months to live, is on Charlie's trail with his own brand of justice in mind. Cleave's fiction set in his native Christchurch, New Zealand, is typically dark and bloody, combining elements of the thriller and horror. The darkness and the blood are present this time, too, though the tone is more that of mainstream crime fiction. Here he dangles the question of truth or delusion until midbook and fashions multidimensional characters, even the worst of whom have redeeming qualities. A roller-coaster ride of a thriller with an Everyman threatened on all sides.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)