China Lake

Evan Delaney #1

by Meg Gardiner

From award-winning author Meg Gardiner, co-author of Michael Mann’s Heat 2Evan Delaney learns that not only has her ex-sister-in-law joined a religious cult, but the unstable young mother plans to regain custody of her son and disappear with him into the fold of the fanatical group. But when murder raises the stakes, Evan is dragged even deeper into the nightmare.

Genres: Mystery, Thriller, Fiction, Suspense, Crime, Mystery Thriller, Religion

416 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 4, 2002

About the author

Meg Gardiner is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of seventeen thrillers. Shadowheart, her latest novel, is part of the UNSUB series featuring FBI agent Caitlin Hendrix. The Real Book Spy calls it “A mind-trip of a story.” Booklist says, “As always, the writing is exquisite and the story is perfectly crafted.” UNSUB, the first novel in the series, won the 2018 Barry Award for Best Thriller. The Dark Corners of the Night was bought by Amazon Studios for development as an hour-long television drama.

Heat 2 is a prequel/sequel to the film Heat, co-authored with the film’s writer/director, Michael Mann. Booklist’s starred review calls it “Riveting… the fully fleshed human stories support and even transcend the often-breathtaking action.” The Associated Press says, “Slick as a Neil McCauley heist and as intense as a Vincent Hanna chase, ‘Heat 2’ is just dynamite.” It debuted at #1 on the NYT best seller list.

Meg is the author of the Evan Delaney series, the Jo Beckett novels, and several stand alones. China Lake won the 2009 Edgar award for Best Paperback Original. The Nightmare Thief won the 2012 Audie Award for Thriller/Suspense audiobook of the year. Phantom Instinct was one of O, the Oprah magazine's "Best Books of Summer."

Meg was born in Oklahoma and raised in Santa Barbara, California. A graduate of Stanford Law School, she practiced law in Los Angeles and taught writing at the University of California Santa Barbara. She's also a three-time Jeopardy! champion. She lives in Austin, Texas.

Find Meg on Facebook: Facebook.com/MegGardinerBooks Twitter: @MegGardiner1 and Instagram: @Meggardiner1.




Series:
* UNSUB
* Evan Delaney
* Jo Beckett

Reviews

[Miriam Smith (A Mother’s Musings) · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my favourite Meg Gardiner book, really enjoyed it from start to finish and would recommend.

[Anne (Booklady) Molinarolo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Meg Gardiner knows how to write suspense! She tells a damn good story from mostly Evan Delaney's perspective in the first person and seamlessly transitions to the third person to further the storyline then right back to Evan POV. This technique adds to the urgency of Luke and her predicament which is very scary - I had nightmares last night.

Evan Delaney is a lawyer and a Sci-Fi author. She stands up to an ultra-right church group, the Remnant at a friend's funeral. She really underestimated them. Peter Wyoming and his cult are "Enders" and they plan to speed up the Apocalypse on or near HELL-O-WEEN. They've already got one of her family members and they have designs on another. They'll stop at nothing including framing her Naval Fighter Pilot brother for Murder! Even Evan's disabled lawyer boyfriend is in their cross-hairs.

The plot is fast moving and Gardiner's prose is easy to read. Pages will fly as you read. Would I recommend this novel? A resounding YES!

[Anna · Rating 1 out of 5]

The back cover promises quite a bit: "this woman is as good as Michael Connelly." Perhaps, but not the Michael Connelly who created Harry Bosch series but a Michael Connelly who doesn't write crime stories.

Evan Delaney is a scifi writer and tells the story from her point of view. Her brother's ex wife, Tabitha, has joined a cult of religious weirdos a few years ago, and now she's back, trying to get the custody of her son, Luke (Evan's brother, Brian, flying for the army, who's the father, basically dumped the kid to Evan when he had to go do some army stuff). The story begins when Evan is in the funerals of the mother of a friend of her's, who died because of AIDS. The funeral is interrupted and greatly disturbed by a bunch of religious nutcases of the same cult that Tabitha joined. Well, fast forward a bit, allow some introductions of way too stereotypically painted characters (the good ones are pretty, the bad ones are fat, ugly, and scream of a need of being locked in a safe house) and some action, and the leader of the religious cult is found dead at the dumpster of Brian's house. The local police capture Brian for murder, and Eve goes out to find out who killed the cult leader, and what really happened.

I did skip most of the book after I discovered it was just too awful to finish to see what supposedly happened, and I didn't find the solution to be credible.

Is this book character or plot driven? The characters are poor, so that would make me think of it more as a plot driven. The characters are plain awful, and Evan lacks the sense of keeping herself out of these dangerous nutcases business. The police and the detectives don't seem to do any actual work in this book - I loathe books where there's any version of an overgrown Nancy Drew wannabe who in her (or his) half-assed detective hobby is smarter than the cops. And if you write a book like this, then don't ever market it as anything to do with a serious procedural writer (If the cover advertised this "as good as Jo Nesbø", it would have got minus five stars). The characters don't seem mature enough for their age, and they lack depth and development during the story. Imagine something like Arnaldur Indridason's Eva Lind, the annoying drug addict, multiply her annoyances by 20, and let an average 14-year old (so perhaps a fourteen-year old Michael Connelly from Redneckville in Kentucky or Alabama) write thirty characters like her in a story. They were all about as interesting and as likable as that. "Surely it can't continue as poorly all the way thru this story..?" well, I gave up.

As the positive side, the case of California against some weasels (early in the book) was funny.

[Jen Blood · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read China Lake in a day, then proceeded to burn through the remaining four books in the Evan Delaney series in a couple of weeks. I haven't enjoyed a series as much since Dennis Lehane's Kenzie/Gennaro novels, and have already committed to reading pretty much anything Gardiner puts out there. Though I rarely pay full price for an e-book, I readily committed to the slightly higher price tag (at press time, $7.99 per e-book on Amazon) for these.

First, the premise: Attorney/journalist Evan Delaney's former sister-in-law Tabitha joins a cult -- and not one of your friendly chanting-and-togas cults, either, but, rather, a batshit-crazy Westboro Baptist-ish church that thrives on conflict. Tabitha decides she's going to reclaim custody of her son Luke -- Evan's nephew -- around the same time that the leader of the cult is found dead in Evan's brother's back yard. Ultimately, it falls on Evan's shoulders to prove her brother's innocence, save Luke, and try to extract Tabitha from the cult... Much mayhem ensues.

I loved this novel. And not in the distanced, objective, ah, that's-a-well-constructed-plot kind of way; I loved China Lake in a thoroughly engrossed, can't-put-it-down, wish-I-knew-these-characters, wish-I'd-written-this-book kind of way. The first thing that attracts me to any work of fiction is the characters, and Gardiner hits a home run with Evan and the rest of the cast. As is the case with most serial protagonists, Evan Delaney has some challenging personality quirks: she's snarky, untrusting, commitment-phobic, headstrong... Gardiner doesn't hold back with these faults, and there are definitely times over the course of the series that I've wanted to shake dear old Evan as a result. But, it makes for a complex, layered heroine, and I've found myself loving her all the more for the challenges she actively works to overcome.

The pacing in China Lake is non-stop, as it is with all five books in the series. While Gardiner's plots are occasionally outlandish, I find myself willingly suspending disbelief simply for the joy of the ride. But the thing that keeps me coming back in all this is the relationship between Evan and Jesse, Evan's paraplegic, ultra-sharp attorney boyfriend. It's sexy, it's real, it's romantic as hell, and I'm as in love with Jesse as I've been with any fictional character who's come down the pike over the years. Gardiner writes with grit, humor, and a wonderful instinct for balancing plot, character, unfolding action, and escalating tension. If you enjoy well-crafted thrillers with biting wit and complex characters, and you're all right with plots that every so often push the limits of the rational mind, check out China Lake. If you're anything like me, you'll be completely hooked on Evan Delaney and looking for your next fix by the final page.

[LJ · Rating 1 out of 5]

CHINA LAKE (Mys/Ama Sleu-Evan Delaney-California-Cont) - DNF
Gardiner, Meg – 1st in series
Signet, 2008, US Paperback – ISBN: 9780451224552

First Sentence: Peter Wyoming didn’t shake hands with people; he hit them with his presence like a rock fired from a sling-shot.

Evan Delaney, a non-practicing attorney, is taking care of her nephew Luke. Her bother Brian, a Navy pilot, has legal custody of the boy but has left him with Evan while he is at sea. Evan discovers Luke’s mother, Tabitha, who abandoned Luke and Brian, is back in the area. She is now a member of The Remnant, a hate-based religious cult. What starts as an attempted abduction of Luke by the group, end up murder when the leader is found dead inside Brian’s cabin.

I could not be bothered to finish this book it was so badly written. Where do I start? The characters: The protagonist, who had the maturity level of a 10-year-old, spent most of her time being too stupid to live, the police were portrayed as complete idiots—from the very beginning, I thought the ATF should have been all over the cult--the members of the cult were way over the top even for being cult members, even the brother irritated me.

The writing was dreadful. From the structure of the chapters, to some of the worst metaphors I’ve ever read, to terrible dialogue there were times I felt as though English were the author’s second language. There were portents. I hate the use of portents. They are unnecessary and divisive and nothing could have kept me reading this book.

I know the author has other books in this series. I can only assume her writing is substantially improved, but I shan’t be reading her to find out.

[Debra · Rating 4 out of 5]

STEPHEN KING’S RECOMMENDATION SENDS UNKNOWN AUTHOR TO NO.1 ON BESTSELLER LIST
ABEBOOKS Press Release:
(Victoria, BC – 21 February 2007) Meg Gardiner, a little known crime writer based in the UK, has shot to No.1 on AbeBooks.com’s bestseller list after being recommended by Stephen King - even though her books are not published in the US.

Gardiner and her thriller China Lake, published in 2002, claimed the top spot last week as North American buyers purchased copies from UK-based booksellers through AbeBooks.com.

King praised Gardiner on his website in December and interest in her work, particularly among bloggers, has been growing ever since. He then wrote extensively about Gardiner again in his Entertainment Weekly column published on February 9 where he said he was “staggered” that she was not published in the US. “I mean, this woman is as good as Michael Connelly and far better than Janet Evanovich,” wrote King, who advises readers to start with China Lake - Gardiner’s first book in her Evan Delaney series.

AbeBooks.com primarily serves customers in the US and Canada but it allows buyers to purchase books from sellers around the world.

Another of Gardiner’s novels, Jericho Point, was the sixth most popular book on AbeBooks.com last week. Oprah’s latest self-help recommendation, The Secret by Rhonda Byrne, was in second place behind China Lake despite recent exposure on Oprah’s TV show.

King says this about the Evan Delaney series: "Simply put, the finest crime suspense series I've come across in the last twenty years...your basic can't-put-'em-down thrill rides."

1/4/13 What a thrill-ride. I couldn't put this book down and have already read the next in this series. Highly recommended.

[Sandi · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book really needed tighter editing. It could have been a page turner but it was way too long and everything was so over the top.

[Bill · Rating 3 out of 5]

China Lake by Meg Gardiner, the first book in the Evan Delaney series was definitely a thriller. Right from the get-go, the action started and it didn't let up until a fiery, explosive ending. Evan Delaney is a lawyer in Santa Barbara, California. At a funeral for the mother of a dear friend, the funeral party is heckled by a group of protestors from the Church of the Remnant. A confrontation ensues and actions continue from then on. One of the members of the church is the ex-wife of Evan's brother, Brian, who is a Navy fighter pilot. Evan has been taking care of their six-year old son, Luke, since Tabitha abandoned him and while Brian was at sea. Another confrontation, at the Church of the Remnant leaves a man dead, who it turns out has rabies. Tabitha wants to get her son back, Evan goes to the Navy air base at China Lake to get Brian's help. There is more violence and death and it turns out that the Remnant has a plan to bring about an Apocalypse. Does it sound confusing? Well, yes it is, and somewhat far-fetched, but the tension and action are ratcheted tight and you find yourself reading and reading to see how Evan and her brother, oh, and also Evan's boyfriend, Jesse, will solve it and save each other and Tabitha and Luke... Whew!!! Confusing at times and convoluted, but an entertaining, scary, exciting read.... (3 stars)

[Michael · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book started off well but went on and on and on. I thought it might be a version of the everready battery.
Evan Delaney is a legal researcher and journalist who also has a law degree. She has been caring for her nephew Luke, a 6 year old whose father has been deployed.
Evan learns that her former sister in law has joined a fanatical religious sect and wants to regain custody of her son. Not only that, but it seems that the religious sect wants the boy for reasons of their own.
Peter Wyoming is pastor of the Reminant and his followers will stop at nothing in controling their followers while they strong arm their detractors.
Meg Gardiner knows how to create a dramatic scene. At one part of the story, something happens while Evan is driving Luke to see his father at China Lake. With two opposing sides in conflict in the desert I felt that if Alfred Hitchcock were to come back and direct one more film, he would love making a film from this novel.
However, the plot was too lengthy and Evan and her boyfriend Jessie go from one calamaty to another. There was a point that the reader would have to question their decision making.
To say that this novel disappoints is to view the author's progress as a writer when you read the remarkable "Dirty Secrets Club."

[Raven and Beez · Rating 3 out of 5]

https://ravenandbeez.wordpress.com/20...

Beez owns this book and I stole it from her so I could read it.

PROS: This book is a constant page turner. It’s hard to let go once you begin. I liked that there was never a dull moment and things were constantly moving forward. Some books just wander around the main plot and this does anything but. Books about religious fanatics is never my thing but this one was not so bad.

CONS: However, the plot was lengthy and it was only around the end that I was at the edge of my seat to know what was gonna happen. The book was clearly plot driven because the characters felt very plain and the police seemed to do a very disappointing job.

Final Declaration: Meh.

[Jennifer Daniel · Rating 1 out of 5]

It was about an army base with cult and a wildfire and a murder. If that doesn't make sense to you, now you know how I felt the whole time I read this book.

[Sheila · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Remnant has decided they don't want to wait for Armegeddon, they would prefer to start it. Books about religious fanatics always disturb me but this is really well written. I give it 4 stars.

[Paulo Goulart · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,5 estrelas, pela dinâmica, crescente e o suspense, ainda que já estivesse a prever o final... A escrita é simples, suponho que o tipo americano comum, e o tema esse então é 100% americano e não é dos que mais me entusiasma.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've always found cults extremely interesting and terrifying, which made this mystery engrossing. I enjoyed learning about the characters and guessing what each of them were hiding. The plot was complicated, but made for a great read.

[Ann · Rating 2 out of 5]

I couldn't get into the plot.

[Debbie Sato · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was too far fetched for me..I know it's fiction but sheesh!!!!

I've read and enjoyed other Meg Gardiner's books so maybe my expectations were too high.

[Carrie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent plot line that has you hoping you’re never in a situation where the police don’t believe you.

[Alan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am aware that this is the author’s Edgar Award winner. I found it exciting enough, but unevenly paced and sometimes choppy and messy in style. Dunno, but I think it may be her first novel. If so, it is remarkable in many ways, but her style has some shortcomings, imo. Could have used a tighter hand at editing.

[Lisa Kay · Rating 3 out of 5]

★★★½ Tanya Eby does a nice job of narrating this audiobook.

I selected this first in the Evan Delaney series for so many reasons, one of which was the pretty blue cover – reminiscent of the skies above China Lake – satisfied a June challenge. The second, because it was an 2009 Edger Award winner, also fitting in with said challenge.

Did I like the heroine, Evan Delaney, or not? Hummm… First, let me say, I like to see people stand up for the disenfranchised, but Evan had a lot to lose, specifically her six-year-old nephew, Luke, whose father is a Navy pilot. I love some of her witty – and at times, snarky – remarks sprinkled through-out the book; however, on other occasions, the first person narrative is detrimental to the IQ level of the heroine. Ms. Gardiner must bring Evan into the proximity of a cult, calling themselves The Remnant; therefore, Evan sometimes acts too stupid to live. Does one really get in the faces of religious fanatics with pithy replies just because they can? As a lawyer, painted obviously more intelligent than the zealots, does one seek them out, thwart the law and, again, insult not only these armed extremists, but the police within hearing? Plus, the AFT, FBI and NCIS would have shown up in real life long before they do (IMHO).

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Still, as this is a first novel, named for an actual place in California’s Mojave Desert – home to NAVAIR’s Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division (NAWCWD) – a setting with which I am familiar, so I got a great sense of place. It also has with some nice twists; I’m willing to give this author another read. If not book #2, Mission Canyon: An Evan Delaney Novel (Evan Delaney), then maybe from her other series Jo Beckett, who is a forensic psychiatrist in San Francisco.

[Akahayla · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another love-hate relationship. Great characters but a little meh on the progression of the plot. Loved how it ended though!

[Kathleen Hagen]

China Lake, by Meg Gardiner, B-plus, narrated by Tanya Eby Sirois, produced by Brilliance Audio, downloaded from audible.com.

Evan Delaney is a lawyer become journalist, and science fiction writer. She lives in Santa Barbara and has no interest in returning at all to her hometown, China Lake, in the desert on a military base. But return she does when she learns that her nephew, Luke, is in danger of being kidnapped by a fringe religious group/occult group, called The Remnant. Her former sister-in-law has joined this group and wants to get Luke back to raise him in the church. The Remnant is willing to do anything, including murder, to get him back. But it becomes clear that there are other things beyond religion involved when it appears that the group has a specific vendetta against the Delaney family. It also appears that the group is trying to get its hands on dangerous weapons in order to start the war to rid the United States of nonbelievers, that is nonbelievers in The Remnant’s form of religion. A spine-tangling action-packed thriller with Evan and her boy friend, Jesse, involved in the very middle of it.

[Selina · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was such a fun read! It was awesome to see the crazy cult and how well Meg Gardiner was able to present their crazy as obvious logic to the cult-member characters. The ending didn't feel rushed and I loved the development of the characters. Definitely a new favorite author!

**

I love these books and I have only read this book once despite reading through all of the others a couple of times. I don't know why I was inclined to skip this one- it is so enthralling! The cult logic is even more pressing and terrifying today based on the political climate of fear and lack of knowledge.

2023: Same thoughts as above, but even more amplified. The cult-logic is a bit frightening with how on the nose it is given the current state of politics. As per always, Jesse Blackburn slays.

[Mindy Dohmen · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ridiculous. That's about all I got for this one & disappointed I wasted time reading it. I was hoping to find a new author for my book shelf & the reason I chose this one was because of the recommendation of the book by both Stephen King & Michael Connelly. Now I find it hard to believe either of them actually read the book. Such a ridiculous story & such unrealistic conversations, characters, & relationships. I mean a lawyer turned novelist turned superwoman. No more Meg Gardiner for me!

[Traci · Rating 4 out of 5]

My cousin suggested this book and author. It is a series and I really enjoyed it. I am getting ready to read the next one in this series! I recommend it!

[Barbi · Rating 1 out of 5]

didn't finish

[Liinely · Rating 1 out of 5]

I stopped after reaching 100 page. No one should suffer under a bad book.

[Mandi Martini · Rating 1 out of 5]

Couldn't even finish. Bad.

[Barry Martin Vass · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars. Would-be authors will find it interesting to check the provenance of this novel. Meg Gardiner was born in Oklahoma, and spent time in Austin, Texas, and Santa Barbara, California; she was a lawyer who also lectured at the University of California before moving to England. China Lake was initially published as a hardback in Great Britain in 2002 by Hodder & Stoughton, and then released as a paperback in 2003. And then six years later China Lake won an Edgar (Alan Poe Award) for Best Paperback Original. How is this possible, you ask? Well...this novel wasn't even available in the United States until prolific reader Stephen King got his hands on a copy, was completely blown away, and began wondering, on his website and in his Entertainment Weekly column, why a consummate author like Meg Gardiner wasn't even available in the US. This was in December 2006 into February 2007. The result was that China Lake shot to #1 on the bestsellers list of AbeBooks.com, an American-Canadian website that lets you order books from other countries. The Mystery Writers of America (they of the Edgar Award) picked up on this and nominated the novel as a paperback original, which was in fact new to the US. And of course Author Gardiner quickly became a force to be reckoned with. So, note to all wannabe writers out there: it isn't always who you know, but who knows about you. Here's a basic plot summary. Evan Delaney is a lawyer/writer living in Santa Barbara. Her brother, Brian, a fighter pilot with the Navy, has just ended the Marriage From Hell and gotten custody of his six-year-old son, Luke; Evan is taking care of him while Brian is taking care of business at the China Beach Naval Air Warfare Center (home of the Sidewinder Missile). But Brian's ex-wife Tabitha has recently joined a violent, anti-government cult and is back in town, looking to either reunite with her son or take him by force. Really good thrillers tend to grab the reader by the throat and simply make them hang on for dear life, and this is definitely in that mold. China Lake starts out with a bang and then warps along at a high-pitched, chattering whine for almost five hundred pages. Adrenaline junkies will eat this up with a spoon. I know I did.

[Nicole Hughes-Chen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wasn't sure about this book initially. It hits you straight away with some religious fanatic characters and I thought perhaps it would be a bit too much for me.

The story was well thought out but I think it lacked that edge-of-your-seat writing this style of novel needs. Evan and Jesse were likable characters. I wasn't sure how I felt about Tabitha or Glory and their endings didn't not stir any deep feelings in me. I thought that Luke did not have a big enough part and sometimes when Evan was running all over the place he seemed a little forgotten.

I didn't really understand what happened with the missile - I thought the remnant wanted a plane fully loaded with missiles and warheads, but then they settled for one missile??? Whilst there was a clever decoy at this stage of the plot, I thought this element could have been better thought out.

I also wasn't sure the book needed the twist of who in the military was helping the remnant; other than Brian we only had Marc Dupree and Garrett Holt, and I didn't care much for either of them.

The writing was grammatically good; I spotted two mistakes in the entire novel. But the writing needed more urgency; it needed to sweep the reader up. Certainly the last third of the book is way better than the first two thirds. I wouldn't rush to read another by Gardiner.

[Virginia · Rating 2 out of 5]

I found it odd how the narration would shift from first person to third. Evan would narrate her side of the story and then it would suddenly turn into her brothers point of view when she wasn’t around. I was reading the kindle edition and I am not sure if this was a formatting problem but several times there were jumps in the timeline and nothing delineating in the page that we now were reading about something else with different characters. It just would go from one paragraph where she is talking about her brother who is doing something to another paragraph where Evan was with her boyfriend doing something else at a completely different location. It was off putting to read.

I also found it way too convenient that Evan somehow meets and knows the exact people who can help her with her problems. It just was unbelievable. She needs some age progression software and it just so happens that she reconnected with a high school friend who is married to someone who has access to that? Yeah, right. I just started skimming towards the end to get the book done with. Stephen King seems to love the author so I might give her another chance. I already have the next book in my kindle from the library so we will see if her writing improved.