Pendergast: The Beginning (Agent Pendergast, #0) by Douglas Preston(Goodreads Author), Lincoln Child
With the twenty-third installment of the Pendergast series by authors Preston and Child, the writing duo deliver a riveting prequel; the story of how Special Agent Aloysius Pendergast came to be part of the F.B.I. as he and his first partner chase an elusive serial killer.
Already present is Pendergast’s unorthodox investigating methods, leading him to be at odds with his supervising partner Chambers as well as the head of the New Orleans field office. Pendergast is more concerned about the pursuit of the truth than upholding protocols and the chain of command; here we get some insight into what events in his still murky past caused this attitude.
One killer with a particularly odd modus operandi confounds the investigation by turning up dead, left in a similar state to his own victims. Did someone discover his identity before the FBI and kill him in revenge? Or is his death the work of his associates? With one killer down, a conspiracy of two more take his place, but only for a short while before one of them is also dead.
Who is killing the killers, and what is their link to each other? A look into the shadowed past of a prestigious university may hold the answers, if only the evidence has not been completely destroyed. Pendergast is determined to find the truth, even if his own partner refused to support his actions.
In the end, it comes down to Pendergast to face an implacable foe for not only justice, but survival. The story nicely tail ends the previous first book of the series, Relic. While it is not required reading to have gone through the rest of series in order to enjoy this new addition, previous readers of the series will experience many “aha!” moments that those new to these characters will not understand at this point, including the origins of Pendergast’s relationship with Proctor, his chauffeur/bodyguard/confident.
I award this new novel five stars, and recommend this book and series to readers interested in thrillers, police procedurals, and detective novel alike.
