Bullet Train

I greatly enjoyed Bullet Train, a thriller that takes place almost entirely aboard the Shinkansen from Tokyo to Morioka. It was certainly violent in parts, but I also found myself laughing out loud, which I was not anticipating at the start of the book. There's a great cast of characters, none particularly lovable (they are killers after all), but some much more likable than others. The top review on Goodreads likens it to a Tarantino movie, but the comparison I kept coming back to was the Coen brothers. The characters are all pretty quirky, and the duo of Lemon and Tangerine especially would have fit right in in Fargo. There are lots of interweaving plots, but they were easy to keep track of and there are several details included in the first part of the novel that come back towards the climax and contribute to its fantastic conclusion.

I'm glad it comes out in August, because I think it will be the perfect beach read!