THE MEMORY COLLECTOR
Meg Gardiner
Dutton Adult
Thriller
ISBN: 9780525950752
Every once in a while a new literary talent who was previously flying under the radar of stardom is “discovered” by a recognized, successful writer and thereby sees his or her career soar. Such is the case with the immensely talented Meg Gardiner, who was the subject of a Stephen King column in Entertainment Weekly in 2007. King had the opportunity to pick up one of Gardiner’s U.K. paperbacks during a trip to Europe, hailed her as “the next suspense superstar” and compared her style to such literary luminaries as Michael Connelly, Sue Grafton, Lee Child, Janet Evanovich and Nelson DeMille.
Gardiner has the unique background of being an American-born writer who had to find success overseas in Europe before being recognized in her home country --- similar to other U.S. writers of recent years like Donna Leon and Richard Laymon. Thank goodness King “outed” her because she has now realized her full potential in the U.S. by winning the Edgar Award for her paperback original, CHINA LAKE. With her latest novel, THE MEMORY COLLECTOR, she continues with the character of forensic psychiatrist Jo Beckett, who debuted in 2008’s THE DIRTY SECRETS CLUB. Prior to this, Gardiner had written five books in her Evan Delaney series.
The plot centers on an individual suffering from anterograde amnesia, the loss of memory of what happens after the event that caused the amnesia. It is different from retrograde amnesia, where memories prior to the event are forgotten. To a large degree, anterograde amnesia remains a mysterious ailment because the precise mechanism of storing memories is not yet well-understood, although scientists know which regions of the brain are involved. In this case, the victim is the mysterious Ian Kanan. Dr. Jo Beckett is called to the San Jose airport where a plane is on the tarmac having just flown in from London. On board is Kanan, acting erratically and apparently having no memory of where he is or how he got back to the U.S.
It turns out that Kanan had been on a mission in South Africa for Chira-Sayf, where he worked as an independent contractor. Beckett, who herself is an independent contractor working with the San Francisco P.D., investigates Kanan’s background and finds out his experience included a prior stint with a special forces group called COBRA. Beckett also learns that Alec Shepherd, CEO of Chira-Sayf, is Kanan’s brother and very protective of him. Kanan came into direct contact with a substance known only as “Slick,” a liquid form of an unstable nanoparticle that was part of a discontinued nanotech project by Chira-Sayf. The bad news is that coming into contact with this substance can cause the rare form of amnesia from which he now suffers. Kanan cannot form new memories and forgets anything after five minutes --- sort of like the Guy Pearce character in the Christopher Nolan film, Memento.
Simultaneous to this action, both Kanan’s wife Misty and son Seth are kidnapped by some mysterious thugs who seek Kanan and the sample of Slick he allegedly brought back to the U.S. The problem is that Kanan has no memory of this and no idea if and where the dangerous substance was located on the flight from London. Beckett, along with Lt. Amy Tang of the SFPD and other colleagues, are now in a race against time not only to locate the sample of Slick but also the whereabouts of Kanan’s family. Most curious is that Shepherd was not responsible for Kanan’s secret mission to South Africa, indicating that someone else within Chira-Sayf may be operating on a dangerous agenda with unknown consequences.
What Meg Gardiner does best in this fast-paced novel is to introduce characters and situations along the way without fully revealing their intentions or relationship to the plot. Like a master magician, she slowly pulls back the curtain on these characters and plot elements as the story moves along and allows the reader to put all the puzzle pieces together to determine what the real picture is. THE MEMORY COLLECTOR is a worthy successor to Gardiner’s previous work and, like Stephen King’s claims, definitely places her among the elite thriller writers working today.
--- Reviewed by Ray Palen
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