Bearing Secrets (Wil Hardesty Novels (Paperback))

Rating:
Summary: Barre can do better than this
Review: After reading The Innocents, the first Wil Hardesty book, I looked forward to Bearing Secrets. Big disappointment! The story begins with the apparent suicide of Max Pfeiffer, a '60s radical, and a call to Hardesty from Pfeiffer's daughter, Holly. At that point the thing goes downhill rapidly. The plot is not a bad idea. Where Barre disappoints is, first, in the seemingly unending problems between Wil and his wife, Lisa. One feels it is time for them to get on with their lives. It is distracting after a time, and the reader must find it hard to identify with either of them, much less sympathize.

Second, the plot is risky. I know I couldn't write it convincingly. But Barre, making a half-hearted effort at some level of believability, fails miserably. The characters are cartoonish, the story told in jerky movements so that we don't know where we are (geographically and chronologically)most of the time. Keep an eye out for Monika and Behr. How did Barre dream them up?

As for the next one in the series I just can't say. I think I may have suffered enough with this overaged surfer dude and all his angst. I realize that a fictional detective needs his/her conflicts and tensions but as much as I liked Wil (and Lisa) at the end of The Innocents, I couln't help thinking "here we go again" at the beginning of Bearing Secrets.

Avoid this one.

Rating:
Summary: Barre can do better than this
Review: After reading The Innocents, the first Wil Hardesty book, I looked forward to Bearing Secrets. Big disappointment! The story begins with the apparent suicide of Max Pfeiffer, a '60s radical, and a call to Hardesty from Pfeiffer's daughter, Holly. At that point the thing goes downhill rapidly. The plot is not a bad idea. Where Barre disappoints is, first, in the seemingly unending problems between Wil and his wife, Lisa. One feels it is time for them to get on with their lives. It is distracting after a time, and the reader must find it hard to identify with either of them, much less sympathize.

Second, the plot is risky. I know I couldn't write it convincingly. But Barre, making a half-hearted effort at some level of believability, fails miserably. The characters are cartoonish, the story told in jerky movements so that we don't know where we are (geographically and chronologically)most of the time. Keep an eye out for Monika and Behr. How did Barre dream them up?

As for the next one in the series I just can't say. I think I may have suffered enough with this overaged surfer dude and all his angst. I realize that a fictional detective needs his/her conflicts and tensions but as much as I liked Wil (and Lisa) at the end of The Innocents, I couln't help thinking "here we go again" at the beginning of Bearing Secrets.

Avoid this one.

Rating:
Summary: Like Reading One Of The Best Ross MacDonalds
Review: Although this one starts off a little slowly, I'd recommend it as one of the best mysteries I've read recently. The plot does a wonderful job of intertwining the past with present, with a surprising and satisfying finish. Wil Hardesty does well again in the lead role, and the 60's backdrop for the historical part of the mystery is well done. Don't miss this one!

Rating:
Summary: BEARING SECRETS---I GUESS I MISSED IT!!!!!!
Review: Based on the other review I guess I missed it on this one. I really liked The Innocents so I bought the rest of the Wil Hardesty series. Boy, do I wish I had not. If you do decide to read Bearing Secrets be sure to have a pen and paper in hand and write down each character and how they relate to the book. You will need this as it is very confusing. I don't think I have ever read a book that I stayed so lost with the people in it. It goes back seventeen years and brings you up to date. There are just so MANY PEOPLE and groups involved. I ended up reading several pages twice to try to connect who was who. I guess I will read the next one as I already have it and hope it is like the first one and not the second.

Rating:
Summary: A fine PI novel
Review: Bearing Secrets is a superb novel. One has a tendency to ladle on accolades and fulsome adjectives until the feeling that no book can be THAT good becomes a barrier to readers. Expectations can be raised too high. But this is a superb novel. This complex, rhythmic, multi-textured novel reaches out to the reader and inexorably binds one tighter and tighter.

It starts with hard-nosed PI Wil Hardesty and an anguished cry for help from a prickly, vulnerable, twenty-year-old hardcase named Holly Pfeiffer. Hardesty's marriage is coming apart and he doesn't know how to stop it. Mostly to distract himself from his personal trouble, he agrees to see Holly. But when he gets to her cabin near Lake Tahoe, he is repeatedly, rebuffed. This woman is a product of her radical father's teachings. He was a veteran of Viet Nam, who then returned to Berkley and used his considerable intelligence and skill to harass the authorities and teach military tactics to a violent splinter group of dissidents. Naturally, his activities drew the attention of the establishment.

When Holly's father Max, dies in a fall from a high ledge in the mountains, Holly accuses the FBI of killing him. After all, the gospel according to Max had taught her that years earlier the FBI engineered her mother's death via a car bomb. In spite of her attempts to rid herself of Hardesty, in Holly's view just another establishment lackey, Hardesty begins a patient, earnest attempt to learn some truths. For a time, the only secrets he bares make Max look guilty. But of what? And then....

Read Bearing Secrets and you will be appalled, exhilarated, horrified and energized. This way lies death, explicit and terrible; here lies corruption and there is exploitation. You are quickly caught up in wheels within wheels. Barre builds tension and suspense cleanly and handles both with dexterity and believability. Fully-formed characters strive against insidious power, fail under the weight of crushing secrets, and strive again.

Yet author Barre does not dwell lovingly on the horror. This book is cleanly written, carefully plotted and very, very intense. It will require attention and careful reading, but Bearing Secrets will reward you in full measure.

Rating:
Summary: A fine PI novel
Review: Bearing Secrets is a superb novel. One has a tendency to ladle on accolades and fulsome adjectives until the feeling that no book can be THAT good becomes a barrier to readers. Expectations can be raised too high. But this is a superb novel. This complex, rhythmic, multi-textured novel reaches out to the reader and inexorably binds one tighter and tighter.

It starts with hard-nosed PI Wil Hardesty and an anguished cry for help from a prickly, vulnerable, twenty-year-old hardcase named Holly Pfeiffer. Hardesty's marriage is coming apart and he doesn't know how to stop it. Mostly to distract himself from his personal trouble, he agrees to see Holly. But when he gets to her cabin near Lake Tahoe, he is repeatedly, rebuffed. This woman is a product of her radical father's teachings. He was a veteran of Viet Nam, who then returned to Berkley and used his considerable intelligence and skill to harass the authorities and teach military tactics to a violent splinter group of dissidents. Naturally, his activities drew the attention of the establishment.

When Holly's father Max, dies in a fall from a high ledge in the mountains, Holly accuses the FBI of killing him. After all, the gospel according to Max had taught her that years earlier the FBI engineered her mother's death via a car bomb. In spite of her attempts to rid herself of Hardesty, in Holly's view just another establishment lackey, Hardesty begins a patient, earnest attempt to learn some truths. For a time, the only secrets he bares make Max look guilty. But of what? And then....

Read Bearing Secrets and you will be appalled, exhilarated, horrified and energized. This way lies death, explicit and terrible; here lies corruption and there is exploitation. You are quickly caught up in wheels within wheels. Barre builds tension and suspense cleanly and handles both with dexterity and believability. Fully-formed characters strive against insidious power, fail under the weight of crushing secrets, and strive again.

Yet author Barre does not dwell lovingly on the horror. This book is cleanly written, carefully plotted and very, very intense. It will require attention and careful reading, but Bearing Secrets will reward you in full measure.