THINK OF A NUMBER - John Verdon

 FIRST LINE: "'Where were you?' said the old woman in the bed. 'I had to pee, and no one came.'"

Homicide investigator Dave Gurney has retired from the NYPD when an old classmate contacts him about some disturbing letters he's been receiving. Mark Mellery owns and operates a spiritual retreat of sorts. People come to clarify their lives and get them back on track. When Mellery starts receiving these taunting letters that insinuate the sender knows him intimately he turns to Gurney. And when Mellery winds up brutally murdered and all the clues lead the investigators in circles, they bring Gurney into the fold to help them solve this bizarre puzzle. The investigators believe someone from Mellery's retreat is responsible, but Gurney has a hard time believing that. His gut tells him that's not the right path to follow. And when a series of other murders follow the same pattern as Mellery's but in completely different geographic locations, Gurney is convinced his gut was right. But there don't appear to be any connections between the victims; who is doing the murdering and why?

THINK OF A NUMBER just stole the spot of my favorite 2010 debut. It's a thought-provoking thriller written with attention to detail. And while it's written in the third person and the readers know more than Gurney, they don't know the answers. So they're working on the puzzle in the same way he is. What I discovered by the end was that I wasn't so interested in who the killer actually turned out to be as I was by the process of unfolding all the clues.

The mind-bending puzzles that form the plot of THINK OF A NUMBER provide a fresh approach to the serial killer concept.

The added dimension of Gurney's dysfunctional relationships to his wife and son add to the depth of Gurney's character. They also enhance a subtle theme that weaves its way through the book in the relationships of almost all the characters. I believe Verdon reveals it to us in a comment from Mark Mellery:

"'We each seem to be wired to believe my situation causes my problems but your personality causes yours. This creates trouble. My desire to have everything my way seems to make sense, while your desire to to have everything your way seems infantile. A better day would be a day during which I felt better and you behaved better. The way I see things is the way they are. The way you see things is warped by your agenda.'"

Like the puzzle of the murders, it makes the reader stop and think about their own interactions with others. Who Gurney is and his own reflection on himself becomes just as pivotal to the plot as the murder investigation.

Verdon also has a talent with imagery. I was especially struck by many images he created throughout the book, including:

"Gurney had the feeling he'd just watched someone stub his toe and turn it into a pirouette."

or

"The door was a reddish brown that reminded Gurney of dried blood. Yellow crime-scene tape, tied to portable stanchions, encircled the shabby little property. All it needed was a bow in the front, thought Gurney, to make it the gift from hell."

The use of contrast in both of these examples of imagery make the mind pictures pop, enhancing their effect on the reader. Verdon creates his own 3-D effect, no glasses needed.

I find that I'm more critical of thrillers than any other book in the crime fiction genre. I don't like the idea of letting go of reality, but I don't even remember if Verdon wanted me to let go of reality because I was so caught up in my fascination with the puzzles and the relationships of the characters that I simply had to know more. Half the fun of the novel was watching the pieces unfold and fit into place both in the investigation of the murder and Gurney's investigation of his own soul. He's a man who has spent his life surrounded by death and while he tries to avoid the one that impacts him the most, he realizes, "No matter how hard one tries to ignore it, death finds a way to be noticed. It seeps into your feelings like water through a basement wall."

THINK OF A NUMBER is one of the most cerebral books I've read in some time. It challenged me as a reader in many ways and I felt enriched by simply having experienced it.

THINK OF A NUMBER is available in hardcover from Crown Publishers (ISBN: 978-0-307-58892-0). And this post is part of the TLC blog tour for THINK OF A NUMBER. You can also play the "Think of a Number" game here.

**Note to book club members: TLC will be holding a "Book Club of the Month" contest for this book in August. Register your book club and you could win up to 10 copies of the book for your members.

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