YOU BELONG TO ME

by HARRISON COLIN

BRAND NEW, Exactly same ISBN as listed, Please double check ISBN carefully before ordering.

Genres: Fiction, Thriller, Mystery, Crime, Mystery Thriller, Suspense, The United States Of America

336 pages, Paperback

First published June 6, 2017

Reviews

[Glenn Russell]

I saw a license plate yesterday that said I miss New York, so I smashed their window and stole their radio. Apologies, couldn't resist beginning with a one-liner aimed at the city famous for one-liners.

Colin Harrison’s 2017 novel You Belong to Me captures the vibrant, pulsating, dynamic, electrifying surge of the city of New York. Sure, the story features riveting dramas of men and women from all walks of life, super rich to dirt poor, an entire rainbow of nationalities and ethnicities, but through it all we feel the throbbing of the Big Apple aka Gotham aka Fun City aka the City that Never Sleeps.

As with the author’s previous novels, You Belong to Me is a keen study in sociology. Here's a snippet from a three page reflection on the current state of the union: "The United States, meanwhile, was steadily fracturing into two populations: those few who had enough money and those many who didn’t. Vast sections of the country were economically dead, its inhabitants hypnotized by the Internet, zombied by pharmaceuticals, illegal drugs, and Christian-identity babble, the family structure destroyed by successive decades of divorce, job loss, and domestic violence.”

Jennifer is one of the poor who has traveled to Manhattan to escape the economically dead small city of Reading, Pennsylvania where she never knew her father and her mother became an oxycontin zombie.

Alas, one of thousands of young ladies wishing to make it in the big city. Although Jennifer lacks money and connections, refinement and polish, culture and college, lacks talent of any sort (zero ability to paint, write, dance, act or model), Jennifer comes to New York City a few months shy of age twenty with one incredible advantage – she's not only stunningly beautiful but is a certain kind of perfect American girl, instantly recognizable, bringing to mind Daryl Hannah or Gwyneth Paltrow.



After a few years trading mostly on her looks - catering, girlfriend for lonely, generous Brit, hot real estate agent, Jennifer meets Ahmed, a tall, elegant, brilliant Harvard Law School educated international financial wiz from an Iranian-American family who happens to be incredibly wealthy with the prospect of amassing even greater wealth. However, with his name, his country of origin, the color of his skin and the texture of his hair, there is one thing Ahmed desperately needs to be completely assimilated – an exceptionally attractive all-American girl for a wife. Ahmed pursues Jennifer; Ahmed marries Jennifer, Ahmed has his trophy. And as far as Ahmed is concerned, Jennifer is his, completely his. Thus the novel's title.

The inclusion of Ahmed in the story lets Colin Harrison gracefully segue to observations about the increasing influence of other races and ethnic groups, especially Latinos, Asians and Middle-Easterners, and most especially by all those bright foreign students churned out by the Ivy League who decide to stay in the United States. I would even go so far as to suggest You Belong to Me could be used as supplemental reading in a college course in urban sociology.

Well, at least Jennifer is allowed to be friends with the guy who also lives on the same floor in her swank Upper West Side apartment building - Paul Reeves, a fifty-year-old twice divorced immigration lawyer. Paul’s passion is maps, his specialty valuable maps of New York City made in the early years, as far back as the mid-1600s. Paul frequents the auctions for rich buyers at Christie’s when maps are the feature items up for sale.


1843 map of Manhattan

The opening chapter of the novel takes place at one such auction at Christie's, where Jennifer, now married to Ahmed who is off in Europe on business, joins Paul as he is about to bid on a map he has had his eye on for years.

Then the unexpected happens: a large young man, well over six feet, dressed in soldier gear appears in the room. Jennifer recognizes him and immediately leaves her seat. He wraps his arms around Jennifer and looks out defiantly for anybody in the room, especially Paul, to interfere. The next moment, the two, Jennifer and the big man, leave together.

As we learn quickly, this hawkish looking soldier, muscular, blonde, sun-beaten, is Billy Wilkerson, recently discharged from the army following tours in Afghanistan, Somalia and Africa. Billy Wilkerson drove his red truck up from his family's ranch in Texas to New York City to find Jennifer. He and Jennifer go back. The plot quickly thickens. And how.

You Belong to Me is a sizzling. fast-paced crime thriller making more sharp turns than a taxi cab racing from Grand Central Station to Brooklyn. Much of the time we follow Paul Reeves but the focus shifts to a number of other big action players: Ahmed's Influential Uncle in Los Angeles, Ahmed's relative Amir in Hong Kong, Paul's entrepreneurial, yoga practicing girlfriend Rachel, NYC muscle men from Lebanon, Iran, Mexico, a NYC detective, map restoration experts, and, of course, Ahmed, Jennifer, and Billy.

Another neat feature is each of the 52 chapters notes the location for the ensuing action - for example: East Eighty-Second Street and Madison Avenue, Manhattan; North Vine Avenue, Palm Springs, California; Fitness Ultimatum, Queens Boulevard, Queens, New York; Plaza Hotel, Central Park South, Manhattan. In this way, it's as if we are following a map (ah, maps!) as we track the ever accelerating action chapter to chapter.

A major theme to keep in mind: wisdom versus emotions and impulse. Are the younger men and women listening and learning from the older men? (Sorry, the only older woman in the novel is Jennifer's mother, at the complete opposite end of the spectrum from wisdom), Can such hard won wisdom be passed on or must people make their own mistakes and learn the hard way?

How much knowledge and insight and richness of perspective is gained with an appreciation of history and geography through maps? What are we to make of Paul's obsession with maps? Curiously, Colin Harrison, also a man obsessed with his map collection, could put much of his own first-hand experience with maps to use in this novel. My sense is Colin and Paul share a good bit in common beyond maps since Colin wrote his novel when in his 50s, the same age range as Paul.

A first-rate read. Highly recommended!


New York City novelist Colin Harrison, born 1960

Paul Reeves in the same room with a much loved map: "Magnificent, the Ratzer. A map used by George Washington to defend the new republic in a time when American was more an idea than anything else and the island of Manhattan a town of a mere twelve thousand souls living in shingled and clapboard wood houses, with the occasional old farmhouse." - Colin Harrison, You Belong to Me

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

You Belong to Me by Colin Harrison is a 2017 Sarah Crichton Books publication.

Gritty noir, a stylish thriller and homage to New York, all rolled into one book.

Paul is a successful immigration lawyer with a seriously obsessive map collecting hobby. While attending an auction with his pretty, but very married neighbor, Jennifer, she abruptly walks out when she meets a solider she obviously recognizes and is very happy to see.

Later, Paul spies the couple making love, which requires Jennifer to explain about the affair. But, Paul is not the only one who knows about her tryst.

Jennifer’s husband is an Iranian lawyer, who is more than aware of his wife’s movements while he is away from home.

In the meantime, Paul has a very valuable map sitting in the palms of his hands, but before he can close the deal, it is snatched away from him, sending him into a fevered quest to find the buyer and get his hands on that map.

The city of New York plays a prominent role in this crime thriller. The atmosphere of the city and Paul’s collection of city maps, creates an intimacy with the history and knowledge of it, making it the perfect backdrop for this dark and complex crime drama.

The characters are also stellar, very well drawn, but a bit stereotypical at times, and not necessarily the type of people you want to root for. The the cast is quite large, which causes me a great deal of trouble in many cases, but I didn’t have much trouble keeping them all straight. Everyone had a specified role and they seldom veer too far off script. But, there is a lot going on here. Murder for hire, relationships and families, obsession, shady underworld characters, and even opportunism.

There is also an interesting age gap between Paul and some of people whose drama he finds himself entangled in, which also provides a thought provoking take on the way age and experience taints your viewpoints. Yet everyone involved was surrounded by an aura of desperation or urgency.

This novel may be billed simply as a crime drama, but there is a pronounced noir quality to the story that greatly appealed to me. I thought the story was well written, a little sarcastic, with some very subtle dark humor hidden inside the cynicism.

I have not read Colin Harrison’s previous novels, so my expectations were no higher going into this novel than with any other, which may have worked to my advantage in this case. I was caught off guard by the tone of the novel, but pleasantly so, and was also very impressed with the style of the writing.

I absolutely love this type of gritty and twisty crime novel and found myself savoring it and absorbing it in a way I haven’t experienced in a long time.

I loved the details, the dialogue, the action, the pacing, and of course the rich irony that brings the show to a close.

I highly recommend this book to those who appreciate noir fiction especially, but anyone who likes a good twisty crime thriller will enjoy this one.


4 stars

[Caro · Rating 4 out of 5]

The city of New York, a beautiful and young wife, a powerful and jealous husband, an old love, a map collector, and many buried secrets. Shake well, serve, and you get You Belong to Me.

This is a novel that has a little bit of everything, mystery, action, and many interesting facts. I particularly enjoyed learning about the grounds for revoking the U.S. citizenship from a naturalized person, you get to learn about this and some random historical facts in a fictional setting. I find these tidbits of information highly interesting.

The story is told from different points of views and is engaging to read.

Overall, I enjoyed it and highly recommend it.

Thanks to the author and the publisher for providing me with a copy of this publication in exchange for an honest review.

[Carol · Rating 5 out of 5]

No cozy mystery book here; so, you won’t find Jessica Fletcher from Cabot Cove in this neighborhood. I’m a huge fan of Colin Harrison. He is a master storyteller. His novels are mostly set in Manhattan and this one is about obsession and possession.

The main character, Paul Reeves is obsessed with maps and he covets a map of New York used by George Washington when Manhattan was only a population of 12,000. His neighbor, Ahmed (a very wealthy Iranian financier) is possessive of his blond, trophy wife, Jennifer and obsessed with finding the man she is having an affair with. Jennifer is passionately fixated on a man from her past and foolish enough to tempt fate with a secret rendezvous…hence the title.

It’s not for the faint of heart but great writing and a terrific story even if it did require a willing suspension of disbelief. It’s a wonderful depiction of New York…a murder triangle with fat cats, financial high stakes and, best of all, NYC noir.

[Elaine · Rating 1 out of 5]

I can't believe the author took 8 years to write You Belong to Me.

I seriously hope he did something more productive with his time because this book was a waste of time, for him and for me and future readers.

On the surface, the story seems promising; Paul Reeves, an immigration attorney and a map collector, is obsessed with obtaining a historical map of deep sentimental value.

At the same time, a young, beautiful woman who lives in his building and married to a very wealthy and successful Iranian businessman named Ahmed, is faced with conflicting loyalties when an old flame reappears in her life.

Doesn't sound too shabby, right?

Unfortunately, readers are bogged down in long digressions with no paragraph breaks on the following random topics:

1. Rats

2. Gyms

3. Geopolitics (what this is exactly I'm still not quite sure)

4. Immigration law

5. How to dispose of a body in a metal barrel

6. Ex-wives

Of course, I can't forget:

7. The selfishness, self-centered and uselessness of all the characters including Paul Reeves. He comes from a modest, hard working background and yet for all his wealth criticizes the very people his social circle revolves in. Rich people attend estate auctions, get over it! Jeez, how old are you? Oh, right. 50.

8. The degrading portrayal of women including Rachel, a desperate 40 year old woman who wants a child so much she is willing to get herself pregnant in order to trick Paul into marrying her. What a standup lady!

We can't forget Jenny, aka Jennifer, who I can understand a bit more. Beautiful, not very bright and from a small town, she knew she could use her beauty to find a man and secure a stable life for herself, considering her troublesome childhood.

9. The ridiculous and unbelievable suspension of disbelief you will need to engage in when reading the chain of events that lead to the murders precipitated by a raging, jealous husband with sexual predatory behavior that unleashes poor decisions that end up enlisting the services of an assassin who used to work for El Chapo, the famous drug lord. Still with me? No, I didn't think so.

10. What's with all the superfluous sex scenes? I found no tinge of sexual chemistry between anyone, not Jenny and Billy, not Jenny and Ahmed, ditto to Paul and Rachel and Paul and Jenny. Okay, Jenny and Bill were rocking the casbah but why? Because she's beautiful and he has a huge penis? Hmm...I could believe in this more than anything else but I didn't feel the chemistry and I definitely didn't feel the love besides Paul's love for his maps.

You Belong to Me is a story about obsession, obsession with maps, obsession with wealth and security, sexual obsession, obsession with blood and gore perpetuated by bad people and selfish and vile one dimensional characters that left me wondering why I gave this book a chance.

Maybe someone could draw me a map to show my thought progression.

[Metodi Markov · Rating 2 out of 5]

Трудно ми тръгна тази история нещо, но след стотната страница нещата се понаместиха и дет се вика пооткина. :)

Купих книгата привлечен от корицата и описанието на сюжета, в което се казваше, че авторът има седем романа посветени на Ню Йорк, град интригуващ често моето съзнание, град който бих желал да опозная по-добре.

Очаквах загадки свързани със стари карти на града, но сюжетът се оказа далеч по-тривиален и модерен - изневяра, ревност, отмъщение. Секс сцените бяха смешновати, явно предназначени за американската публика или за хора с малък опит и въобръжение, на други места авторът се впускаше в някакви бесни многостранични обяснения, нямащи много отношение към структурата на произведението му.

Мотивацията на част от героите остана абсолютно неясна, а някои от тях са направо нереално нелогични в действията си.

Издателство "Quantum Publishers" ми е напълно непознато. За съжаление, книгата е преведена нескопосано (въпреки наличието на двама преводачи и редактор с еднакви фамилии), в текста има доста неточности и неумело ползвани думи и изрази. Това ми развали удоволствието от прочита и рефлектира върху крайната ми оценка за текста.

Една идея повече отдаденост или концентрация върху превода и оформлението биха се отплатили богато, но ме е яд да видя подобна немарливост в продукта на малко и тепърва прохождащо издателство.

Пример: иранците се имат за перси и да ги наречеш араби е неточно на няколко нива. Дълбоко се съмнявам помежду си да говорят на арабски, по-скоро на фарси. Има и още, но няма да задълбавам.

[Alexa Trumpy · Rating 2 out of 5]

The female characters are ridiculous. Rachel, a successful, professional, native Manhattanite describes herself as having "mucho curves" and wants the main character to inseminate her with his "alpha sperm." Another female character, a modern, gorgeous, wealthy woman in her 20s, uses terms like "flam-a-roo" to refer to significant others. Modern women just don't talk/think like this.
The main character, a white guy in his 50s, seems like a selfish schlub who can't figure out how to dress himself or cook things that are not hot dogs or frozen vegetables, but we are supposed to believe he is magnetic, mysterious, attractive, wise, and powerful.
Also, all the non-white males are corrupt criminals.
If you like your mysteries/thrillers to be unbelievable, boring, and tinged with casual misogyny and racism, this is a great choice.

[Carole · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you to Simon & Schuster Canada and NetGalley for providing me with an e-copy of You Belong to Me by Colin Harrison in exchange for any honest review. Paul Reeves, an immigration lawyer and antique New York maps collector, finds himself caught in the middle of the marriage of two of his neighbors. Though he is not involved, he witnesses what can happen when a wife is reunited with a former lover and how her jealous and wealthy husband copes with the situation. The story line winds around many turns and introduces several characters who get involved in this crumbling marriage, one way or another. Few will be standing at the end and the reader will get hooked into following who will do what to whom. A great read that does not disappoint.

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This review is going to be very confusing. I really liked the book. No mysteries to solve but a good thriller where you wondered where it might go because it didn’t always go where you thought it was. But, I had a few problems with it that I would have more expected from a new author, not someone with a long list of books like Mr. Harrison. First off, the story went off a couple times on what seemed like random tangents as though the author decided instead of being a tight knit suspense piece it was going to be a rambling novel depicting the demise of the urban shopping center (4 pages). It also included an excessively long detailed listing of the criteria of people who would or would not be members of a certain gym. This soliloquy could have been summarized in 3 sentences. I forgot why I was reading about a gym by the time the list was finished. At another point in time, Mr. Harrison waxed poetic about how a real estate agent should behave. For 4 pages! If any of these in depth exposes had been germane to the plot, I wouldn’t be complaining about them here. But they weren’t. Secondly, I didn’t really like any of the characters. They were all shallow self-centered people. The story tried to make the reader some of them, but failed for me. They were shallow people making self-centered choices and not happy about suffering the consequences. My other peeve was that I thought the hunt for the map would have at least equal attention as the story of the neighbor and her long-lost lover. But I felt most of the story was centered on her problems and the map was just fill-in. Despite all these criticisms, I did enjoy the book. The winding path of Jennifer, the neighbor, her husband, his family history, and her love interest, made for a compelling story.

A copy of this book was provided by NetGalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux in exchange for an honest review.

[Skip · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lot of different GR views about this new book by Colin Harrison. I really like the depth of his characters and his descriptive writing, most especially his feel for New York and its diverse residents. There is a lot of obsession for both the protagonist (an immigration lawyer, from a modest family) and the antagonist (a very successful international banker, with great wealth) and some brutal crimes surrounding the beautiful blonde wife of the Iranian antagonist and a decorated war hero. Some of the tangents that Harrison chooses are a bit much though. I sure hope we don't have to wait another eight years for his next book.

[Kenneth Iltz · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book. I collected Oregon maps years ago and have a decent collection. Perhaps that was part of the allure of You Belong To Me. Each chapter of the book moves in a different direction with a new element of the larger story. The book is well written and bound to keep you up late at night reading.

The book is two stories that interweave. The first is about Jennifer Mehraz, the beautiful young trophy wife of Ahmed Mehraz, an Iranian born banker/lawyer living in New York. Her beauty is her allure. She has no educational background and she comes from a poor, troubled family. She helps Ahmed to appear to be less Iranian and more American. The problem is that she is in love with Bill Wilkerson, an army Ranger recently discharged. Bill and Jennifer have a long and troubled history together. Ahmed Mehraz and his uncle Hassan intend to get rid of Bill Wilkerson by any nefarious means.

The second story is about Paul Reeves, the neighbor of Ahmed and Jennifer in a high rise New York apartment. Paul is a successful attorney who collects historic maps of the city of New York. The plot revolves around Paul’s pursuit of the precious Ratzen map, of which few copies exist, and which was instrumental to Washington’s defense of New York, enabling his troops to survive and stay in the fight with the powerful British when they stood to defeat the colonists. Paul thought he had negotiated a deal to purchase the map but found out that a wealthy socialite outbid him.

Paul helps Jennifer hide Bill’s whereabouts but Ahmed and his uncle Hassan are in hot pursuit of Bill. So how do maps and Jennifer and Ahmed’s marital problems intertwine? No spoilers here. Suffice it to say that the book is an adventure that you will enjoy taking.

[Genevieve · Rating 2 out of 5]

I chose this on the promise that it was somehow "noir" but I don't see it. Mostly a string of racist and misogynist stereotypes (we've got an unimaginably brutal Mexican biker who used to work for El Chapo, some "elegant" and pragmatic yet ruthless Persians, and a bunch of women who are desperate for marriage/derided for their plastic surgery/equipped to survive only because of their looks and openness to light prostitution, then there's the main character* who costs a bunch of people their lives by cheating on her husband and can be redeemed only by leaving New York for a shithole in Texas and retaking possession of her long-abandoned son). The plot was blah. There were a couple of semi-interesting set pieces (scenes at an auction house, on an apple farm, at a weightlifting gym) and a couple of nice gross-out moments but they were far from enough to carry this.

*Spelled out as a girl who is nothing special except for the fact that she's an "iconic" blonde in the tradition of a long enumerated list including, no joke, Brooklyn Decker and Blake Lively. wtf

[Vessela · Rating 4 out of 5]

Творбата заслужава висока оценка. Беше ми интересно да я прочета. Обаче изпълнението на български е некачествено. Най-вече ужасно много грешки, пропуски и повторения в текста, независимо от двамата преводачи и наличието на редактор, всичките с еднаква фамилия?!? Едно прохождащо издателство би трябвало да се отнася по-внимателно с първата си продукция /а и не само с нея, разбира се/.

[Jan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Every little detail was followed through and tied up in a neat bundle by the end of this riveting book. I do hope that all his women characters are not this vapid, but since I couldn't put it down, I will be looking for some of his older titles now.

[Laurie · Rating 1 out of 5]

The synopsis was the most intriguing part of this book. I was very excited about starting this book but very quickly flipped a switch, the characters are all selfish and the women are shown dependent and weak. Many of the character choices felt like racial profiling while also blatantly trying to say that it wasn’t which just started it out as an uncomfortable read.

As for the storyline, I’m not really sure you could call this a mystery as there was never any speculation about what happened as it was revealed as it was happening and as for a thriller, it would have to be thrilling. Storyline feels overdone and wraps up in the most unrealistic and unethical way.

[Lynn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Could not put it down. Thriller about New York and all the different kinds of people who inhabit it, which usually annoys me (I am a native New Yorker) but this is done in a good way. And well written. I need to try more by Harrison, I haven't read any of his previous books.

[Catherine · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is a nasty little book, where the women are all caricatures and the non-white men are all criminals.

[Bibliophile · Rating 3 out of 5]

A nasty, cynical tale of unpleasant New Yorkers (and a Texan) who completely overreact every time they don't get what they want. Murder, manipulation and map obsession! It was mostly entertaining, but the characters, especially the female ones, never felt real in all their horribleness. I kind of hoped none of them would get what they wanted.

[Anna Curtis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thrillers aren't usually my thing, but this one was really quite good. Each character has a well developed voice and strong - if questionable - convictions. Beautifully paced. Includes some graphic violence and several oddly clinical but still compelling sex scenes.

[Ellison · Rating 2 out of 5]

Easy to read but the plot got sillier as it went along. Evil Iranians, ditzy women and Mexican hitmen did not help.

[Leanne · Rating 1 out of 5]

The worst. Couldn’t finish. Returned it to Audible. Did I say the worst? Like worst, worst.

[Jim Coughenour · Rating 2 out of 5]

Rich people are evil, a bit fascinating, and we're right to hate and envy them. Everyone else is more or less a loser. Many people deserve to be humiliated and die, and they do. Colin Harrison's new New York crime thriller sucked me in and I felt like a dirty voyeur for the full ride. This isn't a book to lift your spirits but it does have a certain nasty entertaining edge. Here's one internal monologue of the protagonist on the state of the union:

The United States, meanwhile, was steadily fracturing into two populations: those few who had enough money and those many who didn’t. Vast sections of the country were economically dead, its inhabitants hypnotized by the Internet, zombied by pharmaceuticals, illegal drugs, and Christian-identity babble, the family structure destroyed by successive decades of divorce, job loss, and domestic violence. Most of the baby-boom generation had no money for retirement, and the great howling sound coming from the next decade would be the millions of old white people living hand to mouth, increasingly infirm, demented, and politically irrelevant. Meanwhile the Latinos would be spreading inexorably, the re-Conquistadores, eventually electing a Latino president while the black underclass sank further behind, no other race interested in helping them now—sorry, but it was true—statistically a shrinking percentage of the population. In a generation, America would be run by the remaining elite whites, native-born Asians, the Jews (of course), the relatively few successful Latinos and blacks, and a sizable sampling of Indians, immigrant Chinese, and all the bright foreign students churned out by the Ivy League who had decided to stay. This was a truth you would hear no American politician utter, because it had history in it, and no one, especially the politicians, had any answers when it came to the constant pressures of history.

A fitting summer read for the first year of Trump.

[Jenn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found it a little difficult to rate this one. On one hand, the whole map theme was much more interesting than I would have expected. But the dude’s relationships felt wrong. He was creepy and in places it felt like he may have had a touch of aspergers. Or maybe he was just weird in general. From the review lines on the front of the book I expected more thriller and more gruesome than was in the book.

[Dustin]

My friend and fellow writer, Glenn Russell, said what I can only to hope to achieve whenever I read Colin Harrison's book, in his fascinating review:


https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Fatty Goodlander · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent read!

It took me awhile to get into the author's cadence, then I was worried it was too literary. Finally I was swept away. Good job!

[Mary-Beth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Reviews kept referring to this novel as "noir." To me, noir conjures up Raymond Chandler and San Francisco in the 40s and femmes fatales. This novel had none of the above! I was also disturbed by the steadily (and gratuitously) rising body count. Maybe this is 2.5 stars instead.

[David Sahl · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've enjoyed Harrison's novels and have waited for the next. This latest novel didn't disappoint. I read not just for the action sequences. I look to the author's control of the characters and the atmosphere throughout the story. Here I can compare Harrison's love of New York with Conroy's love of the south and Lehane's love of Boston. There is an easy development of place and time. Also, the important factor of character in his novels. We meet some dissonant characters. There are the very wealthy, which he seems to understand, and the very gritty back alley types who could kill at a moment's notice. And both types belong together and work off each other to highlight their particular characteristics without becoming corny stereotypes. As far as the convoluted plot here, I enjoy being taken on a clever ride, and Harrison knows how to drive - fast.
I totally enjoyed this novel - as well as his previous novels - and await the next.

[Ben · Rating 5 out of 5]

Obsession. Love. Possession. That is what " You Belong to Me" the novel by Colin Harrison is about.
Paul Reeves is a modestly wealthy immigration lawyer who lives and practises in NYC. His obsession is for old maps of NYC . There is one map that he covets deeply, but it is sold out from under him. Paul wants it; he needs it. He doesn't particularly need the woman who is trying to get him to marry her, but he does want that map.
Paul's next-door neighbors are a wealthy couple, Jennifer and Ahmed. He is truly, wildly rich. She is blonde, beautiful and loves spending his money. Ahmed loves her, or rather , he loves possessing her and controlling her with his money. When he suspects tha the is seeing someone else, Ahmed is obsessed with finding out whom she is meeting. He is the type to do anything to anyone who threatens his possessions.
In this beautifully written, perfectly constructed gem of a novel I found myself enmeshed into the lives of this group of players in a drama that quite goes beyond anything I expected. Mr. Harrison's novels, at least the ones I read, are like that. Not so much action thriller or crime dramas, but human dramas, beginning small and swelling into something deadly.
Just fascinating.
Content warnings: some sexual scenes ,but not too graphic. Some violence, likewise not graphic.

[Simon · Rating 2 out of 5]

Meh. The writing is competent enough, aside from some truly creepy depictions of sex (which may be a de gustibus element, so if you read the book, judge for yourself). The plot is pedestrian, although for what it is, well-executed. Harrison weaves map collecting throughout the book, both as a plot element and a somewhat labored metaphor for the impermanence of everything. Paul Reeves, the underdeveloped hero --- the word is mine, Harrison might be more cynical, although who knows? --- is constantly noticing that maps freeze New York City at particular, now lost, moments in time. Kind of the way that the relationships in the book are fluid. Or something. Suffice it to say that the title is supposed to be ironic, doncha know.

What bothered me the further I read was the relentless cynicism. When you take out the action sequences (well done) and the bits about map restoration and collection, the reader is left with a depiction of Mexicans, Arabs and Persians as stereotypical lowlifes --- the Persians are rich, so they swank around in great suits and have blonde wife fetishes, so highlife lowlifes --- and the women are torn between their desires for material things (Jennifer) and the love of a poor American hero, or independence and their desire for the love of a good man who will give them a baby even if they have to trick him into it (Rachel). Both of these subplots pretty much work out the way you would expect. In Jenny's case there is also a clunky deus ex machina that makes the resolution of her story completely improbable, although Harrison probably thinks he gave both ladies happy endings.

There is a cinematic quality to Harrison's action scenes that make them easy to visualize, so film studios take note. Paul Reeves would be a good part for Tom Cruise if he ever segues into playing people more or less his own age. Come to think of it, there are parts for Channing Tatum and Margot Robbie too. It's that kind of thriller. No more, and thanks to some bilious stereotypes, sometimes quite a bit less.

[Maryanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked these characters, the way they told their stories, the sideways excursions into different aspects of the life and scenes. Some reviewers didn't like the sidebars about gym rats, shopping malls, maps, but I actually found it added character to the book. Yes, some people were predictable, like Jennifer's alcohol mom, and even stereotypical like Billy, but it all worked together.