Kellerman's Delaware mysteries always teeter towards soap opera and occasionally fall in. This is one that fell. Depending on you, the reader, that can be either good or bad. For me, the other elements either make the book good or bad. I like 'The Web'. Another element is that Kelleman's plots always contain Truth - of historical facts or recent headlines on CNN - which he heavily fictionalizes. Since I read the news as obsessively as I do novels, and I have done so for 50 years, plus my memory is not yet decaying, I am always feeling that sense of déjà vu whenever I read a Delaware mystery. As fantastic as they might seem to less informed readers, the only things fictionalized are that these events happen to one guy in his life as a California therapist. Kellerman also conflates events that might have actually occurred decades apart by putting them into the same time era in one location, and of course while these events happened to different real people once, in these books all of the characters are imaginary people. Kellerman also obviously imagines what the real people who lived might have felt going through the actual events in history, as well as constructing heroic behaviors for his fictional characters. Whatever. The fact remains is that as far out as these plots seem to be, they actually have happened on some level to real people at some point in the past somewhere in the world and you can go online to read the real story, or a least find several real stories that match many of the plot bullet points, despite it maybe actually happening to Black-Americans and mental hospital patients in the American south instead of on Aruk, or being a conflation of actual intentional radiation poisoning of soldiers in American deserts and Pacific Islanders in WWII so that there are still islands out there in real life no one can live on today due to the nuclear bombing America did in the name of scientific experimentation. There are also 'hot' spots in American wastelands today, too. Lastly, the recent attempt by the corporations that backed George W. Bush's Iraq war to steal markets and businesses in Iraq for international corporate profit only demonstrate that business rape is an ongoing enterprise today as well. Without the light of journalism and government without corruption, business is selfish, mean, murderous and psychopathic, and when coupled with a military partnership, it is tripled in effect against common human decency. There are thousands of examples of business/military partnerships throughout human history up through current times where entire countries are raped and/or destroyed for the strictly monitory benefits of the few people, the 1% if you will, at the top. These places are easy to spot - despite millions and billions of dollars going into a country or geographical area, there are few schools, clinics, business opportunities or infrastructure like roads and electricity and clean water on tap.So, no, I don't feel these mysteries border on fantasy, only soap opera. Sometimes.
I DON'T HIDE MY REVIEWS EVEN IF THEY HAVE SPOILERS. BUT I DON'T PUT THEM ON A FEED, EITHER.I wouldn't say that Alex Delaware has jumped the shark in "The Web," but the novel is analogous to Fonzy from "Happy Days" taking a trip to Hawaii.Alex and Robin go to an obscure Pacific atoll, Aruk, for the book's action. Their burnt-to-crisp bungalow is being rebuilt and Alex has received a research offer from a doctor based on the atoll.Supposedly Alex is to help the doctor organize his records collected over decades of practice on the island, but turns out the doctor is seeking an "heir" to take over care of -- and this part stretches credulity -- islanders who were born with extreme and rare defects due to unethical med research by U.S. industrial-military complex.The doc (William Moreland) keeps these unfortunates hidden underground (in a web of caves and tunnels built during WWII by the Japanese) supposedly for their own good -- their skin can't survive UV exposure, but these dwellers are also sub-human in intelligence, tiny in size and disfigured.Moreland is basically a benevolent dictator, thinking he knows what's best. But when Alex and Robin figure out the truth, Alex persuades Moreland to stop all the subterranean subterfuge. He gets federal agencies involved in rescuing these misfits and assigning blame. But this summary is over-simplified. There are actually many interesting nuances to the story, such as: personal relationships between the island inhabitants; Moreland's history (he was a promiscuous unfaithful husband in his early days, and had an illegit son, who is now grown and attracted to Moreland's legit-born daughter, neither of whom know the other is a half-sibling; a scheme by the present military-industrial complex to turn the island into a prison-nuke-dump combo.I really enjoyed Kellerman's vivid descriptions of the settings on Aruk -- the beaches, the lush landscape on Moreland's "plantation," the doctor's hobby insectarium, the labyrinth below-ground.As Alex and Robin -- and pet French bulldog, Spike -- eventually discover, even a Pacific paradise can be a purgatory, if not an outright hell.
What do You think about The Web (2003)?
I have read a lot of Kellerman's books, and I think I have now read almost his entire Alex Delaware series. The later books I thoroughly enjoyed, the earlier books (which luckily I read out of order) I hated. This one, being quite firmly in the middle I wasn't sure how I would feel. And having read it, honestly I'm still unsure. To start with, I finished it last night, yet I STILL had to go look up the title to leave this review, so that should tell you something. Secondly, it was weird. There is no other word for it. Its like a bad 60's movie about radiation creating impossible monsters. It was very unrealistic and sci-fi-y, the plot was pretty choppy and none of the characters made sense. Even Delaware himself has a flat, washed out feel. The side characters are actually more tangible, yet they all have a slight horror-movie feel to them. No one is likeable, even remotely. Its like Kellerman tried to write a Delaware book while on some very bad drugs. The imagery is so over done its nauseating rather than descriptive. The need to apparently SCREAM "something bad is going to happen on this island" repeatedly gets so old that by the time something DOES happen, you don't even care. All in all, while the story was more interesting than some of his stuff, he definitely improved with age and experience AFTER this book. Oh, and I missed Milo...
—Sherri
"Look at this," he said. "I'm sure you've never seen a web like this."Mystery readers who like their stories compartmentalised and samey will probably frown upon what Kellerman has done here. It’s an Alex Delaware novel, but it is also quite unlike any of the other novels in the series (or at least those that I have read, which, admittedly aren’t that many).For starters: the story takes place on a remote and obscure Micronesian island. Consider: a large mansion filled with house guests; a gruesome past murder; a gruesome present murder; red herrings; strange people. It does sound like this might be the best novel Agatha Christie never wrote… but it’s not quite that either.Shining the penlight into a dark tank, he revealed something half covered by leaves.It crawled out slowly and my stomach lurched. This novel brings a bit of the old bizarre factor to the table, which is saying quite a lot, considering the nature of the Alex Delaware novels. Let me put it this way, I read The Web on the back of a spate of Horror novels and it didn’t feel out of place.The Web is a fairly cryptic book, quite literally filled with riddles. To be honest, there’s a bit of over-indulgence on the author’s part in turning the whole thing into something not completely unlike a dramatic reality show, but it works… somehow."It's something, isn't it? You come to an out-of-the-way place, think you're escaping big-city crime, and it runs after you like a mad dog."
—Dirk Grobbelaar
Maybe a 5 on the ten point system, but only because I save two's for the likes of James Patterson.....Not the best Kellerman book I've read. PLot a little too weird to be believable, and some strange characters make it even less a spirited read, not to mention the screwy trail of quotes to uncover the mystery. If this was my first Kellerman book, I would cross him off and go elsewhere. Not that his others I've read are poised for any literary awards, but this one just barely above "it was ok", but lower than "liked it".....Oh, for a ten point scale.
—David
