Copyright 2007 by Sandecker, RLLLP. Published by Penguin Group, an imprint of G.P. Putnam’s Sons, New York.

Cussler writes adventure/mystery books featuring Dirk Pitt, the Special Projects Director of the National Underwater and Marine Administration (NUMA), a fictional government agency. I like his Dirk Pitt books. Totally ridiculous plots, but a lot of fun to read.

The Chase, to my surprise, is NOT a Dirk Pitt book. I didn’t realize that until I was about a quarter of the way through the book. Cussler’s Dirk Pitt books always start with a strange scene from the past and then jump forward in time to the present day. Or at least to the day when the book was written. This one starts in 1950, then jumps back to 1906. Only when I realized that it was going to stay in 1906 did I deduce that Dirk Pitt was not going to appear.

The protagonist in The Chase is Isaac Bell, detective par excellence for the Van Dorn Detective Agency which, I am sure, is modeled after Pinkerton. He is the lead detective of a team tasked with tracking down the Butcher Bandit, a notorious serial bank robber in the west who robs banks and kills all the witnesses – over 30 murders in all. Certain clues collected by Bell lead him to San Francisco where he captures the bandit. He turns out to be a prominent citizen and wealthy banker. I am not revealing too much telling you that because it is revealed to the reader less than a third of the way into the book.

A mass murdering bank owner. Yes, that is a typical outrageous Cussler plot.

From the time the identity of the culprit is revealed it becomes a how-will-he-be-taken-down book. There is a romantic subplot and cameo appearances by Enrico Caruso, John Barrymore and a few other famous people, for no apparent reason. And you get a front-row seat for the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

Never a dull moment in a Cussler book.

Anyway, the Butcher Bandit, after being captured by Bell, escapes from San Quentin and Bell has to go after him a second time. It is a railroad chase this time – hence the title.

After finishing the book I learned that The Chase is #1 in a series of 15 books by Cussler featuring Isaac Bell. He has some of the same superhuman qualities as Dirk, but I still missed Dirk Pitt.

7 out of 10.

Copyright 2001 by J.A. Jance. Published by Avon Books, an imprint of Harper Collins, New York.

This is the first J.A. Vance mystery I have ever read. This one features J.P. Beaumont, a retired Seattle homicide detective. I guess I jumped into the middle of the series as this is #15 of the 23 Beaumont books Jance has written.

This was a great book to read while on a cruise because the entire book is set on a cruise to Alaska, on the fictional Starfire Breeze. Because the book is over 20 years old and because the cruise industry has evolved over that time, some of the details are dated. But not many. It captures the essence of cruising pretty accurately.

There are two murders here and they seem to be intertwined. In the end they are less intertwined than they first appear but figuring it all out is part of the fun. The first murder is Margaret Featherman, ex-wife of Dr Harrison Featherman who just happens to be aboard the ship for a medical conference. Quite a coincidence, right? Only it isn’t a coincidence – Margaret arranged to take the cruise with four of her closest friends, specifically to annoy her ex and his new wife. She goes overboard before dinner early in the cruise and no one sees it except for a man with Alzheimer’s who spends the day watching the very boring aft camera. No one believes that he saw someone go overboard – except Beaumont. He gets access to the security tapes and verifies that she did, in fact, go overboard. And not accidentally – the security footage is clear enough to see that she has duct tape on her mouth.

Beaumont learns that there are two FBI agents on the ship, posing as a married couple, with the task of both protecting Dr Featherman from a shadowy group called Leave It to God (LITG) who had a list of doctors who were performing cutting-edge procedures that saved lives that would otherwise be lost. Dr Featherman, who had pioneered an in vitro procedure to save genetically flawed fetuses, was on the list.

The second murder was the Alzheimer’s witness who was pushed off a train during an excursion in Skagway. A passenger who was associated with Dr Featherman – and who had benefited from Featherman’s life-saving surgery – was present when that murder occurred. The believe was that LITG had targeted him as well and had pushed the wrong man off the train.

Two interesting murders, some well-drawn characters, a shadowy killer organization, some romance (Beaumont and one of Margaret Featherman’s travel companions), all within the confines of a cruise. Great fun.

It was my first Jance book but it probably won’t be my last.

8 out of 10.