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NO MAN'S LAND
by G. M. Ford
William Morrow, June 2005
320 pages
$16.95
ISBN: 0060554827


Buy in the UK | Buy in Canada

Former creative writing teacher G M Ford has distinguished himself in creating the series featuring writer Frank Corso as well as the lighter series whose protagonist is investigator Leo Waterman. Ford writes a slick thriller and NO MAN'S LAND exemplifies his talents admirably.

Timothy Driver, a captain in the US Navy, forcibly retired after murdering his wife and her lover, has taken over Meza Azul, the high-security Arizona prison. Driver, whose notions of 'honour' form a large part of his character throughout the story, has Cutter Kehoe, a notorious murderer who likes to keep things tidy by killing witnesses, as his henchman.

Driver demands that Frank Corso, who wrote a book about him, be delivered to the prison. In order to while away the hours until Corso arrives at the facility, for light entertainment the duo executes a hostage every six hours.

Corso, brooding on the defection of erstwhile lover Meg Dougherty, forsakes his near anchorite existence in order to prevent further killing and allows the authorities to send him within the prison walls in exchange for the hostages remaining alive.

Melanie Harris is the presenter of television's American Manhunt. Plunged into the publicity spotlight following the abduction and slaughter of her young daughter ten years earlier, Melanie now stands at a nexus point in her life: her marriage is failing and her show is losing ratings.

Suddenly, a gift from the gods (or something inhabiting a less elevated plane in the cosmos) sees her covering the hostage-taking at Meza Azul and the subsequent escape of Driver and Kehoe, accompanied by Frank Corso, dragged along to tell Driver's story.

While the action of this tale sizzles along, blood and guts bubbling in its wake, the details of some of the characterisations are, perhaps, somewhat less finessed. Driver's escapade is made possible by a medical appointment which is supposed to assess his psychological status, but the author can't seem to make up his mind whether to portray the baddie as a superbly clever schemer in possession of all his faculties, or a thorough crazy, babbling inanities and insanities to himself as he frees his dungeon-inhabiting dregs colleagues in pursuit of exculpation in the public mind.

Corso himself is not depicted as noble to the nth degree, nor is Melissa portrayed as terribly tragic. At times she seems quite cruel. Regardless, the violence inherent in the book leaves nothing to be desired by those enamoured of that sort of thing. Doubtless, aficionados of Ford's Frank Corso will enjoy this further outing for the disgraced journalist.

Reviewed by Denise Pickles, October 2005

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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)


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