Deadfall by Robert Liparulo

I am a fan of Robert Liparulo. I enjoyed his first novel, Comes a Horseman and his follow-up, Germ so I was excited to let my eyes cross over the words to his latest adventure, Deadfall. While he doesn't implement the twist and turns found in a Dekker novel, Liparulo can tell an excellent story.

In Deadfall we find a small town in Canada called Fiddler Falls. According to the website, it has a population of 242. They are what we would consider -secluded-. Out in the wilderness and far from civilization.

The perfect place to get-away for those who enjoy hunting.

While our main characters travel to the forests around Fiddler Falls, our villains enter the town and do a little hunting themselves. Our two groups clash and the game of cat and mouse ensues.

I have noticed that Robert Liparulo writes very strong female characters. In the three novels I have read, the female characters are strong-willed while the male characters tend to come off as weak or timid. Maybe not so much in Deadfall, but all the men have some kind of relational problems. In this book, the main "hero" suffered through a nasty divorce where his wife tried to turn his children against him.

Perhaps, it's a way to get us to invest in characters before they get vaporized. (Not that this hero does). But I was surprised by a few of the deaths in Deadfall.

The plot behind this book: What would it be like if there was a video game company that decided to use a real weapon on real people in order to get a "real" effect for its video games?

So when I say vaporized...

Pretty much everything Liparulo pens has been purchased by movie producers. In fact, work is underway (pre-production) for a story of his that hasn't even been released.

I am a little concerned because he's coming out with a young adult series. I picture his Publisher, Thomas Nelson, throwing Liparulo behind Dekker and seeing if their new strategy will work.