The Fourth Rule of Ten (A Tenzing Norbu Mystery, #4) by Gay Hendricks

The Fourth Rule of Ten (A Tenzing Norbu Mystery, #4) Reviews

• 
  Jen

  The Fourth Rule of Ten
  
  I've read all of the Rules of Ten now, thanks to NetGalley.
  
  Ten finds himself disappointed in his best friend, trying to unravel a human trafficking organization, traveling to Sarajevo, and finally, hopeful about the return of an old flame.
  
  Of course, there are the recurring voices of Ten's old friends from the Tibetan monastery and frequent references to Buddhist philosophy as he attempts to untangle all the twists in this tale.
  
  How does an ex-monk manage his philosophical beliefs with the violence often required in his role of private investigator?
  
  I really like this series, but although I enjoyed this latest installment, this is not my favorite.
  
  NetGalley/Hay House
  
  Mystery/Action. Jan. 5, 2015. Print length: 344 pages.
• 
  Beth

  I have been a fan of the Tenzing Norbu mysteries since the first one came out. I find that, while I'm not generally a huge mystery fan, these are just the right blend of thoughtfulness and suspense and Buddhism. I know - if you're approaching reading these for the first time, that seems weird. But it works quite well in this series, based on an ex-monk now living in LA.
  
  In "The Fourth Rule of Ten", we find ten learning (the hard way, of course) how to let go of expectations. First, his former partner's marriage gets thrown a MAJOR curveball, then a case pops up that may have something to do with that curveball and definitely DOES have something to do with human trafficking...just another span of time in the life of Ten.
  
  While there were moments that made me laugh out loud, there were also several times I teared up. This book is a bit darker than the previous ones, mostly because of its human trafficking theme. Such a huge problem in many of our metropolitan areas, and yet one that seems like the mythical Hydra...cut off one bit, and two more shoot up to replace it. There are threads of hope throughout, but it is truly a vast problem.
  
  Anyway, even with the slightly darker tone overall, I still very much enjoyed this newest book in the series. I look forward to the next one!
• 
  Aleksandras

  I loved it!
• 
  Jean

  I can't get enough of this series about a Buddhist Monk turned Private Investigator. His upbringing was very unusual. Tensing Norbu, or Ten, was the son of a young hippie backpacking through Europe after college, and a man who was going to become the head of a Buddhist monastery. When the couple quickly realized they had nothing else besides Ten in common, he spent half the year with his hippie Mom, and the other half at the monastery, shaved head, meditating and chanting each day.
  
  When Ten got his first taste of reading Sherlock Holmes, he wanted to be detective. He had an opportunity to open a new Buddhist Center in Los Angeles, but when he got there he ditched it, and became first an LA cop, and finally put out his shingle as a Private Investigator.
  
  The plots are great, but I love the way Ten lives the Buddhist precepts, adapting them to his new lifestyle in the U.S. It's very thought provoking, and his character is very likeable. In this book, he helps break up a human trafficking ring. I wish they could write the books faster!
• 
  JR Hassett

  Gay Hendriks has done it again, so much so that I'm tempted to say it's the best of the lot so far.
  
  The rule of this part of the story is based on "unrealist expectations". Think about how many times we set ourselves up for failure and dissappointment by expecting a certain outcome that we know is unrealistic. He stays on target for the entire story, brings in some wonderful other thoughts during his journey, and left me ready for the next in the series.
  
  Thank for keeping me up all night so I could finish it and get something else done! LOL
  
  
• 
  Kimberly

  My least fave of the series so far. Still good but not great.
• 
  Wanda

  Have enjoyed this series but it took me a bit to get into this story. I guess it was because the storyline of human trafficking is hard for me to read about.
  Tenzing Norbu starts off trying to celebrate the 4th of July with his friend and former partner, Bill Bohanen, only to be interrupted by a woman Bill had an affair with and a child that he did not know about until recently. Bill's son is a blogger and aspiring journalist and looking into human trafficking and pulls Bill into his orbit. Bill wants to meet him and flies to Bosnia and Tenzing eventually follows trying to bring Bill home. Tenzing is torn between his friendship with Bill and his wife.
  Tenzing also helps a man he had arrested when he was a cop. The man has gotten out of jail and is trying to live a reformed life and asks for Ten's help. The man ends up helping him later on in the story.
  Tenzing gets involved in a lot more than he bargained for and is constantly trying to balance his life with his previous religious teachings. He calls upon his gods and his friends to help him out. His current life as a private investigator is in sharp contrast to his monistic upbringings and it is interesting to see how he tries to mesh the two. The ending was a little odd and not sure if it was setting us up for a future book or not. Lots of discussion about the problems when Yugoslavia broke up and the ensuing war and the lasting effects. Some interesting descriptions of what Ten finds when he arrives in Bosnia and how he reacts to life there.
• 
  Marlene

  Originally published at
  Reading Reality
  
  Ten’s fourth rule is also the title of the theme song from Frozen, “Let it go”. And since the movie came out in 2013 but the book wasn’t released until 2015, there’s a good chance that the authors at least knew about the song when they finished the book.
  
  And I’m going to let that possible coincidence, well, go.
  
  What Ten is trying, but not always succeeding, in letting go of are his expectations. We tend to get ourselves tied up in what we expect to happen, or what we hope will happen, and are upset when life in general or circumstances in particular don’t meet our expectations.
  
  Like when you feel that you’ve had the same conversation with someone so many times that you can anticipate what they are going to say, so you fail to listen to what they actually do say. Life happens. People change. Others were not put on this world to live up to (or down to) our expectations. And vice versa.
  
  Tenzing Norbu is not the usual suspect when it comes to private detectives. Yes, he’s former LAPD, which is fairly normal. But he is also a former Buddhist monk. And his experiences in the monastery have every bit as much to do with the way he approaches and solves cases as does his time in the LAPD. That his father was the abbot of the monastery, and that Tenzing pretty much failed to live up to every single one of his father’s expectations, also has a lot to do with the way Ten lives his life and the way he approaches this particular case.
  
  At the beginning, the expectation that Ten first lets go of is the expectation that this Fourth of July get-together at his former LAPD partner’s house will be just like the previous ones. That his friends Bill and Martha have a solid and loving marriage, and that their twin daughters will shower their “Uncle Ten” with hugs and affection. Well, that last bit does happen, before everything goes to shit.
  
  Bill’s ex-lover shows up in the middle of the family picnic to inform Bill that their son is missing. Bill is gobsmacked, but Martha is shocked beyond belief. Bill never told her about Maia, or that he had a son. Or that he strayed from their exclusive-relationship-but-not-yet-engagement while he was stationed in Bosnia. Her trust is shattered, and their marriage might be too. Especially when Bill leaves with Maia to chase after their missing young man.
  
  Ten, caught in the middle between helping his friend Bill and consoling his friend Martha, at first doesn’t know what to do. Especially when the facts start coming out. Not the facts about Bill and Maia, because that cat is already out of the bag, but the facts about young Sascha and what he is doing that got him in so much hot water.
  
  Sascha is a journalistic in Bosnia, doing his level best to expose at least the local tentacle of the international human trafficking monster. His mother is afraid that his search may have gotten him killed. Bill takes off to see whether he can find the son he’s never met before it’s too late.
  
  That he is also exploring the “road not taken” with his ex makes at least part of this journey look more like a mid-life crisis than a manhunt.
  
  But Ten follows Bill to Bosnia, in an attempt to either talk his friend out of his madness or at the very least help him find Sascha, who really is in danger. And so is everyone he talks to, including Maia, Bill and Ten.
  
  Because that human trafficking monster has its filthy tentacles everywhere, including Ten’s own backyard.
  
  Escape Rating B+: Tenzing is a detective the opposite of noir. Not that he doesn’t go into dark places, but that he is more self-aware than the average hardened gumshoe. That’s part of what makes him so interesting to follow. And that’s why I keep following, from
  The First Rule of Ten to the Fourth, and sometime later this year,
  The Fifth Rule of Ten. While I think it would be possible to start with Fourth Rule if one’s only interest is the mystery, this is a series that rewards reading from the beginning. Who Ten is, why he does things the way he does and how he relates to the world around him is a journey that builds layer upon layer in each book.
  
  Along with marvelous descriptions of his attitudes toward and his servitude to his feline overlord, the utterly marvelous Tank.
  
  The case that Ten finds himself investigating gets a bit muddled in this one. The scourge of human trafficking in the 21st century is hard to pin down into a single case or a single company, even in fiction. And this case, as horrible as this crime is, surprisingly hinges on the family ties of the perpetrators rather than the victims. Admittedly in a way that slaps the reader with shock at the end.
  
  Most of what’s interesting in this story is Ten’s internal reactions to the events around him, as he examines why he is involved, and what experiences in his past have made him vulnerable to getting roped into Bill and Martha’s mess. It’s fascinating to be inside the mind of someone who is essentially trying to “adult”, as we all do, and seeing his successes as well as his failures.
  
  One of the things that always makes Ten interesting to watch is the way that his past actions get paid forward into his current and future dilemmas. His dysfunctional upbringing gives him empathy for Sascha and makes him vulnerable to Martha’s desperate manipulation. That he treats people fairly and listens attentively makes him friends in unlikely places, and provides him with allies when he needs them the most.
  
  For Ten, what goes around is definitely what comes around. Usually exactly the way he dished it out.
  
  And Ten never gets too far above himself, because Tank is right there to remind him that he’s only human, and that it’s his job to provide dinner.
• 
  Patricia

  I enjoy the Rule of Ten books. They fit into my light reading category, even when they are treacherous and violent and dealing with abhorrent crimes. I guess Ten's Buddhist monk side tempers all of that. While this wasn't the best of the Rule of Ten books, it served the purpose of taking me outside of my own head and reminding me of the problem about having expectations. For some reason, there were a few loose threads in this installment. In particular, I found the conclusion of the case confusing. I didn't have a clear understanding of why what happened happened. Still, I love Ten and his cat Tank and never have a problem spending time with them, even if things didn't gel in a more solid way this time.
• 
  Reikista

  Ten is tangled in helping his friend, Bill, whose marriage to Martha is in peril when it comes to light that he has a Bosnian son, Sasha. When Sasha goes missing, tracking down a ring of slave traffickers, Bill joins his mother and tries to find him. Martha asks Ten to go to Sarajevo to bring Bill home, and Ten winds up pursuing traffickers, and his own old wounds. As all the Tenzing Norbu mysteries, this one has suspense and various absorbing plot lines, touching on important and current topics, and always bringing in the empirical ways that Buddhist practices can be grounding and freeing. A delightful read!
• 
  Aubrey Eicher

  I LOVE this book series. It would make a FANTASTIC movie series. Wonderfully detailed. Perspective shifts are lovely. I highly recommend any of Gay Hendrick's Rules of Ten.
• 
  Tina Tessina

  I loved all of this series, and I hope another will eventually be forthcoming. Tenzing Norbu is a fascinating character, and I would like to read more of him.
• 
  Neilalan

  Great combination of mystery, philosophy and plenty of suspense. Really enjoy this series!
• 
  Riobhcah

  I didn't really think that this book was quite up to the standards of the first three, although it was still not bad.
• 
  Mary Beth

  This book had a darker side then the rest of the books. It is not my favorite of the series.
• 
  Judy

  Another good story about Tenzing Norbu. Looking forward to the next one.
• 
  Swanbender2001

  I enjoy this series due to the characters and the complicated mysteries but this one had some interactions I didn't care for.
• 
  Angie Boyter

  LA private investigator Tenzu “Ten” Norbu tries to live his life in accordance with the teachings of the Buddhist monastery in which he was raised. In this fourth novel in the series, Ten is emphasizing the danger of expectations: “Let go of expectations, for expectations lead to suffering”. As the book opens, Ten is expecting to enjoy a nice Fourth of July cookout at the home of his good friend and former partner from the LAPD Bill Bohannon and his wife Martha. What he finds is, indeed, suffering: a missing son, international human trafficking, and, perhaps most troubling to Ten, the unraveling of what he had thought was a solid marriage between two of his closest friends. The return of Ten’s former girlfriend Julie to help her sister Martha causes Ten to have to manage even more expectations in order to avoid more suffering.
  The Fourth Rule of Ten explores some pretty depressing examples of humanity at its worst, human trafficking and the war in Serbia, but it maintains the upbeat tone that has won over many readers like me who have over-dosed on the stereotypical dysfunctional detective. It accomplishes this through the Buddhist philosophy that pervades the book and the charming offbeat characters.
  Readers are not going to find here lengthy sidebar expositions on Buddhism. Rather, Ten incorporates Buddhism into his daily life and muses on appropriate teachings when a situation arises. Most enjoyable are times when the challenges of life make it difficult to live up to those teachings, such as LA traffic, ” I leaned on my horn, as three decades of Buddhist commitment to impersonal nonattachment flew right out the window. Everything about this logjam was personal, and aimed at me.” In another scene Ten moves from a real rat-trap hotel to a luxurious one. As he contemplates a luscious pot of Viennese coffee from room service, he thinks, ” The Buddha cautions us about such attachments, but the Buddha never tried to stay at the Sarajevo Holiday Inn.”
  In addition to some continuing characters from earlier books, most prominently Ten’s over-sized Persian cat Tank, Ten has new companions in his current investigation. I expect we will see Ten’s “odd but efficient” assistant Kim in the future. The ex-cop Bosnian taxi driver Petar is less likely to have a continuing role, which is a shame. Petar can drive me around Sarajevo any time!
  Although The Fourth Rule of Ten has all the elements that make this series both unusual and enjoyable, the final action sequence was weak enough that I could not give it a 5-star rating. There were just a few too many instances where the actions of both the good guys and the bad guys made me scratch my head and say, “Now why did they do that?”
  Nonetheless, it was great to see my old friend Ten again, and I hope to learn his fifth rule soon.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• 
  David R. Cornwell

  Blend of adventure & philosophy
  
  The entire series has been entertaining so far. Tenzing is a person I'd like to have as a friend. Looking forward to the Fifth Rule.
• 
  Benjamin Thomas

  Tenzing “Ten” Norbu, raised as a Tibetan monk, former LAPD cop, and now a private investigator based in LA, continues his adventures in this 4th book in the series. Once again, his adventures revolve around a particular rule from his Buddhist roots and this time it is this: “Let go of expectations—they always lead to suffering”. That rings true for me as well because I find that lowering my expectations of what will happen or how people will behave leads to less frustration. This rule applies not only to events in the book but also to the other characters.
  
  I really like these mystery novels because they combine traditional mystery elements to solve along with plenty of action and danger. Several seemingly unconnected subplots turn out to be nicely intertwined and it makes for a satisfying read. The major theme here is human trafficking and Ten finds himself deeply involved with an effort to stop an international child-stealing ring. During the plot of the novel, Ten travels to Sarajevo and Croatia and I must say, having lived there myself for several months, the authors really capture the essence of this complex multi-cultural region. In addition, the other characters in the book are not allowed to be merely two-dimensional cardboard cutouts but instead are each unique and bring a real added dimension to the entire story.
  
  As with the other books in the series, I really admire the way Ten struggles to live his life according to his Buddhist upbringing amid the chaos and realities of his life as a crime fighter. Every time I read one of these novels I feel that I take away some positive lessons for myself.
  
  Looking forward to the next in the series.
  
• 
  Sarah (Workaday Reads)

  My complaint for the last book in this series was that it was missing the zen feeling of the previous books, and I have the same complaint with this book. I think it has to do with the political feel of both books. This one featured a human trafficking ring, which is sure to dampen anyone’s zen feelings.
  
  There was a lot going on in this book, and while it was a bit disjointed and busy in the beginning, things did come together in the end. There were multiple mysteries, which all take a logical path to their conclusions. I like this logical process, even if I didn’t care for all the themes in the book.
  
  As usual, I enjoyed Ten’s character, and his continual journey to self enlightenment and happiness. There seemed to be less internal discussions and examinations in this installment, which also lessened the zen feeling.
  
  Overall, I like the series as it has a unique focus, but I miss the monk focus from the first few books. As always, the story stood alone, but is greatly enhanced with the background provided in earlier books. I will be looking forward to the next book in the series, which will hopefully recapture the unique ex-monk angle.