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Ever since it was dreamt up in the wastelands of the Nevada
desert, Las Vegas has always been a city of dreams. The dream
eventually killed its creator, Benjamin Bugsy Seigel, and
this gaudy edifice to greed and lost dreams would play host
to many more deaths. Political infighting has separated the
members of Gis Grissom's once renowned CSI team, but separation
can often be a transitory state. In the gated community of
Los Calina, a haven for the retired wealthy, Gil Grissom is
called to investigate the murder of Grace Salfer, an apparently
motiveless crime. Across town Catherine Willows, the new swing
shift supervisor, has troubles of her own. The body of Angela
Dearborn, battered and bloody, lies alone in her apartment,
another death in the city of dreams...
Killing
Game is a new novel based on the hugely successful CSI:
Crime Scene Investigation - a hundred episodes can't be
wrong. Written by the much respected writer Max Allan Collins,
whose accomplishments are numerous by anyone's standard. Within
the world of CSI he has written several novels, comics
and two video games. Outside of CSI he is a prodigious
and award winning writer of crime stories, perhaps even if
you think that you have heard nothing of his work, you might
remember a little story called The Road to Perdition,
which was turned into a great film
staring Tom Hanks, Paul Newman and Jude Law. If that wasn't
enough he makes his own movies and music.
Killing
Game is a good novel, even for non-fans of the show. It
will keep you entertained and guessing. There's no point in
saying that the killer or killers won't be caught, after all
this is the format of the show so fans will have an expectation
that the same template will be mirrored in the novel. Sometimes,
though, it's not the destination which counts but the journey.
In this case Collins has done a fine job of taking the reader
on a journey, whilst keeping them guessing at each turn of
the plot.
There
are a number of threads that run through the novel that lifts
it above your average genre piece. Although, not shoved down
the throats of the reader is the concept which many of the
characters have to struggle with, the examination of why they
do the job they do. Now it would be easy to just make the
CSI staff have a sense of over riding justice which
drives them forward, but Collins is more realistic about such
things. Personal motivation is individual to each person.
So, personal feelings, ambition and a moral centre all play
a role. The very idea of motivation finally becomes the central
idea around which the narrative revolves.
As
I am not a fan of the show I can't really say if the characterisations
are accurate, though, from a writer of this calibre I'd be
surprised if it wasn't. What I can say is that the characters
all have their own individual voices in the novel.
So,
a good read for fans of detective novels regardless of whether
they are fans of the show.
 
Charles
Packer
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