The Boys from Brazil by Ira Lavin
WARNING! Spoils You for Good Novels
Holy smoke! This book was awesome! I wish I had a list of books like this, which I’d never read, and kept them back, savoring them for when I know I’m going to be on a 24-hour flight to Burma, or 13-hour layover in Newark, so I could pull it out and know, for sure, that I’m going to have my brains entertained-out.
The book starts out – Nazi hunter gets a call from a wannabe Nazi hunter in Brazil. Dr. Mangele (the “Angel of Death” from the German concentration camps of WWII) is still alive and hatching a plot to bring back the Third Reich. Dr. Mangele kills the kid before he can get the whole story out. Everything moves forward quickly from there. Suspense, amazing scenes and characterization, good pace, and about 250 pages long. Read this book and you’ll be reminded that good novels don’t have to be 1,000 pages long. (Steven King, hello!)
According to Steven King, “Levin is the Swiss watchmaker of the suspense novel.” How true. It’s amazing how Levin carefully and methodically turns the screw of each description, each character, each moment, inching up on a masterfully crafted morsel of fiction. It’s so well written, too. It’s the kind of book that inspires “deep reading.” It makes you reflect and think, something lacking from many novels these days. At times, I was so engrossed, I’d hardly notice that I’d read 50 pages, blocking everything else out. So, don’t try to cook and read with this one. The toast will most assuredly wind up burnt.
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