The Straw Men, by Michael Marshall, 2002
400 pages
I was quite compelled to read more books from Michael Marshall since I loved We Are Here, and this one had some great praise and was apparently deeper steeped in horror which is what I'm about. While I might not agree with it being "Scary as hell" - Stephen King, it had it's moments. But aside from those moments, it was entirely awesome nonetheless, a great thriller and mystery all round.
Once again, the key event(s) that would seem to kick it all off are already told on the back. A man finds a note from his recently deceased parents that says "we're not dead", and a girl gets kidnapped, and some guys shoot up a McDonald's.
And once again, the main story is advanced through two seemingly separate plot lines, interspersed with chapters here and there detailing the abducted girl's captivity.
It's more solidly delivered than We Are Here, I'd say, that one has a lot of stuff especially at the end that are kinda like what, but Straw Men comes back around sturdily. The guy with the dead but apparently not dead parents, Ward, goes from the note on a quest for truth, as you can imagine. He is disgruntled to find that his father, the owner of a large real estate agency, had the company shut down rather than passing it on to his heir, which advances his questions further. He finds a video tape with what would appear very mundane material, but, get this, it's anything but.
Meanwhile, an ex-CIA agent is brought back into action (though on his own accord) after the girl's kidnapping, as he believes it to be the work of the same killer he's already been on the heels of years before after his own daughter was a victim and before then.
What we uncover has to do with a secret society bent on reverting back to the ways of hunting and gathering, and they have this whack ass manifesto that says a lot of whack and stupid things about viruses and such misanthropic delusions. So they hella kill people.
It's also quite spoilable, although I suppose that's how mysteries pretty much are. They're mysteries after all. But there's some cool revelations, good shocks, and harrowing violence and vengeful atmosphere, and that humor that I enjoy. It's more straightforward in the end than We Are Here, but I dunno which I liked better. Both are brilliantly constructed.
9/10