Finished The 47th Samurai by Stephen Hunter. This book is part of Hunter’s saga about the Swagger family from Arkansas, including Earl (the World War II hero dad) and Bob Lee (his son and a Vietnam-era sniper).

This book focuses on Bob Lee, who’s now in his sixties and has retired to Idaho where he’s building a house for his wife. One day, a Japanese man, Philip Yano, shows up on Bob Lee’s land asking about a sword that Bob’s father, Earl, might have brought back from from Iwo Jima. Bob Lee eventually tracks down the sword and returns it to Yano in Japan — but soon after, Yano and his family are brutually murdered. So Bob Lee goes all samurai and returns to Japan, determined to track down the sword and kill the men who murdered Yano and his family.

Samurai follows a predictable thriller formula, as Bob Lee bcomes a one-man killing machine roaming through Japan. Nothing wrong with that, but I expected a few more twists than I got (although there is one character whose motivations came as a complete surprise at the end).

Hunter gives the reader a lot of info about Japan, swords, and the samurai tradition. You can tell he did extensive research (and I also know because I work with his daugther, who mentioned it to me). If you like swords or want to learn more about the samurai tradition, this book contains a wealth of information about both. 

But one thing that drove me crazy was the dialogue. Hunter doesn’t put any tags in his dialogue (like “Bob said”), so it was hard to tell who was speaking. A couple of times, I had to go back up and count down the lines to see who was talking. Very annoying. Also, Bob Lee’s speech was a little more aw-shucks and country than I remember from previous books.

Samurai isn’t the best Bob Lee book. (That would be the first book, Point of Impact, a truly great thriller read.) But even a lesser Bob Lee book is better than most. So thumbs up.

Up next: Night Life by Caitlin Kittredge.

Finished Dead Man Rising by Lilith Saintcrow. This is the second in Saintcrow’s urban fantasy series about Dante Valentine, a nercomance who raises people from the dead. Be warned: there are some spoilers ahead.

In this one, Danny’s mourning the loss of her demon lover Japhrimel (from book one, Working for the Devil). But she doesn’t have time to grieve long. Her friend Gabe asks Danny to help her with a series of brutal murders, all of which lead back to Rigger Hall, the school where Danny and other students were horribly abused as children.

This book was quite a bit darker than the first one, much more so than I expected. Poor Danny’s about to snap from grief over losing Japhrimel already, and then she has to confront the horrors of her childhood. Not a light read at all. 

Still, Danny is a very likable character as she tries to work through her grief and adjust to her new demon-enhanced body. She gets a little whiny toward the end of the book, but she does have a lot to deal with. And once again, I enjoyed Saintcrow’s blend of magic and technology. (Plus, there was a glossary of terms in this book. Yeah!)

But overall, I didn’t enjoy this one quite as much as the first book for one reason — Japhrimel. Although Dante thinks about him constantly, the demon doesn’t show up until the last few chapters of the book. His appearance reminded me just how much I liked him in the first book — and how this book suffers from his absense. (Jace is just not a good substitute for the demon, which Dante and the reader quickly realize.)

But I get that Japhrimel’s resurrection was part of the climax and not the middle arc of the story. Still, if you’re a Japh fan like me, this book ends much better than the first one. 😎

Overall, if you’re looking for a dark urban fantasy read, give Dead Man Rising and the rest of the Dante Valentine series a try. Thumbs up.

Up next: The 47th Samurai by Stephen Hunter.