Crais has written 17 novels, 14 of which have featured Elvis Cole. Recently, he began writing some books with Joe Pike as the lead character and Elvis Cole in the secondary role. He just published “The Sentry,” his third book with Joe Pike as the lead.
“The Sentry” just entered the list of New York Times best-sellers near the top. I spoke to Crais recently and asked him about this latest thriller. The book is a bit of a departure because Joe appears to be falling in love. Crais said that “the theme is loneliness and how we all have a natural desire to share our lives with someone else.” Crais explained that “Joe Pike yearns to share his life with a woman.”
As “The Sentry” opens, Pike is putting some air in his tires and notices a couple of young thugs entering a sandwich shop. Pike senses trouble. He crosses the street and interrupts the toughs as they are intimidating the shop owner. The gang members are overmatched. After they run away, Pike is puzzled that the shop owner doesn’t seem very grateful to have been helped.
Then a beautiful woman appears, the shop owner’s niece, and we know Pike’s heart is melting. He is so smitten. This is very uncharacteristic. We understand that this love interest will be nothing but trouble. Pike’s intervention on behalf of the ungrateful store owner opens the door for another wild Crais crime novel to begin.
Crais said, “I tend to think of ‘The Sentry’ as a romance,” and “at its core is this romantic moment wherein Joe meets a woman who is a total stranger. There’s a connection, and he somehow is arrested by the spark and is drawn into her story and frankly, ends up putting himself at great risk in order to not only protect her but then find her when apparently, she turns up missing.”
We meet a villain, Daniel, a psychopathic killer and the “punisher” for a South American drug cartel. He has met his match in Joe Pike.
In our conversation, Crais offered this summary of Pike’s lethal expertise: “he joined the Marine Corps as soon as he could, when he was 17, and thrived on it, and was hardened still further by serving combat tours. When he left the Marine Corps, he became a police officer. That didn’t quite work out for him. He was only a police officer for a few years. He separated from the police and for many years after that he was a professional military contractor, also known as a mercenary. Joe is a highly skilled, trained professional.”
With each successive book, we find out a little bit more about Joe Pike, the man who rarely removes his sunglasses. Oh, and Elvis Cole is still around. Crais says the next book will be 60 percent Elvis and 40 percent Joe Pike.
Vick Mickunas interviews authors every Friday at 1:30 p.m. and on Sundays at 11 a.m. on WYSO-FM (91.3). For more information, visit http://www.wyso.org/BookNook.html
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