Harvest

A novel by Edward O. Mixon
and Norma J. Fisher Mixon
ISBN # 1-59129-493-2
218 pp at 19.95 paperback
Publish America
PO Box 151
Frederick MD 21705-0151

 

One of the signs of a great writing team is when you can’t tell which one brings what to the story, the action and characters flowing seamlessly with no jarring changes in style or substance. This is what authors Edward O. Mixon, and Norma J. Fisher-Mixon has created with their novel “Harvest”, and it is an accomplishment that they should be quite proud of doing. Under their joint effort, this team has produced a fast paced crime drama that rivals any on the market. The detail and insight that they show into the mind of a killer makes it hard to remember that this is a work of fiction rather than true crime.

As any of you that read my reviews with any kind of regularity might have noticed, I am somewhat a student of criminal psychology, yet only in the most layman of terms. I have read more true crime books than I care to admit, I watch every movie and TV show that I can find on serial killers and mass murders, not out of respect or admiration (shudder) but out of wonderment over what might have happened in their life that caused them to be as they are, and what we, as a society can do to keep these types of citizens from happening again.

Homicide Detective Mike Rains has a personal reason for his interest in his field; having lost his love ones to a serial killer himself, he has now dedicated his life to finding and stopping those that prey on the innocent and unsuspecting Because of this, he is a character that you can actually feel for, something that is hard to come by in today’s stereotypical cardboard characters. You can clearly see the driving forces and life experiences that make him so good at what he does. You are there with him as he begins his investigation, you watch as the case slowly falls into place, and cheer at his ultimate deductions and resolution.

David, the killer that Mike is after, is another fully developed character that blew me away-pun not intended. This killer, with his method of slaying his victims and means of sorting out who will be next is so well defined, his motivation so realistic, that to read it was as a breath of fresh air in a long stale genre. I won’t, because those of a weaker will may read this review, go into a description of the means of the deaths of his victims, or what he does to them once he has taken their life. Suffice to say that this guy could give any real or fictional serial killer a run for his money, and yes, that includes Hannibal Lector.

The payoff in this fast paced tale was just as compelling as the rest of the book, the ride not stopping or slowing down, but instead building toward a page turning climax that would have made Hollywood envious in it’s execution.

Allow me to close by mentioning once again the flawless delivery of the writing; the styles are so well blended that you would think that one set of hands typed the words that flowed from one mind. There is no jarring juxtaposition, no meshing of awkward phrases or pacing-I truly can not tell if one wrote one part, and then handed it off, or if one dictated and the other typed, and you know what, it doesn’t matter. This is a perfectly written crime story that the Mixon’s should be very proud of having crafted. Bravo to them both, and thank you for allowing me the most thrill filled read that I have had in a while.