The Puzzle Master by Danielle Trussoni

Hello everyone. I hope you're having a great day.

With four kids (girls), going on a vacation was always a real adventure for my parents.  My dad had his routine shtick he did asking why we packed so many shoes; which became a huge issue when we threw them all in the trunk loose and then had a flat tire.  It was 4 am...in the cold...with no winter coats...and to get to the spare everything (including each and every shoe) had to come out of the trunk, while we stood on the side of the road ... and it started to snow.  We never had a flat tire before, but had two others on that trip. Naturally, my dad blamed it on the shoes. My mom, on the other hand, wasn't concerned about the trunk; she concentrated on keeping us occupied in the car.  She wanted to reduce the likelihood of my sister complaining that my hair blew into her "airspace."  Anything to keep NASA junior quiet. (It is still quite a feat.)  One of the things Mom did was to bring puzzle books. You know the kind, the ones with paper one step down from newsprint.  They featured connect the dots, crosswords, mazes, and lots of word searches. Don't laugh! It was a time before phones and thumb-orific handheld video games. Those puzzle books led to my obsession with the backs of cereal boxes and finding my way to the bee in the center of the maze, or finding the 47.5 spoons hidden in the picture.

I recently read The Puzzle Master by Danielle Trussoni.  This is the story of Mike Brink.  He suffered a brain injury while playing football.  The result was savant syndrome, a rare medical condition.  Mike became able to read 18,000 words a minute with complete retention.  He could decipher patterns, allowing him to solve the most complex puzzles.  Having turned this unusual situation into a positive, he became a famous puzzle maker.  Mike is contacted by a psychiatrist who is treating a woman in prison, Jess Price.  Jess is serving a thirty-year murder sentence but perplexes all as she hasn't spoken a word since her arrest.  One day Jess draws a puzzle that her doctor doesn't understand.  Could it explain what happened during the murder?  The doctor contacts Mike to help solve the mysterious drawing.  This set of events takes Mike on a wild ride, meeting a slew of interesting characters.  The locations change often as fate the of many hangs in the balance, building the suspense as the story crests to a jaw-dropping ending.

This is a new author for me. Where have I been? I have been missing out!  This book is a edge-of-your-seat thriller.  The writing is wonderful, crisp and concise.  The 362 pages are all plot and no tangents, no meandering. Despite the fast-moving story, the characters are well developed.  Likeable or not, they are often surprising.  The settings are different and engaging, told with just enough description. The storyline is rich with puzzles, ancient traditions, and religion.  I found myself mesmerized, ignoring everything and everybody around me. This heart pounding thriller is a roller coaster, and a ride not to be missed.

Many thanks to the author Danielle Trussoni, Random House and publicist Alexis, for bringing this book to my attention.  Not only was it an honor to read, but I've found a new author to follow.