The series continues to let us see peeks of Charlie Parker, and his friends Louis and Angel, and know this is a dual story of good and evil of the highest (or lowest) level. There are angels fighting for either redemption or damnation of Charlie Parker. You see, Charlie Parker is a fallen angel who is still striving for redemption.

It is an amazingly complicated situation with beings fighting for Parker's final fate.

One of these beings is The Collector. He and Charlie have matched wits before.

A number of powerful artifacts have been discovered in Iraq, and soldiers who have come back and somehow been involved in the process have been committing suicide. Parker is hired to see what is happening. Seems many were connected to the artifacts in some way.

It all surrounds that mysterious gold box on the cover that has more power the earth should take. The 'whisperers' come to visit the people involved in the stealing of artifacts, and those involved eventually are suggested the least they can do is commit suicide.

The Collector can handle such things and works with Charlie to stop these suicides, the power that is creating this problem, and get the box.

It is another tour de force for Connolly. It can be read on the one level of the PI Charlie Parker, never getting over the murder of his first wife and daughter, then the desertion of his second wife and daughter, for fear of the same fate happening to them.

Or you can take it as a battle of good and evil - angels literally fighting for souls and Light and Dark.

Either way, Connolly's work is brilliant and quite worthy of reading. I would go back and read these books from the start to see the progression of this amazing story.

Connolly also writes other books also with paranormal subject matter, but none tops the Parker books.

A great read.

ellen george

The Whisperers by John Connolly, ISBN:  978-1-4391-6519-1, Atria Books, a division of Simon & Shuster, Inc., review by ellen george