Sandra Brown's latest novel consumes the reader

Last Saturday at noon I started reading Sandra Brown’s novel Lethal.

By 1 a.m. Sunday, after reading all day, I had a decision to make: should I keep reading all night too or save and savour the rest for the next day?

I chose to savour but then woke up at 6 a.m. after dreaming about the characters all night. By Sunday noon, after almost 24-hours of total absorption, I was at the kitchen stove, book in hand, while I stirred the mushroom soup. Making supper was challenging.

I’ve read Brown’s novels before and like her romance/thriller style, but as the name of this book suggests, it is a deadly read. Before you start reading it you’d better decide to give up your world for a day or two because you won’t be able to leave this story alone.

The action begins on Page 1, when four-year-old Emily Gillette tells her mother Honor, that a sick man is lying under a shrub bush on their front lawn.

Until that moment, it’s an ordinary day in their household. Honor is making a cake. She leaves her child licking the bowl and goes out to investigate. The woman sees a pool of blood under the man and she is not sure if the man is breathing. She leans over to check for a pulse and the man grabs her by the throat and shoves a gun into her ribs.

What follows is a hostage-taking and kidnapping that left me breathless with fear for Honor, who is a widow, and for her child. At times I became so involved in the drama I found myself closing my eyes, as if afraid to read any more.

The man, Lee Coburn, forces Honor to go back in the house as he threatens to kill her and Emily. He is demanding, abrasive and frantic, and apparently starved.

With “a bolt of terror” (Brown’s words not mine), Honor recognizes the man as one whose face she saw that morning on a newscast. “You’re the man who shot all those people,” she says.

So there she is with the devil sitting at her kitchen table as he rams cupcakes into his mouth.

Brown’s sentences are short and sparsely written. She saves her adjectives and instead describes the action with quotes. ‘”Please!” Honor begs. “My little girl —”

“See how easy it would be for me to hurt you?” Coburn asks.

Despite its length, some parts of Lethal seem rushed and a tad unrealistic. It’s hard to believe that after all those reported murders along with Coburn’s vocalized threats that it takes less than 24 hours for him to convince Honor that he is really a nice guy.

In the end, does the reader care?

Brown had to move the story along somehow and the ensuing action is so fast paced it’s as if the reader is inside the house with Honor as she turns away long-known friends to protect her child from Coburn’s threats. Then she sends them away to protect and hide Coburn.

The story takes place in Louisiana and Brown describes what it’s like to live in that state after the disaster of Hurricane Katrina. Brown writes that gangs have formed and now control parts of New Orleans.

Anyone who has travelled in the southern United States will have been stopped near the Mexican border as patrols search motor homes and cars for contraband and fugitives. These patrols wear big, unholstered guns on their hips as they allow their fang-baring dogs to sniff every vehicle.

Brown explains why such an obvious violent, officious show of control is necessary. Some of the most lethal things in her novel happen to young Mexican women and men, who end up as slaves.

In Lethal you’ll find suspense, action, corrupt cops, rugged good guys and a twist or turn on every page. For weekend escape reading it doesn’t get much better than that.