Waiting for the Storm to Pass by Bill Johnstone

Amazon/Createspace

Book Review

This story starts with Mike McCabe sorting through his belongings on his barge/houseboat as he is preparing to leave London for Washington, to become US editor-at-large for the London Daily Herald. He is going back to Washington to dig further into a story that he had previously worked on. He manages to retrieve the files of the private detective, McKendrick, who had also been working on the case and was shot dead during the investigation. In the detective's files he comes across information about one of McKendrick's first cases. The unsolved murder of two young girls who had left home for the bright lights of New York and he decides to pursue this investigation.

Just prior to McCabe's arrival, a murder occurs on a tour boat and a body is found in the river.  This brings Detective Kovarik onto the scene to investigate.  McCabe and Kovarik have a history from a previous novel. It’s not necessary to have read that book first; Waiting for the Storm to Pass stands alone.

At this point we have two investigations and two story lines developing in parallel. However, unless you have never read a mystery you know that there exists a vanishing point and the two stories are destined to intersect. 

The intersection occurs in the seventeenth chapter and from this reader’s point of view that was too far into the book. That the characters in the story only begin to see the connection between the two investigations at this point is fine and logical, because there is no obvious interaction between them.  I think it should be more blatantly evident to the reader what the connection is before this. I found it annoying to alternate back and forth between stories when it was for just a few paragraphs. I  preferred reading full chapters of one story line and then switching. This parallel style may have been chosen in an attempt to draw out the story lines in order to add suspense and tension. I hope not, because I found the effect to be diluting to any build-up of tension and suspense. A few times I found myself thinking, “Get on with it.”

That was too bad because I liked the characters of McCabe and Kovarik. They are interesting, well developed and it’s pretty hard not to like them.  Strangely, the story is written in a "soft tone", a bit unusual for a story about murder, money and power.

Waiting for the Storm to Pass is an easy and enjoyable read. If you are looking for a nail-biting, page turner that you can't put down you might want to leave this book for another day. However, don't ignore it completely, it's a good read.