Natural Disaster Is Key Player in These Mysteries

Despite the heroic responses to hurricanes Harvey and Irma, it's a sad truth that the chaos created by natural disaster also unleashes and provides cover for human predators. So it's no surprise that mystery writers sometimes use a powerful natural menace--whether shaking earth, raging waters or roaring winds--to heighten suspense and complicate detection in their plots. For example, The Weatherman, by best-selling author Steve Thayer, is a collision of man-made and natural mayhem: Two tortured Vietnam vets, one a television meteorologist with an eerie gift for reading the weather and the other a news producer with a disfigured face, both love the same beautiful cop-turned-reporter. When fierce weather events coincide with murders, the meteorologist is accused, and the disfigured vet and lovely reporter join forces to investigate. In The Breathtaker by Alice Blanchard, a massive tornado strikes a small Oklahoma town and leaves behind three mutilated bodies in a ruined farmhouse. Police Chief Charlie Grover assumes the victims were impaled by flying debris, until evidence proves they were brutally murdered. Grover must enlist the aid of a tornado-chasing scientist to stalk a murderer who conspires with nature to conceal terrible crimes. The drama of Hurricane Katrina (plus a New Orleans setting) have inspired many fictional tales. Certainly, Hurricane by Jewell Parker Rhodes deftly weaves the region's natural and supernatural forces in her mystery plot. Dr. Marie Levant, great-great granddaughter of voodoo queen Marie Laveau, awakens from a nightmare, goes for a drive to clear her head, and finds a crime scene: a couple and their baby killed in the village of DeLaire. She reports the murders to the local deputy and sheriff, and meets the ailing Nana, a voodoo practitioner who's foreseen Marie's arrival. As Marie focuses on the local mystery, an approaching hurricane threatens wider death and destruction. Dead Man's Island, by Carolyn Hart, puts a very different sleuth in the eye of a hurricane: Henrietta O'Dwyer Collins, a widowed former reporter, is invited by an old beau, a media magnate, to his private island off the coast of South Carolina to help him figure out who is trying to kill him. As a monster hurricane hits the island, plot and storm naturally peak together. And if you're hungry for disaster thrills with a dash of romance, there's Chris Fey's Disaster Crimes Series, including Hurricane Crimes, Seismic Crimes, Tsunami Crimes, etc. For more options, see https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/45619.Natural_Disaster_Fiction

In Disaster Tales, We Seek Guides to Survival

I currently find myself immersed in coverage of the typhoon aftermath in the Philippines. Why is there such a public fascination with disaster, whether natural or man-made? Sure, there is a vicarious thrill from imagined terrors while reassuringly safe on a comfy sofa in a climate-controlled den, but I think it goes deeper. It's really the survivor stories we want to hear. The silent dead and destroyed buildings are only backdrops. We are all vulnerable to unexpected disaster, from a natural catastrophe to a personal crisis like a car crash or cancer, and we want to be survivors, too. There are many great true-story books about disaster and survival to guide us. Just a few that I've read: Isaac's Storm by Erik Larson about the 1900 Galveston hurricane; the classic A Night to Remember by Walter Lord; The Perfect Storm by Sebastian Junger; Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer; and Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand. From these, I would boil disaster survival down to three ingredients: luck (which I can't control), preparedness (which I can purchase with supplies, training and support services) and the right mindset. This last, the psychology of the survivor, is the secret that I think we seek in disaster stories. People who survive seem to stay calm and clear-headed, to take quick appropriate actions, and to remain adaptable and resilient. Why aren't they paralyzed or panicked by fear and hopelessness? The answer seems to be that survivors conquer fear with their faith in a positive outcome. The source of that faith can be religious belief or scientific knowledge or disciplined self-reliance. But, basically, to survive, you often need to believe in your own survival despite the odds. So feed your faith to starve your fears, as the proverb says, and check out some of these inspiring disaster tales on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Best-Disaster-Books/lm/160WDNETXV59H