James R. Benn (Shard; the Billy Boyle World War II Mystery series) brings readers a set of nine short mysteries, each crackling with a different kind of energy about pushing back and saying "no," in the aptly titled The Refusal Camp. In this collection, the stakes are always high and the danger intense, focusing on racism in the Deep South in one story and setting another on the ski slopes of Norway, with German soldiers in hot pursuit. All of the stories are riveting, but some resonate more. The stand-outs include "The Horse Chestnut Tree," a story about the disastrous circumstances of brothers who underestimate the intelligence of those they enslave; "Glass," a madcap time-space adventure in which hapless cousins find a piece of future technology and embark on a get-rich-quick scheme; and "Vengeance Weapon," in which a prisoner at a Nazi death camp proves, through slowly building tension, that revenge is a dish best served cold. Although Benn imbues all his characters with a bit of rakish humor, there's nary a false note to be had among the narratives and, just to keep things lively, the hero isn't always the usual suspect.
Benn lets each of his characters express their heart's worth, making their individual plights and seemingly insurmountable obstacles accessible to readers. Personalizing the various characters of The Refusal Camp seems so effortless for this author that each story deserves a bit of applause at its end. --Paul Dinh-McCrillis, freelance reviewer