Monday, February 18, 2013

BOOK REVIEW: THE INTERCEPT BY DICK WOLF

From Harper Collins, 387 pages
Hello, and welcome to my first post (and hopefully not my last) on this blog for 2013. I know my presence here was sporadic at best last year, but hopefully things will be better this year despite my busy writing/editing schedule.
In any event...

Let me start off by saying that I think it's fantastic that Dick Wolf has decided to start pursuing a literary career on top of his long standing television resume.
But considering his decades long association with the Law and Order franchise, one should not be surprised to see some similarities between that and his first novel.
The New York Police Department has its own Intelligence Division to discover and prevent terrorist threats before they occur. THE INTERCEPT is the fictitious first adventure of one of their investigators: Jeremy Fisk.
Fisk and his partner Krina Gersten are following a series of events from an attempted plane hijacking that had absolutely no chance of succeeding to a major assassination attempt at the re-dedication of the World Trade Center over the Fourth of July weekend.

As with any episode of any series within the Law and Order franchise, there are a couple of major plot twists before the climax that I will not give away, but will tell you that one of them I was completely surprised by!

Long time fans of his television work can easily draw parallels between his book's main cast and TV characters.
For myself, I can easily see Intel Division Captain Barry Dubin played by Jamey Sheridan, like he did James Deakins during the opening years of Criminal IntentJeremy Sisto (Detective Cyrus Lupo during the final seasons of Law and Order) could portray Jeremy Fisk, and Milena Govich seems perfectly cast to me as Krina Gersten, for the lady detective is akin to Nina Cassaday from that character's tenure on L&O.

Yet while Wolf was drawing upon familiar ground for his first novel, there is one quibble that I could not ignore, but does not spoil the overall story. When trying to figure out what the terrorist's target might be, a comment was made that thankfully "the Yankees were away", playing baseball on the west coast.

But what about the New York METS? Yankees fans in general usually ignore the "other team" except for the latest installment of the infamous "Subway Series". Yet one would think that the Intel Division of the NYPD would not ignore the National League baseball team in their fair city.

Otherwise, I give this novel a solid 'B', and wonder what Dick Wolf has planned for Jeremy Fisk next, for even the cover hints that this is only the first appearance of the character.
____________________________________________________________________________
As for me folks, HUGH MONN, PRIVATE DETECTIVE Book 2: "Catch A Rising Star", his first full length adventure is scheduled for release this year. I still have a few short story commitments to honor, then I will be starting work on the manuscript for ALPHA, Book 2: "Wayward Son"; when I'm not editing stories for the Pro Se Presents magazine or taking care of The Free Choice E-zine (www.thefreechoice.info)
I do have other articles planned for this blog, otherwise Nancy Hansen would never let me hear the end of it!

So until next time, I remain humbly yours,
Lee Houston, Junior
Busy writer/editor at large

No comments: