Don Winslow • Knopf
They are out there, “The Dawn Patrol.” They are the people who get up early and sit on surf boards waiting for that big wave that they can ride in. It may seem placid at the moment but it can change in an instant. There is always something going on under the surface. In this book the Dawn Patrol refers to a group of friends whose love for surfing pulls them together.
The big wave isn’t the only thing Boone Daniels, the laid-back lead character, has to worry about. “If Boone was any more laid-back,” Cheerful, one of the members of the Dawn Patrol says, “he’d be horizontal.” Daniels finds himself involved in a case about a missing stripper, presumed dead, and a child smuggling ring.
Daniels may seem laid back at the beginning but what he goes through during the course of this story transforms him into a tormented, heroic and complicated man.
It all starts when he is contacted by Petra Hall, a lawyer, to find the missing stripper, Tammy Roddick. The chemistry that is built up between the two of them helps move the story along.
Boone just wants to surf and maybe from time to time, if the waves are not good, do small jobs to make enough money to eat fish tacos. His philosophy is, “everything tastes better on a tortilla.” The last thing he wants is for something to separate him from the ocean and the surf. He knows that if he takes this job the chances of him being there to catch the colossal wave is slim.
Author Don Winslow has a style of quick prose that grabs you and refuses to let go. Boone may be laid-back but this prose is not. The story is played on two layers. Violence is not soft soaped. There are many small plots going on and Winslow handles them well. He also includes sleazy characters. Ladies, this book is for the man in your life. The story is told in third person multiple viewpoint omnipotent. It works. The tension build up is handled well.
Winslow has worked in the past as an investigator working the back alleys near Time Square busting pick pockets in movie theaters, but found that was going nowhere. He has a masters degree in military history. But it seems his love is writing. While he has written many books before this one, this work may be his breakthrough novel.
Will there be another story in a series that will partner Boone and Hall? Only time will tell.
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Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on July 4, 2008. Read the original PDF.