The Literate Kitty

One thing I’ve always loved about mountains is the abundance of twisty, narrow, little roads with all those hairpin curves, winding their way up and around and up… and entirely at their own pace (well, at the pace set by those souls who originally cut, blasted, and paved the treacherous paths, in the first place,,, but you get my meaning, I’m sure). That predilection for twisty things carries over to tales of suspense. I like to wonder what’s around the next bend… and the next page turn.  But, if mountain roads were like mazes—with endless wrong turns and wasted energies leading absolutely nowhere—I wouldn’t like them nearly so much.  The same holds true of mysteries. When an author fashions psychological twists into maddening dead ends over and over (and over ) again, at some point I grow weary of following along; there has to be some sort of payoff, here and there, to maintain enough commit to follow all of that incessant winding and meandering to the end. ...