Twelve in 12: The Lock Artist in OD

Title: The Lock Artist

Author: Steve Hamilton

Genre: Crime

304 pages

Michael is the Lock Artist. He has the skill to get into almost any lock or safe imaginable. He’s also a good guy to have on your team because if he gets picked up by the cops, it’s not like he’ll tell them your name. Or anything else, come to that.

You see, a traumatic incident in his childhood has left Michael unable to speak. This gave him his first nickname, the Miracle Boy. If he needs to communicate he uses sign language, notes or pictures. And now he has to do what is needed to save the girl he loves.

Hamilton has given us an enthralling and gripping book. The story alternates between two different periods in Michael’s history, both being the ones that are central to the overall story (that being why he ended up in jail and why he did what he did). Thankfully, like The Time Travellers Wife before it, each chapter starts by telling you when and where that chapter takes place. Without this, it would have been easy to get lost.

Michael himself is a singular character. I’ve never seen anyone like him before in literature. Despite the inability to speak, he has a fair amount to actually say. The art is a nice touch and leads to more than one tender moment between him and Amelia, the object of his affections.

You do find out what happened to him to make him stop speaking and it is equal parts brutal and heartbreaking. I was fine with this, but the strength of the story is such that it could have been left to the readers imagination and the book would still have worked.

The pacing in the book is brilliant with virtually nothing there that isn’t strictly necessary. Be warned, this is not a book to be read in short bursts, but rather one you will not want to put down.

Will