From the PR: “It is 1997, eight months since vigilante justice-seeker Claymore Straker fled South Africa after his explosive testimony to Desmond Tutu’s Truth and
Reconciliation Commission. In Paris, Rania LaTour, journalist, comes home to find that her son and her husband, a celebrated human rights lawyer, have
disappeared. On an isolated island off the coast of East Africa, the family that Clay has befriended is murdered as he watches.

So begins the fourth installment in the Claymore Straker series, a breakneck journey through the darkest reaches of the human soul, as Clay and Rania fight to uncover the mystery behind the disappearances and murders, and find
those responsible. Events lead them both inexorably to Egypt, where an act of
the most shocking terrorist brutality will reveal not only why those they loved
were sacrificed, but how they were both, indirectly, responsible.

Relentlessly pursued by those who want them dead, they must work together
to uncover the truth, and to find a way to survive in a world gone crazy. At
times brutal, often lyrical, but always gripping, Absolution is a thriller that will
leave you breathless and questioning the very basis of how we live and why
we love.”

It’s a very strange thing to be sitting here trying to put together a review for the fourth Clay Straker novel from Paul E Hardistry. It seems like only yesterday that I tore through The Abrupt Physics of Dying – not three and a half years ago. Yet, here I am having just torn through Absolution in record time and wanting more.

It’s exceedingly hard to review any book without giving away too much and I’d hate to do so here especially if this is the last installment in the series. I will say that Absolution is a fantastic read – Hardistry has, over the course of the series, created characters that live and breath and continues to place them in the most gripping and compelling of dramas – in this instance travelling from Zanzibar to Egypt via Sudan, throwing historical events into the mix to add a real sense of gravity and (at times) horror to proceedings.

Clearly a writer of talent, Paul E. Hardistry manages to combine historical fact and technical details with action and plot in a manner that adds weight and validity to events without ever slowing the pace or risking attention drifting during ‘the science bit’. It’s a rare skill and one that Hardistry flexes with the same ease as Clay does a weapon.

While we’re on the subject of Clay – Hardistry’s hero is a refreshingly real and vulnerable lead for such a punchy thriller; while very capable in a ruck, Straker is vulnerable physically (there’s very few thrillers who’s lead doles out such punishment with a stump) and psychologically.  Watching him overcome significant odds is always a pleasure.

I’ve been peppering my reading with a lot of thrillers over the last few years, from the hard-boiled and vast-in-scope Ellroys to the hard-nosed airport thrillers of Jo Nesbø and Lee Child, and Hardistry’s Clay Straker series sits up there with them in quality. The series manages to combine the quite-loud-LOUDER punch of a Reacher scale-up with the depth and complexity of plot normally reserved for literary fiction.

Absolution (which I genuinely hope is not the last in the series) is a real heavy-hitter. A taut, explosive thriller with intelligence that tears along at whip-crack pace and delivers in spades.

Thanks to Karen at Orenda, once again, for my copy of Absolution and to Anne Cater for inviting me to take part in the blogtour.