Review #90: Chasing the Night by Iris Johansen

Chasing the Night by Iris Johansen

Genre: Mystery

Series: Eve Duncan series

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

ISBN: 978-0-312-65119-0

Price/Pages: $27.99/384

Release Date: October 19

My Thoughts and Description:

Surprisingly in all my years of working in bookstores and being a mystery lover, I have never picked up an Iris Johansen book. She's only written about...oh, 40 books or so. I just figured she'd always be there to some day pick up. I finally found that day.

Chasing the Night is her latest installment in her Eve Duncan series. Eve is a Forensic Sculptor who pieces together the bones of the dead, reconstructing them in

hopes to identify them.

She is very good at what she does and because of it, she is kept very busy.

Having never read any of the other books in the series, I got a small glimpse into Eve's world and personality. She has a lover, Joe Quinn, who happens to be a tough good looking cop (gotta love those). She has an adopted daughter Jane who she rarely sees. And she has a ghost...of her abducted daughter Bonnie, taken from her years ago. Her disappearance was never solved and it haunts Eve all these years later.

She uses that pain to guide her and motivate her to find the identity of her victims, mostly children. She wants to give the hurting parents the closure she never had.

I think I may like Eve. I think I may want to go back and read more about her. I didn't necessarily feel like I was missing out on a whole lot for this particular book but for my own weirdness in reading books in order, I may go back and see how it all started.

Chasing the Night matches Eve up with Catherine Ling, a troubled woman who is searching for her own lost child, Luke. Luke was taken when he was 2 by a Russian gangster that Catherine had brought down during her time in the CIA. Rakovac, the gangster, has been baiting Catherine for years, torturing her by not telling her whether Luke is alive or dead.

Catherine is determined to end this game and find her son, nine years later. She approaches Eve, knowing she can help her do an age progression on Luke. Eve is known for caring for her subjects, especially children, and will stop at nothing to help.

Though hesitant at first, Eve agrees to help Catherine in the initial age progressionn. Ultimately they become friends and Eve takes it even further and goes with Catherine to find Luke and kill Rakovac.

This book was definitely fast paced but a bit too full of espionage for me. I was more interested in Catherine and her son and what Eve did for a living. That was the intriguing part. It got a little too involved with the business of Rakovac, the CIA, the terriorism, etc. I find myself wanting to watch movies like that but not really wanting to read books that involve too much of that kind of storyline.

That was really my only issue with it. It seems Iris Johansen can piece together a heart pounding thriller. As a mother, she could really tear at your heart strings with the pain these mothers go through. There are a whole mess of side characters that come in that really make it more involved. Joe Quinn, Eve's lover, was by far, the most intriguing, in my opinion.

I just love those rugged cops!

Rating: 4 stars/ 6 stars

I would recommend it for thriller fans. It definitely has more of an edgy feel to it with all of the hopping from country to country and the terror threats and the CIA involvement. I am a fan of tough female characters and Eve Duncan certainly fits that. I am certainly going to look into her early books in this series.

Author Website:

Iris Johansen

Thanks to Ann Marie from Get Red PR for allowing me the chance to finally read Iris!

Happy reading and as always, thanks for stopping by!

red headed book child