Sleepy´s book-talk

James Patterson - I, Alex Cross

2009-12-01T18:13:00.000-08:00

You can't run
Detective Alex Cross is pulled out of a family celebration and given the awful news that a beloved relative has been found brutally murdered. Alex vows to hunt down her killer, and soon learns that she was mixed up in one of Washington's wildest scenes. And she was not this killer's only victim.

You can't hide
The hunt for the murderer leads Alex and his girlfriend, Detective Brianna Stone, to a place where every fantasy is possible, if you have the credentials to get in. Alex and Bree are soon facing down some very important, very protected, very dangerous people in levels of society where only one thing is certain - they will do anything to keep their secrets safe.

Alex Cross is the only hope to stay alive
As Alex closes in on the killer, he discovers evidence that points to the unimaginable - a revelation that could rock the entire world.

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The latest installment in Patterson's Alex Cross series is one that really took me by surprise. I remember with the last Cross book I vowed I would go back to listen to the audiobook but as it happened I got the book first and I really liked it. A high profile mystery that brings back all the characters the reader has come to love a while back and that truly vanished into the background lately.

The story builds up great but the revelation of who the killer is, is a bit of a letdown, not exciting enough and it seems everything Alex learns in his case was handed to him. Also there are a few points hardly to believe, especially when it comes to the cover ups.

In the end the novel is better than the past ones. It left me wanting more Cross novels.

Rating:
Visit James Patterson.

Hardcover: 400 pages
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company; 1 edition (November 16, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0316018783
ISBN-13: 978-0316018784

Stephen King - Under The Dome

2009-12-01T11:16:00.000-08:00

On an entirely normal, beautiful fall day in Chester's Mill, Maine, the town is inexplicably and suddenly sealed off from the rest of the world by an invisible force field. No one can fathom what this barrier is, where it came from, and when -- or if -- it will go away.

Dale Barbara, finds himself teamed with a few intrepid citizens -- the town newspaper owner, a physician's assistant at the hospital, a select-woman, and three brave kids. Against them stands Big Jim Rennie, a politician who will stop at nothing to hold on to the reins of power, and his son. Because time isn't just short... It's running out.

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Under The Dome holds up to its promise with colorful heroes and villains that make your skin crawl.
On a beautiful sunny day the small town of Chester's Mill is shut off from the rest of the world. The town's people find themselves under an invisible cheese cover that is touchable but won't let anyone in or out.

What happens is what is expected: the powers that be seek more power and influence, although this means to discard of those that don't agree.

Under the Dome an own economic system develops until all else is or will be exhausted which includes air.

Under the Dome is no classical King horror story. Although it is a dark story it shows how human behavior will develop in an enclosed environment which might just make it even more frightening.
As always the reader will meet lots of different characters, each playing its own role in the story. The smalltown life, carelessness and stereotypes are beautifully pictured in this novel and it fits most cut and dried opinions.

I am not sure if there should ever be a judgement on character development. Especially with a novel that has 1000+ pages and lots of characters playing a part in it. Character development probably isn't the point either if you look at the main picture. At the what happens if... .

Love it and got what I expected !

Rating:
Visit Stephen King.

Hardcover: 1088 pages
Publisher: Scribner; 1 edition (November 10, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1439148503
ISBN-13: 978-1439148501

Philippa Gregory - The Other Queen

2009-11-16T10:00:00.000-08:00

Biographers often neglect the captive years of Mary, Queen of Scots, who trusted Queen Elizabeth's promise of sanctuary when she fled from rebels in Scotland and then found herself imprisoned as the "guest" of George Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury, and his indominable wife, Bess of Hardwick.

The newly married couple welcome the doomed queen into their home, certain that serving as her hosts and jailers will bring them an advantage in the cutthroat world of the Elizabethan court. To their horror, they find that the task will bankrupt them, and as their home becomes the epicenter of intrigue and rebellion against Elizabeth, their loyalty to each other and to their sovereign comes into question.
If Mary succeeds in seducing the earl into her own web of treachery and treason, or if the great spymaster William Cecil links them to the growing conspiracy to free Mary from her illegal imprisonment, they will all face the headsman.

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The Other Queen received a lot of mixed reviews and I have to agree, the first third of the book I struggled myself. Although I really liked the multiple-viewpoint technique in The Other Boleyn Girl I found it difficult to get into with The Other Queen.
Later however I began enjoying the book and almost feeling sad to already know it's ending. As the books description mentions the plot is about Mary, Queen of Scot's imprisonment in England which history buffs already tells the most interesting part in Mary's life has already happened. This unfortunately took a lot of momentum from the book which lacks of exciting moments.

In the end I liked it just enough to finish it.

Rating:
Visit Philippa Gregory.

Hardcover: 448 pages
Publisher: Touchstone; 1 edition (September 16, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1416549129
ISBN-13: 978-1416549123

John Saul - House of Reckoning

2009-11-12T09:40:00.000-08:00

After the untimely death of her mother, fourteen-year-old Sarah Crane is forced to grow up quickly in order to help tend her family’s Vermont farm and look after her grieving father, who’s drowning his sorrow in alcohol. But their quiet life together is shattered when her father is jailed for killing another man in a barroom brawl and injuring Sarah in a drunken car crash. Left in the cold care of a loveless foster family and alienated at school, Sarah finds a kindred spirit in classmate Nick Dunnigan, a former mental patient still plagued by voices and visions. And in eccentric art instructor Bettina Phillips, Sarah finds a mentor eager to nurture her talent for painting.

But within the walls of Bettina’s ancestral home, the mansion called Shutters, Sarah finds something altogether different and disturbing. Monstrous images from the house’s dark history seem to flow unbidden from Sarah’s paintbrush–images echoed by Nick’s chilling hallucinations. Trapped for ages in the shadowy rooms of Shutters, the violence and fury of long-dead generations have finally found a gateway from the grave into the world of the living. And Sarah and Nick have found a power they never had: to take control, and take revenge.

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Having read loads of Saul's novels House of Reckoning wasn't exactly something new for me. The scheme is the usual old one. Troubled teenagers, rather picked on by their classmates find each other and conquer their troubles. The re-occurring theme in Saul's books tends to get me bored although I usually enjoy his writings. The3 characters seems to be very shallow with not enough development to make the reader really care.

Compared to other novels like f. e. Suffer the Children I would consider it a failure. Probably not for the reader new to Saul but for those who know his writings well.

Rating:
Visit John Saul.

Hardcover: 304 pages
Publisher: Ballantine Books (October 13, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0345514246
ISBN-13: 978-0345514240

Alex Kava - Black Friday (Maggie O'Dell series, Book 7)

2009-11-09T17:26:00.000-08:00

On the busiest shopping day of the year, some idealistic college students believe they're about to carry out an elaborate media stunt at the largest mall in America.
They think the jamming devices in their backpacks will disrupt stores' computer systems, causing delays and chaos. What they don't realize is that instead of jamming devices, their backpacks are stuffed with explosives, ready to be detonated by remote control and turning them into suicide bombers.

Caught up in a political nightmare, battling a new interim director and still mourning the death of her boss A. D. Cunningham, FBI profiler Maggie O'Dell must put her own troubles aside and fly to Minnesota to help figure out what's behind this terrorist attack - a massacre that is all the more frightening because no group has claimed responsibility.

The search becomes personal when a tip reveals that one of the college students involved is Patrick, Maggie's brother. Afraid and on the run, Patrick must decide if he can finally trust Maggie enough to help her unravel this horrifying nightmare.

Sifting through the debris for answers, Maggie is joined by Nick Morelli, who has recently taken a job with a national security company that over sees security for the mall. Although Maggie and Nick have investigated several cases together in the past, they've never investigated a relationship with each other. Nick would like to change that.

When an informant confides in Maggie that there are other attacks on the secret agenda, she knows that she's running out of time. In less than twenty-four hours she'll need to figure out exactly when and where the second attack will take place, who to look for and how to keep her brother from becoming one of the casualties.

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Pandemonium after several explosives, placed in Americas biggest shopping mall, explode on the busiest business day of the year: Black Friday.
The mall filled with happy shoppers and a few unsuspecting teenagers out for a prank, the explosives cost the lives of the teenagers and nearby shoppers.

What looks like an unclaimed terrorist attack brings Maggie O'Dell to Minnesota, hurried to come up with a profile by reviewing the malls security tapes.
Once again working with Nick Morelli she has to learn through the TV that one of the teenage suspects is her half-brother Patrick, whom she met for the first time not long ago.

An informant reveals that the mastermind behind the game seems to have a different agenda than the usually non threatening group that initially planned the jamming prank. It seems that the mastermind is one not unknown to the FBI: John Doe #2 from the Oklahoma Bombings.

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Black Friday is a quick and easy read for all who love the series and those that pick up one of Kava's books for the first time.
Although not too descriptive in the malls destruction Kava clearly paints a picture of destruction and death in the readers mind that won't be forgotten soon.
The story however has its weak points in structure, especially when it comes the mastermind behind the game.

Relationship-wise it is still a bit stale what goes on between Maggie and Nick. This time around Kava sets Nick in a bad light before, hopefully or not, at one point in future books that the character of Nick isn't really necessary for a Maggie O'Dell novel. It did seem in past books and in he current novel that Nick, besides his strong involvement in Exposed, participates more like a bystander than one of the main characters.

Eventually his character has become unnecessary.

Rating:
Visit Alex Kava.

Hardcover: 304 pages
Publisher: Mira; First Edition first Printing edition (October 1, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0778326519
ISBN-13: 978-0778326519

Patricia Cornwell - The Scarpetta Factor (Kay Scarpetta series, Book 17)

2009-11-08T15:02:00.000-08:00

It is the week before Christmas. The effects of the credit crunch have prompted Dr. Kay Scarpetta to offer her services pro bono to New York City's Office of the Chief Medical Examiner. But in no time at all, her increased visibility seems to precipitate a string of dramatic and unsettling events. She is asked live on the air about the sensational case of Hannah Starr, who has vanished and is presumed dead. Moments later during the same broadcast, she receives a startling call-in from a former psychiatric patient of Benton Wesley's. When she returns after the show to the apartment where she and Benton live, she finds a suspicious package -- possibly a bomb - waiting for her at the front desk. Soon the apparent threat on Scarpetta's life finds her embroiled in a deadly plot that includes a famous actor accused of an unthinkable sex crime and the disappearance of a beautiful millionairess with whom Lucy seems to have shared a secret past.

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The last two installments in the Scarpetta series gave some hope of improvement back to a series most readers once loved but that had lost it's bite. Unfortunately The Scarpetta Factor is a drawback once again. Although it seems that Cornwell tries to give back some substance to the series characters it just isn't what the reader wants. Those who have read the series right from the beginning will miss Scarpetta's investigations, autopsies and exciting morgue stories.
Instead there is a lot of high tech investigation like GPS, Internet and what not.

Cornwell rehashes a lot of the old junk between Scarpetta and now husband Benton. Why he left her and went undercover etc. . It is good to know but not enough substance to fill a 500 pages book.
I'm not sure if the reader still wants to read about the Chandonne family or wants the remaining part to return at all. The Chandonnes' were a part of Cornwell's books way to often and at one point it just gets stale. At least for my taste.

The personal stuff in each characters life got boring and uninteresting, it distracts from the rather thin main plot.

That being said, you'll still like Scarpetta after reading this book but if it is enough to keep you interested for another 500 pages book is the question to be answered.

Rating:
Visit Patricia Cornwell.

Hardcover: 512 pages
Publisher: Putnam Adult (October 20, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0399156399
ISBN-13: 978-0399156397

Cody McFadyen - Abandoned (Smoky Barrett series, Book 4)

2009-10-30T20:15:00.000-07:00

For FBI Special Agent Smoky Barrett, the wedding of one of their own was cause for celebration. Until a woman staggered down the aisle, incoherent, emaciated, head shaved, and wearing only a white nightgown.

No one knows who she is or where she's come from—or why she’s chosen to appear in a church filled with law enforcement agents. Then a fingerprint check determines that the woman has been missing for nearly eight years—that once she was someone's wife, someone's mother…and a cop. Imprisoning her in a dark cell, depriving her of any contact with the outside world, her enigmatic captor was a man she didn't know and who seldom spoke, who punished her only when she failed to follow his most basic instructions designed to keep her alive.

Cold, businesslike, seemingly indifferent to his victims, he's a predator with an M.O. as terrifyingly inscrutable as any Smoky has ever encountered. As she fits together the pieces of what remains of his victim's fractured life, a chilling picture emerges of a killer every bit as calculating, masterful, and professional as Smoky and the team she leads—a professional psychopath who doesn't take murder personally and never makes a mistake.

There's a reason he let one of his victims go free. And by the time Smoky pierces the darkness of his twisted mind, it may cost her more than she can bear to lose to escape. For a trap snapped closed the moment she took this case too much to heart.

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FBI special agent Smoky Barrett celebrates her best friends wedding day when the ceremony is concluded by a woman dumped out of a car in front of the church. She was tortured and looks like her skin hasn't seen the sunlight in a very long time.

The victim is identified as homicide detective Heather Hollister who vanished years earlier. Her husband just recently had her declared dead and received a huge insurance payment.
Meeting the husband Smoky and friend and colleague Alan find his wife and one of his sons killed. Eventually the husband admits to have met a man on the internet who offered him a way out of a bad marriage by having his wife vanish and receiving half the insurance money after seven years. When the husband declined the payment heater was released.

Because Heather isn't the first case across the U.S. it seems that someone offers husbands a way out of bad marriages by kidnapping the wives and keeping them locked away for years.

The case gets very personal when the kidnapper recognizes Smoky's internet trap and kidnaps her and young computer expert Leo.

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Cody McFadyen is one of my favorite writers. His different approach to serial killers, who are almost always out of the box in what they do to their victims, usually gets to me right in the beginning.
Unfortunately with this one my expectations were already high after I received the latest newsletter from the author's website. The plot sounded delicious but couldn't keep up with the promises that were made. It almost wasn't dark enough.

However, without thinking about the newsletter Abandoned is a nice addition to the series. It doesn't top the first two novels but still is a frightening tale.

Rating:
Visit Cody McFadyen.

Hardcover: 400 pages
Publisher: Bantam (October 27, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0553806955
ISBN-13: 978-0553806953

Jordan Dane - No One Heard Her Scream (No One series, Book 1)

2009-10-29T17:23:00.000-07:00

Burdened by grief she hunts a killer.

They never found her sister's body, but Detective Rebecca Montgomery knows her murderer is still out there. In the five months since Danielle went missing. there have been two more brutal abductions. A savage menace stalks the women of San Antonio, and the relentless detective will do anything to find him.

A seductive stranger shadows her every move.

But her latest case - the discovery of a young woman's remains inside the wall of a burdened-down theater - plunges Rebecca from her grief into a brand new nightmare. She soon meets handsome, mysterious Diego Galvan at the crime scene, and his shadowy connections will lead to her first break in both cases. But when Rebecca submits to his considerable powers of seduction, she will leave herself vulnerable to a merciless killer... and when he attacks, no one will hear her scream.

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It has been five months since Detective Rebecca Montgomery's sister Danielle vanished and has been presumed dead eventually.
Grief-stricken Rebecca tries to move one and learn how to deal with her self-reproach when her newest case distracts her:
The old theater has fallen victim to an arsonist but even worse is, that firemen found the remains of a young woman buried alive in the theater's walls.

During the time of the woman's death the theater belonged to Hunter Cavanaugh, a man who's been on the FBIs focus for human trafficking for quite some time.

While Rebecca investigates she is shadowed by a handsome stranger. They soon fall in love but there is one disturbing fact: he works for Cavanaugh.

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No One Heard Her Scream comes from the average suspense/mystery/thriller genre. It isn't worldshaking no is it bad. It's just a good beachread for less demanding reader.

The plot itself sounds promising but doesn't offer lots of surprises. Who's who is pretty much known right from the beginning.
The whole bla about the attraction between Rebecca and mysteryman Diego Galvan, was way too much and reptitive. I believe the reader got the picture after the first two encounters between the two.

For me personally, I found the book not great but entertaining enough to keep me reading.

Visit Jordan Dane.
Rating:

Mass Market Paperback: 384 pages
Publisher: Avon (March 25, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0061252786
ISBN-13: 978-0061252785

Peter Blauner - The Last Good Day

2009-10-26T19:35:00.000-07:00

Lynn and Barry Schulman moved their family to the leafy suburb of Riverside, New York, to be surrounded by family and old friends and escape the danger of city life. But when a headless body--which turns out to belong to Lynn's oldest friend--floats to the surface of the river, they realize Riverside may not be the sanctuary they were seeking. Instead, it's a town fraught with tension and simmering with sexual intrigue. Amid the McMansions bought with boom-economy bonuses and SUVs driven by soccer moms lurks a creepier sense of paranoia and a more sinister web of violent crimes than city dwellers could ever dream of. Stalked by Lynn's old boyfriend and terrorized by a menace that seethes beneath the seemingly placid routine of commuting, play dates, and white-wine evenings, Lynn and Barry engage in a primal fight for their lives and their future together.

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The Last Good Day is one of the books that took me forever to finish. I already forgot most of what happened in the plot.
It seems the author didn't really care about the readers thoughts. The feeble attempt to draw the reader into the even more feeble plot by mentioning 9/11 a few times, didn't really work. After all, the plot hasn't really much to do with 9/11 or its aftermath for the people in the town.

Shallow characters and unbelievable actions by police and protagonists leave a bad taste in my mouth. I definitely won't read Peter Blauner's books again. This one is just too bad and boring.

Rating:
Visit Peter Blauner.

Hardcover: 432 pages
Publisher: Little, Brown (May 2003)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0316098736
ISBN-13: 978-0316098731

George D. Shuman - Second Sight

2009-10-18T18:20:00.000-07:00

Stunningly beautiful psychic Sherry Moore's world has been draped in darkness for as long as she can remember. Though she has been blind since childhood, her extraordinary gift for seeing the last eighteen seconds of a deceased person's memory has helped solve numerous crimes and save countless lives. Her life has been anything but normal, but because of her relationship with Brian Metcalf, the Navy SEAL she met during a dramatic rescue on Mount McKinley, Sherry has never been happier. Then her exposure to deadly radiation changes everything.

Unnerved about the radiation's possible aftereffects and suffering from optical migraines, Sherry checks herself into the hospital to undergo tests. All seems normal until they wheel in the body of one Thomas Monahan. Vivid, terrifying images from his memory flood her thoughts the moment she grasps his hand. She feels a connection take hold as she thrashes about on the gurney, finally letting out a bloodcurdling scream. When Sherry next opens her eyes, for the first time in thirty-two years, she can see.

They call it a miracle. But for Sherry life with sight proves to be more complicated. She has to navigate the world anew, troubled by the agonizing, unanswered question: Who was this man and how had he enabled her to regain her vision? Enlisting the help of retired Admiral Garland Brigham, her confidant and best friend, Sherry doggedly begins to unravel this complicated history and unearths some startling revelations, beginning with the work of Edward Case.

Case is a man used to getting his way. The CEO of pharmaceutical giant Case & Kimble, he has the nation's elite on speed dial. But unsettling rumors have circulated for years about the genesis of the company's stratospheric success, questioning how this upstart firm has gained prominence and grown to be a monolithic institution worth billions of dollars. How its drugs always seem to make it onto the market before those of its competitors. If the secrets to C&K's dominance are ever made public, they will destroy the empire Case has so carefully constructed. And he will stop at nothing to keep his domain intact.

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The fourth novel in Shuman's Sherry Moore series could have been as exciting as the previous novels if it weren't for once again a very dark topic running the side lines: illegal human experiments on U. S. soldiers during the 1950s.

While helping with an investigation Sherry is exposed to radiation. She gives herself over to her trusted doctor when she experiences a number of side effects. To discover if her sight has been affected she touches the hand of one Thomas Joseph Monahan, whom she later discovers, lived in an Asylum for the Insane for over 50 years. During the process something strange happens and when she opens her eyes she has her eyesight back. Not completely but steadily getting better.

With that she has to discover life anew with images influencing her usual instinctual judgement. Haunted by what she saw in her vision she wants to know who Monahan was, why he was in the Asylum and what happened to him.
Her research brings her and her dearest friend Admiral Garland Brigham to the Asylum which lies next to an old, long abandoned military base.

Unfortunately asking for Monahan's background sets off alarm bells, bringing her into the focus of Edward Case, the ruthless CEO of a pharmaceutical company that always seems to be a step ahead of his competition.

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I didn't like this novel as much as the previous one because its style seems to be almost the same plus it got a bit long winded with Sherry's mental state of her relationship with Brian Metcalf and the new influences with regaining her sight. Might have been intentional that she behaves partly like a teenage girl because of that but I really missed the depth when she f. e. saw for the first time how Brian really looks like. Sherry acted out of character, completely trusting her eyesight and she made stupid choices I couldn't understand.

The suspense unfortunately got deflated way too often by knowing who is who and the reader always knowing more than the protagonist did.

Rating:
Visit George D. Shuman.

Hardcover: 288 pages
Publisher: Simon & Schuster (August 4, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1416599797
ISBN-13: 978-1416599791

Dan Brown - The Lost Symbol

2009-10-15T16:45:00.000-07:00

What is lost will be found...

As the story opens, Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon is summoned unexpectedly to deliver an evening lecture in the U.S. Capitol Building. Within minutes of his arrival, however, the night takes a bizarre turn. A disturbing object--artfully encoded with five symbols--is discovered in the Capitol Building. Langdon recognizes the object as an ancient invitation... one meant to usher its recipient into a long-lost world of esoteric wisdom.

When Langdon's beloved mentor, Peter Solomon--a prominent Mason and philanthropist--is brutally kidnapped, Langdon realizes his only hope of saving Peter is to accept this mystical invitation and follow wherever it leads him. Langdon is instantly plunged into a clandestine world of Masonic secrets, hidden history, and never-before-seen locations--all of which seem to be dragging him toward a single, inconceivable truth.

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Amazon seems to have the answer Brown readers are asking: Is The Lost Symbol as good as the The Da Vinci Code ? Amazon says yes. I say no.
My biggest pet peeve with this novel is quite that it reads like a repetition of the Da Vinci Code. Unfortunately Brown couldn't catch me with the same scheme again. Apparently the whole 528 pages plus/minus a few that go back into the past of certain characters, happens in one night, similar to the Da Vinci Code.

It is true that Brown's writing style is a bit naked, call it bland, I call it naked, but his books have gotten enough positive reviews so they can't be that bad. :-)
I liked the book but missed the references in the end. The topic Freemasons and Noetic Science is an interesting one but I guess only for those that are interested to do their research and learn or people who aren't interested in fiction and fact at all. I'm pretty sure that voices are already or will be loud about facts described wrongly etc. .
As one of Brown's characters said a few times in the ending: It's all about the perspective, from which angle you look at things. He's right with this statement when it comes to the book and in general.

So what's to wish for in the future ? Maybe, and be aware here comes a spoiler, not again the bible (thanks) in the ending, visit other places like for example Egypt, there is so much you can write about, change the storyline, the scheme, or just stay who you are, Mr. Brown, obviously your books reach readers and that's what a writer wants, that's what makes a good book. :-)

Rating:
Visit Dan Brown.

Hardcover: 528 pages
Publisher: Doubleday Books; First Edition edition (September 15, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0385504225
ISBN-13: 978-0385504225

Sarah Pinborough - Feeding Ground

2009-10-11T16:26:00.000-07:00

The spider creatures from Breeding Ground have begun to take over London. A small group of survivors try to escape the city via an unused Underground tunnel, only to realize -- too late -- that the tunnel contains a storehouse for the spiders' food.

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It's been a few days since I finished Feeding Ground, a continuation of Breeding Ground and I've already forgotten how the book ended.
As much as I liked all of Pinborough's novels this one left me quite unimpressed, more so bored. We're now in a time where the spiders have taken over London and we have a few of male survivors. The mean drug dealers trying to use the former drugs using woman to their advantage, two groups of teenagers who are trying to survive on their own and the bad guy turned good, helping the teenagers.
So far for the main message.

The bocks description is very clumsy. The Underground tunnel it is talking about comes into play almost on the last few pages and doesn't even play that big of a role. Yes it is storehouse for spider food but the big finale comes just after the tunnel but as I said I don't even remember if the group and the bad guy turned good made it to the boat unharmed. I really have to think hard and still don't remember.

Rating:
Visit Sarah Pinborough.

Mass Market Paperback: 320 pages
Publisher: Leisure Books (September 29, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0843962933
ISBN-13: 978-0843962932

Shane Briant - Worst Nightmares

2009-10-07T20:48:00.000-07:00

Dermot Nolan is an international award winning, bestselling author who seems to have it all - a successful career, fame, fortune, and a beautiful wife. Between the royalties coming in from his most recent book, and the revenue he has received from the film company that bought the rights, Dermot seems every bit the literary darling.
And yet, for the last year, he has suffered from a bout of writer's block and in the process has grossly overspent his income. So when Dermot comes across an unsolicited horror manuscript stuffed into his mailbox from one Albert K. Arnold entitled My Worst Nightmares--My Delicious Memoirs, he cannot help but feel intrigued. it tells the story of the twisted, homicidal "Dream Healer" who snares his victims via his website worstnightmares.com, seduces them into revealing their innermost fears, and then kills them by revisiting their very own nightmares upon them, magnified a hundredfold. And while Dermot is disgusted by the horror of Mr. Arnold's manuscript, he is also deeply intrigued, so much that he seeks to solve his writer's block by rewriting Arnold's novel as his own.
Sweeping aside the threatening prospect of plagiarism, Dermot begins to rework the novel while simultaneously researching Arnold's stories. In his search, he slowly begins to realize that the novel may not be entirely fictional, that these poor characters may have perished at the hands of a twisted torturer.
Could the Dream Healer be real ? Could these innocent cyber-surfers have fallen victim to a raving maniac ? And could Dermot be writing his own ticket to death ... his very own worst nightmare ?

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Bestselling author Dermot Nolan suffers from writers block for the last year. His editor pushes him to give her something to work with. So when the unsolicited manuscript arrives he is tempted to look at it but its content is appalling not only in literally ways.
Dermot however wants to back himself up and research the deaths and names. He soon figures that the unknown author going by the name of Albert K. Arnold has a psychopaths psyche. Further pressured Dermot decides to keep his knowledge to himself, especially when he and his wife Neela, are sure, that Arnold killed himself by jumping of a roof.

He feels safe until a reporter receives secret calls filling him in with clues about crime scenes that relate to Dermot's book locations and place him at the scene of crime.

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Unfortunately I don't have much praises for this novel. Despite taking me forever to finish it I've read a similar book just a few weeks ago. The characters actions didn't often make sense to me and they weren't likeable at all. Whatever happened to them, they brought it onto themselves.

The ending wasn't really an ending, the story just stopped at some point. After the last few chapters finally got my attention it just wasn't conclusive for me and left questions open.
In the opening acknowledgements the author claims to believe he delivered his best novel to date. With five novels published in Australia, Worst Nightmares doesn't keep up with the promise Publishers Weekly announced as the novel being an exciting page-turner. But what else to say, Publishers Weekly still thinks Worst Nightmares is Shane's debut novel.

I won't spent my time or money on this author again.

Rating:

Hardcover: 352 pages
Publisher: Vanguard Press (May 12, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 159315514X
ISBN-13: 978-1593155148

Dick and Felix Francis - Even Money

2009-09-30T12:33:00.001-07:00

On the first day of Royal Ascot, the crowd rejoices in a string of winning favorites. Ned Talbot has worked all his life as a bookmaker—taking over the family business from his grandfather—so he knows not to expect any sympathy from the punters as they count their winnings, and him his losses. He’s seen the ups and downs before—but, as the big gambling conglomerates muscle in on small concerns like his, Ned wonders if it’s worth it any more.

When a grey-haired man steps forward from the crowd, claiming to be his father, Ned’s life is thrown into further turmoil. He’d been told since he was a baby that his parents had died in a car crash.

Barely an hour later, his newly found father is stabbed by an unknown assailant in the Ascot car park. Blood oozing from his abdomen, his father warns Ned to “be very careful.” But of whom? Of what? Ned finds himself in a race to solve his father’s riddle, a race where coming in second could cost him more than even money, it could cost him his life. . . .

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As much as I tried I couldn't finish the book. It was just too boring. I quit after the first third where I waited for something (anything, except bla) to happen after the alleged father was stabbed to death but nothing substantial happened. The final straw was one page that used the Word "I" for about 25 times.

Unfortunately the book is not worth the money nor worth the time spent reading. At least not for me.

Rating:
Visit Dick Francis/Felix Francis.

Hardcover: 368 pages
Publisher: Putnam Adult (August 25, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0399155910
ISBN-13: 978-0399155918

Sandra Brown - Smash Cut

2009-09-27T14:11:00.000-07:00

The murder of Paul Wheeler has all the elements of a blockbuster: family rivalries, incalculable wealth, and a prominent man dying in the arms of his beautiful mistress. It's a case that could earn Derek Mitchell even greater star power. When the Wheeler family approaches him about defending Creighton Wheeler for his uncle's murder - even before he's charged - he jumps at the chance.
But Derek soon discovers that Julie will stop at nothing to secure justice for Paul - and that includes preventing Derek from defending Creighton. Infuriated, Derek realizes that his hands have been tied in a way that could not only cost him the case, but ruin his entire career.

Although Creighton has a rock-solid alibi, Julie is convinced that he is responsible for Paul's murder. But the homicide detectives have another theory. Caught in several lies, and keeping secrets from Derek and the police, Julie is suspected of casting blame on Creighton to cover her own crime. Meanwhile, Derek fears he's once again being duped ... yet he burns with jealousy when he thinks of Julie with her late lover.
But the more Derek learns about Creighton and his darker side, the more he doubts the young man's innocence.
And hiding in a squalid motel under an assumed name is the one man, a career criminal, a killer, who knows the truth.
The clock ticks down toward a shocking ending as Derek and Julie seek to learn whether Creighton's fascination with movie murders is merely a bizarre hobby or depravity. Has he begun reenacting cinema's goriest scenes ... and, if so, who will be his unwitting costars ?

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The books cover description should be called a major spoiler because it almost tells the story in just a few sentences. I'm glad when I got the book I didn't read the description before otherwise I might have been tempted to not read the book at all.
Luckily the description, even if read, doesn't take away that Smash Cut is an exciting thriller to read.
Just when I thought how great the author had hidden the killer's identity (with hints it might not be the suspect you have in mind) she plain let me know by telling me. At first I was shocked and disappointed but afterwards it made perfectly sense and didn't bother the suspense in the least.

I probably won't go back in time to read Brown's older novels but will keep an eye on new publications.

Rating:
Visit Sandra Brown.

Hardcover: 384 pages
Publisher: Simon & Schuster; 1 edition (August 11, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1416563083
ISBN-13: 978-1416563082

Faye Kellerman - Blindman's Bluff

2009-09-23T17:21:00.000-07:00

As a lieutenant in the LAPD, homicide detective Peter Decker doesn't get many calls at 3 a.m. unless a case is nasty, sensational—or both. Someone has broken into the exclusive Coyote Ranch compound of billionaire developer Guy Kaffey and viciously gunned him down, along with his wife and four employees.

A well-known figure on both the business and society pages, Kaffey, with his sons and his younger brother, Mace, built most of the shopping malls in Southern California and earned a reputation for philanthropy, donating millions to worthy causes. It doesn't take long for Peter, his trusted detectives Scott Oliver and Marge Dunn, and the rest of his homicide team to figure out that the gruesome killings must be an inside job. Things become even more entangled when they discover that Kaffey's largesse had included organizations that extended second chances to delinquents, many of whom Kaffey had hired for his personal security. But was the job pure murder/robbery or something even more twisted? A developer of Kaffey's magnitude doesn't make billions without making more enemies with blood grudges.

With leads taking the team across L.A., up and down the Golden State, and into Mexico, Decker is plenty busy—and plenty thankful not to have to worry about his wife, Rina Lazarus, getting caught up in this deadly case. Rina is out of harm's way, serving on a jury at the courthouse.

But then a chance encounter with a court translator who needs her help leads Rina into the terrifying heart of her husband's murder investigations—and straight into the path of a gang of ruthless killers. To protect Rina, Decker must find his prey before death unites his two worlds.

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Blindman's Bluff is the 18th installment in Kellerman's Peter Decker & Rina Lazarus series and it's the first book I've ever rad by this author. The question I always ask myself when jumping into a long established series is if I'd read another book in the series.
My answer in this case would probably be a no for a few reasons:

First of all, I excepted both characters to play a relevant role in the book. The part of Decker's wife Rina could have been played by anyone and her role didn't really contribute to the plot. There is also a lot of build-up in the book. Suspects without end, more names one has to remember over the time span of a few days it takes to get through the book.
Finally the ending was a huge bore for me.

It also took me a while to get the novels title and for those who haven't figured it out I recommend the book Blind Man's Bluff: The Untold Story of American Submarine Espionage. It's not a direct connection but might indicate why the author choose this title, even if slightly irrelevant.

Maybe it just wasn't Kellerman's best but enough for me. :-)

Rating:
Visit Faye Kellerman.

Hardcover: 400 pages
Publisher: William Morrow; First Edition first Printing edition (August 11, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0061702323
ISBN-13: 978-0061702327

Michael Palmer - The Fifth Vial

2009-09-18T21:19:00.000-07:00

In Boston, a disgraced medical student is sent to deliver a research paper that could save her career… In a hospital four thousand miles away, a reclusive scientist, dying from an incurable disease that threatens to make each tortured breath his last, is on the verge of perfecting a serum that could save millions of lives—and bring others inestimable wealth… In Chicago, a disillusioned detective is hired to determine the identity of a John Doe, killed on a Florida highway, with mysterious marks on his body.

Three seemingly disconnected lives, surging unrelentingly toward one another—and linked forever by THE FIFTH VIAL.

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Medical student Natalie Reyes has fallen in disgrace with her supervisors and got suspended from school for 4 months. Her mentor and friend, a famous transplant specialist sends her to Rio/Brazil to speak at a transplant meeting. She never arrives there but is kidnapped, drugged and shot. Days later she awakes with her left lung lost in the shooting. Everything points to her needing a transplant soon.

At the time P. I. Ben Callahan is hired to investigate the identity of an unknown man who was run over by a truck but has visible marks of a recent bone marrow transplant. The Organ Guard Institution assumes him to be a victim of organ trafficking especially because they know about a similar case of a surviving woman who was kidnapped recently.

Valuable Dr. Joe Anson desperately needs a lung transplant. To not loose his valuable research he is tricked into agreeing to a transplant but later has to learn, that he was terribly tricked into an early transplant that has been waiting for him for a long, long time.

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The Fifth Vial is one of the best thrillers I've read this year. With an already satisfied appetite with the organ trafficking topic, this novel didn't hurt a bit. Quite the opposite, I couldn't put it down.
The book has three main characters with Natalie and Ben independently bringing the plot together from their perspective. They both, Ben more than Natalie act stupid at times, bringing their lives into even more danger but readers that are not bothered by some questionable turns in the storyline will enjoy this medical thriller from the first page to the last. They even might oversee the more or less last chapter (which is a bit cheesy) that concluded the relationship between Natalie and the person who received her lung.

Good read !

Rating:
Visit Michael Palmer.

Mass Market Paperback: 544 pages
Publisher: St. Martin's Paperbacks (November 27, 2007)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0312937741
ISBN-13: 978-0312937744

Dennis Lehane - Shutter Island

2009-09-15T12:29:00.000-07:00

The year is 1954. U.S. Marshal Teddy Daniels and his new partner, Chuck Aule, have come to Shutter Island, home of Ashecliffe Hospital for the Criminally Insane, to investigate the disappearance of a patient. Multiple murderess Rachel Solando is loose somewhere on this remote and barren island, despite having been kept in a locked cell under constant surveillance. As a killer hurricane bears relentlessly down on them, a strange case takes on even darker, more sinister shades -- with hints of radical experimentation, horrifying surgeries, and lethal countermoves made in the cause of a covert shadow war. No one is going to escape Shutter Island unscathed, because nothing at Ashecliffe Hospital is what it seems. But then neither is Teddy Daniels.

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U. S. Marshalls Teddy Daniels and his newly appointed partner Chuck Aule arrive on the remote island Shutter Island that holds Ashecliffe Hospital, a maximum security institution for the criminally insane.
A woman has mysteriously vanished from a locked room without leaving any kind of evidence on how she got out and where she went.
While the investigators try to bring some light into the situation, Teddy however has a second agenda.
He has been researching the island and came to find the arsonist who killed his wife. What he finds is much more disturbing. An unaccounted for patient, secret surgical experiments on patients and a complete hospital crew that seems to be in on it.

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Shutter Island was brought to my attention quite some time ago and now that I've finally read it I have to ask myself why it got such great reviews. It certainly doesn't miss the suspense in the story. It even takes some turns that weren't expected at all but halfway through the reader should have caught the drift about what is going on the island.
After a more or less pleasant ride through the pages I craved the big bang at the end but only got a flat not exciting ending. Not a good read for me and certainly a disappointment after having read The Given Day in 2008.

Rating:
Visit Dennis Lehane.

Mass Market Paperback: 400 pages
Publisher: HarperTorch (April 27, 2004)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 038073186X
ISBN-13: 978-0380731862

Stephenie Meyer - Breaking Dawn (Twilight Series, Book 4) (Spoiler included)

2009-09-12T17:24:00.000-07:00

When you loved the one who was killing you, it left you no options. How could you run, how could you fight, when doing so would hurt that beloved one? If your life was all you had to give, how could you not give it? If it was someone you truly loved?

To be irrevocably in love with a vampire is both fantasy and nightmare woven into a dangerously heightened reality for Bella Swan. Pulled in one direction by her intense passion for Edward Cullen, and in another by her profound connection to werewolf Jacob Black, a tumultuous year of temptation, loss, and strife have led her to the ultimate turning point. Her imminent choice to either join the dark but seductive world of immortals or to pursue a fully human life has become the thread from which the fates of two tribes hangs.

Now that Bella has made her decision, a startling chain of unprecedented events is about to unfold with potentially devastating, and unfathomable, consequences. Just when the frayed strands of Bella's life-first discovered in Twilight, then scattered and torn in New Moon and Eclipse-seem ready to heal and knit together, could they be destroyed... forever?

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The fourth and last installment in the Twilight series concludes the whole series with Bella finally giving in to marry Edward and her getting pregnant on their honeymoon, But what wasn't known to be possible happened and Bella bears a half human, half vampire girl she names Renesmee. Bella is also changed into what she chose to be: a vampire.

But these changes affect not only the Cullens' and Bella's family, it also affects the wolves pack, especially Jacob. Other threads involve themselves as well.

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Breaking Dawn with its 700+ pages was a piece to read, especially at parts that were just too long and made me wonder how the capability of writing page after page with the same over and over again just using different words is called. There were parts that I think are excruciating to read just because they don't seem to end, like f. e. Bella's pregnancy. Although she got the child in a manner of a few weeks it felt much longer for the reader to get through that part.

Surprisingly I liked the part from Jacob's view. A style that wasn't used by Meyer in the previous three books.

I didn't like the fact that our Bella got everything she wanted. No sacrifices at all, besides as a vampire she lost all her "bad" characteristics. No problems at all. That certainly helped finding the book exciting.
The Renesmee - Jacob relationship made me choke. Seriously ?

To end this painfully, most certainly spoiling review, I'd like to end that if Meyer would have read Wuthering Heights she'd never have used such an ending. Why she felt the need to mention Wuthering Heights more than once in her books is not understandable to me.

In the end there was no drama. All is well, happily ever after - no.
This particular way of writing a conclusion so many people waited for shatters dreams. Not mine but others I now have to feel bad for.

Rating:
Visit Stephenie Meyer.

Stephenie Meyer - Eclipse (Twilight Series, Book 3)

2009-09-12T11:48:00.000-07:00

As Seattle is ravaged by a string of mysterious killings and a malicious vampire continues her quest for revenge, Bella once again finds herself in the midst of it all, she is forced to choose between her love for Edward and her friendship with Jacob - knowing that her decision has the potential to ignite the ageless struggle between vampire and werewolf. With her graduation quickly approaching, Bella has one more decision to make: Life or death.
But which is which ?

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Bella and Edward move on with their relationship with Bella desperately missing her friend Jacob who keeps away from her since she decided to stay together with vampire Edward. Edward, strictly against a friendship warns her that werewolves aren't predictable and tries to occupy her with his sister Alice or himself to keep her away from La Push, the wolves reservoir.
But sooner or later he has to learn that Jacob's friendship means a lot to Bella, enough to run away from his watchful eyes. He knows that sooner or later Bella has to decide between the human love she feels for Jacob and his and wants her to decide for herself.

When Seattle is raided by a group of young vampires, Bella once again is the target of Victoria's revenge. To win this war the Cullens' have to built an alliance with the wolves pack to fight the group that will come to Forks.

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I don't quite know what to think of this third installment. Bella has her issues with becoming immortal, she has her issues to give up the human qualities Jacob could offer her. The author most definitely went overboard with the whole love triangle thing and certain parts didn't make sense to me at all. But then, I've never been like Bella, who is still the most dependent person in the world, now needing two men to "survive".
Edward seems to have matured a bit by allowing Bella to keep her friendship and decide for herself but still the whole situation is annoying. As a mother I'd probably throw a fit over it.

So top or flop, I wouldn't know and can't decide if I liked it or not. The book didn't offer much substance to me which I expected but overall, it was an ok read to pass the time.
I'm still interested how the story ends and have already picked up the last book to finish the series and get it out of the way.

I refuse to draw any conclusions to the secret fantasies the author might have. Won't do that. No no no.

Rating:
Visit Stephenie Meyer.

Reading level: Young Adult
Paperback: 640 pages
Publisher: Little, Brown Young Readers; Reprint edition (August 4, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0316027650
ISBN-13: 978-0316027656

Brian Freeman - Immoral (Jonathan Stride Series, Book 1)

2009-09-10T16:01:00.000-07:00

Lieutnant Jonathan Stride is suffering from an ugly case of déjà-vu. For the second time in a year, a beautiful teenage girl has disappeared off the streets of Dultuh, Minnesota - gone without a trace, like a bitter gust off Lake Superior. The two victims couldn't be more different.
First it was Kerry McGrath, bubbly, sweet sixteen, and now, Rachel Deese, strange, sexually charged, a wild child.
The media hound Stride to catch a serial killer, and as the search carries him from the icy stillness of the northern woods to the erotic heat of Las vegas, he must decide which facts are real and which are illusions. Stride also finds his own life changed forever by the secrets he uncovered. Secrets that stretch across time in a web of lies, death, and illicit desire. Secrets that are chillingly ... immoral.

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In a time span of one year two young girls have been vanished without a trace. Pressured by public and media, Lieutenant Jonathan Stride and his partner Maggie Bei tried to solve the disappearance of Kerry McGrath in vain and face the same situation again.
But when rumors surface about Rachel's stepfather abusing his stepdaughter, the police digs into the families life, exposing evidence that that the stepfather might have killed Rachel.
Police and the District Attorney agree, that they can reach a conviction for murder without having the body.

The case seems to be solved but three years later when a body is found in the desert of Las Vegas, the past catches up with a restless Stride who never forgot the Rachel Deese case.

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Immoral is an o.k. read that won't bore you but neither will it wow you. I am certain there are a lot of readers that like the whole story but I couldn't find much that appealed to my taste.
The solution to the whole story is rather simply to guess otherwise other parts of the story wouldn't make sense at all. I was only waiting for my assumptions to be confirmed - which I was.

There is lots Mr. Freeman has to work on and probably already did in the following three novels already published.
I'll probably pick up the second book in the series soon just to figure out if things have changed. The Jonathan Stride character development in the end left room for hope and more. :-)

Rating:
Visit Brian Freeman.

Hardcover: 352 pages
Publisher: St. Martin's Minotaur; 1ST edition (August 25, 2005)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0312340427
ISBN-13: 978-0312340421

Sabine Thiesler - Hexenkind

2009-09-07T08:53:00.000-07:00

In an old, lonely and remote farmhouse in the midst of the Tuscany, a mushroom collector finds a horribly mutilated body: Sarah, the German wife of restaurant owner Romano, throat has been cut through.

This brutal killing is only the beginning of the doom that began years ago in Germany, and now reaching into the future to take it's hold over a whole family until it reaches a final, most gruesome ending.

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Romano Simonetti worked in an Italian restaurant in Germany when the battered and abused Sarah stood in his doorway, holding a crying infant in her arms. A friendship developed soon and they fled to Italy to open Romano's dream: a small restaurant.
They marry, they become children but you can not hide from your past.

Sarah's passion for other men, a mentally disabled son, an intelligent daughter with jealousy issues, a mean mother in law, and the daughters father are a mean mixture made to explode sooner or later.

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The book begins with the discovery of Sarah's dead body by one of her former affairs and her husband learning that his wife has been killed. From there on we learn about Sarah and her family through flashbacks placed very nicely. Actually the whole book is more flashbacks than "real time". The reader learns how the family developed and how the disaster was built brick by brick by the victim.

Whatever it was I felt like a bystander watching a families doom slowly develop in front of my eyes. I saw through Sarah's and Romano's eyes. I saw through the eyes of daughter Elsa and those of the abusive ex-boyfriend from Germany.

All in all you won't get a real thriller, nor will you get a family saga. There will be things you will be able to predict, but there will also be things that surprise you.

I for myself couldn't put the book down and loved it from the beginning to the end.

Sabine Thiesler is a German author, who's novels unfortunately haven't been translated yet. Her first novel, Der Kindersammler was a major success. Hexenkind, different but unique in it's own can add to that. Her third novel Die Totengraeberin was published in the beginning of 2009 and I won't wait much longer to pick it up.

Let's hope at some point they are going to translate the books. It really would add to the international list of very good writers.

Rating:

Paperback: 580 pages
Publisher: Heyne Paperback (October 1, 2007)
Language: German
ISBN-10: 3453432746
ISBN-13: 978-3453432741

Robin Cook - Intervention

2009-09-02T16:03:00.000-07:00

It's been more than thirty years since New York City medical examiner Jack Stapleton's college graduation and almost as long since he'd been in touch with former classmates Shawn Doherty and Kevin Murray. Once a highly regarded ophthalmologist, Jack's career took a dramatic turn after a tragic accident that destroyed his family. But that, too, is very much in the past: Jack has remarried - to longtime colleague and fellow medical examiner Laurie Montgomery - and is the father of a young child. But his renegade, activist personality can't rest, and after performing a postmortem on a young college student who had recently been treated by a chiropractor, Jack decides to explore alternative medicine. What makes some people step outside the medical establishment to seek care from practitioners of Eastern philosophies and even faith healers?

Jack's classmate Shawn Doherty is now a renowned archaeologist and biblical scholar at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, whose taste for good wine and generally deteriorating health are taking a toll on his career. He has recently obtained permission for a final dig beneath Saint Peter's, and despite his long-standing grudge against the Catholic Church, begins his research - which eventually takes him to Jerusalem and Venice - only to make a startling discovery with ecclesiastical and medical implications. And when Kevin Murray, now Bishop of the Archdiocese of New York, gets wind of Shawn's findings, he's desperate to keep them from the public. Kevin has strong political ambitions within the Church, but his association with Shawn threatens to undermine them. Kevin turns to his old friend Jack to help protect an explosive secret - one with the power to change lives forever.

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I've always been intrigued to try one of Robin Cook's novels and decided Intervention might as well be the first one. The audio book unabridged audio edition lasted
11 h and 6 long minutes in which I was tempted to just leave it be and listen to another audio book. The plot, strongly reminding of Dan Brown, is intriguing but unfortunately neither the revelation of bones that possibly belonged to the virgin Mary, nor the sparsely detailed research in it's mitochondrial DNA, nor the critis into alternative medicine took a hold of me.
Truly, Cook's way of writing seems very fluent after almost 30 published novels.

The narrator's voice was an ok voice, less memorable than those I am used to but in the end it suffices the purpose. Obviously Intervention isn't a book written for newcomers to Robin Cook. Probably the reason I longer feel tempted to try one of his books.

Rating:
Visit Robin Cook.

Audio CD
Publisher: Penguin Audio; Unabridged edition (August 11, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 014314457X
ISBN-13: 978-0143144571

Jeff Carlson - Plague Year

2009-08-31T09:02:00.000-07:00

The nanotechnology was designed to fight cancer. Instead, it evolved into the machine plague, killing nearly five billion people and changing life on Earth forever.

The nanotech has one weakness: it self-destructs at altitudes above ten thousand feet. Those few who've managed to escape struggle to stay alive on the highest mountains, but time is running out. There is famine and war, and the environment is crashing worldwide. Humanity's last hope lies with a top nanotech researcher aboard the International Space Station-and with a small group of survivors in California who risk a daring journey below the death line.

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As much as I tried the book felt like a flatliner. Having read a tad more than the first third I was hoping for some more sci-fi details and much more excitement. Instead I got the story of some survivors who live above the surviving altitude of nanoprobes which have turned badly against humanity, eating them from the inside out.
A few of the survivors make their way to another camp where they are obviously needed, as a barely surviving visitor told them. He promised them food and shelter and most of all safety.
I never read to the point if he spoke the truth or not.

Sounds interesting but believe me, the story develops flatter than a pancake.

Plague Year is the first in a series of three (Plague War, Jul. 2008, and Plague Zone, Nov. 2009).

Rating:
Visit Jeff Carlson.

Paperback: 304 pages
Publisher: Ace; First Printing edition (July 31, 2007)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 044101514X
ISBN-13: 978-0441015146

Barbara Delisnky - Finger Prints

2009-08-28T10:06:00.000-07:00

Once upon a time she was Robyn Hart, a journalist who saw too much and wasn't afraid to expose it. But that courage nearly cost Robyn her life. Under the protection of the Witness Relocation program, she now has a new identity -- Carly -- and a new job. But the terror of the past still lingers, and Carly lives in fear that her enemies will find her.

Though she tries to wall herself off from the world, one determined man breaks through her defenses -- successful young attorney Ryan Cornell. And though she yearns to give him her heart, Carly doesn’t know if she can. While loving him offers a happiness she thought she'd forever lost, trusting him could cost her everything.

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Carly Quinn left her old life months ago to finally enter the witness relocation program 4 months ago. Having survived an attack on her life in a dark alley she fears for her life and lives a secluded life as a teacher when attractive lawyer Ryan Cornell moves into her building. She desperately tries to keep to herself but falls for his charm and persistence to come into her life. Not without the reassurance of her friend and person responsible for her protection, Sam Loomis, she gives in to Ryan and their relationship grows.

Things become difficult for Carly when the man she brought to jail files motion for a new trial and she might be called back to the witness stand. On top of that Gary Culbert seems quite assured he might be acquitted.
Then there is Sheila, whom Carly got to know before the huge trial. Sheila was responsible for Carly's security and they developed a deep friendship. But since Sheila moved to Cambridge she seems distracted to the dismay of her new boss Sam. Loomis.

Ultimately Carly's is going to be betrayed by a person she loves.

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Finger Prints was first published in 1984 and seems to be one of Delinsky's earlier novels. I couldn't quite figure out if or under what title the book was published before it got named Finger Prints. Today the author seems to no longer like to be associated with her pseudonyms Bonnie Drake or Billie Douglass. Fact is some of her older novels written under her pseudonyms are republished under the name Barbara Delinsky.

Coming to the book I believe it flopped. The writing style is very fluent and easy to read but the plot itself was too much romance, too little suspense. It was pretty clear in which direction the book is going from the beginning and besides all of the romance I was just waiting for something suspenseful to happen.
I'm not excited about the book but it wasn't too bad either. Just reading time I could have spent on something more interesting or a book whose cover description matches the plot.

Rating:
Visit Barbara Delisnky.

Mass Market Paperback: 496 pages
Publisher: HarperTorch (April 1, 1992)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0061041807
ISBN-13: 978-0061041808

Thomas O'Callaghan - The Screaming Room

2009-08-22T22:37:00.000-07:00

John Driscoll has laid the ghosts of his past to rest. He's ready to start over - both personally and as a NYPD homicide commander. But it seems that a serial killer has other plans for Driscoll.

The victims' bodies are found, brutally mutilated and carefully arranged for the world to see - grotesque visions to all except for the depraved killer, who considers them masterpieces. These blood rituals spell out a message to Driscoll.
And they are just the beginning...

Driscoll's investigation will lead him down the darkest of journeys, toward an evil beyond his worst nightmares. In a hellish landscape conceived by the all-too-clever mind of a twisted schemer, Driscoll must play a killer's deadly game. It's up to him to save his city - or die trying.

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The teenagers Cassie & Angus have been abused and tortured their whole life. Now that they are finally free, Angus clever mind knows how to trick the likes that made them suffer so much into their trap to take a gruesome revenge. What remains is a mutilated and scalped body.

While Lieutenant John Driscoll takes charge of the investigations of several murders, a huge pharmacy mogul has his own interest to get to the two teenagers first. His agenda is clear: they need to die for they hold secrets that should never be revealed.

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As nice as the books description sounds, it fails to deliver on a large scale. I wasn't particular impressed with the authors choice of wording but could have gone past that if the plot hadn't been such a boring experience.
Besides the characters own packages, a wife that was just buried and Driscoll's working colleague and love Margaret's struggles with the past it felt like a huge jigsaw where the pieces have been cut very badly.

Rating:
Visit Thomas O'Callaghan.

Hardcover: 352 pages
Publisher: Pinnacle (2007)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0739484303
ISBN-13: 978-0739484302

Lisa Gardner - The Neighbor

2009-08-20T21:53:00.001-07:00

It was a case to spark a media feeding frenzy - a young mother, blond and pretty, disappears without a trace from her South Boston home, leaving behind her four-year-old daughter as the only witness and her handsome, secretive husband as the prime suspect.
But from the moment Detective Sergeant D. D. Warren arrives at the Joneses' snug little bungalow, she senses something off about the picture of wholesome normality the couple worked so hard to create. On the surface, Jason and Sandra Jones were like any other hardworking young couple raising a four-year-old child. But it is just under the surface that things grew murkier.
With the clock ticking on the life of a missing woman and the media firestorm building, Jason Jones seems more intent on destroying evidence and isolating his daughter than on searching for his "beloved" wife.

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Sandra and Jason Jones have been married for almost 4 years, raising her four-year-old daughter Ree. Their marriage isn't what the average person would assume as normal but besides that they are both devoted to their child's safety.
One night Jason returns from work and finds his wife missing and his daughter sleeping in her bed. Police soon considers him their main suspect when a registered sex offender from the neighborhood enters the scene, a secret affair of Sandra's turns up and her estranged father, a judge from Georgia, claims rights on his granddaughter.
And what's wrong with Jason who's behavior and gestures are as cold as ice, calculating and only warm towards his daughter.

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At first I didn't really knew what to think about Gardner's newest novel until the suspense got me. The plot is slightly tied to the previous novel Say Goodbye and the "Burgerman" Gardner opens door after door after door with suspects, giving us a good glimpse of the characters and what they were thinking. I didn't really guess who's involved in Sandra's disappearance up until the almost the end.

I really enjoyed Sandra's flashbacks from the past, how she grew up with abusing parents, met Jason and discovered his terrible secret. The revelation in the end is shockingly twisted and rewarding with a conclusion that takes your breath away. It all fits and I for once closed a book I couldn't put away.

Rating:
Visit Lisa Gardner.

Hardcover: 384 pages
Publisher: Bantam; First Edition first Printing edition (June 16, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0553807234
ISBN-13: 978-0553807233

Jilliane Hoffman - Plea of Insanity

2009-08-18T15:41:00.000-07:00

The prosecutor -- Julia Vacanti. Young and ambitious, and facing a case that could launch her career.
The defendant -- David Marquette. A successful Miami surgeon and devoted family man. The victims -- Marquette's own wife and three small children.
The plea -- Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity.

The perfect father and model husband, David Marquette seemingly just snapped. His experienced defense team claims paranoid delusions caused by schizophrenia drove him to slaughter his entire family.

But the state suspects Marquette's insanity defense is being fabricated to disguise murders that were cold blooded and calculated. Worse, Julia believes Marquette could be responsible for a string of unsolved, brutal homicides. Could he be one of the most prolific and elusive serial killers in the country's history? To bring him to justice, Julia must embark on a terrifying personal journey back into her own past-something she has struggled to forget for fifteen years. And this will lead her to confront a future so chilling, she's not sure she will ever be able to face it...

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Assistant State Attorney Julia Vacanti is appointed to her very first big case:
David Marquette has to stand trial for the gruesome murder of his wife and three children. His defense pleas he's not guilty by reason of insanity on the basis of his family history and his brother being schizophrenic.
In the midst of the trial Julia learns that her brother, whose whereabouts haven't been spoke of since years, is still alive and locked away in a high security facility for the murder of his parents while Julia was on a sleep over. He's treated as being schizophrenic.
Rekindling with her brother Julia begins to understand the difficulties of being schizophrenic and develops doubts in her own allegation against Marquette and that in fact might not be guilty.

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Plea of Insanity was not what I'd expected after I've read lots of raving reviews about Hoffman's previous books.
The plot idea itself is not that bad but not really unique either. It has been there in several novels and movies and unfortunately better done as well.
I don't want to call the book a legal thriller although it was meant to be just that and more.

In the end it was entertaining but probably not enough to make me a fan.

Rating:
Visit Jilliane Hoffman.

Hardcover: 432 pages
Publisher: Vanguard Press; 1 edition (April 10, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1593155077
ISBN-13: 978-1593155070

Warren Fahy - Fragment

2009-08-16T10:29:00.000-07:00

In this powerhouse of suspense—as brilliantly imagined as Jurassic Park and The Ruins—scientists have made a startling discovery: a fragment of a lost continent, an island with an ecosystem unlike any they've seen before... an ecosystem that could topple ours like a house of cards.

The time is now. The place is the Trident, a long-range research vessel hired by the reality TV show Sealife. Aboard is a cast of ambitious young scientists. With a director dying for drama, tiny Henders Island might be just what the show needs. Until the first scientist sets foot on Henders— -- and the ultimate test of survival begins...

For when they reach the island’s shores, scientists are utterly unprepared for what they find -- —creatures unlike any ever recorded in natural history. This is not a lost world frozen in time, an island of mutants, or a lab where science has gone mad: this is the Earth as it might have looked after evolving on a separate path for half a billion years.

Soon the scientists will stumble on something more shocking than anything humanity has ever encountered: because among the terrors of Henders Island, one life form defies any scientific theory— -- and must be saved at any cost.

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The research vessel Trident receives an emergency transmission from a 30-foot sailboat leading them to a remote island that hasn't been touched by humans before: Henders Island, where plants and animals together developed unaffected by human traces or today's flora and fauna.
Upon entering the island a team of scientists and cameramen suffers terrible losses during a live feed to national TV, leaving only two lone survivors: Botanist Nell Duckworth and cameraman Zero Monroe.
The area around the island is quarantined for further investigations and research and Nell is put in charge of the on-site observation team abroad of a mobile lab. But soon the astonished scientists discover that the island eco-system works as vicious as it can be with never before seen lifeforms not only attacking other lifeforms but also capable of finding their ways through metals and acrylics.
Unfortunately things get out of hands when the government recognizes how much of a threat the island inhabitants can get if it ever gets to the mainland.

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Fragment has this jurassic park feeling times four, spiked with difficult to comprehend creations of animals and plants. Luckily it also offers drawings of the animals at the same time which I thought is a wonderful addition to the book.
At times it gets a bit out of hands with unnecessary dialog between scientists that don't talk about the novels topic itself but luckily the reader stays undisturbed engulfed with the island terror after those two very distracting off-topics are done.
In hindsight of the prologue and its sense the book offers a very disturbing sight on what can happen and what has been happening for a long time to eco-systems if interrupted and that the chance of an ultimate extinction of the world we know today isn't as far fetched as one might think.

I believe this is a great effort by a new author one might keep an eye on.

Rating:
Visit Warren Fahy.

Hardcover: 384 pages
Publisher: Delacorte Press (June 16, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0553807536
ISBN-13: 978-0553807530

Stephenie Meyer - New Moon (Twilight series, Book 2)

2009-08-14T08:59:00.000-07:00

Bella celebrates her birthday with her boyfriend Edward and his family, a unique clan of vampires that has sworn off human blood. But the celebration abruptly ends when the teen accidentally cuts her arm on broken glass. The sight and smell of her blood trickling away forces the Cullen family to retreat lest they be tempted to make a meal of her. After all is mended, Edward, realizing the danger that he and his family create for Bella, sees no option for her safety but to leave. Mourning his departure, she slips into a downward spiral of depression that penetrates and lingers over her every step.

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It is a paper cut on Bella's finger that drives the Cullens' out of Forks, promising to never to return. Bella never asked for them to leave, she didn't want them out of her life but she is left with a shattered world, nothing to do with herself and not enough will to live to move on with her life. So the months fly by until Bella remembers her old friend Jacob Black and their relationship intensifies.
For him she has always been his love, for her he is the brother that takes her around doing dangerous stuff. But Jacob has another secret soon to reveal. He's a werewolf trying to protect the people from a vampire that lately left tracks and dead people all around Forks and the reservoir. The vampire of course, is Victoria who seeks revenge on Bella for James' death.
In an attempt to feel something Bella tries herself in cliff diving which almost costs her life if it weren't for Jacob who once again saved her life.
The friendship between the two is put to the test when the frantic Alice, Edward's sister who saw Bella's jump in a vision, arrives to check on Charlie because she thought Bella died. But she's not the only one that thought the same.

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I've been wondering why I kept reading. There isn't really much happening in this continuation of the Twilight novel. It certainly aren't the characters. Each one of them is undeveloped and Bella's the most co-dependent person one can imagine. Her clumsiness, in the beginning kinda funny, hasn't changed and has become quite old. She still wants to become a vampire and it looks like that's her only goal.
I could tear at my hair for Bella's stupidity and have given up to explain why I in the end liked the book. The answer is pretty clear: I don't know.

It is quite irking that Meyer so easily describes depression like it is the normal process of heartsickness. It is not, plus, suicidal behavior might be a bit thoughtless to dish to young teenagers. It certainly needs explanation for some young readers.

Rating:
Visit Stephenie Meyer.
Review Twilight (Twilight series, Book 1).

Reading level: Young Adult
Paperback: 576 pages
Publisher: Little, Brown Young Readers; MTI edition (September 15, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0316075639
ISBN-13: 978-0316075633

Jeremy Robinson - Raising The Past

2009-08-12T14:05:00.000-07:00

FROM THE ICE. . .
A mammoth, flash frozen in solid ice 10,000 years ago is brought to the surface by a team of scientists. An act of sabotage frees the giant from its icy tomb and reveals the secret held inside.

OUT OF THE MAMMOTH. . .
The body of an ancient woman, cloaked in furs, slides out of the mammoth's belly. But it is not the woman that holds the team's attention...it is the object she is clutching...a device created by an advanced civilization.
THE HUNT IS ON. . .
The device is accidentally activated, summoning forces who seek its destruction. It is the key to mankind's salvation and freedom from the men behind the curtain, pulling the strings and leading humanity towards destruction.

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A mammoth is found deep in the Canadian Arctic, completely preserved for the last 10.0000 year. Eddy Moore is the expert in paleontology who is hired and the one to be trusted to retrieve an object this size but while the mammoth is lifted the discoverer and one who pays for the whole operation secretly starts the thawing process in the hopes to retrieve mammoth DNA. What they discover is even more amazing. Out of the belly of the mammoth falls an ancient woman holding a device in her hands that very much looks like Star Trek equipment, especially when it opens and sends out a red light.
Up in space a small black orb makes it way to fulfill what it was built for: Keeping the device from being used. It triggers a huge snow wall to cover the dig site under a thick, icy layer of snow, leaving only a few survivors that desperately need to try to find their way back to civilization.
The crew of 7 gathers what they can find and make their way back in snow mobiles when they are approached by 5 men, claiming to be Inuits who have come to help them. The crew doesn't trust them and at night they make a run for it.

What follows is a chase through the arctic winds that causes more human losses, especially after the device lets of a message for humanity. They are holding the key to a secret citadel that hold a beacon to call for help because the men following the crew are out to kill them. A race from outer space that wants to make sure that Earth is going to be destroyed.

Things get difficult, and whom is ultimately to believe ? The evil race called Ferox, who want to make sure Earth destroys itself one day or the good-natured Aeros, who will come to safe humanity and cleanse Earth from Ferox corruption ?

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Raising The Past is an arctic adventure that promises a lot of excitement. The promise is kept up until the book slips into a sci-fi war between humans and two alien races. My cup of tea emptied there.
The whole citadel part was just too unimaginable and certainly lacked a more detailed description and plot development.

An ok beach read for the soft sci-fi fan.

Rating:
Visit Jeremy Robinson.
Jeremy Robinson on YouTube. (includes book trailers)

Paperback: 308 pages
Publisher: Breakneck Books (September 15, 2006)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0978655117
ISBN-13: 978-0978655112

Michael Baden and Linda Kenney Baden - Skeleton Justice

2009-08-08T11:06:00.000-07:00

The case begins with New York City on high alert for a most bizarre serial killer - a strange kind of thief who stalks his victims for the purpose of extracting a vial of blood, earning him the tabloid nickname the Vampire. As the attacks become more and more vicious and escalate to torture and then to murder, Jake and Manny begin too suspect there is a connection between the killer's seemingly random victims.
But what is the link between the Vampire and a case Manny's been working for a kid, whose high school prank-gone-wrong has earned him the moniker the Preppy Terrorist and an FBI electronic bracelet ?
Jake's careful forensic examinations, Manny's courtroom tenaciousness, and an unusual clue suggesting that a high-ranking politician has risen from the grave take the pair from the bowels of the morgue to the world of international intrigue.
At the heart of this story is a tragic tale of corruption interlaced with cover-ups, conspiracies, death squads, and dictators who committed crimes that to this day go unpunished.

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New York has a new killer on the loose who ether induces his random victims unconsciousness. At first he left them unharmed, drawing just a vial of blood from them but lately his attacks have become more vicious and he's left his victims tortured and dead.
Deputy chief medical examiner Jake Rosen seems to be drawn to case, eager to find the connection between the victims.

Manny Manfreda is a civil rights lawyer. Her newest case involves a teenager who's taken into custody after a makeshift bomb exploded under a mail box and wounded a passing by federal judge. With Jakes brother Sam's help Manny tries to uncover why only her client was taken into custody but not the boys who were with him.
When the boy later vanishes, witnesses Sam's just talked to are found dead and a strange connection between the Vampire and the bombing is found, it soon becomes clear that someone wanted Jake and Manny on the cases for a reason.

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I'd like to give this novel the name of the biggest disappointment of the year. I just can't find anything positive in this suspense novel.
I'd expected so much more and got what most would consider a cozy novel, lacking the forensic science for the most part. Not that it isn't mentioned but wouldn't you expect from a forensic expert at least some interesting details ? Fact is, the forensic pathologist in this novel doesn't really do much of the work and when he does, you learn about it in a short sentence.
The characters are just sad, not even funny. There is not much development during the novel and I didn't really care for them at all. Nor did I think the protagonists were very clever but mere average investigators.
Skeleton Justice is the second (Remains Silent being the first) installment in a series I won't follow up with. It really must be nice to have friends like Cornwell, Rule and Reichs in the business. They'll recommend you, probably without having read what you've written.

Rating:

Hardcover: 336 pages
Publisher: Knopf (June 16, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1400044324
ISBN-13: 978-1400044320

Sandra Glahn - Informed Consent

2009-08-05T11:21:00.000-07:00

Dr. Jeremy Cramer is a young doctor on the verge of a cutting-edge medical discovery. But his research is derailed when Cramer's son is infected with a rare fatal disease. Now as he races against time to save his child's life, Cramer will make a decision that could shatter his career.

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Jeremy Cramer is a third year resident in a hospital. His dream is to one day be able to unravel the secret why the chances of adult drowning victims are so small compared to children under the same circumstances. His drive is a personal matter because he lost his father when he was a small boy.
One day however, while working the emergency room, he accidentally bumps into a nurse that was just about to pick up a used needle that fell to the floor. She pricks herself and soon fells sick with HIV that progresses fast into AIDS and a constant stay in the hospital.
Ridden by shame and self-reproach he agrees to shift his research into the AIDS research to secure funding for what he thinks might be a possible treatment for both HIV and the drowning patients.
His success however is soon overshadowed by another accident he's blaming himself for:
His young son Jak wants to see the lab his father is working in and in a moment of distraction Jeremy doesn't look at what the boy does and the next moment he's got a used glove he took out of the contaminated bin in his mouth. Weeks go by with the boy being under close watch until he falls terribly ill.

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Informed Consent feels like a window that opens into a families daily life, letting the reader watch through their daily struggle, doubts, trust issues, love, self-reproach, hospital life and a lot more. With so much going on it is difficult to just keep the thoughts to the main plot.
I enjoyed the book very much and later thought a lot about the bigger issues mentioned in the book.

Sadly Jeremy's discovery is nothing more than fiction from an author who's lost friends with AIDS herself. But the idea is wonderful. She easily shatters the stereotype belief that HIV patients come from a certain social background, prolonging life and prolonging death.

Overall a fantastic fiction novel very thought provoking if the reader dares to peek behind the curtain.

Rating:
Visit Sandra Glahn.

Paperback: 352 pages
Publisher: David C. Cook; New edition (August 1, 2007)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1589191099
ISBN-13: 978-1589191099

James Patterson and Maxine Paetro - Swimsuit

2009-08-04T09:19:00.000-07:00

A breathtakingly beautiful supermodel disappears from a swimsuit photo shoot at the most glamorous hotel in Hawaii. Only hours after Kim McDaniels goes missing, her parents receive a terrifying phone call. Fearing the worst they board the first flight to Maui and begin the hunt for their daughter.
Ex-cop Ben Hawkins, now a reporter for the L. A. Tomes, gets the McDaniels assignment. The ineptitude of the local police force defies belief. - Ben has to start his own investigation for Kim McDaniels to have a prayer. And for Ben to have the story of a lifetime.
All the while, a killer sets the stage for his next production. His audience expects the best - and they won't be disappointed.

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Young model Kim McDaniels vanishes on Maui. Their worried parents Barbara & Levon arrive frantically searching for their girl because someone, the killer, called them.
Meanwhile a secret Alliance enjoyed the suffering and death of Kim on their desktop screens. But the Alliance has money and they want more, they want the ultimate surprise from their contract killer and master in disguise Henri Benoit.
While Henri plans his next stage with Kim's parents as the main attraction, Benjamin Hawkins, novelist, ex-cop gone crime write for the L. A. Times offers his help to this friendly pair just to see their lives slipping away under his fingers.
Sadly he returns to to L. A. but has the strong feeling, the case for him, at least, is not closed yet.

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The book sort of has two halves with an exceptional first half and an unfortunately not so exciting half which ending was just boring and didn't keep the standard one was expecting.
Sensible readers should be warned that certain killing scenes are violent and shockingly detailed to Patterson readers.
Overall I liked it for the first half but didn't really care for the second part and it's conclusion which missed any excitement and was a huge bore to me. It was readers guilt that made me finish the book.

(One might guess that the first part was mainly written by Paetro, who's been largely involved co-writing the last five novels in the Women's Murder Club series).

Rating:
Visit James Patterson.
Visit Maxine Paetro.

Hardcover: 416 pages
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company (June 29, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0316018775
ISBN-13: 978-0316018777

Barbara Bentley - A Dance With the Devil: A True Story of Marriage to a Psychopath

2009-08-01T08:58:00.000-07:00

Her marriage to retired Navy admiral John Perry seemed almost too good to be true. Because it was…

At the start of her relationship with the intelligent and worldly John Perry, Barbara Bentley couldn't believe her luck—so when things didn't add up, she struggled to ignore her doubts. She kept trying to put the pieces together—unaware that some of them were simply missing. Even as he drained her credit, dodged her questions, manipulated her and misled her, she stayed with him, suppressing her growing suspicions. Ultimately he would try to kill her, proving himself not a protector and provider, but a predator.

This is Barbara’s courageous, compelling story, in her own words—of the slow, choking darkness that fell after the honeymoon was over, what it took to finally drive her to escape and start her life anew, and her tireless efforts to protect other women and help them learn from her example.

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Barbara Bentley met John Perry at a double date dinner party where he impressed with stories about the World War 2, Vietnam, his status as Navy rear admiral, multiple medals and especially the Medal of Honor.
Attracted to the worldly man she soon falls for him and his spoiling presents and agrees to marry him even after he abused her credit card. From the beginning he claimed a huge family that he kept hidden from his wife and who would consider him as the black sheep and her as a gold digger that wants to get to the family fortune.
What follows are years of him spending money they don't own, maxing out credit cards, disappointments and trust issues but Barbara enjoys the happy side as well. Being an admirals wife opens doors she'd never thought would open for her, it gave her status as well.
But the sore spot for their bad financial situation nags at her and every time she stresses this point with her husband he successfully uses his medical condition to soothe her.
Trust finally erodes when the FBI turns up at their door and Barbara decides to investigate her husband and his stories. Discovering his web of lies she brings herself into the dangerous situation of him almost killing her through suffocation with ether.

What follows are months of discovering the man she'd lived with for years and the fight to change the California divorce law that victimized surviving victims even more.

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A clear plus is the author's timeline in telling the story. She doesn't reveal what happened in the end at the beginning of the book which keeps the book very interesting although the reader most certainly knew that in the end the protagoist barely survives an attempted murder.

Bentley wrote her book in the memories she had from this time so she doesn't hold back the mistakes she did. She wanted him to be happy so that he wouldn't leave her and she'd stay happy.
In the end the book is a sad example of a women that discovered her voice after she endured a life along the side of a psychopath that spared her life longer than expected.
It is difficult to comprehend a women accepting visible lies, not getting suspicious. I didn't get it and couldn't understand the feeble attempt to justify why she did what she did. She often enough told me how proud she was to be the admirals wife, which certainly made her look the other way.

I had the strong feeling the author isn't over what happened to her yet. There seem to be a lot of questions she should ask herself and maybe someone who can help her in finding answers. Maybe she did that but she didn't tell the reader.

In the end I felt for her but I'm not as wowed by the book as other readers.

Rating:
Visit Barbara Bentley.

Paperback: 384 pages
Publisher: Berkley Trade (November 4, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0425221180
ISBN-13: 978-0425221181

Mo Hayder - Skin

2009-07-30T15:22:00.000-07:00

When the decomposing body of a young woman is found near railway tracks just outside Bristol one hot May morning, all indications are that she's committed suicide. That's how the police want it too: all neatly squared and tidied away.

But DI jack Caffery is not so sure. He is on the trail of someone predatory, someone who hides in the shadows and can slip into houses unseen. And for the first time in a very long while, he feels scared.

Police diver Flea Marley is working alongside Caffery. Having come to terms with the loss of her parents, and with the traumas of her past safely behind her, she's beginning to wonder whether their relationship could go beyond the professional.

And then she finds something that changes everything. Not only is it far too close to home for comfort - but it's so horrifying that she knows nothing will ever be the same again.

And that this time, no one - not even Caffery - can help her...

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Skin basically has two plots.
While the whole police force is on the search of a footballers vanished wife Detective Inspector Jack Caffery's thoughts are with his last case and the so called "Tokoloshe" who hasn't been caught (quod vide Ritual, March 2008) but he's soon distracted by an alleged suicide whom he believes was staged. His investigations lead him into a house of horror filled with glass jars of human skin.

Meanwhile Sergeant Flea Marley, head of the diver unit, has some very different problems. She's been followed by a decaying smell for days until she discovers a very dead body in the trunk of her car which was just lend by her brother Thom. Thom admits it was an accident and that her freaks but soon together with his girlfriend turns against Flea, threatening her to go to the police and blame it on her.

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In the beginning I wasn't at all enthusiastic to discover the Muti killings from Hayder's last novel. I wasn't especially excited than and Wasn't now. But as soon as Caffrey turn away from the whole Tokoloshe topic the story took a turn to the better and got interesting. Hayder has an excellent talent to merge two completely different stories with each other without leaving open ends that don't make sense for a continuation.

Now that Jack and Flea both have their dark secrets one might be curious how the series unfolds in the future. One thing is for certain, I want the Tokoloshe to go away.

Rating:
Visit Mo Hayder.

Export UK ed edition
Paperback: 368 pages
Publisher: Bantam Press; Export UK ed edition (26 Mar 2009)
Language English
ISBN-10: 0593048229
ISBN-13: 978-0593048221

US edition
Hardcover: 288 pages
Publisher: Grove Press (January 1, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0802119301
ISBN-13: 978-0802119308

Alex Bledsoe - Blood Groove

2009-07-29T07:24:00.000-07:00

When centuries-old vampire Baron Rudolfo Zginski was staked in Wales 1915, the last thing he expected was to reawaken in Memphis, Tennessee, sixty years later. Reborn into a new world of simmering racial tensions, the cunning Nosferatu realizes he must adapt quickly if he is to survive.
Finding willing victims is easy, as Zginski possesses all the powers of the undead, including the ability to sexually enslave anyone he chooses. Hoping to learn how his kind copes with this bizarre new era, Zginski tracks down a nest of teenage vampires. But these young vampires have little knowledge of their true nature, having learned most of what they know from movies like Blacula.
Forming an uneasy alliance with the young vampires, Zginski begins to teach them the truth about their powers. They must learn quickly, for there's a new drug on the street - a drug to its source, they may be unwittingly stepping into a fifty-year-old trap that can destroy them all...

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Actually the books description matches pretty well so there isn't much that can be added without going further into details.
I didn't like the book for several reasons. Besides the vampires being the real bad boys, which actually is delightful after the vampire romance flood that came over us, the story lacks the excitement the description promised.

I was highly irritated because the author constantly reminded the reader about racial issues between Caucasian and African-American. Now I understand the book plays in a different time, where things might have been different in Memphis, Tennessee but as a reader I don't want to be badgered by it.
There is nothing unique in this story except that it feels unripe.

Rating:
Visit Alex Bledsoe.

Hardcover: 304 pages
Publisher: Tor Books; 1 edition (April 28, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0765321963
ISBN-13: 978-0765321961

Barbara Delinsky - Family Tree

2009-07-25T19:22:00.000-07:00

Dana Clarke has just given birth to her first child. The little girl is lovely, but no one can help noticing how little she resembles her parents.
Dana's husband, among others, suspects that she may have had an affair.
In order to put the rumors and speculation to rest, Dana has to delve deep into her past and her husband's heritage to unearth some uncomfortable secrets. Can her marriage survive what she discovers ?

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Dana and Hugh Clarke are happily married although their upbringing couldn't be more different. Dana, lost her mother early and grew up with her grandma, Hugh was raised in a elitist family that prided themselves to know their whole family heritage of Anglo-Saxons.
But their world turns upside down with the birth of their first child, Lizzie, who's unremarkable features point to an African-America heritage.
While Dana's fairly certain her daughter got her features from her mostly unknown family Hugh struggles with his families' resentment towards the child and his doubts in his wife's fidelity. His tool to quiet his families' voices and his own lingering doubts about his wife and best friend and Neighbor, David who looks so much like little Lizzie, is a paternity test.
But Hugh is the father and little Lizzie's blood has more to reveal than that.

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Although an interesting topic, I think the author didn't quite deliver or I didn't get it. I can't put my finger on it but a lot of the protagonists actions didn't make sense to me and were plain old stereotype.
The wife loves knitting, her life is nursing and knitting. The family has to deal with the discovery that there is African-American blood in their veins. Please, spare me. I know there are certainly families that wouldn't want to hear about this but it is hardly imaginable that in today's times a family is a Delinsky-called purebreed.
Also largely missing is the emotion a topic like this should cause in a family.
Probably not the best book by Delinsky.

Rating:
Visit Barbara Delisnky.

Mass Market Paperback: 432 pages
Publisher: Anchor; Reprint edition (June 24, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0307388468
ISBN-13: 978-0307388469

S. D. McKee - Defeated (Darkness Among The Stars, Book 1)

2009-07-23T17:56:00.001-07:00

The years is 2271.
Jonathon Quinn, decorated war hero and captain of the flagship Intimidator, has been ordered to oversee Operation Giant Leap, mankind's latest attempt to shatter technological barriers of interstellar travel.
Scientists at the lunar research facility manage to create a cosmic wormhole into the Polaris System, only to make a shocking discovery.

But in a universe where all is not as is seems, discovery often proves deadly. A catastrophic accident triggers a ripple effect that reaches far beyond the Solar System, provoking an ancient darkness that stalks among the stars. Mankind is plunged into chaos. Jonathon, plagued by rising casualties, begins having induced nightmares that foreshadow the enemy's fierce appetite for destruction.

Did the scientists' grave mistake trigger the war or would the darkness have been set in motion anyway ? The answer brings Jonathon face-to-face with his own extraordinary destiny, which he must accept if he is to have any hope of altering the dire fate of all humanity.

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War hero Jonathon Quinn, captain of the Interstellar Coalition Starship "Intimidator" is to oversee the scientific experiment Giant Leap/ where an artificially created quantum wormhole is enlarged to finally bring answers to interstellar travel. The probe that is send through the hole shockingly discovers another species in the Polaris system. A species that notices the intruder and destroying it.
If it weren't for the scientists guarantee that everything is fine, Jonathon would have stopped the experiment when inconsistency in the scientist calculations cause a huge explosion that possible destroyed the better part of the Polaris system.

The provoked alien species goes to war, pursuing everything human in space and finally turning towards Earth. One by one Jonathon witnesses warships and space stations, even whole planets wiped out without his own weapons doing much damage to the fleshy hull of the alien warships.

It is only when the Intimidator crew is rescued by the Kush'humani that explanations about the evil species are given, telling Jonathon about his own and humanity's heritage and his destiny to lead the Kush'humani in a war against the dark alien species.

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Defeated is probably written for the hardcore sci-fi fan who doesn't shy back from scientific terminology embedded into the plot. McKee gives the reader a full description of an alien spaceship that won't be forgotten and is memorable. The authors background in Physics and Mathematics clearly show in this dark story that is difficult to comprehend but understandably and very believable written.

The only hope left is, that there truly will be a continuation. You can't begin a war and only tell about the first fight.

Rating:
Visit S. D. McKee.

Paperback: 380 pages
Publisher: Behler Publications (October 1, 2005)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 193301623X
ISBN-13: 978-1933016238

Robert Curran - The Haunted - The True Story of one Family's Nightmare

2009-07-20T10:23:00.000-07:00

WARNING:The book you now hold in your hands may be the most frightful tale you'll ever try to forget. It's the story of an average American family assaulted by forces too awesome, too powerful, too dark, to be stopped. It's a true story, supported by dozens of eyewitnesses - neighbors, priests, police, journalists, researchers.
It will disturb you as no horror fiction can. The grim slaughterhouse odors. The deafening pounding. The hoofed half-man charging down the hall. The physical attacks, failed exorcisms, the succubus... and the final terror which torments the Smurl family to this day.

Be forewarned if you fear your dreams. Once you begin reading, you will be unable to stop - or forget. The Haunted will make you rethink what is real - and what real evil means.

-

What a nice, catching blurb. Nevertheless after half of the book I put it down no longer eager to read it, asking myself why I wanted to read it in the first place.
As most supposedly real haunted stories begin, it always begins with a pounding, failing electric appliances and plumbing problems.
That the family put up with all that from 1977 to 1983, later followed by assaults and sightings seems to be a little odd.

I found it very irritating that the author constantly reminded the reader on how faithful the family ( Jack and Janet Smurl, their 4 children and father and mother-in law) was and how good each and every person in this household was.

Finally I had to put the book down when Ed Warren began to tell about his provoking the demons. His way of describing the whole situation is just too much for the normal thinking brain, even if open minded to the whole topic.

I found it utterly unbelievable and prefer to watch the 1991 TV movie version for entertainment.

Rating:

Paperback: 275 pages
Publisher: St Martins Mass Market Paper (January 1994)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0312928009
ISBN-13: 978-0312928001

Stephenie Meyer - Twilight (Twilight series, Book 1)

2009-07-18T16:26:00.000-07:00

When Bella Swan moves from sunny Phoenix to Forks, Washington, a damp and dreary town known for the most rainfall in the United States, to live with her dad, she isn't expecting to like it. But the level of hostility displayed by her standoffish high school biology lab partner, Edward Cullen, surprises her. After several strange interactions, his preternatural beauty, strength, and speed have her intrigued. Edward is just as fascinated with Bella, and their attraction to one another grows. As Bella discovers more about Edwards nature and his family, she is thrown headlong into a dangerous adventure that has her making a desperate sacrifice to save her one true love.

-

The small town of Forks has a new resident who just moved into her father's house: Isabella (Bella) Swan despises small town living and therefore doesn't expect much from her new school either. To her surprise she finds herself to be the main attraction especially for the boys.
It is there that she meets the strange but charismatic Edward Cullen.
With crossing ways the two teenagers fall in love with the difficulties just beginning.
Edward is a vampire, he lives together with his vampire family who don't feed on human blood but rather hunt animals. To establish a relationship the Cullen family, who is mostly glad that Edward found someone even if it is a human, invite Bella to a family vampire baseball game where the group meets three other "non-civilized" vampires.
One of them is James, a tracker, who picks up on Bella's scent immediately. She is in danger and has to flee town - fast.

-

I finally gave in to begin reading the Twilight series and I'm surprised that I flew through the 500+ pages and really enjoyed them.
Twilight is a book for teenagers mostly so the plot seems to be justifiable dull for the experienced reader.
Of course at some point or another I had my thoughts about bell's main attributes are being naive and just clumsy with her feet and Edward being a little prick who gets a bit creepy in how to handle his first love and feelings.
I wouldn't wish my daughter a boyfriend like this or my son a girlfriend like Bella. The development of the relationship and the addiction of the main character Bella do have something irritating whilst Edward is knight in shiny armor never fails.

Sort of a modern fairy tale with some disturbing points.

Nevertheless I found myself reading page after page which must mean that overthinking, which I didn't while reading and won't continue after finishing this review, can be just too much.
Instead lets just enjoy a not too overexciting novel, aimed at teenagers and not think about the messages hidden in it. Were there any ?

Rating:
Visit Stephenie Meyer.

Reading level: Young Adult
Hardcover: 544 pages
Publisher: Little, Brown Young Readers; Standard edition (October 5, 2005)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0316160172
ISBN-13: 978-0316160179

Linwood Barclay - Fear The Worst

2009-07-16T08:01:00.000-07:00

The worst day of Tim Blake's life started out with him making breakfast for his seventeen-year-old daughter Sydney. Syd was staying with him while she worked a summer job at the Just INN Time hotel, and Tim hoped this quality father-daughter time would help her deal with the after-effects of his divorce.

When Syd didn't arrive home at her usual time, Tim thought she'd probably gone to the mall to hang with her friends. When she didn't answer the phone, he began to worry.
Before long, the worry turned to panic. And when the people at the Just Inn Time said they had no Sydney Blake working at the hotel, he began to see his life plunging into the abyss every parent dreads most.

If she hadn't been working at the Just Inn Time every day, what had she been doing ? Something she couldn't -or wouldn't- tell her own father about ? To find his daughter Tim doesn't need to simply track her down - he needs to know who she really was, and what could have made her step out of her own life without leaving a trace.

Only one thing has him convinced the worst hasn't already happened: the fact that some very scary people seem just as eager as he is to find her.

The question is: who's going to find her first ?

-

Tim Blake sells cars had his ups and downs professionally and now lives divorced from his ex-wife, sharing the custody of teenage daughter Sydney.
When Sydney suddenly vanishes without a trace and the police is unable to help in finding her he seems to be the only person determined enough to visit places she hung around at and interview people who might have seen her besides of his from an accident recovering ex-wife Susanne.
He needs to learn his daughter didn't trust him enough to let him know what was going on in her life, even lied to him about the hotel she was jobbing at and a secret relationship with Susanne's boyfriend Bob's son.

Nobody saw her, nobody even knew her at the hotel she claimed to be working at the desk but soon, it seems, people are trying to get Tim's investigations out of the way. Luring him out of state with faked clues where she might be, carefully placing incriminating evidence against Tim. When Patty, Sydney's best friend vanishes after last seen with Tim and people are found dead Tim has to go hiding from police and those who try to get him and his daughter out of the way.

But things aren't at all how Tim pieces them together and he is in for some surprises.

-

During the book I began to admire Tim's determination quite a bit. He went from being the slimy salesperson to the man determined to rescue his daughter with a gun in his hand.

Linwood Barclay again created a page turner that kept me reading for hours in anticipation. Not saying a few things weren't sort of obvious but it didn't hurt the book at all. Fine spun and thrilling the plot itself might not be original but the suspense keeps coming at ya.

Rating:
Visit Linwood Barclay.

Export Trade Paperback: 360 pages
Publisher: Orion Books (2009)
Language: English
ISBN-13: 978-0-7528-9747-9

Dave Cullen - Columbine

2009-07-12T07:13:00.000-07:00

In this book Dave Cullen examines Columbine High School massacre in 1999, the backgrounds of the two teenage shooters Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, the victims and survivors.
I was very taken by the book but found it difficult to digest at times so decided to digest it chapterwise.

Thoughtful he painted a more understandable picture of what happened on this day that ended with 13 death and multiple people wounded. The book seems very well researched, focusing a lot on how the massacre was planned a year in advance.
In a very classic way the reader won't find a single picture in the whole book.

But do I believe everything I've read ? No I don't and never will be able to. There are always voices or statements telling the opposite disregarding or even disproving an authors biases but I do believe that's pretty normal. For me who hasn't read a book about the shootings ever and missed the media coverage completely, the book is enough. I don't need to read more about the massacre, don't want to dive into the minds of these particular murderers. Others might think differently.

In the end we'll probably never know what really was going on prior and on this terrible day.

Rating:
Visit Dave Cullen.

Hardcover: 432 pages
Publisher: Twelve; First Edition edition (April 6, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0446546933
ISBN-13: 978-0446546935

Kristin Hannah - Firefly Lane

2009-07-03T07:22:00.000-07:00

In the turbulent summer of 1974, Kate Mularkey has accepted her place at the bottom of the eighth-grade social food chain. Then, to her amazement, the "coolest girl in the world" moves in across the street and wants to be her friend.
Tully Hart seems to have it all - beauty, brains, ambition. On the surface they are as opposite as two people can be: Kate doomed to be forever uncool, with a loving family who mortifies her at every turn. Tully, steeped in glamour and mystery, but with a secret that is destroying her. They make a pact to be best friends forever; by summer's end they've become TullyandKate. Inseparable.

For thirty years, Tully and Kate buoy each other through life, weathering the storms of friendship - jealousy, anger, hurt, resentment. They think they've survived it all until a single act of betrayal tears them apart ... and puts their courage and friendship to the ultimate test.

-

Firefly Lane is one of those books you will still carry with you long after it is finished. During the book I kept myself asking how it is possible that night and day have become friends. Kate the co-dependent person whose major goal is to have a family and Tully the reckless, career driven one. Through ups and downs Kate always gives Tully a break even when she crosses lines interfering with Kate family issues and upbringing of her daughter.

I believe that everyone who has experienced friendship over a longer period of time can relate to those two in one way or another. You will find pieces of yourself in Kate and Tully.
I felt sad when the book ended. Not only because of its tear jerking ending but also because I would have like to read more.

Rating:
Visit Kristin Hannah.

Paperback: 528 pages
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin; 1 Reprint edition (January 6, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0312537077
ISBN-13: 978-0312537074

David Moody - Hater

2009-06-30T06:37:00.000-07:00

Remain Calm
Society is rocked by a sudden increase in the number of violent assaults on individuals. Christened Haters by the media, te attackers strike without warning, killing all who cross their path.

Take Shelter
The assaults are brutal, remorseless, and extreme: within seconds, normally rational, self-controlled people become frenzied vicious killers. There are no apparent links as a hundred random attacks become a thousand, and then hundreds of thousands. Everyone, irrespective of gender, age, race, or any other difference, has the potential to become a victim - or a Hater.

Wait For Further Instructions
People are afraid to go to work, afraid to leave their homes, and, increasingly, afraid that at any moment their friends, even their closest family, could turn on them with ultra-violent intent. Waking up each morning, no matter how well-defended, everyone must now consider the fact that by the end of the day, they might be dead. Or perhaps worse, become a killer themselves. As the status quo shifts, "ATTACK FIRST, ASK QUESTIONS LATER" becomes the order of the day ... only, the answers might be far different than what you expect... .

-

Daniel McCoyne lives an average life. Married, three children and a job he hates he lives pretty much uninterested in change or better his situation as long as the job pays the bills. But things seems to change without his doings. People around him suddenly act strangely violent killing other people. As the situation escalates David must hide with his family in fear to be the next one who is attacked by the so called Haters, people who suddenly seem to become murderous beast.
But when David awakes one morning he becomes a "Hater" himself barely surviving his defending wife. On the run he witnesses authorities "cleaning" the town he lives in. Haters, including him are arrested and presumably killed. Driven by his only thought, one of his children he recognized as not being a thread to him, he wants to make his way find his wife and rescue his child.

-

So what is it that makes people rave about this book ? I couldn't answer this question even if I tried. The book drags along with David witnessing people changing or chapters where the book completely shifts to an unknown person becoming a Hater. David's personality is a huge bore, as are the small short stories about the Haters.
Interesting though is the fact, that the reader gets to hear the story from the other side when David becomes a Hater himself, filled with rage against those that aren't like him.

The question remains if the reader is interested enough to read the following two parts which aren't published yet. I would be interested in reading how the story goes on, now that we finally got to the point where something happened in David's life but I couldn't stand to bore through another one- or two hundred pages where literally nothing happens except the same thing over and over again.

Rating:
Visit David Moody.

Hardcover: 288 pages
Publisher: Thomas Dunne Books; 1 edition (February 17, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0312384831
ISBN-13: 978-0312384838

Lisa Jackson - Malice

2009-06-28T22:40:00.000-07:00

The scent is unmistakable - gardenias, sweet and delicate, the same perfume that his beautiful first wife, Jennifer, always wore. Opening his eyes in the hospital room where he's recovering from an accident, New Orleans detective Rick Bentz sees her standing in the doorway. Then Jennifer blows him a kiss and disappears. But it couldn't have been Jennifer. She died twelve years ago.

Once out of the hospital, Bentz begins to see Jennifer everywhere, haunting ad taunting him, then vanishing without a trace. Could she still be alive ? But it was Bentz who identified Jennifer's body body after her horrible car wreck, and there had been no question in his mind that it was her crumpled form behind the wheel, her clothes, her wedding ring. He's never doubted it until now. He can't tell his new wife, Olivia, about the sightings or his secret fear that he's losing his mind, even though he knows she suspects something is wrong. But Olivia is also hiding a secret.

When a copy of Jennifer's death certificate arrives in the mail, emblazoned with a red question mark, Bentz follows the postmark trail to Los Angeles, returning to the painful memories he's tried so hard to forget, and straight into a killer's web. Reconnecting with his former LAPD colleagues, Bentz begins to piece together Jennifer's last days, but each new discovery only serves as a chilling reminder of how little he really knew about his first wife. Then the murders begin, each victim a part of Jennifer's past, each grisly corpse pointing to Bentz as the prime suspect.

Someone's been waiting patiently, silently. Someone who knows exactly what happened that night twelve years ago and has been anticipating Bentz's every move. Soon it will be Bentz's turn to suffer for his sins. But he won't be the only one made to pay the ultimate price. For a diabolical killer has now made Olivia the prime target.

-

Rick Bentz left LAPD 12 years ago after a fatal shooting where he shot a teenage in self defense and his wife's horrible car accident that left him a widower to raise his daughter.
Today he is happily married to Olivia and lives and works in New Orleans. But lately, since he woke up from a short coma, he's been seeing his dead wife. It soon becomes clear that someone, his dead wife or not, wants him to return to Los Angeles.
The situation spirals downwards when former friends of Jennifer are found killed just after Rick talked to them about his dead wife and her secrets.

-

I'm not at all familiar with Jackson's New Orleans series or the character Rick Bentz so I won't speak about character development but rather about a gripping thriller with only sometimes too much words to wrap it up. Malice for me felt very conclusive but had its moments when I thought nobody would go such difficult ways just for revenge.
Overall I found this book entertaining and finished it fast. Unfortunately the reader assumes too fast who's the culprit.

Rating:
Visit Lisa Jackson.

Hardcover: 432 pages
Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corporation; (April 1, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0758211848
ISBN-13: 978-0758211842

Guillermo Del Toro and Chuck Hogan - The Strain

2009-06-21T12:32:00.000-07:00

They have always been here. Vampires. In secret and in darkness. Waiting. Now their time has come. In one week, Manhattan will be gone. In one month, the country. In two months - the world.

A Boeing 777 arrives at JFK and is on its way across the tarmac, when it suddenly stops dead. All window shades are pulled down. All lights are out. All communication channels have gone quiet. Crews on the ground are lost for answers, but an alert goes out to the CDC. Dr. Eph Goodweather, head of their Canary project, a rapid-response team that investigates biological threats, gets the call and boards the plane. What he finds makes his blood run cold.

In a pawnshop in Spanish Harlem, a former professor and survivor of the Holocaust named Abraham Setrakian knows something is happening. And he knows the time has come, that a war is brewing....

So begins a battle of mammoth proportions as the vampiric virus that has infected New York begins to spill out into the streets. Eph, who is joined by Setrakian and a motley crew of fighters, must now find a way to stop the contagion and save his city - a city that includes his wife and son - before it is too late.

-

I am an audiobook freak and listen to a lot of books but very rarely sit down to review one. With this one I am making an exemption because I believe it deserves a good review.
The book is narrated by Ron Perlman, who I've never listened to before, except on various movies. His deep voice however is gripping and very kept me listening for hours.
Besides the phenomenal, non romantic, dark vampire plot the book creates a sense of darkness the old vampire lover has been craving for a long time, at least since vampires have become humanized with way to much romantic novels lately.

So who searches for romantic is at the wrong place with this one. What you'll find is a haunting darkness you haven't encountered for a long time. I find it to be excellent and exciting.

This audiobook is the first installment of a planned trilogy in which at first a plane lands in New York. Its passengers, besides four survivors, are all dead without visible indications of why. CDC Dr. Eph Goodweather is called to enter the plane first as it is suspect to a possible virus.
The plane also had a huge crate in its cargo that mysteriously vanished the same time, the survivors turned into raving, vampirelike killer machines.
Old Abraham Setrakian knows what is happening and is out to contain the so called virus but he knows better. His past taught him that Manhattan and the whole world is facing extinction.

New York is infected, vampires running the streets.
The war has begun and its only opponents is a small group of an old man, a woman, a doctor and his little boy and a sewer cleaner.

Rating:

Audio CD
Length: 13 hrs and 36 mins
Publisher: HarperAudio; Unabridged edition (June 2, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0061715204
ISBN-13: 978-0061715204

Gillian Flynn - Sharp Objects

2009-06-19T09:03:00.001-07:00

WICKED above her hipbone, GIRL across her heart
Words are like a road map to reporter Camille Preaker's troubled past. Fresh from a brief stay at a psych hospital, Camille's first assignment from the second-rate daily paper where she works brings her reluctantly back to her hometown to cover the murders of two preteen girls.

NASTY on her kneecap, BABYDOLL on her leg
Since she left town eight years ago, Camille has hardly spoken to her neurotic, hypochondriac mother or to the half-sister she barely knows: a beautiful thirteen-year-old with an eerie grip on the town. Now, installed again in her familys Victorian mansion, Camille is haunted by the childhood tragedy she has spent her whole life trying to cut from her memory.

HARMFUL on her wrist, WHORE on her ankle
As Camille works to uncover the truth about these violent crimes, she finds herself identifying with the young victimsa bit too strongly. Clues keep leading to dead ends, forcing Camille to unravel the psychological puzzle of her own past to get at the story. Dogged by her own demons, Camille will have to confront what happened to her years before if she wants to survive this homecoming.

-

Camille Preaker is a news reporter and her latest assignment sends her to her hometown and her dysfunctional family. Camille's loss of her little sister years ago and the upbringing by a mother that didn't shown any affection towards her made her an alcoholic and cutter who used to compulsively cut words into her skin.
Now two girls have been killed and were found with their teeth pulled.

While interviewing Wild Gaps residents Camille also gets to know her little sister who seems at her young age of 13 to be the towns beauty and bully, described by everyone as being mean.

Camille is drowning in memories about her sister and her long way of suffering until she died when a terrible, terrible suspicion begins to form in her mind.

-

I've recently read Dark Places, Flynn's second novel which reminded me I've got another one of hers on my shelf since like forever.I also remember there was a lot of hype about this book which I can't relate to.

First and foremost each and every person in this book seems to be more or less to be disturbed. It didn't make the characters likeable at all which might be difficult for some readers. The story unfortunately is very predictable and I remember I looked up around page 50 and told my husband it would be a shame that I already know who's the killer and how the story is going to unfold.
I do believe the novel has a lot of darkness in it and at times it becomes too much and too implausible.

I'm glad I read the second book before the first one otherwise I'd ever have picked up Dark Places which actually was entertaining besides it's flaws.
Sharp Objects though lacks something not every new writer has: sophistication. Regardless of the author being a more or less "famous" reviewer for Entertainment Weekly.

Rating:

Hardcover: 272 pages
Publisher: Shaye Areheart Books (September 26, 2006)
ISBN-10: 0307341542
ASIN: B0028N729O

Simon Clark - Vampyrrhic

2009-06-15T18:06:00.000-07:00

Leppington is a small town, quiet ad unassuming. yet beneath its streets terrifying creatures stir.
Driven by an ancient need, united in their burning hunger, they share an unending craving. They are vampires. They lurk in the dark, in tunnels and sewers ... but they come out to feed.
For untold years they have remained hidden, seen only by their unfortunate victims. Now the truth of their vile existence is about to be revealed - but will anyone believe it ? And is it already too late ?

-

David Leppington left his birthtown, named after his family, when he was a young boy. Now he returns with a job offer and the hope to reconnect with his uncle George who tells him about ancient tales of their families and the shocking truth about a pact that was made once with the great North god Thor who in return for a favor asked for the Leppingtons' leader to lead an army of his in his war against Christianity.
According to his uncle the last Leppington is supposed to unleash and army of undead upon his return to town. The army, hidden and locked away in the tunnels under the town have been waiting for centuries, living from blood that came through the drains of a huge slaughterhouse.

Meeting Bernice, another guest in the Station Hotel, and Electra, its owner, the three have a dinner when a fourth person, the badly mannered, mean looking jack Black enters the game. The circle is closed and the group feels they are there for a purpose and have been many years ago.

History might or might not repeat itself.

-

Although I liked the books I've read by Clark so far, this one felt more like a badly influenced Stephen King novel. I didn't quite get the reference to the watching crow except I thought about Randall Flagg who appeared in numerous novels written by Stephen King.
All in all I didn't think there was any uniqueness in this novel. Too much inconsistencies, not enough action.

Rating:
Simon Clark on fantasticfiction.com

Paperback: 434
Publisher: Leisure Books (July, 2002)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0843950315
ISBN-13: 9780843950311

Lisa Jackson - If She Only knew

2009-06-11T17:42:00.000-07:00

She woke up with a new face...
Not only has Marla Cahill survived a deadly car accident, but her beautiful features have been restored through plastic surgery. She should be grateful. Instead, she's consumed by confusion . . . and panic. For the people gathered at her bedside — her family — are strangers. And so is the woman whose haunted eyes stare back from the mirror...

She woke up with no memories...
Secluded at the magnificent Cahill mansion, Marla waits for something to trigger recognition. Yet the only thing she's left with is the unshakable feeling that she is not who everyone says she is, and that something is very, very wrong...

... and she woke up to murder
Determined to piece together the truth of her identity, she finds herself drawn to her brother-in-law, Nick — a man who seems both to want and despise her. And as her fractured mind slowly clears, Marla begins to have flashes of another life . . . of cruel betrayals and deadly secrets. Marla's life isn't just different — it's in danger, controlled by a twisted killer who's waiting for the right moment to strike ...the moment Marla remembers...

-

Marla Cahill survived a terrible accident that left her without any memories of her life before. No she slowly wakes up from a coma, learning she has a husband and two children she doesn't feel anything for. From the beginning she feels something is wrong with the people around her keeping secrets hidden from her. The situation doesn't get easier for her when Nick, her husband Alex's brother, is called to help with the huge company Alex owns.
She feels attracted to him, he despised her and what she once did to her.
But only he is on her site when everybody else is trying to keep her hidden in the Cahill's huge mansion as if they didn't want her to get her memories back.

-

Having read a few of Lisa Jackson's novels I found this book only average at the most. The tension once expected from the storyline doesn't really come out.
From things that didn't make sense in the end to things that were just obvious, the book including its ending is a disappointment for me.
Luckily and the reason why I read a mystery from the genre romance, Jackson kept the cheese in a low profile. Thank you for that.

Rating:
Visit Lisa Jackson.

Paperback: 447 pages
Publisher: Zebra (October 1, 2000)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1420101927
ISBN-13: 978-1420101928

J. K. Rowling - Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire (Year 4)

2009-06-07T17:08:00.000-07:00

Harry Potter is midway through both his training as a wizard and his coming of age. Harry wants to get away from the pernicious Dursleys and go to the International Quidditch Cup with Hermione, Ron and the Weasleys.
He wants to dream about Cho Chang, his crush (and maybe do more than dream).
He wants to find out about the mysterious event that's supposed to take place at Hogwarts this year, an event involving two other rival schools of magic, and a competition that hasn't happened for hundreds of years.
He wants to be normal - even by wizarding standards.
And in his case, different can be deadly.

-

Beginnig his fourth year at Hogwarts, fourteen-year-old Harry Potter and his friends eagerly await Dumbledore's huge announcement of the Triwizard Tournament involving two other European schools of magic. The Goblet of Fire will choose those 17 and above to participate in the tournament and there will only be one student of each school participating..
The bigger the surprise when the goblet gives a fourth name as participant and it is no other than the underage Harry Potter.

Seeing and feeling the signs of Lord Voldemort once again Harry has to face three difficult tasks, a crumbling friendship with Ron and last but not least the dangerous Lord Voldemort.

-

The forth installment in this series really hits the mark going out of being pure children's literature. Dealing with problems every young adult faces sooner or later. What I liked about this very thick book is that it never got boring once with much darker elements and more action it's contents grew with our three heros.
As always Harry relies heavily on the help of his friends and teachers to survive.

Rating:
Visit J. K. Rowling.

Paperback: 752 pages
Publisher: Scholastic Paperbacks (July 30, 2002)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0439139600
ISBN-13: 978-0439139601

Terri Persons - Blind Sight

2009-06-01T06:45:00.000-07:00

A deer hunter tracking his wounded prey through the Minnesota woods gets much more than he bargained for when he makes the grisly discovery of a young girl's bod. The condition of the corpse is shocking:
The girl had been pregnant, but the fetus has been removed from her womb and an inverted pentagram drawn on her forehead.
After the girl is identified as the daughter of a high-powered senator, the FBI is called in to find the murderer - and the missing baby.

The case becomes increasingly complex as Bernadette and Tony's personal relationship heats up, and the investigation is hampered by the many lies that lead them on an circuitous - and deadly- route to the truth.
Through dogged police work and Bernadette's unique powers of second sight, they close in on the killers on a frigid night in snowy woods in an effort to save the tiny victim of the toughest crime they've ever had to solve.

-

The corpse of a young, runaway girl is found by a deer hunter. Lydia Dunton was the daughter of U. S. senator Magnus Dunton, her pregnant womb was sliced open to remove the baby she carried and on her forehead the killer left an inverted pentagram.
Bernadette Saint Clare and her supervisor and partner Anthony Garcia are pressured to solve the case asap and get the smallest victim back alive but where to begin ?

When evidence is tampered with, a suspect is killed and a whole town keeps silent about a possible satanic cult or a witches coven the investigators have to find other ways. One leads Bernadette to an old case that happened many years before in a town not far away and a town where Lydia Dunton was shortly before she was killed.
Recovering Lydia's backpack and using Bernadette's special ability, the investigators are able to bring a little light into the case, a light that puts her own parents into the spotlight.

-
Blind Sight is the third novel in a series featuring Bernadette Saint Clare and Anthony Garcia and as the two previous novels, Blind Spot and Blind Rage it keeps what it promises. Like before Bernadette's sight is mostly irrelevant but gives her hunches and the killer's surroundings that come in handy. With a not too overpowering romantic relationship deepening in this novel it offers the typical whodunit FBI procedure with very likeable characters and and introduction to a new character I got the feeling we will meet again.

Rating:

Hardcover: 336 pages
Publisher: Doubleday (May 26, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0385526539
ISBN-13: 978-0385526531

George D. Shuman - Lost Girls

2009-05-29T11:52:00.000-07:00

Sherry Moore becomes embroiled in her most perilous and disturbing case to date and finds that the lives of hundreds of women hang in the balance.

Sherry Moore would do anything for her confidant and best friend, retired Admiral Garland Bringham. So when he suddenly asks her to assist a team of U.S. Navy SEALs in a daring high-altitude rescue on Mount McKinley, she doesn't hesitate and soon finds herself flying across the country to hang vertically off an Alaskan cliff, tethered to Captain Brian Metcalf. Sherry, renowned for her ability to see the last eighteen seconds of a deceased person's memory, takes the hand of a dead climber, hoping to ascertain the whereabouts of his missing climbing team. But what she sees leaves her with visions that will haunt her long past Alaska.

While rumors of slave girls being trafficked around the Caribbean have circulated for years, little credible evidence has been uncovered about these "lost girls." When detective inspector Rolly King George recovers the body of a young blond woman, naked except for a shocking tattoo branded onto her cheek, he knows she may hold the key to toppling this criminal underworld. Through delicate back-channel negotiations, Sherry arrives in Kingston, Jamaica, to see the deceased and finds that things are more complicated than she thought: the remains are of Jill Bishop, an American teenager last seen in a Santo Domingo marketplace.

Carol Bishop, relentless in her pursuit to find out how her daughter died, and Sherry, the distressing images from Mount McKinley still fresh in her memory, embark on a frantic hunt for clues from the Domincan Republic to the remote jungles of Haiti, racing against time to save others from Jill's fate. Along the way, Sherry must confront a legendary voodoo priest, who possesses abilities eerily similar to her own, and take on a man whose depraved practices give new meaning to the word evil.

-

While in the Dominican Republic young and rich Jill Bishop is kidnapped, tortured and gang-raped, Sherry Moore is called to help to locate a group of missing climbers that were surprised by a storm.
With her ability to see the last 18 seconds of what a dead person was thinking she touches the body of a dead man who tried to leave coordinates painted on a wall for rescue teams to find his team.
The group is found but Sherry's horror-stricken by what else she saw: broken and tortured women, a one eyed man hovering over them and leaving a tattoo on their face.
More surprisingly she later learns the background of this man who was running away from his father's legacy.

When Jill sees the chance to end her life with a jump out of a flying planes door and into the ocean, she is watched by a senior investigator on holiday who happened to be part of a convention talking about human trafficking issues and exactly the tattoo he finds on Jill's dead body.
Hiding the dead body he makes the right calls to the right man who bring back Sherry to touch Jill's memory.

It is a race against time and law, bringing to strong women together, leading them into a nightmare.

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Lost Girls is the most impressing book I've read this year. I literally couldn't put it down and read it in one sitting. Shuman like in his previous novels doesn't make Sherry the main attraction but the person connecting the dots and people.
Human trafficking has never been such visible and graphic for me. I mean I knew about it but did I really think about it ? I doubt it.
I had the shivers, I got frightened just by suggestions and my own imagination.
It's not easy to digest if you can't let go of what you think about and what your imagination shows you but if you do you are in for ride you won't forget easily.

I haven't forgotten my doubts after I read the first Sherry Moore novel, 18 Seconds, along came Last Breath which was quite good.

But Lost Girls leaves me with three words:
Excellent, frightening and unforgettable.

Rating:
Visit George D. Shuman.

Hardcover: 256 pages
Publisher: Simon & Schuster (September 16, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1416553010
ISBN-13: 978-1416553014

Franck Thilliez - Die Kammer der toten Kinder

2009-05-28T10:53:00.000-07:00

Friends Vigo & Sylvain have been laid off work some six months ago. After a nightly, childish visit at their former employers walls, armed with spray cans Vigo decides a little race with himself with turned off headlights might be just what they need.
Too late he sees the man stepping onto the dark street. The man is dead, his duffel bag filled with two million Euros.
Although Sylvain wants to call the police Vigo can coax him into silence. His plan is to clean the scene as best as they can, make the body disappear and take the money for themselves.

Lucie Henebelle always wanted to become a profiler but destiny gave her two twin daughters to raise all by herself besides her police job.
Luck has it that she becomes involved in the disappearance of professor Cunar whose wife frantically called the police that he hasn't returned home from his way to pay off his little daughter from the hands of a kidnapper. The girls dead corpse is found in the house next to the scene where evidence is found of an accident. The kidnapper must have seen what happened to the father and although must have seen the car that killed the professor.

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Die Kammer der toten Kinder (orig. La chambre des morts) is a fast paced novel that just sounds right to be made into a grueling movie.
Thilliez throws in some new elements to the thriller genre and easily tricks the reader into a plot that wasn't expected from what the books description tells up front. Taxidermy isn't a topic that I have met often while reading. The more it is interesting to read about it. it sucks out ones breath to just think about a killer mounting his victims.

In the end what threw me off was the books ending which didn't met the standard the reader got used to by Thilliez but maybe that's just me who prefers to read English rather than my native language. Whatever it is, it was a fine read with great movie opportunities and a good Hannibal Lecter feel.

So far the book hasn't been translated into English yet.

Rating:
Visit Franck Thilliez.

Perfect Paperback: 352 pages
Publisher: Ullstein Taschenbuchvlg. (July 31, 2007)
Language: German
ISBN-10: 3548266673
ISBN-13: 978-3548266671

Barbara Delinsky - While My Sister Sleeps

2009-05-22T22:06:00.000-07:00

An Olympic marathon contender, self-centered Robin Snow often rubs her younger sister, Molly, the wrong way. After many years in her sister's shadow, Molly takes out her resentment with petty actions, such as refusing to accompany Robin on a run. Fatefully, Robin has a heart attack while training and falls into a coma. As Robin's condition fails to improve, Delinsky digs tediously into the family's woes: Molly's touchy relationship with Robin's ambitious reporter ex-boyfriend; middle son Chris's dealings with a would-be blackmailer; mother Kathryn's trouble coming to terms with Robin's dire prognosis.

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The two sisters Molly and Robin Snow couldn't be more different from each other. Robin, the elite marathon runner training for the Olympics, depending on her sister Molly's help managing her daily life and her job at the family plant and tree nursery.
Life changes when 32-years-old Robin suffers a heart attack that leaves her brain dead, forcing the family to come to terms with family issues, deeply hidden secrets and revelations. During the process deciding on what to do with the earthly remains of Robin, her mother Kathryn lives in denial while sister Molly becomes Robin's advocate and voice on what Robin would want.
Reading her sister's diary Molly sees a different side of her sister she's so often despised but never the less deeply loves but the journal also opens doors to revelations that could shatter the whole family.

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While My Sister Sleeps is one of those stories you live and feel while you are reading. I downloaded an excerpt which included the first chapter and I instantly wanted the whole story. The beauty of this book is in the non-dramatic way Delisnky tells us the story. Of course it is dramatic and sad but her way of telling is no nonsense, not overly tearful but mature.
I fell in love with this until now unknown author and will definitely read more of her novels.

Rating:
Visit Barbara Delisnky.
Watch the trailer.

Hardcover: 336 pages
Publisher: Doubleday; First Edition edition (February 17, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0385524927
ISBN-13: 978-0385524926

C. J. Box - Three Weeks To Say Goodbye

2009-05-20T20:12:00.001-07:00

Jack and Melissa McGuane have spent years trying to have a baby. Finally their dream has come true with the adoption of their daughter, Angelina. But nine months after bringing her home, they receive a devastating phone call from the adoption agency: Angelina's birth father, a teenager, never signed away his parental rights ad he wants her back. Worse, his father, a powerful Denver judge, wants him to own up to his responsibility and will use every advantage his position of power affords him to make sure happens.
When Jack and Melissa attempt to handle the situation rationally by meeting face-to-face with the father and son, it is immediately apparent that there's something sinister about both of them and that love for Angelina is not the motivation for their actions.
As Angelina's safety hangs in the balance, Jack and Melissa will stop at nothing to protect their child. A horrifying game of intimidation and double crosses begins that quickly becomes a death spiral where absolutely no one is safe.

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Melissa and Jack McGuane went through the adoption process to finally receive their newborn daughter Angelina nine months ago. Life has changed but they are a happy family until the birth father and his father, a influential and powerful judge claim the child back due to never have signed the parental rights away.
Facing the legal loss of their daughter the McGuanes' are left with three weeks to say goodbye to the little girl.

Three weeks that fly by in an instant but not without the McGuanes' using own resources to find something on the judge to discredit him in court. But everyone is shying away in fear of the judge's grudge. Left with two dear friends they find worrying clues but nothing substantial.
With their daily life being messed with the parents know nothing good can come of the judge's family and they begin to fear for Angelina's life.

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Three Weeks To Say Goodbye is a novel where you literally fly through. With a
no-brainer writing style Box catches the reader on a beach read that is enjoyable but not overly exciting. The missing surprises and the cliche-ish characters didn't match the usual standard I have gotten used to by C. J. Box.

Rating:
Visit C. J. Box.

Hardcover: 352 pages
Publisher: Minotaur Books; 1 edition (January 6, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0312365721
ISBN-13: 978-0312365721

Gillian Flynn - Dark Places

2009-05-17T09:49:00.000-07:00

I have a meanness inside me, real as an organ.

Libby Day was seven when her mother and two sisters were murdered in "The Satan Sacrifice of Kinnake, Kansas."
as her family lay dying, little Libby fled their tiny farmhouse into the freezing January snow. She lost some fingers and toes, but she survived and famously testified that her fifteen-year-old brother, Ben, was the killer.
Twenty-five years later, Ben sits in prison, and troubled Libby lives off the dregs of a trust fund created by well wishers who've long forgotten her.

The Kill Club is a macabre secret society obsessed with notorious crimes. When they locate Libby and pump her for details - proof they hope that may free Ben - Libby hatches a plan to profit off her tragic history. For a fee, she'll reconnect with players from that night and report her findings to the club ... and maybe she'll admit her testimony wasn't so solid after all.
As Libby's search takes her from shabby Missouri strip clubs to abandoned Oklahoma tourist towns, the narrative flashes back to January 2, 1985. The events of that day are relayed through the eyes of Libby's doomed family members - including Ben, a loner whose rage over his shiftless father and their failing farm have drive3n him into a disturbing friendship with the new girl in town.
Piece by piece, the unimaginable truth emerges, and Libby finds herself right back where she started - on the run from the killer.

-

Libby Day's family was slaughtered when she was seven years old. Since then she's passed time living of a the fund well wishers built for her. 25 years is a long time and now the fund is at its end. With no education or working experience chances are that sooner or later she won't be able to pay her rent and what than ?
When Lyle Wright approaches her in the name of the The Kill Club, a society that of crime fans, approaches her and offers money just for talking in front of some people about her past she's more than desperate enough to accept the offer but soon learns that the majority of the club believes in Ben's innocence and thinks she was coached into her testimony against her brother.
Desperation brings her to agree to talk to people of her past for money and she soon finds herself thrown into a past she didn't know about. Beginning to believe that maybe she was coached she learns about the dark side of her brother's nature and the ultimate conclusion what really happened on January 2, 1985.

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Dark Places is an easy, conclusive read, with three main characters: Libby in the present, Ben and Libby's mother Patty Day in the past. It is difficult to find any sympathy for the protagonists except for the mother but the lack of character doesn't hurt the whole story which is a great mystery.
Some things add up strangely and make the book especially in the end very weak but ultimately it kept me reading probably because it was such an easy read where one got everything served on a platter.

Rating:
Visit Gillian Flynn.

Hardcover: 368 pages
Publisher: Shaye Areheart Books (May 5, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0307341569
ISBN-13: 978-0307341563

Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith - Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

2009-05-15T09:25:00.000-07:00

"It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains."

So begins Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, an expanded edition of the beloved Jane Austen novel featuring all-new scenes of bone crunching zombie mayhem. As out story opens, a mysterious plaque has fallen upon the quiet English village of Meryton - and the dead are returning to life !

Feisty heroine Elizabeth Bennet is determined to wipe out zombie menace, but she's soon distracted by the arrival of the haughty and arrogant Mr. Darcy. What ensues is a delightful comedy of manners with plenty of civilized sparring between the two young lovers and even more violent on the blood-soaked battlefield.
Can Elizabeth vanquish the spawn of Satan ? And overcome the social prejudices of the class-conscious landed gentry ?
Complete with romance, heartbreak swordfights, cannibalism, and thousands of rotting corpses, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies transforms a masterpiece of world literature into something you'd actually want to read.

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People who know me, know that once in a while I dive into a zombie novel enjoying some gore and flesh eating. This novel however didn't get me at all. Instead I gave up after about 30 pages. Instead of the usual zombie gore I got a huge zombie bore and still feel very disappointed in this novel.
I understand this book should have some sort of zombie humor in it but even this one I couldn't find.

In the end I believe this book is more for the original Pride and Prejudice fan than it is for the zombie fan. Romance fans probably don't have a clue about zombies and might find some humor in this one the zombie fan probably won't.

I liked the cover art. :-)

Rating:

Paperback: 320 pages
Publisher: Quirk Books (April 4, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1594743347
ISBN-13: 978-159474334-4

Steve Alten - MEG: Hell's Aquarium

2009-05-12T09:20:00.000-07:00

The Philippine Sea Plate:
The most unexplored realm on the planet. Surrounded by subduction zones and no less than six abyssal gorges - including the seven-mile-deep, 1,500 mile long Mariana Trench, the sea is also home to an incredibly anomaly, for hidden beneath its primordial crust lies the remains of the Phantalassa, an ocean that dates back 220 million years. vast and isolated, the Phantalassa is a purgatory of existence, inhabited by nightmarisch sea creatures log believed extinct.

Tanaka Institute, Monterey, CA:
Four years have passed since Angel, the 76-foot, 100,000 pound Megalodon returned from the Mariana Trench to birth her litter of pups - five females - far too numerous and aggressive to keep in one pen. As accidents mounts, one solutions presents itself: A Dubai royal prince is building the largest aquarium in the world and seeks to purchase two of the "runts".
The deal hinges on hiring Jonas Taylor's twenty-one year old son, David, to be their handler.
Jonas reluctantly agrees, and David is off to Dubai for the summer of his life, not realizing he is being set up to lead an expedition that will hunt down and capture the most dangerous creatures ever to inhabit Earth.

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The Tanaka Institute located at the beautiful coast of Monterey, California, holds the most desired attraction for shark fans and therefore the most dangerous monster ever captured alive: Angel, the Carcharodon megalodon and her litter of five pups. Since the pups are getting too big for the aquarium and "casualties" have already happened, Jonas Taylor faces decisions on how to handle their space problem. The offer from Dubai to buy two of the pups and some submersibles comes just in time as the animals become more and more annoyed with each other. Maybe this will keep the activists threatening to boycott the aquarium away for a while.
He reluctantly agrees to send his young son David with the sharks to keep an eye on them and also to teach a group of pilots how to handle the submersibles.

David didn't anticipate that the main goal wasn't to get him as a teacher but rather get him into diving the depths of the dangerous Phantalassa. He is lured into the deep dive with more than the possibilty to never come back.

Jonas knowing what awaits his son deep down has to react when he learns his son's submersible is missing.

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What an adventure packed in a single book that easily could have been two books with two themes ! I couldn't get enough of the happenings in the Institute and on David's
excursion into the difficult to imagine depths of the ocean.
Having read all of the MEG books I easily say this one is the best of them all.
The pups are food for your nerves, never letting you sit back in your seat and relax. The book mostly keeps you on the edge of your seat wondering how crazy one would be about a movie and a movie it should be.

Meet old characters of the Taylor family and their closest friends and get to know the new generation of Taylors' and their friends, most certainly building the foundation for more dangerous adventures.

All I can say is, that I want more and already took out the older novels to re-read them again.

Rating:
Visit Steve Alten.

Hardcover: 342 pages
Publisher: Variance Publishing LLC (May 19, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1935142046
ISBN-13: 978-1935142041

Gwen Hunter - Rapid Descent

2009-05-08T08:07:00.000-07:00

The kayak trip was supposed to be a honeymoon. But when Nell and Joe Stevens are caught in a flash flood, Nell is swept under, trapped and looses consciousness. When she awakes, safe on shore, she finds a note from Joe, explaining that has gone for help. He never returns.

The search that follows raises more questions than it answers. About the family he never mentioned, who arrive in Nell's sleepy hometown. The enormous inheritance. And worse, the question whispered by locals: is Nell responsible ?

Always hoping for Joe's return, Nell tries to put the rumors behind her. But as years slip past, Nell craves answers. She takes to the river again in search of the truth and finds that jealousy, desperation and deception can pull you under faster than churning water - and you may never resurface.

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Six years ago Nell Stevens husband Joe promised to get help for his injured wife after a kayak accident. he never returned nor was his body discovered by a search and rescue team.
Today Nell runs a river company specialized in kayaking and guided tours, her precious son turning out just like his father Joe.

Orson Lennox was just a young police man when he took part in the search and rescue team looking for Joe. Today, after an injury, he's one the verge to decide to either quit police work or go into the cold case squad. He asks for a job at Nell's and begins snooping around with Nell still being the prime suspect.
But there are other interesting leads he discovers. People with a motive. Not as strong as Nell but still.

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Rapid Descent is a cozy mystery / slightly romance novel where the reader doesn't need to think too much and can enjoy the story unfolding.
The first part about Joe's disappearance and the search for him took a huge part in the book and could have been a but shorter, leaving more space for what happens in the present.
Otherwise enjoyable and relaxing.

Rating:
Visit Gwen Hunter.

Mass Market Paperback: 384 pages
Publisher: Mira (February 1, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0778326217
ISBN-13: 978-0778326212

Van Ryn/Cerak: Mistaken Identity: Two Families, One Survivor, Unwavering Hope

2009-05-05T08:10:00.000-07:00

Meet Laura Van Ryn and Whitney Cerak: one buried under the wrong name, one in a coma and being cared for by the wrong family.

This shocking case of mistaken identity stunned the country and made national news. Would it destroy a family? Shatter their faith? Push two families into bitterness, resentment, and guilt?

Read this unprecedented story of two traumatized families who describe their ordeal and explore the bond sustaining and uniting them as they deal with their bizarre reversal of life lost and life found.

And join Whitney Cerak, the sole surviving student, as she comes to terms with her new identity, forever altered, yet on the brink of new beginnings.

Mistaken Identity weaves a complex tale of honesty, vulnerability, loss, hope, faith, and love in the face of one of the strangest twists of circumstances imaginable.

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In April 2006 the Cerak family got note that their daughter Whitney was killed in a terrible car accident.
Meanwhile in the hospital the only survivor, Laura Van Ryn, has to recover from her injuries and a damage to the brain.
While the family Cerak took care of Whitney's burial and learnt how to live without their daughter, the Van Ryn family didn't leave Laura's bedside and watched over her slow recovery.
It takes five weeks for Whitney to voice that the Van Ryns' are not their parents.
The Cerak family learns that their daughter is alive and the Van Ryn family has to learn that their daughter died five weeks ago.

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Maybe I am the exception but I thought the book was terrible and found myself skipping whole chapters, especially those where again and again the talk was about God. For someone who does not consider herself a Christian the whole Bla is difficult to stand, too much bore and alienating. I skipped almost all of the printed blog entries about the praising overdose.
I wanted to learn about the families, not God. About emotions and the difficulties they were going through. Instead I found their life wrapped in a bubble about God. It certainly would have been nice to have known that up front. I wouldn't have read the book then.
Of course what the families went through is terrible and saddening, there is no doubt in that but a more down to earth perspective would have helped the whole story.

In the end I should have known because just a few months and way before the paperback was released the book lay on B&N bargain table for a few bucks.

Rating:

Hardcover: 288 pages
Publisher: Howard Books; Second Printing edition (March 25, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1416567356
ISBN-13: 978-1416567356

Tonke Dragt - Das Geheimnis des siebten Weges

2009-05-04T08:42:00.000-07:00

And then ? What what happened then ? Five minutes before end of school teacher Franz begins telling his pupils adventurous tales about warriors and swords, dark castles, shipwrecks and unoccupied island.
Difficult to believe that one day one of his tales is coming to reality ! Together with his pupils he becomes entangled in a secretive complot.

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Franz van der Steg teaches his new class for about three weeks, entertaining them daily with five minutes of adventurous tales about Franz, the red head. One day, when he's not really in the mood to tell tales he tells them that he's awaiting a secretive letter, not knowing from whom it will come and what it is about.
To his surprise he really receives a letter from Count Gradus Griesenstein who offers him a position as tutor for his nephew Gerd-Jan. To make the situation more mysterious for Fran,z who has never before heard the name Griesenstein, he meets members of the seven conspirators who claim he is the 7th member who is supposed to help and free Gerd-Jan from his uncle who keeps him inside the walls of the "Treppenhaus", their huge and more strangely mansion, full of stairs.

The centuries old prophecy tells that one day seven conspirators will help to find the hidden treasure that would free the descendant of Gregorious Griesenstein.

Franz soon discovers that uncle Gradus keeps Gerd-Jan in the house because he wants the treasure all for himself but Gradus never thought the prophecy might come true. Franz hair is red and the prophecy is quite green.

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I have been planning to read this book for a long, long time. Actually since the book was made into a small TV series in 1982 when I was a child myself. Ever since I sort of thought about it every now and then.
No wonder it sucked me in from the first page on. This is a beautiful novel for children around 10-100, mysterious and suspenseful.
The character Franz van der Steg seems to be a little bit off, trying to be stern with his pupils. I don't remember a teacher talking to me like Franz van der Steg does in the book but then, when the book was published I wasn't even born for another 10 years.

Unfortunately this great book, De zevensprong (orig. title), was never released in english but it sure should be.

Rating:

Paperback: 312 pages
Publisher: Beltz (March 20, 2002)
Language: German
ISBN-10: 340778063X
ISBN-13: 978-3407780638

Stuart MacBride - Flesh House

2009-05-01T08:08:00.001-07:00

Killers have terrorized Aberdeen in the past - Detective Sergeant Logan McRae has the scars to prove it - but when body parts show up in a cargo container at the harbor, they kick off Scotland's largest manhunt in twenty years.
The last time they were searching for Kenneth Wiseman, a brutal killer who terrified the country and who was eventually caught only to be acquitted eleven years later on a technicality. Now he's gone missing, people are dying, and the police are certain he's at work again.

As the violence escalates, DS McRae is forced to work with the senior officers assigned to the original case who have returned to Aberdeen to finish what they stared. With decades of secrets and lies coming to light, the only thing that's certain is that the city will never be the same.

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Aberdeen has had its share of psychopaths but when a mechanic finds body parts in a malfunctioning cooling container alarm bells are ringing. Especially since the container seems to come from a company who's owner is the brother-in-law of of Kenneth Wiseman recently acquitted from jail based on a technicality.
People know and fear Wiseman as being the Flesher, who butchered multiple people and left only joints of meat. Now that he is out he's vanished and police are trying to get a hold on him.

Detective Sergeant Logan McRae is part of the new investigation team, bound to let in the investigators from 20 years ago.
He soon begins to feel the maybe the3 investigation team was wrong from the beginning and although an evil man, Kenneth Wiseman might not be the killer they are searching for.

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I haven't read the previous three novels so I don't really want to base anything on character development etc. . The plot in itself is amazingly good if it weren't that the book just seems to be too long.
Very enjoyable is the dialogue between the different police members, characterful, each with own likes and dislikes, they all seemed very normal.
The grim plot and the many twists kept me reading and finishing the book. However I probably won't pick up another book of this series.

Rating:
Visit Stuart MacBride.

Hardcover: 480 pages
Publisher: Minotaur Books (October 14, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0312382634
ISBN-13: 978-0312382636

Wendy Roberts - Devil May Ride (Book 2)

2009-04-22T22:33:00.000-07:00

A Ghost Dusters Mystery

Sadie Novak is blessed with the gift of second sight. More of a curse, really, since she's the owner of a crime scene cleanup company and can't get through a job without the ghost of a murder victim popping in for a chat.

Sadie and her sexy partner, Zack, find themselves knee-deep in trouble on their latest job when they stumble over evidence of a chilling cult ritual in an abandoned meth lab, and Sadie comes face-to-face with an evil spirit unlike any she's seen before.
And it's no coincidence that a depleted hoard of stolen cash turns up at her next crime scene just in time to convince a gang meth-deprived motorcyclist that Sadie made off with their money.

With a hell-raising band of bikers hot on her heels, Sadie has to act fast. She knows the threads are all connected, but how ? It's a shock to discover that everything is linked to her own family -- and a secret so dark it makes gossiping with ghost look like child's play.

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Sadie Novak, owner of Scene-2-Clean, a crime scene mopping company, recently took up to clean meth labs in addition to cleaning trauma scenes.
So this time in an adjoining shed near a meth lab she's been cleaning with employee Zack, they find a newborn boy next to a freshly slashed open goat and an evil spirit claiming to be the mother that gave her body and newborn willingly to a cult.
At another scene Sadie finds evidence of ritualistic happenings and also a well hidden huge amount of money.
Sadie gets the sense that the labs are connected to each other without knowing that her dive into her brothers past brings her much nearer into the cults reign then she's ever imagined.

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Devil May Ride is the second novel in about the Ghost Duster Sadie who because of the ability to speak to murder victims, gets deeply involved in solving the belonging case. Unlike The Remains Of The Dead, Devil May Ride couldn't keep up with the fun I enjoyed during the first novel.
I didn't find myself caring for the main plot but more interested in the story of Sadie's brother Brian who killed himself six years earlier.
In the end everything ran pretty much together but the end came fast and uneventful.

Rating:
Visit Wendy Roberts.

Paperback: 288 pages
Publisher: Signet (December 2, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0451225651
ISBN-13: 978-0451225658

Richard Montanari - The Skin Gods

2009-04-14T15:15:00.000-07:00

The streets of Philadelphia are blistering in the summer heat, the homicide rate is soaring and the nights belong to the mad. Detectives Kevin Byrne and Jessica Balzano are prowling the streets with a growing sense of unease. Where next will evil rear its ugly head ?

When a series of seemingly unrelated crimes shatter the silence of the city, their worst fears are confirmed. A beautiful secretary is slashed to death in a grimy motel shower. A street hustler is brutally murdered with a chainsaw. Piece by piece, a strange and sickening puzzle presents itself: someone is meticulously recreating Hollywood's most horrifying murder scenes, capturing them on film and inserting the clips into videos - for an unsuspecting public to find. While Kevin begins furtive investigations of his own, Jessica goes undercover to work the back alleys of Philadelphia, entering a violent world of underground film, pornography and seedy nightclubs, hidden to all but initiated. Discovering that none of The Actor's victims are as innocent as they appear, the two detectives arrive at a terrifying reality: they are not just chasing a homicide suspect. They are stalking evil itself.

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Since the case of The Rosary Girls as been successfully closed, Detective Kevin Byrne has mostly recovered from the shot to his head and a six week induced coma. The decision to return to the force or not is his but when he gets news that Julian Matisse has been released from jail after having done only 2 years in jail the decision is made for him. His partner Jessica Balzano welcomes her partner and they are both assigned to a breathtaking, unbelievable case:
Someone stages killing scenes from classic movies, cuts the fictional scene from a VHS tape and puts the new and real scene in its place. The tape is then left at rental stores, waiting for an unsuspecting customer to pick it up.

While Kevin tries to figure out the reasons for Matisse's early release, Jessica's investigation into The Actor's case brigs her to the shady world of pornography, drugs and nightclubs. And more tapes are being found by customers.

Time is short, not only for Jessica to solve the case but also for Kevin who parallel searches for clues about Matisse and the kidnapping of his new love Victoria.

The Skin Gods is difficult to compare to the previous novel The Rosary Girls. There is again a subplot which is worked by Byrne and his amazingly gut instincts but it didn't get me as much as in The Rosary Girls. The investigation as a team between Jessica and Kevin comes way too short with Kevin moving around mostly by his own.
The scheme of newly discovered suspects being killed by the actual killer has been used again and I couldn't find much new ideas in this novel.

Rating:

Hardcover: 416 pages
Publisher: William Heinemann (2006)
ISBN-10: 0434013943
ISBN-13: 978-0434013944

Charlaine Harris - Dead Until Dark

2009-04-09T07:17:00.001-07:00

Sookie Stackhouse is a small-time cocktail waitress in small town Louisiana. She's quiet, keeps to herself, and doesn't get much out. Not because she's pretty. She is. It's just that, well, Sookie has this sort of "disability". she can read minds. AHd that doesn't make her dateable. ad then along comes Bill.
he's tall, dark, handsome-- and Sookie can't hear a word he's thinking. He's exactly the type of guy she's been waiting for all her life...

But Bill has a disability of his own: He's a vampire with a bad reputation. He hangs out with a seriously creepy crowd, all suspected of - big surprise - murder. And when one of Sookie's coworkers is killed, she fears the next...

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2 years ago the vampire community had its coming out, acknowledging to the world it is true, they are there and "alive". Since then Sookie Stackhouse has been waiting for the first vampire to enter her place of work, the "Merlotte's" in Bon Temps, Louisiana. She recognizes him instantly only because of his gorgeous looks but also because he is so quiet in his head. Sookie has this ability that makes her life very difficult at times: She read peoples thoughts. When they slowly get to know each other they both have to learn the other persons live is as difficult as their own although Sookie fears Bill's live is one of blood and murder.
Their love is tested when two women in town are found strangled. They both were too vampire friendly and had them suck their blood in the past. Sookie's relationship to Bill doesn't stay unnoticed by the towns people and when her grandmother is killed in a gruesome way it becomes clear that this relationship doesn't seem to sit well with someone vampire or human.

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I got to read the first book of this series because I saw it on TV. I found it very frustrating how the TV series and book differ from each other and this fact alone took a lot of the fun away. Ultimately it was the series that made me want to read the book.
That aside, I think Dead until Dark is a fine read if you don't expect too much action but rather the difficulties between a mind reader and newly legalized vampire.

Good enough to pick up the second novel some time.

Rating:
Visit Charlaine Harris.

Mass Market Paperback: 292 pages
Publisher: Ace Books (May 1, 2001)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0441008534
ISBN-13: 978-0441008537

Scott Sigler - Contagious

2009-04-06T14:56:00.000-07:00

Across America. a mysterious pathogen transforms ordinary people into raging killers, psychopaths driven by a terrifying, alien agenda. The human race fights back, yet after every battle the disease responds, adapts, using sophisticated strategies and brilliant ruses to fool its pursuers. The only possible explanation: the epidemic is driven not by evolution but some malevolent intelligence.
Standing against this unimaginable threat is a small group, assembled under the strictest secrecy. Their best weapon is hulking former football star Perry Dawsey, left psychologically shattered by is own struggles with this terrible enemy, who possesses an unexplainable ability to locate the disease's hosts. Violent and unpredictable, Perry is both the nation's best hope and a terrifying liability.
Hardened CIA veteran Dew Phillips must somehow forge a connection with him if they're going to stand a chance against this maddeningly adaptable opponent. Alongside them is Margaret Montoya, a brilliant epidemiologist who fights for a cure even as she reels under the weight of endless horrors.
These three and their team have kept humanity in the game, but that's not good enough anymore, not even when the disease turns contagious, triggering a fast countdown to Armageddon. Meanwhile other enemies join the battle, and a new threat - one that comes from a most unexpected source - may ultimately prove the most dangerous of all.

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4 months have passed since the triangle virus was first detected. Since then the life of Margaret Montoya, who became the leading epidemiologist, has changed. She travels in a mobile, following the CIA agents Dew Phillips who desperately tries to keep Perry Dawsey from killing triangle host. Physically recovered from his injuries the former football star's infection and bravery to fight it by all means, has left him with the ability to track the living hosts and kill them. Out of control Perry Dawsey needs Dew to help him understand how important it is to capture a living host to study the virus and develop a cure and also to locate the gates the hosts brood is trying to build.
Meanwhile the vector, an orbital hoovering undetected in the air releases a second kind of seed that infects humans, turning them into something else, even worse: protectors.
Under them is little Chelsea, a small child who adapts to the virus in the most promising ways. Chelsea is powerful and her goal clear: protect the hosts so that their brood hatches and can build the gate undisturbed by humans. When the orbital fails it is up to Chelsea to keep blocking out Perry from receiving any information about their whereabouts.

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If asked if the book is good I'd say yes and no. I've had major troubles to get into the plot and it dragged quite a few times but when it peeked I was floored by the writers imagination.
I didn't like the role of the little angel like girl with gold locks thinking she'd communicate with God a bit too cliché-ish. If it was supposed to be frightening I pretty much failed for me. I couldn't imagine that girl being the pure infected evil it was supposed to be. Also very much cliché is Montoya's struggle to understand that sometimes people have to die for the greater good, especially when humanities survival is in the loop. It was very much annoying to me.
The ending unfortunately utterly predictable.

Last but not least the editor should be fired. It is one thing to oversee a spelling mistake, which certainly are quite a lot in the book, but missing whole letters is a bad thing for the readers eye.

Rating:
Visit Scott Sigler.

Hardcover: 448 pages
Publisher: Crown (December 30, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0307406318
ISBN-13: 978-0307406316

Petra Hammesfahr - Der Stille Herr Genardy

2009-03-31T13:33:00.000-07:00

The friendly, unobtrusive, older man lives in a small apartment above a pet shop. Apparently he's not the kind who could do harm to anyone.
But every now and then, mostly on weekends, he drives his car far above land and approaches little girls...
Suddenly a little girl is standing all by herself outside in the cold. She's starring into the window of the pet shop, day after day. The older man approaches the child, gradually gains its trust and invites it into his apartment... .

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Since Sigrid's husband died five years ago, she's been struggling to keep the house and home she and her daughter Nicole live in. Now she desperately seeks a new tenant for the other half of her house. The friendly, older man who likes to live in the apartment gives her the creeps but he's willing to pay more than the last tenant and even pays for using the garage. His name is Josef Genardy.

Sigrid doesn't know she's opened the door to her home to the Monster that killed her friends daughter. That the Monster has used and killed not only her friends child but another one, too. He's been abusing children his whole life and always got away with it because nobody ever suspected him.
But Sigrid is a very emotional woman that listens to her feelings and when her daughter's friend doesn't want to come to their house anymore, she suspects something is very very wrong, especially when she notices how eager Genardy is to touch children.

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Der stille Herr Genardy is a German book that hasn't been published in English. So far there is only one book that has been published in English by Petra Hammesfahr: The Sinner (ISBN 1904738257, pub. 02/08). I haven't read it yet.

The tale about Sigrid and her daughter is very much depressing. Especially because of Sigrid's lack of confidence to speak up to others and act accordingly to her feelings, regardless if wrong or right. She even didn't do anything when she knew there is definitely something wrong with her new tenant. When she knew he is a pedophile.
I was mighty annoyed by her handling the situation so badly regardless of her past and what she went through with her dead husband.

The author picks up a topic most people don't want to talk or hear about. She makes the reader see into Gernardy's distrubed mind, teaching the reader that the Monster often is a victim of his own abnormal drive which leads much further than the usual thriller goes. A path I reluctantly agreed to walk on and I'm glad I came out of it unharmed.

Rating:
Visit Petra Hammesfahr.

Paperback: 333 Seiten
Publisher: Lübbe; 1. Edition (June 13, 2006)
Labuage: German
ISBN-10: 3404155270
ISBN-13: 9783404155279

Curtis Sittenfeld - American Wife

2009-03-28T23:46:00.000-07:00

A kind, bookish only child born in the 1940s, Alice Lindgren has no idea that she will one day end up in the White House, married to the president.
In her small Wisconsin hometown she learns the virtues of politeness, but a tragic accident when she is seventeen shatters her identity and changes the trajectory of her life.
More than a decade later, when the charismatic son of a powerful Republican family sweeps her off her feet, she is surprised to find herself admitted into a world of privilege. And when her husband unexpectedly becomes governor and then president, she discovers that she is married to a man she both loves and fundamentally disagrees with - and that her private beliefs increasingly run against her public persona. As her husband's presidency enters its second term, Alice must confront contradictions years in the making and face questions nearly impossible to answer.

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American Wife is based on the life and decisions of Laura Bush, First Lady of the United States. If loosely based or not is to be discussed by persons that are interested in the Bushs' autobiography.
The book most definitely has its up and downs and surely at times gets downright boring.
Especially disappointing to me was that the life in the White House and the presidency fell way too short and were stuffed with unnecessary information.
The middle part of the book was the best one to me but I didn't find myself caring for the characters which has nothing to do with the whole world knowing the Bushs' but the missing personality in the characters.
What I found beautifully captured are Charlie Blackwell's (George W. Bush) missteps in language. :-)

The questions that I'm asking myself is, the book obviously is not a biography, it is fiction but feels like a biography. As for the fiction part there just isn't enough to go with except that the author is very in favor of the female character.

Rating:
Visit Curtis Sittenfeld.

Paperback: 592 pages
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks (February 10, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0812975405
ISBN-13: 978-0812975406

J. K. Rowling - Harry Potter and the prisoner of Azkaban (Year 3)

2009-03-24T07:31:00.000-07:00

For twelve long years, the dread fortress of Azkaban held an infamous prisoner named Sirius Black. Convicted of killing thirteen people with a single curse, he was said to be the heir apparent to the Dark Lord, Voldemort.
Now he has escaped, leaving only two clues as to where he might be headed> Harry Potter's defeat of You-Know-Who was Black's downfall as well. And the Azkaban guards heard Black muttering in his sleep, "He's it Hogwarts...he's at Hogwarts."
Harry Potter isn't safe, not even within the walls of his magical school, surrounded by his friends. Because on top of it all, there may well be a traitor in their midst.

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The news of Sirius Black having escaped from Azkaban fortress is a shock in the wizarding world. He is known of being the traitor and once best friend of James Potter, that led Lord Voldemort to the hidden Potters' and he is the murderer of 13 people with one single curse. The Ministry of Magic and the dementors, Azkabans terrible guards, are searching for him and because they know it is more than likely that Black will turn up at Hogwarts, the school becomes the most secured place on earth - so they thought.
Harry's new school year offers new subjects and and once again a new teacher in Defense against the Dark Arts: Professor Remus Lupin who soon becomes the most favorite teacher of all. Harry however has a lot more to worry about. For example there was this huge dog he saw when he fled the Dursleys' house and following this the reading his new teacher took from his tea cup, telling him about the Grim, a huge dog and the omen of death.

It is a challenging year at Hogwarts that not only tests Harry's capabilities as a wizard but also puts the friendship between Ron, Hermione and Harry to the test as well.

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This book offers a lot insight to the life, friends and enemies James Potter had at Hogwarts. It pretty much seems that this books is fundamental for the following books although I haven't read them yet nor did I see the movies. It explains a lot about Snape's disliking of Harry Potter as well.

Most certainly the reader will meet certain characters of this novel in the following books. I'll let you know - soon. ;-)

Rating:
Visit J. K. Rowling.

Paperback: 448 pages
Publisher: Scholastic Paperbacks (September 11, 2001)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0439136369
ISBN-13: 978-0439136365

Wendy Roberts - The Remains Of The Dead (Book1)

2009-03-20T20:10:00.000-07:00

A Ghost Dusters Mystery

Sadie Novak has got the kind of job that kills cocktail chatter dead: She owns Scene-2-Clean, a crime scene cleanup company. And if wiping up after murders weren't enough, she can also see and talk to the ghosts of the victims.

When a grieving relative hires Sadie and her employee, ex-cop Zack Bowman, to clean up after the murder-suicide of Trudy and Grant Toth, Sadie figures she's bound to encounter at least one chatty ghost. But instead she finds herself talking to Kent, a man she meets at the scene who is very much alive--so much so that Sadie agrees to go on a date with him.

When a ghost does appear--the oddly silent Trudy-- the spirit seems determined to prove her husband's innocence, and inspires Sadie to track down the real killer. But as Sadie scours the crime scene, she quickly realizes that she's in way over her head, that Kent has a strange connection to the dead couple, and that someone wants her to give up the ghost ... for good.

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Sadie Novak has a unique occupation that might seem to be disgusting for most people but for her is a salvation to do something good for those left behind. She mops up the blood and guts after a crime scene has been cleared from police. But her job goes far beyond mopping since she developed the ability to see and talk to certain ghosts who died innocently.
Her new assignment brings her and employee Zack to the house of Trudy and Grant Toth - and most certainly she excepts a ghost to show up. It is her goal to help those souls to move on and no longer hang on their earthly life.

But Trudy, the victim, is different. Obviously she was killed by her husband who later killed himself but when the strange, mute ghost tries to communicate with Sadie all she understands is that Trudy believes it wasn't her husband who killed her.
With that being understood Trudy moves on and leaves Sadie with doubts in the watertight evidence the police gathered. Did Trudy try to tell her that Kent, Grants best friend, killed her ?

Sadie begins to investigate on her own with a disastrous outcome, endangering the life of others and her own.

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The Remains Of The Dead is a very easy and cozy mystery that nonetheless is entertaining and suspenseful.
Sadie's blunt way of dealing with the ghost and telling them they have to understand that they are dead so that they can move on shows, that she accepts that she has a gift but clearly could life without it. She is good at heart, helping those that suffer through their grief by not making it more difficult as it is.
Her partner Zack fell a bit short. He's the ex-cop who keeps everything in perspective. He knows of Sadie's gift but doesn't want to have much to do with it in the beginning.

All in all I enjoyed reading this first installment of a paranormal mystery series and am eager to follow up with the second novel Devil May Ride. A third publication in this series is planned for end of 2009 with the title Dead And Kicking.

Rating:
Visit Wendy Roberts.

Paperback: 288 pages
Publisher: Signet (December 4, 2007)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0451222687
ISBN-13: 978-0451222688

Simon Beckett - Whispers Of The Dead

2009-03-18T19:26:00.000-07:00

Recuperating from a near-fatal attack, forensic anthropologist David Hunter has returned to the renowned research facility where he first trained - the Body Farm in Tennessee. Still bearing physical and emotional scars, he hopes the trip will hone his old skills and restore his shattered confidence.

So when his former mentor invites him to assist on a murder investigation, he agrees. After all, he's simply there as an observer - what could possibly go wrong?

But even Hunter is unprepared by the gruesome nature of the killing. The victim has been bound and tortured, and the body has decomposed beyond recognition - far more so than it should have. Fingerprints at the scene appear to identify the killer; however Hunter is convinced that nothing is quite as it seems.

Then a second body is found, and suddenly the team are plunged into a nightmare of deception and misdirection, in pursuit of a macabre serial killer whose forensic knowledge seems disturbingly familiar. As the death toll rises and Hunter finds he has enemies even within the investigation, he begins to fear that they might be on the trail of a maniac who simply cannot be stopped... (Description taken from author's webpage).

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Anthropologist David Hunter has come a long way since he was stabbed by Grace Strachan. With the scars that remind him from the outside, he deals with the aftermath of knowing a killer is on the loose who might or might not come back to him at any time. Separated from his girlfriend Jenny he searches for a sense in his life and if he still is any good in his job. He accepts the invitation by his old mentor Tom Lieberman, head of the unique, world famous Body Farm in Knoxville, Tennessee, to study on some dead bodies.

Tom tries to give David a way back into his old occupation and motivates him to help in a gruesome new case: a decaying body was found in a cabin, stabbed to a table, covered with maggots the scene offers a shocking picture. Despite the heat coming from a red glowing heater directly next to the dead body the maggots stages of development don't match the timeframe when the cabin was rented. The maggots seem to be much older than they should be and the only evidence leads to someone who died six month earlier.
When Tom suffers from a heart attack leaving him in intensive care, David wonders if the killer deliberately left conflicting evidence to mock the anthropologist and was planning to get to him from the beginning.
But with Tom in the hospital and the killer's plan failed, his narcissism might bring him to look for another appealing target.

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Whispers of the Dead or Leichenblaesse, the German edition I've read, is the third installment surrounding David Hunter, following The Chemistry of Death and Written in Bone
.
Getting to know the author it is easily expectable that his approach to forensic studies is easily bound into the plot making it very understandable. The gruesome plot, twists and sudden developments the book is a very exciting read, as long as you don't read the German edition. I could vent for hours about the boring translation that is as far from British and American colloquial language as possible. In the end I found myself translating into English and got the tension I was waiting for.

In this third novel David Hunter seems more approachable as in the previous novels and the reader gets a more detailed sense of his personality.
For myself I could have been better off to not read the included view of the killer that made me guess the killer's identity way too early.

Overall I feel sad for the German readers. They really should consider reading the book in English. What I have found on excerpts, the book reads itself way better in its original language.
You just can't compare the dry German explanation of a decaying body with the 'colorful' explanation in English. :-)

Overall, it's the best novel in the series and I'd recommend it to anyone interested in forensics, a gruesome plot and the strength to take in one dead body after the other.

Rating:
Visit Simon Beckett.

American Edition
Hardcover: 320 pages
Publisher: Delacorte Press (May 19, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0385340060
ISBN-13: 978-0385340069

German Edition
Gebundene Ausgabe: 416 Seiten
Verlag: WUNDERLICH VLG.; Auflage: 5 (16. Januar 2009)
Sprache: Deutsch
ISBN-10: 3805208669
ISBN-13: 978-3805208666

Michelle Gagnon - The Tunnels

2009-03-14T09:14:00.000-07:00

An old, abandoned tunnel system beneath a prestigious New England college becomes the gruesome stalking ground of a serial killer.

The crime scenes are both grim and otherworldly. The bodies of two female students are found mutilated and oddly positioned in the dark labyrinth beneath the school - haunting symbols painted on the walls above them.

In her decade tracking serial killers, FBI special agent Kelly Jones has witnessed terrible offenses against humanity. Yet the tragedy unfolding at her alma mater chills her to the bone. Evidence suggests that the connection between the victims --all daughters of powerful men. And elements of the killings point to a dark ancient ritual. As the body count rises, so do the stakes. The killer is taunting Kelly, daring her to follow him down a dangerous path from which only one can emerge.

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FBI Special Agent Kelly Jones is called to her old alma mater where a serial killer favors young girls coming from powerful families. Her bodies hung up in a tunnel, their chest is carved open and rips severed from the spine. Behind them he leaves a painting with the blood of his previous victim.

The surprising involvement of Jake Riley, a former FBI agent no head of security of one of the victims father, in her investigations doesn't help either but word is, that Riley has to be involved in whatever happens in the investigations.

When more girls and suspects die, Kelly receives an invitation to follow the killer into the tunnels alone. Pressured to at least rescue the latest kidnapped girl she begins her descent.

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I'm not impressed at all with this debut novel. In fact I'm happy to have finished it. The story is quite old and has been written a hundred times. Lacking new additions to the plot and main characters that just fell flat without much personality, this book feels like a timer filler that you pick up during commercials or while waiting in the doctor's office.
Don't get me wrong, the last third had a bit more excitement and the book got better but the ending came as expected: very unsuccessful and unimaginative.

Having the second novel of this series somewhere in my pile I'm tempted to give it away without even looking at it.

Rating:
Visit Michelle Gagnon.

Mass Market Paperback: 304 pages
Publisher: Mira (June 1, 2007)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 077832446X
ISBN-13: 978-0778324461

Linwood Barclay - No Time For Goodbye

2009-03-11T09:30:00.000-07:00

The house was deathly quiet. That was the first sign that something was terribly wrong. Fourteen-year-old Cynthia Bigge woke that morning to find herself alone. Her family - mother, father and brother - had vanished without a word, without a note, without a trace. Twenty five years later, Cynthia is still looking for answers. Now she is about to learn the devastating truth.

Cynthia and Terry Archer still live in Milford, Connecticut, not far from the old Bigge house on Hickory Street. With a solid marriage and a young daughter, the Archers seem on track for a successful future. But the questions raised by Cynthia's past still haunt her, and her obsession to find the answers threatens to destroy everything they've worked for. For Cynthia, there can be no closure until she finds out why her family disappeared - and how they could have left her behind.

Terry thinks the segment on the popular TV crime-stopper Deadline is a mistake. But his wife hopes that someone watching will have a lead to her missing family. Sure enough, it's Cynthia who spots the strange car cruising the neighborhood, hears untraceable phone calls, and discovers the ominous "gifts". And as Cynthia's nerves begin to unravel, no one's innocence is guaranteed, not even her own. By the time the first body is found, it's clear that her past is mre of a mystery than she ever imagined - or may ever survive.

Someone has returned to this Connecticut town to finish what was started twenty-five years ago. And by the time Terry and Cynthia discover the killer's shocking identity, it will be too late even for goodbye.

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Cynthia Bigge was 14-years-old when the morning after a terrible fight with her parents she woke up and her family was gone and never returned. With no evidence of a crime happened or not Cynthia is left to grow up at her aunt Tessa's house.

25 years later Cynthia's husband has his doubts in the TV show Cynthia decided to do. He is not sure it will really help Cynthia in her quest to find her family and believes it might just worsen the situation. And worsen it did.
It begins with cars Cynthia notices but hasn't she always had some car that looked suspicious to her ? A phone call she received but accidentally deleted from the phones history, the sudden appearance of her fathers old hat on the kitchen table when only she was the one who was in the house.
Terry begins to wonder if his wife might have lost it and probably suppressed the happenings from that night 25 years ago.

But when bodies turn up dead he knows for sure his wife didn't do anything of this.
Someone has come back to get to Cynthia, to finish what was forgotten 25 years ago.

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No Time for Goodbye kept me reading. Narrated by the very likeable character of Terry it twists and turns and leaves you guessing what really happened just to be surprised in the end because you just didn't think of it being so easy but then, maybe it isn't easy at all.
The reader will suspect people that might know something, or even might have been involved but you just get snippets and hunches you can't really place.
Attention grabbing until the end.

Rating:
Visit Linwood Barclay.

Hardcover: 352 pages
Publisher: Bantam (September 25, 2007)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 055380555X
ISBN-13: 978-0553805550

Kay Hooper - Blood Sins (Bood Trilogy, Bk. 2)

2009-03-09T08:51:00.000-07:00

Some sins can't be forgiven...because some sins no one survives.

Young, vulnerable, attractive Tessa Gray made the perfect victim. Which was why Noah Bishop of the FBI's Special Crimes Unit recruited her to play the rolw of grieving widow. As the supposed new owner of propert coveted by the Church of the Everlasting Sin, she'd be irresistible bait for the reclusive and charismatic Reverend samuel.
Hir fortified compound in the mountains near Grace, North Carolina, had been the last known residence of two women murdered in ways that defied scientific explanation.

Though hardly as naive or as vulnerable as she appears, Tessa knows she has a lot to learn about using her unique gift. She also knows that Bishop and the SCU have to be desperate to rely on an untried psychic agent in an undercover operation so dangerous. And desperate they are.
For the killer they're hunting is the most terrifyingthey've ever faced and shakes even the most seasoned agens: a soulless megalomanical cult leader who can use their own weapons, talents, and tactics against them.

By entering the cult’s well-guarded compound, Tessa will be exposing herself to the dark magnetism of a psychopath on an apocalyptic crusade of terror that spares no one, not even the youngest victims. And Samuel has protected himself within a fanatically loyal congregation, many of whom occupy surprising positions of power within the community. Even Grace'’s chief of police, Sawyer Cavenaugh --— a man Tessa will have to trust with her life--— may be unable to protect her. Because no one, not even Tessa herself, can guarantee she’s strong enough to resist temptation — or powerful enough to battle a killer who’'s less than human.

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Since the books decription is quite correct I don't even want to spoil anything of the plot to the reader.
Blood Sins is the continuation of Blood Dreams in which Tessa Gray was first discovered as being a psychic. I didn't read Blood Dreams but listened to the audiobook which made it harder for me to recollect the happenings in the first novel. Despite of the authors note on her webpage that the trilogy can be read singlewise I wouldn't recommend it. Especially not when unfamiliar with the characters.

For me the book didn't hold a lot of surprises because over time I've become familiar to Hooper's writing style and her book concept. This book is no exception. The end comes fast, spectacular but is quite short. I certainly missed the investigation part in this one.
However, considered that I literally flew through the books and finished it on one day does mean is wasn't boring at all. I liked it and will be glad to get all questions answered with the third book.

Rating:
Visit Kay Hooper.

Hardcover: 304 pages
Publisher: Bantam (December 16, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0553804855
ISBN-13: 978-0553804850
Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.3 x 1.3 inches

Richard Montanari - The Rosary Girls

2009-03-08T00:33:00.000-08:00

Veteran Philadelphia cop Kevin Byrne has been living on the edge for far too long. His marriage failing and his heart lost to mad fury, Byrne loves to take risks and break rules.
Now he and his rookie partner, Jessica Balzano, have just caught the case of a lifetime:
Someone is killing devout young women, bolting their hands together in prayer, and committing an abomination upon their bodies.
Byrne and Balzano spearhead the hunt for the serial killer, who in turn leads them on a methodically planned journey.
Suspects appear before them like bad dreams, and vanish just as quickly. Meanwhile, the calender approaches Easter, the day of the resurrection. The last rosary will be counted, and a madman's cruel judgment will be meted out unless someone stops his wicked, pitiless crusade.

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It is Jessica Balzano's first day at the Philadelphia homicide unit with her new partner Kevin Byrne. With no time to acclimated they catch their first case together:
A young girl is found dead in the basement of an abandoned house. Her neck is broken, her hands wrapped with a rosary and bolted together like in prayer. With a second victim found not 24 hours later it becomes clear the killer favors young teenage girls attending Catholic schools and takes them in broad daylight.

Jessica and Kevin need all their instincts to follow the upcoming leads bringing them to a psychiatrist working for the Catholic schools. But something doesn't seem to fit when their only suspect is found hanged in his house. With his death the secret of the girls connection to each other and a lead to the killer seems to be lost forever.

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Speaking of building characters Montanari introduces two cops that couldn't be a better match to each other. With Jessica being the wife struggling with her separated cop husband and Kevin the commited veteran cop a lot of their background flows through the book building a relationship to the reader.
This novel is so full of turns that it is difficult to keep up and as soon as you think you might have figured out who the killer is you're slapped square in the face.

Gruesome, dark and amazingly thrilling.

Following this first novel are three books in a series around Balzano and Byrne: The Skin Gods, Merciless and Badlands.

Rating:
Visit Richard Montanari.

Mass Market Paperback: 432 pages
Publisher: Ballantine Books (February 28, 2006)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0345470966
ISBN-13: 978-0345470966

Neil Gaiman - The Graveyard Book

2009-03-05T19:18:00.001-08:00

Nobody Owens, known to his friends as Bod, is a normal boy.
He would be completely normal if he didn't live in a sprawling graveyard, being raised and educated bu ghosts, with a solitary guardian who belongs to neither the world of the living nor of the dead.
There are dangers and adventures in the graveyard for a boy. An ancient Indigo Man beneath the hill, a gateway to a desert leading to an abandoned city of ghouls, the strange and terrible menace of the Sleer.

But if Bod leaves the graveyard, then he will come under attack from the man Jack, who has already killed Bod's family... .

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For me it was an impulse to buy this extraordinary book. Actually I walked through B&N children's books when I saw the interesting, shining cover. Of course I had read about the book sooner on different forums so I bought it and din't really read the books description. :-)

The man named Jack enters quietly the house, leaving the father, the mother and the daughter dead. With only the little toddler left he makes his way up to the top of the house to find the toddlers crib being empty.
The boy is awaken by a crash in the house. His curious manners make crawl, walking isn't an option at this young age, out of his room, down the stairsand through the open front door.
The man named Jack sniffs the air. He sniffs through the house, outside the door and follows the child's scent.

Mrs. and Mr. Owens look down onto the little toddler that half naked just crawled through the graveyards gates. The approaching man seems to be its father but then they hear a shout the man is going to kill the boy. Mrs. Owens speaks to the voice and fading shadow that begs them to protect the child and take it into their midst.
Mrs. and Mr. Owens agree and the child vanishes in the mist leaving the man Jack alone on the graveyard.
The Owens have been dead for hundreds of years and so have their graveyard friends. It is decided that the boy stays on the graveyard to be safe and raised like their own. With his guardian the solitary Silas, the boy grows and learns the secrets and dangers of the graveyard but getting older he seeks for more then the graveyard can offer bringing him to the danger of the outside world and eventually exposing him to the man who has never stopped searching for him.

-

I find the book utterly charming and entertaining.
The idea of having a child raised by ghosts learning the ghost of all ages and the graveyards history and accomplishing ghostly abilities is fascinating and lovely described by the writer.
The character Silas and his whole role in the book almost demand of more of him and his following adventures and maybe his former life. Same goes for the man Jack and what drove him to end the lives of Bod's family.

The first chapter though seems for me a bit too graphic for the recommended age range. Being not an expert on children books or not being a parent myself I'd still recommend parents to read over it first and then decide if their child's development is far enough to handle graphic scenes. The chapter might has well have been taken from a cozy mystery.

Otherwise the book is perfectly safe, including everything a child might like: A little creepy, lots of love and friendship between the ghosts and their community and how much love they put into the boys education. Lovely and enchanting.

Rating:
Visit Neil Gaiman.
Watch the trailer on You Tube.

Reading level: Ages 9-12
Hardcover: 320 pages
Publisher: HarperCollins (September 30, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0060530928
ISBN-13: 978-0060530921

Gayle Wilson - The Inquisitor

2009-03-03T20:20:00.000-08:00

The serial murderer dubbed the Inquisitor has already killed over a dozen women in various cities, and the authorities haven't a clue to his identity. He is organized, methodical and certain to kill again. And now he's set his sights on Birmingham psychologist Jenna Kincaid.

Convinced that the Inquisitor killed his only sister, ex-army Ranger Sean Murphy has been hunting for him with one thing in mind: revenge. If his instincts are right, Jenna Kincaid will lead him to his prey.

But Jenna has gotten to Sean in a way that no one has in a very long time. And now he's desperate to keep her safe - because the madman is taking a terrifying pleasure in the game unfolding. And if the killer wins, it's Jenna who will pay the ultimate price.

-

It happens once or twice a year that I pick up a book that I just can't finish. I quit reading after 158 dragging pages where literally almost nothing happened. It is a huge disappointment to me because the books I've read by Gayle Wilson were actually quite good.

Jenna Kincaid is psychologist in Birmingham. Shortly before Christmas she gives an interview to a TV reporter who asks her a non scripted question about recent killings in Birmingham. Not in the position to give an adequate profile Jenna gives back common knowledge but sound as if she would feel not only sad for the victims but the killer as well.

Sean Murphy is alarmed to see this interview on TV. Having followed the killers tracks for quite some time and his personal relationship to the killer of his sister made him restless and he wants revenge. With an appearance in Jenna's office he tries to set the fear into her mind because he knows she fits the killers pattern in appearance and just made herself his target that might be killed tomorrow, next week or next month.

-

What happened with this book ? 154 pages and all I got from it is what I've written above, a phone call Sean received and a gift box in Jenna's fridge. Coming from the romantic suspense genre I expected somewhat the suspense but got instead the unfolding, dragging and plain boring romance between the two main characters. Usually I do read romantic suspense when the suspense isn't overshadowed by the romance but this one ? Nah. It will take some time until I pick up another Wilson book.

Rating:
Visit Gayle Wilson.
Other books reviewed by Gayle Wilson: The Suicide Club (pub. 07/2007) Victim (pub. 02/2008).

Mass Market Paperback: 352 pages
Publisher: Mira (July 1, 2006)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 077832320X
ISBN-13: 978-0778323204

Kim Pfaffenroth - Dying to Live: Life Sentence

2009-03-01T07:23:00.000-08:00

At the end of the world a handful of survivors banded together in a museum-turned.compound surrounded by the living dead. The community established rituals and rites, to help them integrate into their new existence. In a battle against kingdom of savage prisoners, the survivors lost loved once, they lost innocence, but still they coped and grew. They even found a strange peace for the undead.

Twelve years later the community has reclaimed more of the city and has settled into a fairly secure life in their compound. Zoey is a girl coming of age in this undead world, learning new roles - new sacrifices. But even bigger surprises lie in wait, for some of the walking dead are beginning to remember who they are, whom they've lost, and, even worse, what they have done.

As the dead struggle to reclaim their lives, as the survivors combat an intruding force, the two groups accelerate toward a collision that could drastically alter both of their worlds.

-

12 years and the life as we know it has become a place in our heart, a valuable memory for the older ones, a memory of gore and rage for those who grew up in both and a confusing, questionable one for those who were born into this new world. Zoey was born the day after the world ended. She was raised in a museum whose borders in time have been grown due to the help of Milton their leader whose half-dead ability to lead the undead into fenced places to lock them away gave a piece of security for those desperate to survive.

Popcorn has grown up and began calling himself Will at one time. He's never forgotten what happened to him and the effects of what the prisoners did to him as a child and being a warrior at the age of 10 changed him. He prefers to be alone or out chatching zombie together with Milton.
He already noticed that some zombies are more gentle than others but when one particular male zombie shows more and more of a functioning brain his curiosity is huge. To learn that this exemplar understands what he says, can read and write impresses him. He bonds with the undead easier than with the living and after years enjoying more company of the undead than with his living companions he soon developes a friendship.

His name is Wade Truman. He doesn't remember what happened before he woke up on the pavement one day. He knows things, understands words and can read but sometimes the connection to what he reads seems to be missing. He doesn't understand the way those who speak are but he understands he's done terrible things to people and that must be the reason why he lives behind this fence.
But he feels lonely between those raging others of his who don't seem to care abut anything. He's glad he's got his friend Lucy who must have been a violin player a long time before all this started.
Befriending Will, the speaking one, is a nice change and being taken out of the fence for walks is such a pleasure for Lucy and him. Will seems to be so different from the other speakers.

The world outside of the fence is dangerous and soon Wade and Lucy have to learn that those who speak not only struggle against those they call zombies but also with themselves and those around them. Confusing as they are they even kill each other. Wade needs to make decisions beyond what he has done the last 12 years. A decision between saving the life of those that chased and put him away or just watching what happens.

-

Like the prequel Dying to Live: a novel of living amongst the undead" I had hard times to put this book down and time just flew by.
The sequel is on such a personal and deep level and very different from most zombie novels. Lacking the gore and survival tactics usually used in this genre, the novel makes a stride towards how the society formed into what I believe is the best possible solution but at the same time very idealized.
To know what is going on inside of a zombies brain, his slowly attempts to fathom what is going on an react to it, his caring and worrying are more than a lot of human survivors can offer.

Pfaffenroth might disappoint those who want to read the same story over and over again but he certainly gives the thinking reader some salty mind crackers. His philosophical angle, his turning of something old into something new is impeccable and leaves the reader satisfied.

Rating:
Visit Kim Pfaffenroth.

Paperback: 232 pages
Publisher: Permuted Press (October 15, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1934861111
ISBN-13: 978-1934861110

Kim Pfaffenroth - Dying To Live: A Novel of Life Among The Undead

2009-02-28T07:52:00.000-08:00

Jonah Caine, a lone survivor in a zombie-infested world, struggles to understand the apocalypse in which he lives. Unable to find a moral or sane reason for the horror that surrounds him, he is overwhelmed by violence and insignificance.

After wandering for months, Jonah's lonely existence dramatically changes when he discovers a group of survivors. Living in a museum-turned-compound, they are led jointly by Jack, an ever-practical and efficient military man, and Milton, a mysterious, quizzical prophet who holds a strange power over the dead. Both leaders share Jonah's anguish over the brutality of their world, as well as his hope for its beauty. Together with others, they build a community that reestablishes an island of order and humanity surrounded by relentless ghouls.

But this newfound peace is short-lived, as Jonah and his band of refugees clash with another group of survivors who remind them that the undead are not the only-nor the most grotesque-horrors they must face.

-

It has almost been a year since the Apocalypse stroke as flesh eating zombies.
Those who survived hide behind barricades, those who don't have a hiding place became killing machines, avoiding towns and the night. The incurious zombies rarely look up so a higher platform to sleep on almost seems like a piece of heaven for one night.
Jonah is one of those who came to find his family without success. Since then he adapted to survival on the street and learnt how to keep the zombies at bay.
Rescued from a dangerous situation Jonah is taken in by a larger group of survivors. Protected by a huge river and the museums gates they built up a small community with new but mostly humane rules. Their leader Milton is a "half-infected" who wasn't bitten by a zombie but by zombie rodents that were used for testing the disease.

With his bright character Milton dreams of rebuilding society within their gates where food and security can be taken for granted.

It is a long way the community has to go to archive the goal piece by piece. Jonah is an asset to the community as well as ex-military Jack, his girl-friend Sarah, ex dental-hygienist turned into doctor and Tanya as well as young "Popcorn" who don't feel fear but lots of rage.

In their quest to find more survivors Jonah, Tanya and Popcorn are taken hostage by ex-prisoners who survived in their prison by eating venison and rotten peaches. There is only one person who can rescue them out of this situation but does he value the safety of the community more than the lives of three community members ?

-

Dying to Live is a bit like the common zombie book with some nice add-ons. It is intellectual not only because the author used Dante and Shakespeare but also uses them in his dialogues between Jonah and Milton.
What I liked about Dying to Live is that is was approachable and humane. Pfaffenroth looks behind what happened and looks up to the future without resting on the common goal of building up a new society with empty phrases. He asks for the why more than once and he delivers.

I read the book in one day and picked up its continuation Dying to Live: Life Sentence up directly after closing the novel.

David Wellington was right to to say Dying to Live is a thinking man's zombie novel.

Rating:
Visit Kim Pfaffenroth.

Paperback: 216 pages
Publisher: Permuted Press (April 1, 2007)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 097897073X
ISBN-13: 978-0978970734

Alafair Burke - Judgment Calls (Samantha Kincaid Series, Book 1)

2009-02-27T09:56:00.000-08:00

A Judgment In Question
After three years on the job in Portland's Drug and Vice Division, Deputy District Attorney Samantha Kincaid gets what she wants: her first case with the Major Crimes team.
Kendra Martin, a 13-year-old runaway, has been found drugged, viciously assaulted, and left for dead in the Columbia River Gorge. Despite pressures to kick the case to assault, Samantha goes for attempted murder. Unfortunately the girl's story isn't jelling. Then again, neither is the alibi of the suspect she ID'd, a low-life who insists he's innocent. One thing is certain. Kendra knows the streets better than Vice- and Samantha's following her down every last one of them to crack the case.

A Life On The Line
But the road to the truth is more dangerous than Samantha dreamed, leading to an earlier death-penalty conviction, a teenage prostitution ring, and threats to Samantha's own life. When the possibility of a serial killer enters the fray, it sends Samantha's trail into a tailspin, and tests her judgment - in both her professional and personal life - to very death.

-

Samantha Kincaid has been working as a Deputy District Attorney for the last three years when she takes on a case that might make or break her. 13-year-old Kendra Martin is a heroin addict who prostitutes to support her addiction. She has been found sexually assaulted and left for dead. Despite the victim's circumstances she delivers a quite good witness statement and is able to identify one of the two culprits. The man she identified is Frank Derringer, who has been released on parole after sexually assaulting a young girl. His fingerprint is found on Kendra's purse, his car suspiciously has been overpainted and overhauled from the inside the day after Kendra's assault.
It seems to Samantha that she's got the case in the bag and Derringer might as well admit of what he did. Unfortunately during a fast trial the defense smashes each and every evidence Samantha has gathered and even opens up to compare Kendra's assault to a case a few years ago where the suspects have been trialed and sent onto death row.

With her personal romantic relationship to an in both cases involved detective Samantha is taken from the case but her mind doesn't rest. What is it that she didn't notice the first time around ? Something is nagging in the back of her brain and she has to figure it out fast before Frank Derringer and presumably his brother Derrick get away.

-

One thing is for sure, readers who read Burke's two novels of the Ellie Hatcher series (Dead Connection and Angel's Tips) almost won't recognize the same author in the first few chapters of this book. It gave me a hard time to focus on all the maneuverings around the case. However after the first initial "shock" I got into it. As always what Burke writes makes sense to the reader and she closes the book with no open questions.
Characters however felt surprisingly short which might as well be the result of the first person telling by Samantha herself. Being the first published book of hers I certainly cut her some slack and found the book quite good for a first publication.

Knowing Alafair Burke I'll sure read the following books in the Kincaid series. I'll trust they will be better than her debut novel.

Rating:
Visit Alafair Burke.

Mass Market Paperback: 368 pages
Publisher: St. Martin's Paperbacks (May 4, 2004)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0312997205
ISBN-13: 978-0312997205

J. K. Rowling - Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Year 2)

2009-02-24T07:42:00.000-08:00

Ever since Harry Potter had come home for the summer, the Dursleys' had been so mean and hideous that all Harry wanted was to get back at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. But just as he's packing his bags, Harry receives a warning from a strange, impish creature who says that if Harry returns to Hogwarts, disaster will strike.

And strike it does. For in Harry's second year at Hogwarts, fresh torments and horrors arise, including an outrageously stuck-up new professor and a spirit who haunts the girls' bathroom. But then the real trouble begins - someone is turning Hogwarts students to stone. Could it be Draco Malfoy, a more poisonous rival then ever ? Could it possibly be Hagrid, whose mysterious past is finally told ? Or could it be the one everyone at Hogwarts most suspects ... Harry Potter himself !

-

It is Harry Potter's 12th birthday and it is his summer vacation with his dreaded family, the Dursleys. Nothing has changed and they still despise everything that has to do with magic. So Harry finds himself locked in a room with bars in front of the only window and a small cat door for his small food deliveries. He wonders what the little house-elf Dobby meant by warning him to go back to Hogwarts school. What did he mean something terrible is about to happen ?
Upon his decision to return back to Hogwarts and freed by his friends the Weasley boys, Ron, Fred and George, all literally seems to go wrong: Ron and Harry can't enter the hidden gate to the train platform, Harry breaks his arm and other small bothersome things hapen.
The annoying new teacher in Defense against the Dark Arts doesn't seem to be that clever either. He's famous because he wrote a lot of books about his adventures but than everytime he uses his magic something seems to go wrong. He's seeking Harry's presence which bothers Harry even more.

When the school is shocked at the finding of the petrified Mrs. Norris, the housekeeper's cat, and a message announcing the Chamber of Secrets has been opened again, it leaves our three friends Hermione, Ron and Harry puzzled. Especially because at the same time Harry heard a voice no one else was able to hear.

When more students are found petrified, Harry rescues a student from a snake attack and learns he can speak Parseltongue, the students non "pureblood" students feel threatened by Harry because the legend says that the Chamber was built by Salazar Slytherin and his heir will be able to open the Chamber of Secrets and unleash the horror within. Slytherin was one of the rare wizards able to speak Parseltongue.

Harry and his friends are now pressured to find the Secret within the Chamber and do whatever they can to protect those that don't come of a pure wizard family.

-

What makes this book very charming is that it continues where the last novel left us: Harry heading of for summer vacation with the Dursleys. No surprise thing haven't changed in the Dursleys opinion about magic but quite shocking that they lock the poor boy away.
Surprisingly I found a lot messages in this book. They went from child abuse, to obnoxiousness and very bad racism, leaving young readers certainly with questions parents should not be shy to answer. The point of racism has such a bad taste it almost made me sick but as life is, people deal with this every day and so this might be a good time to introduce our children into what is right and what is wrong. The way the topic is introduced to the reader is very bold and straight forward which I found is very nice.

Overall I found the book fun to read and Harry grows on me. I'll continue to read the other books in time.

Read my review to Harry Potter and The Sorcerer's Stone (Book 1).

Rating:

Visit J. K. Rowling.

Hardcover: 352 pages
Publisher: Arthur A. Levine Books (November 1, 2003)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0439554896
ISBN-13: 978-0439554893

James Patterson / Michael Ledwidge - Run For Your Life

2009-02-22T09:16:00.000-08:00

A spree killer passes brutal judgment.
A calculating murderer who calls himself the Teacher is taking on New York City, slaughtering the powerful and the arrogant. Everyone is his potential student - from the loudmouthed girl on her cell phone to the city's snooty upper crust.
His message to them is clear: remember your manners or suffer the consequences ! For some, it seems that the rich are finally getting what they deserve. For New York's elite, it's a call to terror.

No chance for redemption.
There is only one man in the NYPD who can tackle such a high-profile case: Detective Michael Bennett. For anyone else, the pressure would be overwhelming, but Mike is ready to step up - taking care of his ten children has prepared him for the job. As the media frenzy escalates, all of Mike's children fall victim to a virulent flu bug - almost as challenging an assignment for Bennett as tracking down the killer.

One man struggles to save a city.
A secret pattern emerges in the Teacher's lessons, leaving detective Bennett just a few precious hours to save New York from the greatest disaster in its history.

-

New York City homicide detective Michael Bennett is assigned to a new case at the worst time. With his wife's death the responsibility to take her care of their 10 adopted children is huge enough and now they all fall ill with a terrible flu, vomiting all over their place. Now he is supposed to catch a killer who's pattern doesn't make sense and always strikes at high profile places.

He calls himself the Teacher and his pupils are those who flaunt things, wealth and beauty. The penalty for obnoxiousness is death and you'd better listen to him and don't forget your manners.

With the killer getting bolder and shooting a beautiful stewardess in broad daylight, leaving a hotel lounge full of witnesses the Teacher is identified and his wife and two daughters found dead in their home. Peeling layer after layer Bennett is finally able to uncover the killers pattern and does everything to protect the only next possible victim.

But Bennett hasn't done his investigations without forgetting his own manners which might just turn out to be a terrible mistake.

-

I actually really liked this book. For me it seems that co-writing with another writer makes Patterson's book more approachable for me than his other novels. Patterson readers know of Patterson own pattern of crazy psycho killers running through a town - therefore this book doesn't hold any surprises at all. But still the Ledwidge influence gave this book just a tad more than the old story usually offers.
Michael Bennett seems to be the average man struggling with his family issues and missing his wife. He's got personality as far as being a family father goes by mopping vomit off the floor and having some jelly on his sleeves. The cop side of him got a bit short. He actually isn't as striking as the books description does make him seem. The investigation part is just too short or better, it lacks the investigation at all. It seems more like the normal police procedure unravels the killer's identity and Michael's share is the big finale.

In the end I liked it and read through it fast. I wouldn't say I was vowed but actually enjoyed the family parts.

Rating:

Visit Michael Ledwidge.
Visit James Patterson.

Hardcover: 384 pages
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company (February 2, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0316018740
ISBN-13: 978-0316018746

S. J. Bolton - Sacrifice

2009-02-18T18:11:00.000-08:00

Tora Hamilton is an outsider at her new home on the rocky, wind-swept Shetland Islands, a hundred miles from northeastern tip of Scotland. Though her husband grew up here, it's the first time he's been back in twenty years.

Digging in the peat on their new property, Tora unearths a human body, at first glance a centuries-old bog body, interesting but not uncommon. But realizing that the body is in fact much newer, that the woman's heart has been cut out and that she was killed withing a few days of bearing a child, Tora, herself an obstetrician, becomes obsessed with finding out what happened to her -- even when police, her colleagues, and eventually her husband warn her against getting involved.
Reading town records and researching local lore, Tora discovers a disturbing link to ancient Shetland legend and uncovers a collection of deep, dark secrets - the kind of secrets worth killing for.

- I don't want to get too deep into the book itself because the books description already tells all the main plotlines minus a few very exciting ones.
For the reader who likes to not only read mysteries settled in the U. S. Sacrifice is an exciting and suspenseful must read with a lot of myths beautifully bound into the plot.
With its twist and turns the reader never quite figures who's the villain and how much people are really involved in the one dead body Tora discovers. It might be a whole hospital or just a few, the whole island or just a particular group of men and knowing women.
The plot is complex and can only be recommended.

S. j. Bolton will publish her second book available in the U. S. in May 2009 and. Its title is Awakening.

Rating:
Visit S. J. Bolton.

Hardcover: 384 pages
Publisher: St. Martin's Minotaur; 1st edition (May 27, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0312381131
ISBN-13: 978-0312381134

Scott Sigler - Infected

2009-02-15T14:53:00.000-08:00

Across America a mysterious disease is turning ordinary people into raving, paranoid murderers who inflict brutal horrors on strangers, themselves, and even their own families.

Working under the government's shroud of secrecy, CIA operative Dew Phillips crisscrosses the country trying in vain to capture a live victim. With only decomposing corpses for clues, CDC epidemiologist Margaret Montoya races to analyze the science behind these deadly contagion. She discovers that these killers all have one thing in common -- they have been contaminated by a bioengineered parasite, shaped by a complexity far beyond the limits of known science.

Meanwhile Perry Dawsey -- a hulking former football star now resigned to life as a cubicle-bound desk jockey -- awakens one morning to find several mysterious welts growing on his body. Soon Perry finds himself acting and thinking strangely, hearing voices ... he is infected.

The fate of the human race may well depend on the bloody war Perry must wage with his own body, because the parasites want something from him, something that goes beyond mere murder.

-

Who doesn't remember Sinatra's song I've got you under my skin (I've got you deep in the heart of me.So deep in my heart, that you're really a part of me).
Something similar feels Perry Dawson when he develops first a rash and later triangle shaped growths with eyes. It gets worse when he hears voices in his head and these voices begin to communicate with him, demanding and wanting to be fed. Struggling with the voices that become a part of him he tries his best to withstand their demands but he gets weaker with each passing hour.

Dew Philipps has sworn revenge to the person responsible for the death of his much younger partner. The person who killed his partner is dead but was infected with something the CIA and the leading epidemiologist Margaret Montoya don't know much about. They know the infected humans have turned into paranoid killing machines but their dead bodies always decompose faster as the remains can be gathered or processed for further examination. They need a live example to learn the secret about this disease if it is one and feel their wishes fulfilled when Perry sends an email to a website set up by the CIA to find more infected humans.

No one knows yet that the seeds fell from heaven, and invaded human bodies across America. That these humans have become hosts to something so finely engineered that the seeds slowly overwrite the human DNA and create something foreign to make the bodies their own incubator.

-

It took me a bit to get into the story and the writers style but I got largely excited how the story around Perry Dawson unfolded and how precise Scott Sigler described what happened to Perry and how he tried to get rid of the triangles on his body.
The reality of what happens in this novel is scary, the used science even more scarier.
I was able to put myself into Perry's character so easily, first for feeling sympathy when he began scratching himself (who hasn't had a rash in his life ?) and later acted to the voices demands in his head.

Sigler is a new author for me and I can't wait to read the continuation of Infected, named Contagious. Worthwhile when you enjoy science fiction and aren't afraid of developing a rash.

Also it needs to be mentioned that the title of certain chapters were just hilarious. :-)

Sigler offers his books as podcasts free on his website or you can also visit randomhouse and listen to the whole book online.

Rating:
Visit Scott Sigler.

Hardcover: 352 pages
Publisher: Crown (April 1, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0307406105
ISBN-13: 978-0307406101

Howard Dully and Charles Fleming - My Lobotomy, A Memoir

2009-02-11T16:25:00.000-08:00

At twelve, Howard Dully was guilty of the same crimes as other boys his age: he was moody and messy, rambunctious with his brothers, contrary just to prove a point and perpetually at odds with his parents. Yet somehow, this normal boy became one of the youngest people on whom Dr. Walter Freeman performed his barbaric transorbital -or ice pick- lobotomy.
Abandoned by is family withing a year of the surgery, Howard spent his teen years in mental institutions, his twenties in jail, and his thirties in a bottle. It wasn't until he was in his forties that Howard began to pull his life to together. But even as he began to live the "normal" life he had been denied, Howard struggled with on e question: Why ?

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In 1998 Howard Dully began the journey into his past to find the answer to what happened to him and would be life stigmatizing and changing forever. The secret kept hidden from him until he held the answer in a file named DULLY, HOWARD in his own hands.

Howard was born a normal child with a loving mother who died at an early age. His father, lacking general affection, remarried and Howard's life got even more complicated. The new mother didn't like him and didn't want him. She began picking on him, spanked him and told lies about him so that the father in the evening would spank him some more. He was singled out, had to eat alone and lived a life in fear of his stepmother.
He was 12 years old when the stepmother contacted Dr. Walter Freeman, the famous but controversial surgeon performing the lobotomy. After several talks with the stepmother (and Howard) the doctor concluded that Howard was a normal boy but performed the lobotomy anyway. The file contradicts that Howard suffered from schizophrenia.

But for his stepmother the gruesome surgery wasn't enough. She still said he was a violent child and she could not live under the same roof with him and his brothers. Howard had to go - and he did. From juvie hall to mental hospitals to an asylum for the insane - all the while being told by doctors that he is a normal boy but that there is no other place for him to go since home wasn't a possibility for him.

As a child living with truly insane people and troubled kids he stood true to himself but developed what was unavoidable: he became delinquent as soon as he was given to a halfway house. He lacked basic awareness for himself, had never learned to take care of himself and soon was given back to the asylum for the insane where he stayed a few years. At one point he couldn't be kept in the asylum any longer as being diagnosed as healthy.
He was released on his own, soon married and became a father, dreaming the dream of having a family but it didn't work out with him being drunk and drugged all the time. Things slowly changed when he met his second wife Barbara and a second child one the way when he decided he had to get his act together and become responsible.

-

I began reading the book with totally different expectations which is what happens when you decide to read a book without reading the inside flap of the cover. I only read what stood on the back of the book which mainly focused on the topic and title of the book: The Lobotomy.
So when I learned the book actually has one chapter concentrating on before and after the lobotomy I thought about the purpose of the book. I decided to put my expectations away and go with the story.
Howard's story is one of many and then some more. The whole story of how easily it was decided to perform the dangerous surgery and how easily people around Howard were manipulated by his stepmother is terrible and it is no wonder this boy became a handful. Despite of him more then once writing he doesn't remember that much. No child is able to develop normally in a surrounding like he did. No child is able to develop normally in surroundings he lived in later either. He practically grew up surrounded by really insane people, troubled kids and teenagers and he never experienced love since his birth mother died. One has to ask how he managed to not get into more trouble than he did. Alcohol abuse, drug abuse, bad checks, ... .

I felt outraged by what happened to a child and that there was no protection either by a "father", professionals or the government.

The last chapter in the book was powerful and even answered my questions as of why this book was written. As Dully states himself: Where were the authorities ? With Freeman not being a licensed psychiatrist allowing him to diagnose the boy schizophrenic and perform the surgery, the missing medical standard. The doctors that examined Howard, those who knew he was going to have a lobotomy despite their conclusion he was normal.
He talks about today's doctors who are allowed to diagnose depression or bipolar illness in children, prescribing powerful medications leaving the parents to decide if they want a to consult another doctor for a second opinion.

First and foremost he was a victim of unloving parents and authorities who didn't care to give a child and growing teenager the protection it deserved. He hid behind the lobotomy only recognizing later, that the lobotomy was the explanation to everything that went wrong in his life. That he hid behind it and had to stop being the victim. In the end he is lucky he survived the whole procedure. Many did not or were heavily brain damaged.

Rating:

More about Howard Dully's journey:
My Lobotomy - Howard Dully's journey (NPR radio program, upper left under the title)

Paperback: 304 pages
Publisher: Three Rivers Press; Reprint edition (August 26, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0307381277
ISBN-13: 978-0307381279