Book: The Burning Soul by John Connolly
Reviewed by: MysteryPeople Crime Fiction Coordinator Scott M.
John Connolly’s Charlie Parker is unique to crime fiction’s damaged and haunted private eyes, in the sense that he is truly haunted. After losing his wife and child, Parker finds himself on cases where human evil entwines with the supernatural. Connolly avoids snaggle toothed demons, instead using a subtlety that makes the supernatural elements almost unrecognizable from the criminal acts in the book and therefore all the more chilling.
Connolly barely uses the supernatural in the latest Parker book, The Burning Soul, which is twisted enough from the start. Charlie is hired by Randall Haight, a man who, along with another boy, killed a young girl in his youth. Given a new identity by a judge when released from juvie, Haight sets up a normal, law abiding life for himself in Pastor’s Bay, Maine. But lately someone has been sending Haight unsettling photos of barn doors, including one of the barn where the girl was killed. If that isn’t enough, Anna Kore, a girl the same age as the one Randall killed, has gone missing in Pastor’s Bay.
Charlie primarily takes the case to find Randall’s tormentor in order to find a link to the missing girl. Also drawn to the crime are a questionable FBI agent and some members of Boston’s Irish mob. All of these characters are woven together with secrets that are coming out of the past with a vengeance. This applies most of all to Charlie’s own client.
Connolly depicts Pastor’s Bay as an anguished character itself. Already hit by the bad economy, the disappearance of Anna Kore has sent it into a spiritual tail spin. A pharmacy posts a sign declaring they don’t sell Oxycontin in order to avoid robbery. Everybody is suspicious, especially an outsider like Charlie.
It’s Connolly’s skill at showing the ripples of a violent act that make this a standout book. He shows us shattered lives and some truly horrific behavior. Family proves to be more a source of immoral enabling than warmth. He takes us through all of this and more with a beautiful prose style, delivering us back, shaken but safe, with a better understanding of human nature’s dark side, possibly even sympathizing with it. Now that’s scary.
John will be here November 6th at 4pm to discuss his latest Young Adult novel, The Infernals (sequel to the bestselling novel The Gates), and will also take any Charlie Parker questions. Come on down and meet one of the greats.
BookPeople 
Mr Connolly’s great strength has always been in characterisation.
I couldn’t seem to get into this book at all which surprised me enormously as his previous Charlie Parker books have always been strong in their plot line AND his ability to make us believe in his cast.
The usual witty interplay between Parker, Angel and Louis, which illuminate his previous books in the series, is completely missing here and in fact their appearance seems almost irrelevant.
I do hope that John is not becoming bored with his creation as did C.S. Forrester with Hornblower and Conan Doyle with Sherlock Holmes as I so want to know where Parker is finally going!