Book Talk: Demille and DeMille, ‘The Tin Men’

Nelson DeMille is on my list of “Favorite All-Time Authors.”  The first of his twenty-four novels that I read was “The Gold Coast,” a mystery thriller that also illustrates quite clearly the difference between the “old money” upper-upper class and the “newly wealthy” lower-upper class.  He followed that with best-seller after best-seller, including “The General’s Daughter,” which became a motion picture, starring John Travolta and Madeleine Stowe.  

A few years ago, he began collaborating with his son, Alex, formerly a filmmaker.  Together, they produced “The Deserter,” “Blood Lines,” and now “The Tin Men” (2025, 364 pages in hardback format).  Unfortunately, for his fans, this is Nelson’s last novel.  He died in 2024, while working on the manuscript with his son.  The protagonists in all three of their novels are Army CID (Criminal Investigation Division) Chief Warrant Officers Scott Brodie and Maggie (Magnolia) Taylor.

Brodie and Taylor are sent to Camp Hayden, somewhere deep into the Mojave Desert, accurately described as “the middle of nowhere,” to investigate the death of Major Roger Ames, who was working on a top-secret military project at the (fictional) military installation.  Official reports show that he died in his office, but Brodie and Taylor discover that he was actually killed while tinkering with the programming of an autonomous robot, the Army’s newest weapon that was being trained for future wars.