Book Talk: Greg Iles, ‘The Quiet Game’

I’ve read a few of Greg Iles’ more recent novels, all stand-alones, and I enjoyed each of them. I decided to do a quick search on the Internet to find what else he had written and discovered that he started a series, based on a character named Penn Cage, just before the turn of the century. So, I ordered the debut novel, The Quiet Game (1999, 624 pages in paperback format).

Unlike many mystery/thrillers, this book opens peacefully, with Penn and his four-year-old daughter Annie enjoying Disney World in Florida. They are there to try to ease their pain over the loss of Penn’s wife to cancer. Interestingly, no one gets shot, no dead body floats behind a boat at It’s a Small World, and no one in a clown suit terrorizes people. Penn simply phones his parents in Tennessee to tell them that he’s decided to sell his house in Houston and move back to Natchez. Uh-oh!

In Texas, Penn was a prosecutor who sent many felons to prison and quiet a few murderers to the death chamber. But he’s become a famous author, and has removed himself from the legal profession in order to protect Annie from the death threats that he’s been getting from the brother of one of the men he has convicted.