{"id":5798,"date":"2024-09-10T07:02:37","date_gmt":"2024-09-10T14:02:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/?p=5798"},"modified":"2024-09-10T07:02:37","modified_gmt":"2024-09-10T14:02:37","slug":"matthew-becker-run","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/matthew-becker-run\/","title":{"rendered":"Matthew Becker: Run"},"content":{"rendered":"

Debut<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>This book is by a former customer of ours, who, as a kid, used to shop with his family at our store.\u00a0 He and his brother gobbled up thrillers like they were candy, and I\u2019m happy to say, Becker has now written an excellent one of his own.\u00a0 I have rules when I\u2019m reading a thriller, and if they don\u2019t meet them, I always feel a lack.\u00a0 They are: upping the ante; the seemingly unsolvable problem; the twist; specifity; and pace.<\/p>\n

Becker ups the ante right off the bat.\u00a0 Ben and Veronica, a happy, seemingly ideal couple, are suddenly split apart when Veronica disappears after a mass shooting in a Washington DC park. Immediately, the reader is on Ben\u2019s side as he tries to find his wife, the only clue being a mysterious text she\u2019d sent him out of the blue before her disappearance. There\u2019s the unsolvable problem: where is Veronica, and why has she disappeared?<\/p>\n

Ben has some advantages going for him.\u00a0 He\u2019s smart and capable and he works for a Congresswoman.\u00a0 Even more to his advantage, his best friend appears to be the front runner in an upcoming presidential race. He has strings to pull and he pulls all of them, including the string that ties to Veronica\u2019s place of employment \u2013 she\u2019s a gifted mathematician and a professor.\u00a0 The math parts are Becker\u2019s specific details that make this book stand out.\u00a0 While I\u2019m not a math-y person, it didn\u2019t matter, as the clues were laid out and explained fairly, and they added that important and grounding note of believability to the story.<\/p>\n

This book is full of twists, which I\u2019m not going to give away in a review, but there\u2019s a look at deeper, unknown motives for the characters that are discovered throughout the book.\u00a0 Harlan Coben is excellent at this, and Becker has obviously learned at the feet of the master. I will say there are family ties and connections that are unexpected and provide all the twists any reader could want.<\/p>\n

Last on my list is pace, which no good book lacks.\u00a0 This book is well paced and had me looking forward to opening the pages after I\u2019d been away from it for a bit.\u00a0 It was hard to put down.\u00a0 But the last rule of thrillers, which has never made it to my official list, is that the main character is sort of an everyday hero.\u00a0 From John Buchan to Dick Francis on down to Harlan Coben, the main character is a relatable person who in the worst of circumstances steps up and most importantly, does what\u2019s right.\u00a0 Ben fills that bill.<\/p>\n

This is a very well told and put together thriller.\u00a0 I loved the DC setting (another specific element of the book) and I really liked Ben and was on his side the whole time.\u00a0 While his hunt is for Veronica, it\u2019s Ben the reader roots for as they read.\u00a0 (Veronica is basically the MacGuffin.) Ben is a worthy hero to drape this wonderfully constructed story around.\u00a0 This is a terrific debut. —\u00a0Robin Agnew<\/em><\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Debut This book is by a former customer of ours, who, as a kid, used to shop with his family at our store.\u00a0 He and his brother gobbled up thrillers like they were candy, and I\u2019m happy to say, Becker has now written an excellent one of his own.\u00a0 I have rules when I\u2019m reading … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[1745,1218,1743,1276,1744,13,1467],"class_list":["post-5798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-aetheon-books","tag-debut","tag-matthew-becker","tag-robin-agnew","tag-run","tag-suspensethriller","tag-washington-dc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5798"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5798\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5800,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5798\/revisions\/5800"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5798"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/auntagathas.com\/aa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}