Books to give you a thrill (and a dash of mystery)

by Geoff Loftus
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6 books
I read for a very simple reason: I hope to be entertained. To be taken out of myself and my daily life. And a good thriller does that. It often takes me someplace I’ve never been – like the world of British steeplechasing in Dick Francis’s work or on a tramp steamer in Alastair MacLean’s The Golden Rendezvous. And, at their very best, thrillers examine normal emotions of love and fear, guilt and hope against a dramatic backdrop that makes for an urgent and entertaining reading experience. That’s what I hope I’ve done in the last book on this list, my very own Murderous Spirit.
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Flying Finish

Dick Francis, 2005
Francis always offers satisfying plots, a hint of romance, action, and humor. Even better, his protagonists are not only trying to stop bad guys—they’re trying to discover something about themselves, probably to remake their lives. Flying Finish features an amateur steeplechase jockey/pilot who becomes entangled in an international smuggling operation run by gangsters who wouldn’t think twice about killing him.

The Golden Rendezvous

Alistair MacLean, 2009
I’ve been a fan of Alistair MacLean since my high school days, when MacLean was churning out bestsellers like The Guns of Navarone and Where Eagles Dare every year. MacLean creates tough, grim heroes who do whatever they have to do to get the job done. His protagonists, like his writing style, are blunt instruments, but they carry on with heavy-handed humor and cynicism. In The Golden Rendezvous, MacLean delivers a muscular maritime thriller complete with a tactical nuclear weapon, pirates, and a beautiful, rich young woman.

The Goodbye Look

Ross Macdonald, 2010
The Mystery Writers of America honored Ross Macdonald with a Grand Master Award for his Lew Archer novels, recognizing their psychological and moral depths. In the Archer books, the sins of the fathers and grandfathers cascade through the years to horrific, homicidal effects on Archer’s clients. In The Goodbye Look, what starts as an investigation into a burglary turns into an effort to solve a years-old kidnapping. And to figure out how a gun used in a years-old murder is connected. Archer finds that a family’s love, lies, greed, and violence make for a volatile mix.

The General's Daughter

Nelson DeMille, 2001
Nobody does tales of betrayal, sex, and violence better than Nelson DeMille. And almost no one has a better ear for sly, cynical, funny dialogue. The General’s Daughter  has all the usual DeMille ingredients, this time presented in a murder mystery/thriller that takes place on a U.S. Army base in the American south. The protagonists of this book must deal with their own convoluted romantic past, the possibly corrupt local police, the inside-politics of the Army, and the torturous history of one young woman.

Farewell, My Lovely

A Novel
Raymond Chandler, 2002
Raymond Chandler’s private detective stories featuring cynical tough guy Philip Marlowe aren’t just good mysteries, they’re just very good novels. Marlowe is quick with a quip and quicker to grab a drink. If he has to, he resorts to using his fists or a gun. In Farewell, My Lovely, Marlowe is getting nowhere looking for a missing person. Given his lack of success, he does what any private investigator would do – he goes to a bar for a drink. A gunman barges into the bar, and when he can’t find his girlfriend there, kills the bar’s owner and escapes. Marlowe is sucked into the hunt, finding plenty of lies, women, and violence along the way.

Murderous Spirit

Geoff Loftus, 2016
Jack Tyrrell was a burnout. A former Green Beret and U.S. Marshal, he’s become a drunken loser who, once upon a time, accepted a bribe and was shot by the people who bribed him. Tyrrell survived the shooting. His wife, Maggie, did not. Five years after her death, Maggie appears to him as a ghost and offers him a chance to make things right. She introduces Tyrrell to Harry, who may literally be heaven-sent. Tyrrell, with Harry working as his case manager, sets out to help a veteran who’s suffering from PTSD and has assassinated a pair of Wall Street CEOs. Action, murdered Wall Street titans, the Russian mafia, and a beautiful woman mix with questions regarding free will and what constitutes moral behavior to give this thriller a spiritual edge. “Can one author combine a thriller, a romance, and a ghost story? Geoff Loftus does so admirably in his fast-paced, well-written, and engrossing new novel about a man given a second chance from a wholly unexpected source: his dead wife, whose murder he holds himself responsible for. Let this one-of-a-kind story teach you something about love, forgiveness, and even faith.” – James Martin, SJ, bestselling author. The mix of Charles Dickens, Philip K. Dick, and a terrific action story told by a sad yet funny narrator is wonderfully entertaining and spiritually engaging.