Review: Cool Mystery, Lots of Action, Fun Read
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 09 15, 2013
Vincent Zandri's bread-and-butter is the crime fiction genre. His brand as a novelist has more to do with brash private investigators Dick Moonlight and Keeper Marconi than chasing down archeological relics.That's what makes The Shroud Key such a surprise. The Shroud Key finds Zandri mining the ossuary of the thriller sub-genre occupied by the Dan Browns of the world.In The Shroud Key, thriller writer/sandhog/treasure hunter/private investigator (more about all those slashes later) Chase Baker is on the hunt for the physical bones of Jesus Christ. Or, more accurately, he's looking for a missing archeologist whom was kidnapped to find the bones. The key to finding both is encoded on the Shroud of Turin. Baker heads to an Egypt still adjusting to an Islamic revolution and gets to work.Without reading anything more than the previous paragraph, readers will inevitably be making mental comparisons between The Shroud Key and The Da Vinci Code. That's only apropos; Dan Brown put this sub-genre on the map with Code.But don't be dismissive of The Shroud Key given how close it hovers to Code on the bookshelf. The Shroud Key is worth the read for three reasons.First, there's a hammy hubris to Dan Brown's writing that turns some readers off. There are no knowing winks. No sardonic nudges. Nothing to indicate Brown is in rolling his eyes along with readers. Thankfully, that's all missing in The Shroud Key. Zandri knows what this is: a slice of alternative history served on a plate of gun battles, car chases, wise cracks, booby traps and explosions, with a cold beer to wash it all down.Second, the hunt for the bones of Jesus is a compelling mystery anyway. The theory goes that Jesus actually survived crucifiction by swapping in someone else to die on the cross. Finding the mortal remains of Jesus would prove the Resurrection, the singular event at the heart of Christianity, never happened. Zandri wraps the mystery of The Shroud Key around this theory. But he doesn't overwhelm the reader with minutae. He pokes at the theory just enough to compel readers to Google images of the Shroud of Turin as they work through The Shroud Key.Third, Zandri did his research. Against the advice of the U.S. State Department, he traveled to Egpyt while the Muslim Brotherhood was in power. The experience clearly shows through in the writing. While Zandri gives the reader plenty of thrills and spills to hold attention into the next chapter, he also inserts details that give The Shroud Key a real sense of place. Egypt, both past and present, are on full display, as is Zandri's journalistic tone.So it should be obvious where the character of Chase Baker originated. Baker is Zandri. Both commute between New York and Italy. Both write best-selling thrillers. Both spent time exploring Egypt. And both wear bush jackets in the field.I know that because Zandri wrote an article about staying safe overseas for the magazine I work for full-time, Living Ready. I mention it here to drive home the point that Zandri's skills as a journalist benefits The Shroud Key. It would've been easy for a plot hinging on a complicated religious history theory set against the complexities of post-revolutionary Egypt to cannibalize readers' attention spans. But as any good journalist knows, the solution is to boil complex issues into simple, digestible pieces.That's why The Shroud Key works. At its core, it's a treatise on the destabilizing effects that political chaos in Egypt is bringing to its priceless antiquities. But on its surface, it's an entertaining read with all the bells and whistles readers expect from a thriller.Dan Brown should take note. This is how to do it right.