{"id":8369,"date":"2021-02-24T10:51:59","date_gmt":"2021-02-24T14:51:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/?p=8369"},"modified":"2021-02-24T10:51:59","modified_gmt":"2021-02-24T14:51:59","slug":"book-review-stranger-danger-stranger-3-by-michaelbrent-collings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/book-review-stranger-danger-stranger-3-by-michaelbrent-collings\/","title":{"rendered":"Book Review: Stranger Danger (Stranger, #3) by Michaelbrent Collings"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"cover<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

( Amazon.com\u00a0 )<\/a><\/p>\n

Stranger Danger <\/em>by Michaelbrent Collings<\/p>\n

Written Insomnia Press, 2020<\/p>\n

ISBN: 979-8575116776<\/p>\n

Availability: paperback, Kindle<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Then Jesus asked him,\u00a0\u201cWhat is your name?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMy name is Legion,\u201d\u00a0he replied, \u201cfor we are many.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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Stranger Danger<\/em> is the third volume in the series featuring Legion, a teacher of justice and pain.\u00a0 Like the unfortunate of the Biblical parable, Legion may have demons inside him and be quite crazy, in a figurative and literal sense.\u00a0 But that doesn’t stop him from teaching people the error of their ways, in a bone-cracking, skin-pulping fashion.\u00a0 If you’ve read the other two volumes (Stranger<\/em> and Stranger Still)<\/em> then you can’t miss this one, it’s the best one yet.\u00a0 If you haven’t, this is still a great read.\u00a0 Minus a couple small issues, it can still be read and understood as a stand-alone.\u00a0 It’s every bit as good as Stranger Still <\/em>(reviewed\u00a0here<\/a> ) but with the few minor tweaks made, this one is a notch above its predecessor.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

As in the prior volumes, Stranger Danger<\/em> runs two concurrent threads that start off separate, but eventually twine together.\u00a0 Legion, a man with the ghosts of his brothers (Fire and Water) always with him and talking to him, stars in the first one.\u00a0 He simply goes (or is led) to a place with a lot of wrongdoing, investigates the source of problems, and rectifies the wrongs inflicted on innocents, in an agonizing fashion.\u00a0 This time, the site of mayhem is Tree City, a standard city with a ghetto overrun by four separate street gangs.\u00a0 Legion’s story thread soon intersects with that of Candela Garcia, a cop who has been on the run from a psychopath for years, and has finally settled in Tree City, determined to make a better life for her son Chase, and the people of the city.\u00a0 Her son makes the mistake of falling in with Wolf, the leader of one of the gangs.\u00a0 Candela has to deal with the double trouble of helping her son and stopping the gangs from decimating the city.\u00a0 Fortunately for her, Legion believes in stopping evil also, and the two of them use their opposing methods and beliefs to bring justice to the city.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Stranger Danger<\/em> has the usual hallmarks of Collings’s writing in this series: extremely fast pace, excitement, and a mild touch of gore.\u00a0 It’s the small touches that push this book above the previous one.\u00a0 Fire and Water, the ghostly spirits in Legion’s head, are much better developed. Their advice does play a critical role in assisting Legion, but their constant verbal squabbling with each other also provides some occasional light-hearted moments.\u00a0 The contrast between the two main characters also helps.\u00a0 Candela is a straight-arrow, by-the-book cop who despises corruption and can’t be bought.\u00a0 Legion understands right and wrong, but has no concept of laws when it comes to applying punishment.\u00a0 Where Candela would make an arrest, Legion would break bones and crush pelvises.\u00a0 It adds a nice dynamic to the story.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The character of Legion has also evolved.\u00a0 Before, he was emotionless.\u00a0 Now, at times, he actually experiences fear and (gasp!) happiness of a sort.\u00a0 He isn’t flawless in his retribution either: one could make the case that a couple of the people Legion injures didn’t deserve it– they were just flunkies doing their legal jobs.\u00a0 It’s different then the usual “good” or “evil” dynamic usually found in the series.\u00a0 At the same time, Legion starts to question whether he should only punish the sinners, or maybe try helping out good people who don’t need correcting.\u00a0\u00a0 It all adds up to a more complex and interesting character.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Stranger Still<\/em> is the best entry yet in a series that appears to have a ways to go.\u00a0 Now, it’s just a matter of counting the days until the next one is released.\u00a0 Recommended.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Contains:\u00a0 violence, profanity, gore<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Reviewed by Murray Samuelson<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

( Amazon.com\u00a0 ) Stranger Danger by Michaelbrent Collings Written Insomnia Press, 2020 ISBN: 979-8575116776 Availability: paperback, Kindle   Then Jesus asked him,\u00a0\u201cWhat is your name?\u201d \u201cMy name is Legion,\u201d\u00a0he replied, \u201cfor we are many.\u201d   Stranger Danger is the third volume in the series featuring Legion, a teacher of justice and pain.\u00a0 Like the unfortunate<\/p>\n

Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[450,2243,2278,4790],"class_list":["post-8369","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-crime-fiction","tag-michaelbrent-collings","tag-religious-horror","tag-stranger-danger"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8369","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8369"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8369\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8374,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8369\/revisions\/8374"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.monsterlibrarian.com\/TheCirculationDesk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}