Invisible Prey [Mass Market Paperback]

This is Sanford's 17th novel featuring Lucas Davenport. All of them have been good reading by a master of the police procedural. A few have been slightly better than the others. "Invisible Prey" comes close to being the best of the lot.

As always Lucas Davenport, a Special Agent for Minnesota's Bureau of Criminal Apprehension is called in when a situation is too tough for a local police department or too politically sensitive. "Promoting" Lucas to this job from his former job with a police department was a brilliant move by Sandford, as it lets Davenport roam the landscape without being bothered by jurisdiction. Clever guy, Mr. Sanford.

The story opens with two women, an elderly heiress and her maid, being brutally bludgeoned on a dark and rainy night in a home in St. Paul's most element neighborhood. (Yes, Sanford really does set the scene on a dark and rainy night. Also, inexplicably, the dustjack puts the opening murders in Minneapolis, rather than St. Paul.)

Lucas is dealing at the moment with a very politically sensitive investigation of a local politician who may have had just a bit too much to do with the minor daughter of his current paramour. But the old woman's murder, especially because of it's brutality, carries some poltical weight too, so Lucas looks in on the scene.

The two disparate investigations - a sex scandal and a double murder - ultimately become involved.

Sanford writes some of the best police procedurals to be found. His characters are solid and have depth. Lucas Davenport's wealth, acquired in an accidental second career as a software developer, is helpful in giving the character wider latitude in his social millieu and in setting him apart from his law enforcement officer peers. Sanford is very clever when it comes to character and plot development. A few books back, he introduced Weather, a surgeon, younger than Sandford who is now his wife and the mother of his young son. There is a standard cast of characters arond Lucas and most them are here. There's Marie, Davenport's hard driving, politically savvy boss; Flowers, the oddball investigator; Jenkins and Shrake, the two cops who often provide muscle when needed.

In this novel, Sanford adds a young Afican-American boy who provides a couple of key clues. I suspect he will play a role in subsequent novels. He also adds Sandy, a young woman intern whose quirky character and investigative skills wouldn't be surprising to see in future books.

Sanford identifies the killers early to the reader and then play very adroitly with the reader as Davenport attempts to discover who they are. Along the way, we get a few characters who might be involved and might not be. We also get to meeet a few people who aren't very pleasant.

Sanford plays the mystery and the reader along beautifully. As the last hundred of pages or so rush by, Davenport starts closing in, though it isn't until close to the end that we're sure the killers will be found before Davenport himself becomes a victim.

Overall, a great police procedural with believable characters and solid plotting by a master of the genre. Definitely page turner material. (Too bad they don't still make detective movies like they used to: Lucas Davenport would be the basis for a great series.)

Jerry

I've been a fan of the Prey series by John Sandford over the years. But lately the titles haven't captured my attention as much as they used to. In the latest, Invisible Prey, I once again find myself thinking that it was an enjoyable read, but the excitement and edge isn't there any more.

Lucas Davenport is pulled into a case where an older lady and her maid are brutally murdered. The trashed house makes it look like it could be a burglary gone bad, but something doesn't quite ring true for Davenport. He's able to find a couple other crimes that have somewhat the same characteristics, and the common element has to do with antiques and a particular set of quilts. You find out very quickly who the guilty parties are in the killings, and the story revolves around the desperation of the killers and their need to eliminate Lucas from the case in order to avoid being run down. There's a subplot involving an accusation of improper behavior with a minor and a state senator. Lucas is also involved in this case, and the killers attempt to mess up that case, also to draw Lucas in a different direction.

In many of the earlier Prey stories, there was a strong element of how Lucas would use his intellect and gaming skills to anticipate and solve the crimes. But lately, that characteristic is more secondary, and too much time is spent dwelling on his new political position in the bureau. The story is fine as a typical crime novel, but the things that used to draw me to Davenport aren't there much now. I'll likely keep reading new installments in the series, but I don't know that I consider them a "must read" any more...

John Sandford does it again with Invisible Prey. Lucas Davenport, who is one of the most believable characters in modern crime fiction, continues his career in breaking a case that is deliciously complex, involves wonderfully convoluted and perverse characters and carries you from connection to connection until suddenly it will all make sense. This is a fine novel about interesting people, some of whom are doing violent and destructive things and others whom simply want to lead nice, decent lives and catches both the way in which the innocent can without cause be destroyed by evil, and the way in which good can in the end triumph. As an optimist, I find it always comforting to read John Sandford's novels and in particular I enjoy his Lucas Davenport pursuit of justice.

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