Name: Cajun Justice
ISBN: 9781538752364

James Patterson

Tucker Axum III

A new standalone thriller from the world's #1 bestselling author!

Cajun Justice

Remi Damours

I don't exactly know what I was expecting when I picked up this book. I've never read a James Patterson book before so I don't know if this is the type of book he usually writes, but this didn't exactly encourage me to read any more of his work.

My main issue with this book is that it will never surprise you. There are no plot twists, no big reveals, no interesting problem solving. The main character is an imbecile and does not come up with a single clever solution to any of his problems. The problem is that I don't think we're supposed to think the main character is a huge idiot. We're supposed to think he's a reliable man who always tells it straight. I know this not because of anything that happens in the book, but because his acquaintances keep telling him that he is a reliable man who always tells it straight. 

When the protagonist arrives in Japan, it reads like a bunch American action movie tropes got dropped into the middle of a "Top 10 unusual things about Japan" clickbait article. You'll hear about vending machines and capsule hotels, honor and how everyone is so polite, etc. but don't expect more than a very shallow view of Japan as most of the characters the protagonist interacts with are conveniently huge fans of American culture. The book also somehow makes Japan feel very small, with two scenes in particular. 

(view spoiler)[First, someone takes the protagonist to a hostess club. By coincidence, it turns out that his sister is working at this club, which, okay fine, it's a coincidence. 

Later on, the protagonist is looking for a tattooed Japanese man, and the extent of his search for this guy is to talk to someone who tells him "Oh a bunch of Americans get tattoos at this place, maybe try going there I don't know." Cain then goes to the tattoo place and the person he's looking for shows up just minutes later. It feels like the author immediately ran out of ideas on how to advance the plot and trusted that readers would be satisfied if the plot just came charging at the main character in increasingly unlikely sequences of events. (hide spoiler)]

Cajun Justice

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