Tag Archives: Crazy Dangerous

Praise from Caesar

I had the pleasure of getting my review of Andrew Klavan’s novel Crazy Dangerous (not here, but in its The American Culture incarnation) linked today by Klavan himself. In the course of the linkage he refers to me as “my colleague.”

That’s kind of the apotheosis of the concept of generosity, right there.

I’m Klavan’s colleague in more or less the same way I was Sir Anthony Hopkins’s colleague when I was doing community theater down in Florida. Or in the same way I was Christopher Nolan’s colleague when I cobbled together my West Oversea trailer. Or in the same way that guy in the subway station who plays with his instrument case open for spare change is Yo Yo Ma’s colleague.

But the fantasy is appreciated.

Yesterday was Svenskarnasdag (Swedish Day) at Minnehaha Park in Minneapolis. As usual, the Viking Age Club & Society was there for the entertainment, enlightenment, and moral uplift of the community. I fought a few fights, and never did better than a mutual kill. I’ve come to accept the fact that that’s more or less my calling.

Talked to a fellow who asked me about the Vikings in Scotland, and I was able to unload a lot of the stuff I learned in The Viking Highlands.

The subject didn’t stray as far as the Battle of Kringen, in 1612, whose 400th anniversary is today. Information here. (Thanks to Tim Eischen for bringing this to my attention.)

In brief, King Gustav Adolf II of Sweden wanted to attack Denmark by way of Norway. He hired a group of Scottish mercenaries under the command of George Sinclair (ironically, the Sinclairs are one of those Highland clans with Norse roots. But I doubt if that bothered them much) to march across Norway. An irregular force of Norwegian farmers ambushed them in a narrow mountain pass at Kringen, killed most of them by causing an avalanche, and slaughtered most of the rest. A few survived, and numerous Norwegians in Romsdal take pride in being their descendents.

We Norwegians have relatively few military victories to celebrate in our history, so this event looms large in our cultural tradition.

Crazy Dangerous, by Andrew Klavan

Andrew Klavan has taken a small (but worthwhile) detour in his writing career over the last few years, producing top-notch thrillers aimed at the Young Adult audience, published by Christian publisher Thomas Nelson. His previous four books, The Homelanders series, brought the Christian YA field to a whole new level. All in all, I think the stand-alone novel Crazy Dangerous is even better.

One improvement is the narrator/hero of Crazy Dangerous, Sam Hopkins. Unlike Charlie West, the hero of the Homelanders books, Sam is not an adolescent James Bond, outstanding at everything he does and equipped with a black belt. Sam will be far easier for most kids to identify with. He’s a smallish, not very popular, not academically outstanding, not very athletic teenager, struggling with the challenges of being a preacher’s kid in a small town in upstate New York. When he receives an odd offer of “friendship” from three of the shadiest kids in his school, he gets involved with them, just to escape the public expectations that face every PK.

But the situation changes when his new “friends” make an attack on Jennifer, a vulnerable classmate with mental problems. Rescuing Jennifer, and paying the price for it, seems to be the end of Sam’s adventure, but it’s only the beginning. Because Jennifer’s mysterious, oddly articulated visions of impending death and disaster have more truth in them than anyone guesses, and everyone in Sam’s world is not what they seem. But the lesson Sam is learning—“Do right. Fear nothing”—steers him through a variety of strange paths to the right decisions in a big, explosive story climax.

Great story. Great values. I found it interesting that Sam’s pastor father, though a good dad and a wise man, seems to be a liberal Christian, and therefore blind to some truths that might have helped his son. That was an intriguing—and narratively useful—nuance.

The plot was weak at one point, I thought, where Sam made a braver choice than I thought consistent with his character. But that might be just a coward’s reaction to reading about a better person than himself. It certainly won’t bother young readers, who will consume this book like nacho chips and shake the bag for more.

Highly recommended for teens and up. Great for adults too. Intense situations, but no foul language.