Still Life with Crows (Pendergast, Book 4)

When a series of murders strikes small-town Kansas, FBI Special Agent Pendergast must track down a killer or a curse -- either way, no one is safe. A small Kansas town has turned into a killing ground.Is it a serial killer, a man with the need to destroy?Or is it a darker force, a curse upon the land?Amid golden cornfields, FBI Special Agent Pendergast discovers evil in the blood of America's heartland.No one is safe.

From Publishers Weekly

That FBI Special Agent Pendergast, one of the most charismatic thriller heroes in memory, dominates this latest novel from Preston/Child is the good news; that he's working the least interesting case of his literary career (other outings include The Cabinet of Curiosities and Reliquary) is the bad. An unusual serial killer is wreaking havoc in a small corn-growing town in Kansas; he leaves outlandish signatures, such as a mutilated body within a circle of crows on stakes and a ring of broken corn stalks. On his own initiative, Pendergast, no stranger to bizarre murders, shows up to investigate, and the authors make much hay from the contrast between the lean, infinitely refined and impossibly erudite Pendergast, a distinct descendant of Sherlock Holmes, and the down-home milieu he finds himself in. As if to emphasize his ancestry, the authors give Pendergast a Watson here: one Corrie Swanson, a rebellious, pierced and tattooed teenage girl whom he hires as his driver and guide. Further killings occur, which rumor and Pendergast tie to a 19th-century massacre of a band of outlaws by Indians. (As Pendergast explains to Corrie, he arrives at this conclusion through a "form of mental concentration, one of my own devising, which combines the memory palace with elements of Chongg Ran, an ancient Bhutanese form of meditation.") Not surprisingly, the relatively hick local cops don't like Pendergast, nor do the local politicians, who hope their town will be chosen for a lucrative experiment in genetically modified crops. When Corrie is dragged off to the killer's hideaway in a massive cave system, however, cops and Pendergast unite in an extended underground cat-and-mouse chase that will entertain readers despite their likely disappointment at the absurd, even ludicrous, identity of the villain. This may be minor Preston/Child, but it is major Pendergast; those for whom he's the cup of tea will drink deep.Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

The authors of such hits as Relic (1992) and The Cabinet of Curiosities [BKL Je 1 & 15 02] bring back Special Agent Pendergast, the FBI man whose slightly archaic dialogue, unique mode of dress, and seemingly endless array of esoteric facts make him a fascinating lead character. This time out Pendergast is in Medicine Creek, Kansas, a small town that appears to be home to its very own serial killer. The novel begins with a gruesome murder, after which we're introduced to wily Sheriff Dent Hazen, a man who doesn't take kindly to out-of-towners investigating crimes on his turf. Just as we're getting to know Hazen, the pace kicks into high gear, with more bodies and a full-tilt investigation. As usual, Preston and Child deftly mix the real and the surreal, creating an atmosphere in which everything, for reasons we can't quite nail down, seems a tad off-kilter. Call it creeping paranoia, perhaps, or the dreadful certainty that something awful is about to happen. Whatever you call it, it's a recipe for success. David PittCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About the Author

The thrillers of Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child "stand head and shoulders above their rivals" (Publishers Weekly). Preston and Child's Relic and The Cabinet of Curiosities were chosen by readers in a National Public Radio poll as being among the one hundred greatest thrillers ever written, and Relic was made into a number-one box office hit movie. They are coauthors of the famed Pendergast series and their recent novels include Fever Dream, Cold Vengeance, Two Graves, and Gideon's Corpse. In addition to his novels, Preston writes about archaeology for the New Yorker and Smithsonian magazines. Lincoln Child is a former book editor who has published five novels of his own, including the huge bestseller Deep Storm. Readers can sign up for The Pendergast File, a monthly "strangely entertaining note" from the authors, at their website, www.PrestonChild.com. The authors welcome visitors to their alarmingly active Facebook page, where they post regularly.

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