Thirteen Hours [Hardcover]

Afrikaner Deon Meyer's latest pulse-pounding thriller hits the ground running--literally. In Cape Town, South Africa, at six in the morning, an American teenage tourist is running for her life. Her best friend's throat was slit in front of her and she is bolting from the perpetrators' clutches. The story hits its stride early and swiftly as events unfold over thirteen-hours. Vicious outlaws and the snarl of conspiracy; Afrikaner, Xhosa, and Zulu crime-fighters; and crooners and corporate fleecers storm the pages of the book. Besides Rachel Anderson, the pursued and wily tourist, there's music industry giant, Adam Barnard, found shot and dead near his hard-drinking, faded-diva wife.

This is my third Meyer book (this is his seventh), after reading Dead at Daybreak and Blood Safari, all set in the author's home country. The narrative is bracing and the characters resonant and ripe. Meyer delivers with sizzle in this dual-crime novel; his terse prose lances the pages, and the pitch-perfect pace purrs and thrums. The reader feels like a detective as fragments eventually pull together from the grime of corruption. You suspect, you speculate, and you quiver. The knot of Barnard's death is teased out concurrently with Rachel's web of intrigue. Meyer is brilliant at interlocking disparate characters, events, and scenes, and at solving parallel puzzles.

The crisp story is supported by trenchant characters. Benny Griessel, the Slavic-eyed, bushy-haired Inspector with a sinking marriage and six months sobriety, has a sharp radar and a fox's energy, as well as a tarnished reputation. He pursues the perps with thirsty zeal while trying to keep his inner demons at bay. Can he save his marriage? Can he rescue the girl? Will the lure of drink undo him? Benny struggles to keep it together while people's lives are falling apart.

Fransman Dekker, an apt, avid cop with a strident temper, is furious about the racial hiring practice in the department. He's close to losing his cool over the results of affirmative action--not black enough, not white enough, feeling the statistical stab of "eight percent coloured." His nemesis, Zulu Mbali Kaleni, is one of the most delightfully imperious and exotic policewomen I have come across in fiction. She looks like an "overstuffed piegeon," with a "big bulge in front and a big bulge behind in her tight black trouser suit." Dekker, Griessel, and Kaleni, like the other players in the book, are dimensional and sympathetic. Meyer has a knack for fiery characters that vault from the pages while they crackle and burn.

The story is taut and the climax is gripping. Although more cinematic and conventional than his previous work, Meyer's brio is seductive, his pointed narrative is spicy. Some parts are predictable, yet without feeling tired and shopworn. He tells the story with a candid depth that is wholly humane and authentic. A primal essence buzzes and hums as he juxtaposes scenes, cutting from one jolting moment to the next. And although I am typically put off by cell phone bits in a novel, Meyer's snappy insertions actually increase the story's tensile strength. The chapters revolve around the clock and the minutes fly with the pages. He controls the fluid narrative with an acid restraint and never goes overboard. It vibrates with soul, but it's not for the faint of heart.

In his best and most complex novel yet, Afrikaans-writer Deon Meyer recreates thirteen hours of life in Cape Town, South Africa, hour by terrifying hour, revealing more about the city's many criminal cultures than you may want to know. The police who try to keep the criminal underworld at bay are undermanned and undertrained. A series of police scandals has led the National Commissioner to establish a whole new South African Police Service (SAPS), retaining the best and most experienced officers within new departments and hiring new recruits from all racial groups. Racial differences, tribal differences, and changing historical roles add to the complexities here as good people try to prevent crimes in a fraught and changing environment in which the Metro Police are also flexing muscles over control, and private security agencies perform their own investigations.

In the opening pages, a young girl, still in her teens, is tearing through the city, begging for help from people she sees, as she tries to escape five or six young men who are pursuing her. Her companion, who was also trying to escape these men, now lies dead, her throat slit and her backpack stolen. SAPS Captain Benny Griessel and his young, inexperienced staff are assigned to this case, and soon have their worst fears realized. The young victim was an American tourist, with all the governmental complications that entails on all levels. At the same time, the body of a music executive, shot in the head with his own gun, is found at home near his wife, an alcoholic who knows of his flagrant affairs and who has been lying passed out for hours. She appears to have shot him.

As Benny and his staff investigate, these separate stories interrupt each other as more information is revealed about each crime in the course of the day. The author keeps the suspense at fever pitch. Rachel Anderson, the girl trying to escape, must evade discovery for many hours, while Benny Griessel must keep all the leads for two separate cases going in the right direction and find Rachel before her pursuers do. The main characters' own backgrounds and family lives unfold and add depth to the novel, showing how they live, for better or worse, in the newly integrated society. As the novel develops further, the ins and outs of the not always honest music business, the roles of Russian owners and managers of clubs and bars, the weaknesses of police officers who may be offered enormous bribes, illegal immigration from other African countries whose governments are in total disarray, the problems of a drug culture, and the corruption which seems to be an unfortunate natural result of power all appear as well integrated themes and plot lines.

Despite the darkness of its plot, Afrikaans writer Deon Meyer honors hard-working and honest people of all races in this novel--Benny Griessel (white), bright new detective Vusumuzi Ndabeni (black), no-nonsense female investigator Mbali Kaleni (black), and pathologist, Tiffany October ("coloured"). These people and others like them are the future of the country and its hope, and Deon Meyer, an Afrikaaner, celebrates them within the context of a society in transition. Mary Whipple

Blood Safari
Dead at Daybreak

From I gather, this is the 2nd detective thriller featuring Detective Inspector Benny Griesell. I believe the first one is titled Devil's Peak. It's now officially on my to be read list! Thirteen Hours was an expolsive and harrowing thriller! I'd never heard of Meyer prior to reading this one, but he's on my radar now. Usually I'm hesitant to read an author I'm unfamiliar with unless the book is free. From the opening explosive scenes to the finale this one goes a breakneck speed. It's definitely in the top 5 books I've read this year.

Deon Meyer knows how to spin a story! I won't go in the plot or anything like that as you can read about that in the synopsis or someone who is more adept at giving you and idea about the what the book is about. I will say, as you may have guessed already, is that the book takes place over 13 hours. I will give the basic premise of the novel: A girl witnesses the murder of her friend and goes on the run from the bad guys. Griesell is the one investigating the murder and must protect the girl. Keep in mind this novel is not for the weak of heart: It's very violent! I love Griesell as the main character. He is a complex and tragic character. I also gig the setting, Cape Town, South Africa, which is very unique and intriging in how it is presented.

For some reason, even with thrillers this awesome, the price on them doesn't stay up. That's you can now get a nice copy fairly cheap! What are you waiting for? I'd bet that even the most jaded of readers would have a hard time putting this one down. It does everything a detective thriller should and then some. I'm waiting in agony for my copy of Devil's Peak to arrive! Bravo, Mr. Meyer... keep'em coming!!!!!!!!!!!!

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