John Verdon Archives -

Shut Your Eyes Tight – John Verdon

Originally posted on March 14, 2012. Updated October 2025 with new links, images, and notes.

So yesterday I did it. I reached what I thought was an unreachable goal. When I finished Shut Your Eyes Tight by John Verdon, I reached my goal of reading 60 books in 2017!

Shut Your Eyes Tight by John Verdon is the second book in his Dave Guerney series. The main character in the book, Dave Guerney, is a retired New York City homicide detective. He is a gifted detective and is the most decorated detective in NYPD history.

An intriguing Case Comes to Dave

Fellow NYPD detective Jack Hardwick brings the case that forms the plot for Shut Your Eyes Tight to Dave. The case is four months old case and involves the beheading of a bride on her wedding day. Jack brings Dave the case because he thinks the police are moving in the wrong direction. And he believes the Dave the Super Detective can use his skills to solve the case.

Initially, the case seems to be a pretty open and shut. The new bride, of a noted psychologist, was the victim. While the killer appears to be a Mexican who came to work for the psychologist as a gardener and rose to the position of assistant to said psychologist. The Mexican was the last person to see the bride alive and he has now vanished!

But after for months the police are no closer to finding the killer, than the day of the murder. Hardwock believes there is much more to the case than do the two officers who are heading the investigation. He brought the case to Guerney for that reason . He believes that the great detective Guerney can solve the mystery.

Dave thinks the case is intriguing. His wife Madeleine sees it as a diruption of their new idyllic life. Despite Madeleine‘s objections, Dave decides to help the victim’s mother and investigate for two weeks. Then report what he found to the mother and the police.

Dave Finds Out the Case IS like an Onion

When Jack Hartwicks brings the case to Dave, he says the case was like an onion. The removal of each layer reveals something new. And that’s just what Dave’s investigating reveals.

As Dave investigates his discoveries turn the simple slam dunk case into the search for a serial killer! The question then becomes can he ever get to the center of the onion, before he or his wife are the necat victims!

Bottom Line

I am now a fan of Dave Gurney the character and John Versin the writer. I look forward to moving onto book # 3 Let the Devil Sleep. In fact I just checked the e-book editon out of my library!

Anyway I enjoy the characters that Verson has created, both Dave and Madeleine and the surrounding cast. I also enjoy the plots that Verdon has created. The storyline in Shut Your Eyes Tight was like an onion and each new discovery gave the case a new look until the final pages!

Goodreads Rating. 3.97 My Rating 4.0. So Check it Out

Update Note : Since this post was written in 2012 John Verson has written six more Dave Gurney books. I have read one of them book 1 # 3 Let the Devil Sleep . I think it’s time to pickup this series again! Book #4 Peter Pan Must Die is in my Kindle Library!

Links

Author’s Website
Goodreads
Amazon

John Verdon

John P. Verdon is an American novelist. In 2010, Crown/Random House published his first mystery thriller, Think of a Number, the debut novel in the Dave Gurney detective series. Wikipedia

Born: 1942 (age 83 years), The Bronx, New York, NY

Education: Fordham University, Regis High School

Think of a Number - John Verdon - Dave Gurney Number 1 — Think of a Number – Dave Gurney #1

Originally posted on July 20, 2015. Updated October 2025 with new links, images, and reflections after reading additional books in the Dave Gurney series.

John Verdon’s debut novel Think of a Number has been on my To Be Read bookshelves for a very long time. Each time I pass the book, I say to myself “you know you should read that book”. Until last week, my answer was “I’ll get to it one of these days!”. Well, one of these days came last week and now I can kick myself for not reading it earlier!! Maybe I should have just taken the time to read the David Baldacci quote on the cover:

“Remarkable…The writing is haunting and quotable. the twists expertly placed and infinitely plausible… You can read the book as a game of cat and mouse, a ride of chilling suspense or a literary repast, since it provides all in abundance.”

All of the above is true.. the line he left out is you’ll feel like kicking yourself if you don’t read it!!

The cat and mouse in the story are retired, NYPD Detective Dave Gurney and the mouse a meticulous and diabolical serial killer.

The Plot

The story begins when Dave receives a call form an old classmate who is panicked. He has received a letter that asks him to ‘think of a number any number up to a thousand – the first number that comes to your mind. Picture it. Now see how well I know your secrets. Open the envelope”. When the envelope is opened and the number 658 is revealed the classmate is panicked. He can not believe that the letter writer guessed correctly. What else may he know! What did he do to anger this man!

Soon additional poetic letters arrive one requesting money. The classmate of course pays. Soon the letters become more threatening, culminating in the ritualistic murder of the classmate. He is stabbed multiple times in the neck with a broken bottle of Four Roses whiskey. The minimal evidence left at the scene, a folding lawn chair, cigarette butts and tracks in the snow, all lead nowhere and Dave and the police are left baffled!

When another victim turns up in Brooklyn murder in a similar fashion, Dave knows that its the work of a serial killer. But with no evidence of significance found at either crime scene how will they catch this killer! But catch him they must or more will die!!

What I Thought – Rating 4.5 out of 5.

Think of the Number is a well-crafted debut novel. I thought the storyline was original and intricate. I enjoyed the characters, particularly Dave Gurney. During the time that Gurney served in the New York Police Department, he caught more serial killers than anyone else in the history of the NYPD.

Now even though he is retired from the force, he can’t stop doing what he does best – Catching Bad Guys!! Of course Dave is caught between a rock and a hard place though.

His wife Madeline wants Dave to stay retired and out of harms way. She knows though, that Dave’s not going to let this one go, especially since the victim was a friend. Of course there is the other reason, too. Dave is a cop who loves to solve cases, and this one is one intriguing cases to crack!! So Check it Out!

As for me, I am now set to move on to book two in the series Shut Your Eyes Tight. The good part is that the book is already on my Kindle!! I bought it a while back, when Amazon had it on sale for $1.99!

I also have book four Peter Pan Must Die on the Kindle, bought in a similar fashion!!

Now all I need is for book 3 Let The Devil Sleep to go on sale before I finish book 2! My guess is that will not happen. But there’s always hope – and the library!! Oh no Book 5 Wolf Lake was release on July 16th!!

Update (October 2025): Since first posting this review, I’ve continued with John Verdon’s Dave Gurney series — reading Book 2, Shut Your Eyes Tight and Book 3, Let the Devil Sleep. Both build on Gurney’s analytical mind and Verdon’s knack for psychological tension. I’m looking forward to diving into Book 4, Peter Pan Must Die next.

Links and Biography Information