The Good Son - Heartwarming Family Drama Movie | Perfect for Movie Nights & Family Bonding

I have read all of Gruber's novels and I have come to expect deep character development, for want of a better word texture, sense of place, incredible plotting and pacing. I found all of these and more in this novel. Usually these work best on a small scale, a murder plot involving individuals, they tend to fail on a bigger scene. So this was a novel I really didn't think could be written. A thriller about the Middle East and the complexities of religion that are tied up into great plotting and deep character development.One thing that run's through all of Gruber's work is that they contain strong female protagonists with a religious, or mystical bent. And they all leave a little bit of doubt behind about their motives. This is true of Sofia in this novel. Gruber actually does a bunch of really hard things here with Sofia. Sofia, like many of Gruber's past heroines' is something like a Saint, a religious leader who searches for God and comes close, but also a bit of a con. Think of St. Augustine's Confessions he traces his story as a sinner and his finding God. And in many ways the most interesting portion is the sinner part and there are are times when the Saint actually comes across as a bit of wise ass. This is why I think Gruber's heroines are so real. The mystical nature, and the search for God, are rooted in an imperfect vessel, one of the real world, strong, competent, clever, indeed there is nothing other wordly about them. I think a lot of religious leaders must have been something like this. Most would never get a hearing if their characters weren't intensely alive to the human condition.A second hard thing that Gruber does is he takes this religious angle and transforms the novel into a sort of novel of ideas. All be it this is something muted but it is related to the political and ideological debate that at its best would actually happen. It is cut short by not letting the "conference attendees" finish.Finally, and this is really hard, he writes a thriller that is set in Pakistan and Afghanistan and his protrayel of the society, the context of the story, strikes me as very believable. It is the context that actually makes this novel work so well. It is not so sereotyped as almost all of thrillers set in the middle east are.Finally, these are reasons for someone who likes thrillers not to read this book. Religiosity, ideas, sociology do not normally add to a thriller. But somehow these do. I literally read this book in a sitting. Although I am layed up at the moment. So what I am saying is I really do not understand how he as managed to do this. It is a really good read, despite it being a thinking sort of read. Its style is a little but like John LeCarre, but neither world weary, nor as deeply cynical.