killers of a certain age by deanna raybourn

Billie, Mary, Helen and Natalie have been a part of it for a long time, with over forty years of service under their belts. The story opens by introducing us to four once-valued members of the Museum, the afore-mentioned organization. In Deanna Raybourn‘s Killers of a Certain Age, the top-level members of an assassin organization is about to find that out the hard way. People born and moulded in the world of yesterday are often looked down upon as holders of obsolete knowledge and skills, quite erroneously I should add. Color me highly impressed! I can’t wait to read more stories with these hilarious batch of characters.The world of today is moving faster than ever, causing generational gaps to grow wider and wider by the minute. The emphasis, as rightfully so for the assassins, is to incapacitate targets quickly and smartly.ĭeanna Raybourn has created a fascinating brand-new world of killers existing stealthily in the modern world.

The action sequences are swift, powerful, and grounded enough to show the change of fighting tactics with age with grace and lethal efficiency and none of the flashy showboat-y martial arts moves that wouldn’t make sense. This wonderful switch-up makes it much easier to follow along the storyline with the back-and-forth of the timelines.Įven at the spry age of 60, the assassins don’t hold back on kicking ass. The narrative switches between the present-day first person POV of Billie, arguably the take-charge leader of the group, and a third person POV that paints a broader picture of the mess these lovely assassins have landed themselves in. Each assassin comes with her own set of skills and they master their craft with utmost precision, some however weathered by tragedies and existential crises appropriate for their ages. Deanna Raybourn portrays characters with balanced personalities whom you can actually picture as believable.

The female voice lends tremendous credence to the highly entertaining, charming, and multi-dimensional female leads in this witty thriller. Underestimated by the younger assassins, the retired group of femme fatales take the fight to the Board of the Museum, utilizing decades of contacts and wits and experience to turn the tide in their favor and show the younger generation that youth doesn’t trump experience as easily as one might expect. What starts off as a fun cruise to commemorate this achievement quickly turns murderous when they realize they’ve been marked for termination by their former employee, an organization codenamed The Museum.

Killers of a Certain Age is a peculiar and novel approach to the assassin-thriller subgenre and it’s one that works hilariously well.ĭeanna Raybourn tells a fascinating tale of a group of female assassins who’ve just reached retirement at 60 years of age.

Killers of a certain age by deanna raybourn