By: Colin Harrison Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux Average Rating: Binding: Hardcover Label: Farrar, Straus and Giroux Number of Items: 1 Number of Pages: 336 Publication Date: April 01, 2008 Release Date: April 01, 2008
There’s no doubt about it: Colin Harrison is a master storyteller. Critics and readers love his gripping, dark books. It’s hard not to get sucked into his world. Entertainment Weekly calls him the “class act of the urban thriller,” Michiko Kakutani of The New York Times lauds him as “a master of mood and atmosphere,” and Publishers Weekly crows that Harrison writes “like an angel.”
Now the author of The Havana Room, Afterburn, and Manhattan Nocturne raises the stakes with an electrifying new thriller, The Finder. Harrison spins the story of a young, beautiful, secretive Chinese woman, Jin-Li, who gets involved in a brilliant scheme to steal valuable information from corporations in New York City. When the plan is discovered by powerful New Yorkers who stand to lose enormous sums of money, Jin-Li goes on the run. Meanwhile, her former lover, Ray Grant, a man who was out of the country for years but has recently returned, is caught up in the search for her. Ray has not been forthcoming to Jin-Li about why he left New York or what he was doing overseas, but his training and strengths will be put to the ultimate test against those who are unmerciful in their desire to regain a fortune lost. Ray is going to have to find Jin-Li, and he is going to have to find her fast.
An incredibly well-told tale There is a vignette in THE FINDER, Colin Harrison's latest novel, that is worth buying and reading the whole book for. Actually, there are several --- several dozen --- but let's talk about just one right now. It involves two men, both named Ray Grant (one Jr., one Sr.). Sr. is an ex-NYPD detective who is dying from the inside out of cancer. He wants Jr., a somewhat enigmatic, extremely capable guy, to help him end it all. Jr. refuses, for what seems like a selfish reason: he wants as much time with Sr. as possible. I've given nothing away here (I hate when people do that, even with the best of intentions, don't you?), but pay close attention to this exchange. It becomes very important later. And, like the rest of THE FINDER, it is an incredibly well-told tale, perfect in every way.
Harrison does not publish often --- about every three or four years is his cycle --- so that, no doubt out of consideration for his audience, he writes stand-alone books instead of series. You won't find yourself wondering how the cast is going to stop a runaway train at the conclusion of one of his novels, which frees him up a bit. He can end a book any way he pleases because you won't see the characters again. Accordingly, he has had some of the darkest endings I can remember reading. It's what comes between the beginning and the end, however, that's important. What Harrison does, to superior effect, is take a bunch of disparate folks, put them to cross-purposes at each other and watch what happens. In the case of THE FINDER, it's quite a bit.
In addition to the two Rays, the book introduces Jin-Li, a young Chinese woman who is the head of a New York City document disposal service with a very select clientele. She is also the ex-girlfriend of Ray Jr. Jin-Li has a brother, Chen, in mainland China who is able to make warehouses full of money thanks to Jin-Li, in a way that will have you shaking your head in admiration while trembling with fear. Jin-Li has a client, Good Pharma, whose nominal head, Tom Reilly, discovers that the small pharmaceutical company has been adversely affected by Chen and Jin-Li. In the unfortunate choice of words to the wrong person, he sets a number of disastrous chains of events in motion.
And there's Bill Martz, with more money than God and the power to buy everyone I've just listed, and more, several times over. Martz is heavily leveraged with Good Pharma, and if the company is hurting, then Martz is really hurting. It turns out that Martz has a low pain threshold, and when he discovers what's going on, it's not pretty.
We begin meeting all of these folks, fine and otherwise, when Jin-Li goes out one night clubbing with a couple of her Hispanic workers. The night ends in a particularly horrific way with two women dead and Jin-Li on the run and in hiding. This incident brings her brother out of his mainland China hidey-hole and to New York City. His financial empire depends upon Jin-Li doing her job, something she can't do while she's in hiding. Chen knows about Ray Jr. and thinks that he is responsible for his sister's disappearance and possible death. Ray doesn't know a thing --- Jin-Li had broken up with him weeks before, and he still does not know why --- but he wants to find out where Jin-Li is and why someone wants to kill her. Ray Jr. turns to his father, one of the best people and detectives he knows. At first, Ray Sr. isn't a lot of help; he is heavily sedated and barely lucid, more often than not. Yet Ray Sr. holds a small but important key to what is occurring in THE FINDER, information upon which Jin-Li's life, and more, will ultimately depend.
Obviously, not everyone who appears here is going to make it to the end. Like most of Harrison's work, it did not conclude the way I thought. All I will say is that you should not expect a sequel. But don't let that keep you from eagerly anticipating his next book, especially if you read THE FINDER.
--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub
Cool but dirty New York Thriller This was my first Harrison thriller but I was positively surprised by how much I liked it. I live in NYC and its always nice to read about about New York even though I live here because it is the best city in the world. Harrison who also lives here knows all the down and dirty things about this city and its mix of amazing characters. The book starts off with a truly shocking murder that at once repulses but also fascinates because we all know that truly sick people live in this world and some of them have thought about actually doing something like this. While the mystery aspect almost takes a backseat to the characterizations of the people, the ending is satisfying and even a little profound. I will read "Bodies Electric" next (which for some reason is not in print right now and I had to buy it used) .
This is Probably the Best Novel by Harrison I have Read Colin Harrison specializes in "literary thrillers" -- his novels are essentially works of suspense, but he spends a huge amount of time developing his characters and describing the realities of urban life. I've read a few of his novels, including his debut BREAK AND ENTER (awful) and THE HAVANA ROOM (very good). I think that THE FINDER is the best Harrison novel I've read so far.
THE FINDER is a relatively fast-paced novel about a complicated business scheme to steal confidential business information. Something goes wrong, leading to a series of murders and other violent incidents. The plot is remarkably silly if you take the time to think about it, but Harrison is a good enough writer to make things believable and compelling.
Some people have compared this work to BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES and I find that a very apt comparion. In many ways, the story simply serves as an excuse for Harrison to introduce a multitude of characters in New York City and describe (usually in minute detail) how they perceive the world. Even the minor supporting characters get this treatment, which will either delight or exasperate the reader. For the most part, I was delighted by Harrison's descriptions, which seemed highly cynical yet true to life.
Harrison is also interested in how things work -- are you curious about how a gas station makes money? Or how documents are disposed of by large corporations? Harrision spend pages of THE FINDER describing these processes in great detail. I found this material fascinating, but I'm guessing that other readers will find themselves bored.
In the end, I found this novel highly entertaining, despite the lack of a truly sympathetic character (a character named Ray Grant comes closest, although he's a bit of a cliche). Harrison is an incredibly gifted writer, and I recommend this novel to people who enjoy books that take the time to fully flesh out their characters and situations.
Very good crime thriller I've read a couple other books by Harrison and this is the best yet. This novel is as much about New York and its denizens as it is about corporate espionage and shady stock dealings. What I like about Harrison is that he writes genre novels like nobody else. His unique voice really gives you the feel of the fast paced hustle and bustle of New York.
Superb urban noir crime story Those of you who remember movies like "Naked City" or fancy the noir crime thrillers of the late 1940s will feel immediately at home with Colin Harrison's "The Finders", which is frankly one of the best urban noir novels I've read in years.
New York, with its endless contrasts between rich and poor, elegance and crass, conflicting cultures all trying to get their piece of the American pie is the perfect setting for noir fiction and Harrison, a Brooklynite, plays it for all its worth. And, man, does he ever do it well!
In the high-rise office towers of Manhattan where "Masters of the Universe" contend for billions, young illegal Mexicans scurry about cleaning the detritus of the business at night under the supervision of Jin Li, a young, beautiful Chinese woman. Jin Li is more than she appears to be. She is, in fact, a key player in a global power play, something that becomes apparent when she takes an after work, middle of the night ride with two of her Mexican female workers. They part in a remote Brooklyn park when disaster in the form of truck bearing a load of excrement comes on the scene.
Jin Li escapes death and is pursued by a growing cast of characters. The good guy is Ray Grant, Jr., Jin Li's recent lover who still pines for her. Grant, Jr. is backed by his father, who is dying of cancer, a near-retirement NYPD detective and that's it. Against them and Jin Yi is a surprising number of bad guys, all of whom Harrison introduces flawlessly, each one racheting up the suspense level.
There are few writers with Harrison's skill and the ability to keep layering on plot twists. It is a delight to watch as we are introduced to Bill Martz, Tom Reilly, Chen, Victor, Richie, Violet, Montoya, Elliott and more, each contributing their bit of evil to the story without tripping over some other character.
Harrison deftly builds his main characters like Jin Li, Ray Grant, Jr., Bill Martz, Chen and the others largely through backstories and flashbacks. In less adept hands, this technique could be disastrous, but Finder pulls it off beautifully.
The suspense builds with each page as these characters pulled literally from different universes come together on a collision course. The ending is a bit of a stretch, but still totally acceptable.
If you like noir, you will love "The Finders". If you like suspense, crime or thriller novels, "The Finders" will have you turning pages. It is simply one of the best I've read in a while.
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