Mind Games Book Review *Carolyn Crane*

Carolyn Crane, who has quite the reputation in the blogging community running The Trillionth Page since 2007, has written a very strange book indeed with Mind Games. What we have here is a woman who believes she's no one special. Justine Jones is a very average," medium pretty" looking woman who lives with a deep mind-numbing fear. Justine suffers from hypochondria and believes she's dying from a brain disease called vein star syndrome. Her mother eventually died from it because the doctors didn't diagnosis it correctly.

Because Justine is ruled by this fear, she had hidden her true self from others. This started around the time her family fell apart, due to a con man named Ben Foley who stole her family's savings. Justine spots Foley at a Mongolian restaurant called Mongolian Delights she her boyfriend Cubby have dinner at one night. Justine confronts him because he maybe conning a young couple he's sitting with. Before things can get out of hand, the owner of the restaurant comes over. Justine feels a rush, like molten lava in her blood, because the restaurateur is very handsome, almost leopard like. She also comes to the conclusion that he's a highcap, a person with amazing mental abilities. Highcaps are recognized but very much looked down up because of the powers they have. And since Midcity is being held hostage by a highcap serial killer called the Brick Slinger, who uses telekinesis to hurl bricks that kill. Crime is up tenfold, but there's hope because the new chief of police, Otto Sanchez is in charge and Justine believes he will turn things around and stop this dangerous killer.

Justine and Cubby leave after a less than satisfying dinner. She knows it will only be a matter of time before he's fed up with her. Justine longs for normalcy, a short reprieve from the fear and worry she lives with every hour of every day. But the moment she walked into Mongolian Delights, her future changes, because Sterling Packard waves a gold ticket in front of her face. He'll teach her to use her hypochondria and channel it in such a way into others, where all the sickness in her mind will be released and she can finally be at peace.

The couple with Foley was actually targeting him. They work for Packard and take Justine to him. Packard is not who he seems to be. He owns the restaurant by no choice of his own. For the past eight years he has been stuck in the restaurant surrounded by a force field where he can't leave. The only way he can be free is if his nemesis releases this field. But Packard can't kill the person, because if his nemesis dies, the field will remain intact and Packard will remain within those walls forever.

Justine is intrigued by Packard, who wants her to join his team of disillusionists. Packard can detect a person's weakness, such as with Justine, and will train her to "zing", where she'll push her mental disease into these criminals, increasing their own weaknesses and disillusion them to a point where they'll have an incident, much like a psychological asthma attack. After a few more zings, these dregs of society will be destroyed and the victims and their families, who paid for the right, will be avenged.

Justine has some concerns because she's joining a vigilante group, but when Packard shows her who their targets are, she joins, thinking she'll do this temporarily and walk away cured and having a clear conscience because she was able to do a better job than the police have. Through her training and eventual targeting, Justine feels she belongs. This group is just like her, and in a way have become her family. She bonds with them, including Packard who tempts her. She wants to remain loyal to Cubby because he's her one last possible chance of having a normal life. But, Packard has other plans for Justine, and because he hasn't been upfront with her, she's backed into a corner where her need to zing grows. Her private search for Packard's nemesis draws her deeper into this underworld where she must constantly feed her hunger that may lead her to another individual, who with one thought, could destroy not only Justine, but Packard and his band of disillusionists as well.

Mind Games is a bleak atmospheric urban setting where you can taste the steam rising from the pavement. Carolyn Crane has written one of the most unique urban fantasies I have read in recent memory. If you're fan of Ann Aguirre and Ilona Andrews, the debut talents of Carolyn will floor you in such ways you won't see coming.

Packard is not what he seems and a very sketchy guy. Justine is somewhat weak when it comes to Packard because of her attraction to him. She wants to give him the benefit of the doubt. Justine is a very caring and loving woman who wants to see the good in people. And because of how she acts, she begins a chain of events that will rock Midcity and the disillusionists.

Things may go over your head in the beginning. It did with me, and eighty pages in I still couldn't figure out where Carolyn was going with this. And then there comes a point where it all starts to make sense. Talk about a book that gives you a high while you read. The reader is pulled along for the ride with Justine, and when all things are revealed, you will be stunned.

Mind Games is one big rush, a hybrid of the A-Team, and a storyline that includes the elements of Tarantino's Pulp Fiction and Kill Bill, combined with the dark nature of both the hero and villain found in Chris Nolan's The Dark Knight.

Not many authors can make me stand up and take notice with their debut like Carolyn has. There's a little something for everybody in this book, with unique characters, a few hot love scenes and a sexual euphemism or two I still can't believe Carolyn threw in there. But when I read it, I thought, this is the Carolyn Crane I know. I bow down to Carolyn's masterful writing. (Bantam)

Congrats my wonderful CJ, you have arrived. You're a tour de force! (RRRJessica dared me to use that overused review phrase)

Final Grade: A-

A few other Mind Games reviews:
Dirty Sexy Books
Fantasy Dreamer's Ramblings
Read Review React

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