The assassination of the vice president of the United States leads a New York City police detective to uncover a political conspiracy and a struggle for world domination in Mitchell’s debut dystopian tale, set in the near future.
In 2057, Detective Nick Garvey’s latest case is hush-hush: the unpublicized murder of Vice President Jerome Wellsley and four Secret Service agents in New York. But the top priority for Nick and his partner, Tim Branson, is to protect President Lenora Allison. Nick has a good idea of who would want to have her dead: Jason Beck, the supreme director of the World Council, which, after acquiring the majority of the world’s oil, rules over multiple countries. President Allison, it turns out, is a potential threat to the Council’s control; she’s planning to activate a system, involving a 30-year-old Japanese satellite, that will convert the sun’s energy into electricity for the whole of Manhattan. Nick’s ex-partner, Gerry Martin, who’s now a World Council employee, is a source of inside information. Unfortunately, Beck soon becomes aware of what Gerry and Nick are doing. The detective already has his hands full with his estranged daughter, Sandra, who blames him for her mother’s death and wants to keep him from his 7-year-old granddaughter, Nicole; she’s also latched onto an abusive man named Delmar Pillsbury. As Nick unravels the conspiracy, it will likely put Nick—or someone close to him—in serious jeopardy.
Although the novel’s dystopian setting is well-described, it’s first and foremost a detective story. As the gleefully convoluted plot unfolds, Nick slowly uncovers a mystery that involves even more murder; he also detects signs of probable sabotage of the electrical grid, and he eventually exposes a tangled scheme involving, among other things, a curious metal box and a man thought to have died years ago. But Mitchell’s vision of the future in this work seems more alarmingly realistic than those in other sci-fi tales, with law enforcement being an especially striking facet of it. Official city policemen (or “pro cops”) like Nick are a dying breed; the Council’s Pop (short for “Population”) Police are so feared by communities that they’ve taken to safeguarding themselves with their own “paracops.” Mitchell’s environment of World Council domination and surveillance often feels claustrophobic, and it’s literally so when he has Nick traverse dark, underground tunnels with someone in pursuit: “Nick counted twenty faint heartbeats and decided he could wait no longer. Ten steps. Twenty. Twenty-five. No further sounds.” The characters aren’t easily defined, even by their actions; some that initially appear to be Nick’s allies eventually turn out to be something else entirely. There’s surprisingly little violence, although the novel is not without its grimmer moments; dog lovers, in particular, should proceed with caution. But Mitchell contrasts these with bits of tenderness (as when a number on a truck sparks a memory of little Nicole) and humor (as when Tim’s electronic video tablet is deemed “ancient”).
A beefy police procedural with well-developed sci-fi and espionage touches.
"When the world stops working and the oil runs out, no one is exactly sure what sort of chaos will unfold, but author Carl H. Mitchell has a pretty good idea. Sundown: Engineering Gives the Devil a Sunburn is an ambitious and entertaining peek into what lies ahead for the world. A corrupt Supreme Leader is pulling the world’s strings in dangerous directions, the fabric of American democracy has crumbled, and survival is becoming more important than maintaining any semblance of society.
The novel begins with a bang – or rather a strangle – of the vice president of the United States, and the book’s rugged hero, Nick Garvey, is handed the case. From there, the investigation begins and the intensity rarely slows. Garvey is involved in almost every subplot of the novel in some way, and he is stretched thin as a detective perpetually living on the edge. However, there is much more going on above his pay grade that might explain the brutal murder of the VP, as well as the strange behavior of Jason Beck, the Supreme Leader of the World Council.
Swerving wildly between his personal struggles, political maneuverings, and covert plots that threaten to undermine what little hope is left in New York City, Nick Garvey is a fascinating center point of the novel, with enough grit to weather anything coming his way. That being said, he is also more than a vengeful vigilante - he has a softer side, a deep love for his family, and a strong social conscience, manifesting as a desire to improve the world that he has seen fall apart.
What readers are given is a visceral look into a possible future, where law and order has essentially collapsed. Crime runs rampant, cities feel more like urban prisons, and those in power care little for the peasants their plans crush. "Savage" is a good word to describe Mitchell’s vision of the future, but within this brutal future that would make even Cormac McCarthy raise an eyebrow, there are still a few shreds of hope and goodness – and Garvey is determined to root them out. Put together, it's an enthralling mix of a cautionary tale and suspenseful thriller.
The writing is captivating, and this futuristic world is beautifully conceived. There are constant supporting details that make this universe seem painfully real and frighteningly possible, given our current trajectory as a global society. There are a few narrative stumbles, particularly the repetitive use of certain words, and a few grammatical errors that could have been caught on a final editing sweep. Overall, however, the exposition is well-balanced with action, the characters are believable and memorable, and the plot is well-constructed and plausible – even the explanations of the most convoluted plots and schemes have a core reality.
Mitchell clearly envisioned this world in its entirety, and then went about creating it in a thrilling work of speculative fiction. With two more books to come, this first book in the series lays the groundwork for an exciting and terrifying look at a bleak future, framed within a novel of riveting suspense."
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Editor, SPR
